Guild Wars 2

No, not a “the game is dying” topic. However, I believe the game may be in trouble.

1) The game has been losing players.

Now, we don’t know how many players the game has. We have been told ArenaNet has sold 2 million units; the fact they have not stated anything later is a good hint that they have not reached 3 million yet. Still, we have no way of knowing how many active players the game has, and since ArenaNet never revealed this number for GW1, I doubt they will do so for GW2.

However, we have a sample. Here. The number themselves don’t mean anything, but the curve is likely a good sample of what has been happening in the game – player population peaks during the weekend, but overall the game has been losing players.

Now, this isn’t unexpected. Every big MMO released after WoW has lost many players after a few months, mostly due to the players who were looking for the next big MMO, and who then have left seeking the next big thing. This can be seen quite clearly here, for example. The fact GW2 is losing players does not mean the game is dying – of course it was going to lose players, what matters is how many will stay when the situation stabilizes.

However…

2) NCSoft is in trouble

See here - a massive fall in NCSoft stocks. I don’t believe this has been due to GW2, a single game (which is far from being NCSoft’s main game) would not have that much impact. Rather, the fall happened after the announcement of NCSoft’s Q3 quarterly report, as seen here.

With such a bad impact due to the latest quarterly report, I’m sure NCSoft is pushing all its studios to bring as much profit as possible. In the case of GW2, it’s hard to know exactly in which ways a bigger profit could be achieved, but it’s within reason to expect that more people playing means more money earned (since it’s likely that more people would buy something in the game store).

Right?

IMO, no. But I wouldn’t be surprised if NCSoft believed in that, and, under the current circunstances, that they are looking very disfavorably at how GW2 has been losing players.

3) Conclusion: the article Colin Johanson on How ArenaNet Measures Success would be true on an ideal world.

However, for NCSoft right now it’s far from being an ideal world. They need profits, right now; or in the absence of profits, at least big numbers. And considering how long ArenaNet had to make GW2, well, it’s not surprising that NCSoft would like to collect, and collect big.

Ergo – I would not be surprised if NCSoft were pressuring ArenaNet to bring as many players as possible to Guild Wars 2.

No matter the cost.

Its not in trouble yet, as they have plenty of time to rectify the problems.

The reason people say the games in trouble is because of the glaring issues with the game, the lies the devs have told us, the bait and switch that was pulled, and NOBODY at all has even responded to the concerns. The threads simply get deleted and the posters suspended.

I have no trouble believing that its NCsofts fault at all. But Arenanet arent children. They should be able to stand up and stick to their values like they did very successfully in GW1.

None of the 23 friends I started the game with plays this game anymore. Went out for a beer with them on last night and it was the butt of all jokes too lol.

It’s going to take me a year, maybe a year and a half, to get my Incinerator dagger… so I for one will be around for at least that long

Zimlobo.3962:

It’s going to take me a year, maybe a year in a half, to get my Incinerator dagger… so I for one will be around for at least that long

And thats one of the main reasons for the complaints. They advertised NO grind. Especially one that takes months to get a piece of armor or weapon that will be outdated in the next “power creep”.

Any game that’s willing to throw their current playerbase under the bus for hamsters and locusts deserves to tank. SWG NGE comes to mind, although this is not even close to that big of a disaster (yet).

Renegadeimp.8439:

Zimlobo.3962:

It’s going to take me a year, maybe a year in a half, to get my Incinerator dagger… so I for one will be around for at least that long

And thats one of the main reasons for the complaints. They advertised NO grind. Especially one that takes months to get a piece of armor or weapon that will be outdated in the next “power creep”.

The new items are not stronger than leg weapons. Leg weapons are an optional grind.

ref.8196:

Renegadeimp.8439:

Zimlobo.3962:

It’s going to take me a year, maybe a year in a half, to get my Incinerator dagger… so I for one will be around for at least that long

And thats one of the main reasons for the complaints. They advertised NO grind. Especially one that takes months to get a piece of armor or weapon that will be outdated in the next “power creep”.

The new items are not stronger than leg weapons. Leg weapons are an optional grind.

Point is, I’ll have plenty to do over that span of time and a legendary will be a happy result of months spent playing the game. So Anet has my attention. To be fair I’m a fanboy to the point that I’m even looking forward to the 3rd GW novel… so take what I say with a grain of salt.

NCsoft stocks speak volumes right now.

The investors call is gonna be really bad for em.

NCSoft just * cannibalized* the last MMO I came from despite it being a sustainable source of income, and cancelled the entire thing out of the blue. I literally logged in and was told my game was being shut down one day. Staff wasn’t even given notice to wrap things up in any kind of meaningful way. I’m still irked about that.

That NCSoft is doing poorly isn’t really news to anyone that is paying attention. I wouldn’t be terribly surprised if GW2 was closed by them as well.

NaughtyProwler.8653:

Any game that’s willing to throw their current playerbase under the bus for hamsters and locusts deserves to tank. SWG NGE comes to mind, although this is not even close to that big of a disaster (yet).

Yep.

This game is in serious trouble.

kKagari.6804:

None of the 23 friends I started the game with plays this game anymore. Went out for a beer with them on last night and it was the butt of all jokes too lol.

I started the game with three close friends. One doesn’t have the time to devote to the game due to work and has subsequently quit due to not wanting a gear grind beyond that which already exists. The other grew bored a month or so ago and went back to WoW to try out MoP. A shame, really.

Zimlobo.3962:

Point is, I’ll have plenty to do over that span of time and a legendary will be a happy result of months spent playing the game. So Anet has my attention. To be fair I’m a fanboy to the point that I’m even looking forward to the 3rd GW novel… so take what I say with a grain of salt.

Lets assume you (not being flammy here) hate pvp but love dungeons
And what happens after you get that item and a couple weeks later Anet annouces that Legendary are going to be replaced with a NEW tier. You can only get this in PvP and it will be better then anything you can get in the dungeons.

What would you do?

Would you quit and be angry at the change in direction? Would you voice your opinion? Would you just “deal with it”?

Imagine how many players they would have drawn in if they had worked on balancing PvP to the point that GW2 became an e-sport.

Ostra.3927:

Lets assume you (not being flammy here) hate pvp but love dungeons
And what happens after you get that item and a couple weeks later Anet annouces that Legendary are going to be replaced with a NEW tier. You can only get this in PvP and it will be better then anything you can get in the dungeons.

To be fair, this is what they said about the new gear:

“Ascended and infusion rewards will be available in both PvE and WvW over time, and be made available through all sorts of content around the world including existing content. "

i would say yes.

the fact that they are catering to the bottom of the barrel types who have no life and want to win through statistical advantages is causing me to want to play a different game instead.

i am not a no lifer. getting a new game is not a big deal to me. i can lose the 60$ on this game and not really care. however, all they are doing with their current path is making sure thats the total amount they will ever get from me. there are plenty of other options available.

I think the entire industry based around the MMO genre is in trouble, actually. The market is saturated, for one thing. I decide I don’t feel like dabbling in GW2 today? That’s fine. There are so many free games out there right now (many of which used to be AAA sub games) that I can barely choose which to play.

Sure, if I were to stay with one long I’d have to pony up some cash, but you know what, I never do stay long enough because either the cash shop annoys me into leaving or another game pulls me away before I really need to think about spending money.

The hundreds of dollars a year in box and sub fees I was spending every year are over, thankfully. I welcome our new free to play overlords and I’m done with paying $60 box prices for games that I won’t spend two months in. The problem for those new overlords is, none will get much money from me, and most won’t get a dime.

I’m also of the opinion most of this is the result of money. No developer is this stupid. Although ANet does have a history of taking problems with simple solutions and “fixing” them in stupid ways.

There’s nothing to be done, though. NCSoft is crashing and burning, and dragging GW2 with it, which is only making the problem even worse. I imagine GW2 will go F2P sometime next year.

Plague.5329:

I’m also of the opinion most of this is the result of money. No developer is this stupid. Although ANet does have a history of taking problems with simple solutions and “fixing” them in stupid ways.

There’s nothing to be done, though. NCSoft is crashing and burning, and dragging GW2 with it, which is only making the problem even worse. I imagine GW2 will go F2P sometime next year.

I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic or if you mean they’ll drop the box fee and give the game away.

Anyone who doesn’t believe that GW2 is in trouble is a little naive at this point. There’s been a lot of controversial changes in the last patch and a lot of backlash from the gaming press and players themselves.

Corvindi.5734:

Plague.5329:

I’m also of the opinion most of this is the result of money. No developer is this stupid. Although ANet does have a history of taking problems with simple solutions and “fixing” them in stupid ways.

There’s nothing to be done, though. NCSoft is crashing and burning, and dragging GW2 with it, which is only making the problem even worse. I imagine GW2 will go F2P sometime next year.

I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic or if you mean they’ll drop the box fee and give the game away.

I know people refer to GW2 as being a F2P, but that’s mainly because a lot of people have gotten so used to the idea of subscriptions they’re amazed at the idea of paying for something, having it, and actually owning it.

I mean they’ll drop the first time fee and start pouring things into the cash shop. Maybe not things to circumvent grind (no idea, as that will be a marketing and sales decision down the line), but just a lot more items. So, actual F2P. Not the idiotic F2P some people think one time purchases are.

Ostra.3927:

Zimlobo.3962:

Point is, I’ll have plenty to do over that span of time and a legendary will be a happy result of months spent playing the game. So Anet has my attention. To be fair I’m a fanboy to the point that I’m even looking forward to the 3rd GW novel… so take what I say with a grain of salt.

Lets assume you (not being flammy here) hate pvp but love dungeons
And what happens after you get that item and a couple weeks later Anet annouces that Legendary are going to be replaced with a NEW tier. You can only get this in PvP and it will be better then anything you can get in the dungeons.

What would you do?

Would you quit and be angry at the change in direction? Would you voice your opinion? Would you just “deal with it”?

I’m all for it! I want new shinny things. I want to PvP and WvW and craft and complete jumping puzzles and do dungeons and just explore and have /dance parties… and kickoff costume brawls in taverns. I guess the trick is I spend about 2-3 hours a day playing, lot more on the weekends, as apposed to 7+ hours everyday. So I’m not burning through content. Strange enough my favorite thing to do is go into low level zones and help new people and alts. I’ve spent time just hanging in cities talking to people, logging out for the day without even leveling. I don’t think I’m alone, there may be 1 other person out there like me

hell no the servers are full

Ah, I see. No box fee is what you meant. I suspect you’re right, they will drop it or greatly reduce it (GW2 on sale now! all over the net). Who knows, they may have dropped it already in some markets that are used to cash shops and not subs.

42 (GW2 3rd qt profit) million ain’t gonna cut it… Idk how much it cost to make GW2, but I bet it cost more than 50 mill on the low end.

It’s gonna take A LOT of cash shop purchases to turn a decent profit. I’m sure they’re not in it to make a 20 or 30% gain…. That’s barley interest on the loan..

I do think the stock drop was because of GW2. Lets be honest most people expected more sales than AION… At this rate B2P is a utter failure for publisher and gamer a like. Pub. doesn’t make money, gamer has no say.

By 1st qt 2013 GW2 will be NCsofts smallest earner. Expect a more aggressive cash shop sooner than later, and freemium model by June of next year.

In trouble? You point out some interesting statistics but it really is pretty subjective. The one thing I agree on 100% is the whole NCsoft connection. That company has a way of destroying games regardless of how well one of their games did in the past and they never got the whole East vs. West play styles correct. Once I heard NCsoft was publishing this game I cringed and almost didn’t want to buy it.

Be that as it may, the one area that I’m beyond frustrated over is the new gear and potential grind down the road it is going to bring. Sugar coat it anyway you want but the main post now is what, 8,000 posts and a order of magnitude more views. People are upset over the whole deal and continue to point to the original vision from the devs: No Grind.

Glass half full, glass half empty – take your pick but I for one don’t really like it. There are several things I would have done to make it challenging for other play styles but you know, they didn’t ask me (or anyone else). They just did it and now have people pretty upset.

I do know this though. Out of the 5 people I personally know who played the game with me I’m the only one left who plays it. I log in nightly and work on map completion. I farmed a bit of Orr for my exotic gear which I bought via gold. I do the daily to get my karma drink. If a precursor drops then I’ll have karma and I’ll have the honor badges. Beyond that I’m flat out broke with 15 gold, 10 slot bags, and default bank space.

I have 27 chests that I’ll probably have to give away because I never get keys and I’m not going to use my gold to buy gems, etc. I’ve never every paid money for gold or to buy stuff in game. I pay for the retail box, or a monthly fee. I’m not too keen on spending more outside the box. To each his/her own though.

Game is fun. Love the environment. Crazy love the jump puzzles. Just don’t honestly like a gear progression. I like a end state and even playing field when I WvWvW…

Personally I’ve been seeing fewer people log in for 2 reasons: 1) They played the game a few times and decided they don’t like it and/or prefer something else and left weeks ago without looking back, or 2) They have reached level 80 and, although they still love playing, just aren’t compelled to log in every day. (There are also still some crazies like myself who log in as much as they can, but I digress…) I thought the latter was according to plan for Anet. Just keep people satisfied with the game (even if they only play a couple times a week) and when they push a holiday/event/content addition to clean up with gem store goodies.

Unfortunately this has all flown out the window at the speed of a trainwreck and now “dedicated players” are expected to log in and grind for hours in order to stay on par with max gear++.

This is the absolute wrong solution if Anet is hurting for money. There are plenty of things people will pay for. All this will do is drive people to either quit playing at all, or play more but with no additional need/desire to make gem purchases.

Erasculio.2914:

2) NCSoft is in trouble

See here - a massive fall in NCSoft stocks. I don’t believe this has been due to GW2, a single game (which is far from being NCSoft’s main game) would not have that much impact. Rather, the fall happened after the announcement of NCSoft’s Q3 quarterly report, as seen here.

With such a bad impact due to the latest quarterly report, I’m sure NCSoft is pushing all its studios to bring as much profit as possible. In the case of GW2, it’s hard to know exactly in which ways a bigger profit could be achieved, but it’s within reason to expect that more people playing means more money earned (since it’s likely that more people would buy something in the game store).

Right?

IMO, no. But I wouldn’t be surprised if NCSoft believed in that, and, under the current circunstances, that they are looking very disfavorably at how GW2 has been losing players.

3) Conclusion: the article Colin Johanson on How ArenaNet Measures Success would be true on an ideal world.

However, for NCSoft right now it’s far from being an ideal world. They need profits, right now; or in the absence of profits, at least big numbers. And considering how long ArenaNet had to make GW2, well, it’s not surprising that NCSoft would like to collect, and collect big.

Ergo – I would not be surprised if NCSoft were pressuring ArenaNet to bring as many players as possible to Guild Wars 2.

No matter the cost.

NCSoft is in trouble because as it turns out the F2P model in general doesn’t work that well in practice for 99% of games, which NCSoft has a huge stake in (GW2 isn’t purely F2P, there’s an upfront cost). It’s only REALLY worked for Dungeon & Fighter (the US localization was horribly mismanaged and never really caught on) and to a lesser extent Maple Story, which are both owned by Nexon Group (a formerly Korean company that moved their HQ to Japan to avoid getting into trouble with “bad” South Korean laws like not giving people’s phone numbers to third parties for money without permission – or try to… they ended up getting nailed with several landmark successful lawsuits despite the fact).

Even Nexon (which now owns a majority of NCSoft shares) had flat net profits last fiscal year in Korea and is being kept afloat almost purely by D&F and MS sales in China (D&F reached the 3 million concurrent player mark there recently, which makes GW2 look like small fries). Nexon manages around 30+ F2P MMOs in South Korea alone and owns most of their development studios, similar to NCSoft.

Blade & Soul was supposed to be NCSoft’s new savior, but it just hasn’t looked that way for them.

Black Ops 2 is amazing. Yes, GW2 is in trouble I’m sure I’ll never log in again, a dev can certainly regularly check my account for proof of this. I hope many other people are as serious as me and against this BS ANet are pulling. What a horrible direction they are going in.

I bought MoP recently after reading the thief changes and am enjoying grind more there than in a game that was supposed to have none.

Rumor has it that swtor cost about 200 million to make. If GW2 sold 2 million copies there isn’t a far stretch that it netted in 98 million of box sales alone at a steady 49 buck per copy. That leaves them about 1.2 million shy of 2 if that is what these games go for now adays.

How much money does the trading post net a day? Good question and I have no idea. I avoid it like the plague but I know people who play LoL and they buy stuff all the time. So that formula works just not sure how it works with GW2.

If the idea behind the Black Lion Chests was to earn some cash then I’m failing at that game because as I said I have 27 and haven’t bought any key. So I’m not helping then any I guess because I’m playing the game and doing everything from within it.

Crapgame.6519:

Rumor has it that swtor cost about 200 million to make. If GW2 sold 2 million copies there isn’t a far stretch that it netted in 98 million of box sales alone at a steady 49 buck per copy. That leaves them about 1.2 million shy of 2 if that is what these games go for now adays.

How much money does the trading post net a day? Good question and I have no idea. I avoid it like the plague but I know people who play LoL and they buy stuff all the time. So that formula works just not sure how it works with GW2.

If the idea behind the Black Lion Chests was to earn some cash then I’m failing at that game because as I said I have 27 and haven’t bought any key. So I’m not helping then any I guess because I’m playing the game and doing everything from within it.

3rd qt report had GW2 at 42 mill. If they are being honest about the sales, I expect some of the 4th qt profit will be differed revenue from the initial box sales.

I’m really sick of these threads debating whether or not the game is successful. It’s literally just for the purpose of baiting people into coming to the thread so that you can all talk about how much you hate someone or something . MMO players just really love to hate stuff and argue about how they can make games better than any random game studio they choose to criticize that day – taking pleasure in the ridiculing of someone’s livelihood because they couldn’t give you an experience deep or meaningful enough for you to waste your spare time with.

Maybe I’m just as pathetic for bothering to involve myself in it.

All doom and gloom. GW2 is going strong and will go on for a long time to come.

Osculim.2983:

All doom and gloom. GW2 is going strong and will go on for a long time to come.

If its going strong why did they completely reverse one of their core principles and not tell us a single thing about it before? They have not told us why they did this, why it was necessary, on what feedback they acted on… nothing!

A company that doesnt provide answers to its customers is always hiding something. Its usually trouble.

Bellatrix.5402:

Erasculio.2914:

2) NCSoft is in trouble

See here - a massive fall in NCSoft stocks. I don’t believe this has been due to GW2, a single game (which is far from being NCSoft’s main game) would not have that much impact. Rather, the fall happened after the announcement of NCSoft’s Q3 quarterly report, as seen here.

With such a bad impact due to the latest quarterly report, I’m sure NCSoft is pushing all its studios to bring as much profit as possible. In the case of GW2, it’s hard to know exactly in which ways a bigger profit could be achieved, but it’s within reason to expect that more people playing means more money earned (since it’s likely that more people would buy something in the game store).

Right?

IMO, no. But I wouldn’t be surprised if NCSoft believed in that, and, under the current circunstances, that they are looking very disfavorably at how GW2 has been losing players.

3) Conclusion: the article Colin Johanson on How ArenaNet Measures Success would be true on an ideal world.

However, for NCSoft right now it’s far from being an ideal world. They need profits, right now; or in the absence of profits, at least big numbers. And considering how long ArenaNet had to make GW2, well, it’s not surprising that NCSoft would like to collect, and collect big.

Ergo – I would not be surprised if NCSoft were pressuring ArenaNet to bring as many players as possible to Guild Wars 2.

No matter the cost.

NCSoft is in trouble because as it turns out the F2P model in general doesn’t work that well in practice for 99% of games, which NCSoft has a huge stake in (GW2 isn’t purely F2P, there’s an upfront cost). It’s only REALLY worked for Dungeon & Fighter (the US localization was horribly mismanaged and never really caught on) and to a lesser extent Maple Story, ….

I would beg to differ. Most games that go free to play generate much more revenue than they did as subscription games. Dungeon & Dragons Online and Lord of the Rings Online are two examples I can think of right off the bat. Both just recently released new expansions by the way.

SonicTHI.3217:

Osculim.2983:

All doom and gloom. GW2 is going strong and will go on for a long time to come.

If its going strong why did they completely reverse one of their core principles and not tell us a single thing about it before? They have not told us why they did this, why it was necessary, on what feedback they acted on… nothing!

A company that doesnt provide answers to its customers is always hiding something. Its usually trouble.

They’ve stated this before. They only implemented what people have perceived to be the beginning of a gear grind because they felt as though the difficulty/time invested in getting a Legendary and the difficulty/time invested in getting an Exotic set were too far apart. They introduced Ascended as a means by which to give people some sort of a middle ground between those two things. I think they could have achieved the same goal without adding extra stats, but this act was founded in a very real and justifiable reason. If they’re willing to make changes these big as soon as this, they are probably willing to rethink their changes just as quickly. Anet isn’t some demon company, and they don’t implement changes with malice – contrary to how some people would imply by their vehement anger. They care about the game, and anyone willing to delude themselves into thinking otherwise hasn’t seen this quote:

“I’m going to try to get some sleep, because I’m exhausted, and tomorrow is going to be a very long day. There is such a range of emotion I’m experiencing right now, but mostly I just want to say that I hope you guys love it. Love it forever, or love it and then move on to something else, but just love it, and know that three hundred of us melted down our hearts to give it to you. It’s all yours soon.”

We’re talking about people here – introducing free content not only because it’s their job but because they are extremely passionate about their work. It’s easy to just turn these people into faceless monsters out to annihilate all the hopes and dreams you POURED into getting your Exotic sets (lol). You’re not happy about it, fine – say it and go do something else for a bit but don’t hold some arbitrary grudge against these people as though they have some sort of vendetta against you and your virtual accomplishments.

Aelelan.1639:

We’re talking about people here – introducing free content not only because it’s their job but because they are extremely passionate about their work. It’s easy to just turn these people into faceless monsters out to annihilate all the hopes and dreams you POURED into getting your Exotic sets (lol). You’re not happy about it, fine – say it and go do something else for a bit but don’t hold some arbitrary grudge against these people as though they have some sort of vendetta against you and your virtual accomplishments.

Look we agree with you. These are devs and artists and writers and quality assurance people that many of us respected a LOT.

The problem is those people we respected for what they did in the past and what they said in the past. Now the actions are different from the past… and they are not saying anything anymore.

So if you have a friend.. a close friend that suddenly says “you are not worth my time anymore” wouldnt YOU be upset? Of course. All we want is an honest answer to why the change. If it is because they truly think this is for the better fine, we can disagree and go our seperate ways. If they had no choice, fine they have a job and bills like I do, I would understand.

But by not saying anything we are left without closure. Many of us have been dedicated fans for over 7 years, that is a long time to be suddenly treated like trash.

Before anyone says “they are a business not your friend” this poster took it to a personal level so I am just explaining it from a personal stand point.

“I’m going to try to get some sleep, because I’m exhausted, and tomorrow is going to be a very long day. There is such a range of emotion I’m experiencing right now, but mostly I just want to say that I hope you guys love it. Love it forever, or love it and then move on to something else, but just love it, and know that three hundred of us melted down our hearts to give it to you. It’s all yours soon.”

Bad news. Thanks to what you did to it, I don’t love it anymore. Quite the opposite. I guess you shouldn’t have done it, huh?

I think before the last patch GW2 was doing OK. I certainly was having a blast and was highly invested in the game. With the current patch GW2 has gone the way of D3 and trouble will certainly be in the title of any reference to the game from now on. Anet has decided to take the game in a direction that the player base doesn’t want and will probably double-down on their error rather than reversing themselves on their reversal of design philosophy. That’s the way Blizzard does it and Anet seems to be taking their cues from them at the moment.

Ostra.3927

So if you have a friend.. a close friend that suddenly says “you are not worth my time anymore” wouldnt YOU be upset? Of course. All we want is an honest answer to why the change. If it is because they truly think this is for the better fine, we can disagree and go our seperate ways. If they had no choice, fine they have a job and bills like I do, I would understand.

I guess I got a little inflamed and went off a bit too much. It’s really just pent up from posters less understanding/patient/coherent than you are.

They have said their reasons though: Ascended gear is mean to be a middle ground between getting a Legendary and getting Exotics. They can probably do it better, but they recognized a problem and proposed a solution.

My problem with your argument though is that they aren’t just arbitrarily saying “you’re not worth our time anymore”. People have definitely been saying that there is nothing to do at 80 – they had hit a wall with getting a legendary. It was too big of a task for a lot of people to undertake, and what many would call the main source of “endgame” suddenly became irrelevant to them as a result. They made a request to Anet and they have responded in a way that they saw best fit – far from what I would consider being treated like trash. A sect of people made their requests known (albeit a sect that they may or may not listen to) and they have responded. Perhaps not in the best way, they attempted to solve this problem, and now we suddenly have spit in their faces claiming that people will never play the game again and that all is lost for this game. I can appreciate toughness and a good verbal tear-down of an introduced mechanic, but these aren’t grounds to say “I’ll never play this game again.” especially after as big a change as this one. They have demonstrated (on a more general design scale) through this change that they are both listening to their playerbase (arguably too much) and that they are not too proud to rule out rethinking what they had originally intended to please what they can ascertain is the will of their fans (the ascertaining part is where I think the problem is).

These are good things to me firstly because this is the polar opposite of what we have gotten from plenty of game makers and even filmmakers – a complete an ardent claim that these are works of the maker and should be made only as the maker sees fit (George Lucas). If nothing else it is at least a change. Secondly because it bodes well for the rethinking of decisions as unpopular as controversial as this one.

I firmly believe that this game couldn’t do much to make me ever make a claim that I will never look at it again considering the amount of exploration there is left in the principles that they have put forth. Who knows though – I could be eating my words in a year or so.

Aelelan.1639:

They’ve stated this before. They only implemented what people have perceived to be the beginning of a gear grind because they felt as though the difficulty/time invested in getting a Legendary and the difficulty/time invested in getting an Exotic set were too far apart. They introduced Ascended as a means by which to give people some sort of a middle ground between those two things. I think they could have achieved the same goal without adding extra stats, but this act was founded in a very real and justifiable reason. If they’re willing to make changes these big as soon as this, they are probably willing to rethink their changes just as quickly. Anet isn’t some demon company, and they don’t implement changes with malice – contrary to how some people would imply by their vehement anger. They care about the game, and anyone willing to delude themselves into thinking otherwise hasn’t seen this quote:

“I’m going to try to get some sleep, because I’m exhausted, and tomorrow is going to be a very long day. There is such a range of emotion I’m experiencing right now, but mostly I just want to say that I hope you guys love it. Love it forever, or love it and then move on to something else, but just love it, and know that three hundred of us melted down our hearts to give it to you. It’s all yours soon.”

We’re talking about people here – introducing free content not only because it’s their job but because they are extremely passionate about their work. It’s easy to just turn these people into faceless monsters out to annihilate all the hopes and dreams you POURED into getting your Exotic sets (lol). You’re not happy about it, fine – say it and go do something else for a bit but don’t hold some arbitrary grudge against these people as though they have some sort of vendetta against you and your virtual accomplishments.

Please spare me diplomatic spin crap. I already heard that from ANET PR guys. What we want is actual reasons and justifications for those actions not some watered down text that has no real answers and just begs for more questions. Saying legendaries are too grindy so we ll introduce more grind for stats so you actually need to grind is ridiculous without first justifying stat grind in the first place.

Me and many others have known and supported ANET for the past seven years. Pulling a stunt like this without any previous communication on why the stat increases and grind are actually necessary and good for the game is just not something anyone of us expected or rather even perceived as possible. Maybe we got spoiled by all the information given to us during production but even so a clear departure of the manifesto and countless blog posts and interviews is not something you just forget to mention.

No company is a demon but they are companies, especially the ones in the back who deal only in money and dont give 2 kittens for the actual product. Even so NCsoft has stayed clear of direct dictation to ANET. To me it seems this has changed.

As for the actual people at ANET. no they are not faceless monsters. We ve grown to trust them, watch them give interviews and some even talked to them live. Noone here holds any grudge against the hard working programmers, artists, etc. but the people who made this decision or rather dictated it… well i d really like to know their side of the story… but we r not getting it.

Also because you mentioned it: i have no max level exotic sets but could have easily afforded them for all my max lvl characters at this point. I m a very cautions person with how i spend my money, virtual or otherwise and was still weighing my options for armor that should have lasted me longer than a few months (as it did for most people).
That doesnt mean that this didnt affect me and i should stay silent about it. A clear departure of principles is something far more important than some pieces of virtual gear and could mean the end of the game and even ANET that we all have grown to love and trust.

It was all planned, or that’s a least what I think can explain teh magnitude of the expansion. Do you think all this new content can be pulled out in a week? even a month? They’ve probably been planning it since… I can’t even imagine since when.
This isn’t a desperate move, I think… this way, they advertised/sold the game to “anti-grind” players while at the same time being able to grab some of the MMO-hoppers. They’ll manage to keep them interested for a while and then… Well, I don’t know. I’m not a seer (I could infuse my armor by myself, ha!), and I don’t claim to know what they’re thinking. They know better than I do.

“I’m going to try to get some sleep, because I’m exhausted, and tomorrow is going to be a very long day. There is such a range of emotion I’m experiencing right now, but mostly I just want to say that I hope you guys love it. Love it forever, or love it and then move on to something else, but just love it, and know that three hundred of us melted down our hearts to give it to you. It’s all yours soon.”

It doesn’t work like that. Emotions are very misleading. Sure as hell I bought this game following my emotions (GW1) and not my reason, and here I am, feeling confused as hell, I’ll admit. Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. I should have seen that coming.
And well, the only thing I can say for certain, with limited informations, is that the game is unstable. What does it mean? I certainly don’t know.
P.S. Cheer up. If they manage to get it right, good for them, the game and the community. If they fail, it won’t steal good memories this game gave you, and that you’ll remember even years later. They made a decision that they think will help them gain some money. Anet, Ncsoft, whatever. It’s up to you now if you want to see the end of this or you just can’t. Either way, it’s not the end of the world. Don’t lose your head, it will be ok.
And stop attacking Anet. They’re people, after all. They can make mistakes, and they certainly don’t think we’re bags of trash.

Osculim.2983:

All doom and gloom. GW2 is going strong and will go on for a long time to come.

Both NCSoft and ArenaNet are in trouble. No, it won’t.

Guild Wars 2 is definately not in trouble. As a matter of fact, if they continue to add content that does have some mix of vertical progression and add more to PvP and WvW, then this game will last for years. If Anet listens to the few thousand same posters on the same 3 forums regarding “power creep” then it will be a guild wars 1 clone. That’s great for the minority that played it in the MMO community, but I think Anet wants something bigger and more then a niche.

They want to appeal to both sides of the fence, but it sure will be hard with the vocal minority in these forums on a daily basis. 2 million soldish? A few thousand complainers on the same three forums. Anet you decide.

Natural.7013:

They want to appeal to both sides of the fence, but it sure will be hard with the vocal minority in these forums on a daily basis. 2 million soldish? A few thousand complainers on the same three forums. Anet you decide.

But what made the 2 million people buy the game??

Did 2 million people buy the game because they increased the power creep? Or maybe 2 million bought the game because they said this would be different then all the other games?

Yeah thought so.

http://youtu.be/GnbuOTXFkL0

SonicTHI.3217

Please spare me diplomatic spin crap. I already heard that from ANET PR guys. What we want is actual reasons and justifications for those actions not some watered down text that has no real answers and just begs for more questions. Saying legendaries are too grindy so we ll introduce more grind for stats so you actually need to grind is ridiculous without first justifying stat grind in the first place.

If you wanna assume I support Ascended gear, be my guest. I’m not going to tell you not to. I can just tell you that I honestly don’t think it was a good idea and think there are other better ways within the anti-stat boost framework to give the middle ground they seek. Whether you accept that as truth is your problem.

They listened to a portion of their playerbase – great. They put a plan into action to solve it – also great, but they didn’t put a necessarily effective one in. No reason to leave the game altogether. You call it departure from principles, I call it experimentation with solutions outside of the restrictive guidelines that they set forth pre-launch. The reason I make the distinction is because departure from principles implies that this is something they are doing consistently – adding gear statistically better than our current gear to give progression. To pretend that because they decided in one patch to introduce something outside of their conceived realm of possibility for the game is reason to jump to the conclusion “WELL kitten I GUESS THATS IT FOR ME. THEY’VE GOT A GEAR GRIND” is just straight up ridiculous. I’ve said it before – there was a problem, they gave a solution. This isn’t a precedent by which to dictate future decisions. They didn’t say “ kitten I GUESS THIS WHOLE COSMETIC THING DIDN’T WORK OUT. OH WELL BACK TO STATS FOR THIS GAME”. There just isn’t nearly enough evidence to support that this is the new norm for this game. I’ll be happy to eat my words when there is because when you’re wrong you’re wrong even when I’m the one that’s wrong.

Aelelan.1639:

SonicTHI.3217

Please spare me diplomatic spin crap. I already heard that from ANET PR guys. What we want is actual reasons and justifications for those actions not some watered down text that has no real answers and just begs for more questions. Saying legendaries are too grindy so we ll introduce more grind for stats so you actually need to grind is ridiculous without first justifying stat grind in the first place.

If you wanna assume I support Ascended gear, be my guest. I’m not going to tell you not to. I can just tell you that I honestly don’t think it was a good idea and think there are other better ways within the anti-stat boost framework to give the middle ground they seek. Whether you accept that as truth is your problem.

They listened to a portion of their playerbase – great. They put a plan into action to solve it – also great, but they didn’t put a necessarily effective one in. No reason to leave the game altogether. You call it departure from principles, I call it experimentation with solutions outside of the restrictive guidelines that they set forth pre-launch. The reason I make the distinction is because departure from principles implies that this is something they are doing consistently – adding gear statistically better than our current gear to give progression. To pretend that because they decided in one patch to introduce something outside of their conceived realm of possibility for the game is reason to jump to the conclusion “WELL kitten I GUESS THATS IT FOR ME. THEY’VE GOT A GEAR GRIND” is just straight up ridiculous. I’ve said it before – there was a problem, they gave a solution. This isn’t a precedent by which to dictate future decisions. They didn’t say kitten I GUESS THIS WHOLE COSMETIC THING DIDN’T WORK OUT. OH WELL BACK TO STATS FOR THIS GAME". There just isn’t nearly enough evidence to support that this is the new norm for this game. I’ll be happy to eat my words when there is because when you’re wrong you’re wrong even when I’m the one that’s wrong.

Do the math for how long it’s going to take to get new gear set.

Then get back to us on the lack of evidence this game is becoming a gear grind.

Most of us are smart enough to know when the ship is sinking because of the abundance of washed up WoW players on it.

If they continue with this monthly event style pacing, the game will be quite alive for a good while longer.