Guild Wars 2

I have added several ANET employees and have found it quite disappointing at their achievement point counts. Not that its the only way to measure time spent in the game , but its a kittene to avoid if your doing dailies, monthlies, or just trying a bit of everything. I have found that some have yet to even earn the first AP chest (500). After the game being out 2 years I would have hoped by now that they would have at least 2k. Playing your game is key to making it right. Playing on a test server isn’t getting you the entire experience and isn’t interacting with the community.

I would love to hear everyone’s (ANET/community) thoughts on the subject!

They probably have their own personal account. It wouldn’t surprise me if a lot of them don’t want to spend more time on the game after putting in 40+ hours a week into it as well.

Perhaps, they play more on their other accounts. No one can really tell anything by APs. It would be sad to see the dungeon-run party acceptance being applied elsewhere.

Fernling.1729:

They probably have their own personal account. It wouldn’t surprise me if a lot of them don’t want to spend more time on the game after putting in 40+ hours a week into it as well.

The personal account bit is probably true.

Not spending more time is not good. You want devs who love the game, not just treat it as a paycheck. And playing is very different from working on the game.

These are people who are essentially forced to be casual players, when you think about it. They are working full-time jobs doing game development and some of them have families too.

It would be a wonder if some of them have made a lot of progress. And perhaps a bit disconcerting, considering how little time that would mean they’re spending on activities not related to GW2.

sirian.4981:

Fernling.1729:

They probably have their own personal account. It wouldn’t surprise me if a lot of them don’t want to spend more time on the game after putting in 40+ hours a week into it as well.

The personal account bit is probably true.

Not spending more time is not good. You want devs who love the game, not just treat it as a paycheck. And playing is very different from working on the game.

Some employees not caring about the game itself is more than fine. No need for the network guys to have an interest in the game, there job is done the same either way. Of course there’s a ton more that don’t really matter.

I’d like to think they do, but I don’t think they play much. There have been too many “glaring things” done or not done to say otherwise.

Don’t assume that if you are a dev that you have a say in what gets done when. A lot of those decisions are above your pay grade and it’s up to you to implement them as best as you can.

Their are a bunch of devs. No doubt some play more than others. But what you guys are forgetting is that they play on another account as well. Just because they don’t play on “this map” doesn’t mean they’re not playing.

So if they play on their test server and then play a bit on this map…how much do you really expect of these guys.

What they probably don’t do is play one type of content for zillions of hours. The probably don’t pug dungeons for days on end. Why would they?

Is it reasonable to expect them to? I don’t think so.

Essence Snow.3194:

I’d like to think they do, but I don’t think they play much. There have been too many “glaring things” done or not done to say otherwise.

I doubt there are very many, out of the 350+ employees, that make the design or implementation decisions. It really doesn’t matter if ‘Fred’ over in bookkeeping plays or doesn’t play. Same with ‘Sue’ in localization, or ‘Mary’ over in support.

There was a dev post that said Anet allots time for them to play the game. And he said not inluding that time, hes lucky if he gets in 20 hours a week with family and other personal obligations. Ill try to find the post. But, yes they do play the game. Saw a dev the other night in WvW running along with our zerg. People just about had a heart attack.

Edit: heres that post I was referring to

After thinking about this I feel like many of you think that every dev should have complete understanding of every aspect of this game. And my gut reaction is to say that it is unreasonable to expect that from us, after all Guild Wars 2 is a huge game, and even now I am still discovering new things in it. And whether or not it is reasonable to expect that, it is not that I don’t have complete understanding due to a lack of trying. I mean sure I only spend about 20 hours a week on my own time playing Guild Wars 2, this does not include the time that ArenaNet sets aside for all of their employees to play the game, and sometimes it can be hard to get through jumping puzzles, fractals, WvW, activities, sPvP, dungeons, tPvP, living story, Hot-Joins, crafting, guild missions, ect with only a finite amount of time each week to play. I could probably cut more time out of playing other games, enjoying my hobbies, working to improve my programming ability, trying to maintain friendships and spending time with family to play more Guild Wars, but right now that isn’t something I am willing to do. So instead I’m just going to understand that some players are going to see problems that I don’t. And ask them for as much information I can so that the problem can be identified and fixed. And I appreciate that our players understand this as well and are willing to bring these problems up in a polite and respectful manner.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/pvp/please-remove-rank-from-spectator-mode/first

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Essence Snow.3194:

I’d like to think they do, but I don’t think they play much. There have been too many “glaring things” done or not done to say otherwise.

I doubt there are very many, out of the 350+ employees, that make the design or implementation decisions. It really doesn’t matter if ‘Fred’ over in bookkeeping plays or doesn’t play. Same with ‘Sue’ in localization, or ‘Mary’ over in support.

And some of the obvious bugs or broken whatever that make it past all of them unregarded? I mean we are not talking about once in a blue moon.

Well, that is a developer tag character.

Maybe the Anet employee have non developer tag character…. you’ll never know.

Essence Snow.3194:

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Essence Snow.3194:

I’d like to think they do, but I don’t think they play much. There have been too many “glaring things” done or not done to say otherwise.

I doubt there are very many, out of the 350+ employees, that make the design or implementation decisions. It really doesn’t matter if ‘Fred’ over in bookkeeping plays or doesn’t play. Same with ‘Sue’ in localization, or ‘Mary’ over in support.

And some of the obvious bugs or broken whatever that make it past all of them unregarded?

What has ‘Fred’ in bookkeeping to do with that? It’s unreasonable to think he would be able to ‘fix’ a bug. That would lay more at the feet of the QA people, and I would guess they play the game several hours a day. Then, send the information to the Devs that ‘fix’ said bugs. They just don’t get APs for it, I’m guessing.

Besides, knowing the forums, if Devs had high AP scores, players would probably attribute it, not to playing, but ‘cheating’ somehow.

I would imagine it wouldn’t matter if they were QA or not. If they saw an issue it would be prudent of them to notify someone

There isnt much in the game to spend time on….

As others have said, I’m pretty certain that most of the devs have their own personal accounts for playing the game. I, for one, wouldn’t want to be bothered by non-stop PMs and mails when I just want to do AC or map or run around in WvW.

Sounds like much about nothing.

To be in the top 90% of Guild Wars 2 you only need about 3500 achievement points.

If only 10% of the entire playerbase has 3500 achievement points or more why would we expect to see many ANet employees with more than that?

Also their Job is to develop and play test the game, when they’re playing the game for leisure why would they grind AP?

Much about nothing if you ask me

Essence Snow.3194:

I would imagine it wouldn’t matter if they were QA or not. If they saw an issue it would be prudent of them to notify someone

Who says that they haven’t done so ? Knowing abut an issue does not mean that it is instantly fixed.

And really, who says that they need to ? I mean after all everyone of those issues may have been reported a thousand times before an Anet employee ever sees it during their play time.

Here you go!

Devs playing the game: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/wuv/wuv/Adopt-a-Dev-for-the-WvW-Fall-Tournament

I dont care if they play or not and nether should you.

Hell, I’ve long believed that no one at Anet plays their own MMO very much, if at all. Or if they (rarely) do, they most likely play Thieves. I don’t think anyone who runs other MMOs play their own game much, if any, either.

i could care less what they do with their spare time, as long as they are doing their jobs proficiently.. i remember people got all bent out of shape when a developer stated they didn’t thoroughly test a large encounter on one of the patches.. i don’t expect the contractor to test every bolt and board that goes into a house.. more on subject, there’s an ideal that every programmer develops their game and then stays at the office all night playing it.. in any case i really don’t think arena net plays their game the same way their customers expected to and only this year have i seen ‘common sense’ changes being taken toward the issue.

A dozen people from ANet isn’t representative of the company, any more than 500 players would be representative of the overall player base. I’d be more concerned if you had 50-100 ANet employees listed and first compared them to a similar fraction of non-ANet players who also have 50+ hr/week jobs. (Making suitable allowance for how many hrs of company time those employees use to play on the live system.)

As a Chef for a Japanese restaurant. I will spend upwards of 50 to 60 hours a week in my kitchen.

on those rare occasions when i get to go out with my family, or my friends. or just by myself.

you can bet the LAST place i am going is for Sushi.

I have several “Devs” in my guild.
they are Very real people, and Enjoy the game as much as we do.

Why would they play it when they hardly even devellop it anymore.

Once in a while i see dev’s on WvW, all i can say is never noticed a dev with a guardian not being a bag (livestream dev with guardian).

I am a musician and a songwriter and I rarely listen to my own music…

I am also making games with RPGmaker from time to time, and I more or less never play trough any of my finnished games, I let my friends do that and have them report to me what has to be fixed and improved. I don’t think my music or games would be better if I listened and played them more, I think I would get more bored of it and do something else.

They probably use their work accounts for all the public stuff. Those may get wiped regularly or even not gain AP at all.

a physician does not need to be ill to do his job.

What the devs do in there free time is really none of our business. For them to have AP equivalent to some people here, they’d have to live and breath the game all day and all evening. As a developer myself, the last thing I want to do when I get home is use the thing I’ve been working on all day. If it is a game, I might play with it a bit but I’d rather not spend every evening in front of a screen as I’ve already been sat in front of one for 8 or more hours. Frankly, technology gets dull when it is your profession and you start yearning to get away from the screen.

I’m amazed some people are still convinced they don’t play at all. They do, it’s been noticed . . . they have “public” accounts which are known to be Devs, and private ones where “shhhh, I’m not on duty”.