Guild Wars 2

Hi all,

I have been playing GW2 since the 3 day headstart and have about 2.5k hours in the game. I have commented on various things on the forums and reddit in the past, and I have a vague memory of doing a feedback thread a few years ago, but I wanted to do an overall feedback post about how I currently feel about GW2. So, as I am a bit bored and have some spare time at work, I thought I would put something together. Some of this may be too late or too much work required to change now, but I thought I would include it anyway. Please also keep in mind that this is feedback from MY perspective. I do not believe I speak for others and if I come across that way I apologize, but that is not my intent. It is purely my take on GW2 and how it makes me feel.

So, where to begin? Well, first I will start with what I like and will then detail what I dislike and how I think things can be improved. I will not talk about story or graphics much, as that is not my main focus when playing games. For me it is about ease of use and gameplay. Story and graphics are of course important, but they are secondary in my mind, and to be honest GW2 does a good job with the graphics and an ok job with the story, so not much to say in that regard really. Also, I will not give my feedback on everything the game offers, and will mainly focus on the things that are most important to me. So without further ado, here is my current feedback on GW2:

The Great

Combat – Anet created a combat system in GW2 that was a very good mix of tab targeting and aiming action combat, which has improved even more since launch. It is fast paced and the animations (for the most part) are very fluid. And on top of that you can move your character around while using most abilities, and that aspect of it alone put GW2’s combat above all others, and still does today to some extent. I also like that they added things like stun breaks and condition cleanses, which is surprisingly lacking from some games. And the fact that they have managed to create a different playstyle for each profession is quite impressive, even if some of them are unbalanced at times it is still an achievement that each profession feels different to the next. The combat in GW2 is the biggest plus for me, and the main thing that has kept me playing for so long.

Accessibility – The next best thing about GW2 is how accessible things are in the game. For example, being able to jump into PvP, from anywhere in the world, and being bumpered up to max level and gear, is one of the best moves Anet has made. And while I think they didn’t do as good a job with WvW, I still appreciate how easy it is to jump into a borderland from anywhere. Then there are things like waypoints (more on this later) and account bound bank space, which makes the game much more approachable and makes your gaming experience so much easier. You can jump straight to the fun.

Non-Competitive PvE – I know some players like their worlds to have a mix of PvE and PvP in the same environment, and to be honest I like that sometimes too. But I also appreciate how Anet separated PvE and PvP in their game, and on top of that they made the PvE areas as non-competitive as possible. From individual nodes to mob xp sharing, you do not fear other players in the world, and in fact in many cases you appreciate them being there. It was a paradigm shift that I was waiting to happen for a long time, and I think Anet did a good job in this regard. They have faultered from time to time here, but they are usually quick to correct these mistakes. I have played a few games since GW2 launched and thought to myself how much better GW2 is for having non-competitive PvE content.

Character Customization – While GW2 may lack in the character face and body customization department, they truely excel in the gear customization department. It is not perfect by any means, but with being able to change the appearance of your gear, while keeping the stats, and unlocking dyes which you can use forever, and not forgetting outfits, I feel GW2 has a very flexible customization system. It’s no City of Heroes or Champions Online, but it is better than most. Other developers are starting to implement more customization into their games now, but none of them yet have created one that is as free from restrictions and user friendly as GW2’s. Being able to change your look out in the world without needing an NPC, and being free to change your armour colour as and when you choose, are great features to have.

The Not So Great

Breadcrumbs – One of my biggest bugbears in GW2 is all the breadcrumbs put in front of you, such as PoI’s, Vistas, etc.. To me, exploration should be something you do because you want to do it, not because the map, or some other guide or title or achievement, says you should do it. The more tickboxes and reward incentives they give you for exploration the less I enjoy it, because the focus is no longer on exploring and much of the sense of discovery is taken away from you. When I first started playing GW2 I enjoyed the story and enjoyed exploring each new zone, but after a while I found myself focusing so much on completing each maps checklist that I was no longer paying attention to the world around me. By the time I got to Orr I was no longer going off path to check stuff out and was mainly going from point A to point B (poi to vista) in as straight a line as possible. GW1 was much better in this regard, until they added the cartographer title. To indicate this, when that title was added to the game I had already explores 96% of the world, and I had done that because I wanted to do it for the fun of it and there was nothing on the map distracting me from it along the way.

Too Easy To Travel – I know I said above that waypoints are great, due to how they make the game more accessible, I also have an issue with them. When you look at the map GW2 is actually a very large world. But it quickly feels very small and I think one of the main reasons why that is is due to the over abundance of waypoints. I feel that far too many were added to each map and moving to the exact spot you want to get to takes hardly any time at all. In my opinion, GW1 had a good balance by forcing you to start from outposts. You didn’t have too far to go from an outpost, but you couldn’t spawn a few seconds run away from where you wanted to go either (unless you wanted to go to the outpost of course). It made each map feel large, even though they were probably smaller in physical dimensions to GW2’s maps. The over use of waypoints, in my opinion, has made each map feel very small (after you have explored the map once of course).

Not So Dynamic Events – When GW2 was first talked about, the devs indicated that the dynamic events system would create be these map changing events that happened with/without player actions, and that they would make the world feel alive. Unfortunately, however, for me that illusion was broken very early and very quicly. Most of them felt too scripted and the dynamic part of them was merely a simple scaling system that increased the number of mobs or the health of the bosses. While many events are interesting, with some fun gameplay mechanics, they did not feel that dynamic and they certainly didn’t make the world feel alive. And with some of them repeating so frequently (centaur events are one example) that feeling of a living breathing world vanished completely and the dynamic events system felt more like rides/attractions at a themepark than organic living world events.

Too Much Focus On Numbers – I have always thought of Anet as innovators and inventors when it came to game design, so it made me a little sad when they used old and tired systems in GW2. While there were levels in GW1, there were so few (20) and they were gained so quickly you could’ve easily classed it to be a level-less game. I suppose it was a level-lite game really, and I really liked that. It didn’t keep your focus on levels for too long and allowed you to put it back onto the gameplay quite quickly. I understand that rule systems are needed, but the more of them you visibly put infront of the player the less they will focus on the actual gameplay and the fun.

GW2 was created with 80 levels, and while it doesn’t take too long to achieve max level, it does take part of your focus off the game itself, and that is a bad thing in my opinion. And they keep adding more numerical systems into the game, such as the new mastery system and rank reward tracks. And then you have gear tiers to climb, adding yet another distraction from the actual gameplay. Levels, and other number based systems, are so old and tired now that the genre is screaming out for a change. I was hoping Anet would be the ones to break this mold, but it doesn’t look like they are willing to take that step. Now with HoT the arbitrary number systems have ruined content for me yet again. For example, I can learn how to speak a new language by fighting mobs, to gain numbers to add to an xp bar. It just doesn’t feel right to me.

When they talked about HoT I thought ‘Cool, it will be like Zelda/Metroid’, but it feels as far from those games as it can be. In Zelda you either discovered new toys or gained them as a reward for performing a certain task for someone. In HoT you gain new toys by doing anything, which results in there being nothing to link your actions with the newly acquired toy. It just feels odd and arbitrary to me. And then you have the issue of reward tracks and other numerical reward systems in PvP and WvW. By adding in rewards tracks they may have made the more materialistic among us happier, but the problem is it added something that players cared more about than the gameplay itself. Players now leave matches, leech or intentionally disrupt games, just because it effects their reward potential. I know some players probably wouldn’t play PvP if there was no reward, but I feel the games themselves, and the quality of player participation, would be a lot better if there were no rewards, at least in PvP.

…Continued on next post…

Improvements

I’m not sure how some of these things can be changed now, as many are deeply integrated into the game’s systems. But here are the changes I think would greatly improve the game for me:

Play Your Way Mechanics In All The Right Places – One of the biggest blunders Anet have continuously performed, in my opinion, is how they have implemented the ‘Play Your Way’mechanics in all the wrong places. For example, they made HoT with maps that stopped you progressing through them but allowed you to unlock that progression by doing whatever you wanted (aka, learning a language by fighting mobs). But what they should have done is allow you to freely progress through the map, but create special locked off areas and hidden content which require you to do/discover specific things in order to acquire the items needed to access them. Then you have a multitude of waypoints to make it easier to get about, but they lock off zones behind levels and gear tiers. Overall, it feels like they hold your hand when you don’t want them to and let you free when you want their to be a focus and reason to do something.

I am not sure how they can fix this in the current game, but I feel that future content should allow players to get to the content they want to play quickly, and not lock it off behind an ‘unlock it your way’ system. And when it comes to unlocking special areas I think most players would be perfectly ok with doing a specific task to unlock something, so long as they can use whatever build they prefer to complete it. To me, playing your way is not about what activities you can do to unlock something, it is about how you go about tackling those specific activities. I hope that makes sense.

No More Levels or Gear Tiers – I know this change will likely never happen, but I feel there are some very good benefits to having no levels or gear tiers. For one thing you will be free to explore the world in your own way, chosing your own direction. You want to go straight to Orr? Sure, why not, you should be free to explore wherever you want whenever you want, with no arbitrary restrictions in your way. This change won’t affect the story because that is directed by story markers and such, and you have to go to certain locations to do each part. If anything, a level-less system would improve how players experienced the story because there would be no risk of the player being under/over leveled for each story step.

Another big benefit of no levels/gear tiers, is how new and veteran players can join up with each other straight away without feeling like they are too weak or too strong. PvE content is supposed to be a cooperative experience after all, so why force players to be at different capabilities? Just imagine it, you’re a veteran player who has just convinced a friend to start playing the game. Currently you have to wait while they level and gear their character before they can join you in the cool high level stuff. But, if there were no levels/gear tiers your friend could follow you to the content straight away and start enjoying it with you from day one. And I do not believe for an instant that this kind of freedom would confuse people or prevent them from doing the story or other content. They would still need to explore the world and the story can be designed to direct you and pace itself accordingly.

No Exploration Hand Holding – In my opinion exploration should be something you want to do, not a task the game gives you to do. So my suggestion to fix this would be to hide poi’s, vista, skill points, waypoints, etc. on the map, until you activate them. So for example, you reveal a new area and uncover some of the shroud, but no icons appear on the map until you activate them (view a vista, get close enough to complete a poi, etc.). By showing them on the map you take away that sense of discovery, and that is the main reason why most people expore in the first place. And if you really need something there, to give new players some kind of direction, may show only one or two waypoints situated at important locations, such as at cities and outposts. Make exploration fun again by allowing us to discover things ourselves.

Fewer Waypoints and No Armour Repairs – As mentioned above I think there are far too many waypoints in GW2, and removing many of them would achieve two things. Firstly, it will psychologically make the zones feel a little bigger. Secondly, it will slightly increase the penalty of dying, which is not a bad thing. With a slight increase in the death penalty (more time to get back to where you was) the armour repair system would not really be needed in the open world. Hell, it’s not really needed now. I persoanlly feel that removing the repair system, at least in the open world and WvW areas, would be a QoL improvement appreciated by many. To me, armour damage is not a discourement against defeat, it is merely an annoyance and only really has any function in dungeons and other instanced content. So at the very least the armour repair system should only be in effect in this kind of content, and removed from open world PvE and WvW.

More Solo And Small Group (Repeatable) Content We have dungeons for 5 man groups and now raids for 10 man groups, but there is not much in the way of repeatable content for smaller groups and solo players. You have open world events, sure, but this is not on-demand content like dungeons, fractals and raids are. And before anyone says it, yes I know it is an MMORPG, but that is such an old and invalid arguement these days I really shouldn’t have to defend this point. However,I know many have an issue with the notion of solo content in an MMO, so I will briefly explain my view on this subject.

MMO, as I am sure many of you know, stands for Massively Multiplayer Online. But what it does not mean is Massively Cooprerative Online, which is what I believe a lot of people think it means. What Massively Multiplayer means, in my opinion, is that the game can house many players in the world at the same time. There is no globally accepted or official rule that states an MMO must be designed around group content only. This is a rule that was made up by certain player groups. What kind of content an MMO should have can only be decided by the developers, never by the players. So if an Anet dev tells me GW2 is designed for group play only I will accept that and move on. But I do not believe GW2 is solely designed around group content.

I also feel the following is worth considering: According to the Myers Briggs Type Indicator (a personality type testing system), introverts make up about 50% of the population, and as introverts are more likely to enjoy solo or small group play with friends, than large group/social content, it would make sense for a business based on Massively Multiplayer games to at least cater, in some small part, to the introvert players of the world. A developer would be missing out on a massive chunk of revenue by only catering to players interested in socializing and large group content.

Conclusion

Overall I feel GW2 is a good game, with some fantastic elements to it. But ultimately I feel it can be frustrating at times and not as enjoyable to play as I thought it would be. The enjoyment I get from it’s various activities does not last long, and I think part of that is because the developers have focused so much on progression systems and rewards that the gameplay mechanics and activities have suffered as a result. I feel GW2 has missed out on so much potential, based on how it was described in the manifesto and other communications pre-launch. The general feeling I get from GW2 is that is it a themepark with various rides that, while are fun in places, are not good enough to keep you in game for long. After all, you wouldn’t stay in a real world theme park for more than a few days without feeling a little burnt out or bored would you?

To me, the MMORPG genre has always been about creating new worlds. Worlds you want to disappear in with your customized avatar. MMORPG’s have never been a quick fix gameplay kind of thing, such as FPS games. They offer you a wide variety of activities to take part in, a massive play area to explore and a long story to enjoy. The strange thing is, GW2 has all these things, but it has done them in such a way as to make me feel empty afterwards. The discovery from exploration was partly taken away from me and the massive play areas made small by all the waypoints. Story wise it was ok, but it didn’t feel as epic or as interesting as it’s predecessor. When I first started playing GW2 I thought the combat would be enough to keep me playing for a long while, and it has for the most part. But combat alone is not enough after a while, and now the game is feeling like it is lacking something. It doesn’t keep me invested for long enough and doesn’t offer enough of the content I enjoy to keep me playing for long.

For my quick fix gameplay, and fast paced craziness, I play Warframe, and recently I have been getting my exploration and large world progression fix from Black Desert Online. Between these two games I have all the stuff I enjoy in MMO games and as a result I have been playing GW2 less and less, and mainly only logging in to get my daily login rewards then logging off again. I haven’t given up on GW2 completely, as I did use to enjoy WvW and PvP ocassionally, and still jump into that part of the game when the mood takes me. But the frequency of my proper gameplay visits in GW2 has dwindled dramatically. Maybe if they can get WvW into the state I expected it to be I will return. Or if they add more game types in sPvP. But on the PvE side of things I think there are too many changes required for it to appeal to me for any length of time. But who knows, maybe a future expansion will bring with it the kind of content I will enjoy.

Like I say, GW2 is not a bad game, it is great in many respects. And I have not stopped playing it completely, so this is not an ‘I quit’ post. But I do hope that Anet can push GW2 back towards the vision of the game they gave us before launched. Anyway, thank you for reading this far and I hope it has been of some use to someone. And if my opinions are not shared by anyone else, then that is fine. I just wanted to express how I feel about the game at the moment. GW2 is a great game, better than most in fact, I just feel it could be so much better.

Rin