Guild Wars 2

Many of you will probably have already seen the July Eurogamer interview;

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-07-03-its-unlikely-guild-wars-2-will-ever-get-an-expansion-pack

…This thread is less to bring the news, and more to gauge how people would feel if this turned out to be the case.

Zadorojny (the developer, not the Dredge general) has explained that, as they currently have it planned, the Living World may take the role of the Expansion. That is to say, GW2 may never have a full expansion, but the Living World instead.

Living World updates have given us some great bits of content (I loved the MF), but that said, I’m really saddened by the possibility that the LW could replace true expansions. I don’t see how the Living World could give us anything on the same scale as an expansion could— dragons, continents, playable races. It raises the prospect of never having much more land to explore.

Even if the Living World did give us new zones (as it did with Southsun), they would surely be swarmed by players during the first few weeks of availability— rather than the more organic experience of the players spread over many new zones in a true expansion.

How do people feel about this?

I wouldn’t be surprised at all if we never see an expansion on this game. If Arena Net is making enough money with their bimonthly mini updates and their new rotation of items in the store, they essentially have no motivation to sink money into a full expansion.

lol if you want huge expansions that pop out of nowhere suddenly, go play another game. the living story is amazing and perfect.. nothing like it, that’s what makes GW2 perfect and unique, you never know what new invasion/farm/achievements are coming

Thank you, ColinJohanson

How do I feel about the Living World/Story? I feel that this Living World business is doing to Guild Wars 2 what this sinkhole in Louisiana is doing to the town of Bayou Corne.

Wow that sounds awesome. Looking forward to it.

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

Personally, I’d love to see how it can go with the Living World as the means of injection. Seeing games like Wildstar and ESO declaring they’ll be subscription based games makes me think how high you all have raised the bar on the whole pricing model for MMOs… think about it, are those games going to be able to surpass what you all at ANet are doing as far as new content goes, and surpass it enough to actually justify the subscription fee? I have my doubts. You have a real winning formula here, I hope to see things continue along this front.

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

Can we take this statement to mean that no “expansion” content has been worked on? Since I assume you’d have to know the method before you developed it all

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

And will certain implementations like the living story give us all the features and content we’ve come to expect from expansions? It seems kind of hard to use the living story to add things like a continents worth of maps or new social/fluff features like lfg tools and housing.

Tachenon.5270:

How do I feel about the Living World/Story? I feel that this Living World business is doing to Guild Wars 2 what this sinkhole in Louisiana is doing to the town of Bayou Corne.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRhesBaRCME

Why I believe you’ve hit the nail on the head, good sir.

This is the part where we hope to god it’s not just more temporary crap.

An expansion presented in Living World format would be…exactly what we have right now…lol

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

How about starting an official poll here on the forums? That way you can get a clear picture of what at least this section of the community wants. The way I see it looking at a single page and see “X% want an expansion” has to be easier than trying to figure it out based on all the rather…schizophrenic threats and posts on the subject. Or, if you don’t mind breaking the forth-wall a little bit, have active players vote in-game using the same system as you did for the recent Cutthroat Politics event.

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

Traditional expansion just divide the community. Some buy and some don’t.

Use the Living Story to add traditional expansion content. So everyone can play. You will also see more gem store sales that way.

Onshidesigns.1069:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

Traditional expansion just divide the community. Some buy and some don’t.

Use the Living Story to add traditional expansion content. So everyone can play. You will also see more gem store sales that way.

At the risk of sounding cheap, it doesn’t necessarily have to be a product you need purchase. Similar to what EVE online does, dropping an expansions worth of content on you free of charge.

Terok.7315:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

And will certain implementations like the living story give us all the features and content we’ve come to expect from expansions? It seems kind of hard to use the living story to add things like a continents worth of maps or new social/fluff features like lfg tools and housing.

Those things are already being added. And none of those things are content per say aka simply UI changes. Housing are things that can be added and are not story driven.

I believe he is talking specifically like new maps/regions or their supposedly vision for raids.

Thank you for the clarification Colin (and quick reply too)! Much appreciated.

I’d still be in favour of an expansion as the means of delivery myself, but this has alleviated my fear a bit.

I just doubt the LW mode of delivery could give us anything quite on the same scale— many new zones, a new dragon, etc. It’s good at keeping the world we have alive, but expanding it to a significant degree? I’m not sure about that.

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

Thanks for the reply. My vote, if you’re interested, is “traditional expansion”.

silvermember.8941:

Terok.7315:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

And will certain implementations like the living story give us all the features and content we’ve come to expect from expansions? It seems kind of hard to use the living story to add things like a continents worth of maps or new social/fluff features like lfg tools and housing.

Those things are already being added. And none of those things are content per say aka simply UI changes. Housing are things that can be added and are not story driven.

I believe he is talking specifically like new maps/regions or their supposedly vision for raids.

Those were examples.

Onshidesigns.1069:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

Traditional expansion just divide the community. Some buy and some don’t.

Use the Living Story to add traditional expansion content. So everyone can play. You will also see more gem store sales that way.

They could do it like aion and just add new regions BUT I suspect Ncsoft might see this as a money making opportunity which isn’t a bad thing. Expansions also allows the game to reset. But I think they should do it the aion method where you get content without paying for it.

Also there is nothing really wrong with dividing the community anyways, other MMORPG have done it and it doesn’t significantly impact the coumminity except for a few cheapskates (non-negative manner). If you have issues paying for the expansion you can also just grind use the gold and buy the expansion through the cash shop (extremely brilliant if they go via this method) it generates the demand for gems and cheapskates don’t have to worry about spending real money.

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

No…not through the Living World! The Living World needs to DIE! DIE! DIE! DIE! DIE!

It all depends on what the LS updates bring. If they manage to release fleshed out zones/dungeons/weapons and heck, a playable race maybe, more power to them!

If they don’t…uh…not sure about this.

Terok.7315:

silvermember.8941:

Terok.7315:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

And will certain implementations like the living story give us all the features and content we’ve come to expect from expansions? It seems kind of hard to use the living story to add things like a continents worth of maps or new social/fluff features like lfg tools and housing.

Those things are already being added. And none of those things are content per say aka simply UI changes. Housing are things that can be added and are not story driven.

I believe he is talking specifically like new maps/regions or their supposedly vision for raids.

Those were examples.

Essentially, I was commenting on them being bad examples since they have nothing to do with story new maps or anythings. All those things are simply UI changes, just like the wallet. They have no real impact on the world itself.

Personally, until Anet figures what they want to do with this game making an expansion is pointless. They are still trying to see how things work, how to make the world alive and give reasons for players to be out doing DE.

I don’t see players doing DE UNLESS they are leveling and or have “rewards”. farm wars 2 they cried.

Anet, the living world is all good, but it doesn’t qualify as expansion content.

timidobserver.7925:

Anet, the living world is all good, but it doesn’t qualify as expansion content.

I don’t think you read it currently. He was saying he wants to use the Living story to introduce new areas not that they are expansion content. Besides if they keep improving LS content like they did between aetherblade and this invasion, LS could replace the really boring DE we currently have.

The DE we currently have would have appealed to far more people if they could actually play it 15 minutes after the hour begins. lol

I really don’t see what the fuss is about.

The only difference between an expansion and the living story is how the content gets pushed out

Expansion – content comes out all at once
Living Story – content is gradually pushed out

People naturally hate change and still think of the old MMO mentality. Expansions are just as dated as paying for subscriptions.

One of the problems I’m seeing is that if you use the living story to add, say, the crystal desert to the game- how can you add an entire zone with hubs and quests and dungeons and stuff in a living story patch? if you add the zone but no content itd be disastrous

The problem is that expansions aren’t kittening temporary.

Vol.5241:

I really don’t see what the fuss is about.

The only difference between an expansion and the living story is how the content gets pushed out.

Expansion – content comes out all at once
Living Story – content is gradually pushed out

So when juxtaposing the Living Story with, say, Guild Wars: Factions or Guild Wars: Nightfall you really see no difference other than release schedule?

We used portals to enter new lands in Guild Wars. I see no reason why there couldn’t be a Living Story release that introduced a portal to several zones in a new (expanded) map. There is no inherent limit on the amount of content that can be released through the Living Story method; some teams are working on large content releases, even as we speak. I am not sure it matters exactly how said content is made available to us, except for maybe the cost to the players.

@ Sil – And there’s nothing saying that expansion type content would be temporary, if rolled out in a similar fashion to the living world. We have also been told that with the 2nd half of the year, we will start seeing more permanent impact from the LS, meaning its not going to all be temporary.

@Darkace – It more likely, should they decided to patch expansion content via the LS system, that we would see several ‘set up’ type chunks in pre-launch patches, in order to get a decent chunk of content into the world and set up (but not necessarily accessible) prior to the expansion kick off. They have done such ‘prep’ updates before for larger content patches.

I wouldn’t mind more living world content as opposed to an expansion but they need to either:

a) Put more time into it. Currently 2 weeks is not enough time to get the content created, polished, and published. Most of the content has been buggy to say the least and is getting worse with every release. I love the current content but you can tell it was released far, far too early.

b) Add more people to the team to create it. See above.

It is clear that Anet can not put out quality content with the current development time / people working on it. Hell, even the last holographic image was junk. The head clipped through the girls hair and looking up the jawline was seperated from her face…

Like what Anet is doing but they need to think quality over quantity…

New races have to come with a new storyline which will be through a expansion pack.

Living Story mini additions like mini-games and the occasional new DE is vastly different than a full expansion. To the player, it feels vastly different to have hours of content – new maps, new dungeons, and new gear ready and waiting to explore whenever they want than little bits here and there of content that, such as with this update, you do a lot of sitting around waiting and can’t play whenever you have the time.

Sil.4560:

The problem is that expansions aren’t kittening temporary.

Sure they are. That’s the thing most people don’t realize. They’re temporary, and they’re clutter. Look at WoW for example. Burning Crusade. Accept it or not, that was entirely temporary content once Lich King came out. But to make things worse it stuck around as clutter you’re forced to pass through as you race to level up. But the dungeons, the raids for BC… they stand abandoned, empty, their temporary moments of glory long lost and forgotten.

Expansions are temporary when the next one comes along and takes the players somewhere else.

darkace.8925:

Vol.5241:

I really don’t see what the fuss is about.

The only difference between an expansion and the living story is how the content gets pushed out.

Expansion – content comes out all at once
Living Story – content is gradually pushed out

So when juxtaposing the Living Story with, say, Guild Wars: Factions or Guild Wars: Nightfall you really see no difference other than release schedule?

I barely played either so I can’t comment on how they would release it through Living Story.

But I’m sure they would be able to present as such.

A quick analogy I can think of:
Expansion = Movie
Living Story = Mini-series

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

The game is 1 year old. You guys should have that figured out on day 1, not being disrespectful but this seems like you are delaying the decision, to force feed us this Living story. Which in this sense is a great idea, but take longer between updates and really produce something worth calling Living story. To this day, now this might be just me but, the game seems the same as it was on release day. The living story did nothing to make it more lively and really make a huge impact on the world. The decision about an expansion is huge, and not being decided 1 year into the release of the game is quite frankly a disasterous business plan. Especially nowadays when there is so much competition in the mmo market, which doesnt really allow a company to take 2-3 years of leasure time, or “filler” content. People are going to get bored, and i guess now allowing us to farm for our legendarys will secure your player base for a bit more time, however not for long… What will happen when players get their legendarys? Oh, ascended armor. That will get players interested again for about 7 days.

I hope while they are working on these small content updates they have a large update in the works, I want to see more of the world become available all at once. With more dungeons, and a storyline type quest added

I really hate Living story. Its cool and free of course. But I don’t want to think I’m forced to play a game because “If I don’t play now, I’ll never get the chance to play it again”.

I would really prefer some sort of expansion chapter (Even if its one per year), and living sotry goes on with the other sorts of releases we’ve saw around this year.

Actually, I’m about to quit game. I’m estressed to feel obligated to play temporary content. I’m tired of think that I need to be tied to game, if I don’t want to lose content.

silvermember.8941:

Terok.7315:

silvermember.8941:

Terok.7315:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

And will certain implementations like the living story give us all the features and content we’ve come to expect from expansions? It seems kind of hard to use the living story to add things like a continents worth of maps or new social/fluff features like lfg tools and housing.

Those things are already being added. And none of those things are content per say aka simply UI changes. Housing are things that can be added and are not story driven.

I believe he is talking specifically like new maps/regions or their supposedly vision for raids.

Those were examples.

Essentially, I was commenting on them being bad examples since they have nothing to do with story new maps or anythings. All those things are simply UI changes, just like the wallet. They have no real impact on the world itself.

What are you talking about?

I was asking whether or not the living story is capable of implementing the same features you would find in a traditional expansion (new features, new areas, new story content) with the same type of player reception (hype, interest, etc..) and cohesiveness that you would expect. I didn’t mention anything about the UI and nothing about the story specifically. My question isn’t even loaded, I don’t really have a preference one way or the other as long as we get an expansions worth of content.. somehow..

MauricioCezar.2673:

I really hate Living story. Its cool and free of course. But I don’t want to think I’m forced to play a game because “If I don’t play now, I’ll never get the chance to play it again”.

I would really prefer some sort of expansion chapter (Even if its one per year), and living sotry goes on with the other sorts of releases we’ve saw around this year.

Actually, I’m about to quit game. I’m estressed to feel obligated to play temporary content. I’m tired of think that I need to be tied to game, if I don’t want to lose content.

I never got to see Elvis live in concert. I’m not about to quit life over that however.

We will basically be getting an expansion that we don’t have to pay direct money for, it’s cool.

Pacifica.9576:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

Can we take this statement to mean that no “expansion” content has been worked on? Since I assume you’d have to know the method before you developed it all

That’s really question of the year right there. If there’s no content yet then nobody is going to stick around for another 1-3 years while they make it(even if they have the bi-monthly releases of achievement point grinding).

Vol.5241:

I barely played either so I can’t comment on how they would release it through Living Story.

But I’m sure they would be able to present as such.

A quick analogy I can think of:
Expansion = Movie
Living Story = Mini-series

This is the best analogy of this I have seen. A perfect example.

jaka.9635:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

The game is 1 year old. You guys should have that figured out on day 1, not being disrespectful but this seems like you are delaying the decision, to force feed us this Living story. Which in this sense is a great idea, but take longer between updates and really produce something worth calling Living story. To this day, now this might be just me but, the game seems the same as it was on release day. The living story did nothing to make it more lively and really make a huge impact on the world. The decision about an expansion is huge, and not being decided 1 year into the release of the game is quite frankly a disasterous business plan. Especially nowadays when there is so much competition in the mmo market, which doesnt really allow a company to take 2-3 years of leasure time, or “filler” content. People are going to get bored, and i guess now allowing us to farm for our legendarys will secure your player base for a bit more time, however not for long… What will happen when players get their legendarys? Oh, ascended armor. That will get players interested again for about 7 days.

Not all business decisions are made at the beginning of the venture. Some need additional data and consideration prior to being made. Considering that they were trying something wholey new with living world, and needed to get its kinks worked out before they could even determine if it presented a viable option for expansion roll out, they couldn’t have known ‘on day 1’ if everything would work out in order to make such a decision.

Zindrix.1750:

Pacifica.9576:

ColinJohanson.2394:

I just want to remind folks again, the features and content you’d traditionally find in an expansion will absolutely be added to Gw2. The thing we haven’t decided is what form the release of that content would be presented in, be it a traditional expansion, living world, or some other form.

Can we take this statement to mean that no “expansion” content has been worked on? Since I assume you’d have to know the method before you developed it all

That’s really question of the year right there. If there’s no content yet then nobody is going to stick around for another 1-3 years while they make it(even if they have the bi-monthly releases of achievement point grinding).

They aren’t going to tell us if they are working on an expansion, because then we will want to know when to expect it, what it’s story is, etc, etc. (Stupid filter) Until they are close to rolling it out, we won’t hear about it simply because of how the community reacts.

It would be extremely foolish of us to assume that they have not worked on an expansion to some extent. We have been told repeatedly that it is not their focus right now. Keyword, there is focus. Doesn’t mean they don’t have people working on it though. It is likely that they have stories roughed out, and some general components done or in the works, but until they are ready to start hiring voice actors or have a significant portion of the work done, they will continue to tell us that they aren’t focused on an expansion.

Expansion is big part of the world opening up, living world is small updates. I prefer the first one.