Guild Wars 2

…and the most reoccurring element has been concern/pessimism for the future of the game. I know similar things happen for every MMO in varying degrees, but I noticed it seemingly everywhere I looked; regardless of the website over the course of the last few week(s). I know Anet does not talk about content updates much before hand, but from what I am seeing a large number of people need something to give them hope. A hope that what could potentially be their favorite game is not slowly dying away. I am not posting this to start anything; I have just recently returned for HoT myself, and am curious as to whether the community is really that lacking/in a bad way. I noticed a definite drop in the server populations (from full to high, and high to low, etc.). I just want to know if something occurred to warrant it, or if I am just not aware of changes that have been made that would cause at least the appearance of such a population shift. I am hoping for a number of positive changes/additions that spell a bright future in Tyria as we move into this new year.

Server population now is based on WvW activity. With the HoT update, a lot of people stopped playing WvW for various reasons. They may or may not be playing in PvE or PvP.

There have been good additions, but for every good one there is 5 bad that shouldn’t have happened unless the developers have amnesia. The overall direction is highly questionable.

yeah you can definitely sense player frustration. the problem is that the game feels like an rpg that you love but have played too many times. so people move on or find something new for awhile (im playing ff14).

the forum complaints are real ones and anet dev team needs to really deliver in big ways (new legendaries/pvp balance just wont cut it). but the pessimism comes into play because they really haven’t delivered a winner in a long time.

anet silence is seriously troubling-i don’t think anyone believes that they are silent because they have big things in the works. but rather that they are silent because they are having trouble fixing hot issues.

we can also gather from this silence that hot hasn’t been well received by players. if hot had been wildly popular could you imagine the devs not doing interviews or just bragging about it (not in a bad way but it’s just human nature-when you produce a well received product you want to talk about it).

the stone cold silence of anet since hot release is admission that they released a flawed and troubled product and are quite stuck at the moment…needless to say players at least sense this.

bear.3894:

…and the most reoccurring element has been concern/pessimism for the future of the game. I know similar things happen for every MMO in varying degrees, but I noticed it seemingly everywhere I looked; regardless of the website over the course of the last few week(s). I know Anet does not talk about content updates much before hand, but from what I am seeing a large number of people need something to give them hope. A hope that what could potentially be their favorite game is not slowly dying away. I am not posting this to start anything; I have just recently returned for HoT myself, and am curious as to whether the community is really that lacking/in a bad way. I noticed a definite drop in the server populations (from full to high, and high to low, etc.). I just want to know if something occurred to warrant it, or if I am just not aware of changes that have been made that would cause at least the appearance of such a population shift. I am hoping for a number of positive changes/additions that spell a bright future in Tyria as we move into this new year.

Server population drop is from pretty much everyone quitting WvW because of the terrible changes to WvW in HoT.

The problem is that ANET sunk a lot of cash into the HoT project and it failed to meet the expected financial returns. (I am not going to go into the why and how in this thread).

They are not going to be making any major investments any time soon in the game. Its a simple matter of cash-flow. they need to recoup their investment in HoT before anything else is invested.

^ can’t wrap my head around just what exactly costed so much, given HoT is not exactly the biggest xpac to hit the market in gaming industry…

Prime Greek.1092:

The problem is that ANET sunk a lot of cash into the HoT project and it failed to meet the expected financial returns. (I am not going to go into the why and how in this thread).

They are not going to be making any major investments any time soon in the game. Its a simple matter of cash-flow. they need to recoup their investment in HoT before anything else is invested.

Gw2 to be good needs 2 expansions that failed drastically so devs can open their eyes and start thinking about players and not themselves and their meaning of “fun”.

The new WvW is just terrible so no surprise that people aren’t playing it. The HoT expansion was very small, 4 zones that are only populated at all on a timed meta and that’s if you can get into a decent zone. Most times you are dumped into a dead, pointless map so unless you are luck enough to get a taxi then there is no point being in the HoT maps, it also feels as if there is only VB and AB that were competed,the other two are half finished maps with nothing worth doing in them and terrible zone navigation, especially TD.

All ANet seem to focus on is adding MORE types of currency and RNG into the game, something the players have repeatedly said no to.

And then you have 10,000gate. WTF were they thinking, turning GW2 into one of the worst Korean grinder MMOs out there.

Hardly surprising that there is so much discontent, ANet have really lost their way and it shows in the game, they don’t dare to respond to ANY of the threads that players create about this.

There is a small group of posters who have been consistently trashing the game on these forums for a long time. They’re very loud. They’re very consistent. They have an agenda. There is a bit of a bandwagon effect: people who are mildly discontent(in reasonable ways) with one aspect or another will tend to chime in on these hyperbolic threads and they snowball. The same thing is happening on a larger scale with the forums as a whole.

When you notice someone posting over-the-top negativity, take a look through their post history. Most people who complain are not one of these, of course, but you’ll start seeing them and recognizing their names.

Just in this thread, for instance:

Prime Greek.1092:

GW2 is a failure…. Now we have a game that will become Obsolete by New Years.

^From THREE years ago.

-

Selkirk.4218

it’s entirely possible anet purposefully put in a multiplier (something that gave better chances on table) for new accounts.

lol

Selkirk.4218:

anet looks like a company completely out of touch with their playerbase.

Selkirk.4218:

it is shocking… paying 50 dollars for an expansion perspective it feels like a ripoff…

Selkirk.4218:

hot feels like a kickstarter gone bad… anet has managed to strangle the genuine enthusiasm of thousands of fans.

Selkirk.4218:

the maps have such a negative burn factor that the very idea of visiting them is barf inducing.

-

Ragnarox.9601:

Been in mmorgp games for 15 years and this is far worst expansion ever created in whole mmo history.

Ragnarox.9601:

this expansion is not worth 45€ atm (feel bad for those that spent 100€)…. Very unhappy customer.

Ragnarox.9601:

You know this what you offer is a death sentence in this already pretty dead game?

Ragnarox.9601:

You already lost million+ players in 1 month… just sayin…

lol

Ragnarox.9601:

Heart of Thorns:
- If you want elite spec = grind
- If you want masteries = grind
- If you want to do story = grind
- If you want heropoints you need 20 ppl to kill champion
- Did I mention grind?

So where’s the fun gone? Doing things 100 times in a row is not fun.

Take everything you read here with a mountain of salt. Play the game and enjoy it to whatever extent you do. Don’t get pulled into the hatefest here, these things take on a life of their own independent of the game itself.

while i think it’s fair to say i haven’t been happy with the game…i think the bigger worry is the people who don’t post their unhappiness. i walked away from gw2 and there are plenty more who don’t come to forums to express their displeasure..they just go away.

not every negative post has value but the white knights surely add less than nothing to a serious discussion of the game’s future. the ’everything’s rosy’ , ‘hot is a 10/10’, ‘colin rocks’ crowd are the ones in an echo chamber. but who knows i might be wrong and hot truly is ‘the best mmo expansion every made’ …:D.

could the white knights(errr ‘hardcore’ pve crew ;D ) with their incessant sycophantic ramblings actually be the ones with an agenda?

Selkirk.4218:

while i think it’s fair to say i haven’t been happy with the game…i think the bigger worry is the people who don’t post their unhappiness. i walked away from gw2 and there are plenty more who don’t come to forums to express their displeasure..they just go away.

not every negative post has value but the white knights surely add less than nothing to a serious discussion of the game’s future. the ’everything’s rosy’ , ‘hot is a 10/10’, ‘colin rocks’ crowd are the ones in an echo chamber. but who knows i might be wrong and hot truly is ‘the best mmo expansion every made’ …:D.

Very much this. And it isn’t hard to notice that they have struggled to keep a strong player base relative to the number of people that bought the game when it launched.

The entire MMO market is in decline, however, and GW2 in many respects seems to be a case of excessive ambition leading to perpetually disappointing execution. They are also very inept at managing resources in general and several aspects of the game, including in no small part market communication, game balance, and the microtransaction business model. When you release 3 new armor models as part of a fifty-dollar expansion then shove new outfits into the gem store every week after that, you’re going to hack off a lot of players, many of whom will simply stop playing and stop spending money on the game rather than coming to the forum and complaining.

Selkirk.4218:

could the white knights(errr ‘hardcore’ pve crew ;D ) with their incessant sycophantic ramblings actually be the ones with an agenda?

This false dichotomy illustrates the problem well.

There is a gigantic space between incessant sycophantic ramblings and unreasonable hyberbolic negativity. This space is where conversations and even rational arguments happen.

What I’ve noticed lately is there are people who insist on ad hominem attacks by labeling everyone who disagrees with them as a “white knight”. For one thing, these personal attacks have nothing to do with the legitimacy of their arguments. It’s the same as if I was going around and just posting that those complaining about the games are just “whiners”. It would be a personal attack which has no bearing on their complaint.

Ragnarox.9601:

Prime Greek.1092:

The problem is that ANET sunk a lot of cash into the HoT project and it failed to meet the expected financial returns. (I am not going to go into the why and how in this thread).

They are not going to be making any major investments any time soon in the game. Its a simple matter of cash-flow. they need to recoup their investment in HoT before anything else is invested.

Gw2 to be good needs 2 expansions that failed drastically so devs can open their eyes and start thinking about players and not themselves and their meaning of “fun”.

I always love the arguments of “fun”. Please. Tell me what’s “fun”. Lets hope what’s “fun” for you is “fun” for everyone else too.

You have to admit though, ANet never address the things that upset players. (cough 10,000). And this just fuels more discontent and a desire to post more outrageous and negative comments in an attempt to get anything acknowledged, or at very least to prevent them putting more bad design in (grind). Sadly it doesn’t seem to work as they just put in more grind, more RNG and more crap to fill your inventory up.

Ayrilana.1396:

posting that those complaining about the games are just “whiners”. It would be a personal attack which has no bearing on their complaint.

which is done with some degree of frequency (even if not by you).

Ayrilana.1396:

What I’ve noticed lately is there are people who insist on ad hominem attacks by labeling everyone who disagrees with them as a “white knight”. For one thing, these personal attacks have nothing to do with the legitimacy of their arguments. It’s the same as if I was going around and just posting that those complaining about the games are just “whiners”. It would be a personal attack which has no bearing on their complaint.

because as with “grind”, people don’t know what a “white knight” is anymore due to it being overused in the wrong situations. So its just thrown out there as an insult now to anyone who agrees with anet on anything, no matter how small

Sandpit.3467:

You have to admit though, ANet never address the things that upset players. (cough 10,000).

But see, that’s just not true. I see a lot of people asking for better communication from ANet, absolutely. In my opinion, they could do a much better PR job. But “never addresses the things that upset players” is just demonstrably, categorically, not a matter of opinion, false. This is hyperbole.

Sandpit.3467:

And this just fuels more discontent and a desire to post more outrageous and negative comments in an attempt to get anything acknowledged, or at very least to prevent them putting more bad design in (grind).

There is no real justification for posting outrageous negative comments. There are reasons that people do it- but it isn’t justified. There’s a difference. There’s a reason my five year old cousin throws a tantrum when I take away his candy. And maybe I’m even wrong for taking it away! Maybe ANet has done things are are totally wrong, demonstrably, not a matter of opinion, utterly, wrong. But see, this isn’t the point. The outrageous negativity is so far out of proportion to the transgression. This is the issue!

It’s like if someone were to, say, not hold a door open for me when my hands were full. That’s inconvenient, and I’d be a bit miffed. Maybe, if I knew them, I’d say “Hey, don’t be a kitten, hold that door for me brah!” And even if, then, they were all like “I’m not holding kitten for you noob lol,” I’d just kind of shrug and be like “Whatever?” and go about my day.

It would be an unreasonable over reaction for me to slash their tires, kill their entire family, or develop a method for traversing alternate realities in order to eliminate their existence from the entire metaverse in a cyclone of bloody violence EVEN IF THEY WERE IN THE WRONG. That’s over the top, hyberbolic, completely destructive, harmful behavior. It doesn’t matter that the person should have held the door for me. I’m still being a jerk by murdering them. This is an example of my reaction being completely disproportionate to the transgression.

Please forgive my use of analogy. Too much coffee.

well of course people that find fault with anet are childish and prone to temper tantrums….

sarasvatri.6871:

Sandpit.3467:

You have to admit though, ANet never address the things that upset players. (cough 10,000).

But see, that’s just not true. I see a lot of people asking for better communication from ANet, absolutely. In my opinion, they could do a much better PR job. But “never addresses the things that upset players” is just demonstrably, categorically, not a matter of opinion, false. This is hyperbole.

Sandpit.3467:

And this just fuels more discontent and a desire to post more outrageous and negative comments in an attempt to get anything acknowledged, or at very least to prevent them putting more bad design in (grind).

There is no real justification for posting outrageous negative comments. There are reasons that people do it- but it isn’t justified. There’s a difference. There’s a reason my five year old cousin throws a tantrum when I take away his candy. And maybe I’m even wrong for taking it away! Maybe ANet has done things are are totally wrong, demonstrably, not a matter of opinion, utterly, wrong. But see, this isn’t the point. The outrageous negativity is so far out of proportion to the transgression. This is the issue!

It’s like if someone were to, say, not hold a door open for me when my hands were full. That’s inconvenient, and I’d be a bit miffed. Maybe, if I knew them, I’d say “Hey, don’t be a kitten, hold that door for me brah!” And even if, then, they were all like “I’m not holding kitten for you noob lol,” I’d just kind of shrug and be like “Whatever?” and go about my day.

It would be an unreasonable over reaction for me to slash their tires, kill their entire family, or develop a method for traversing alternate realities in order to eliminate their existence from the entire metaverse in a cyclone of bloody violence EVEN IF THEY WERE IN THE WRONG. That’s over the top, hyberbolic, completely destructive, harmful behavior. It doesn’t matter that the person should have held the door for me. I’m still being a jerk by murdering them. This is an example of my reaction being completely disproportionate to the transgression.

Please forgive my use of analogy. Too much coffee.

But are forum posts, essentially just talk (even if hyperbolic), disproportionate to the transgressions? That is a matter of opinion.

Your analogy is pretty far removed from what happens here.

Einlanzer.1627:

Selkirk.4218:

while i think it’s fair to say i haven’t been happy with the game…i think the bigger worry is the people who don’t post their unhappiness. i walked away from gw2 and there are plenty more who don’t come to forums to express their displeasure..they just go away.

not every negative post has value but the white knights surely add less than nothing to a serious discussion of the game’s future. the ’everything’s rosy’ , ‘hot is a 10/10’, ‘colin rocks’ crowd are the ones in an echo chamber. but who knows i might be wrong and hot truly is ‘the best mmo expansion every made’ …:D.

Very much this. And it isn’t hard to notice that they have struggled to keep a strong player base relative to the number of people that bought the game when it launched.

The entire MMO market is in decline, however, and GW2 in many respects seems to be a case of excessive ambition leading to perpetually disappointing execution. They are also very inept at managing resources in general and several aspects of the game, including in no small part market communication, game balance, and the microtransaction business model. When you release 3 new armor models as part of a fifty-dollar expansion then shove new outfits into the gem store every week after that, you’re going to hack off a lot of players, many of whom will simply stop playing and stop spending money on the game rather than coming to the forum and complaining.

I agree with this, back when southsun come out. It was a disaster. I walked away from the game for a few months. Now some people who dislike HoT may comeback, then again, they may not. For me HoT was not as big of a disaster as southsun, but that doesn’t mean I like HoT, far from it. Once I manage to do a TD meta, the only time I will set foot in HoT maps will be to play through the story and grab the 5-6 HC’s needed to finish the elite specs.

Ashen.2907:

sarasvatri.6871:

Sandpit.3467:

You have to admit though, ANet never address the things that upset players. (cough 10,000).

But see, that’s just not true. I see a lot of people asking for better communication from ANet, absolutely. In my opinion, they could do a much better PR job. But “never addresses the things that upset players” is just demonstrably, categorically, not a matter of opinion, false. This is hyperbole.

Sandpit.3467:

And this just fuels more discontent and a desire to post more outrageous and negative comments in an attempt to get anything acknowledged, or at very least to prevent them putting more bad design in (grind).

There is no real justification for posting outrageous negative comments. There are reasons that people do it- but it isn’t justified. There’s a difference. There’s a reason my five year old cousin throws a tantrum when I take away his candy. And maybe I’m even wrong for taking it away! Maybe ANet has done things are are totally wrong, demonstrably, not a matter of opinion, utterly, wrong. But see, this isn’t the point. The outrageous negativity is so far out of proportion to the transgression. This is the issue!

It’s like if someone were to, say, not hold a door open for me when my hands were full. That’s inconvenient, and I’d be a bit miffed. Maybe, if I knew them, I’d say “Hey, don’t be a kitten, hold that door for me brah!” And even if, then, they were all like “I’m not holding kitten for you noob lol,” I’d just kind of shrug and be like “Whatever?” and go about my day.

It would be an unreasonable over reaction for me to slash their tires, kill their entire family, or develop a method for traversing alternate realities in order to eliminate their existence from the entire metaverse in a cyclone of bloody violence EVEN IF THEY WERE IN THE WRONG. That’s over the top, hyberbolic, completely destructive, harmful behavior. It doesn’t matter that the person should have held the door for me. I’m still being a jerk by murdering them. This is an example of my reaction being completely disproportionate to the transgression.

Please forgive my use of analogy. Too much coffee.

But are forum posts, essentially just talk (even if hyperbolic), disproportionate to the transgressions? That is a matter of opinion.

I think there’s a pretty clear line where “just talk” becomes disproportionate to the transgressions, yeah, and that it’s only a matter of opinion in the philosophical rabbit hole sense.

Ashen.2907:

Your analogy is pretty far removed from what happens here.

Man, I pre-apologized for that, gimme a break. Principle stands though I think.

anet hasn’t had any wins in so long that it isnt just a matter of walking away and coming back to something good at some point. the road ahead is a short narrow one filled with tolls. anet thinks small and cheap and delivers ‘content’ that mirrors this vision.

i actually disagree with most on the forums when they cry poverty as the reason anet doesn’t develop anything-i think they are doing pretty well and anet, if asked, would tell you just that. this answer is more troubling than the poverty answer however. if they are flush with cash and aren’t producing content now….

the hardcore crowd is ‘happy’ for the moment (or at least they pretend to be)-they even got a ‘hardcore’ festival…10000 drinks. but this won’t last as the ‘hardcore’ are the ones that burn out the fastest.

the ‘negative’ comments are almost something of a historical footnote. hey you remember gw2? yeah used to be a good game..what happened?

the hot pollyannas needn’t worry about the negative comments. the devs do not read these forums and do not post in them. instead they prefer the sweet words of the redditors…‘This is an example of an expansion done right’, ‘Lots of new content, thrilling story’…‘A brilliantly meaty expansion’…ad nauseam.

sarasvatri.6871:

Ashen.2907:

sarasvatri.6871:

Sandpit.3467:

You have to admit though, ANet never address the things that upset players. (cough 10,000).

But see, that’s just not true. I see a lot of people asking for better communication from ANet, absolutely. In my opinion, they could do a much better PR job. But “never addresses the things that upset players” is just demonstrably, categorically, not a matter of opinion, false. This is hyperbole.

Sandpit.3467:

And this just fuels more discontent and a desire to post more outrageous and negative comments in an attempt to get anything acknowledged, or at very least to prevent them putting more bad design in (grind).

There is no real justification for posting outrageous negative comments. There are reasons that people do it- but it isn’t justified. There’s a difference. There’s a reason my five year old cousin throws a tantrum when I take away his candy. And maybe I’m even wrong for taking it away! Maybe ANet has done things are are totally wrong, demonstrably, not a matter of opinion, utterly, wrong. But see, this isn’t the point. The outrageous negativity is so far out of proportion to the transgression. This is the issue!

It’s like if someone were to, say, not hold a door open for me when my hands were full. That’s inconvenient, and I’d be a bit miffed. Maybe, if I knew them, I’d say “Hey, don’t be a kitten, hold that door for me brah!” And even if, then, they were all like “I’m not holding kitten for you noob lol,” I’d just kind of shrug and be like “Whatever?” and go about my day.

It would be an unreasonable over reaction for me to slash their tires, kill their entire family, or develop a method for traversing alternate realities in order to eliminate their existence from the entire metaverse in a cyclone of bloody violence EVEN IF THEY WERE IN THE WRONG. That’s over the top, hyberbolic, completely destructive, harmful behavior. It doesn’t matter that the person should have held the door for me. I’m still being a jerk by murdering them. This is an example of my reaction being completely disproportionate to the transgression.

Please forgive my use of analogy. Too much coffee.

But are forum posts, essentially just talk (even if hyperbolic), disproportionate to the transgressions? That is a matter of opinion.

I think there’s a pretty clear line where “just talk” becomes disproportionate to the transgressions, yeah, and that it’s only a matter of opinion in the philosophical rabbit hole sense.

Ashen.2907:

Your analogy is pretty far removed from what happens here.

Man, I pre-apologized for that, gimme a break. Principle stands though I think.

And yet I think that some of the transgressions go far beyond almost any type of forum post (with the exception of actual threats of violence). Accepting money for an advertised product and then purposefully and knowingly depriving the purchaser of said product is a bit worse than saying mean things about a company in my opinion.

The forums have been filled with pessimism and negativity since day 1. The last few weeks are nothing new.

Prime Greek.1092:

The problem is that ANET sunk a lot of cash into the HoT project and it failed to meet the expected financial returns. (I am not going to go into the why and how in this thread).

They are not going to be making any major investments any time soon in the game. Its a simple matter of cash-flow. they need to recoup their investment in HoT before anything else is invested.

Oh, but, please do go into why and how, please. I am so very intrested to know how exactly some random gamer have such a great private information into Anet financial reports and returns, such great insight on how much they invested into HoT and how much they returned of their investments from the product sales. You also seem to have a “great” knowledge about their future plans, considering the game. How? From where?

Honestly I am always buffled, when I see posts like this. This is nothing, but your personal presumtions, stated as solid facts, which is completely redicilous.

The last few weeks have been far worse due to the horrendous balance issues with the game in sPvP and how that filters through to PvE. Warriors and Thieves have been kicked down the crapper, metacrap has been all the rage and not even having a pro-team QUIT ON STREAM is enough to get Anet to push out more MEANINGFUL BALANCE CHANGES.

I’m happy to see all the negativity, because it’s reflective of my own feelings on the PvP situation.

The bottom line is the expansion did not hold the attention of the masses for long nor did it reinvent the wheel. Honestly, I don’t know what people were expecting given the time frame and lack of class testing. I’m not even going to get into that PvP and WvW nightmare.

The sooner Living World returns, the better. Chasing the next carrot achievements is what this game is all about.

Let’s not kid ourselves.

Honestly I’m having a blast in WvW. How many WvWers walked away in the first week and never came back because they hated the new borderland maps or heard from the vocal posters here that WvW is broken/sucks when it really isn’t. It’s just different now.

This isn’t just here – it’s happening elsewhere, as well.

I don’t know whether the problem is coming from the top, in games lately?

Or whether (probably more likely) it is the new crop of games devs, who are determined to take games in a very specific type of direction (mainly backwards!) and forget the majority of the players’ wants/needs?

But, yes, it seems to be an industry trend.

It’s a mistake, but there you go.

Sarevok.2638:

The last few weeks have been far worse due to the horrendous balance issues with the game in sPvP and how that filters through to PvE. Warriors and Thieves have been kicked down the crapper, metacrap has been all the rage and not even having a pro-team QUIT ON STREAM is enough to get Anet to push out more MEANINGFUL BALANCE CHANGES.

I’m happy to see all the negativity, because it’s reflective of my own feelings on the PvP situation.

They were both very OP, in WvW.

Thieves weren’t considered to be good, in zergs, but they were the kings of ganking.

I don’t do sPVP, so I can’t comment on that, but I’m assuming they were probably OP there, too?

It’s possible they have been over-adjusted the other way, or that they just got used to being Gods.

That often happened in WoW.

Something very OP got nerfed slightly and its players, who were generally the type of players who only ever played OP classes, weren’t used to ever losing.

So, if they started losing, they extrapolated from that, that they must have been over-nerfed.

Even though, in many cases, they were still stronger than some other classes had ever been…

Not saying that is the case here, but it is something that happens.

Either way, both classes were extremely OP, previously, so it’s kind of hard to be too upset for them, now.

Especially as they were, almost certainly, totally scaring off newer players.

Especially newer players who were playing less strong classes.

When I first started playing, on Ranger, thieves were one (or, at most, two) shotting me from stealth and trying to fight warriors was a total non-starter.

If I knew a thief was lurking around (as they ALWAYS were, then, as they were so OP), I just didn’t try to go anywhere, anymore.

That, pretty obviously, isn’t good for the game.

Of course, things should be made fair, if they really aren’t ATM, but still.

I’m all for meaningful balance changes, but those take time and just making those two classes stronger again, would obviously just return us to the previous (totally undesirable) situation.

You must also remember that people who post negatively actually care and want to see the game improve. Those that don’t care just leave. I know which customer I would prefer and it’s not the ones that just leave. If I keep ignoring the feedback and everyone leaves then that one is on me.

Ayrilana.1396:

What I’ve noticed lately is there are people who insist on ad hominem attacks by labeling everyone who disagrees with them as a “white knight”. For one thing, these personal attacks have nothing to do with the legitimacy of their arguments. It’s the same as if I was going around and just posting that those complaining about the games are just “whiners”. It would be a personal attack which has no bearing on their complaint.

See and I don’t mind being called a white knight. I’m happy to fight for what I believe in. Yeah, believe in.

Because those who often comment on how easy something is to fix, or how lazy devs are for not fixing X Y or Z, or how little work when into X Y or Z have no clue about how much work it takes or how hard devs work or even what devs were trying to accomplish whether it’s accomplished or not.

I leave most constructive feedback threads alone. But yeah I’m happy to be a guy who stands up to people who I feel are using hyperbole, which doesn’t help anyone, or making false claims, or even stating their opinion as if it’s some kind of fact.

Being a white knight, on the whole, isn’t really such a bad thing.

Ardenwolfe.8590:

The bottom line is the expansion did not hold the attention of the masses for long nor did it reinvent the wheel. Honestly, I don’t know what people were expecting given the time frame and lack of class testing. I’m not even going to get into that PvP and WvW nightmare.

The sooner Living World returns, the better. Chasing the next carrot achievements is what this game is all about.

Let’s not kid ourselves.

I’m not so sure the Living World didn’t hold people’s attentions as long as the industry average. I have people in my guild who played the new WoW expansion for a month and came back. A month or two seems to be what you get from expansions in most games.

Edit: And I should point out, there are people still enjoying the expansion to this day.

Selkirk.4218:

while i think it’s fair to say i haven’t been happy with the game…i think the bigger worry is the people who don’t post their unhappiness. i walked away from gw2 and there are plenty more who don’t come to forums to express their displeasure..they just go away.

not every negative post has value but the white knights surely add less than nothing to a serious discussion of the game’s future. the ’everything’s rosy’ , ‘hot is a 10/10’, ‘colin rocks’ crowd are the ones in an echo chamber. but who knows i might be wrong and hot truly is ‘the best mmo expansion every made’ …:D.

could the white knights(errr ‘hardcore’ pve crew ;D ) with their incessant sycophantic ramblings actually be the ones with an agenda?

Just as there is constructive criticism and brainless bashing, I think the same can be said about white-knighting; just because one is defending what they like about the game, it doesn’t make their points automatically invalid.

The major issue I have seen since the game launched is the persistent negativity a small portion of the players show. Some argue that fighting this mob or completing that event to progress is “grind”. I played games like Everquest years ago and I know what real grinding is. Sitting in Dulock dual boxing with guildies to get XP and gold for hours so I could get that next level so I could begin my epic. The closest thing GW2 has to this is working on a legendary, but that is even easier than EQ.

I am a very casual player, usually playing 2-3 hours a day if not less. I still love the game and I am looking forward to what comes next.

Prime Greek.1092:

The problem is that ANET sunk a lot of cash into the HoT project and it failed to meet the expected financial returns. (I am not going to go into the why and how in this thread).

They are not going to be making any major investments any time soon in the game. Its a simple matter of cash-flow. they need to recoup their investment in HoT before anything else is invested.

Anet over-valuing it’s content and ideas yet again. They think they presented a shiny bright diamond the size of an egg into every players lap. But a lot of players have picked up the bright diamond only to discover their hands are now covered in excrement.

Prime Greek.1092:

The problem is that ANET sunk a lot of cash into the HoT project and it failed to meet the expected financial returns. (I am not going to go into the why and how in this thread).

They are not going to be making any major investments any time soon in the game. Its a simple matter of cash-flow. they need to recoup their investment in HoT before anything else is invested.

Source?

Used to play WvWv every night, now I only played it once since hot. Not really liking it.
that said I am not in HOT either. I really dislike hot with the forced group game play.

Even worst is how Anet lied to us saying small guilds will not be over looked. we have a 3-4 person guild that played every night since early GW1 and can not see a way to get the arena for our hall. *sigh

Angelica Dream.7103:

Used to play WvWv every night, now I only played it once since hot. Not really liking it.
that said I am not in HOT either. I really dislike hot with the forced group game play.

Even worst is how Anet lied to us saying small guilds will not be over looked. we have a 3-4 person guild that played every night since early GW1 and can not see a way to get the arena for our hall. *sigh

Same boat here. 3 person guild going nowhere fast because ANet can’t deliver.

Sandpit.3467:

DarcShriek.5829:

This such total BS. There are a number of negative posts from people that are simply trolling. Really, complaining isn’t as honorable as you would like people to believe.

So you think that a lot of people that complain actually enjoy the game as it is and only complain to troll? Now THAT is total BS. Trust me, when I stop complaining it’s either because there are no serious problems in the game, or I have completely given up and gone elsewhere.

You think trolls don’t exist. Don’t we wish.

the real root of the problem is arrogance on the part of Anet, they seem to have this baffling view that they are right and everyone else is wrong, including peers in their own industry, it’s costing them big time and they need a massive shift in top level management.

The bottom line is, they are simply NOT as good as they THINK they are.

I feel a lot of negativity would have been avoided if the people complaining felt Anet is listening. We still have no idea how raids are meant to be endgame content, when or if SAB is coming back, when GvG will be implemented (along with a bigger guild arena), when more Stronghold will be made, if balance issues and build variety will be fixed, and when the required server merge for WvW will happen…

If all these things receive a clear answer we will be on good grounds for the future.

I have not been on the forum in literally months, and have uninstalled the game, due to discontent. On a whim, I came back to lurk some topics and see what the conversations would be about, and after reading some people’s comments, I couldn’t resist from posting.

These are my own personal opinions on the matter, from someone who has played this franchise since Sorrow’s Furnace over 10 years ago.

The forums and playerbase have been afflicted with many people who are always agreeing with Anet and those who are satisfied with the product oftentimes, in my experience, seem to be newer players or not of the ‘hardcore’ or longtime veteran crowd. They continually have faith in the game, but for those like myself who have been around for such a long time, there are many, many players, friends, etc that have left the game, like myself, due to discontent.

The people who are standing by Anet need to seriously re-evaluate exactly why they are so dedicated to the product, because anyone on the forums posts here because they care about the game and seeing it grow and improve in their own way, and immediately attacking ‘whiners’ or anyone who has any complaint is disrespectful and destroys any objective conversation about the game and it’s direction.

Also, someone said that Anet doesn’t release their financial data and how is it that anyone can know of their profit margins; to that person I scoff at them and laugh, because they publish their financial data during their stockholder meetings and some conventions, and it’s actually pretty easy to find online. Anet is running their own game into the ground because it is making them money. Someone out there is dumping money into armors and the cash shop and this model is profitable in a short and medium term investment, but ruins goodwill amongst their own playerbase.

I am going to split this post into two parts. Lol

Now a quick aside before my main point:
Right now is the holiday season and the company likely has most of their staff on vacation or going home, so it’s understandable that they have been quiet lately. They have families and are humans too, so allowing them to spend time with their loved ones seems sensible. Don’t worry about the recently terrible PR and communication, they have acknowledged the issue before and are trying, I actually have a very long memory of them starting new initiatives and attempting to reach out to their communities so to be objective and fair, I’d agree with the statement that they do try and talk to their players. People don’t have an individual, one-on-one with them, but let’s not disrespect the efforts of Gaile Gray or other developers and support specialists who troll the forums, I recall conversations with several of them, both in-game and on the forums. Simply saying they don’t try isn’t a fair statement at all.

My main point:
The pessimism is Real. It’s always been there, since day 1. Yes, I admit it. I am one of the pessimists. But what people forget is that the pessimists leave, and its new groups of people complaining, getting upset, getting told their opinions are invalid by Anet supporters, and they get fed up and leave. Here we are over three years later, and we have had multiple groups of people standing up and leaving again and again, and the playerbase has obviously shrank. It’s to the point where almost nobody is happy, and that is because the people who keep defending the mistakes are doing damage to the conversation and now allowing any kind of critique which lately, is apparent that needs to desperately happen.

Check with any player from the Beta, and I have both IRL friends and online friends, and they can spew off a list of valid reasons of why they stopped caring about the game or how they felt slighted in one way or another. My personal list, is about 20 items long of factual events that directly caused me to have less enjoyment in a game. The reason the game is even around now is because they focused on gathering new players to replace the older ones (who were malcontents) and gradually through this process the new(er) players have themselves become malcontents.

What I am really trying to say is that Anet is going to be in trouble if it is already NOT in trouble, and before it’s too late, as a community we may need to come together to examine and itemize, critique, their entire history and come together to offer suggestions on where they could improve. Overhauling the game may even yet be too little, too late.

Thank you for reading my long winded commentary. Back to the shadows I go..

Vayne.8563:

But yeah I’m happy to be a guy who stands up to people who I feel are using hyperbole, which doesn’t help anyone, or making false claims, or even stating their opinion as if it’s some kind of fact.

Being a white knight, on the whole, isn’t really such a bad thing.

I’m sorry, but this has to be said. You use a lot hyperbole too. Plus, most of your arguments are based on unverifiable anecdotes. You don’t stand up to hyperbole or false claims, you bully people who have different experiences with the game than you do. The way you talk to people doesn’t help them with their problems, it actually makes it worse. Just leave them alone, unless you have some constructive help. No one wants to be bullied when they are frustrated with the game, no matter how unreasonable you think their frustration is.

Are you kidding? These forums are always super pessimistic. My goodness. I try to avoid them but still get roped in sometimes.

People playing the actual game are having fun and not at all pessimistic. The game has grown with the exception of WvW and the mishap with fractals, both of which should hopefully be changed soon.

Even the big fractal players in my guild just do other PvE stuff and less fractals. They are a bit annoyed sure, but nothing like what this forum represents.

The only population I see truly left out/shrinking are the poor WvWers. And they still play a bit. I think a lot of them went into PvP too with the league and all.

sarasvatri.6871:

*

Right, and I guess we can’t make any conclusive statements about someone who goes through other people’s posting history and makes a thread about it….

Forums exist as an avenue to complain about stuff. If you only post “I love this game and this is why” threads you get removed/kicked from most forum communities. That’s because these threads serve no real purpose. Forums exist to be constructive in the sense that people who don’t like something, can go there and discuss it amongst the community. The people who post thread after thread of discontent are probably huge fans of the game that just saw it go downhill and either: don’t know how to quit, still choose to hang in there hoping for the future, or actually really enjoy the game more than they hate it. If someone is going to complain consistently over a long period of time, it shows love for the game not hate.

In terms of this game, we realize the kind of hate and discord amongst the community BECAUSE: We share (or sympathize with) it to some degree, we see multiple people posting the same kind of complaints.

Selkirk.4218:

anet hasn’t had any wins in so long that it isnt just a matter of walking away and coming back to something good at some point. the road ahead is a short narrow one filled with tolls. anet thinks small and cheap and delivers ‘content’ that mirrors this vision.

i actually disagree with most on the forums when they cry poverty as the reason anet doesn’t develop anything-i think they are doing pretty well and anet, if asked, would tell you just that. this answer is more troubling than the poverty answer however. if they are flush with cash and aren’t producing content now….

the hardcore crowd is ‘happy’ for the moment (or at least they pretend to be)-they even got a ‘hardcore’ festival…10000 drinks. but this won’t last as the ‘hardcore’ are the ones that burn out the fastest.

the ‘negative’ comments are almost something of a historical footnote. hey you remember gw2? yeah used to be a good game..what happened?

the hot pollyannas needn’t worry about the negative comments. the devs do not read these forums and do not post in them. instead they prefer the sweet words of the redditors…‘This is an example of an expansion done right’, ‘Lots of new content, thrilling story’…‘A brilliantly meaty expansion’…ad nauseam.

I’m going to address your post because I think something is wrong.
The hardcore burning out fastest – that’s where you’re wrong.

I’m hardcore – my time played vs number of days since GW2’s release means I’ve played an average of 3 hours ( actually a bit over) of GW2 ever since it was released – every day.
Moreover that hasn’t been very condensed – eg 9-10 hours on some days and no time on other days – because I doubt I’ve had more than 5 days in which I didn’t log into GW2 in 2015.

And before you assume I do nothing else but game – you’re wrong – I also finished university this year and have other things I do as well.

That’s what hardcore means – it means being invested in something and sticking with it.

Ardenwolfe.8590:

The bottom line is the expansion did not hold the attention of the masses for long nor did it reinvent the wheel. Honestly, I don’t know what people were expecting given the time frame and lack of class testing. I’m not even going to get into that PvP and WvW nightmare.

The sooner Living World returns, the better. Chasing the next carrot achievements is what this game is all about.

Let’s not kid ourselves.

Because honestly the expansion was bad in a number of ways – the worst however is that in a primarily cosmetically driven game this expansion gave us incredibly few armor skins to work towards.

It’s as simple as that – cosmetics driven game – no cosmetic choices as rewards – nobody bothering with it that much.

Not to mention that we only got 3 new legendary weapons – the high-end be all-end all skins.
3 skins means that people who don’t like any of the current ones they released with HoT have nothing to do – nothing to work for.

I’m personally not working on HoT stuff because there are no HoT skins I particularly like – so then why bother?