Guild Wars 2

I really like the “Guild Wars 2 Design Manifesto” posted on April 27, 2010.
What is vision for a good game, everyone should read it.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/guild-wars-2-design-manifesto/

I also like following in “how ArenaNet Measures Success” posted on June 19, 2012.

“If our model was subscription based, we might be spending all this time racing to add as much filler content as possible to keep players chasing the carrot, but as content designers with the goal of making fun, we get to spend this time refining our content and making it amazing. As designers this is both liberating and refreshing in an industry where so rarely do developers get time from publishers to actually polish their games. (High-five, NCsoft!)”

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/is-it-fun-colin-johanson-on-how-arenanet-measures-success/

ah here we go again.

I’ll get popcorn and hit F5 every few minutes…

I did not want offend anyone, apologies.

Nevertheless, I don’t understand why the original post was trashed by the forum monitor so quickly. I did not even read most of the responses.

The original vision in the Manifesto is superior in my opinion.

Anyone have that “Oh this thread again” picture? Might be needed.

Since this has been shut down/moved multiple times today what exactly do you hope to gain?

I think when people talk about the manifesto (a statement of intention, not a promise like a lot of people make it out to be) they forget about things like resources available to the devs, or the fact that they have the concurrency numbers.

This isn’t defending every decision they make (IMO, Ascended and LS is poorly implemented, and the lack of communication regarding the implementation of Ascended), but it’s something to consider as to why they didn’t stick with their original intentions.

As for the ‘everything you love about GW1…’ line, who are they aiming that at? Everyone has different things they loved and disliked about the game.

I want to read the responses of the community regarding the Manifesto and the original thread was deleted before I had chance to read them. So I am posting it again.

As stated in the deleted thread (reposting deleted threads are against the rules btw) people really should look up the definition of a manifesto before complaining about stuff like this.

This is the definition of a manifesto:

a written statement that describes the policies, goals, and opinions of a person or group

In no way or form does it claim that a manifesto is a rock-solid plan. It is simply a statement of intent, and intents need to change in order to work, if the situation changes.

It is highly unlikely that the game would be as successful as it is if they had done everything exactly as they envisioned it 2.5 years before release, simply due to the fact that the market changes, as does peoples interests and wants.

I wouldn’t blame him too much…
Maybe he’s just another one of those “who likes the game, doesn’t come to the forums, they spend the time online playing”, that decided to come and join the “vocal minority who rants on the forums”…
So he may don’t know that the “Manifesto lies” argument has already been discussed ad nauseam

I have rephrased my post. I am learning the rules here.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/rules

I have rephrased my post. I am learning the rules here.

Thx for the rules. Does the current post break any rules?

Anet doesn’t care about the manifesto anymore, and I think it’s pretty obvious they don’t really care about the playerbase too much either.

The manifesto was abandoned. There is nothing to discuss.

Manifesto did its job…. sell boxes.

Now the gemstore took over the game.

knives.6345:

ah here we go again.

I’ll get popcorn and hit F5 every few minutes…

lol

I almost like the irony in hindsight of the “how Arenanet Measures Success” more than the lies of the manifesto. At least the manifesto is several years old, the other is just a couple months before release.

Exalibur, where are you when we need you?! Come and punish this infidel!
Btw, yeah this thread again, so weird that time after time is not the same person posting it.
I say maybe, again, maybe it’s a natural reaction being mesmerized by such a beutiful list of intents and maybe it’s sad to observe were things went, so when people find the manifesto they come to the forum to ask: “Why”?

Lord of Rings.5371:

I have rephrased my post. I am learning the rules here.

You have posts that are a month old. Slow learner, eh?

Company puts out an ad for the product.
Ad makes it sound like the best thing ever.
The company doesn’t deliver.
Customers feel betrayed and lied to.

Draco.2806:

Company puts out an ad for the product.
Ad makes it sound like the best thing ever.
The company doesn’t deliver.
Customers feel betrayed and lied to.

More like:
Company puts out an ad for the product.
Ad makes it sound like the best thing ever.
The company delivers a mediocre release.
Instead of fixing the problem the company decides to take the easy way out with a tried and tested method: grind.
Original customers feel betrayed and lied to.

Won’t ever buy a B2P game again, 90% of the developer focus in this model is creating crap they can sell. I’d rather pay a subscription and get real content and attention to balance.

The amount of new content since release that I have actually enjoyed has been close to zero.

Almost no substantive balance or diversity improvements have been made in a year, with the notable exception of WVW and art, the game could not have disappointed me any more than it already has.

scerevisiae.1972:

Won’t ever buy a B2P game again, 90% of the developer focus in this model is creating crap they can sell. I’d rather pay a subscription and get real content and attention to balance.

The amount of new content since release that I have actually enjoyed has been close to zero.

Almost no substantive balance or diversity improvements have been made in a year, with the notable exception of WVW and art, the game could not have disappointed me any more than it already has.

THIS.

I never played GW1 but caught wind of GW2 a couple months before it released.

-Read the manifesto and loved it
-bought the game and enjoyed it for a couple months
-manifesto gets trashed
-felt disappointed and deceived, so
-i chose to spend my time elsewhere

I’ll never play another subscription game again, because of the design decisions that make subscription games work are the very design decisions that make subscription game suck. Everything has to be slowed down. They want you in that game and they don’t want you to leave. Sub games all seem to have dailies. They also seem to have rep grind. They also seem to be focused on raids and dungeons which frankly are not why I play an MMO.

The manifesto remains to this day 90% true. The two or three lines people take out of context to quote are just that. Two or three lines out of context.

But most importantly, there are plenty of things in the game that I do think are fun and many of them have been introduced recently. As an example, I think Southsun Survival is fun. I think many of the mini games that come around have been fun. I understand a lot of people enjoy the music game over Christmas.

I certainly like the new TA path, the new fractals and the new Teq encounter, even if I had to join another guild to take down Tequatl.

And I really like the instances in the new living story. I like how the living story has changed the world. Waypoints gone, hearts changed to compensate. Things have changed in the game due to the living story. I find that fun.

The problem here is that people want to interpret each sentence of a paragraph as a separate entity but that’s not how reading works. When Colin talks about grind in the manifesto, he defines it. He says in most games you have this boring grind BEFORE you get to the fun stuff. He’s talking about that when he refers to grind again. Once you define a word in a paragraph, that’s the definition it takes.

He subsequently spoke about how you have to level up in most games to get to raids at end game and you don’t have to do this here. They put encounters like Shadow Behemoth and the great jungle wurm right in starter zones, so people could get to some fun stuff, instead of just boring stuff.

Naturally fun is subjective, but I think they did exactly what they said they were going to do.

The only line I question in the manifesto is the line about “everything you love about Guild Wars 1”. Of course, everyone might love completely different things, and that’s clearly a marketing line, but the rest of the manifesto…I think they pretty much did what they said they were going to.

There’s no mention of gear grind in the manifesto, it’s clearly not the kind of grind being referred to. I think people need to stop quoting three year old documents and move on with it. If you don’t like the game, that’s cool. If you don’t think they’ve stuck to the letter of the word of a document even a year or two old…well, MMOs change all the time.

How come no one brings up the Iteration blog post that Anet posted that spent the entire post talking about how they change things that don’t work, including completely throwing out entire systems if necessary. Seems like a curious omission to me.

Vayne.8563:

Everything has to be slowed down. They want you in that game and they don’t want you to leave. Sub games all seem to have dailies. They also seem to have rep grind. They also seem to be focused on raids and dungeons which frankly are not why I play an MMO.

Seems like a nice description of gw2.
- Slowed down = gating (we’ve seen enough of it).
- Dailies – check,
- Reputation grind (achiv, glory, wvw rank) – check,
- Raids (dragons maybe) – check,
- Dungeons (almost every LS has one) – check.

Vayne.8563:

How come no one brings up the Iteration blog post that Anet posted that spent the entire post talking about how they change things that don’t work, including completely throwing out entire systems if necessary. Seems like a curious omission to me.

What systems? PvP which needs a major rework is still in the game.

P.S.

I already moved to a different game (sub based) and I’m happier because there’s no cash shop and the last update was just awesome.

Vayne.8563:

I’ll never play another subscription game again, because of the design decisions that make subscription games work are the very design decisions that make subscription game suck. Everything has to be slowed down. They want you in that game and they don’t want you to leave. Sub games all seem to have dailies. They also seem to have rep grind. They also seem to be focused on raids and dungeons which frankly are not why I play an MMO.

Eve Online.

Dark Catalyst.1028:

Vayne.8563:

I’ll never play another subscription game again, because of the design decisions that make subscription games work are the very design decisions that make subscription game suck. Everything has to be slowed down. They want you in that game and they don’t want you to leave. Sub games all seem to have dailies. They also seem to have rep grind. They also seem to be focused on raids and dungeons which frankly are not why I play an MMO.

Eve Online.

I should have qualified. I’ll never play another theme park MMO that’s sub based. Eve Online is in a space all by itself.

Though I don’t know a whole lot of people who play Eve Online for PvE, and I’m chiefly a PvE’er. Love the concept though.

Vayne.8563:

How come no one brings up the Iteration blog post that Anet posted that spent the entire post talking about how they change things that don’t work, including completely throwing out entire systems if necessary. Seems like a curious omission to me.

• Condition damage caps in PvE making multiple condition users redundant
• Ranger and Necromancer pet AI
• Designing Engineers so that the ultimate prestige item in the game is unlikely to be seen during combat
• Particle spam which makes herd play a melange of color and light rather than a game where you can enjoy seeing what’s happening
• Still cannot filter on armor weight on the TP

Pity they don’t throw out these systems rather than a feature they advertised.

The Manifesto was a brilliant PR move.

Same with the game title….Guild Wars 2 ……yeah, sure.

Now its swept under the carpet…they got your money (and mine).

I imagine those PR guys laughing hard now everytime someone comes up with the manifesto.

scerevisiae.1972:

Won’t ever buy a B2P game again, 90% of the developer focus in this model is creating crap they can sell. I’d rather pay a subscription and get real content and attention to balance.

The amount of new content since release that I have actually enjoyed has been close to zero.

Almost no substantive balance or diversity improvements have been made in a year, with the notable exception of WVW and art, the game could not have disappointed me any more than it already has.

Pretty much this.

They launched game unfinished and never fixed/finished it.

hotfix added grind.

rest is 90% automated live updates, gemshop items and skins or new vendors/grindable tags.

i don’t know what to say really except im losing interest finally. hope there’s something interesting games coming out next year.

matjazmuhic.1649:

Vayne.8563:

Everything has to be slowed down. They want you in that game and they don’t want you to leave. Sub games all seem to have dailies. They also seem to have rep grind. They also seem to be focused on raids and dungeons which frankly are not why I play an MMO.

Seems like a nice description of gw2.
- Slowed down = gating (we’ve seen enough of it).
- Dailies – check,
- Reputation grind (achiv, glory, wvw rank) – check,
- Raids (dragons maybe) – check,
- Dungeons (almost every LS has one) – check.

I think by slowed down he meant actually gating content behind checks. Stuff like you cant go raiding on FF14 before spending weeks spamming the same two dungeons over and over and over for tokens.

scerevisiae.1972:

Won’t ever buy a B2P game again, 90% of the developer focus in this model is creating crap they can sell. I’d rather pay a subscription and get real content and attention to balance.

The amount of new content since release that I have actually enjoyed has been close to zero.

Almost no substantive balance or diversity improvements have been made in a year, with the notable exception of WVW and art, the game could not have disappointed me any more than it already has.

I can relate to this a lot. Anytime a new mmo is announced(wildstar, eso, eq:n etc) I just hope that it will be sub based. I’ve never been big into f2p/b2p mmos, but GW2 definitely left a nasty taste in my mouth. It’s not terrible, I just think things would be significantly better as a sub mmo.

SonicTHI.3217:

Draco.2806:

Company puts out an ad for the product.
Ad makes it sound like the best thing ever.
The company doesn’t deliver.
Customers feel betrayed and lied to.

More like:
Company puts out an ad for the product.
Ad makes it sound like the best thing ever.
The company delivers a mediocre release.
Instead of fixing the problem the company decides to take the easy way out with a tried and tested method: grind.
Original customers feel betrayed and lied to.

More like:
Company puts out an ad for the product.
Ad makes it sound like the best thing ever.
Players reject the concept in droves because they want it to be more like [insert game here].
The company discovers they don’t have a large enough niche to support the game.
Company alters their concept to cater to the larger audience they need.
Original customers whine and pitch a fit about being betrayed and lied to.

chemiclord.3978:

SonicTHI.3217:

Draco.2806:

Company puts out an ad for the product.
Ad makes it sound like the best thing ever.
The company doesn’t deliver.
Customers feel betrayed and lied to.

More like:
Company puts out an ad for the product.
Ad makes it sound like the best thing ever.
The company delivers a mediocre release.
Instead of fixing the problem the company decides to take the easy way out with a tried and tested method: grind.
Original customers feel betrayed and lied to.

More like:
Company puts out an ad for the product.
Ad makes it sound like the best thing ever.
Players reject the concept in droves because they want it to be more like [insert game here].
The company discovers they don’t have a large enough niche to support the game.
Company alters their concept to cater to the larger audience they need.
Original customers whine and pitch a fit about being betrayed and lied to.

More like:

• Company puts out ads about the game’s progression system.
• Ad appeals to potential customers, many of whom buy the game based on the ad.
• Company drops the ball on cosmetic progression, grossly underestimating how quickly the customers will get their character’s look, and discouraging the pursuit of multiple looks by selling transformation consumables rather than wardrobe slots.
• Players complain there’s nothing to work toward.
• Company makes the easier/less costly choice of implementing a shallow stat progression rather than fixing cosmetic progression. Said stat progression is tied only to time in game, rather than completion of difficult content. GW2 becomes the only MMO out there where BiS weapons and armor are obtained primarily via crafting.
• Players who bought the game expecting the ads to reflect the game say, “WTK?” Other players who wanted BiS to be available via hard content also say, “WTK?”

:D Vanye will be the one who turns off the lights

chemiclord.3978:

Players reject the concept in droves because they want it to be more like [insert game here].
The company discovers they don’t have a large enough niche to support the game.

Bull$%*t.

The only reason Guild Wars 2 is popular is because people WANTED this kind of game.

Guild Wars 2 was the talk of every gaming outlet for years because of what it promised to be, and the player response to it was overwhelming. People bought this game because they – and I – really believed all this stuff about living world, diverse skills, “play how you want”, lack of grind, good story (haha), and many other improvements on the old MMO formula.

But ANet didn’t deliver. They certainly polished up many of the rough edges, they deserve credit there, but it just wasn’t enough to make it into a game their Manifesto and their blog posts promised it’d be.

Then there’s that whole thing about leaving the game in a sorry broken state and doing a complete 180 regarding the gear/achievement treadmills…

They promised. Players bought in… then players left in droves because there was “nothing to do” or “no endgame.” They didn’t want to go back into “newbie zones” for dungeons. They wanted raids. They wanted phat loot. They wanted vertical progression.

GW1 veterans WEREN’T ENOUGH. I’m sorry you hate it; but it’s true.

chemiclord.3978:

They promised. Players bought in… then players left in droves because there was “nothing to do” or “no endgame.”

Correct.

I think they expected the community to embrace horizontal progression and instead they got a lot of “there’s nothing to doooooo” whining.

Well they were right. There IS nothing to do.

And there’s no horizontal progression either. The only way to change your looks is with a cash-exclusive item, and that change is permanent. You choose your looks and you’re done. There’s no progression.

So now chasing shinies is completely pointless – not only do they not give you better stats, they won’t give you new looks either.

And without chasing shinies, what else is there to do? Press 1 or ten different kinds of drakes that press 1 on you? Explore featureless green plains for the sake of exploring featureless green plains? Really, what do you do in the open world? Nothing. This would be a death sentence to any game.

The game is boring. There’s no incentive to do anything, and there’s no fun in doing it.

I mean, if you enjoy it, more power to you, but it’s not good game design, and it’s not going to be enough for most people.

chemiclord.3978:

They wanted raids. They wanted phat loot. They wanted vertical progression.

People bought the game in droves because they wanted the opposite of what the game promised?

People gushed about how great the Manifesto is even though they wanted none of it?

Is this the opposite-day version of logic, or what?

chemiclord.3978:

I’m sorry you hate it; but it’s true.

Then again, with responses like that, it sounds like you’re just trolling for heck of it…

Xae Isareth.1364:

I think by slowed down he meant actually gating content behind checks. Stuff like you cant go raiding on FF14 before spending weeks spamming the same two dungeons over and over and over for tokens.

you mean like how you cant do fractals 50 till you grind through fractals 1-49? and grind your resistance gear?

Shadow Blade.1324:

you mean like how you cant do fractals 50 till you grind through fractals 1-49? and grind your resistance gear?

Technically you can do lvl 50 Fractals without ever joining a fractal over lvl 1,, and the infusions can be bought on the TP.

Draco.2806:

snip

I should specify.

GW1 veterans bought in because of the manifesto and what was promised. The problem there is that niche wasn’t (and isn’t) enough to support the game on it’s own.

You can actually see it in the manifesto; they KNEW that… which is why they threw in the “if you hate MMOs, then you should definitely try Guild Wars 2.”

The problem is… that group didn’t buy in. Why would they? They hate MMOs. Why would they buy into one?

They had a second group, the content locusts, who didn’t give one tenth of one kitten about the manifesto. They just wanted something to do because they were bored with the other MMO offerings. THAT group, the representative cluster of the MMO market, rushed to 80, cried about nothing to do, then quit.

Arena.net had to do something. The GW1 veterans who bought in weren’t enough. The MMO haters weren’t buying in. They decided they needed to hold the attention of the content locusts.

And now you see the vertical progression. You see content being shot out rapid fire, all things that the traditional MMO playerbase salivates over. All to keep people logging in, and (hopefully) spending money on the gem store.

That’s just how it turned out. I question the decision myself… but I also fear I would make the same decision they did; because the way things were wasn’t working.

chemiclord.3978:

GW1 veterans bought in because of the manifesto and what was promised.

Not just the veterans. Tons of people who never played or never liked Guild Wars bought in too (like me).

It seems you’re trying to say that people who bought the game for what it promised didn’t actually buy the game for what it promised, which is… which makes no sense. Or are you trying to say something else?

chemiclord.3978:

The problem is… that group didn’t buy in. Why would they? They hate MMOs.

Uh, hello. I did.

Lots of other people did, and they’ll tell you if you’d just ask. The whole thing about Manifesto was, is that it claimed to do away with all the things people hate about MMOs.

chemiclord.3978:

That’s just how it turned out. I question the decision myself… but I also fear I would make the same decision they did; because the way things were wasn’t working.

The things weren’t working because ANet didn’t deliver on their promises. It’s very simple.

Adding a grind treadmill is just a patchwork effort to keep people addicted through psychological manipulation when they wouldn’t stay for the fun of it otherwise. Everyone knows this trick. It’s badly overused in the gaming industry.

Draco.2806:

Adding a grind treadmill is just a patchwork effort to keep people addicted through psychological manipulation when they wouldn’t stay for the fun of it otherwise. Everyone knows this trick. It’s badly overused in the gaming industry.

Oh, absolutely agreed.

I also know, sadly, that that’s what the MMO market as a whole goes for. They couldn’t give one tenth of one kitten about how “fun” something is as long as they have shinys better than the “casuals” shinies that they can show off. They love to brag about the hours they put in, and how much more l33t their phat purplez are than yours.

There’s only so far players will let you change the game. Arena.net learned this the hard way.

In honesty, I really feel for players like you. I guess I’ve become jaded about the gamer mindset enough that I’m no longer surprised when games that promise to be different wind up drifting towards the “WoW clone” experience. Guild Wars 2 was HARDLY the first to try to break the mold, you know.

MMO players just aren’t interested in anything different… and it doesn’t seem like players like you are enough for developers to sustain a different model.

If this game is sub-based, I would have paid $amount monthly x 12mos. So say, the monthly is $10 and I started September last year, that;s about 15mos, which is about $150. Now many sub-based MMO from big names usually sell their game (with a free first month included when you buythe game) for about $60. So that brings me to:
$60 + $150 – 10 (the first month) = $200 for the year (plus tax).

But instead, I paid for the box price and will continue to play for the box price for as long as I play this game, without having to worry that if I go on leave, my computer broke, or simply have no time to play, that I’m wasting my subscription.

I have played F2P Korean MMO way back 2006-2009, and boy, the amount of items you need to “play” the game is more than what anyone would spend in a sub-based game (I never bought into it though), but early in the life of that game, the items for sale are for looks only, but eventually, they sell the actual gear lol.

I played the initial WoW too during release, but…refunded my money. I can’t bear the fact that the game I paid for already would require me to keep paying just to continue playing. I understand about the server and stuff, but I was an old-school Single Player/Multiplayer gamer. I thrive in Battle net (free), family/friend LAN (free), LANfest (free).

So when I saw the Manifesto, and discussing about the payment model, I quickly tried the game. And during my stay, till now, it’s almost perfect. Sure, there are some misses, but nothing will ever be perfect because even if it’s perfect for me or perfect for others, chances are, the game is still not perfect because each and every player is different.

So I play what I like, skip things I don’t like. When the time comes this game got boring for me, I won’t be posting here blaming Anet about broken promises, or whining about how imbalance stuff are, or how loot are bads. I’ll complain about broken stuff, but nt enough to make me rage. It’s a game, it’s not my life, I do what I like in it, and leave when I get over it. No high blood pressure…just fun.

Vayne.8563:

I’ll never play another subscription game again, because of the design decisions that make subscription games work are the very design decisions that make subscription game suck.

But you don’t think b2p/f2p games are just as bad? The game design decisions are based purely on monetization. Same thing, different coat of paint.

chemiclord.3978:

They promised. Players bought in… then players left in droves because there was “nothing to do” or “no endgame.” They didn’t want to go back into “newbie zones” for dungeons. They wanted raids. They wanted phat loot. They wanted vertical progression.

GW1 veterans WEREN’T ENOUGH. I’m sorry you hate it; but it’s true.

We’ll never know, because ANet bailed on the cosmetic endgame. Dreary stat boosts without the phat loot and the raids was cheaper to produce.

They must be tight on resources, hurting for cash or milking the player base.

Even I thought GW2 would be grind free, cosmetic achievements earned from challenging content. Boy was I ever wrong.

Is it easier to make an entire expansion? Or is it easier to re-skin an existing tier 3 human cultural armor set by adding some flame effects and slapping it with a 10$ price tag?

It’s really sad that it has come to this.

IndigoSundown.5419:

chemiclord.3978:

They promised. Players bought in… then players left in droves because there was “nothing to do” or “no endgame.” They didn’t want to go back into “newbie zones” for dungeons. They wanted raids. They wanted phat loot. They wanted vertical progression.

GW1 veterans WEREN’T ENOUGH. I’m sorry you hate it; but it’s true.

We’ll never know, because ANet bailed on the cosmetic endgame. Dreary stat boosts without the phat loot and the raids was cheaper to produce.

What I can tell you is from my experience, an initial guild of 20… I’m the only one left. The other 19 got bored because there was no reason to play after they got their exotics. There wasn’t any raids or any better loot to be had, so they left.

You may question the wisdom of catering to those players (I do), but from my experience, they represent the bulk of the MMO market.

What did people do in GW1 once they reached max level?