Guild Wars 2

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-07-03-its-unlikely-guild-wars-2-will-ever-get-an-expansion-pack

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“So right now we’re not really looking at expansions as an option,” lead content designer Mike Zadorojny told me on his visit to London last week."

“It’s something that’s on the table but it’s not something we’re focused on, because what we want to do is – our idea here is that with Living World, we can do what expansions would have done but do it on a more regular basis.”

Interesting thoughts, and I agree with it. Expansions by nature for most MMOs are additions of content.

But no game in the history has experimented with content like Living Story churns out, so it only makes sense that Living Story would be considered an expansion, only that Living Story provides content gradually while an expansion provides content all of a sudden

“But what about making money? Guild Wars 1 survived on paid expansions, editions, add-ons, whatever you want to call them – are we to believe that the boxed sales of Guild Wars 2 and micro-transactions are enough to sustain such a large operation?

“Yes,” responded Zadorojny. “It absolutely is enough.”

And you guys wonder why they keep making RNG boxes? It sells. I say continue on with that trend.

My gripe with only focusing on fast paced live story content is the amount of QA (Quality Assurance) that goes into each update. The faster you push out content, maps, weapons, armor, etc. the less time you have polish, review, etc. The idea is great, but the product might not be up to par with what they are promising. Take for example players receiving all the dragon helms a week before the finale. A huge bug that got through, something that isn’t as common in slower paced updates. Also note the accidental achievement section ((DELETE ME!!)) that found its way through to the live client. They are working very fast paced and have increased workloads. Broken Content isn’t good content. As players, we shouldn’t be the “ultimate” testers. We want to enjoy the content that the game has promised us. People who take up the testing role should be doing that, not us.

From what Mike Zadorojny says in this interview, we will see expansion type content rolling out with the Living Story – that the 4 Living World teams are a fraction of their development force and they have large feature teams as well.

This is spectacular!!!

Eh. If that’s the case then I’d really like to see them focus more on adding new zones, which is the main reason I’ve been hoping for an expansion. Real zones too, not half-arsed ones like SSC. Likewise, I would accept a complete overhaul of certain existing zones (so that they’re practically new zones), like Orr.

My enjoyment comes from alts and map completion and right now there’s a definite dead end to that content, especially with no expansion. I really don’t care much for what they’ve done with the Living Story so far and I hate all this temporary content.

What I’ve loved about expansions in the past is getting 3 or 4 new zones open and released at once. It really was a breath of fresh air, and gave me a new perspective on the game as an adventurer, rather then just re-visiting old zones with slightly different mobs.

The problem, I think, with the living story updates is that there’s no real ground breaking change. It’s like 1 small area, a couple of small events and then waiting a couple of weeks until the next update. There’s no brand new sweeping forests to explore, or new towns or villages, or no new castles/mountains/jungles. And for me that makes the new content just seem a bit hollow.

An expansion would change everything.

Believe me, I don’t mind the RNG boxes at all. I’ve defended them in the past, and place the blame firmly on the shoulders of the players who can’t control their buying impulses. Many of whom are adults, by the way, so this isn’t even an age thing. Anyway, I digress…

I can’t exactly say i’m on board with this larger plan.

I love expansions because they represent a whole, large infusion of content. There’s just a lot at once, and they have the liberty to change major things. Entire quest lines, new classes, new abilities, new continents, a whole revamped trait system, skill system, etc.

This little trickle of content is currently nowhere near that of an expansion, even if you add it all together. If you consider what permanent content has stayed in GW2 from release till now… does it even equal half an expansion if all added up? I seem to recall the words “whole expansion worth of content” used in a ANet post describing these patches long ago, which I assume must be a bad joke. 0 new skills, 0 new classes, 1 new map. Same 3 WvW maps, same 1 sPvP mode. The only significant (again, permanent) additions are a few sPvP maps, fractals, guild missions and a WvW trait line. The rest of the gigantic patch notes have been 1) temporary content, 2) balance changes, and 3) bug fixes. Even the new items (ascended) were added in an extremely lazy manner (i.e. plopping them all into one vendor for daily completions) – I would’ve loved to see these tied into some rare world boss drops, some rare dungeon drops, with names befitting where they come from.

I love the frequent content of course, I do all the living story things, I like it! I show my appreciation through paying a self imposed sub fee by purchasing gems, and want these to continue. However, I stress that none of this matches the feel of an expansion. Not even close. These 2 week patches have not yet scratched the surface of content i’d want in an expansion. Can you imagine one of these patches releasing a new class? Can you picture one releasing Elona, or Cantha? I can’t even imagine it without a proper boxed expansion, which I would be more than happy to pay for. If this is written out of GW2’s future, that would really make me a lot less optimistic about this game.

Sephius.2876:

What I’ve loved about expansions in the past is getting 3 or 4 new zones open and released at once. It really was a breath of fresh air, and gave me a new perspective on the game as an adventurer, rather then just re-visiting old zones with slightly different mobs.

The problem, I think, with the living story updates is that there’s no real ground breaking change. It’s like 1 small area, a couple of small events and then waiting a couple of weeks until the next update. There’s no brand new sweeping forests to explore, or new towns or villages, or no new castles/mountains/jungles. And for me that makes the new content just seem a bit hollow.

An expansion would change everything.

+1

I’d like to add that it would be nice if Anet struck a balance between the two, expansions and living story. Throw us an expac here and there, but keep the living story thing going as well but maybe with not the intensity we are now seeing. All I am saying is maybe sacrificing expansion packs on the altar of living story isn’t a good idea. Like you, I need new zones, dungeons too… permanent ones.

Sephius.2876:

What I’ve loved about expansions in the past is getting 3 or 4 new zones open and released at once. It really was a breath of fresh air, and gave me a new perspective on the game as an adventurer, rather then just re-visiting old zones with slightly different mobs.

The problem, I think, with the living story updates is that there’s no real ground breaking change. It’s like 1 small area, a couple of small events and then waiting a couple of weeks until the next update. There’s no brand new sweeping forests to explore, or new towns or villages, or no new castles/mountains/jungles. And for me that makes the new content just seem a bit hollow.

An expansion would change everything.

It is unreasonable to expect a new map every 2 weeks.

As the interview stated, the Living Story team that is rolling out these ‘episodes’ is pretty small, compared with the backbone team that is working on entirely different content. This different content could be new maps, races, dungeons, skills, e.t.c.

And that different content can be rolled through the Living Story in some way.

I agree, ever since they started off with the Molten Living Story, it’s been small. But that could change in, say August, if (speculation) they decide to release the Tengu race through Living Story. They could release 3-4 maps along with that, as well as two new dungeons.

Right now, Guild Wars 2 is new, it’s thriving and players are still eager to see what’s around the corner. But with any game, newness wears off and quality content that is new is what keeps players biting. Throwing in fast paced content I think will only deter a good portion of players. Especially when new large MMOs come out to the playing field.

Just because they are releasing content every two weeks doesn’t mean its attracting. Kind of like Call of Duty updates, new maps with the same objective, after awhile new maps don’t matter because the mechanics are the same. That’s why that franchise is in a rapid 1 year game release, to change things up. Even then they have a hard time adding new exciting features.

All I’m trying to say is, games that last are the ones with quality content. That’s what an expansion is all about, a large amount of content that is released like a new game. It’s been pounded with QA and has new voice overs, mechanics, themes, etc.

It also creates a “bandwagon” of players who are hopping from one content to the next, following the speed train of content, whats left from previous updates is deserted maps, lonely mini games, etc. I think many players are all ready caught up in this, including myself. Trying to slam all these achievements out so I can be ready for this next slew of content. It creates a fast burnout on players. I would rather be able to take my time and enjoy content at ease.

I take that as very bad news. So basically, the game is finished? The living story updates have so far been a little lacking, mostly veiled attempts to get the players to go back to older content that they have already completed. If no expansions are planned I don’t really see any future for the game as the living story is not going to carry it unless they make some major improvements to what they have been releasing so far.

They can say whatever they want. We already know NCSoft expects them to release expansions and that one is in the works and well on its way. And since NCSoft is in charge what they say goes.

ShiningSquirrel.3751:

I take that as very bad news. So basically, the game is finished? The living story updates have so far been a little lacking, mostly veiled attempts to get the players to go back to older content that they have already completed. If no expansions are planned I don’t really see any future for the game as the living story is not going to carry it unless they make some major improvements to what they have been releasing so far.

Read the link dude. There is a whole bunch of other people/teams working behind the scenes that have no part with the current Living Story team right now, but that content could be pushed in as Living Story content.

Another way you can look at the interview, which unfortunately a lot are not, is that they have multiple teams creating content, and based on the interview the living story team is just a small part of the big teams, the point being that the living story team could the living story as a vehicle to drive new maps.

Honestly, though I do thing they will release new expansions. Expansion is a way to reset the game somewhat and bring back players and it is an ez way to make money while still support living story. Actually, it would be nice if the living story were used to replace dynamic events making it longer or zone wide.

Wow. Black Lion Trader must be doing better than I thought, if they are willing to forgo the expansions. The expansions were a major money maker for GW1, and I would have assumed would be just as big of one here in this game.

I’m actually curious how that will work out. I have no ill feelings towards the idea, and in fact find it kind of exciting.

I don’t think fixing signs and setting fire to effigies alongside temporary dungeons and RNG boxes is going to keep this boat afloat much longer. They’d better have something big up their sleeves. Like, maybe, norn-sized inflatable armbands.

Vol.5241:

It is unreasonable to expect a new map every 2 weeks.

The 2-week schedule is something Anet has imposed upon themselves. I can’t say I’ve read very many endorsements of that schedule either, most people seem to feel it’s too much and I agree with them.

I would personally prefer more of a 4-8 week schedule with ‘beefier’ content instead of run around for a week spamming “F” on objects, grinding mobs for achievements, and maybe a 5 minute story instance. It feels like filler with no real substance or enjoyment. I don’t want or need that every 2 weeks.

I’d like to see the Crystal Desert, Far Shiverpeaks, the rest of Maguma, and Ring of Fire. I’d also like to see more done with the other Elder Dragons, better-designed meta events, new (permanent) dungeons, more dynamic Dynamic Events and a variety of new/different/exciting skins. There’s been nothing to say that Living Story updates won’t add any of these things over time. I hope they will.

Lane.3410:

Eh. If that’s the case then I’d really like to see them focus more on adding new zones, which is the main reason I’ve been hoping for an expansion. Real zones too, not half-arsed ones like SSC. Likewise, I would accept a complete overhaul of certain existing zones (so that they’re practically new zones), like Orr.

My enjoyment comes from alts and map completion and right now there’s a definite dead end to that content, especially with no expansion. I really don’t care much for what they’ve done with the Living Story so far and I hate all this temporary content.

Actually new zones as part of the future of living story is mentioned here

Along with things like permanent destruction of parts of the world, dungeon overhauls, etc.

It sounds like they have some really elaborate plans for what they would like to do, and where they would like to go, with the living story…

….and I plan to be along for every step of that wild, crazy (buggy) ride!

ZudetGambeous.9573:

They can say whatever they want. We already know NCSoft expects them to release expansions and that one is in the works and well on its way. And since NCSoft is in charge what they say goes.

If there’s one thing that’s true about business, it’s that things change. If ANet’s business plan is producing the revenue hinted at in the article, I could see NCSoft signing off on it despite what may have been said in the past.

Lane.3410:

I would personally prefer more of a 4-8 week schedule

I agree with this, although I won’t harp on this. I trust ANet knows what schedule they can stick to, and what works best for their cycle.

I certainly am not resisting the 2 week schedule, only hoping that it doesn’t mean an endless stream of small, temporary content. I’d want to see building block changes – new zones, new classes, new skills, new maps (www). Of course we’re only 10 months in, so i’m not saying these are due, only that I hope these are not being neglected in lieu of another temporary “kill 300 of these bad guys” event.

Does this mean that full dragons and continents will be released in these updates eventually? If so, then that makes me so happy!
If this means that we will never see other dragons or continents then it makes me very unhappy.
Oh well, we’ll see how it goes

This, if it turns into the way things shall be, will mean an endless series of hastily cobbled together, poorly plotted, un-QA’d, marginal quality updates with a lot of shinies to get through quickly, but little larger substance.

We’ll never see the remaining 2/3rds of the core game: Elona and Cantha – as those are too big to plop into a bi-weekly update.

I remember as a kid reading comics, and a certain publisher Eclipse, putting out a title ‘Airboy’ decided its grand independent publisher move would be to shift titles to a biweekly schedule.

- Writing and art suffered. We started seeing guest artists who looked like ‘interns’ getting issues, and writers who looked like ‘the guy who ran our D&D sessions last week’ writing the stories…

Any hope of larger plot changes was lost.

Expansions are needed – they give space for the HUGE changes, the world shakers. Like adding a whole continent back in.

There is nothing about an “expansion” that particularly interests me. And, the threat of a level cap increase makes it more a subject of dread. I like the idea of evolving a living world—that seems more like the way worlds evolve and less cataclysmic (pun intended).

And, rather than a two week release schedule, I vote for one that has a chance to produce quality content, say, a 2-3 month development cycle.

Vol.5241:

“But what about making money? Guild Wars 1 survived on paid expansions, editions, add-ons, whatever you want to call them – are we to believe that the boxed sales of Guild Wars 2 and micro-transactions are enough to sustain such a large operation?

“Yes,” responded Zadorojny. “It absolutely is enough.”

And you guys wonder why they keep making RNG boxes? It sells. I say continue on with that trend.

GW1 didn’t have the Queen of Greed leading the monetization department.

…which is funny because NCSoft released a statement 2 months ago on how ArenaNet was currently working on an expansion set for the holiday season/early 2014.

Without expansions….does that mean we won’t get new classes or skills? My god the skills are getting really old by now. Especially when many classes have weapons that they all avoid.

Tolmos.8395:

Wow. Black Lion Trader must be doing better than I thought, if they are willing to forgo the expansions. The expansions were a major money maker for GW1, and I would have assumed would be just as big of one here in this game.

Different age o gaming. EQ2 expansions sold off the shelf during pre-order when GW1 was out. Now, it too, is F2P with a sub and RL marketplace. Once Sony sheds the Sub to keep up with games like GW2 there won’t be much of a difference.

Kichwas.7152:

This, if it turns into the way things shall be, will mean an endless series of hastily cobbled together, poorly plotted, un-QA’d, marginal quality updates with a lot of shinies to get through quickly, but little larger substance.

We’ll never see the remaining 2/3rds of the core game: Elona and Cantha – as those are too big to plop into a bi-weekly update.

insert buzzer sound here Wrong!

They could easily have 1 team (or more) set aside to work on a ‘larger’ content piece to be released down the road, while other teams work on the smaller arc stories. Development involves a lot of planning, including future planning. for things just like this. Its not ‘develop, push. develop, push’ That doesn’t work, and if that was how they actually did it, the content we got be a heck of a lot more buggy than it is.

Agile development → many small, collaborative teams working as cohesive whole.

Yes, each piece has some bugs, the majority of which are small and easily overlooked in testing. Kitten, my development team has 2 testers, the company we contract for has a fricking FLEET of testers (QAs) and kitten still slips through, even with thorough testing scenarios. (Some of those documents are frippin novels, and downright intimidating!) Its just not possible to think of every out of the box possibility that someone else might have.

Sort of off topic there, anyway, the point is you can easily do ‘large scale’ projects along with the small. In fact, in most agile environments, that large piece will be broken down into many many smaller subtasks, spread out across multiple sprints, each component receiving its own testing, along with full functional and integration testing once the whole thing is done, after which is could be rolled out. I’ve seen it done, I’ve done it myself. Its completely doable.

Zindrix.1750:

Without expansions….does that mean we won’t get new classes or skills? My god the skills are getting really old by now. Especially when many classes have weapons that they all avoid.

It helps to read the article

A Looking For Group tool will be “slipped” into a Living World update when it’s ready, and something as significant as a new character profession could too – an example he used with a heavy “not that we’re talking about this” caveat.

Of course that can be taken two ways, that they are not yet talking about it or that they are and are technically not allowed to talk to the press about it.

Conncept.7638:

Vol.5241:

“But what about making money? Guild Wars 1 survived on paid expansions, editions, add-ons, whatever you want to call them – are we to believe that the boxed sales of Guild Wars 2 and micro-transactions are enough to sustain such a large operation?

“Yes,” responded Zadorojny. “It absolutely is enough.”

And you guys wonder why they keep making RNG boxes? It sells. I say continue on with that trend.

GW1 didn’t have the Queen of Greed leading the monetization department.

Dwayna forbid a corporation operates with the allure of making money…

I don’t mind the lack of expansions as long as the “expansion-worthy content” gets put into Living Story.

Stuff like full new zones, new skills, new races, new classes, new weapons (not new skins, I’m talking completely new weapon types like flails, land-usable spears) ect. If they can incorporate that sort of thing into Living Story somehow, then no expansions will be 100% fine by me.

The problem there is that so far we’ve seen not even a hint of anything like that. The closest thing to “expansion grade content” we’ve gotten thus far is probably Southsun Cove or maybe fractals. And Southsun, while it is a new zone, is also very lacking compared to previous zones, so even that’s a stretch. Everything else has been a bit of story content, a limited time dungeon or two, skill tweaks… all more in the realm of standard monthly content than anything huge.

I guess we’ll have to see if they can incorporate more content like that in the future to see if I still think a proper expansion is needed.

Zindrix.1750:

Without expansions….does that mean we won’t get new classes or skills? My god the skills are getting really old by now. Especially when many classes have weapons that they all avoid.

This is what I am really worried about right now. In a few months I will have a level 80 of every class. The part I enjoy the most right now is playing different classes, it seems there might never be any new classes or races with the living story.

This new content every two weeks is nice and all…but I am ready for something a little more meatier then go press F 200 times in different places for a new backpack skin. And a dungeon that leaves long before it gets old. Why put the effort into something that shows up for such a short time. SAB stayed for a whole month (and again was removed long before I was finished with it. It REALLY needed to stay permanently).

If we aren’t going to be getting real expansions, can we start working new races and classes into the game on a rotation? Like we get a new race and class and 6 months later we get another race and class?

Electro.4173:

I don’t mind the lack of expansions as long as the “expansion-worthy content” gets put into Living Story.

Stuff like full new zones, new skills, new races, new classes, new weapons (not new skins, I’m talking completely new weapon types like flails, land-usable spears) ect. If they can incorporate that sort of thing into Living Story somehow, then no expansions will be 100% fine by me.

The problem there is that so far we’ve seen not even a hint of anything like that. The closest thing to “expansion grade content” we’ve gotten thus far is probably Southsun Cove or maybe fractals. And Southsun, while it is a new zone, is also very lacking compared to previous zones, so even that’s a stretch. Everything else has been a bit of story content, a limited time dungeon or two, skill tweaks… all more in the realm of standard monthly content than anything huge.

I guess we’ll have to see if they can incorporate more content like that in the future to see if I still think a proper expansion is needed.

Let’s look at the alternative.

-GW2 releases in August.
-We get no new content at all, except for holiday events
-GW2 releases an expansion 10 months from release

I don’t know about you but I think a game as detailed as GW2 would not have an expansion in under a year. So I’m not sure why you expect Anet to release an ‘expansion’ worth of content in that span. I’d like Anet to do it, but I don’t expect them.

lockheedlight.5910:

Zindrix.1750:

Without expansions….does that mean we won’t get new classes or skills? My god the skills are getting really old by now. Especially when many classes have weapons that they all avoid.

This is what I am really worried about right now. In a few months I will have a level 80 of every class. The part I enjoy the most right now is playing different classes, it seems there might never be any new classes or races with the living story.

This new content every two weeks is nice and all…but I am ready for something a little more meatier then go press F 200 times in different places for a new backpack skin. And a dungeon that leaves long before it gets old. Why put the effort into something that shows up for such a short time. SAB stayed for a whole month (and again was removed long before I was finished with it. It REALLY needed to stay permanently).

If we aren’t going to be getting real expansions, can we start working new races and classes into the game on a rotation? Like we get a new race and class and 6 months later we get another race and class?

If you are in this game solely because you want to lvl all classes to 80 then you’re going to run out of time in this game. It’s unfair to expect Anet to release a whole plethora of new classes just to satisfy you alt-o-holics. 1-2 new classes is fine, but another set is too demanding.

Raine.1394:

There is nothing about an “expansion” that particularly interests me. And, the threat of a level cap increase makes it more a subject of dread. I like the idea of evolving a living world—that seems more like the way worlds evolve and less cataclysmic (pun intended).

And, rather than a two week release schedule, I vote for one that has a chance to produce quality content, say, a 2-3 month development cycle.

Haha, I can totally agree with what you’re saying the level cap increase. I’d go so far as to say I want all an expansion brings MINUS, as you most awesomely put it, a dreaded level cap increase.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

Kichwas.7152:

This, if it turns into the way things shall be, will mean an endless series of hastily cobbled together, poorly plotted, un-QA’d, marginal quality updates with a lot of shinies to get through quickly, but little larger substance.

We’ll never see the remaining 2/3rds of the core game: Elona and Cantha – as those are too big to plop into a bi-weekly update.

insert buzzer sound here Wrong!

They could easily have 1 team (or more) set aside to work on a ‘larger’ content piece to be released down the road, while other teams work on the smaller arc stories. Development involves a lot of planning, including future planning. for things just like this. Its not ‘develop, push. develop, push’ That doesn’t work, and if that was how they actually did it, the content we got be a heck of a lot more buggy than it is.

Agile development -> many small, collaborative teams working as cohesive whole.

Look at the messy and small scale nature of what we have gotten and it is exactly how it’s been working. develop → push → develop → push → etc…

Fit me an entire continent with as many zones as the FULL current game has, into this plan…

That’s just Elona. Now do it again for Cantha.

And that is just to get us back to the size of the core GW1 world…

- Can you really imagine putting those in, one zone at a time? Or even half a zone like Southsun…?

That’d be an even worse mess.

Either you leave large empty gaps and come back to them, or it suffers from ‘empires of the small’ – each zone being abnormally small and unusually focused on just one event theme, with odd gates to keep people from walking just outside the village gates…

Zindrix.1750:

Without expansions….does that mean we won’t get new classes or skills? My god the skills are getting really old by now. Especially when many classes have weapons that they all avoid.

Wouldn’t the solution to this be making all weapons desirable, instead of just adding more skills, 90% of which won’t be used?

Also, this may not be the case. For example, when they release an area, the culture or the race in that area (I’m looking at you, Tengu and the Dominion of the Four Winds) might have a profession that isn’t practiced in the game currently, and so the player might be able to ‘learn’ that profession to unlock it. Same with weapons and profession skills.

Vol.5241:

Electro.4173:

I don’t mind the lack of expansions as long as the “expansion-worthy content” gets put into Living Story.

Stuff like full new zones, new skills, new races, new classes, new weapons (not new skins, I’m talking completely new weapon types like flails, land-usable spears) ect. If they can incorporate that sort of thing into Living Story somehow, then no expansions will be 100% fine by me.

The problem there is that so far we’ve seen not even a hint of anything like that. The closest thing to “expansion grade content” we’ve gotten thus far is probably Southsun Cove or maybe fractals. And Southsun, while it is a new zone, is also very lacking compared to previous zones, so even that’s a stretch. Everything else has been a bit of story content, a limited time dungeon or two, skill tweaks… all more in the realm of standard monthly content than anything huge.

I guess we’ll have to see if they can incorporate more content like that in the future to see if I still think a proper expansion is needed.

Let’s look at the alternative.

-GW2 releases in August.
-We get no new content at all, except for holiday events
-GW2 releases an expansion 10 months from release

I don’t know about you but I think a game as detailed as GW2 would not have an expansion in under a year. So I’m not sure why you expect Anet to release an ‘expansion’ worth of content in that span. I’d like Anet to do it, but I don’t expect them.

I’m not saying I’d expect an expansion already if they were doing that model, nor that I expect all of what I listed to be in the game already.

Just worried that we’ve barely seen anything of that caliber at all thus far, especially if they’re going to use Living Story as their only real means of updating the game. Not saying its all doom and gloom either yet, just saying hopefully we’ll start to see more signifigant additions going forward to the near future. They have said they’re just getting into the “groove” as far as Living Story goes, so maybe along with that will come a greater amount of expansion-grade content as well.

If they do this right, it will be pure win imho. I always disliked how expansions worked for MMO. All of a sudden you would get 15+ new zones, dungeones, etc… ad because of that, zones in before expansion will be left to die for a period of time.
If they can do this, it will add sandbox element to the game, just like EvE, which I think is awesome.

And best thing I read in that interview, is that living world team will have 3-4 motnhs to make new content compared to 6-8 weeks they had untill now is quite reassuring.

I really dislike the way they talk about living world being so great. It’s a bit like a car salesman or something. They only think it’s great because it promotes gem store sales which fills their pockets with money.

The original reason they said they wanted to go with no sub fee is because that way, the players can vote with their wallets on what types of stuff they like and don’t like. The idea is that it would force them to strive for excellence in order to please the customers. In some ways, this vision has been clouded. Rather than trying to find the very best quality of package they can sell us, they are looking for some ideal middle ground where they can earn a quick buck without breaking a sweat.

Now that I’ve heard about them having multiple teams working on different living story releases, I think what the problem might be is some of those teams just have more talent than others. I think whichever team did halloween and SAB has the most talent. I can’t wait for their releases. The dragon bash team… eh, not so much.

I’m sure if Anet is reading this they are laughing because they know who’s on each team, and it would be my foot in my mouth if it happened to be the same team, but just got lazy. Lol.

Hopefully people read the whole article rather than jumping to conclusions at the title.

If it works out like they are hoping then I think it will be fantastic.

However, sometimes great ideas on paper don’t work out so well in practice.

Kichwas.7152:

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

Kichwas.7152:

This, if it turns into the way things shall be, will mean an endless series of hastily cobbled together, poorly plotted, un-QA’d, marginal quality updates with a lot of shinies to get through quickly, but little larger substance.

We’ll never see the remaining 2/3rds of the core game: Elona and Cantha – as those are too big to plop into a bi-weekly update.

insert buzzer sound here Wrong!

They could easily have 1 team (or more) set aside to work on a ‘larger’ content piece to be released down the road, while other teams work on the smaller arc stories. Development involves a lot of planning, including future planning. for things just like this. Its not ‘develop, push. develop, push’ That doesn’t work, and if that was how they actually did it, the content we got be a heck of a lot more buggy than it is.

Agile development -> many small, collaborative teams working as cohesive whole.

Look at the messy and small scale nature of what we have gotten and it is exactly how it’s been working. develop -> push -> develop -> push -> etc…

Fit me an entire continent with as many zones as the FULL current game has, into this plan…

That’s just Elona. Now do it again for Cantha.

And that is just to get us back to the size of the core GW1 world…

- Can you really imagine putting those in, one zone at a time? Or even half a zone like Southsun…?

That’d be an even worse mess.

Either you leave large empty gaps and come back to them, or it suffers from ‘empires of the small’ – each zone being abnormally small and unusually focused on just one event theme, with odd gates to keep people from walking just outside the village gates…

If you really think they are doing strait develop →push, then you truly have no idea how development is worked. If you think the minor issues they’ve had with the small scale are bad, you have no idea what you would see if they did do straight develop→push without any sort of QA work.

Also, they wouldn’t have to fit an entire continent into a single release necessarily. The story arcs could lead you through one zone (or even 2) at a time. A single story doesn’t have to open the whole of Cantha, or Elona. There are a lot of ways to go about it.

Besides, how do you know they don’t have a team of 5 or 6 people completely dedicated to creating Cantha (or Elona) for later release. This again goes back to development planning, and they have stated that they have the next year planned out already. We have no idea how much they are working on, how far ahead the development is vs release. Everything they want to do is very doable.

This just killed a bunch of my excitement for the future of this game.

We’re never going to visit Elona or Cantha now. Any future Dragons will likely be killed off cheaply if we even get to fight them at all.

I’m tired of fighting unrelated side stories that feel like filler. What happened to the other dragons?!

Thorn.7963:

This just killed a bunch of my excitement for the future of this game.

We’re never going to visit Elona or Cantha now. Any future Dragons will likely be killed off cheaply if we even get to fight them at all.

I’m tired of fighting unrelated side stories that feel like filler. What happened to the other dragons?!

^ didn’t read article

Vol.5241:

Thorn.7963:

This just killed a bunch of my excitement for the future of this game.

We’re never going to visit Elona or Cantha now. Any future Dragons will likely be killed off cheaply if we even get to fight them at all.

I’m tired of fighting unrelated side stories that feel like filler. What happened to the other dragons?!

^ didn’t read article

I’m actually thinking a lot of people didn’t actually read it, and even many that did don’t understand that everything they are talking about doing is completely doable.

Thorn.7963:

This just killed a bunch of my excitement for the future of this game.

We’re never going to visit Elona or Cantha now. Any future Dragons will likely be killed off cheaply if we even get to fight them at all.

I’m tired of fighting unrelated side stories that feel like filler. What happened to the other dragons?!

So, why wouldn’t we see Elona or Cantha?

Vol.5241:

Thorn.7963:

This just killed a bunch of my excitement for the future of this game.

We’re never going to visit Elona or Cantha now. Any future Dragons will likely be killed off cheaply if we even get to fight them at all.

I’m tired of fighting unrelated side stories that feel like filler. What happened to the other dragons?!

^ didn’t read article

Yes I did. The living story has been extremely underwhelming.

Thorn.7963:

This just killed a bunch of my excitement for the future of this game.

We’re never going to visit Elona or Cantha now. Any future Dragons will likely be killed off cheaply if we even get to fight them at all.

I’m tired of fighting unrelated side stories that feel like filler. What happened to the other dragons?!

1. Why not? Southsun was introduced. If they got people working on things outside of the Living Story, there isn’t anything to say they can’t or won’t be working on these places.

2. I’d argue it’s better to try things out and gain feedback on unrelated filler than major world plot points such as the Dragons. I mean, look how well received the Zhaitan fight was.

Thorn.7963:

Vol.5241:

Thorn.7963:

This just killed a bunch of my excitement for the future of this game.

We’re never going to visit Elona or Cantha now. Any future Dragons will likely be killed off cheaply if we even get to fight them at all.

I’m tired of fighting unrelated side stories that feel like filler. What happened to the other dragons?!

^ didn’t read article

Yes I did. The living story has been extremely underwhelming.

Well I’m sorry that you expect boatloads of content every 2 weeks and that you would rather prefer to pay for another box for new content when the alternative is to have 2 weeks of new content and every now and then get hammered with new maps, classes and items maybe once or twice a year.