Guild Wars 2

femalehumanmeta.8351:

Obtena.7952:

femalehumanmeta.8351:

Vayne.8563:

From my point of view the game is more populated now than back then.

If you think the game is more populated now than at launch, why does Anet not give us more concrete player population numbers like the peak concurrent user figures they included in their “the first year” blog post? It’s definitely not because there are more people playing the game.

Anet has never given those numbers, so concluding there is a correlation between them releasing those numbers and the health of the game is bad.

The blog post I linked do include those numbers. At the peak of the games popularity, during the first year, there were 460k concurrent users. Anet haven’t released concrete player population numbers like that since.

I’m not bashing the game, I like the game. Still do. I preordered hot and got my money’s worth, but to deny the changes they’ve made over the years like introducing megaservers (just a fancy word for server merging), wvw server merging, and the game going f2p (it’s not a coincidence they announced f2p after ncsofts most recent quarterly earnings report at the time had gw2 revenue at it’s lowest since launch), being a direct result of player population issues.

Only Anet knows how much the player population has dropped off, but it should be obvious to most that it has happened.

ESO launched with a mega server. Maybe the mega server was due to the fact that they expected to fail. The Anet megaserver game onboard after ESO announced theirs.

It solved a problem with population imbalance on certain servers. For example, I was on TC and never ever had a population problem anywhere at any time, because everyone was guesting to TC to get stuff done. In fact, there were complaint threads on these forums by people in TC who couldn’t get into their own server. The megaserver solved those problems.

Saying it was down to population loss is an assumption. And again since ESO launched with a mega server and advertised it, what evidence is there that the sole reason or even main reason for the mega-server was population reduction.

The real reason is more likely that running servers that had less people on them wasn’t as cost effective as making servers as you needed them. Businesses do make changes to save on cost.

The WvW problem started soon after launch because of the free server transfers. So many people wanted to be on blackgate.

Three months after launch there were already a bunch of dead WvW worlds. Merging those worlds with other servers is three years overdue.

Anyone can look at the quarterly statement, see the profits and know the game is healthy. That’s far more factual than making assumptions about why certain decisions were made.

One thing is just guessing. The other is factual.

Vayne.8563:

Anyone can look at the quarterly statement, see the profits and know the game is healthy. That’s far more factual than making assumptions about why certain decisions were made.

One thing is just guessing. The other is factual.

You are insinuating that “healthy profits” imply “healthy population” which it most certainly does not. …and using the word healthy to describe anything, unless you define exactly what you mean by healthy, is certainly a very vague term.

Healthy can mean, okay, fine, acceptable, good, or even… what I’m assuming you are going for…. not dead.

You reference quarterly statements…

Microtransactions are what anet initially said was supposed to keep the game afloat, and it is still a topic of discussion at earnings reports.

“The amount of gem sales and item sales versus active players is ok.”

Meaning… there are enough active players who are willing to make gemstore purchases to sustain the game upkeep costs and still return a profit… and only this.

Healthy, as I would take from the earnings report, would simply be defined as ‘acceptable’ and it is in regards to population contributing to revenue, not population as a whole.

Lets not forget how HoT sales were lower than anticipated.
“we have not seen the level (of sales) we have hoped”

What does that tell you?

Nothing… or should I say next to nothing.

…because anet sold the core game bundled in with the expansion.

(in order to obscure data regarding new game sales as well as existing player expansion purchases.)

…so we will never know if:
Anet sold an acceptable amount of copies to new players, but failed to earn enough sales from existing vet players
Anet sold an acceptable amount of copies to existing vet players, but failed to earn enough sales from new players
or
Anet failed to sell acceptable amounts of copies to existing vet players AND new players.

But it is definitely one of the three, and I would not declare that healthy by any definition.

Also regardless of which is actually true…. THEY ALL MEAN LOWER POPULATION THAN ANTICIPATED.

All MMOs eventually die, and that will happen with WOW as well, because its simply not practical to keep adding new content forever.
Newer games will always be developed to attract players from existing games.
Every MMO has the most number of players the day its released, and then the numbers slowly go down over time.

mdee.5194:

All MMOs eventually die, and that will happen with WOW as well, because its simply not practical to keep adding new content forever.
Newer games will always be developed to attract players from existing games.
Every MMO has the most number of players the day its released, and then the numbers slowly go down over time.

Wow actually had it’s highest player base at 12 mil at the launch of its 2nd expansion wrath of the lich king. So not really true. But I do feel that gw2 is tanking atm

I am playing in aussie time zone (actually from Eastern Siberia but the time zone is very familiar) and after logging into the game I find myself alone most of the time. On both guild roster and WvW, even enemies I stumble uppon are usually not very numerous unless it’s EB (and it’s still very unlikely too). And if I decided not to play in my prime time zone, my other choice is to play after work in late evening when I am fairly exhausted and can hardly concentrate and that’s very crucial part since I like roaming/competitive more than anything else in this game.
So yeah, in my time zone the game is pretty much dead. I’ve only been playing for 11 months but I am starting to think I should not have bothered with GW2 as well as other MMOs.

Vasdamas Anklast.1607:

On both guild roster and WvW

Unless you joined a guild that plays specifically in your time zone, it could be dead a lot of the time because you play in a weird timezone to them. I have found this myself playing on US servers from the UK, I joined a guild because I was playing late night, when I switched to earlier I found I couldn’t play with them. Solution is to find a guild that IS on when you are.

If you only play wvw you are playing a subset of people anyway. Again I’ve found this when going to get badges of honour last time, if I got on too early I was alone, two or three people would turn up later and then shortly after that we’d be outnumbered.. I don’t think there is a solution to that apart from stop turning up at the wrong times. Best way to do that is find the guild that plays at your time or look at a server move to one that is popular in your timezone.

There is still the chance you won’t get a decent wvw population in your timezone because rng timezone.. but at the same time you may find a new guild helps a lot.

General Health.9678:

Vasdamas Anklast.1607:

On both guild roster and WvW

Unless you joined a guild that plays specifically in your time zone, it could be dead a lot of the time because you play in a weird timezone to them. I have found this myself playing on US servers from the UK, I joined a guild because I was playing late night, when I switched to earlier I found I couldn’t play with them. Solution is to find a guild that IS on when you are.

If you only play wvw you are playing a subset of people anyway. Again I’ve found this when going to get badges of honour last time, if I got on too early I was alone, two or three people would turn up later and then shortly after that we’d be outnumbered.. I don’t think there is a solution to that apart from stop turning up at the wrong times. Best way to do that is find the guild that plays at your time or look at a server move to one that is popular in your timezone.

There is still the chance you won’t get a decent wvw population in your timezone because rng timezone.. but at the same time you may find a new guild helps a lot.

……………..

Think I haven’t tried searching for a guild? Those I found on EU aren’t really hardcore and most of the time PPT/K-train which they start doing just once I am off to work(and I am not really into that shabby business). I also tried transfering to NA and even found an appropriate guild but guess what? Ping over 600 so not thanks, begged Anet to transfer myself back to EU because I couldn’t even participate in any area that includes big ammount of players.

TheBlackLeech.9360:

Vayne.8563:

Anyone can look at the quarterly statement, see the profits and know the game is healthy. That’s far more factual than making assumptions about why certain decisions were made.

One thing is just guessing. The other is factual.

You are insinuating that “healthy profits” imply “healthy population” which it most certainly does not. …and using the word healthy to describe anything, unless you define exactly what you mean by healthy, is certainly a very vague term.

Healthy can mean, okay, fine, acceptable, good, or even… what I’m assuming you are going for…. not dead.

You reference quarterly statements…

Microtransactions are what anet initially said was supposed to keep the game afloat, and it is still a topic of discussion at earnings reports.

“The amount of gem sales and item sales versus active players is ok.”

Meaning… there are enough active players who are willing to make gemstore purchases to sustain the game upkeep costs and still return a profit… and only this.

Healthy, as I would take from the earnings report, would simply be defined as ‘acceptable’ and it is in regards to population contributing to revenue, not population as a whole.

Lets not forget how HoT sales were lower than anticipated.
“we have not seen the level (of sales) we have hoped”

What does that tell you?

Nothing… or should I say next to nothing.

…because anet sold the core game bundled in with the expansion.

(in order to obscure data regarding new game sales as well as existing player expansion purchases.)

…so we will never know if:
Anet sold an acceptable amount of copies to new players, but failed to earn enough sales from existing vet players
Anet sold an acceptable amount of copies to existing vet players, but failed to earn enough sales from new players
or
Anet failed to sell acceptable amounts of copies to existing vet players AND new players.

But it is definitely one of the three, and I would not declare that healthy by any definition.

Also regardless of which is actually true…. THEY ALL MEAN LOWER POPULATION THAN ANTICIPATED.

Actually they don’t. You’re making unwarranted assumptions. That is to say every single MMO in existence, all of them bar none, suffer from natural attrition.

Some people buy games and never end up playing them. There are many reasons, some times game related and sometimes not. People get too busy. They lose the internet. Their computer is too slow to do anything. Sometimes they don’t like the graphic style. Or the grind. Or the combat system, or the lack of content.

Every game has natural attrition. That’s normal. So how do you get new players into the game.

Sure original people have left the game. That’s the same as every game. But since the game has gone free to play there are also new players. How many of each, no one knows.

You’re making the assumption that the new players coming in our less than the players that left permanently as opposed to players who left and came back, of which there are at least a few, because there’s a bunch of those in my guild.

You don’t have math, or numbers. You have conjecture. Of course, I don’t have math or numbers, I just have conjecture too.

The different is, I’m not the one positing the position of the game is lower or higher. I’m simply saying your claim isn’t based on anything but your personal experiences, which may not tell you anything.

For example, there may be less people in dungeons and more people in fractals. There may be less people in WvW and more in SPvP. There may be more raiders but less open world players.

There’s simply no way to know. I don’t make posts saying the population is this or the population is that.

I simply make posts saying no one can know and making assumptions is just that. Making assumptions. It is my belief you’re making kittenumptions.

Because many of those who take a break from the game do come back for new content.

GW2 is NCsoft’s best performing title in the western market. Blade and Soul might rival GW2 if their western figures remain the same or higher than their western launch numbers, but that is extremely rare and I doubt it. Even so only having two titles performing strong in the West, they will want to hold onto this market so GW2 isn’t going anywhere soon if NCsoft has a say in it.

Ever since launch the quarterly reports have been relatively stable and comparable to their other titles in the eastern market even though the eastern market has a far higher revenue potential. At least if this site is anything to go by: https://www.superdataresearch.com/market-data/mmo-market/

The revenue in Asia is double all the others combined. Even though GW2 released in China I think the majority of it’s success is in the West. And a title in a smaller market doing comparably to titles in a far larger market seems about as healthy as you can get without being a WoW or Lineage outlier.

If we’re taking anecdotal evidence, every time I do a key run there’s at least a handful of players in the starting instance even far off peak hours for every race (I randomly choose a race just for a touch of variety). Admittedly possibly key farmers as well, but that in addition to seeing simple questions regularly being asked in chat like the location of world bosses in starter zones, questions about daily rooms, questions in EotM and WvW tell me there’s a decent stream of new players, or at the very least veteran players finding new stuff to get into. Either way, plenty of active players for my needs.

There also haven’t been any major layoffs unlike Wildstar, and Colin’s leaving was friendly in nature as they had him continue to work even after announcing his eventual departure and they included him in their AMA at the time. They’ve been building up LS with current events that, even though they are simple, are far better than setting sign posts like how LS1 began and it’s clearly building up to something. Nothing in all of that says the game’s unhealthy to me.

Dragonfeu.4356:

I’m seeing less and less videos put up by the big GW2 youtubers and they’re receiving less and less views. I haven’t played in a few months, so i’m completely out of touch with the community but are a lot of players quitting?

I just came BACK to GW2 after a longish hiatus, and frankly I was stunned by the exact opposite – how alive GW2 is. It kinda got me and my gamin’ buddies (we all came back) talking about how, while GW2 is certainly a heavy-hitter at the AAA MMO tier, the game doesn’t get nearly enough mention or credit for being an astounding good game.

Also – unrelated, quick nod to the devs and the art team: Somebody put alotta love into the HoT expansion. I’m not a big fan of how bewildering and sometimes frustratingly 3D it is (ie with the canopies, and the root-jumping, the flying, all that) – but that doesn’t stop me from appreciating the design, the art, the the time spent making those zones look amazing. Well done!

I’m going to back up DaikonSamurai.6714’s comment about players in the starting instance. No matter what time. No matter what day. When I make a key runner there are new chars in the human starting instance. On average I’ll see from 6 to 8 new chars each time I go in there. In addition, since I run straight from the spawn point to the boss I don’t see the ones that are at the inn or running around killing centaurs. Maybe they’re vets making alts, but this increase started with the start of f2p and has continued from that time.

As to people having dead servers, I see people all the time. When I’m out farming or doing events there’s always other people out and around. Unless the map is closing I’m never seeing dead maps so it’s strange I always see so many and they see so few.

Vayne.8563:

TheBlackLeech.9360:

Vayne.8563:

Anyone can look at the quarterly statement, see the profits and know the game is healthy. That’s far more factual than making assumptions about why certain decisions were made.

One thing is just guessing. The other is factual.

You are insinuating that “healthy profits” imply “healthy population” which it most certainly does not. …and using the word healthy to describe anything, unless you define exactly what you mean by healthy, is certainly a very vague term.

Healthy can mean, okay, fine, acceptable, good, or even… what I’m assuming you are going for…. not dead.

You reference quarterly statements…

Microtransactions are what anet initially said was supposed to keep the game afloat, and it is still a topic of discussion at earnings reports.

“The amount of gem sales and item sales versus active players is ok.”

Meaning… there are enough active players who are willing to make gemstore purchases to sustain the game upkeep costs and still return a profit… and only this.

Healthy, as I would take from the earnings report, would simply be defined as ‘acceptable’ and it is in regards to population contributing to revenue, not population as a whole.

Lets not forget how HoT sales were lower than anticipated.
“we have not seen the level (of sales) we have hoped”

What does that tell you?

Nothing… or should I say next to nothing.

…because anet sold the core game bundled in with the expansion.

(in order to obscure data regarding new game sales as well as existing player expansion purchases.)

…so we will never know if:
Anet sold an acceptable amount of copies to new players, but failed to earn enough sales from existing vet players
Anet sold an acceptable amount of copies to existing vet players, but failed to earn enough sales from new players
or
Anet failed to sell acceptable amounts of copies to existing vet players AND new players.

But it is definitely one of the three, and I would not declare that healthy by any definition.

Also regardless of which is actually true…. THEY ALL MEAN LOWER POPULATION THAN ANTICIPATED.

Actually they don’t. You’re making unwarranted assumptions. That is to say every single MMO in existence, all of them bar none, suffer from natural attrition.

Some people buy games and never end up playing them. There are many reasons, some times game related and sometimes not. People get too busy. They lose the internet. Their computer is too slow to do anything. Sometimes they don’t like the graphic style. Or the grind. Or the combat system, or the lack of content.

Every game has natural attrition. That’s normal. So how do you get new players into the game.

Sure original people have left the game. That’s the same as every game. But since the game has gone free to play there are also new players. How many of each, no one knows.

You’re making the assumption that the new players coming in our less than the players that left permanently as opposed to players who left and came back, of which there are at least a few, because there’s a bunch of those in my guild.

You don’t have math, or numbers. You have conjecture. Of course, I don’t have math or numbers, I just have conjecture too.

The different is, I’m not the one positing the position of the game is lower or higher. I’m simply saying your claim isn’t based on anything but your personal experiences, which may not tell you anything.

For example, there may be less people in dungeons and more people in fractals. There may be less people in WvW and more in SPvP. There may be more raiders but less open world players.

There’s simply no way to know. I don’t make posts saying the population is this or the population is that.

I simply make posts saying no one can know and making assumptions is just that. Making assumptions. It is my belief you’re making kittenumptions.

Because many of those who take a break from the game do come back for new content.

You don’t always need to apply a quantitative label to kitten data or information.

…and simply because we, the consumer, do not have raw number data, doesn’t mean we can’t come to conclusions using facts presented to us.

You can’t ignore the fact that HoT sales were poor… and you can’t pretend that poor game sales is not something contrary to your statements about the game being healthy.

…and certainly…

You can’t ignore the fact that GW2 is now free to play and Anet isn’t getting the free to permanent conversions they hoped for.

There are many other things that CAN be ignored, and in true white knight fashion you dismiss them left and right.

Megaserver implementation masks dwindling map populations.
PvP matchmaking reworked to lower queue times and mask low pvp playerbase.
Entire WvW servers devoid of activity.
Development team relocating resources away from content that was paid for and promised to focus on “something else.”
Flagship members of the Anet team leaving without being replaced.

It all points to the same thing, regardless of the absence raw number data.

The game’s not doing so hot.

Play as you want is disappearing rapidly. The movement to require completion of content in PvE, WvW and PvP is being added to any achievement of significance. As long as you enjoy everything the game has to offer it’s not a problem. If there’s a single area of the game you don’t like, that is YOUR PROBLEM now, and the game is HUGE.

The last forced WvW for the Gift of Battle has me spending my game time, looking for a new game. So. dying? No. Significantly dropping in players? yes. Will the 6 precursors in my bank rot away there? most likely.

The next “expansion” will determine whether this goes to a monthly fee in my estimate. Kind doubt I’ll see it.

The game is on the verge of death.

Playing the game does not mean that Gw2 is thriving.
1. 18% loss in sales from last quarter to this one.
.1a The majority of those sales where from Gem store items.
2. F2P’s are NOT converting to paid accounts in mass as they thought.
3. Sales predicted to decline (another 18%?)
4. Insane throughput of Gem Store items.
5. Introduction of account bound weapon skins (force B.L.K. purchase)
.5a this right here will probably be the final severe of Gw2 from peoples wallets.
6. ArenaNet and their infinite wisdom thinks that some expansion pack is going to stop Gw2 from hemorrhaging money. I assure you the pre-order will be vastly smaller this time around.
7. Pvp has a lack of players…I should not run into the same set of people across multiple tiers and divisions and in HotJoin. Lol. Have a look at all them empty rooms.

Never forget…the Mega server merge makes the game look more full than it is. Always.
Same with World Vs World linking same thing in end result. This game has been in decline from that moment (mega server) forward…just now it’s really dropping off.

Starting zones are scarce of players occasionally a new guild is recruiting. This is where all new players are going to be by default. Period. Don’t know why people don’t get this…you don’t start the game in Arah. No new players in starting zones…means no fresh Benjamins.

The point I am trying to make is that Gw2 is not dead but it is not dying…yet. It’s kind of in kittenous decline. It’s…on the bridge…so it hasn’t quite crossed it and it hasn’t quite burned it. However, surely ArenaNet is making sure Gw2 crosses to the other side.

Like I said these people that keep going on about how people still play is fine but should players start really voting with their wallets…have fun…trying to play game people don’t want to pay for…which is exactly what Gw2 is in the middle of now. Yeah they can come back…great but unless they’re waiving a fifty in hand it doesn’t matter if they come and go…no monies.

TheBlackLeech.9360:

You don’t always need to apply a quantitative label to kitten data or information.

…and simply because we, the consumer, do not have raw number data, doesn’t mean we can’t come to conclusions using facts presented to us.

You can’t ignore the fact that HoT sales were poor… and you can’t pretend that poor game sales is not something contrary to your statements about the game being healthy.

…and certainly…

You can’t ignore the fact that GW2 is now free to play and Anet isn’t getting the free to permanent conversions they hoped for.

There are many other things that CAN be ignored, and in true white knight fashion you dismiss them left and right.

Megaserver implementation masks dwindling map populations.
PvP matchmaking reworked to lower queue times and mask low pvp playerbase.
Entire WvW servers devoid of activity.
Development team relocating resources away from content that was paid for and promised to focus on “something else.”
Flagship members of the Anet team leaving without being replaced.

It all points to the same thing, regardless of the absence raw number data.

The game’s not doing so hot.

Well said. +1

I’m not sure healthy games merge servers especially 6 months after a major expansion. Have anymore devs left?

its a game, people play it, people have fun. Whats really really unhealthy is people buying a game and spending months complaining about it in a forum instead of accepting that they have bought something that doesn’t suit their tastes and moving on..

Wish the megaserver would stop dumping me into empty maps and 10s later ask me to move to another map. I can definitely tell a difference in population in the end zones from the first two weeks of the expansion till now though, just like you can feel the same with wvw. Megaserver masking the population, yeah probably, but won’t ever know for sure until official numbers get thrown out somewhere.

P.S Obviously less people are playing because not much content since the expansion other than raids, which probably only serve 5-10% of the population.

Dragonfeu.4356:

I’m seeing less and less videos put up by the big GW2 youtubers and they’re receiving less and less views. I haven’t played in a few months, so i’m completely out of touch with the community but are a lot of players quitting?

If you are seeing social media decreasing then you maybe right.. I do not follow any so i cannot comment on that.

TheBlackLeech.9360:

Vayne.8563:

TheBlackLeech.9360:

Vayne.8563:

Anyone can look at the quarterly statement, see the profits and know the game is healthy. That’s far more factual than making assumptions about why certain decisions were made.

One thing is just guessing. The other is factual.

You are insinuating that “healthy profits” imply “healthy population” which it most certainly does not. …and using the word healthy to describe anything, unless you define exactly what you mean by healthy, is certainly a very vague term.

Healthy can mean, okay, fine, acceptable, good, or even… what I’m assuming you are going for…. not dead.

You reference quarterly statements…

Microtransactions are what anet initially said was supposed to keep the game afloat, and it is still a topic of discussion at earnings reports.

“The amount of gem sales and item sales versus active players is ok.”

Meaning… there are enough active players who are willing to make gemstore purchases to sustain the game upkeep costs and still return a profit… and only this.

Healthy, as I would take from the earnings report, would simply be defined as ‘acceptable’ and it is in regards to population contributing to revenue, not population as a whole.

Lets not forget how HoT sales were lower than anticipated.
“we have not seen the level (of sales) we have hoped”

What does that tell you?

Nothing… or should I say next to nothing.

…because anet sold the core game bundled in with the expansion.

(in order to obscure data regarding new game sales as well as existing player expansion purchases.)

…so we will never know if:
Anet sold an acceptable amount of copies to new players, but failed to earn enough sales from existing vet players
Anet sold an acceptable amount of copies to existing vet players, but failed to earn enough sales from new players
or
Anet failed to sell acceptable amounts of copies to existing vet players AND new players.

But it is definitely one of the three, and I would not declare that healthy by any definition.

Also regardless of which is actually true…. THEY ALL MEAN LOWER POPULATION THAN ANTICIPATED.

Actually they don’t. You’re making unwarranted assumptions. That is to say every single MMO in existence, all of them bar none, suffer from natural attrition.

Some people buy games and never end up playing them. There are many reasons, some times game related and sometimes not. People get too busy. They lose the internet. Their computer is too slow to do anything. Sometimes they don’t like the graphic style. Or the grind. Or the combat system, or the lack of content.

Every game has natural attrition. That’s normal. So how do you get new players into the game.

Sure original people have left the game. That’s the same as every game. But since the game has gone free to play there are also new players. How many of each, no one knows.

You’re making the assumption that the new players coming in our less than the players that left permanently as opposed to players who left and came back, of which there are at least a few, because there’s a bunch of those in my guild.

You don’t have math, or numbers. You have conjecture. Of course, I don’t have math or numbers, I just have conjecture too.

The different is, I’m not the one positing the position of the game is lower or higher. I’m simply saying your claim isn’t based on anything but your personal experiences, which may not tell you anything.

For example, there may be less people in dungeons and more people in fractals. There may be less people in WvW and more in SPvP. There may be more raiders but less open world players.

There’s simply no way to know. I don’t make posts saying the population is this or the population is that.

I simply make posts saying no one can know and making assumptions is just that. Making assumptions. It is my belief you’re making kittenumptions.

Because many of those who take a break from the game do come back for new content.

You don’t always need to apply a quantitative label to kitten data or information.

…and simply because we, the consumer, do not have raw number data, doesn’t mean we can’t come to conclusions using facts presented to us.

You can’t ignore the fact that HoT sales were poor… and you can’t pretend that poor game sales is not something contrary to your statements about the game being healthy.

…and certainly…

You can’t ignore the fact that GW2 is now free to play and Anet isn’t getting the free to permanent conversions they hoped for.

There are many other things that CAN be ignored, and in true white knight fashion you dismiss them left and right.

Megaserver implementation masks dwindling map populations.
PvP matchmaking reworked to lower queue times and mask low pvp playerbase.
Entire WvW servers devoid of activity.
Development team relocating resources away from content that was paid for and promised to focus on “something else.”
Flagship members of the Anet team leaving without being replaced.

It all points to the same thing, regardless of the absence raw number data.

The game’s not doing so hot.

Actually I can ignore the fact that HOT sales were poor because we don’t know they were poor. We know they were less than expected. That CAN mean poor. It can mean okay. It can even made decent but we expected more.

And HOT sales don’t mean anything when the core game is free to play and many new players signed on for that.

In other words, if 50,000 people left the game and 50,000 people joined, that would be the same. Which has nothing at all to do with HOT sales. That’s simply a red herring.

I don’t know anyone in my guild who hasn’t bought HoT. Not one single person. And yes, that’s only a couple of hundred people, but that’s the point.

What NcSoft said SPECIFICALLY is that they expected more free to play players to move on to HOT and that didn’t happen.

That’s the reason for the level 80 boost. It’s likely a lot of people were leveling too slow and there’s no reason to buy HoT pre level 80.

Megaserver does mask dwindling populations but that’s not necessarily evidence of population dwindling. That’s an side-effect, because the problem of guesting existed at the time mega-servers were introduced.

You’re saying the mega server was introduced to solve the problem of dwindling numbers. It was introduced ages ago. The problem at that time had nothing to do with HOT. It had everything to do with guesting and people loading themselves onto the most active servers. Don’t you remember people in TC and Blackgate complaining they couldn’t get on their own servers, due to guesting.

That’s one of the reasons the mega server was introduced. That is has the ability to make dwindling numbers doesn’t actually indicate numbers have dwindled. It only indicated we don’t know if they dwindled.

Back in the day when everyone and their brother were guesting to the three busiest servers, that was a problem and that’s when they started working on megaservers.

At that point, most people didn’t think the population was declining, UNLESS they refused to guest. The rest of us were stuck on overflow servers.

Vayne.8563:

I don’t know anyone in my guild who hasn’t bought HoT. Not one single person. And yes, that’s only a couple of hundred people, but that’s the point.

Your guild does not represent the gw2 community, it’s a rather erroneous attempt to even to make such a statment.

echo.2053:

Vayne.8563:

I don’t know anyone in my guild who hasn’t bought HoT. Not one single person. And yes, that’s only a couple of hundred people, but that’s the point.

Your guild does not represent the gw2 community, it’s a rather erroneous attempt to even to make such a statment.

Actually I never made claim that my guild didn’t. But NcSoft absolutely said that free to play players didn’t pick up on HoT. They said nothing about existing players.

It’s perfectly acceptable to say that my guild has universally bought the game if that’s the case. Forum-goers can draw what conclusions they want from it.

Why not say something to people who saying that they know why Anet instigated a mega-server system, who have no proof at all of what they’re claiming?

Partial much?

Vayne.8563:

Actually I can ignore the fact that HOT sales were poor because we don’t know they were poor. We know they were less than expected.

In business terms, not meeting sales expectations is poor sales performance.

In the past you have said something to the effect that a product which is meeting its business plan is doing well. Not meeting sales expectations is not meeting the business plan for a given product.

Ashen.2907:

Vayne.8563:

Actually I can ignore the fact that HOT sales were poor because we don’t know they were poor. We know they were less than expected.

In business terms, not meeting sales expectations is poor sales performance.

In the past you have said something to the effect that a product which is meeting its business plan is doing well. Not meeting sales expectations is not meeting the business plan for a given product.

Again, and I repeat, all Anet has said specifically is that the number of people who are free to play that didn’t buy HoT was less than expected. And that’s all they said.

That is how they accounted for the lower than expected sales.

So it’s not about people who were already playing the game who didn’t buy HoT, most of whom probably did. It’s about the group of people who came in as free to play that Anet expected to buy HoT.

These are two very different issues. And again, when it comes to the question of is the game dying, if there’s a bunch of people playing who didn’t buy HoT the answer is still no. The game is not dying.

Vayne.8563:

echo.2053:

Vayne.8563:

I don’t know anyone in my guild who hasn’t bought HoT. Not one single person. And yes, that’s only a couple of hundred people, but that’s the point.

Your guild does not represent the gw2 community, it’s a rather erroneous attempt to even to make such a statment.

Actually I never made claim that my guild didn’t. But NcSoft absolutely said that free to play players didn’t pick up on HoT. They said nothing about existing players.

It’s perfectly acceptable to say that my guild has universally bought the game if that’s the case. Forum-goers can draw what conclusions they want from it.

Why not say something to people who saying that they know why Anet instigated a mega-server system, who have no proof at all of what they’re claiming?

Partial much?

For what other purpose to mention that than to attempt to make that claim?

Peoples friend lists and guild have gone quiet grey with last logins 6+ months. Their point of view is just as valid as yours, you aren’t speical. Your guild might even purge users who haven’t logged in for x amount of time which would alter that result quite a bit would it not?

Likewise you ALSO have no proof to your claims as you do not have access to player numbers as well. Sales doesn’t show rate of decay.

Megaservers were introduced to mask low player numbers. Players weren’t guesting to other servers because those servers were omageeerddd at pve but rather their own servers were empty.

If it were meeting expectations they would of flat out stated that. Instead they are pulling other departments for other work.

Games dying is a point of view idea with no definite answer. The population is not the same as it was a few years ago. Maybe it’ll take the next full priced to see that.

echo.2053:

Vayne.8563:

echo.2053:

Vayne.8563:

I don’t know anyone in my guild who hasn’t bought HoT. Not one single person. And yes, that’s only a couple of hundred people, but that’s the point.

Your guild does not represent the gw2 community, it’s a rather erroneous attempt to even to make such a statment.

Actually I never made claim that my guild didn’t. But NcSoft absolutely said that free to play players didn’t pick up on HoT. They said nothing about existing players.

It’s perfectly acceptable to say that my guild has universally bought the game if that’s the case. Forum-goers can draw what conclusions they want from it.

Why not say something to people who saying that they know why Anet instigated a mega-server system, who have no proof at all of what they’re claiming?

Partial much?

For what other purpose to mention that than to attempt to make that claim?

Peoples friend lists and guild have gone quiet grey with last logins 6+ months. Their point of view is just as valid as yours, you aren’t speical. Your guild might even purge users who haven’t logged in for x amount of time which would alter that result quite a bit would it not?

Likewise you ALSO have no proof to your claims as you do not have access to player numbers as well. Sales doesn’t show rate of decay.

Megaservers were introduced to mask low player numbers. Players weren’t guesting to other servers because those servers were omageeerddd at pve but rather their own servers were empty.

If it were meeting expectations they would of flat out stated that. Instead they are pulling other departments for other work.

Games dying is a point of view idea with no definite answer. The population is not the same as it was a few years ago. Maybe it’ll take the next full priced to see that.

You’re making a statement. “Megaservers were introduced to mask low player numbers.”

I’ve said consistently no one has the numbers. Not me, not you. Well Anet does. You’re the one making claims here. Not me. I’m telling you that you’re essentially making a raft of assumptions. I’m the one not making assumptions.

You insist you KNOW why the mega server was implemented. I’ve offered other possibilities.

Now, it’s POSSIBLE you’re right, but you have NO evidence. None. Zero. Zilch. You have your own thought process. Maybe people left your guild.

I’m the one saying no one knows. You’re the one making a definitive statement with no evidence. I’m happy to let the rest of the forum judge based on that.

Do you see me saying without a doubt why the megaserver was instituted? Are you sure it wasn’t simply an efficiency measure? A way to stop people from complaining about being on overflows on crowded servers because everyone was guesting to a few servers.

You may well think you know the single solitary reason of why mega servers were created. And you’re entitled to that OPINION. But stop stating it as fact, because you don’t have any facts. You have an opinion you’re expressing as a fact.

Now, if Anet did implement megaservers because of the guesting problems (I sure remember complaints on these forums even if you don’t), then they would ALSO have the side effect of masking a dropping population IF the population was dropping.

But to make the assumption that you’re right with no evidence except your say so is nothing more than stating an opinion or maybe a guess as a fact.

I’m still waiting for a shred of evidence besides you saying so.

Vayne.8563:

Ashen.2907:

Vayne.8563:

Actually I can ignore the fact that HOT sales were poor because we don’t know they were poor. We know they were less than expected.

In business terms, not meeting sales expectations is poor sales performance.

In the past you have said something to the effect that a product which is meeting its business plan is doing well. Not meeting sales expectations is not meeting the business plan for a given product.

Again, and I repeat, all Anet has said specifically is that the number of people who are free to play that didn’t buy HoT was less than expected. And that’s all they said.

That is how they accounted for the lower than expected sales.

So it’s not about people who were already playing the game who didn’t buy HoT, most of whom probably did. It’s about the group of people who came in as free to play that Anet expected to buy HoT.

These are two very different issues. And again, when it comes to the question of is the game dying, if there’s a bunch of people playing who didn’t buy HoT the answer is still no. The game is not dying.

1) I did not not claim that the game is dying.

2) you are the one that stated, and I quote, “we know they (sales of HoT) were less than expected,” not I.

3) If those F2P conversions to HoT purchases were less than expected, then there were, by definition, expectations for them as part of the overall sales expectations for HoT. These were not met. Existing player purchases of HoT and F2P conversion purchases are not two completely different things even if they are different lines in a ledger somewhere. They are both aspects of one thing, HoT sales expectations?

Ashen.2907:

Vayne.8563:

Ashen.2907:

Vayne.8563:

Actually I can ignore the fact that HOT sales were poor because we don’t know they were poor. We know they were less than expected.

In business terms, not meeting sales expectations is poor sales performance.

In the past you have said something to the effect that a product which is meeting its business plan is doing well. Not meeting sales expectations is not meeting the business plan for a given product.

Again, and I repeat, all Anet has said specifically is that the number of people who are free to play that didn’t buy HoT was less than expected. And that’s all they said.

That is how they accounted for the lower than expected sales.

So it’s not about people who were already playing the game who didn’t buy HoT, most of whom probably did. It’s about the group of people who came in as free to play that Anet expected to buy HoT.

These are two very different issues. And again, when it comes to the question of is the game dying, if there’s a bunch of people playing who didn’t buy HoT the answer is still no. The game is not dying.

1) I did not not claim that the game is dying.

2) you are the one that stated, and I quote, “we know they (sales of HoT) were less than expected,” not I.

3) If those F2P conversions to HoT purchases were less than expected, then there were, by definition, expectations for them as part of the overall sales expectations for HoT. These were not met. Existing player purchases of HoT and F2P conversion purchases are not two completely different things even if they are different lines in a ledger somewhere. They are both aspects of one thing, HoT sales expectations?

2) you are the one that stated, and I quote, “we know they (sales of HoT) were less than expected,” not I.

Here’s where that information about sales to f2p came from

Q4 2015

Don’t cry if you read, this game is kittening dying.

It shows all symptoms of a dying game.
it even looks like they don’t have enough workers in the company…

less and less Guild Chat,Community Showcase Live.
They have nothing to report.
May be they even gave it up and are working on others projekt.
GW2 Failed at the most important moment where they should not fail.

whatever i reached legend, i am off until next PVP season maybe.

Ashen.2907:

Vayne.8563:

Ashen.2907:

Vayne.8563:

Actually I can ignore the fact that HOT sales were poor because we don’t know they were poor. We know they were less than expected.

In business terms, not meeting sales expectations is poor sales performance.

In the past you have said something to the effect that a product which is meeting its business plan is doing well. Not meeting sales expectations is not meeting the business plan for a given product.

Again, and I repeat, all Anet has said specifically is that the number of people who are free to play that didn’t buy HoT was less than expected. And that’s all they said.

That is how they accounted for the lower than expected sales.

So it’s not about people who were already playing the game who didn’t buy HoT, most of whom probably did. It’s about the group of people who came in as free to play that Anet expected to buy HoT.

These are two very different issues. And again, when it comes to the question of is the game dying, if there’s a bunch of people playing who didn’t buy HoT the answer is still no. The game is not dying.

1) I did not not claim that the game is dying.

2) you are the one that stated, and I quote, “we know they (sales of HoT) were less than expected,” not I.

3) If those F2P conversions to HoT purchases were less than expected, then there were, by definition, expectations for them as part of the overall sales expectations for HoT. These were not met. Existing player purchases of HoT and F2P conversion purchases are not two completely different things even if they are different lines in a ledger somewhere. They are both aspects of one thing, HoT sales expectations?

1) It doesn’t matter if you said yourself that Guild Wars 2 is or isn’t dying. It’s the topic of the thread. That’s what we’re discussing. We’re not discussing if there are 4.5 players when there used to be 5, or 10 players when there used to be 12, at least I’m not. People are implying by their statements that Guild Wars 2 is dying. I’ve seen dying games in my day and this isn’t one of them. Wildstar, by contrast is dying. And you can see it in sales figures, and layoffs.

2) Yes, I did say that HoT didnt’ meet the target. But HoT is not Guild Wars 2. Guild Wars 1 went free to play and for all we know that exceeded the target. HoT was a setback. HoT itself can not be said to be successful. But HoT’s success or failure is not actually an indicator to the health of the game over all, only the health of HoT. I don’t really believe that HoT was an abject failure. It was a minor disappointment.

This answers your 2-3 actually. Is Guild Wars 2 dying? No. In my OPINION it’s not dying and there’s very little actual evidence to suggest it is. However, HoT did not do as well as expected….which does mean HoT is dying either.

When someone asks a question, my answers are almost always going to be in the context of that question. Not sure why some people don’t get that.

Seyiwaji.4082:

Don’t cry if you read, this game is kittening dying.

It shows all symptoms of a dying game.
it even looks like they don’t have enough workers in the company…

less and less Guild Chat,Community Showcase Live.
They have nothing to report.
May be they even gave it up and are working on others projekt.
GW2 Failed at the most important moment where they should not fail.

whatever i reached legend, i am off until next PVP season maybe.

If you’re off until the next PvP season the game isn’t dying. And even if you don’t come back it’s still not dying.

We’ve been here before, where the game has had nothing to report. And then suddenly there’s stuff to report. A lull doesn’t mean dying.

I’m sure that having to fix HoT too make it more palatable to a wider range of players set schedules back. And in case you haven’t noticed, the April patch was well-received and the new raid wing came out this week. This is NOT the indication of a dying game.

Dying games don’t spend the kind of resources Anet did to fix their mistakes. Why would they?

This is an interesting thread.. as I am burned out on BDO, tired of ESO and was a founder/beta tester for this game. Then I left because my guildies wanted something else while the Lions Gate was under attack… Now, I am back to lone wolf status and wondering if its worthwhile to buy HoT.

Darlgon.9273:

This is an interesting thread.. as I am burned out on BDO, tired of ESO and was a founder/beta tester for this game. Then I left because my guildies wanted something else while the Lions Gate was under attack… Now, I am back to lone wolf status and wondering if its worthwhile to buy HoT.

HoT is the way forward. It’s worth buying it if you want to continue with the game moving forward. The core game is going to get less and less updates over time.

Some people enjoy it, some less so. It’s more challenging than the open world core game, which some people like and some people don’t. The maps are harder to navigate, but I find them more interesting over all.

DLgamer is an authorized reseller that often has the game on sale, and for that price, in my opinion it’s definitely worth it.

Your mileage may vary. lol

Darlgon.9273:

This is an interesting thread.. as I am burned out on BDO, tired of ESO and was a founder/beta tester for this game. Then I left because my guildies wanted something else while the Lions Gate was under attack… Now, I am back to lone wolf status and wondering if its worthwhile to buy HoT.

Wait until LS3 hits to make your choice.

HoT is relatively interesting but most of the fun came from doing the content with everyone else doing it for the first time.

Most of the meta events have been done so much it’s just people going through the motions with little communication outside of necessary chat.

The single player story is maybe 3 hours of content itself at most.

Even most of the rest has little replayability. Most of the people left in the maps are just there to farm materials and once you get what you need, there’s little reason to keep coming back.

Anyone who isn’t farming is usually part of some hero point train which should tell you how fun the content is to play more than once.

It’s really only worth the $50 if you intend to come back for the long haul. When compared to all other gaming media $50 could buy you, it’s not really worth it on it’s own merits.

Vayne.8563:

You insist you KNOW why the mega server was implemented. I’ve offered other possibilities.

You do realize that your suggested possibility is the other side of the same coin right? probably not so I’ll break it down for you – you say a glass is 1/3 full of water while i say its 2/3 empty – is the actual amount water different between the two statements? Answer is no. In this case players were complaining about guesting taking up spots on a world server meanwhile the lower tiered world servers were guesting from a lack of players.[/quote]

LOL you really believe that completely changed server groupings over such a veeerrrrryy minor inconvience for a few number of servers, but yet can’t separate skills for pve/pvp modes – that is pretty choice LMFAO. Saying 2 out of 24 worlds being the cause for change is rather counterintuitive to the arugment.

Vayne.8563:

Maybe people left your guild.

Were you ever actually in a guild? It’s rather hard to believe you were since there is a log feature that clearly states whether a player left on their own accord or was kicked by x player. Interestingly enough how would one know their last login date if they have left the guild and were not on friends list?

Since you want to be “factual” where did you get the “fact” that for every player leaving a new one joins to the point where you made this statement despite no one having access to actual numbers:

Vayne.8563:

In other words, if 50,000 people left the game and 50,000 people joined, that would be the same.

Free players don’t bring anything to the table until they purchase the game which is only possible through the HoT bundle. We’ve talked about the free player converison already.

The game has an air of staleness which inevitably leads to the decline in population much like a leak to a boat – it may be afloat for the time being but it wont last forever.

At the end of this conversation, and as the thread dies, i’d like to point out that for as many problems that i have with this game, and as much anger that i’ve had at ANet for some of the DUMBEST design decisions i have ever seen in any online game, i always come back and get hooked.

Moral of the story: If you enjoy it, it doesn’t matter who is online. There are always people online. And people who are looking for people to game with.

echo.2053:

Vayne.8563:

You insist you KNOW why the mega server was implemented. I’ve offered other possibilities.

You do realize that your suggested possibility is the other side of the same coin right? probably not so I’ll break it down for you – you say a glass is 1/3 full of water while i say its 2/3 empty – is the actual amount water different between the two statements? Answer is no. In this case players were complaining about guesting taking up spots on a world server meanwhile the lower tiered world servers were guesting from a lack of players.

LOL you really believe that completely changed server groupings over such a veeerrrrryy minor inconvience for a few number of servers, but yet can’t separate skills for pve/pvp modes – that is pretty choice LMFAO. Saying 2 out of 24 worlds being the cause for change is rather counterintuitive to the arugment.

Vayne.8563:

Maybe people left your guild.

Were you ever actually in a guild? It’s rather hard to believe you were since there is a log feature that clearly states whether a player left on their own accord or was kicked by x player. Interestingly enough how would one know their last login date if they have left the guild and were not on friends list?

Since you want to be “factual” where did you get the “fact” that for every player leaving a new one joins to the point where you made this statement despite no one having access to actual numbers:

Vayne.8563:

In other words, if 50,000 people left the game and 50,000 people joined, that would be the same.

Free players don’t bring anything to the table until they purchase the game which is only possible through the HoT bundle. We’ve talked about the free player converison already.

The game has an air of staleness which inevitably leads to the decline in population much like a leak to a boat – it may be afloat for the time being but it wont last forever.[/quote]

Free players can buy gems…and I know some that have done so.

I would worry if this was Wildstar level of bad. Currently no, GW2 is not dying. However has it shrunk greatly in population following HoT and all HoT patches? Yes.

Mirta.5029:

I would worry if this was Wildstar level of bad. Currently no, GW2 is not dying. However has it shrunk greatly in population following HoT and all HoT patches? Yes.

How do you know? What is your evidence? Source please?

Vayne.8563:

Mirta.5029:

I would worry if this was Wildstar level of bad. Currently no, GW2 is not dying. However has it shrunk greatly in population following HoT and all HoT patches? Yes.

How do you know? What is your evidence? Source please?

1. Plenty of people have seen their servers shrink. There’s two pages of people saying the exact same thing.
2. After the profitability spike caused by HoT being sold, GW2 has fallen in profitability below what they used to make before HoT. This would have not been the case if the population stayed exactly the same, unless you think that people that used to buy things suddenly stopped for no good reasons.

Mirta.5029:

Vayne.8563:

Mirta.5029:

I would worry if this was Wildstar level of bad. Currently no, GW2 is not dying. However has it shrunk greatly in population following HoT and all HoT patches? Yes.

How do you know? What is your evidence? Source please?

1. Plenty of people have seen their servers shrink. There’s two pages of people saying the exact same thing.
2. After the profitability spike caused by HoT being sold, GW2 has fallen in profitability below what they used to make before HoT. This would have not been the case if the population stayed exactly the same, unless you think that people that used to buy things suddenly stopped for no good reasons.

1. Have we seen 100 people say they’ve seen their servers shrink? The only place they could possibly see that is WvW. There’s no other place to see your server’s shrink. As an example, tons of people run fractals now, even in my casual guild. A lot more than ever before. I’d never see them on a server, because they’re in fractals for much of their play time. So how do you know servers have shrank. If peiople are running fractals and some are running dungeons again and some are raiding and even I’m doing the stupid PvP season, how does this prove anything at all? You have a dozen people saying something. In those same threads you have a handful of people also saying that they see people everywhere they go. So not everyone agrees. This is not proof of anything. The population is not known by anyone but Anet.

2. HoT selling has nothing to do with how many people are playing the game if the core game is free to play. It really is simple. Let’s pretend there were 600,000 people playing. And let’s pretending half of them bought HoT and half didn’t. 300,000 sales would certainly be lackluster. It’s entirely likely that some of those other 300,000 moved onto other things. But then the game went free to play. Are you saying they couldn’t get those numbers from free to play players? I absolutely believe they can.

But free to play players can’t post here and can’t talk in map chat so things seem deader. I’m a new zones running into free to play players all the time. I’m also in zones where I run into returning players.

Can you, or anyone, categorically state the number of returning players plus free players is significantly less than those who play?

Can you account for people taking a break until new content comes out that haven’t left but only log in for dailies?

Because I don’t think you can.

Edit: Obviously I’m pulling numbers out of my kitten as an example, rather than trying to provide accurate numbers.

Mirta.5029:

Vayne.8563:

Mirta.5029:

I would worry if this was Wildstar level of bad. Currently no, GW2 is not dying. However has it shrunk greatly in population following HoT and all HoT patches? Yes.

How do you know? What is your evidence? Source please?

1. Plenty of people have seen their servers shrink. There’s two pages of people saying the exact same thing.
2. After the profitability spike caused by HoT being sold, GW2 has fallen in profitability below what they used to make before HoT. This would have not been the case if the population stayed exactly the same, unless you think that people that used to buy things suddenly stopped for no good reasons.

With all the bad decisions Anet can pull from the magic hat, they cant even pull out a normal rabit out of it.

Vayne.8563:

2. HoT selling has nothing to do with how many people are playing the game if the core game is free to play. It really is simple. Let’s pretend there were 600,000 people playing. And let’s pretending half of them bought HoT and half didn’t. 300,000 sales would certainly be lackluster. It’s entirely likely that some of those other 300,000 moved onto other things. But then the game went free to play. Are you saying they couldn’t get those numbers from free to play players? I absolutely believe they can.

But free to play players can’t post here and can’t talk in map chat so things seem deader. I’m a new zones running into free to play players all the time. I’m also in zones where I run into returning players.

Can you, or anyone, categorically state the number of returning players plus free players is significantly less than those who play?

Can you account for people taking a break until new content comes out that haven’t left but only log in for dailies?

Because I don’t think you can.

if for two years GW2 consistently brought, let’s say 20 million. HoT sales open up. Suddenly the profit jumps to 40 million. However the quarter following that the profit is suddenly 7 million. Something that has never happened before.

Are you telling me that free to play players buy nothing? Or that people that used to play the game and buy stuff no longer buy stuff, but still play? Drop in profit always correlates with drop in players. Especially when F2P normally brings a jump in profits rather than a fall.

EDIT: and just to clarify, for the second time, I don’t think that the game is dying. If someone wants to try it out, I would say “sure, go ahead!”. It’s in no way doomed. It’s just that the numbers and in-game view doesn’t add up with the game being at the same population as it was a year ago. From my perspective there was a clear decline.

There are some seriously silly doomsayers in this thread.

This just in: anecdotal evidence is less than mediocre, and you tend to look for what you want in it.

I think the target audience shifted to a degree. It’s my opinion that ArenaNet shifted focus slightly away from long term retention to a more mobile game style market.

I didn’t buy HoT and own 2 accounts for GW1 and GW2 that have everything prior to HoT. Does that mean anything? Not really. Whe HoT was announced I would have purchased it if it were available at that time just because there had never been a prior GW franchise release that had been anything but fantastic. ArenaNet’s track record of excellence had earned that from me. Once information kept coming out though, I made a decision to not buy it though and I am glad I didn’t as it’s not my cup of tea.

I am hopeful that future releases will get the GW franchise back to being more the type of thing I want to play. This RNG account bound weapon thing that recently happened is a step back though. I am not a fan of that type of monetization but that’s one of the things I was talking about with the mobile-games-like business model things I was talking about earlier.

Mirta.5029:

Vayne.8563:

2. HoT selling has nothing to do with how many people are playing the game if the core game is free to play. It really is simple. Let’s pretend there were 600,000 people playing. And let’s pretending half of them bought HoT and half didn’t. 300,000 sales would certainly be lackluster. It’s entirely likely that some of those other 300,000 moved onto other things. But then the game went free to play. Are you saying they couldn’t get those numbers from free to play players? I absolutely believe they can.

But free to play players can’t post here and can’t talk in map chat so things seem deader. I’m a new zones running into free to play players all the time. I’m also in zones where I run into returning players.

Can you, or anyone, categorically state the number of returning players plus free players is significantly less than those who play?

Can you account for people taking a break until new content comes out that haven’t left but only log in for dailies?

Because I don’t think you can.

if for two years GW2 consistently brought, let’s say 20 million. HoT sales open up. Suddenly the profit jumps to 40 million. However the quarter following that the profit is suddenly 7 million. Something that has never happened before.

Are you telling me that free to play players buy nothing? Or that people that used to play the game and buy stuff no longer buy stuff, but still play? Drop in profit always correlates with drop in players. Especially when F2P normally brings a jump in profits rather than a fall.

EDIT: and just to clarify, for the second time, I don’t think that the game is dying. If someone wants to try it out, I would say “sure, go ahead!”. It’s in no way doomed. It’s just that the numbers and in-game view doesn’t add up with the game being at the same population as it was a year ago. From my perspective there was a clear decline.

Actually we were doing about this much a year ago. 24 million a quarter. This number hasn’t significantly dropped.

You’re saying the numbers don’t add up. I think you should look at them again. They do. And I expect them to go down from here, but so far the performance of the numbers isn’t under question and has never been under question.

If the game wasn’t living up to dollar expectation, you’d hear about it. It is.

What we do know is less people bought the expansion than Anet thought would buy it. But that’s all we really know at this point. Dollar for dollar, we’re pretty much flat, not down.

@Vayne.8563
Number talk for themselves, and this is only the beginning
Huge gain from HOT 4q15: Now see 1q16, the game is decaying

https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/4j3ntv/ncsofts_earnings_report_1q16_strong_performance/

http://i.imgur.com/QEp8Y9o.png

You can say what you want. Reality is there.
If you ask people if they will buy a new expansion. I am sure 50%+ will say NO.

Seyiwaji.4082:

@Vayne.8563
(…)
If you ask people if they will buy a new expansion. I am sure 50%+ will say NO.

That is how i feel to.

Didnt even finished HoT due bad grind, even in grindier old mmos a guy can have fun while doing it on gw2.. it is a diferent story, everything i do it feels forced content… so no more expansions imo for me while they keep showing poor game mechics.

Seyiwaji.4082:

@Vayne.8563
Number talk for themselves, and this is only the beginning
Huge gain from HOT 4q15: Now see 1q16, the game is decaying

https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/4j3ntv/ncsofts_earnings_report_1q16_strong_performance/

http://i.imgur.com/QEp8Y9o.png

You can say what you want. Reality is there.
If you ask people if they will buy a new expansion. I am sure 50%+ will say NO.

You’re still missing the point though. Where did I say the new expansion sold well? I do believe most people still playing this game from before it went free to play did buy the expansion, because there really isn’t great reason not to, unless you’re like really broke.

That said, my comments have been all along, people stopped playing and free players started playing. Some people left and some people came back.

Until you can put numbers to those figures you don’t know the total population of the game, period, end of story.

The total population of the game is really what makes a game dead or dying if you can pay your bills.

Dying games simply don’t go back and fix entire maps that people don’t like. They don’t do it because they’re dying. They don’t have the resources TO do it.

Anet went back and made huge and wide-sweeping improvements to HoT. No dying game would do that or even consider doing that.

This entire conversation is ridiculous.

Is the game dying? No. Whether 50% of the people bought HoT or not, the answer is no, the game isn’t dying. 8 million dollars a month isn’t dying either. There’s nothing it indicate the game is dying except a bunch of people who need to refresh themselves on what that word actually means.

Look at Wildstar. That game is dying. Wildstar canceled plans to go to new markets. Wildstar has had layoffs. That’s a game that’s dying.

Is Guild Wars 2 dying? You’d have to have a very specific definition of that word to say yes. And you’d probably be wrong anyway.

I think Anet took a nose dive in population with the new direction of it’s ‘end game’ as far as the expansion goes.

But people don’t mean a thing, it’s all about making money, and the game will live and grow as long as it’s profitable, regardless of how many people play it.

So it’s not really dying till it’s losing money.