Guild Wars 2

Devata.6589:

VOLKON.1290:

So many words, so I’ll be brief.

Screw expansions.

Here’s the skinny. We know that there are now four teams working on Living Story content in four month cycles. That in itself is a lot. We also know that there are other teams working on the big, juicy stuff as well, things that take longer to refine and deliver. Things worthy of expansions. You all need to realize we’re getting the best of all worlds here… a constant influx of new content to do in between the big releases of major content. Look at games that rely on expansions. They toss you an expansion, you burn through it in a month and wait four or six months recycling the same old stuff waiting for the next release.

We’re getting a constant flow of new things to do while the “big” stuff is being developed. That works for me.

No you don’t get best of 2 worlds you get worse of 2 worlds. You get a F2P game that you payed for to play. To me thats the worse of to worlds.

I know what you mean.. whats the problem, a nice story leading up to content thats the same as an expansion. Sounds good I agree and they might indeed deliver the same amount of content. Thats not the issue here.

The problem for me (there are some other reasons for other people) is that you also have to think about the business behind it. I signed up for a B2P game because I do not like F2P game because of there focus on cash-shops (like the temporary content, but I will not go further into that now). So now Anet does not work with expansions they are focusing on the gem-store for income.

Thats my problem with it.

It’s not the idea of content overtime that leads to the same amount as a expansion would do. that by itself (forgetting the business behind it) would be fine. But there is a business behind it so we can’t forget about that.

Why is that a problem? There’s nothing at all in the cash shop that’s required to move through this game whatsoever. Nothing you can buy that makes you better, more powerful, etc. Just fluff. Yes, some pretty nice fluff, but fluff none-the-less.

I recall a predecessor MMO that I played once… I paid for the game then paid every month to play the game I paid for all the while waiting for the opportunity to pay for an expansion in order to get more content, and then when I did I didn’t get the full expansion, just releases every few months… months which I continued to pay extra for to play the part of the expansion that was released that I paid for to expand the content of the game that I paid for.

You want me to believe you’d rather have that scenario than to simply pay for the game and get access to all the content available (which is constantly being added on to) while being given the option to choose from a myriad of fluff items to buy only if you wish?

Really?

ObsiMoth.6342:

The reiterate what many have already said, people are displaying a ridiculous amount of impatience here. Typical MMO’s would take just as long as this to release any substantial content updates, and the 8 months that people like to bandy around is simply the amount of time ANet has had to develop such content. Expect to hear information towards the end of the year following the games anniversary, not before.

This thread was not started because Anet did not say nothing about an expansion yet and people became impatience. It was started because Anet said they are not planning only any expansion so far (not planning.. so thats also not working). Quotes from Mike Zadorojny for the reason this thread was started.

“So right now we’re not really looking at expansions as an option,”

“If we do this right,” “we will probably never do an expansion and everything will be going into this Living World strategy.”

Now there is this little bid of hope that they do not say anything about it because they want it to be a surprise.. But looking at how the game already is strongly focused on the gem-store thats not the most likely possibility.

Only other hope is they changed there idea’s before it destroys the game.

There are already many complains about temporary content so that helps a little but in the end the financial people won’t read that, they will look at the numbers and when they see a decline in players they first will think it’s just because of an external factor and then when they figure out they really need to change there idea’s it’s to late.

There is also another number they will look at and thats the gem-sales. Thats something people can have influence on.

VOLKON.1290:

Devata.6589:

VOLKON.1290:

So many words, so I’ll be brief.

Screw expansions.

Here’s the skinny. We know that there are now four teams working on Living Story content in four month cycles. That in itself is a lot. We also know that there are other teams working on the big, juicy stuff as well, things that take longer to refine and deliver. Things worthy of expansions. You all need to realize we’re getting the best of all worlds here… a constant influx of new content to do in between the big releases of major content. Look at games that rely on expansions. They toss you an expansion, you burn through it in a month and wait four or six months recycling the same old stuff waiting for the next release.

We’re getting a constant flow of new things to do while the “big” stuff is being developed. That works for me.

No you don’t get best of 2 worlds you get worse of 2 worlds. You get a F2P game that you payed for to play. To me thats the worse of to worlds.

I know what you mean.. whats the problem, a nice story leading up to content thats the same as an expansion. Sounds good I agree and they might indeed deliver the same amount of content. Thats not the issue here.

The problem for me (there are some other reasons for other people) is that you also have to think about the business behind it. I signed up for a B2P game because I do not like F2P game because of there focus on cash-shops (like the temporary content, but I will not go further into that now). So now Anet does not work with expansions they are focusing on the gem-store for income.

Thats my problem with it.

It’s not the idea of content overtime that leads to the same amount as a expansion would do. that by itself (forgetting the business behind it) would be fine. But there is a business behind it so we can’t forget about that.

Why is that a problem? There’s nothing at all in the cash shop that’s required to move through this game whatsoever. Nothing you can buy that makes you better, more powerful, etc. Just fluff. Yes, some pretty nice fluff, but fluff none-the-less.

I recall a predecessor MMO that I played once… I paid for the game then paid every month to play the game I paid for all the while waiting for the opportunity to pay for an expansion in order to get more content, and then when I did I didn’t get the full expansion, just releases every few months… months which I continued to pay extra for to play the part of the expansion that was released that I paid for to expand the content of the game that I paid for.

You want me to believe you’d rather have that scenario than to simply pay for the game and get access to all the content available (which is constantly being added on to) while being given the option to choose from a myriad of fluff items to buy only if you wish?

Really?

No really not as thats not what I am saying. I am not comparing it to an sub-scription based game and I also don’t play them. I am comparing B2P to F2P.

Whats bad about F2P.. or better whats bad about cash-shop focus. Well in the case of GW2 thats the temporary content. I don’t like temporary content thats there to pressure people to play and buy gems. I prefer a B2P game where I buy the game and expansions and then have always access to all the aspects of the game based on the fact that I did buy the game and the expansion. No temporary stuff to try and get me to play / buy gems. No currency-driven system because they want me to buy gems and convert it to gold in stead of farming mats. No game where decisions ingame are based on the question “how do we get people to buy gems” in stead of “how do we get the game to be so good people will also buy the expansions”.

You might not have a problem with gem-store focus, I do.

And you don’t have to compare it to an sub-based game as this thread is about the other option.. expansion based / B2P.

Its not remporary content its is but its not live story is it own little thing for people who like it when they add the temp stuff they normally add some perm stuff all diffrent for diffrent play styles and its awesome its adding the old rpg elemnt that people use to love sure you will miss out on some stuff but thats just the ingame persistant life. (and i really dont understand what i just typed neither)

Devata.6589:

VOLKON.1290:

So many words, so I’ll be brief.

Screw expansions.

Here’s the skinny. We know that there are now four teams working on Living Story content in four month cycles. That in itself is a lot. We also know that there are other teams working on the big, juicy stuff as well, things that take longer to refine and deliver. Things worthy of expansions. You all need to realize we’re getting the best of all worlds here… a constant influx of new content to do in between the big releases of major content. Look at games that rely on expansions. They toss you an expansion, you burn through it in a month and wait four or six months recycling the same old stuff waiting for the next release.

We’re getting a constant flow of new things to do while the “big” stuff is being developed. That works for me.

No you don’t get best of 2 worlds you get worse of 2 worlds. You get a F2P game that you payed for to play. To me thats the worse of to worlds.

I know what you mean.. whats the problem, a nice story leading up to content thats the same as an expansion. Sounds good I agree and they might indeed deliver the same amount of content. Thats not the issue here.

The problem for me (there are some other reasons for other people) is that you also have to think about the business behind it. I signed up for a B2P game because I do not like F2P game because of there focus on cash-shops (like the temporary content, but I will not go further into that now). So now Anet does not work with expansions they are focusing on the gem-store for income.

Thats my problem with it.

It’s not the idea of content overtime that leads to the same amount as a expansion would do. that by itself (forgetting the business behind it) would be fine. But there is a business behind it so we can’t forget about that.

Thing is the business mode isnt strictly speaking the players business its the company’s. We knew there was going to be a cash shop and we knew whakittens going to sell. Nothing changed there. P2P, B2P or F2P is not a contract that guarantees you’ll find certain things in the game and not others. Essentailly every P2P game (definitely the big ones) eventually introduced a cash shop for example. What would you say there? people have the impression that paying a subscription + box sale gives you everything and now suddenly hmm nope there are extras you can buy. Is that some sort of betrayal by the company on a previous agreed conduct? Not at all. There is no agreement just cause you invested in their business model. They’re free to monetize the game any way they want. Gw2 Cash shop is one of the best implementations. Nothing thats essential and if you cant afford real money you can still get everything though just playing.

Dont base your entire perception on what you believe they’re going to do based on their business model choices base it on the actions they do because after all like I already pointed out before, if they sell an expansion it doesnt mean they’ll not be cash shop focused at the same time and like wise just cause they’re cash shop focused it doesnt mean they will not do whats best for the game. Again pointing at WoW, thats a subscription MMO yet for a while they sold vanity pets / mounts… people were okey with that since for the most part it didnt impact the game… indirectly it allowed for RMT but anyhow…. now they’re gonna start selling XP boosts and Lesser Charms that can be converted into Elder charms that essentially give you extra loot from high level bosses. Players are calling that Pay to Win. So once again a certain business model does not protect you from the stuff you hate of other business models. The business model itself is meaningless in this regard in my opinion. Its what they do that really counts.

Devata.6589:

No really not as thats not what I am saying. I am not comparing it to an sub-scription based game and I also don’t play them. I am comparing B2P to F2P.

Whats bad about F2P.. or better whats bad about cash-shop focus. Well in the case of GW2 thats the temporary content. I don’t like temporary content thats there to pressure people to play and buy gems. I prefer a B2P game where I buy the game and expansions and then have always access to all the aspects of the game based on the fact that I did buy the game and the expansion. No temporary stuff to try and get me to play / buy gems. No currency-driven system because they want me to buy gems and convert it to gold in stead of farming mats. No game where decisions ingame are based on the question “how do we get people to buy gems” in stead of “how do we get the game to be so good people will also buy the expansions”.

You might not have a problem with gem-store focus, I do.

And you don’t have to compare it to an sub-based game as this thread is about the other option.. expansion based / B2P.

You know how many assumptions you’re doing here? For starters you say that you choose b2p because you buy the game and then get access to everything. That was never promised by anyone, not Gw2, not Gw1 not any other B2P game I am aware off. In fact I am not aware of any B2P game that doesnt charge for extras.

The currency driven system is a good thing. It means you can play any content of the game you want and still get the stuff you want. Gw1 did that too. Just cause you can use gems as a short cut it doesnt mean the game is forcing you to buy gems. If Gw1 had RMT you’d have felt the same. Plenty of stuff in that game that was a nightmare to farm. Diamonds, Some of the hero armor, Sapphires, etc.. the Guild wars series was always about getting the most powerful stuff easily but then the nice cosmetic stuff required dedication.

As discussed in other threads I concede that putting stuff for a short period of time on trade post can in some cases make you pay more. But your other arguments here are pure speculation. Just cause you’re offered a short cut it doesnt mean you’re being forced to take it. And most certainly B2P itself is not in it self any sort of guarantee of how the game will grow in the future in the sense of what direction devs are going to take.

An expansion would do this game so much good. also if they want money ADD MORE TO MERCHANDISE STORE! i’ve wanted one of those fuzzy quaggan hats since it was in the gem store. add more stuff for R/L plox

Galen Grey.4709:

Devata.6589:

No really not as thats not what I am saying. I am not comparing it to an sub-scription based game and I also don’t play them. I am comparing B2P to F2P.

Whats bad about F2P.. or better whats bad about cash-shop focus. Well in the case of GW2 thats the temporary content. I don’t like temporary content thats there to pressure people to play and buy gems. I prefer a B2P game where I buy the game and expansions and then have always access to all the aspects of the game based on the fact that I did buy the game and the expansion. No temporary stuff to try and get me to play / buy gems. No currency-driven system because they want me to buy gems and convert it to gold in stead of farming mats. No game where decisions ingame are based on the question “how do we get people to buy gems” in stead of “how do we get the game to be so good people will also buy the expansions”.

You might not have a problem with gem-store focus, I do.

And you don’t have to compare it to an sub-based game as this thread is about the other option.. expansion based / B2P.

You know how many assumptions you’re doing here? For starters you say that you choose b2p because you buy the game and then get access to everything. That was never promised by anyone, not Gw2, not Gw1 not any other B2P game I am aware off. In fact I am not aware of any B2P game that doesnt charge for extras.

The currency driven system is a good thing. It means you can play any content of the game you want and still get the stuff you want. Gw1 did that too. Just cause you can use gems as a short cut it doesnt mean the game is forcing you to buy gems. If Gw1 had RMT you’d have felt the same. Plenty of stuff in that game that was a nightmare to farm. Diamonds, Some of the hero armor, Sapphires, etc.. the Guild wars series was always about getting the most powerful stuff easily but then the nice cosmetic stuff required dedication.

As discussed in other threads I concede that putting stuff for a short period of time on trade post can in some cases make you pay more. But your other arguments here are pure speculation. Just cause you’re offered a short cut it doesnt mean you’re being forced to take it. And most certainly B2P itself is not in it self any sort of guarantee of how the game will grow in the future in the sense of what direction devs are going to take.

GW1 became big as being B2P where indeed expansion where the focus. No temporary stuff.

Still farming for currency seems to be more boring and help to get people to transfer gems to gold. I did not say they force people to buy anything, I said they pressured. Thats something else. So indeed they do not force you.. thats also why I did not say that. That does not mean currency’s are bad but to much of it is bad. For example, getting tokens from a dungeon to get that dungeon-set is fine. But at the same time also put a rare drop in it.. like they did in MF or AR. Do the same with some mobs. Give a few mobs that are a lot of (in one place) a rare mini of them-self as drop. Those who like it can farm it other people don’t. Make mats farmable if you really want to farm it. Now for many things currency’s are the only or at least the most viable options.
I never played GW1 but if it’s one item like a weapon, a mini a skin it’s fine if it’s a nightmare to farm, as long as it’s farmable.. so there are mobs or whatever in an area where people can run around and kill them.. For mats.. so stuff you need a lot of, farming should be less hard because the difficulty there is getting the number you need.

And for the last part your again saying I make assumption because I say it forces you to.. no I did not, I said it pressures. Thats really something else.

You are correct that you never can be sure in what direction a game might go. But thats why I am here. Trying to prevent if from going in the wrong direction.

Appoh.2875:

An expansion would do this game so much good. also if they want money ADD MORE TO MERCHANDISE STORE! i’ve wanted one of those fuzzy quaggan hats since it was in the gem store. add more stuff for R/L plox

If you want an expansion don’t buy gems because then they will focus on the gem-store and not on the expansion. Sadly thats where we at.

Expansions are back on the table (see the latest interview with Colin http://www.twitch.tv/guildwars2/c/2585362 ) but it’s not 100% sure yet.

So if you really want expansions you maybe better transfer gold to gems to get something from the gem-store and support them some extra with the expansion by buying the collector edition.

VOLKON.1290:

We’re getting a constant flow of new things to do while the “big” stuff is being developed. That works for me.

But the 4 teams doing the ongoing content releases are not working. Every release is bug ridden. Many bugs do not get fixed. The content is a mish mash and not being done to any defined standards and is largely fluff.

If its leading up to something big fine but the narrative within each content release does not convey that at all. Its the problem of flame and frost writ large.

Peter.8047:

Vayne.8563:

Peter.8047:

I want a full expansion. These quick little events that only last a small amount of time are not equal to a full expansion. At this rate we will never see any new skills, character classes, races or a new full map.

These events every 2 weeks are fine, as long as you are also creating a complete expansion as well.

At this point in GW1’s life, Factions was coming out soon. A brand new campaign, 2 new characters, a whole new map, 100’s of skills, brand new armor sets and new enemies as well as a new a multiplayer mode and challenge missions.

All we have in GW2 a year later, is fractals and some new gem store items.
We want new character classes, new races, new armor and weapons, new weapon types for each character, a new map (just remake Cantha GW2 style), a new multi-player game type with 3-4 maps, more guild features like guild halls and GvG.

If you can deliver this type of core content without an expansion then that’s fine, but these little 2 week mini updates just feel like something to keep us busy for a few hours, rather then a true full expansion experience.

And the amount of content combined between Factions and Prophecies is still considerably less than the amount of content in Guild Wars 2.

That is to say, after Guild Wars 1 was out a year and Factions was released, there was less Guild Wars 1 content than there was Guild Wars 2 content at launch.

That maybe so, but I played Prophecies from the day it launched all the way up until the day Factions launched, never stopped and never got bored. I played GW2 until December and stopped because I was completely bored (Came back to check out the event, already bored again. See the problem here?). I feel the smaller amount of content in GW1 was much stronger, especially compared to these little mini updates.

This may also be due to the fact that I have not had to ever change my characters skills (since theres a total of like… 5 per class exaggerating) and the SPvP is complete trash, but those are flaws with the actual game itself and not so much the “content”.

I guess I want an expansion because in my mind that’s the only way ANet can improve all the things I don’t like about the game and also add all the things I want in the game. It feels like since we are just getting these smaller updates, the game is going to stay completely the same (no new skills, no new characters, no new PvP, no new real maps, no permanent changes to the game).

Like I said before, if they can find a way to add these major things through these small updates then fine. If by the end of the year we have a new race and a new character and a new map to explore, I will be happy. And also, I’d be cool with them doing the small updates IF they were also working on a full expansion pack at the same time, then I’d be completely cool with it.

Both my sons played Prophecies at launch and were bored in a period of a couple of months. They went to WoW and stayed there for five years. One bought factions, got bored after a month.

Me, I started in WoW and migrated to Guild Wars 1 and never looked back.

If you were a PvPer, of course Guild Wars 1 was a much better game. If you’re a PvE’er, it’s hard to imagine you not getting bored with Guild Wars 1 periodically.

Devata.6589:

GW1 became big as being B2P where indeed expansion where the focus. No temporary stuff.
snip.

Ok fine, pressured not forced… fair enough. My argument still stands though are we really pressured or is more like they’re monetizing a need? If we use your logic on the restaurant industry you’re basically arguing that the world will suffer famine because restaurants will push famine on people since it increases their income if people are hungry. In truth that doesnt happen. Restaurants dont work to spread famine, they know its there and they just try to monetize it by actually creating incentives.

Gw2 could be doing the same. In most respects Gw1 required much heavier farming to acquire stuff. In fact apart from legendaries and stuff that requires a lot of charged/corrupted lodestones I’d say everything in Gw2 is much easier to get then in Gw1. Gw1 however didnt have any RMT so the reason for the big effort was a genuine game design meant to give goals for people to work towards while playing. The same might be true in Gw2 only Arenanet are trying to monitize people who just arent willing to put in all the effort required and want to take a short cut.

I completely agree to adding armor pieces as rare drops in dungeons. Thats a very good idea imho. full support there

I dont think mini are but afaik almost everything else is a very rare drop. Example this screenshot shows someone looting a precursor off a dead mob:
http://i.imgur.com/yGjnUDRh.jpg

Mats are farmable right now. I explained this before, you’re comparing farming mats with CoF P1 a path thats just out of balance. That path simply pays at least 4x the amount it should thats why you’re not considering farming mats directly viable and just like nothing else is viable compared to CoF P1. but think of it this way, CoF P1 is like one of those CEOs that are payed in millions. Farming mat is your average job with an average pay. Does the fact a CEO earn more then an average pay make most jobs not viable?

I guess having not played Gw1 its understand that you might find it hard to see it but I am pretty sure it is precisely intended it takes a lot of effort to get the mats required to build certain stuff. In Gw1 it was in a way worst because not only you needed stuff that was expensive / had a rare drop and you needed quite a bit of it but you also had another factor, some of the materials dropped in really hard areas that are even nearly impossible to solo. In Gw2 difficult as a gate isnt used but I guess thats offset with bigger requirements in a way.

In the grand scheme of things it makes sense. We all need a goal to work towards, it makes things more interesting. Stats are very easy to get but cosmetic stuff requires work. Some sets are easy to get, crafting, dungeons etc.. But some sets like say Mjolnir require a ton of work to get. Legendary weapons require even more. But thats what gives them status. Gw1 was the same. It had prestige armors that werent that hard to get. For example Ancient armor required 40 platinum + a few rare materials that could be bought relatively cheaply or even crafting using common materials. Then you had armor like say Vabbian armor that cost just 25 plat in terms of gold but used extremely rare materials that had really low drop rates and couldnt be build from common materials. The cost of these materials would be around 400 extra platinum pieces. You had armor like say the kurzick armor that while it could be had for relatively a small amount of money it required a lot of reputation with the faction so it required a lot of work in that camp. Then you had obsidian armor that uses rare materials that only drop in the most difficult areas in the game, the ones that are very hard to solo. You could buy the materials and avoid there but the cost would be well above 1000 platinum.

So just like Gw2, Gw1 had stuff that you could earn relatively easy in a few weeks. It also had stuff that took months to earn and that was definitely not motivated by the cash shop cause you couldnt use real money to get your self a short cut to it in anyway.

Vayne.8563:

Peter.8047:

Vayne.8563:

Peter.8047:

I want a full expansion. These quick little events that only last a small amount of time are not equal to a full expansion. At this rate we will never see any new skills, character classes, races or a new full map.

These events every 2 weeks are fine, as long as you are also creating a complete expansion as well.

At this point in GW1’s life, Factions was coming out soon. A brand new campaign, 2 new characters, a whole new map, 100’s of skills, brand new armor sets and new enemies as well as a new a multiplayer mode and challenge missions.

All we have in GW2 a year later, is fractals and some new gem store items.
We want new character classes, new races, new armor and weapons, new weapon types for each character, a new map (just remake Cantha GW2 style), a new multi-player game type with 3-4 maps, more guild features like guild halls and GvG.

If you can deliver this type of core content without an expansion then that’s fine, but these little 2 week mini updates just feel like something to keep us busy for a few hours, rather then a true full expansion experience.

And the amount of content combined between Factions and Prophecies is still considerably less than the amount of content in Guild Wars 2.

That is to say, after Guild Wars 1 was out a year and Factions was released, there was less Guild Wars 1 content than there was Guild Wars 2 content at launch.

That maybe so, but I played Prophecies from the day it launched all the way up until the day Factions launched, never stopped and never got bored. I played GW2 until December and stopped because I was completely bored (Came back to check out the event, already bored again. See the problem here?). I feel the smaller amount of content in GW1 was much stronger, especially compared to these little mini updates.

This may also be due to the fact that I have not had to ever change my characters skills (since theres a total of like… 5 per class exaggerating) and the SPvP is complete trash, but those are flaws with the actual game itself and not so much the “content”.

I guess I want an expansion because in my mind that’s the only way ANet can improve all the things I don’t like about the game and also add all the things I want in the game. It feels like since we are just getting these smaller updates, the game is going to stay completely the same (no new skills, no new characters, no new PvP, no new real maps, no permanent changes to the game).

Like I said before, if they can find a way to add these major things through these small updates then fine. If by the end of the year we have a new race and a new character and a new map to explore, I will be happy. And also, I’d be cool with them doing the small updates IF they were also working on a full expansion pack at the same time, then I’d be completely cool with it.

Both my sons played Prophecies at launch and were bored in a period of a couple of months. They went to WoW and stayed there for five years. One bought factions, got bored after a month.

Me, I started in WoW and migrated to Guild Wars 1 and never looked back.

If you were a PvPer, of course Guild Wars 1 was a much better game. If you’re a PvE’er, it’s hard to imagine you not getting bored with Guild Wars 1 periodically.

I am a PvE’er and Guild wars 1 was my favorite MMO prior to GW2 hands down. Different people have different tastes I guess

GW2 is doomed to failure when games as Archeage and Black desert come online. This game has too much imbalances, bugs, and fundamental problems to be competitive to real mmos. So I’m not surprised it will have no expansions. GW2 is good for losing time, nothing more. Sad that other companies decided to follow GW2 model. I’m talking about Neverwinter and Elder Scrolls. These two, like GW2, are online not mmo games – some new genre

Ikcen.7518:

GW2 is doomed to failure when games as Archeage and Black desert come online. This game has too much imbalances, bugs, and fundamental problems to be competitive to real mmos. So I’m not surprised it will have no expansions. GW2 is good for losing time, nothing more. Sad that other companies decided to follow GW2 model. I’m talking about Neverwinter and Elder Scrolls. These two, like GW2, are online not mmo games – some new genre

Hmmm…I remember comments very similar to this in regards to GW1 too. No subscription can’t last, blah blah. Sure, it was a niche game, but its still going.

chuckle ‘doomed to failure’ yeah yeah, please share whatever you’re smoking.

Krosslite.1950:

Vayne.8563:

There are two points I’d like to make, regarding recent posts in this thread.

1. The reason, in my opinion, temporary content is temporary..particularly things like dungeons, is because after a month or two, those dungeons would take traffic away from everything else. Anet wants people in the open world, not in a handful of dungeons. People who like dungeons and come from other games were dungeons are central don’t get this at all. Dungeons aren’t really central in this game. Anet wants the world to be bigger than the dungeons. Leaving the dungeons in divides the playerbase. They saw this with fractals. Everyone complains there are less people in the world. Right. Because five people at a time in a dungeon means less people in the open world.

2. People say subscription games are better because when a game uses the cash shop to fund itself, everything becomes about the cash shop…and to a degree that’s true. What those same people aren’t saying is that when a game is a subscription everything about the game is put in there to get people to play LONGER. Everything about the game is slower. You level slower. You have dungeon/raid lockouts. You have very slow crafting. You have flight paths. You have no instant travel. You may or may not like any of those things, but the whole idea is, the longer they can keep you playing, the happier you are.

I’ve played many subscription games over the years and I don’t like them. By the same token I’ve played many free to play games and I don’t necessarily like them. Lotro cost me a small fortune because much of the content had to be paid for. SWToR can’t really be played, unless you pay. This feels like a lie to me.

So far at least, I can play Guild Wars 2 without paying a fortune in the cash shop and I don’t have those annoying lockouts or things that really slow me down. I can just play the entire game.

It’s a matter of personal taste, but I’ll never play a subscription game again, because subscription games are designed to slow you down….far more than a game like Guild Wars 2 is.

You get a +1 from me bro and totally agree.

I think it is due to the fact that we have been in MMOs longer then most posting here

Only a +1 for him? I give him a +2.

Totally agree. I don’t like it when a game’s designed is held back by the ball and chain of it’s subscription fee OR cash shop.

In my ideal game design environment, there would be no subscriptions or micro transactions. It would be like Skyrim or Bioshock. All the money would have to be made on the initial package and nothing else (except for traditional expansions), which would force the developer to make absolutely sure that the initial package was extremely good. Think about it this way: the developer is a business company like any other. They have their eye on the money. Where’s the money? In WoW its in the subscription, so they design around maximizing the profits from subscriptions. In GW2 it’s in the cash shop. So logically they would want to focus there (Are they doing that? That’s another argument), and in Bioshock the money is in the initial box, so the focus goes to the game itself.

Ikcen.7518:

GW2 is doomed to failure when games as Archeage and Black desert come online.

I’d like to know what dictionary you got your definition of “failure” from. Also, never heard of Archeage or Black Desert, probably never will. Also, inb4 someone on another forum says “lulz archeage and black desert r doomd 2 failure cuz of [insert next token mmo here]”

Ikcen.7518:

GW2 is doomed to failure when games as Archeage and Black desert come online. This game has too much imbalances, bugs, and fundamental problems to be competitive to real mmos. So I’m not surprised it will have no expansions. GW2 is good for losing time, nothing more. Sad that other companies decided to follow GW2 model. I’m talking about Neverwinter and Elder Scrolls. These two, like GW2, are online not mmo games – some new genre

Archeage and Black desert are both sandbox mmo’s while GW2 is not but sort of tries to be one. They want an ever changing world where people influence the world and so on. They try to do that with the living story but in the end it will not have the possibility’s an sandbox mmo has if it comes to those thinks so if Anet really wants to go on with the “player change the world” what does seem as a good think to me they might want to evolve there game into a sandbox mmo. However then there is still a lot of work to do.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

Ikcen.7518:

GW2 is doomed to failure when games as Archeage and Black desert come online. This game has too much imbalances, bugs, and fundamental problems to be competitive to real mmos. So I’m not surprised it will have no expansions. GW2 is good for losing time, nothing more. Sad that other companies decided to follow GW2 model. I’m talking about Neverwinter and Elder Scrolls. These two, like GW2, are online not mmo games – some new genre

Hmmm…I remember comments very similar to this in regards to GW1 too. No subscription can’t last, blah blah. Sure, it was a niche game, but its still going.

chuckle ‘doomed to failure’ yeah yeah, please share whatever you’re smoking.

Still thats a big difference. There are some people who feel very strong about subscription-based games and company’s like to listen to them because they see money but in the end there simply aren’t enough people who are still willing to pay monthly and are willing to switch to a new game.

I did say exactly the same the other way around in the bet-forums of Chronicles of Spellborn and Rift. I said, subscription based mmo’s do not work anymore. Eventually you need to go F2P and then you already lost a big playerbase.

CoS does not exist anymore and Rift has indeed moved to F2P.

I do not agree with Ikcen that they are doomed. Colins last interview gave some hope as he promised that only the story would be temporary but all the upgrade / content would be permanent. So doomed they are not but they are for sure on a slippery slope. If one of the big releases that will come soon are going B2P as well and do promise a focus on expansion in stead of there cash-shop and GW2 would not have solved there biggest problems by then it could indeed go bad for GW2. But they still have some time to handle there issue’s. It still has a lot of potential. However after almost a year you might expect you don’t still need to say it has potential but that they finalized the potential they have.

VOLKON.1290:

Devata.6589:

VOLKON.1290:

So many words, so I’ll be brief.

Screw expansions.

Here’s the skinny. We know that there are now four teams working on Living Story content in four month cycles. That in itself is a lot. We also know that there are other teams working on the big, juicy stuff as well, things that take longer to refine and deliver. Things worthy of expansions. You all need to realize we’re getting the best of all worlds here… a constant influx of new content to do in between the big releases of major content. Look at games that rely on expansions. They toss you an expansion, you burn through it in a month and wait four or six months recycling the same old stuff waiting for the next release.

We’re getting a constant flow of new things to do while the “big” stuff is being developed. That works for me.

No you don’t get best of 2 worlds you get worse of 2 worlds. You get a F2P game that you payed for to play. To me thats the worse of to worlds.

I know what you mean.. whats the problem, a nice story leading up to content thats the same as an expansion. Sounds good I agree and they might indeed deliver the same amount of content. Thats not the issue here.

The problem for me (there are some other reasons for other people) is that you also have to think about the business behind it. I signed up for a B2P game because I do not like F2P game because of there focus on cash-shops (like the temporary content, but I will not go further into that now). So now Anet does not work with expansions they are focusing on the gem-store for income.

Thats my problem with it.

It’s not the idea of content overtime that leads to the same amount as a expansion would do. that by itself (forgetting the business behind it) would be fine. But there is a business behind it so we can’t forget about that.

Why is that a problem? There’s nothing at all in the cash shop that’s required to move through this game whatsoever. Nothing you can buy that makes you better, more powerful, etc. Just fluff. Yes, some pretty nice fluff, but fluff none-the-less.

I recall a predecessor MMO that I played once… I paid for the game then paid every month to play the game I paid for all the while waiting for the opportunity to pay for an expansion in order to get more content, and then when I did I didn’t get the full expansion, just releases every few months… months which I continued to pay extra for to play the part of the expansion that was released that I paid for to expand the content of the game that I paid for.

You want me to believe you’d rather have that scenario than to simply pay for the game and get access to all the content available (which is constantly being added on to) while being given the option to choose from a myriad of fluff items to buy only if you wish?

Really?

Actually yes.

And I’ll tell you why. The current model forces ANet, however much they would rather not, to cater to the “fluff” crowd. Not only do cash-shop items become ridiculously immersion-breaking in this game, but the story and setting of GW2 becomes skewed toward this “fluff” crowd and solid content suffers. Without a sub, they have to make the game appealing to that demographic that uses real cash to purchase gem-shop items. This is why the game is so whimsical and theme-parky. All those casual thirty-somethings with money to burn are not only driving the game-economy, but also driving content.

2 years ago I would have agreed with you Vayne, but seeing how much of an influence the cash-shop can have on non-sub game content…I hate it. That’s great if you would rather have free, watered-down content than fork over 20 bucks a month, but I would rather pay for the good stuff. And if you think this stuff we have now is “good” well I can’t argue personal taste I guess, it’s beyond me though.

They could get away with it in GW1 because of the quick expansion releases along with the fact that it wasn’t a monster of a game to produce and run. And it wasn’t a true MMO I guess, but that’s another topic. At any rate, seeing how GW2 turned out I bet you would be surprised at how many GW1 players would now concede the option of actually paying a small sub if it meant content would improve.

I could be wrong but I doubt it.

*note: I’m not saying a pure sub is the way to go(a hybrid model would probably do it these days), only that if something involving a sub would deliver better content, I’d be for it.

Xenon.4537:

Krosslite.1950:

Vayne.8563:

There are two points I’d like to make, regarding recent posts in this thread.

1. The reason, in my opinion, temporary content is temporary..particularly things like dungeons, is because after a month or two, those dungeons would take traffic away from everything else. Anet wants people in the open world, not in a handful of dungeons. People who like dungeons and come from other games were dungeons are central don’t get this at all. Dungeons aren’t really central in this game. Anet wants the world to be bigger than the dungeons. Leaving the dungeons in divides the playerbase. They saw this with fractals. Everyone complains there are less people in the world. Right. Because five people at a time in a dungeon means less people in the open world.

2. People say subscription games are better because when a game uses the cash shop to fund itself, everything becomes about the cash shop…and to a degree that’s true. What those same people aren’t saying is that when a game is a subscription everything about the game is put in there to get people to play LONGER. Everything about the game is slower. You level slower. You have dungeon/raid lockouts. You have very slow crafting. You have flight paths. You have no instant travel. You may or may not like any of those things, but the whole idea is, the longer they can keep you playing, the happier you are.

I’ve played many subscription games over the years and I don’t like them. By the same token I’ve played many free to play games and I don’t necessarily like them. Lotro cost me a small fortune because much of the content had to be paid for. SWToR can’t really be played, unless you pay. This feels like a lie to me.

So far at least, I can play Guild Wars 2 without paying a fortune in the cash shop and I don’t have those annoying lockouts or things that really slow me down. I can just play the entire game.

It’s a matter of personal taste, but I’ll never play a subscription game again, because subscription games are designed to slow you down….far more than a game like Guild Wars 2 is.

You get a +1 from me bro and totally agree.

I think it is due to the fact that we have been in MMOs longer then most posting here

Only a +1 for him? I give him a +2.

Totally agree. I don’t like it when a game’s designed is held back by the ball and chain of it’s subscription fee OR cash shop.

In my ideal game design environment, there would be no subscriptions or micro transactions. It would be like Skyrim or Bioshock. All the money would have to be made on the initial package and nothing else (except for traditional expansions), which would force the developer to make absolutely sure that the initial package was extremely good. Think about it this way: the developer is a business company like any other. They have their eye on the money. Where’s the money? In WoW its in the subscription, so they design around maximizing the profits from subscriptions. In GW2 it’s in the cash shop. So logically they would want to focus there (Are they doing that? That’s another argument), and in Bioshock the money is in the initial box, so the focus goes to the game itself.

Not sure how you can give +points for it.

He is explaining why sub-based games are not good. Well I do not think many people in here disagree. The topic is about expansions, not about subscription. Yeah I agree sub-based is bad but thats not the issue here.

And for the reason why hey have temporary content.. I did see him already give many reasons changing it all the time. If people like to do dungeons let them. If you take out what they like they might also leave the game and then you also don’t see them somewhere else.

Beside in another thread he said people would not do the temporary stuff anymore anyway or would be not smart enough to find it (he said people don’t like to think so you should just give them multiple options) what go’s directly against what he is saying now.

Yeah when you keep the dungeons in some people will do that in stead of doing the new stuff that they can do at another time.. but that will only mean there are a few people less in that area. New stuff will still have many people because people check out new stuff. it’s that easy. And many parts of the world will stay empty anyway.

Devata.6589:

Still thats a big difference. There are some people who feel very strong about subscription-based games and company’s like to listen to them because they see money but in the end there simply aren’t enough people who are still willing to pay monthly and are willing to switch to a new game.

I did say exactly the same the other way around in the bet-forums of Chronicles of Spellborn and Rift. I said, subscription based mmo’s do not work anymore. Eventually you need to go F2P and then you already lost a big playerbase.

CoS does not exist anymore and Rift has indeed moved to F2P.

I do not agree with Ikcen that they are doomed. Colins last interview gave some hope as he promised that only the story would be temporary but all the upgrade / content would be permanent. So doomed they are not but they are for sure on a slippery slope. If one of the big releases that will come soon are going B2P as well and do promise a focus on expansion in stead of there cash-shop and GW2 would not have solved there biggest problems by then it could indeed go bad for GW2. But they still have some time to handle there issue’s. It still has a lot of potential. However after almost a year you might expect you don’t still need to say it has potential but that they finalized the potential they have.

There have been doom sayers for this game since practically the moment it launched. There are for every game. I gave but one example. How many people said WoW would fail when it first came out? (Answer: A kitten of a lot) It really holds no water. People say SWTOR is dead/doomed/dying, and while yes they went free to play, they’re still puffing along. Sure, they don’t have 8 billion subscriptions or a million active players, but really, they don’t have to. Eve sure as heck don’t. It’s got what half a million players, less? And its rolling along quite solidly.

Trying something different does not [necessarily] doom the venture to failure. Living story has not doomed GW2 to failure. Heck, ascended and its uproar didn’t even ‘doom them to failure’ and boy did we see a lot of apparently clairvoyant people on here at that point. [Side note, anyone that has been paying attention since the initial implementation of LS, has heard them tell us repeatedly that things would start coming faster, we would have more perm content, etc, they just needed to work out the kinks. And now, tada, they are telling us to start expecting it with the upcoming updates. Imagine that.]

Are they going to have competition? Sure, its expected. Is it going to suddenly put them out of business? I highly doubt it. This is like saying that Burger King put McDonalds out of business by opening up (which is obviously didn’t). Competition is healthy. Will they lose players to these other games? Sure. Will some of them come back for any number of reasons that I’m not going to bother listing? Sure. Just like people still go back to play GW1. Or people opt to eat as McDonalds instead of BK.

sigh Name me one (relatively recent) MMO that achieved its potential in its first year? Fully and completely, with an expansion, complete polish, no bugs, etc. While I admittedly haven’t played that many MMOs, I can’t think of one. Still, I’d be perfectly happy to be proven wrong.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

Devata.6589:

…..

There have been doom sayers for this game since practically the moment it launched. There are for every game. I gave but one example. How many people said WoW would fail when it first came out? (Answer: A kitten of a lot) It really holds no water. People say SWTOR is dead/doomed/dying, and while yes they went free to play, they’re still puffing along. Sure, they don’t have 8 billion subscriptions or a million active players, but really, they don’t have to. Eve sure as heck don’t. It’s got what half a million players, less? And its rolling along quite solidly.

Trying something different does not [necessarily] doom the venture to failure. Living story has not doomed GW2 to failure. Heck, ascended and its uproar didn’t even ‘doom them to failure’ and boy did we see a lot of apparently clairvoyant people on here at that point. [Side note, anyone that has been paying attention since the initial implementation of LS, has heard them tell us repeatedly that things would start coming faster, we would have more perm content, etc, they just needed to work out the kinks. And now, tada, they are telling us to start expecting it with the upcoming updates. Imagine that.]

Are they going to have competition? Sure, its expected. Is it going to suddenly put them out of business? I highly doubt it. This is like saying that Burger King put McDonalds out of business by opening up (which is obviously didn’t). Competition is healthy. Will they lose players to these other games? Sure. Will some of them come back for any number of reasons that I’m not going to bother listing? Sure. Just like people still go back to play GW1. Or people opt to eat as McDonalds instead of BK.

sigh Name me one (relatively recent) MMO that achieved its potential in its first year? Fully and completely, with an expansion, complete polish, no bugs, etc. While I admittedly haven’t played that many MMOs, I can’t think of one. Still, I’d be perfectly happy to be proven wrong.

I am not sure what you are trying to prove to me as I did say they were on a slippery slope but I did not say they where doomed. And for sure people will stay playing but there is a difference between a success and people stay playing it and a total failure.

I can not name one sub-based game and I did not expect one as I am saying that about sub-based games for many years now. But the financial people behind those games believed that could work.

I think there are some F2P games that did reach there potential in the beginning like League of Legends (2009). But I was also not talking about reaching full potential. Once again there is also a difference between a game that reached it’s full potential and a game where you can say “it has a lot of potential” where I think the last one is how you hear many people (those positive and those negative about GW2) talk about GW2. You need to use that potential (not finalized the full potential) before other games might come and take your playerbase away because if those games do thinks better it will be a big drawback. And yes still people will play it but there is a difference between a success and ‘people play it’.

As MMO you need to bound people to you and normally you have a pretty short time for that. I have the idea the GW2 has a problem bounding people to them-self.. I know this from what I see in the guild.. many people simply stop playing. And there will also be people that sit for the ride until another ‘better’ ride comes along while GW2 should have those people already bound to them.

Or to say it different, they do not yet have a very loyal playerbase… loyal does not mean having some fanboy’s of course. I think Anet does have it’s fair share of those.

I have a feeling we are going to be seeing more smaller additions of content instead of big expansions with these latest games.
GW2 is doing it pretty well, and I hope ESO and Destiny do thees more constant smaller additions instead of large expansions. GW2, ESO, and Destiny have all said that they want to be more of a constant living world anyways, so I’m cool with it.
Hope everything goes well for each!

Ikcen.7518:

GW2 is doomed to failure when games as Archeage and Black desert come online. This game has too much imbalances, bugs, and fundamental problems to be competitive to real mmos. So I’m not surprised it will have no expansions. GW2 is good for losing time, nothing more. Sad that other companies decided to follow GW2 model. I’m talking about Neverwinter and Elder Scrolls. These two, like GW2, are online not mmo games – some new genre

Archage and Black Desert? LOL, Still fanboys of kill 10/10 MMOs with loot steal and quest grief-ing? Or warrior type girls fighting monsters wearing high heals shoes?
No wonder GW2 is still a twilight zone for you.

Devata.6589:

I am not sure what you are trying to prove to me as I did say they were on a slippery slope but I did not say they where doomed. And for sure people will stay playing but there is a difference between a success and people stay playing it and a total failure.

I can not name one sub-based game and I did not expect one as I am saying that about sub-based games for many years now. But the financial people behind those games believed that could work.

I think there are some F2P games that did reach there potential in the beginning like League of Legends (2009). But I was also not talking about reaching full potential. Once again there is also a difference between a game that reached it’s full potential and a game where you can say “it has a lot of potential” where I think the last one is how you hear many people (those positive and those negative about GW2) talk about GW2. You need to use that potential (not finalized the full potential) before other games might come and take your playerbase away because if those games do thinks better it will be a big drawback. And yes still people will play it but there is a difference between a success and ‘people play it’.

As MMO you need to bound people to you and normally you have a pretty short time for that. I have the idea the GW2 has a problem bounding people to them-self.. I know this from what I see in the guild.. many people simply stop playing. And there will also be people that sit for the ride until another ‘better’ ride comes along while GW2 should have those people already bound to them.

Or to say it different, they do not yet have a very loyal playerbase… loyal does not mean having some fanboy’s of course. I think Anet does have it’s fair share of those.

Lol, silly me, I took out the line where I disagreed about them being on a slippery slope, which was sort of where the debate was going.

Any venture that maintains a profit, is technically considered a success. So even if GW2 were to become only a niche game with only 500k people playing, as long as it continued to turn a profit, it would still be a ‘success.’ Not a roaring success, sure, but there really aren’t a lot of those anymore once the excitement wears off and the rose colored glasses get removed.

In regards to potential, only when a game reaches its full potential (and since you used the phrase ‘reach its potential’ the full part is implied) can you ever stop saying ‘it has potential’ whether it be a lot or a little, and of course how much potential is almost always going to be subjective. While I’ve never played LoL, from my understanding is that isn’t quite the same thing as what we’re looking at here, but I’m not going to argue one way or the other regarding it.

Customer loyalty is important to almost all companies. Yes, generally you have a relatively small time frame to grab that customer’s attention, gain their trust, and then bind them to you; however, I don’t think Anet has as much of an issue as you, and many others, seem to think. But, I could be wrong. Truthfully, only time will tell.

Devata.6589:

Appoh.2875:

An expansion would do this game so much good. also if they want money ADD MORE TO MERCHANDISE STORE! i’ve wanted one of those fuzzy quaggan hats since it was in the gem store. add more stuff for R/L plox

If you want an expansion don’t buy gems because then they will focus on the gem-store and not on the expansion. Sadly thats where we at.

Expansions are back on the table (see the latest interview with Colin http://www.twitch.tv/guildwars2/c/2585362 ) but it’s not 100% sure yet.

So if you really want expansions you maybe better transfer gold to gems to get something from the gem-store and support them some extra with the expansion by buying the collector edition.

The merchandise store is on there website… you get the plush charr books etc. I want more real life stuff. do you understand now?

Ronah.2869:

Ikcen.7518:

GW2 is doomed to failure when games as Archeage and Black desert come online. This game has too much imbalances, bugs, and fundamental problems to be competitive to real mmos. So I’m not surprised it will have no expansions. GW2 is good for losing time, nothing more. Sad that other companies decided to follow GW2 model. I’m talking about Neverwinter and Elder Scrolls. These two, like GW2, are online not mmo games – some new genre

Archage and Black Desert? LOL, Still fanboys of kill 10/10 MMOs with loot steal and quest grief-ing? Or warrior type girls fighting monsters wearing high heals shoes?
No wonder GW2 is still a twilight zone for you.

Lol, no he is more a fanboy of the Smash 150 Pinatas and eat 250 Zhaitaffy or to give 15 cows foot or to give 20 plants water or to collect 30 samples of something and warrior type (almost naked) girls fighting monsters wearing pinks quaggan backpacks.

Really don’t act like if GW2 is so different on those aspects. The hearth and event type of quest usually make them even more superficial where some traditional quest could give a more detailed story and let you really get to know some of the NPC’s. I would welcome some traditional quest in an example.. of course if they are more of a story then the examples you gave. (To bring is back to the subject of the the thread)

Appoh.2875:

Devata.6589:

Appoh.2875:

An expansion would do this game so much good. also if they want money ADD MORE TO MERCHANDISE STORE! i’ve wanted one of those fuzzy quaggan hats since it was in the gem store. add more stuff for R/L plox

If you want an expansion don’t buy gems because then they will focus on the gem-store and not on the expansion. Sadly thats where we at.

Expansions are back on the table (see the latest interview with Colin http://www.twitch.tv/guildwars2/c/2585362 ) but it’s not 100% sure yet.

So if you really want expansions you maybe better transfer gold to gems to get something from the gem-store and support them some extra with the expansion by buying the collector edition.

The merchandise store is on there website… you get the plush charr books etc. I want more real life stuff. do you understand now?

Yeah but I was not referring to your comment about the merchandise store but about the gem-store. “i’ve wanted one of those fuzzy quaggan hats since it was in the gem store.” But you mean you mean you want a real life version. That wasn’t really clear to me from your first post. I thought you where basically talking about both.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

Devata.6589:

I am not sure what you are trying to prove to me as I did say they were on a slippery slope but I did not say they where doomed. And for sure people will stay playing but there is a difference between a success and people stay playing it and a total failure.

I can not name one sub-based game and I did not expect one as I am saying that about sub-based games for many years now. But the financial people behind those games believed that could work.

I think there are some F2P games that did reach there potential in the beginning like League of Legends (2009). But I was also not talking about reaching full potential. Once again there is also a difference between a game that reached it’s full potential and a game where you can say “it has a lot of potential” where I think the last one is how you hear many people (those positive and those negative about GW2) talk about GW2. You need to use that potential (not finalized the full potential) before other games might come and take your playerbase away because if those games do thinks better it will be a big drawback. And yes still people will play it but there is a difference between a success and ‘people play it’.

As MMO you need to bound people to you and normally you have a pretty short time for that. I have the idea the GW2 has a problem bounding people to them-self.. I know this from what I see in the guild.. many people simply stop playing. And there will also be people that sit for the ride until another ‘better’ ride comes along while GW2 should have those people already bound to them.

Or to say it different, they do not yet have a very loyal playerbase… loyal does not mean having some fanboy’s of course. I think Anet does have it’s fair share of those.

Lol, silly me, I took out the line where I disagreed about them being on a slippery slope, which was sort of where the debate was going.

Any venture that maintains a profit, is technically considered a success. So even if GW2 were to become only a niche game with only 500k people playing, as long as it continued to turn a profit, it would still be a ‘success.’ Not a roaring success, sure, but there really aren’t a lot of those anymore once the excitement wears off and the rose colored glasses get removed.

In regards to potential, only when a game reaches its full potential (and since you used the phrase ‘reach its potential’ the full part is implied) can you ever stop saying ‘it has potential’ whether it be a lot or a little, and of course how much potential is almost always going to be subjective. While I’ve never played LoL, from my understanding is that isn’t quite the same thing as what we’re looking at here, but I’m not going to argue one way or the other regarding it.

Customer loyalty is important to almost all companies. Yes, generally you have a relatively small time frame to grab that customer’s attention, gain their trust, and then bind them to you; however, I don’t think Anet has as much of an issue as you, and many others, seem to think. But, I could be wrong. Truthfully, only time will tell.

No, for a businesses something is a success if it fulfills or exceeds the financial goals.

To be exact I even said ‘finalized the potential’ but I also said I was talking about how people talk about it. So how many people now still talk about it as it has potential while they don’t talk about all the finalized potential.

I also never played LoL and indeed it’s not exactly the same but all MMO’s from the last years where sub-based and I can’t defend those as I don’t believe in that payment model. And those games kinda proved me right as they all had to stop being sub-based. But then let me state it differed. The last one big successful MMO there was, WoW for sure managed to make there imprint and gain the community’s loyalty and attention within a year.

With your last sentence you seem to again imply I am saying GW2 will die. But I am not. If I did I would not bother coming to this forum. In the latest interview Colin promised that only the story’s will be temporary while additions / other content will be permanent and he also said expansions are on the table (before it was said they wanted to do anything with the living story). That means that they are listening so there is for sure a good possibility they will go the right way. NCsoft also pretty much gave them the thumps up for an expansion.

But yeah it’s a slippery slope because they can still turn the wrong way.

Obsidian.1328:

2 years ago I would have agreed with you Vayne, but seeing how much of an influence the cash-shop can have on non-sub game content…I hate it. That’s great if you would rather have free, watered-down content than fork over 20 bucks a month, but I would rather pay for the good stuff. And if you think this stuff we have now is “good” well I can’t argue personal taste I guess, it’s beyond me though.

Spot on this is exactly why I have come to dislike the GW2 model.

morrolan.9608:

Obsidian.1328:

2 years ago I would have agreed with you Vayne, but seeing how much of an influence the cash-shop can have on non-sub game content…I hate it. That’s great if you would rather have free, watered-down content than fork over 20 bucks a month, but I would rather pay for the good stuff. And if you think this stuff we have now is “good” well I can’t argue personal taste I guess, it’s beyond me though.

Spot on this is exactly why I have come to dislike the GW2 model.

But there is no need for the cash-shop focus if they go for an expansion-pack focus. The problem was that they suddenly started to focus on the gem-store and had no plants for expansions anymore. That means that they sort of took the model of a F2P game and I agree thats bad. But if they indeed turn back to the expansion pack focus they can drop the gem-store focus and the thinks you dislike about it should also go away.

And after getting a lot of complains about those things expansions are now back on the table. So lets hope they go for that.

The “GW2 model” at this moment resembles more a F2P model then a B2P model. Thats the problem.

Devata.6589:

But there is no need for the cash-shop focus if they go for an expansion-pack focus. The problem was that they suddenly started to focus on the gem-store and had no plants for expansions anymore. That means that they sort of took the model of a F2P game and I agree thats bad. But if they indeed turn back to the expansion pack focus they can drop the gem-store focus and the thinks you dislike about it should also go away.

And after getting a lot of complains about those things expansions are now back on the table. So lets hope they go for that.

The “GW2 model” at this moment resembles more a F2P model then a B2P model. Thats the problem.

Yep I agree with this as well. But it won’t happen, too many design decisions have been embedded in the game funnelling players towards the gem shop and appealing to the ‘whales’. They would have to roll back these as well as get an expansion out.

Ikcen.7518:

GW2 is doomed to failure when games as Archeage and Black desert come online. This game has too much imbalances, bugs, and fundamental problems to be competitive to real mmos. So I’m not surprised it will have no expansions. GW2 is good for losing time, nothing more. Sad that other companies decided to follow GW2 model. I’m talking about Neverwinter and Elder Scrolls. These two, like GW2, are online not mmo games – some new genre

What because of the solo aspect? I think you’ll find most western mmos will have this option. Wildstar, another more traditional mmo, certainly will with solo dungeons at endgame. Players want options sometimes they want to solo being amongst other players in what feels like a living world, other times they want to play more with other players.

Devata.6589:

Archeage and Black desert are both sandbox mmo’s while GW2 is not but sort of tries to be one. They want an ever changing world where people influence the world and so on. They try to do that with the living story but in the end it will not have the possibility’s an sandbox mmo has if it comes to those thinks so if Anet really wants to go on with the “player change the world” what does seem as a good think to me they might want to evolve there game into a sandbox mmo. However then there is still a lot of work to do.

GW2 will never be a sandbox, a sandbox is a world where the content is largely player created. The world of GW2 may change but its all done largely by the developer.

morrolan.9608:

Devata.6589:

Archeage and Black desert are both sandbox mmo’s while GW2 is not but sort of tries to be one. They want an ever changing world where people influence the world and so on. They try to do that with the living story but in the end it will not have the possibility’s an sandbox mmo has if it comes to those thinks so if Anet really wants to go on with the “player change the world” what does seem as a good think to me they might want to evolve there game into a sandbox mmo. However then there is still a lot of work to do.

GW2 will never be a sandbox, a sandbox is a world where the content is largely player created. The world of GW2 may change but its all done largely by the developer.

But look at what you are saying (and is 90% accurate) a sandbox is a world where the content is largely player created. (90% because the content is still developed by the developers but the gamers sort of decides where everything is. They put there house somewhere and so on.)

Now look at what Anet says they want. The want the players to have an effect on the world. The players need to ‘change’ the world, the players need to have an effect on the world. Thats what they are going for now. But thats what you have in sandbox games and GW2 is not a sandbox game.

So they have the option to change into a sandbox game or try to be something they aren’t. But if this is really what they want then change it into a sandbox-game.

Because really if I hear Colin talk what he describes is a sandbox game. Players change the world.

See this: http://www.twitch.tv/guildwars2/c/2585362

Devata.6589:

Because really if I hear Colin talk what he describes is a sandbox game. Players change the world.

Its semantics and illusory, players will have some power to change but not to the extent thakittens an actual sandbox eg. the upcoming election which is just 2 branching options not what I would call player created change.

Guild Wars 2 is not, and will never be a sandbox game. But I’m thinking sandbox games are always going to be niche. None of them will pull most people from Guild Wars 2.

First of all, sandbox games almost always require more time and effort than theme park games. You lose more when you die. Think of a game like Eve.

Eve is arguably the most successful sandbox MMO in existence. It has half a million or so players, and that’s its high.

WoW is a theme park with 8.3 million players.

Themeparks are more designed for the masses and the masses will make them money.

Anyway since Trion bought Archeage, my hopes for it have gone down quite a bit.

Obsidian.1328:

2 years ago I would have agreed with you Vayne, but seeing how much of an influence the cash-shop can have on non-sub game content…I hate it.

I’ve heard this argument many times before but it was never accompanied by compelling evidence. In fact most arguments I heard can be easily disproved. Thing is its easy to link stuff together and its easy to see a reason behind that link but that doesnt necessarily make it so.

Example A common argument I hear often is games that dont have a subscription limit storage space as to force you to buy extra space. Link being most f2p / b2p games do in fact sell extra storage space and a logical thinking if they sell it, they obviously want people to buy it so they logically limit it in order to force people to buy it.

Is that true however? Aion, Rift, WoW and many other MMOs when they were subscription based also employed a limited inventory that required the players to buy expansion for it using in game money. There is no doubt in such games that limited inventory is a game mechanic and not a way to push people into spending money. Yet just because Gw2 is selling inventory expansion I’ve seen people blame its free to play nature for that. (like Aion, rift and WoW before hand you can also expand the inventory using in game money if you want to) So really is that “limited” inventory the result of no subscription or just one more goal for people to reach?

This can be said for many other things. Low in game income can be blamed on the gems to in game money but it can also be tight control on inflation. XP boosters can be blamed for slow leveling up curve even though clearly it was much harder to level up in P2P MMOs that sold no XP boosters. etc.. etc.. It is easy to blame something one might not like on the cash shop but that doesnt automatically mean that design choice was made in service to the cash shop.

morrolan.9608:

Devata.6589:

But there is no need for the cash-shop focus if they go for an expansion-pack focus. The problem was that they suddenly started to focus on the gem-store and had no plants for expansions anymore. That means that they sort of took the model of a F2P game and I agree thats bad. But if they indeed turn back to the expansion pack focus they can drop the gem-store focus and the thinks you dislike about it should also go away.

And after getting a lot of complains about those things expansions are now back on the table. So lets hope they go for that.

The “GW2 model” at this moment resembles more a F2P model then a B2P model. Thats the problem.

Yep I agree with this as well. But it won’t happen, too many design decisions have been embedded in the game funnelling players towards the gem shop and appealing to the ‘whales’. They would have to roll back these as well as get an expansion out.

Can you people be a bit specific… What game design decisions did Gw2 take that steers it towards the F2P in a bad way?

Also @Devata you claim Gw2 when more towards f2p then to b2p… compared to what exactly? there was only one other b2p game that I am aware of and thats Gw1 which you say you never played. So which B2P game did you play prior to Gw2 that you were hoping Gw2 business model would follow exactly?

Galen Grey.4709:

morrolan.9608:

Devata.6589:

But there is no need for the cash-shop focus if they go for an expansion-pack focus. The problem was that they suddenly started to focus on the gem-store and had no plants for expansions anymore. That means that they sort of took the model of a F2P game and I agree thats bad. But if they indeed turn back to the expansion pack focus they can drop the gem-store focus and the thinks you dislike about it should also go away.

And after getting a lot of complains about those things expansions are now back on the table. So lets hope they go for that.

The “GW2 model” at this moment resembles more a F2P model then a B2P model. Thats the problem.

Yep I agree with this as well. But it won’t happen, too many design decisions have been embedded in the game funnelling players towards the gem shop and appealing to the ‘whales’. They would have to roll back these as well as get an expansion out.

Can you people be a bit specific… What game design decisions did Gw2 take that steers it towards the F2P in a bad way?

Also @Devata you claim Gw2 when more towards f2p then to b2p… compared to what exactly? there was only one other b2p game that I am aware of and thats Gw1 which you say you never played. So which B2P game did you play prior to Gw2 that you were hoping Gw2 business model would follow exactly?

Technically at this point, TSW is also buy to play.

The thing is, after playing many F2P MMOs, Guild Wars 2 is NOTHING like them. There’s no way to compare GW 2 to SWToR or Lotro or DDO, or Perfect World…it’s just a different system.

I mean in some of those games, content needs to be purchased separately for you to even play. SWToR is almost impossible to play without paying monthly. There’s no p2w in Guild Wars 2, there’s no content locked off by the cash shop.

So I’m not sure of Devata’s point.

Vayne.8563:

Galen Grey.4709:

morrolan.9608:

Devata.6589:

But there is no need for the cash-shop focus if they go for an expansion-pack focus. The problem was that they suddenly started to focus on the gem-store and had no plants for expansions anymore. That means that they sort of took the model of a F2P game and I agree thats bad. But if they indeed turn back to the expansion pack focus they can drop the gem-store focus and the thinks you dislike about it should also go away.

And after getting a lot of complains about those things expansions are now back on the table. So lets hope they go for that.

The “GW2 model” at this moment resembles more a F2P model then a B2P model. Thats the problem.

Yep I agree with this as well. But it won’t happen, too many design decisions have been embedded in the game funnelling players towards the gem shop and appealing to the ‘whales’. They would have to roll back these as well as get an expansion out.

Can you people be a bit specific… What game design decisions did Gw2 take that steers it towards the F2P in a bad way?

Also @Devata you claim Gw2 when more towards f2p then to b2p… compared to what exactly? there was only one other b2p game that I am aware of and thats Gw1 which you say you never played. So which B2P game did you play prior to Gw2 that you were hoping Gw2 business model would follow exactly?

Technically at this point, TSW is also buy to play.

The thing is, after playing many F2P MMOs, Guild Wars 2 is NOTHING like them. There’s no way to compare GW 2 to SWToR or Lotro or DDO, or Perfect World…it’s just a different system.

I mean in some of those games, content needs to be purchased separately for you to even play. SWToR is almost impossible to play without paying monthly. There’s no p2w in Guild Wars 2, there’s no content locked off by the cash shop.

So I’m not sure of Devata’s point.

True but If I brought up TSW I am sure I will get retorted with TSW didnt start B2P it started P2P.

If we go beyond the switch though I guess the same arguments that can be made for Gw2 can also be made for TSW.

You can buy stuff like Instant AP packs so you could argue that leveling is intentionally slowed down to pressure you into buying them, yet as far as I can tell the leveling wasnt modified from its P2P times.

You can buy storage space… again the base storage as far as I know was not reduced from when it was P2P.

You can even buy straight up advantages like bonus to attack rating and removal of conditions etc..

Yet at the same time they’re also selling access to content B2P style.

I personally do not see the clear lines between B2P, F2P and P2P some people suggest there are. Especially now a days all models share the same design decisions and sell the same kind of stuff in their cash shops. For a while having cash shops in P2P was unheard of, now they all have it (or nearly all) like wise things change for the better. A long time ago F2P meant you could buy the best equipment in the game, now thats essentially gone. What I am trying to say is now a days you can never say in B2P and P2P business model you will never find X because thats something only F2P do. Those rules just dont exist. At the end of the day is what you get.

You dont like game design X , thats perfectly fine but dont blame it on the business model cause most likely thats got nothing to do with it. Besides now more or less games are trying to include every type of business model Just look at Swtor or Lotro they’re free to play, buy to play and have a subscription as well. P2P have introduced cash shop or in case of TSW straight out started with one. Lines between what it means to be P2P, B2P and F2P are just no there, definitely not any longer.

This game was promised as a sandbox MMO, but it’s not. It’s clean themepark. The difference between both is the interest. In themepark you play for losing time, or some statistics – GW2, in sandbox you play more, cause you change the game world. So many ideas in this game fail cause it’s themepark. Dynamic events fail, great bosses fail, WvW fail and etc. If you play or not, this change nothing in GW2. But Anet made other mistakes /for me/ too. They implement so much PvE solo, which with 4 guilds system, and lack of 1vs1 PvP, makes GW2 even not a real MMO, but some kind of classic single player game put on an online platform. That’s why I think GW2 will fade soon after the new generation MMO’s start.

Ikcen.7518:

This game was promised as a sandbox MMO, but it’s not. It’s clean themepark. The difference between both is the interest. In themepark you play for losing time, or some statistics – GW2, in sandbox you play more, cause you change the game world. So many ideas in this game fail cause it’s themepark. Dynamic events fail, great bosses fail, WvW fail and etc. If you play or not, this change nothing in GW2. But Anet made other mistakes /for me/ too. They implement so much PvE solo, which with 4 guilds system, and lack of 1vs1 PvP, makes GW2 even not a real MMO, but some kind of classic single player game put on an online platform. That’s why I think GW2 will fade soon after the new generation MMO’s start.

For starter the game was never promised as a sandbox at all. It was promised as theme park thats has sandbox elements. Personally I feel thats exactly what they delivered.

For starters sandbox are not about changing the world at all. For example GTA is considered a sandbox and you dont change anything in the world there. The actual difference between theme park and sandbox is theme park provide a clear path you have to follow. A main story, Leveling quests from 1 → max level that go one way etc.. Sandbox is more about the freedom of playing what you want. Gw2 has a little of that. Dynamic events are part of that for example. They dont have a set path you have to follow. They not tied to quest hubs which you go through as you level up like other theme parks. For example in Gw2 there is no problem reaching max level and then doing an event in Wayfarer hills. In typical Theme park that doesnt exist. Once you out level an area than that basically stops existing for that character. In Sandbox games like say Eve online though the whole world is your playground and Gw2 shares those elements.

The whole thing with Sandbox games is how you play the game is something you dictate rather then what the game dictates. However I dont get it, on side you claim to want a sandbox which I would imagine means you like sandbox games thus should be accustomed to playing your way rather then how a game forces you to play. Yet you then make this statement “They implement so much PvE solo”. The only solo play there is are hearts everything else is not really solo play at all. They implemented content that scales from 1 player to 10 players (every event in the world) and content that scales from 5 – 25 players (group events) and also content that scales to 100 people (world bosses)

if you’re playing solo is because you decided to play solo. Sure the game allows you to play solo if you want… thats one of the sandbox element, freedom of choice. But also rewards you if you team up. Team up with a guild member and you’ll get 5x the amount of influence you get solo for your guild. So do an event solo and you get 2 influence. Be in a group with 1 other guild member and you’ll get 10 influence. The event will also scale up with means more enemies which means more loot ergo more reward.

Right a lack of 1v1 makes a game not a real MMO. I mean a Massive Multiplayer Online game that supports 500vs500vs500 battles on 4 maps (so really at one time you can have 6000 players fighting against each other is not really a Massive Multiplayer Online Game cause you cannot have 1vs1 (though you can have that too with custom arenas but never mind….

Maybe it will fade like you’re saying who knows… Right now its probably the 2nd most profitable MMO and it hasnt even launched in the biggest MMO market yet so forgive me if I dont share your opinion on this.

Galen Grey.4709:

Obsidian.1328:

2 years ago I would have agreed with you Vayne, but seeing how much of an influence the cash-shop can have on non-sub game content…I hate it.

I’ve heard this argument many times before but it was never accompanied by compelling evidence. In fact most arguments I heard can be easily disproved. Thing is its easy to link stuff together and its easy to see a reason behind that link but that doesnt necessarily make it so.

Example A common argument I hear often is games that dont have a subscription limit storage space as to force you to buy extra space. Link being most f2p / b2p games do in fact sell extra storage space and a logical thinking if they sell it, they obviously want people to buy it so they logically limit it in order to force people to buy it.

Is that true however? Aion, Rift, WoW and many other MMOs when they were subscription based also employed a limited inventory that required the players to buy expansion for it using in game money. There is no doubt in such games that limited inventory is a game mechanic and not a way to push people into spending money. Yet just because Gw2 is selling inventory expansion I’ve seen people blame its free to play nature for that. (like Aion, rift and WoW before hand you can also expand the inventory using in game money if you want to) So really is that “limited” inventory the result of no subscription or just one more goal for people to reach?

This can be said for many other things. Low in game income can be blamed on the gems to in game money but it can also be tight control on inflation. XP boosters can be blamed for slow leveling up curve even though clearly it was much harder to level up in P2P MMOs that sold no XP boosters. etc.. etc.. It is easy to blame something one might not like on the cash shop but that doesnt automatically mean that design choice was made in service to the cash shop.

Yeah and some things might be because of the cash-shop and some won’t. Fact is that if they need to get there income from a cash-shop they will try to make people buy from it in one way or the other. They simply need to. Nobody can ever proof what decision is made directly because of that and what is decision is not.. well except if somebody secretly records a meeting where the financial people talk about it and he puts it online. But you do know that if they focus on the gem-store some decisions are based on it.

As you know I blame the temporary content (being it temporary in-game stuff or items only temporary available in the gem-store), gold-driven system (thats something else as low income) and rng-boxes to that. Yeah I think the limited char slots have to do with it but giving you 5 and even giving you the option to buy more with ingame gold seems totally fair to me. No complain there.

You say “In fact most arguments I heard can be easily disproved.” but thats also not true. You mean you can always find some possible reason why they would have made a decision in a way that the gem-store was not the reason. And yeah I can also come up with some theoretical reason why they did some of those thinks I blame to the gem-store focus without it being because of the gem-store focus but that also dot not make it true.

Fact is that if a company needs to get there income from the cash-shop they will try to get people to buy from it and so make ingame decisions to try them to do so. Decisions people notice and some people may not like. B2W is the most infamous example but there are many more that are not B2W.

With a focus on expansions there is no need for a focus on the gem-store and so no need for decisions that infect the game and are there to try to get people to buy gems. So whatever those decisions will be there is no need for them anymore.

Galen Grey.4709:

morrolan.9608:

Devata.6589:

But there is no need for the cash-shop focus if they go for an expansion-pack focus. The problem was that they suddenly started to focus on the gem-store and had no plants for expansions anymore. That means that they sort of took the model of a F2P game and I agree thats bad. But if they indeed turn back to the expansion pack focus they can drop the gem-store focus and the thinks you dislike about it should also go away.

And after getting a lot of complains about those things expansions are now back on the table. So lets hope they go for that.

The “GW2 model” at this moment resembles more a F2P model then a B2P model. Thats the problem.

Yep I agree with this as well. But it won’t happen, too many design decisions have been embedded in the game funnelling players towards the gem shop and appealing to the ‘whales’. They would have to roll back these as well as get an expansion out.

Can you people be a bit specific… What game design decisions did Gw2 take that steers it towards the F2P in a bad way?

Also @Devata you claim Gw2 when more towards f2p then to b2p… compared to what exactly? there was only one other b2p game that I am aware of and thats Gw1 which you say you never played. So which B2P game did you play prior to Gw2 that you were hoping Gw2 business model would follow exactly?

I don’t need to have played it to know there payment model. Yeah GW1 was a good example where you buy the game and buy expansions and that was the focus of that game. Besides many games work like that, you mean MMO games. There are not many MMO’s that use a B2P system. They mainly use sub-based or F2P. The fact that GW2 is at this moment the only real B2P MMO (or well, was) was the main reason for my interest in GW2. But to answer that question.. I hope they would follow there GW1 business model.

The design decisions I refer to I also put in my last comment but I will sum them up here for you again.

Temporary content (the temporary events with temporary achievements but also items temporary available in the gem-store), gold-driven system and RNG-boxes.

Vayne.8563:

Galen Grey.4709:

morrolan.9608:

Devata.6589:

But there is no need for the cash-shop focus if they go for an expansion-pack focus. The problem was that they suddenly started to focus on the gem-store and had no plants for expansions anymore. That means that they sort of took the model of a F2P game and I agree thats bad. But if they indeed turn back to the expansion pack focus they can drop the gem-store focus and the thinks you dislike about it should also go away.

And after getting a lot of complains about those things expansions are now back on the table. So lets hope they go for that.

The “GW2 model” at this moment resembles more a F2P model then a B2P model. Thats the problem.

Yep I agree with this as well. But it won’t happen, too many design decisions have been embedded in the game funnelling players towards the gem shop and appealing to the ‘whales’. They would have to roll back these as well as get an expansion out.

Can you people be a bit specific… What game design decisions did Gw2 take that steers it towards the F2P in a bad way?

Also @Devata you claim Gw2 when more towards f2p then to b2p… compared to what exactly? there was only one other b2p game that I am aware of and thats Gw1 which you say you never played. So which B2P game did you play prior to Gw2 that you were hoping Gw2 business model would follow exactly?

Technically at this point, TSW is also buy to play.

The thing is, after playing many F2P MMOs, Guild Wars 2 is NOTHING like them. There’s no way to compare GW 2 to SWToR or Lotro or DDO, or Perfect World…it’s just a different system.

I mean in some of those games, content needs to be purchased separately for you to even play. SWToR is almost impossible to play without paying monthly. There’s no p2w in Guild Wars 2, there’s no content locked off by the cash shop.

So I’m not sure of Devata’s point.

All those games also got released as sub-based games. And besides I did not compaire them to those games to I am not sure what point you are referring to.

If you mean that GW2 took a F2P model and your point is.. look at those games, they are F2P and are not like GW2 so GW2 does not use a F2P model??

Many of those games also make different decisions so thats not a valid point. There are multiple ways a F2P model can work. The similarity is that they all make decisions in the game to try and get people ti buy stuff from the cash-shop. Being it P2W items or locked content and so on. GW2 does it for example with temporary content.. what is in a way also locked content as there is no way you would be able to get all those temporary items without buying gems with money.

It’s de focus on the cash-shop that makes it a F2P model.. not the way they focus because there are many ways to do that. Is GW2 now doing it in the worst way possible? No far from.. like you say no P2W and there is also not a level lock or any of that stuff. Then again your examples are games that first had a sub-based model.. thats even worse then F2P imho.

I think Raiderz for example has a similar system as GW2 does at this moment. Bad thing there is that you cant transfer ingame gold into Zen (There gems) but then again, they have other ways to earn free Zen. But I don’t want a F2P system like Raiderz but a B2P system (Like GW1).

Just for the record, just because you need to pay the first game does not yet make it a B2P model. TSW uses a F2P model at this time. But I think we had that discussion before so I will leave it to that.

Devata.6589:

Galen Grey.4709:

morrolan.9608:

Devata.6589:

But there is no need for the cash-shop focus if they go for an expansion-pack focus. The problem was that they suddenly started to focus on the gem-store and had no plants for expansions anymore. That means that they sort of took the model of a F2P game and I agree thats bad. But if they indeed turn back to the expansion pack focus they can drop the gem-store focus and the thinks you dislike about it should also go away.

And after getting a lot of complains about those things expansions are now back on the table. So lets hope they go for that.

The “GW2 model” at this moment resembles more a F2P model then a B2P model. Thats the problem.

Yep I agree with this as well. But it won’t happen, too many design decisions have been embedded in the game funnelling players towards the gem shop and appealing to the ‘whales’. They would have to roll back these as well as get an expansion out.

Can you people be a bit specific… What game design decisions did Gw2 take that steers it towards the F2P in a bad way?

Also @Devata you claim Gw2 when more towards f2p then to b2p… compared to what exactly? there was only one other b2p game that I am aware of and thats Gw1 which you say you never played. So which B2P game did you play prior to Gw2 that you were hoping Gw2 business model would follow exactly?

I don’t need to have played it to know there payment model. Yeah GW1 was a good example where you buy the game and buy expansions and that was the focus of that game. Besides many games work like that, you mean MMO games. There are not many MMO’s that use a B2P system. They mainly use sub-based or F2P. The fact that GW2 is at this moment the only real B2P MMO (or well, was) was the main reason for my interest in GW2. But to answer that question.. I hope they would follow there GW1 business model.

The design decisions I refer to I also put in my last comment but I will sum them up here for you again.

Temporary content (the temporary events with temporary achievements but also items temporary available in the gem-store), gold-driven system and RNG-boxes.

They can’t really follow the Guild Wars 1 business model, because it won’t work. And they’ve more or less said so early on in interviews. What they said, and I’m paraphrasing here, is the the Guild Wars 1 cash shop was added as basically an afterthought and never really factored into the business plan. They said that the cash shop would be more central to Guild Wars 2’s business plan.

There’s a reason. To go from a staff of 50 people, to a staff of 300 with bigger headquarters and overhead requires more cash flow. It’s that simple.

Everything is more expensive. SWToR was the most expensive MMO of all time. Why? Voice acting is enormously expensive and there was a ton of it. There’s a lot of voice acting in Guild Wars 2 also, far more than there was in Guild Wars 1, at a far greater expense.

The entire genre has changed. It’s more competitive. People put out content faster. If Anet had this game and waited a year and then put out an expansion without depending on the cash shop, the game wouldn’t be sustainable. And though Anet didn’t come right out and say that, they did say that the cash shop was a part of the business plan in a way it wasn’t in Guild Wars 2. They were pretty up front about it.

The whole industry has changed. It would be very hard for anyone to compete against companies taking in more money in this climate.

Galen Grey.4709:

Vayne.8563:

Galen Grey.4709:

morrolan.9608:

Devata.6589:

But there is no need for the cash-shop focus if they go for an expansion-pack focus. The problem was that they suddenly started to focus on the gem-store and had no plants for expansions anymore. That means that they sort of took the model of a F2P game and I agree thats bad. But if they indeed turn back to the expansion pack focus they can drop the gem-store focus and the thinks you dislike about it should also go away.

And after getting a lot of complains about those things expansions are now back on the table. So lets hope they go for that.

The “GW2 model” at this moment resembles more a F2P model then a B2P model. Thats the problem.

Yep I agree with this as well. But it won’t happen, too many design decisions have been embedded in the game funnelling players towards the gem shop and appealing to the ‘whales’. They would have to roll back these as well as get an expansion out.

Can you people be a bit specific… What game design decisions did Gw2 take that steers it towards the F2P in a bad way?

Also @Devata you claim Gw2 when more towards f2p then to b2p… compared to what exactly? there was only one other b2p game that I am aware of and thats Gw1 which you say you never played. So which B2P game did you play prior to Gw2 that you were hoping Gw2 business model would follow exactly?

Technically at this point, TSW is also buy to play.

The thing is, after playing many F2P MMOs, Guild Wars 2 is NOTHING like them. There’s no way to compare GW 2 to SWToR or Lotro or DDO, or Perfect World…it’s just a different system.

I mean in some of those games, content needs to be purchased separately for you to even play. SWToR is almost impossible to play without paying monthly. There’s no p2w in Guild Wars 2, there’s no content locked off by the cash shop.

So I’m not sure of Devata’s point.

True but If I brought up TSW I am sure I will get retorted with TSW didnt start B2P it started P2P.

I personally do not see the clear lines between B2P, F2P and P2P some people suggest there are. Especially now a days all models share the same design decisions and sell the same kind of stuff in their cash shops. For a while having cash shops in P2P was unheard of, now they all have it (or nearly all) like wise things change for the better. A long time ago F2P meant you could buy the best equipment in the game, now thats essentially gone. What I am trying to say is now a days you can never say in B2P and P2P business model you will never find X because thats something only F2P do. Those rules just dont exist. At the end of the day is what you get.

You dont like game design X , thats perfectly fine but dont blame it on the business model cause most likely thats got nothing to do with it. Besides now more or less games are trying to include every type of business model Just look at Swtor or Lotro they’re free to play, buy to play and have a subscription as well. P2P have introduced cash shop or in case of TSW straight out started with one. Lines between what it means to be P2P, B2P and F2P are just no there, definitely not any longer.

Of course you get retorted with that because it was a P2P game and like I said just because you buy the game it does not really make it a B2P game. Yeah if you would literally read the words as if it is not more as that it would.

You say the lines are not very clear because most games share similar design decisions. Well let me make it clear.. or at least as how I define it.

F2P focuses on a cash-shop and so make design decisions based on that focus. Trying to get people to buy stuff with cash. If that is locked content, B2W items, items only available for a limited time, locked levels or what more. There focus is the cash-shop and so game design is based on that because thats where they get there main income from.

Sub-based. The game is based on a subscription. Usually they will ask money for the box and expansions but thats not necessary. They might also have a cash-shop but there is no focus on it. They just put some items in there for some extra income. Game design is not based on getting people to buy something from the cash-shop.
There main income comes from the subscription.

B2P That games focuses on box-sales (online or real boxes) so the original box but also the expansions. They also might have a cash-shop with some fun or useful items in it but game-design it not based on getting people to buy something there. It’s a nice side-income. They focus on box-sales because thats where they get there main income from.

Devata.6589:

Galen Grey.4709:

Vayne.8563:

Galen Grey.4709:

morrolan.9608:

Devata.6589:

snip

And after getting a lot of complains about those things expansions are now back on the table. So lets hope they go for that.

The “GW2 model” at this moment resembles more a F2P model then a B2P model. Thats the problem.

Yep I agree with this as well. But it won’t happen, too many design decisions have been embedded in the game funnelling players towards the gem shop and appealing to the ‘whales’. They would have to roll back these as well as get an expansion out.

Can you people be a bit specific… What game design decisions did Gw2 take that steers it towards the F2P in a bad way?

Also @Devata you claim Gw2 when more towards f2p then to b2p… compared to what exactly? there was only one other b2p game that I am aware of and thats Gw1 which you say you never played. So which B2P game did you play prior to Gw2 that you were hoping Gw2 business model would follow exactly?

Technically at this point, TSW is also buy to play.

The thing is, after playing many F2P MMOs, Guild Wars 2 is NOTHING like them. There’s no way to compare GW 2 to SWToR or Lotro or DDO, or Perfect World…it’s just a different system.

I mean in some of those games, content needs to be purchased separately for you to even play. SWToR is almost impossible to play without paying monthly. There’s no p2w in Guild Wars 2, there’s no content locked off by the cash shop.

So I’m not sure of Devata’s point.

True but If I brought up TSW I am sure I will get retorted with TSW didnt start B2P it started P2P.

I personally do not see the clear lines between B2P, F2P and P2P some people suggest there are. Especially now a days all models share the same design decisions and sell the same kind of stuff in their cash shops. For a while having cash shops in P2P was unheard of, now they all have it (or nearly all) like wise things change for the better. A long time ago F2P meant you could buy the best equipment in the game, now thats essentially gone. What I am trying to say is now a days you can never say in B2P and P2P business model you will never find X because thats something only F2P do. Those rules just dont exist. At the end of the day is what you get.

You dont like game design X , thats perfectly fine but dont blame it on the business model cause most likely thats got nothing to do with it. Besides now more or less games are trying to include every type of business model Just look at Swtor or Lotro they’re free to play, buy to play and have a subscription as well. P2P have introduced cash shop or in case of TSW straight out started with one. Lines between what it means to be P2P, B2P and F2P are just no there, definitely not any longer.

Of course you get retorted with that because it was a P2P game and like I said just because you buy the game it does not really make it a B2P game. Yeah if you would literally read the words as if it is not more as that it would.

You say the lines are not very clear because most games share similar design decisions. Well let me make it clear.. or at least as how I define it.

F2P focuses on a cash-shop and so make design decisions based on that focus. Trying to get people to buy stuff with cash. If that is locked content, B2W items, items only available for a limited time, locked levels or what more. There focus is the cash-shop and so game design is based on that because thats where they get there main income from.

Sub-based. The game is based on a subscription. Usually they will ask money for the box and expansions but thats not necessary. They might also have a cash-shop but there is no focus on it. They just put some items in there for some extra income. Game design is not based on getting people to buy something from the cash-shop.
There main income comes from the subscription.

B2P That games focuses on box-sales (online or real boxes) so the original box but also the expansions. They also might have a cash-shop with some fun or useful items in it but game-design it not based on getting people to buy something there. It’s a nice side-income. They focus on box-sales because thats where they get there main income from.

You left out one thing. Everything about subscription games that I’ve seen leads to slowing you down. Lockouts, RNG loot in dungeons so you have to run them umpteen times to get gear that you need to progress, flight paths, long amount of time crafting, long waits to level, that sort of thing.

If F2P games push you toward the cash shop, subscription games push you to play longer and slower.