Guild Wars 2

Guild Wars 2’s business model demands that the NPE be in place. Guild Wars 2 supports itself through box sales and gem sales. It’s business model is to get players in the game and in the gem store. ArenaNet has said (in response to the player’s feedback about the NPE) that their numbers frequently showed that they were losing a lot of investment because new players were front-loaded with too much content at one time. Personally, when I first started Guild Wars 2 at launch, I remember running around Queensdale skipping nodes, skipping merchants, trying to figure out hearts, not understanding the trading post, trying to find a main city, etc etc. As a level 80 character, do I have these same problems? Of course not… but that does not mean that new players do not still have this confusion upon entering the game for the first time. The NPE addressed this issue in hopes to get the new player gradually into the game and into the gem store. For all you level 80 characters, the NPE was not for you – just accept it. It is not ‘dumbing down’ the game, nor is it assuming that the player base is dumb. It’s a guide for new players to experience content at a gradual pace.

The NPE was put into the game with the vision to sustain GW2’s F2P business model.

If you’re going to try to do PR to defend ANet’s bad decisions, at least do us the courtesy of having your points be coherent. I’m not even demanding that they be correct (that’s too much to ask from spin doctors), but the gem store is an entirely different set of problems from the NPE. You could have made the same point without the pointless appeal-to-profit argument by pointing out that Anet said that the early game was scaring new players away.

Not that I buy that excuse, either. No one who has ever played an MMO or CRPG can honestly say they found Queensdale “overwhelming,” and I question the wisdom of trying for new player retention by making the first six to twelve hours of your game, as in, how said new players are introduced to it, stale, boring, and completely lacking in variety.

Unless what they’re actually out to do is change their target market to the Zynga Zombies (which they might find a little difficult at a $60/acct initial layout) but the NPE does seem like it could appeal to the phone-freemium crowd.

Targren.6073:

the gem store is an entirely different set of problems from the NPE. You could have made the same point without the pointless appeal-to-profit argument by pointing out that Anet said that the early game was scaring new players away.

Without the “appeal-to-profit argument” it doesn’t explain *why the NPE was put into the game. Without it, the argument would sound something like -

The experience was scaring new players away, so ArenaNet changed the NPE so that new players were introduced differently to the game.

Why does ArenaNet care if not for the livelihood of Guild Wars 2? Obviously, the “appeal-to-profit argument” you are saying I could do without is essentially the entire answer for why the NPE changes were made. New players are an investment into Guild Wars 2 and for this game to sustain itself it needs new players. That’s just plain and simple business 101.

Targren.6073:

No one who has ever played an MMO or CRPG can honestly say they found Queensdale “overwhelming,” and I question the wisdom of trying for new player retention by making the first six to twelve hours of your game, as in, how said new players are introduced to it, stale, boring, and completely lacking in variety.

You’re still addressing the NPE with your stale-mindset that “If I didn’t see it as problem, then it must not be a problem to anyone.” News Flash: That’s not how it works. Also, queensdale isn’t the problem in itself – its the amount of things that are available to the new player at one time, this is why ArenaNet has gated content for new players.

Sparks The Rescue.5043:

You’re still addressing the NPE with your stale-mindset that “If I didn’t see it as problem, then it must not be a problem to anyone.” News Flash: That’s not how it works. Also, queensdale isn’t the problem in itself – its the amount of things that are available to the new player at one time, this is why ArenaNet has gated content for new players.

I’m not addressing it with “my stale mindset.” I’m addressing with the observation that, as a justification goes, it’s utter kitten, and even if it were true and the new players are complete cherry phone gamers, it’s still not a justification for bad design.

What’s even worse is that, by pushing back “completion” (meaning having access to the full range of your characters ability) to the highest level, you make sure that first-time 80s don’t know how to fully play their characters yet. Might as well sell “Unlock a character slot that automatically starts at level 80” in the gem store while they’re at it. It would feed their “livelihood” and poor design is apparently forgivable in that pursuit.

I am pretty sure that newer players spend more gems in general than veterans, so if I was in Anets place, I would cater more towards newer players as well.

Personally, playing since head start, i propably spent 3 times more gems within the first year compared to the last 15 months.

At some point, you have all account unlocks you need, the occasional gem purchase is for a skin, convenience item or maybe a server transfer.

I stopped buying things from the store when they started to add far too many things too frequently. Also hate this full “outfit” thing they started to go with. It leaves me no customisation with mixing at all.

Heh… i actually introduced a guy bout 2 days before the NPE patch hit to the game, he installed and patched it a day before the npe launched and then another time with the NPE patch. Basically he came to the game without knowing ANYTHING about what was before cept some stuff i told him like the battle of la and what some of the classes do, a bit about what races are running about and stuff..but basically he didnt knew anything. We sorta had a “LAN party” going on… well basically us 2 guys sitting on a couch, eating chips and playing gw2. He started of..like it always is with making a char. He went for a norn warrior.. cause he likes big, heavy armored, heavy armed and imposing chars and norn warrior was basically perfect for him. I went offline and watched him playing. He started of with the tutorial like any new char, got the message with the movement and went “fair enough, that shouldnt be too bad”, clicked it away and started walking about a bit to get used to the way his norn moves. He also tried that 1 skill he got a few times and went “so thats it then? Hitting? Kay” and followed the other npcs up to the wild hunt thingy with the ice worms and started hitting away. It was quite obvios that he didnt feel good while doing it, basically just the 3 hit combo over and over and that was about it. As the big worm popped up he went “oh boy thats a big one” and went hitting it. He didnt watch his health cause he probably figured its just the tutorial and its impossible to die…and oh boy he was right. The worm eventually got him with that knockback attack and hit him down to 1 hp and before he could stand up he got hit again to no effect. “Hey, im immortal? Is that a glitch?” he asked. Me not knowing anything about the NPE cept that annoying arrow thingy in the top couldnt say anything to it. Eventually he healed up and killed off the worm. Got his lvl up, the 2nd skill and another weapon and went “cool, new weapon, lets see if we cant double weild that”. Then looked up in the options the button to bring up the hero panel and took a look into his empty wardrobe, minies and stuff before eventually looking into the equipment tab. He tried to pull the new weapon into the off hand and got obviosly no 2nd weapon in his hands. “what the hell? I got the weapon, its a lvl 1 weapon, i should be able to use it” he said before sighing and dragging the better weapon onto the main hand and the other one he got from the start on his off hand. He then started off with that norn tutorial zone and did some hearts (that i explained him to be basically quests). He wasnt all that hyped…even with the fast level ups you could see that he clearly didnt feel powerfull, he even murmured something about “yea, afterall ima noob, why did i expect” sometime as he did the quests. I just sat there thinking that this was a LOT more satisfying sometime in the past. At lvl 7 he then finally got to use the off hand weapon and went like “bout kittening time” then looked to me and asked “hey. Is that game always that boring and slow? Where are all the epic things you told me about? Bro im lvl 7 and i got 4 attacks, the hell is that kitten?” I couldnt answer.. i was used to the “unlocking with using the weapon” way and i was sitting there puzzled and trying my hardest to understand wtf is going on here. By now he should have unlocked his weapon swap and figure out that he can pull off some nasty combos with 2 weapon sets.

He went on to lvl 10 after an hour or so and went to do the story but trailed off and wandered arround a bit in the norn city and saw some end game chars kittening about with a box of fun up by the trading post. He played a bit with the box and did a costume battle with the moa transform of the box. You could see he liked it, he had a smirk as he beat the living crap out of another guy with the slime transform. Even talked a bit to the lvl 80 guys, that he is new and likes how the game looks but that it feels rather boring atm. He got the obvios replys… but one of the guys gave him some gold and a 10 slot inventory box. “Hey, those guys are pretty cool” he went and there was the first time i was able to say that this is usually the norm for gw2. The community is friendly. Eventually he went on and took a look at the trading post and went " hmm.. thats pretty straight forward, but i doubt i need that right now anyways and went to do his story then. He left the story with lvl 11 and then ventured up to the wayfarer hills, up to the small settlement with the kids who play with the snowballs where i waited for him to help him level. I meanwhile figured out how to turn of the darn NPE “you better go check that out” arrow thingy. We killed the goat thingy in the event and that pretty much brought him to lvl 12 and his first skill, banner of defence. Man he had a smirk as he summoned it the first time and started using it as a melee weapon (its pretty funny to beat critters to death with a banner, gotta agree). “Man that took forever to unlock. But it seems now we get the game started” he said and stumbled then onto the traitline tree. " WHAT? Why cant i make a build? Not a single point to spend?" He said clearly annoyed and kept going, doing heart quests and stuff. Eventually the evening went over and he went home with his laptop. Didnt see him for some days, had stuff to do and met up with him to some coffee in town..like we usually do atleast once a week. I asked bout guild wars and hows it going there. He said that he uninstalled it again. It was too boring, not rewarding at all and he couldnt figure out how to make a build. I already took a good sip of the NPE meanwhile…so i knew his issues and just left it be with the theme…

The NPE may be ok for the new players, but the overall levelling system without getting explained how you get your traits for the level you have reached or when you discovered them to find out that you have to be level 80 to get them is totally koeienstront ( use google trans NL to your native language).

Strange as it may seem, developers and even management can have other motives besides profit. I imagine that ANet management and staff also cares about how well the game is received. They’ve certainly worked hard enough on it to warrant that kind of pride.

exp.3178:

The NPE may be ok for the new players, but the overall levelling system without getting explained how you get your traits for the level you have reached or when you discovered them to find out that you have to be level 80 to get them is totally koeienstront ( use google trans NL to your native language).

Wow, is the NEW player experience focused on NEW players, who could have known that?

It is actually more explained now how you get your traits than it was before. Before you had to find the profession trainers and buy a random book (without any actual information) now you can just press the trait you might be interested in and it tells you EXACTLY what you must do in order to get it.

lordkrall.7241:

It is actually more explained now how you get your traits than it was before. Before you had to find the profession trainers and buy a random book (without any actual information) now you can just press the trait you might be interested in and it tells you EXACTLY what you must do in order to get it.

I seem to remember being notified that I qualified for traits when they unlocked under the old system. Also, my profession trainer had a book over his head. In fact, he was standing there in Queensdale before I even qualified to get the first trait. Since I looked, I knew what I was doing when the prompt came to say I could use traits.

Compare that to, “Find the grand chest in the Ship of Sorrows.” The prompt shows a PoI in the general vicinity. It took me some time and a visit to a third party sight to find the actual Ship. So much for EXACTLY.

Since all of the old traits were gained from books sold by trainers, you had to learn where to go once. Now, there are 65 different prompts, and some are better than others. Some are far from precise.

All i’ll say, i have 80% less fun exploring the world as veteran, because I know, all good things as skins come from Gem store, and that’s why i avoid playing the game as Arena Net imagined, sad story is.. why play game if you can buy things with cash.. Plain stupid if you ask me, because all we have right now ….. .“COME N**BS WE HAVE MONEY PURCHASE IF YOU CAN’T DO STUFF AND GRIND 5 HOURS FOR IT”…

That’s exactly how it feels… we shifted to “disabled” mode of playing MMO… sadly it’s true, they know, we know.. every1 knows that this should not happen.. and that’s why THIS game will NEVER have competition play.. because game is TO EASY..

But some will say… BUT Fire… we have lvl50 fractals, dungeons.. and bla bla.. we do.. but what does that bring to you? 1 month of joy and then you are bored to death and grind them just because you have nothing better to do..

ANDDDD then again we have those who will always say… “BUT Fire… why not play for fun?”… well definition of fun is something you define… i find my fun on my own way..

well just my personal opinion take it or leave it.. i don’t like PvE simply because what it has became.. 90% of us that go from PvP to PvE.. care only for rewards.. why would you ever go to PvE.. to see how sexy new nature look is?? Yeah right.. or play Living story?

Well couldn’t care less…