Guild Wars 2

I have a feeling GW2 did not fully get to a part of players.
I read some “exit reviews” and realize not only most people didn’t understand the game but they also didn’t notice the revolutions of the game.

For instance, the dynamicity of the world is by a large extent something completely new to the gaming market.
It’s a world’s first.
The way NPCs contend land and through 50 events cause 500 different consequences and situations, the way they ally with other NPCs temporarily.
For instance, when you harvest “unexploded shots” in Kessex Hills.
Most players believe it’s just fetch questing – yet an hour earlier a real battle happened, with centaurs first building a bridge, getting through, conquering a fort and then sending 3 siege units to besiege a nearby village.
And that is where those unexploded shots were from. It’s all linked to real occurrences in the world, that are consequence of other event chains.
I can just wonder the amount of coding that went into to create something like this.
And the amount of creativity, too.

Then why is GW2 being misunderstood as a traditional MMO rather than being played for what it is?
Perhaps gamers are not ready for this, the leap between traditional MMO and GW2 is too long for a generation that was used to much more simple formats?
For instance, computers weren’t immediately accepted in the society back in my days, people still didn’t recognize their potential and used them the wrong way.
But look at them now.

What’s your take on this?

I think we all get how DE’s work. They are great if you are willing to follow them around. However most players don’t like waiting around for 15-30+ minutes just to get the next part of the DE when there is an another one happening.

Ooh and they aren’t a world firsts thing. I believe Tibia and other mmorpgs implemented these kind of no-talking-to-npc-just-walk-closeby-type-of-quests. Which also resulted in different quests if you completed or failed them.

My take is you bought the sales hype.

DEs are weak. Simple zergfests and nothing more, they have little to no impact on the world and just repeat endlessly. Public quests in Warhammer were more fleshed out.

A lot of GW2 sounds goon on paper, but in practice we end up wandering around spamming attacks in zergy, unfocused encounters.

GW2 isn’t misunderstood by people who don’t like it, it’s understood all too well and we see it for what it really is. An oversimplified, theme park of a game with very little depth.

For a lot of people it’s not what they want and for a lot of us it’s exactly what we want. I get what you mean OP but it doesn’t matter how hard you try to make people understand. They either like it or they don’t.

Red Falcon.8257:

I have a feeling GW2 did not fully get to a part of players.
I read some “exit reviews” and realize not only most people didn’t understand the game but they also didn’t notice the revolutions of the game.

For instance, the dynamicity of the world is by a large extent something completely new to the gaming market.
It’s a world’s first.
The way NPCs contend land and through 50 events cause 500 different consequences and situations, the way they ally with other NPCs temporarily.
For instance, when you harvest “unexploded shots” in Kessex Hills.
Most players believe it’s just fetch questing – yet an hour earlier a real battle happened, with centaurs first building a bridge, getting through, conquering a fort and then sending 3 siege units to besiege a nearby village.
And that is where those unexploded shots were from. It’s all linked to real occurrences in the world, that are consequence of other event chains.
I can just wonder the amount of coding that went into to create something like this.
And the amount of creativity, too.

Then why is GW2 being misunderstood as a traditional MMO rather than being played for what it is?
Perhaps gamers are not ready for this, the leap between traditional MMO and GW2 is too long for a generation that was used to much more simple formats?
For instance, computers weren’t immediately accepted in the society back in my days, people still didn’t recognize their potential and used them the wrong way.
But look at them now.

What’s your take on this?

I agree with you completely, just from the responses on this thread I can see that a lot of people simply don’t get it.
There is genius at work in this game’s design and I think dynamic events are a big part of that. The truth is that this game is easy to pick up but it does reward players who have the patience to take the time to immerse themselves in the world.

It is not designed to run through in a zerg and blowing through the content like a locust horde. There is such depth that it is mindblowing- you are just not going to see it if you come with the attitude of time is money where is my loot.

Red Falcon.8257:

Perhaps gamers are not ready for this, the leap between traditional MMO and GW2 is too long for a generation that was used to much more simple formats?

Nah. GW2 isn’t fundamentally more complicated than earlier MMOs. I just think for some there’s a dissonance between how it plays and how it’s wrapped. You see hot keys, minimap, spells and fantasy, you think WoW with tweaks. And why wouldn’t you? The last 8 years have largely been that except for a few outliers.

But we can’t blame marketing either. You can’t say “MMO” and not think of the 900lb gorilla. And you can’t risk saying “is nothing at all like what you expect” because so many people make purchase decisions on precedent and reference. You can only hope people who say they want something different actually want something different and not just “my favorite WoW class but not-kittened”

Another group might be disappointed that GW2 is very different from GW1. MMOs don’t typically get sequels. But where they have so far, the sequel was nothing like the original in game play. EQ2 and AC2 shared only lore with their predecessors. PS2 is closer to PS1, but that’s not really in the same field. And so comparatively few people have played the first two (nor will play the third) that these aren’t well known examples anyway.

No group mentioned above is wrong.

This isn’t a critique of close minded thinking or any of that. We’re supposed to be allowed to like or dislike something, and continue or quit as a result

Having said all that, we’re at a stage in a new MMO launch where the official boards will feature a lot of ragequits, complete with manifestos about what’s wrong/broken/stupid about the game. This will lead to an echo chamber for a bit until the last of the disillusioned move on. Once the remaining dedicated fan base is established, they’ll be the veterans to usher in new players and explain how things really work here.

My hope is that this happens in time for Anet to reap the benefits of the Holiday shopping season. New players brought in after the disillusioned move on is really when the game starts to grow again.

Morrigan.2809:

I agree with you completely, just from the responses on this thread I can see that a lot of people simply don’t get it.
There is genius at work in this game’s design and I think dynamic events are a big part of that. The truth is that this game is easy to pick up but it does reward players who have the patience to take the time to immerse themselves in the world.

It is not designed to run through in a zerg and blowing through the content like a locust horde. There is such depth that it is mindblowing- you are just not going to see it if you come with the attitude of time is money where is my loot.

I guess You could say GW2 is an elegant game for a more civilized age. :P

Personally, I like the game. For the most part, the game feels like your ordinary go-out-and-kill-stuff type game, but there are a few things that make it fun for me, where WOW was not fun.

First off, though those of us looking to clear a heart on our map are technically all doing our own thing, trying to kill x of whatever or gather y or whatever, because we’re not clicking on some dude with a question mark over his head, because of the lack of “accept quest” functionality, it feels like we’re just there, helping out this dude, and we can work together or separately like we feel like it without hurting each other. It just feels seamless.

And I do like how the events change and evolve over time. No, I’m not hanging around to watch the whole thing; gotta move on to the next map. But I like the idea that events progress over time, that my actions have some kind of impact.

The next step, IMO, is to put the ebb and flow of NPC actions under player control. Picture if you will: the fusion of the MMO and the 4x: Massively Multiplayer Master of Magic Online (MMMOMO, lol) or something like that. Players in control of several sides, which fight or cooperate according to the decisions of the players in control, with some kind of political mechanism in place to allow those players who want to contest control to do so. Some just play it like a theme park, only peripherally aware that all these fetch quests, PVP zones, and such exist because some other players made it that way, and the outcome actually matters. Others contribute at a more strategic level, jockeying for power through periodic elections or, perhaps, sporadic insurrection, with each race using a different mechanism to determine political influence.

Honestly, I got in to GW2 just to see how they’re dynamically generated quests work, to see if it fits with the design listed above. I’ll stay because I’m having more fun with an MMO than I’ve ever had.

Red Falcon.8257:

I have a feeling GW2 did not fully get to a part of players.
I read some “exit reviews” and realize not only most people didn’t understand the game but they also didn’t notice the revolutions of the game.

For instance, the dynamicity of the world is by a large extent something completely new to the gaming market.
It’s a world’s first.
The way NPCs contend land and through 50 events cause 500 different consequences and situations, the way they ally with other NPCs temporarily.
For instance, when you harvest “unexploded shots” in Kessex Hills.
Most players believe it’s just fetch questing – yet an hour earlier a real battle happened, with centaurs first building a bridge, getting through, conquering a fort and then sending 3 siege units to besiege a nearby village.
And that is where those unexploded shots were from. It’s all linked to real occurrences in the world, that are consequence of other event chains.
I can just wonder the amount of coding that went into to create something like this.
And the amount of creativity, too.

Then why is GW2 being misunderstood as a traditional MMO rather than being played for what it is?
Perhaps gamers are not ready for this, the leap between traditional MMO and GW2 is too long for a generation that was used to much more simple formats?
For instance, computers weren’t immediately accepted in the society back in my days, people still didn’t recognize their potential and used them the wrong way.
But look at them now.

What’s your take on this?

If you think the dynamic world is a premiere, I suppose you’ve never heard of Rift.

Also, what’s that huge leap? That Guild Wars 2 called their grinds optional?

Personal story has been done before in SWTOR and it was better than here.
Dynamic world has been done before.
Armor and gold grinds have been done before.
Active combat has been done in Tera and personally I think it was better executed there.

The only new things that I can think of that Guild Wars 2 brought to the genre are:
-the public mob tagging systems;
-downscaling (Rift has a similar mechanic as far as I know, but it was implemented long after we’d known it would be in Guild Wars 2) – I personally find it annoying;
-the ability to revive NPCs;
-quests not requiring you to pick them up anymore;
-being a member of multiple guilds at once;
-the stat plateau – we don’t know if this will change with time; they might add new levels in expansion and then you’d get a new treadmill, even if not as big as WoW’s.

Sure, these things contribute a lot to a better experience, but it’s still not that big a leap everyone is making it out to be.

This game is more WoW than Guild Wars 1. Guild Wars 1 was innovative. Guild Wars 2 is a classical themepark MMO with the same grinds, fancy combat, awesome graphics and environments and some other gameplay improvements. As far as immersion goes, however, for me, it dies every time I press “O”.

I forgot to mention there’s probably a “grass is greener” effect going on here. People don’t notice all the annoyances that they have been complaining about in other mmos don’t exist here, but I for one remember them.

I remember when I was playing Swtor and couldn’t find a healer for dungeons to save my life. And when we did get one ( after an hour of doing nothing) he was an arrogant prick who quit after one wipe in a dungeon none of us had done before. I remember in WoW I could never find a raiding guild because all of them demanded that I already have several pieces of raiding gear as well as raiding experience from vanilla (I started playing in BC). Later things got worse with gearscore and achievement linking. I also remember the forums being flooded with complaints about how PvP wasn’t even remotely fair because of the pvp gear grind that only people with the most free time could max out.

I wonder if those people who left GW2 went back to those games, waited 3 hours for a tank and thought to themselves “God I missed this.”

Gohlar.3671:

My take is you bought the sales hype.

DEs are weak. Simple zergfests and nothing more, they have little to no impact on the world and just repeat endlessly. Public quests in Warhammer were more fleshed out.

A lot of GW2 sounds goon on paper, but in practice we end up wandering around spamming attacks in zergy, unfocused encounters.

GW2 isn’t misunderstood by people who don’t like it, it’s understood all too well and we see it for what it really is. An oversimplified, theme park of a game with very little depth.

In all MMO’s you are spamming attacks. Come up with something better.

I agree that its misunderstood.

“Aye yo guild wars, why u only have 10 skills? wow has more this is dumb”

The original Guildwars had 8. And one was for Rez sig in most cases, leaving you with 7 to work with.

Why does everyone compare this game to WoW? Sorry, but this game is more like GW1 with a bit of monster hunter tacked on. if you dont suck at this game, you can litterally avoid all damage of boss mobs by simply dodging. In monster hunter, all you had to do was get out of the way. its the same in this game. Giant AoE world boss killing people with his AoE? kittening roll bro. it has invinciable frames.

Dungeons are badly designed imo though, with pubs, it feels like the basic enemies are more dangerous then the bosses. You can kite the boss all day, and dodge his attacks with practice. Stopping the zerg from the “trash” mobs, in most cases it feels like the “trash” mobs do more damage then the boss, and you cant dodge them forever like bosses.

A much closer game to GW2 imo is Terra online. Eitherway, GW2 has some balance issues, but once those are worked out, this game is set. For all the people who didnt play Guildwars 1, I think you should prolly find a diffrent game imo. Cause its called guildwars 2 for a reason. Its the continuation of a game much before your time im sure.

DEs are weak. Simple zergfests and nothing more, they have little to no impact on the world and just repeat endlessly.

Proof of what I was saying in the OP.
People just zerg DEs brainlessly and don’t realize what DEs actually do.
One DE can lead to chains that change the entire zone completely (either positively or negatively).

Sad that online gamers are still that immature from a gaming perspective.
Bringing traditional MMO players into GW2 is like bringing a deaf man to a concert.

I hope at one point this kind of game will have its own genre and its own userbase; those who want a dynamic, living world instead of “MUST…LEVEL…PLAYERS=ZERG… NNNNNGHHHHH”.

It’s pretty clear those types of players are not ready for playing a proper game.

I’d like to add that today’s gamers care too much about “being rewarded for their efforts” – something I’ve seen in more than one post. Games are no longer about having fun on them, instead if a player does something “amazing” in World vs World for instance (such as finding a great position to place a siege weapon etc), he will expect to be “rewarded for it”. The feeling of doing something cool is no longer a reward in itself.

People want their “achievements” to be acknowledged and they want others to see them as special flowers, and they completely neglect the fact that in an open war 99% of the soldiers are nothing but that – common soldiers. Not everyone ends up in epic tales…

delmarqo.5038:

But we can’t blame marketing either. You can’t say “MMO” and not think of the 900lb gorilla. And you can’t risk saying “is nothing at all like what you expect” because so many people make purchase decisions on precedent and reference. You can only hope people who say they want something different actually want something different and not just “my favorite WoW class but not-kittened”

This is my sentiment as well. I love GW2 because it’s almost exactly what I’ve been looking for in an MMO for years. I also played a ton of GW1 and loved it as well.

To expand on your point of of creating an MMO that’s different and people’s expectations of different, I want to add that I think part of the issue is the marketing of MMO’s that claim to be different. Since to explosion of WoW we’ve heard almost every big MMO say that they’re something “different” and when it comes down to it things are pretty much the same except for one or two aspects. Maybe it’s more cutscenes and voice acting for the story, maybe it’s tweaks to the combat system, maybe it’s how they handle the talent tree, but at the end of the day 90% of how the game is played is exactly like WoW. Many people who are disillusioned by GW2 were expecting that outcome, the WoW structure with something minor changed.

One of the huge complaints I see is the lack of endgame progression and players needing to have a carrot on a stick to strive for. What Anet seems to be doing, because they did this in GW1, is having a low mark for gear that will get you through all the content and then have better looking gear for those who want to strive for it. This changes the focus from grinding for gear with better stats to the content itself.

Now I don’t personally like the endgame progression style of play. I played WoW for awhile and it was disheartening spending a lot of time slogging through content that many times wasn’t very compelling just to hit the level cap and then not being able to find a raiding guild willing to go back to the earlier raids so I could get gear to do the raids they were on. I essentially quit because I was locked out of content because I couldn’t get that gear, but that’s personal preference. There are obviously a lot of people who enjoy that style of play or WoW wouldn’t be as popular as it is.

And endgame progression isn’t the only example, but it speaks clearly to the point that GW2 isn’t the MMO for everyone. I think it’ll be quite successful, but I don’t think it’s going to be a “WoW-killer.” It will fill a niche of people looking for a departure from the standard MMO fair without having to go as extreme as something like Eve Online.

And you will get people who will come to the forums complaining about how the game is kitten because it’s not like every other MMO in a specific aspect that they love. In fact you will probably see many more complaints on the forums because the people enjoying the game are the ones playing it while those who aren’t enjoying it are the ones who, for one reason or another, feel ripped off and want to vent that fact. Those complaints will also come in many shapes from “I would enjoy this game better if you did X” to “I’m quitting and telling everyone I know this game is kitten because it doesn’t do X,Y and Z.” The complainers on the forums is why I can’t stand visiting most MMO forums except for maybe once or twice a week.

Morrigan.2809:

Try harder.
You just have to look at the conversion rate from gems to gold and vice versa to see that it is clearly more beneficial for to you trade your in game gold to gems. That is intentional.

I’m guessing you failed to understand the point of my post. You can’t earn gold without heavy grinding (and if so, how is the game better than other MMOs?), therefore it’s more convenient to buy gems and trade them for gold.

LOL misunderstood? Anets entire manifesto was blowing smoke so they could capitalise on the ‘bored mmo gamer’ out there. and yet most of the stuff advertised minus DE’s and a persistant world existed in gw1.

face the facts. gw2 was the biggest hype pile ever, even more than swtor. and it has failed. 2 million box sales prove how easy it was to dupe people but now look, barely anyone is playing because once the glitz wore off they realised it was a north korean run mmo hidden under the guise of western development.

wah wah misunderstood LOL gimme a break. this is what happens when your fabled company kitten on the competition, kitten on mechanics which WORK all because they didnt want to make something that would be called a ‘wow clone. so instead they make a warhammer/rift/doac clone, remove any rewards for doing anything and claim ’fun is enough’ ROFL.

when i play wow, my endgame starts at level 1. oh no, that cant be right can it? how dare i have fun playing WOW from level 1 to level 90 OMG…BLASPHEMY!

If you play GW2 like a conventional game, you’re perfectly fine with it.

If you’re looking for that inflating gear fix, you’re probably better off elsewhere. I’m not even knocking that style of game, I’m just saying GW2 isn’t it. And no one ever pretended it was, so it kind of baffles me how people failed to understand this.

That said, I suspect they’ll very quickly find a way to keep the addicts hooked through the cash shop, though. Probably introducing prequisite pieces for legendaries to black lion chests or something, something to gamble real money on.

Gauradan.8361:

If you think the dynamic world is a premiere, I suppose you’ve never heard of Rift.

Tabula Rasa actually started the whole dynamic event thing. Wish other games also copied the combat of that game as well. Still waiting.

lollie.5816:

Gauradan.8361:

If you think the dynamic world is a premiere, I suppose you’ve never heard of Rift.

Tabula Rasa actually started the whole dynamic event thing. Wish other games also copied the combat of that game as well. Still waiting.

I didn’t know that about Tabula Rasa and I’m guessing most people never even heard of it. Rift was a more commonly known example, but thanks for pointing that out.

Gauradan.8361:

lollie.5816:

Gauradan.8361:

If you think the dynamic world is a premiere, I suppose you’ve never heard of Rift.

Tabula Rasa actually started the whole dynamic event thing. Wish other games also copied the combat of that game as well. Still waiting.

I didn’t know that about Tabula Rasa and I’m guessing most people never even heard of it. Rift was a more commonly known example, but thanks for pointing that out.

np, still mourn the loss of that game and its ideas/combat from the gaming world, tons of bugs or not. Hoping one day some game dev will realise its importance. Look – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Of3Uxw9MNec&list=PLD5AB1C0D55DC4B88&index=100&feature=plpp_video and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4p5_NFQinNc&list=PLD5AB1C0D55DC4B88&index=101&feature=plpp_video

lollie.5816:

Gauradan.8361:

lollie.5816:

Gauradan.8361:

If you think the dynamic world is a premiere, I suppose you’ve never heard of Rift.

Tabula Rasa actually started the whole dynamic event thing. Wish other games also copied the combat of that game as well. Still waiting.

I didn’t know that about Tabula Rasa and I’m guessing most people never even heard of it. Rift was a more commonly known example, but thanks for pointing that out.

np, still mourn the loss of that game and its ideas/combat from the gaming world, tons of bugs or not. Hoping one day some game dev will realise its importance. Look – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Of3Uxw9MNec&list=PLD5AB1C0D55DC4B88&index=100&feature=plpp_video and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4p5_NFQinNc&list=PLD5AB1C0D55DC4B88&index=101&feature=plpp_video

i missed the boat on TB but i had a mate of mine always raving about it.

InfiniteRetro.9865:

LOL misunderstood? Anets entire manifesto was blowing smoke so they could capitalise on the ‘bored mmo gamer’ out there. and yet most of the stuff advertised minus DE’s and a persistant world existed in gw1.

face the facts. gw2 was the biggest hype pile ever, even more than swtor. and it has failed. 2 million box sales prove how easy it was to dupe people but now look, barely anyone is playing because once the glitz wore off they realised it was a north korean run mmo hidden under the guise of western development.

wah wah misunderstood LOL gimme a break. this is what happens when your fabled company kitten on the competition, kitten on mechanics which WORK all because they didnt want to make something that would be called a ‘wow clone. so instead they make a warhammer/rift/doac clone, remove any rewards for doing anything and claim ’fun is enough’ ROFL.

when i play wow, my endgame starts at level 1. oh no, that cant be right can it? how dare i have fun playing WOW from level 1 to level 90 OMG…BLASPHEMY!

I could tell you were a WoW player from the first paragraph, before I even got to the last part. You have that mentality, that degraded mentality of someone who’s too troubled with ADD.

@mitlandir theres that intelligent gw2 community i keep seeing. the one that bashes every other mmo, mmo gamer to claim their digital fail game was somehow the new breed of mmos. you know what i see? i see as do many others a game that is so bogged down with grind that everything required is more effort than mmos 8 years ago. excellent design for 2012.

once games like elder scrolls online, archeage, phantasy star online 2, final fantasy 14 a realm reborn begin their marketing pushes you’re little north korean mmo will all be but forgotten.

InfiniteRetro.9865:

@mitlandir theres that intelligent gw2 community i keep seeing. the one that bashes every other mmo, mmo gamer to claim their digital fail game was somehow the new breed of mmos. you know what i see? i see as do many others a game that is so bogged down with grind that everything required is more effort than mmos 8 years ago. excellent design for 2012.

once games like elder scrolls online, archeage, phantasy star online 2, final fantasy 14 a realm reborn begin their marketing pushes you’re little north korean mmo will all be but forgotten.

I don’t bash without a reason, I’ve been there, I’ve seen all that. I played WoW from mid TBC to Ragnaros in Cata, both pvp and pve. And the fact remains – I could classify you as a WoW player from your first sentence.

I know WoW’s community and I know it’s almost as cancerous as LoL’s, and nothing can dissuade me from that.

GW2 is different, I don’t see it as grindy at all. That is actually the biggest reason I like it – because I don’t HAVE to do anything, as opposed to your beloved WoW where you HAVE to do your daily stuff and HAVE to get your daily points and HAVE farm your gear.

What you see is your own business and I’m not obliged to agree. In my opinion the only reason WoW is so popular is because most people enjoy being someone’s puppets, they enjoy being forced to grind content and then feel “rewarded”. They enjoy the unimaginative approach.

Compare it to MTV’s mind-dumbing reality shows that are way more popular than say cultural documentaries and such. They will of course be more successful that way, because if there’s high demand for something it will be sold more efficiently and that’s fair enough.

I’m not asking you to accept my standpoint that GW2 is a great game, I’m not asking you to like it; what I want is for you to accept the possibility that GW2 caters to a different (and maybe more sophisticated) taste.

@Gauradan
“You don’t have to do anything in WoW either. There’s a ton of other things you can do other than farming for gear or doing dailies. In Guild Wars 2, you have to grind if you want something; same is the case with WoW. I don’t see the difference.”

I don’t? Say I wanna do arena – can’t without BG gear, say I wanna gank – again I sort of need decent gear or else I’ll die to ppl in arena gear, say I wanna raid – I can’t if I don’t have the HC gear, say I wanna do HC raids – I can’t unless I join a semi-hardcore guild where I’ll have to keep up with others’ gear and put up with Guild Masters who demand that I cancel my night outs with friends because “how dare I agree to go out on a Wednesday evening WHEN WE ALWAYS HAVE RAIDS THEN!!!?!”… (happened more than a few times).

If you skip multiple daily dungeons/bgs on wow you’re already disadvantaged and you won’t even be invited for a raid without certain gear level.

On GW2 I can do dungeons with blue gear, I can do them with green gear, I can do tham in any gear. It might make it harder but if I know when to dodge and how to combo I’ll still do better than a fully exotic player who doesn’t know what he’s doing.

On GW2 I can do WvWvW with my guild at any level, I will always be useful to them and if I can’t attend a WvWvW raid, no biggie.

So no, sorry but I don’t see your point.

Mitlandir.8306:

@Gauradan
“You don’t have to do anything in WoW either. There’s a ton of other things you can do other than farming for gear or doing dailies. In Guild Wars 2, you have to grind if you want something; same is the case with WoW. I don’t see the difference.”

I don’t? Say I wanna do arena – can’t without BG gear, say I wanna gank – again I sort of need decent gear or else I’ll die to ppl in arena gear, say I wanna raid – I can’t if I don’t have the HC gear, say I wanna do HC raids – I can’t unless I join a semi-hardcore guild where I’ll have to keep up with others’ gear and put up with Guild Masters who demand that I cancel my night outs with friends because “how dare I agree to go out on a Wednesday evening WHEN WE ALWAYS HAVE RAIDS THEN!!!?!”… (happened more than a few times).

If you skip multiple daily dungeons/bgs on wow you’re already disadvantaged and you won’t even be invited for a raid without certain gear level.

On GW2 I can do dungeons with blue gear, I can do them with green gear, I can do tham in any gear. It might make it harder but if I know when to dodge and how to combo I’ll still do better than a fully exotic player who doesn’t know what he’s doing.

On GW2 I can do WvWvW with my guild at any level, I will always be useful to them and if I can’t attend a WvWvW raid, no biggie.

So no, sorry but I don’t see your point.

i got booted out of the wow raiding/pvp guild called Civilian once because i didnt play every time we had an Rbg planned so i can symapthize, people really dont seem to understand that guild wars 2s “end game” is extremely liberating and fair as opposed to others.

Yeah maybe as a gamer, I’ve misunderstood the game. In a modern video game, I like to see:

• Good visual and music: no argue here, it’s beautiful.
• Immersion: the dynamic event are good, voice acting make things alive. The sense of progression isn’t very strong. Hitting lvl80, you need to go a forums looking for end-game, fanboys/trolls talk non-stop about WoW, 300+g precursors make you consider buying gold, constant reminder that you’re just a customer.
• A good story: the lore is good if you dig enough, the personal story is good until +-lvl20, a nice at Claw Isle and the source of Orr. But lacks cut-scenes, too many unimportant/repetitive choices, terrible ending.
• Interesting combat system: lot of potential, confusing in group with the load of visual effect. The solo gamestyle is fine, but not satisfying as a group.
• Challenge: lvl1-80 is easy, but that’s ok. lvl80 is still easy, where’re the challenging stuff ?
  *No grind: grind in lvl1-80 is well hidden, it’s cool. lvl80 is all about grind: grind 100,000+ money for the easiest end-gear, grind thousands of tokens for the “pseudo-hard” gear, grind loads of mats+millions karmas points+hundreds of millions experience points+grind WvW+… for the ultimate stuff. Challenging? No. Grindy? Yes.

In a multiplayer game, I like to see:

• Playing with other players: was cool at launch, even though only few were talking to each other during events. Now, leveling areas are so empty. In dungeon, it feels like “every one for himself”. You can run a dungeon you’ve never seen before without form of communication.
• Teamplay: There’s a lack a synergy and roles between classes. There’s something but not required. Be the only one to survive and run with 4 npc-like players dps a bit, die and run back, that works fine.
• Competitivity: without actually playing with someone, I’ve no clue about who’re good players, both in PvP and PvE.

Maybe a misunderstood that those features are in GW2. “If you’re a MMO player, you want to try GW2. If you’re not a MMO player, you DEFINITIVLY want to try GW2”, someone above mentioned their marketing, I’ve to admit, they got me.

(And I havn’t mentioned traditional MMO stuff, just basic features from single player games and multiplayer games)

Gohlar.3671:

My take is you bought the sales hype.

DEs are weak. Simple zergfests and nothing more, they have little to no impact on the world and just repeat endlessly. Public quests in Warhammer were more fleshed out.

A lot of GW2 sounds goon on paper, but in practice we end up wandering around spamming attacks in zergy, unfocused encounters.

GW2 isn’t misunderstood by people who don’t like it, it’s understood all too well and we see it for what it really is. An oversimplified, theme park of a game with very little depth.

Care to explain in more details how you feel GW2 is oversimplified compare to other MMOs out there.
And can you also please explain more indepth why you feel the game lack any depth.

I’m really intressted you see beacuse I see these kind of respons from time to time and very few if any care to explain why they feel what whent wrong and how It compares to other MMOs out there.

lack of class defining roles = zerg tactics for every encounter.
Lack of real rewards from boss fights = little satisfaction from victory over these bosses
Lack of random rewards from dungeons but a set currency = you feel like your grinding.

I could go on but you get the idea there is a downside to many things put in. I think this game simply tried to shove too many new ideas into one game and the result is a very fun single player/co-op game. As a rpgmmo not really feeling it. I never grew attached to my character like i did in other games. Nor was i entranced in the story like i was in other games. theres lots of things i probably dont know about the story but the world never really challenges me to want to know anything that wasnt easily fed to me. This game is very weak in almost anything that would keep a hardcore rper happy. Some might disagree, its possible i just have higher standards/requirements in this field or have played higher quality games so have a sharper opinion. But it is what it is.

Zutroy.9105:

*No grind: grind in lvl1-80 is well hidden, it’s cool. lvl80 is all about grind: grind 100,000+ money for the easiest end-gear, grind thousands of tokens for the “pseudo-hard” gear, grind loads of mats+millions karmas points+hundreds of millions experience points+grind WvW+… for the ultimate stuff. Challenging? No. Grindy? Yes.

Could you please point me in the direction of an mmo that has NO grind? Or at the very least an mmo that has less grind than GW2 in obtaining best stats gear? If you could give me just one example that would be great.

@TOPIC
Honestly, I don’t wanna bash ANet or discourage them.

So instead, lets look at your argument of::
Anyone that doesn’t like GW2 is because they “misunderstood” what it is.

Basically, the more I see people defend the “features” of GW2.. the more I question why it’s an MMO.

Think about it.

They say:
Explore the world.
Do dungeons
Create another alt and complete multiple “story lines”.

but why should I have to do things I don’t want? why can’t I just keep taking on new challenges with my lv80? isn’t there more things ta do in the world?

Because ANet are so afraid of the trinity.. the combat suffers (zerg w/spamfest). This trivializes content ~ The same can be said about loot and how you’re leveled down into that same content.

Truth be told, GW2 plays A LOT like Oblivion and Skyrim.

Sure it also has grind mechanics suited for an MMO (Legendary weapon anyone?) ~ but beyond that, can you really say GW2 is an MMO instead of a single player game with co-op?

If yes, then I would fault ANet for nothing more than how misleading their Manifesto was ~

Point of fact, I honestly thought the events would be more thought out. Where, just like in Warhammer’s Public Quests, you could push the “warfront” utilizing these dynamic event chains into an epic dragon fight of the ages!

but no, it was nothing like that.
can’t even count how many dragons I’ve killed, just by showing up and sitting in the corner spamming till victory

Do an event once and you get the gist of it and odds are, you’ll get to do it 7-8 more times before you leave that zone ~ most of the time, you wont though. as you’ll just be bored of it and move on after the 3rd or 4th time.

TL;DR
GW2 is pitched as an MMO ~ but Fans/ANet demand you play it like a console game.

Perhaps people are misunderstanding… but can you really blame them, when the marketing/interviews/dev diaries and blogs, paint a different picture than what the game really is?

I read pretty much all the interviews, diaries and marketing on the game I could find for four years. The game is pretty much what I expected it to be and I wouldn’t trade it for any other mmo currently out there. Not even close.

Maybe I’m the one who understood the interviews wrong? But then what are the odds that it turned out into exactly what my vision of it was?

Archer.6485:

I read pretty much all the interviews, diaries and marketing on the game I could find for four years. The game is pretty much what I expected it to be and I wouldn’t trade it for any other mmo currently out there. Not even close.

Maybe I’m the one who understood the interviews wrong? But then what are the odds that it turned out into exactly what my vision of it was?

That’s fine, but the topic talks about “misunderstanding” ~ and honestly, I would have to agree with it.

People aren’t aware of what GW2 “is” based off just casually looking at it or the interviews/blogs/ect.

IE: It’s a console game, sudo-mmo style.

It plays like one and if you expect to come into GW2 for the long haul, you’ll be disappointed.

Most people like gated content and progression.. not always in terms of gear/loot/ect ~ but as content that you actually have to “think” is overall kinda challenging.

IE: Puzzles and Dungeons with multiple run-throughs, WERE quite popular.
But the events and world in general aren’t.

While you could say “if you don’t like GW2, then go back to your game of choice” ~

Honestly, based of the numerous topics like this one, trying to understand “why” people are leaving, I would agree and say most the people I know, already have .

Should ANet be worried? ~ Nope!

GW1 did fine, living off expansion cash flow ~ w/o the need of a cash shop for a long time. So there’s nothing to say they weren’t planning ta do the same with GW2.

Anywho, as the topic stated ~ people are moving on, not because the game is bad ~ but because it can’t give people a “new place ta call home”.

IE: There’s nothing to WORK towards in GW2 and is designed to be played for few hundred hours, then you drop it till the next expansion ~ IE: The Elder Scrolls. (Console game).

This whole discussions reminds me of Louis CK – Everything is amazing and nobody is happy.

It’s as good as it is. I don’t understand why people expect perfection. Nothing is perfect, but some things are really good, and GW2 is one of those things.

It’s AMAZING to me how you people exaggerate it. GW2 is a vast improvement over the things offered in Warhammer and Rift, it’s a great complimentary product to any out of the marked, it’s offering something different, it’s actually broken the WoW-Copy spell, and yet people are still angry, and judgmental less than two months into release.

In fantasy land, everything should be perfect, and we should all be millionaires and nobody should ever be sick, but in reality this is not how things is. It seems useless and waste of time to write these long ramblings about the imperfection of things. Critique is one thing, but a lot of this stuff posted here is not critique. It’s just senseless or entitled whining.

Take a few step backs and try to realize how amazing and fun GW2 really is for what it is. Really. You will never be happy in life if this is your outlook. To be discontent as long as there are problems. Your moneys worth, marketing or what other people said or feel or do, will never make anything related to you perfect.

There is no excuse other than your own expectations of the things around you. Do things annoy me in GW2? Yes, plenty. But simultaneously, in the broader scheme of things, it’s simply one of the best online games I’ve ever played, and the most fun I’ve ever had in a MMO since SWG Pre-CU and early days of Planetside. That was almost 10 years ago.

GW2 is wonderful.

If it is fun then it is fun. If it is not then it is not.

Doesn’t matter if it is a clone or something completely new. Never understood those people who ignore something because it is too different/too much of a clone.

My take on it is that DE are nice but: 1 GW2 did not invent them, DEs have been used in MMOs for years now. EVE online has incursions, rift has rifts, TR had em, WH had em etc. So nothing new about DE at all.

MMOs can provide content in two main forms: Sandbox and Theme park. Once the MMO has it’s sandbox infrastructure and theme park content made up, then the key question for players is:

Is the game FUN or not.

Do I want to log back in month after a month to play the content?

Do my guild/corp mates want to log back in month after month to have FUN playing the content TOGETHER with me or not?

Do I feel like I am constantly challenged and is that challenge fun or a GRIND?

Does the game provide content that encourages me to make friends and join guilds/corps?

Do my friends in my guild/corp enjoy the challenge of multiplier content enough to set up voice coms, guild forums and stay playing for months on end because the game is FUN?

I have only ever played THREE MMOs where the answer to the above questions was positive:

1. EVE online. Played for many consecutive years. The real giant of MMos.
2. WOW. Playewd for over a year. A fantastic MMO.
3. EQ/EQ2 Played for a year. A great MMO.

No other MMO to date has provided me with enough fun entertainment to keep me playing consecutively for much more than a couple of months.

This game is a console interpretation of a traditional MMO. Maybe some people like that but personally I think that there’s so little substance it might as well be single player. The DE that you’re so fond of are little more than timed zerg events which are almost impossible to lose, dungeons are ridiculous corpse running treadmills and WvW is just dull.

Other MMOs have catered to a certain type of people; WAR went for large scale PvP, WoW for PvE and EVE for MS Excel fans. GW2 on the other hand spread itself thin on all fronts and ended up being bland across the board.

AlexanderFaust.4518:

IE: It’s a console game, sudo-mmo style.

I agree. I didn’t really follow GW2 development because GW1 didn’t do anything for me. Coming at it blind, when I first played it and saw the contextual UI, I immediately wondered when they’d announce the Xbox 360 version

lollie.5816:

Tabula Rasa actually started the whole dynamic event thing. Wish other games also copied the combat of that game as well. Still waiting.

Ah, memories. Someone here might show up with an even earlier example, but the dawn of procedurally triggered dynamic events was from Garriot’s even earlier game: UO. TR had the concept of moving front lines, but they felt half implemented at the time.

Typically UO events were triggered by a location on a map or an interactive object, like the news post on Empath Abbey. You read a news post, and based on what it said, you knew to go a certain direction a certain distance to perform certain tasks (clear a mob camp, rescue a citizen, etc). Often these triggered second and sometimes third event chains. I think they’d despawn if not completed, but can’t remember.

This then was repeated in SWG with the Mission Terminals.

TR combat was pretty good. It felt like Planetside 1.5, which is kinda why I like PS2 now too. Still surprising that 10 years later, nobody’s made a true MMOFPS (even Huxley was all instances).

Ya know, I keep hearing these people saying, “OMG the DEs’ are all zerg fests, all we do is zerg ’em without any strategy or tactics or effort at all!”; then I hear, “All the classes are cardboard cutouts an’ you pick one build and wear it inta the ground until lvl 80!” and I think, (key Christopher Walken) Wow – if I played my game the way you play your game, I’d hate it, too.

When I hit a Dynamic Event, I go in using my skills and traits in ways ta help the other players. I try ta work combos when I can, I use powers what give bonuses ta other people, I keep what is happenin’ around me in mind. When I start ta get tired of a build, I change it – not jus’ my weapons, but my skill layout, and even my trait picks – ta make for a different play style … and it works. And when I’m runnin’ around the world, I pay attention to the NPC dialogue, which can be full of interestin’ information, jokes, easter eggs, foreshadowing, hints about puzzles, an’ more.

All those things keep the game fun, exciting, interesting, an’ worth playing every time I log in. If yer not willing to do any of those things, (not to mention the many other things you could be doing) then of course you’re not having fun.

And before someone says, “Wait ’til you hit level 80!”; I barely even know what level I am … high 60’s … I ain’ playin’ the game ta grind out levels … I’m playin’ it to have a good time. (Though I will admit that for a game with levels, if I can go several levels without caring about my skill points the game might as well not have levels. I’d like somethin’ to excite me about skill points after I get my 30 pnt – elite.)

Disclaimer 1: I’m digging the game. A great deal.

Disclaimer 2: I find long, autobiographical essays on why someone quit playing a video game – written with all the gravity and self importance of a world leader resigning from office – to be tiresome. Particularly as they are always just another list of problems (real and imagined) about the game that could be gleaned from one or more of hundreds of threads. Rarely an original thought to be found.

delmarqo.5038:

Having said all that, we’re at a stage in a new MMO launch where the official boards will feature a lot of ragequits, complete with manifestos about what’s wrong/broken/stupid about the game. This will lead to an echo chamber for a bit until the last of the disillusioned move on. Once the remaining dedicated fan base is established, they’ll be the veterans to usher in new players and explain how things really work here.

But they don’t move on, do they? They engage in the bizarre and deeply unhealthy habit of spending all their time hanging around battling about something they profess to hate and have quit, as opposed to spending their time somewhere else, any where else, discussing something they like.

On topic: Dynamic events, lack of quest givers and the rest … no, in fact, GW2 didn’t invent the wheel. Many of these ideas/concepts were in place in other games. And? Integrating and executing concepts successfully also makes for a quality product. And integrate enough of them, and you do create something unique.

An Audi R8, after all, is just a collection of car parts. Yet it so much more.

Jack of Tears.9458:

Ya know, I keep hearing these people saying, “OMG the DEs’ are all zerg fests, all we do is zerg ’em without any strategy or tactics or effort at all!”

How many times have you lost a DE? I can’t remember ever losing one even if I was trying my hardest or dancing with a nearby farmer NPC. They’re zerg events as the only reason you’ll ever lose is because not enough people turned up for the event rather than because the people who did turn up are six sandwiches short of a picnic basket.

delmarqo.5038:

TR combat was pretty good. It felt like Planetside 1.5, which is kinda why I like PS2 now too. Still surprising that 10 years later, nobody’s made a true MMOFPS (even Huxley was all instances).

CCP might have pulled it off by making DUST a kind of FPS MMO like the old pen and paper Travelers game; but some crazy CCP dev got it into their head that they must only tap the console players. They even made DUST a PS3 exclusive! If only CCP made DUST for PC like planet side 2….(I cry every night because of their crazy decision)

Hey guys news flash raids in games like WOW are nothing more than zergs where you fight roboticly scripted npcs. if you have ever played as a Dps then you know what i mean. move out of fire A stand in random boss generated buff B continue spamming highest dmg move for the enitre fight, pop trinket rince repeat there you go “Organized zerg”.

Plutoe.4859:

How many times have you lost a DE? I can’t remember ever losing one even if I was trying my hardest or dancing with a nearby farmer NPC. They’re zerg events as the only reason you’ll ever lose is because not enough people turned up for the event rather than because the people who did turn up are six sandwiches short of a picnic basket.

Depends what ya mean by “not enough people”. I’ll give ya this, yer right that they don’t scale up well enough after a point … the best DEs’ are always those what have just enough people ta do ‘em that they feel hard, but not so many that they get easy. I play in the middle of the night, so I’ve hit alot ah Events with that many players – so as we’re all feeling excited an’ mighty after we win.

And we have lost a few because we just didn’ have enough people, even though we fought hard … but those can be fun too.

So, I suppose, sure … if ya’ve got unlimited people ta do the events, you reach a point where they stop being difficult or excitin’ and that needs ta be fixed. But I never go into them playin’ like I expect that, jus’ like I don’t go inta any fight thinkin’ “okay, I gotta hit 2,3,1,6,1,3,2 to win” … if ya go in playing it like you’re doin’ yer taxes, then sure it’s gonna lose it’s shine.

I never liked the RIFT approach. At least when I played it then it was always that 3- or 5-tiered gate-in-place thing with some of the surroundings affected and mostly requiring a group in the end to beat the final tiers. It was also a bit repetitive as it was all bound to the same number of types of elements. I mean in itself it indeed set itself apart from WoW this way but I am way more happy with the GW2 approach for the reason that DEs all have their own zone-dependant background. I don’t know how RIFT is today seeing that when I played it that it was 1.5 yrs. ago.

You see, that’s one of the things which people need to realize in addition to that not every player comes from the same background and may not have played these games which had it. Because jaded MMO nomads usually are more cynical anyway. But it doesn’t always have to be ‘totally different’. It’s sometimes the way it is implemented and utilized which counts. WoW’s basic structure was all based on the same core mechanics which people knew from EQ and yet it distanced itself from that game by being more newbie- and solo-friendly, more intuitive and overall more fun for the most players.

In that sense maybe GW2 hasn’t done enough of it yet and certain criticism are always true. It’s not that a MMO game starts off in a way where you can say it’s done, even the most longest running MMOs still have their fierce critics going on. Just look at EVE’s forums which still have their long carebear-vs.-ganker debates going on and how CCP never seems to do enough to eliminate the other side. Sure its criticisms died a bit down over time but you will never get rid of certain elements. So I reckon we will still debate on how raids and holy trinity would be so much better in a couple of years (oh yes, I am expecting it to actually last that long).

GW2 is not misunderstood. It just disliked by a portion of the people that bought it. That is totally normal and no big deal. The problem is though that there are people who shrug, say, well, let´s look for another game I might enjoin more, and people who just cannot stand that a lot of people actually enjoy it. They turn this forum into a snakepit and will not be happy before anyone agrees how much this game sucks. But I took the liberty to look at a few forums of other games. WoW, Secret World, DDO, you name it, everywhere you have the same bile being spewed by the same personality type. I guess that is just the concomitant of the internet.

Many people saying DE are zerg fest, but in RIFT when a MAP boss appears it was even more of a zergfest than anything ever in GW2 and that had the ‘AMAZING’ holy trinity. All that was needed was 1 geared tank to ‘hold aggro’ and a healer or 2 and everyone else just leans back and ‘spam’ macros. I personally had my rogue with 15+ skills down to spamming 3 buttons doing 1k+ dps at the time(3 months after launch before i saw what it was and quit).

Point is Zergfest will always seem like a zergfest when too many people are around. The beauty of GW2 can only truly be seen once you try a new character and play in these ‘lowpop’ zones where DEs are done with a few people where skills ACTUALLY shine

Well said, Jack of Tears.9458.. I agree with you completely.

What I do instead of weraing NICE armors and legendary ones is when I get bored of it, I wear weak ones! Ugly ones even. I just like the new flavor to it. you eat pizza everyday, you get tired of it. YOu wear same clothes every day, you get tired of it. Time to change that. Including weapons and skills and traits. EXPLORE people. This game is about that.

I love it, and I love the adventure. I make up my own adventure, not following what GW2 says. I even drag ppl into my team and we go out and solo a champion troll together. Usually the number of 3 people (including me) take out a champion. It is a LONG hard battle, but when we succeed, even if the reward sucks, the challenge was more than enough for me.

Guild Wars 2 is NOT misunderstood

Just ask people in game. Not in map chat but the people who don’t need to blast their egos in the most public way. Not the unsatisfied people on the forum. The people wearing dungeon armor jumping through puzzles. Taking part in events just to explore even though they have a star by their name.

Ask those people. For the rest well they end up here or in another game and there’s nothing wrong with that.