(edited by Ronah Lynda.2496)
Better a constant LS then a delayed EXP
Except that they’ve stated that LS is going to progress in HoT, which means if you want more LS, you’re going to be waiting for the expac in the first place. All we’d see in the meantime is them re-hashing old stuff.
Mind you, “replaying” old fights such as scarlet or mari, even without tied achievements available anymore, would still be something, as those were some god kitten awesome fights.
Without beating a dead horse too much in this thread…
If anet wants to go with the expansion pack every so often delivery method, I would hope that we will see an expansion every two years instead of every three.
The Living World stuff was okay….. but it was just not enough content often enough to keep players entertained.
Switching from the Living World model…. to the expansion model….. simply by damming up a bunch of Living World releases is not what anyone asked for.
Living world had its place….. to hold us over until an expansion arrived….. and Anet completely undermined its purpose by halting it completely to work on an expansion.
It entirely depends if HoT is campaign sized or eotn sized.
I dont know about you guys, but I’d rather have a Living story update once a month plus some features updates on the way then wait for an expansion for more then half of year.
The reason why we’ve had to wait for the expansion for so long was because (as I understand it) their original plan was the first model, and when that failed it took a while to change their tactics.
Agreed, but people have been asking for an expansion. Some even took out the pitchforks. So we are stuck with it now. Stack up on materials, do some exploring, pvp, whatever and enjoy the view while we wait.
The expansion has never been delayed as there hasnt been an official release date, ever….
Have to go with expansion over constant living story content. Here is why:
Expansions create buzz. That is a major promoter for this approach. Just look at WoW and how for every expansion (last time myself included) lots of former WoW players flock back to check out the new stuff. Granted most lose interest after 2-4 weeks and leave again (see WoW rentention numbers post WoD). This is actually a good thing for GW2 since the game is designed in a way that having people periodically come back and enjoy the game for a while is a good thing.
Living story does keep people interested longer, but only so much. I remember finishing most living story stuff 1-1.5 weeks after a new LS event was released and then being bored back with same-old same-old. Also new living story content is not big enough to attract new players in big amounts.
GW1 did it, and it worked. Hopefully GW2 will succeed in the same way. An expansion every 1-2 years will keep players coming back to check out the game and attract new players.
Not sure how this translates to content. I’m under the impression multiple LS patches create about the same amount of content as an expanion, though that might be untrue.
Many people wanted all content at once. That means you have to wait until everything is ready. It also means that there will not be content released before.
LW seasons could have prevented this longer gaps. Seasons can create the same buzz and a even greater promotion. You imagine the announcement on PAX south and replace “expansion HoT” with “LW season HoT”.
Many people wanted all content at once. That means you have to wait until everything is ready. It also means that there will not be content released before.
LW seasons could have prevented this longer gaps. Seasons can create the same buzz and a even greater promotion. You imagine the announcement on PAX south and replace “expansion HoT” with “LW season HoT”.
I disagree, small content does not create buzz. Having DLC like content released certainly does not, or do you read the big news left and right about some new DLC hitting game xyz on a regular basis?
Game expos happen 1nce a year and even if there are multiple, you are in direct competition with every other game there. Showing off your 2 week content will not even get a smile out of most people there.
Many people wanted all content at once. That means you have to wait until everything is ready. It also means that there will not be content released before.
LW seasons could have prevented this longer gaps. Seasons can create the same buzz and a even greater promotion. You imagine the announcement on PAX south and replace “expansion HoT” with “LW season HoT”.
I disagree, small content does not create buzz. Having DLC like content released certainly does not, or do you read the big news left and right about some new DLC hitting game xyz on a regular basis?
Game expos happen 1nce a year and even if there are multiple, you are in direct competition with every other game there. Showing off your 2 week content will not even get a smile out of most people there.
An LW season HoT would also deliver new maps, a new class, Mastery system, elite specialisations, Stronghold, the new borderlands etc. and they could have announced this on Pax south. In addition the first episodes could already run/have been released.
(edited by Belenwyn.8674)
Many people wanted all content at once. That means you have to wait until everything is ready. It also means that there will not be content released before.
LW seasons could have prevented this longer gaps. Seasons can create the same buzz and a even greater promotion. You imagine the announcement on PAX south and replace “expansion HoT” with “LW season HoT”.
I disagree, small content does not create buzz. Having DLC like content released certainly does not, or do you read the big news left and right about some new DLC hitting game xyz on a regular basis?
Game expos happen 1nce a year and even if there are multiple, you are in direct competition with every other game there. Showing off your 2 week content will not even get a smile out of most people there.
An LW season HoT would also deliver new maps, a new class, Mastery system, elite specialisations, Stronghold, the new borderlands etc. and they could have announced this on Pax south. In addition the first episodes could already run/have been released.
Changes on such a big scale are very hard to manage to be brought out in seperate segments. Just look at how good a job anet does with their weekly tuesday patches. Having more of such goodness is not in the best interest of the game.
As other people have said when they were doing the Living Story people kept on (and on, and on) demanding an expansion. Not in addition to the LS, instead of it. Some people even suggested “compromises” like Anet developing and saving up a year’s worth of releases to all come out together like an expansion would.
So we got (or will get) an expansion.
And now people are annoyed we don’t have the Living Story.
What they’ll do after that is anyone’s guess. Anet has always been very much in favour of experimentation instead of sticking to ‘the way it’s done’, but I suspect it will depend in large part on how well HoT is received vs. past Living Story releases. The one thing you can count on is someone, somewhere will think they’re doing it wrong.
Danielle Aurorel, Dear Dragon We Got Your Cookies [Nom], Desolation (EU).
“Life’s a journey, not a destination.”
“Life’s a journey, not a destination.”
The title of this thread is misleading. How can the expansion be delayed when a release date was never announced?
I also prefer living story to expansion if living story would include updates such as new maps, new professions and new skills.
www.AlchemyIncorporated.net
Sorrows Furnace
Sorrows Furnace
Living Story with updates every two weeks would have been amazing… if they didn’t delete the old content for all intents and purposes after that bi-weekly period was up. The way it was implemented means that it’s one and done and if it’s missed you’re simply not connected to the game as you could have been. We’ll see how it goes in the future.
I’m definitely in the LW camp, I never wanted an expansion and still don’t. Both for selfish reasons, the LW was free and you only had to spend money on the gem store if something cosmetic caught your eye, and also practical reasons, it gave me something to do for 3-4 days every 2-4 weeks that kept things fresh. And longer whenever they introduced a new map or the like. It also worked really well for all the causal gamers. Some of my gamer friends still haven’t finished Season 2 yet.
Also, we need to look at HoT. How much content is it really going to add?
New 9 elite specs, 1 new class, mastery system, ~5(?) new maps with 3 biomes each, new story, new cosmetic stuff (weapon and armor skins).
I’m not counting the new Borderland or Stronghold as HoT content because everyone who just has the core game will be able to play them too. And potentially they could launch before HoT, considering they are completely unrelated. Same goes with the defiant changes, break bars, condi caps, and other condi changes, and new trait system as nothing about them are HoT specific.
Now consider that we haven’t gotten any real new content since Jan, this exp is at the earliest coming out in late Aug (8.5 months after the last new stuff). Maybe later as there are only ~12 weeks until then and we still have: minimum 9 weeks with no skipping (like we did during the closed PvE beta) and the potential for ~15+ weeks of info.
6 elite specs left,
1-2 more weeks of base rev stuff (we still have 2 more legends at least and no mention of the other 2 traitlines we’re missing)
1-2 weeks Guild halls
1 Week of challenging group content
0-1 week showcasing more Masteries
0-3 weeks of more “Lore” stuff (exalted, any story stuff)
0-2 weeks of any mention of other maps or what another biome will actually look like
0-1 weeks showing off more of the new Borderland (zerg fight areas, good roaming spots, showing off the oasis event, etc)And below may or may not stop content flow that week
1-2 WvW betas
1-2 more closed PvE betas
1-3 open PvE betas
So back on point. Waiting for ~8-10 months with no content, then having to pay $20-40(?) for content that will take most people 1-2 months to finish is not something I wanted for gw2. With people just flocking back to the game every ~2 years when a new xpack rolls out. And even if I wanted to just wait for the new season of LW, you have to buy HoT to play it.
And the sad thing is, I will most likely buy HoT, as will many of the people that play on a daily basis. Partly because we are so content starved that we want something new and if we don’t buy it we won’t be getting anything new, and partly because we still want to play the game with our friends, etc. Everyone will have their reason for buying it, I just hope Anet doesn’t see the mass blind purchases and decide to keep down this road.
Interestingly enough your opinion is the exact opposite of what the forum warriors were screaming for up until now.
I won’t stop because I can’t stop.
It’s a medical condition, they say its terminal….
It’s a medical condition, they say its terminal….
Again, people need to stop viewing LS vs HoT though their own limited eyes ala “I want A instead of B cause I have an imediate benefit from it”.
MMOs live and die through 2 things:
- the ability to attract new players
- the ability to retain players be it permanent or periodically
GW2 entire business model is dependant on people buying gems. More players = more gems sold = more money for anet = the ability for more content. Period.
The Living Story model was an interesting Idea, but I think it failed in the department of attracting many new players, especially causal ones. It probably helped keep people longer around, but that is no benefit without a subscription fee.
Perfect example:
Both for selfish reasons, the LW was free and you only had to spend money on the gem store if something cosmetic caught your eye, and also practical reasons, it gave me something to do for 3-4 days every 2-4 weeks that kept things fresh.
Yes, that’s great for your wallet, and terrible for anet and the longevity of the game. Anet is in it to make money, or at least break even. Won’t work with people not spending money on the game.
I’m not counting the new Borderland or Stronghold as HoT content because everyone who just has the core game will be able to play them too. And potentially they could launch before HoT, considering they are completely unrelated. Same goes with the defiant changes, break bars, condi caps, and other condi changes, and new trait system as nothing about them are HoT specific.
Developing content costs money. Doesn’t matter if anet decides to provide said content for free or not. You can’t arbitrarily decide to omit content only because they don’t expansion gate it from you.
Going to repeat what I said earlier. Expansions create attention and encourage people to try the game after missing the vanilla launch. That is the main benefit of the expansion model (and the ability to charge money for something which otherwise might have been free with LS. Which in turn means more money can be spent on the game. Always remember to view things from the developer point of view too, not only consumer).
Living Story will resume after HoT release, though I’m sure not right away…they already stated that the LS would continue, but not until after HoT.
I love the concept of the LS. Great idea.
The storytelling involved and the general implementation all but killed my interest. Truly detestable. If Anet cannot write and implement decent gameplay and story on the LS short schedule then I am gld that they are switching to an expansion even if I originally preferred the LS concept.
Living Story with updates every two weeks would have been amazing… if they didn’t delete the old content for all intents and purposes after that bi-weekly period was up. The way it was implemented means that it’s one and done and if it’s missed you’re simply not connected to the game as you could have been. We’ll see how it goes in the future.
Except they’d already changed it long before HoT was announced. Season 2 is permanent and even accessible to people who didn’t own the game when it came out (for a price), and it was designed to be more re-playable than Season 1 to go along with that. (For example achievements that actually require some skill and multiple attempts instead of simply completing instances and killing X enemies.)
But people still complained that they didn’t like it and wanted an expansion instead.
Danielle Aurorel, Dear Dragon We Got Your Cookies [Nom], Desolation (EU).
“Life’s a journey, not a destination.”
“Life’s a journey, not a destination.”
I’ll be honest, I haven’t missed the Living Story and the minuscule updates that came with it at all. I mean, sure, it was nice every few weeks or so getting something new to do for a half hour, but honestly I’ve barely noticed it was gone.
I do find it funny that during LS Season 1 and 2 people were complaining that they would rather have all the content at once in an expansion type patch instead of this steady trickle of content. Now we’re told we are getting an expansion and people are saying they want the steady trickle back.
I do think that Anet should provide some filler content to tide us over until HoT gets released though. At least give us the seasonal festivals or SAB or another WvW tourney.
I much preferred LS Season One, and it’s design and release cadence. I wasn’t fond of Season 2, at all. I never asked for an expansion, nor for ‘permanent’ content.
I can’t comment on HoT, as it’s not been released yet, but I hope it provides enough to do until the next expansion, if that is the release model we will have in the future.
I much preferred LS Season One, and it’s design and release cadence. I wasn’t fond of Season 2, at all. I never asked for an expansion, nor for ‘permanent’ content.
I can’t comment on HoT, as it’s not been released yet, but I hope it provides enough to do until the next expansion, if that is the release model we will have in the future.
Yes I agree with this. Non permanent is a draw for me, a sort of I was there type thing. A mix of non permanent with a permanent dungeon/instance whatever would have been perfect I think.
The things they tried I think needed more time to mature, they hopped around too much. But with a population with the attention span of a gnat what could they do?
Will need to wait and see.
I much preferred LS Season One, and it’s design and release cadence. I wasn’t fond of Season 2, at all. I never asked for an expansion, nor for ‘permanent’ content.
I can’t comment on HoT, as it’s not been released yet, but I hope it provides enough to do until the next expansion, if that is the release model we will have in the future.
I don’t believe the expansion will give us enough to do until the expansion after it, but I do believe the expansion after it will come sooner and I believe content will be released between expansions to keep us going.
This first expansion is a bit different because it took longer to start, and because it redesigns so many of the game’s basic systems, which weren’t originally sufficiently to build upon. Anet learned and applied some lessons and moving forward, they won’t have to redesign these systems again, nor should they be experimenting with something like Season 1.
Interestingly enough your opinion is the exact opposite of what the forum warriors were screaming for up until now.
That could be due to the fact that those that were happy were playing, and those that were not were complaining and demanding an Xpac. It seems we have a juxtaposition going on now, but the former kept players happy and the latter will drive a few (bored) players away.
Even the inclusion of a rehashed festival as this point would tide over many of the complainers. This extended dry spell is causing many players in my guild to just not bother logging in; myself included.
Well, to be honest, the Living Story was part of what drove me away from the game back when I mostly played this casually. When I was only logging on a few times a week, I felt like I had an obligation to do LS activities and only LS activities because otherwise I was missing out. And if I ever stopped playing for a while to focus on other games, I’d come back feeling alienated from the story and full of disappointment for having missed things forever.
The reason I stopped playing WoW was because I felt like if I wasn’t on it every day then I was wasting money. I originally got into GW2 for the buy to play model, but ended up going on hiatus for similar reasons. Had the LS been an expansion, however, I probably wouldn’t have felt the same pressure and would have probably bought it.
I’d like to make it clear that GW2 is my mainstay now I’d love to see the LS again (were it viable). I’m not sure if my experience with season one was typical of casual players. I just thought I’d share how I felt as a casual player, and why an expansion would probably have lead me to invest more time and money in the game.
I’d agree with the OP if the LS releases actually delivered the ‘expansion like content’ they were supposed to.
But in practice, they only put in some short, linear story instances with little replayability, a couple grindy openworld zerg maps, a scarce offering of group instances (some of which flopped and were swept under the rug and forgotten), and absolutely nothing for WvW/PvP players.
They were burning out their staff and neglecting several game modes with LS. My guess is that the expansion is supposed to “catch up” for the last 2-3 years, and then they’ll restart the LS cycle — and hopefully learn from the mistakes of seasons 1 and 2.
The issue was the lack of diverse new content, not just the release pattern.
I much preferred LS Season One, and it’s design and release cadence. I wasn’t fond of Season 2, at all. I never asked for an expansion, nor for ‘permanent’ content.
I can’t comment on HoT, as it’s not been released yet, but I hope it provides enough to do until the next expansion, if that is the release model we will have in the future.
I don’t believe the expansion will give us enough to do until the expansion after it, but I do believe the expansion after it will come sooner and I believe content will be released between expansions to keep us going.
This first expansion is a bit different because it took longer to start, and because it redesigns so many of the game’s basic systems, which weren’t originally sufficiently to build upon. Anet learned and applied some lessons and moving forward, they won’t have to redesign these systems again, nor should they be experimenting with something like Season 1.
Fwiw, there was also the China release, which seems to have siphoned a great deal of the non-LS (and late in the process, even the LS) resources to prep the game to be then converted by the partner company. That diversion of resources should not be needed again — unless management gets some strange and unlikely ideas, like porting the game to consoles.