Guild Wars 2

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.

There’s some really good points in this. So it makes sense for them to have LS and daily time-gated content to bring people in regularly, but for the people that take breaks is this a huge deterrent to come back?

Ever since they made achievement points so valuable(even more so after MF removal) I’ve kicked myself for skipping a lot of the LS content. Most of the rewards for completing it was for some cosmetic thing which I generally thought was ugly in the first place, but if those achievement points will never be able to be earned again then I might see a reason for people to not want to take breaks OR never come back because they’ve already lost so much.

This content is turning non achievement grinders into achievement grinders and most people aren’t happy about it(I know, don’t play the game if you don’t like it). But it’s scarier to think that this game which was made for “casuals” is certainly less friendly in this way with permanent account bonuses based on completing frequent temporary content. It’s an interesting dilemma: keep current players or permanently lose others(which is more profitable to Anet?).

Why not both?

I didn’t like these Living Story contents at the beginning, but now we have new content every 2 weeks and it’s really fun overall, so I really enjoy now logging on and playing new stuff every 2 weeks.
But I think big things need to be released on a expansion pack… and with big I mean really BIG things, such a new professions, new races, new continents, new storylines for our characters, new mechanics, new PvP modes, new WvW maps…

So to sum it up: keep going with Living Story to evolve the world and release expansions to expand the game too!

VOLKON.1290:

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.

Yes, and this is a game. Not a life. I know its only my opinion, but I hate transform My life tied in a game life. I really hate any sort of this thing. Play a good game is cool. Feel it obligated as a life itself that isn’t. Not for me.

Lanfear, that is a good point. BUT saying 1 year into the venture of GW2 that you dont know how to release it? Dont they have all the data they ever wanted by now to make that decision?
Also, breaking down an expansion worth of content to multi-mini-expansions would seem watered down content.
And i understand that now that they got into the LS groove and (i guess) dont have the man power to work on the expansion full time, would take some adjusting for them and us players. We would not get LS anymore for the time being until they release the expansion, but that would be the sacrifice to make.
It would really determine if we would like to continue supporting the game, if we like the way the game is being played out, etc.
Right now, it seems like a blind sniper is taking shots with each LS update. It just feels random. Seems like a story being described form 10 different point of views.

Yeah, the nice thing about a real expansion is that it includes content that I can play whenever I have time rather than over a 2-week and once-hourly time frame when I am likely to be busy with other aspects of my life. I have missed entire story arcs that are nowhere explained because I have other things to do than game. It creates a disjointed feel to the game for me that is demotivating overall. I’ve had players tell me they’ve gone back to other games because they feel they’ve missed too much already and will likely miss a lot more in the future that they can’t simply play through on their own time.

LanfearShadowflame.3189:

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.

Maybe they really are just unsure how to release it like you say. Maybe they’re fighting with NCsoft about what is going to be more profitable? Who knows.

Either way they have their “expansion content” laid out for them. How many dragons are left? Boom done. More likely they’re having a headache over balancing new classes they will hopefully add, but they should honestly give up the dream of this being a “serious” pvp game and just add the classes.

aspirine.6852:

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

It only seems small because you get small bits and pieces of added content. In the end it equals to an expansion. I prefer LS.

Seriously, imagine if this game had zero updates since release? Do you think you or I would still be here?

Not everyone will stick around to wait for an expansion.

Temporary content (Living Story in this case) isn’t the best idea. As jaka above me said, the game still looks the same as it did on release, maybe with the added exception of Fractals but that’s it.

Living Stories add temporary content which some players may enjoy just to have it removed a few weeks later and the only permanent content that is left is the same old base GW2 game which many people have played over and over.

It is also disappointing that ANet doesn’t actually care much for the little things in the game, such as adding missing equipment (link below):

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/suggestions/Lack-of-Ascended-Accessories-Bonuses/first#post2596320

The game as it is now is boring and the living story feels recycled, sometimes unexciting.

The GW1 expansions added so many new things and have kept me playing for more than 7 years. GW2 will barely reach 1 year for me and I doubt it will go any higher at this pace.

Things that I want and think this game desperately needs:

New dungeons where I can EARN my own gear
New zones to farm top end mats and new events along with it(currently only 3 zones where you can farm ori)
New races and classes to feed my alt-hunkering needs
I want to explore!!! I loved leveling up and exploring new areas finding “hidden” gems and seeing beautiful vistas

And all of that I am willing to either buy a boxed expansion or pay per content. Although I’d rather have the traditional expansion with CE edition. Just saying.

Superfast.5901:

you never know what new invasion/farm/achievements are coming

This is the way to go, each month you do not know you will encounter.

jaka.9635:

Lanfear, that is a good point. BUT saying 1 year into the venture of GW2 that you dont know how to release it? Dont they have all the data they ever wanted by now to make that decision?
Also, breaking down an expansion worth of content to multi-mini-expansions would seem watered down content.
And i understand that now that they got into the LS groove and (i guess) dont have the man power to work on the expansion full time, would take some adjusting for them and us players. We would not get LS anymore for the time being until they release the expansion, but that would be the sacrifice to make.
It would really determine if we would like to continue supporting the game, if we like the way the game is being played out, etc.
Right now, it seems like a blind sniper is taking shots with each LS update. It just feels random. Seems like a story being described form 10 different point of views.

Business is full of red tape and politics. They may simply be saying that they haven’t made a decision because the way they want to release it is not how their parent wants to release it, or some such. We have no idea what is going on behind the scenes, and while Anet is its own ‘entity’ so to speak, NCSoft still has to pull the trigger on large scale decisions. Or, there may be internal kinks that we aren’t aware of. Right now, I can completely understand how an expansion and how to release it might not be a ‘big deal’ considering they have been prepping for several months for the China release. No small feat that, and as such, some things simply have to be put on a back burner.

I highly doubt manpower is an issue for them. They have told us time and again that they have larger teams working on larger content, in addition to the 4 living story teams.

They wouldn’t necessarily break the expansion down into multiple playable smaller chunks. They could patch in the data in updates prior to the initial kick off, and have it all available to us at that time. Chunking it out across multiple patches though would just make it easier to download…instead of one massive update. Although, they could roll out it out in small patches too, but I don’t think that’s what they were trying to say when they were talking about using the LS system to present it to us.

Zindrix.1750:

Maybe they really are just unsure how to release it like you say. Maybe they’re fighting with NCsoft about what is going to be more profitable? Who knows.

Either way they have their “expansion content” laid out for them. How many dragons are left? Boom done. More likely they’re having a headache over balancing new classes they will hopefully add, but they should honestly give up the dream of this being a “serious” pvp game and just add the classes.

Just because there are more dragons doesn’t mean the story itself is that simple. They may have most of it laid out. They may have some of the stories roughed out, but things change all the time. Anyone that has ever written anything knows and understands this. Things change with every draft, every script. They think they have it finalized, then it turns out something they want to do, they can’t for some reason.

If you look Colin’s last post, he’s basically dancing around what people want to know. In plain English that’s a yes, we’ve worked on some expansion stuff, but it’s a background project that we aren’t ready to share the details on just yet.

I just hope there will be some new areas and no more events involving festivals and parties. The dragon apocolypse is near and all they do in Tyria is celebrate xD

just add more farm, this game need more farm, more account points and more minis.

Vol.5241:

Not everyone will stick around to wait for an expansion.

To be fair, the Living Story isn’t keeping every single player, either. There are as many things to dislike about temporary content as there is to dislike about long waits, although many an MMO has done well without bimonthly minigames.

Celtic Lady.3729:

Vol.5241:

Not everyone will stick around to wait for an expansion.

To be fair, the Living Story isn’t keeping every single player, either. There are as many things to dislike about temporary content as there is to dislike about long waits, although many an MMO has done well without bimonthly minigames.

One of the higher ups (not Colin, I believe Mike Z) said a few months back that their internal metrics show that the playerbase plays more with bi-weekly releases than monthly releases. That’s why they announced the rate of content releases.

And now we have confirmation today from Mr Cartwright that the playerbase is on the rise

http://www.polygon.com/2013/8/23/4650486/guild-wars-2-player-base-is-on-the-rise-after-post-launch-slump

So I think Living Story is more of a success than a failure that is portrayed around here

It’s early yet in the whole 2-week content routine. This is the honeymoon phase for it. Time will tell if 2-week updates will be able to keep people long-term. Rift did regular mini-updates as well but as they got increasingly stale, the player-base began to fall off.

Vol.5241:

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

Now consider the production values of a mini-series vs that of a blockbuster movie.

I prefer Living Story or some other form that’s unique (And free. I’m cheap like that.)

Someone should point out that they never said the expansion would be free, even if they did use the LS system to roll it out….

darkace.8925:

Vol.5241:

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

Now consider the production values of a mini-series vs that of a blockbuster movie.

Well you can go compare Saving Private Ryan with Band of Brothers, both of which are highly acclaimed.

The relevant thinking here is comparing it in MMO terms.

If you try for an expansion you’re going to have a game with no updates for a long time. Your playerbase decides not to play and you lose out on revenue

As opposed to Living Story, it keeps things fresh and keeps people playing. And they can also provide themed microtransactions to help supplement their revenue.

I don’t see the problem.

Most mmorpg expansions include the following.

- new zones including new bosses, monster types, quest, dungeons, items, etc.
- new races
- new classes
- sometimes a graphics or UI update
- etc

^ All of this can be delivered in story format through the living story, and regular patches in small o r large doses.

I love the idea of the Living Story being the way expansion content is introduced to the game. I think a lot of people assume nothing will change from present method of delivery. Arenanet have stated that thi is not the case. Permanent content including new races, weapon types or classes, large zones, mob types, dungeons and such would join what we already get. We would get an expansion, it’s just whether we get it dumped on us all at once or whether we get it in installments that tie into an evolving world.

I don’t like it.

Actually starting to become less and less of a fan. Other posters that recognize me know I have been supportive of the game and Anets design decisions since beta. My posting history reflects that, with my only real criticisms being the black lion chest/key scam, that live action trailer, and the damage WvW still suffers from caused by months of free guesting.

But this living story stuff…while it was interesting and novel to begin with is just starting to feel pointless. We started the Hero’s Journey cycle with the Dragons. And then that just stopped and left us hanging. Then we are dropped into the middle of another Hero’s Journey cycle that seems extremely disjointed and random.

The worst part is Tyria as a whole is just left to whither because the bulk of players run off to do the living story stuff. Not because they might particularly want to, but because they are afraid they will up being penalized if they don’t.

I have seen the villagers outside of DR in QD sick more in the past few weeks than I ever have. In the living story we are trying to keep someone from murdering Krytans, while out in the world we are letting them get poisoned to death by bandits. This is a perfect allegory for the current state of the game. Living story zones see overflow, while the rest of the world dies.

So it’s extremely sad there will be no traditional expansions (and even sadder that apparently no expansion content seems to be in production since they don’t even have a delivery method settled upon). Traditional expansions have their place in MMOs. For instance, new classes and races will cause people to revisit low/mid level zones on alts and allow them to experience old content in a new way. While new high level areas, dungeons and prestige awards give current players large new chunks of content to experience and explore. Instead we get living story: every player in the same place, doing the same thing, getting the same stuff neglecting an enormous, gorgeous world and rich lore that is lucky to hold on to a crumb from living story’s temporary content plate.

For myself, the draw away from expansions and move towards Living story, temporary content and focus on corralling players to one tiny area have me more inclined to give another game a grab at my allotted MMO play time. A few months ago, I never would have considered 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.

Based on the quality of living stories and the number of bugs and lack of actual story presented… well it doesn’t inspire a lot of faith in “expansion” type content.

At this point I would settle for single 6 month updates like WoW if we could get some more polish and an actual story out of it instead of 2 lines of story, 10,000 bugs and then 2 weeks of grind fest for achievements.

The idea of 2 week content updates is great, you just clearly don’t have the staff and writers to pull it off in a polished manner.

Vol.5241:

Well you can go compare Saving Private Ryan with Band of Brothers, both of which are highly acclaimed.

The relevant thinking here is comparing it in MMO terms.

If you try for an expansion you’re going to have a game with no updates for a long time. Your playerbase decides not to play and you lose out on revenue

As opposed to Living Story, it keeps things fresh and keeps people playing. And they can also provide themed microtransactions to help supplement their revenue.

I’m not saying you’re wrong, I’m saying you’re wrong to pretend those of us who want fully-developed expansions are backward thinking or somehow wrong to think that way.

But to the point at hand, I’m not saying they can’t do both. And I’m not even saying they can’t just roll with the Living Story. But if that’s the route they’re going to take, I’d rather them go with once per month updates and give us a bit more to chew on with each update. This would mean less filler and more of the polish we all appreciated about the game when it launched.

Expansions tend to be permanent. I can go do a zone two years later with an alt. Not so with the LS. Once it’s gone, so are all it’s achievements and other aspects. I lose the ability to join in because I was busy during that time. Also, brief updates tend to begin to look and feel the same after several months. At that time, fascination with the system starts to cool off.

Lambent.6375:

I don’t see the problem.

Most mmorpg expansions include the following.

- new zones including new bosses, monster types, quest, dungeons, items, etc.
- new races
- new classes
- sometimes a graphics or UI update
- etc

^ All of this can be delivered in story format through the living story, and regular patches in small o r large doses.

That stuff can be released via LS, you’re right.

But I can’t see us getting that kind of content on the same scale.

For example; imagine a full year’s worth of LS releases. Do you think it’ll amount to a single full expansion’s worth of permanent content?

I’m not convinced that it would. We WOULD get great events (like these invasions), but at the end of the year, we’d still be left with far fewer zones, and a much smaller world. I just can’t see it building anything on the same scale.

Perhaps I’ll be proven wrong.

Celtic Lady.3729:

Expansions tend to be permanent. I can go do a zone two years later with an alt. Not so with the LS. Once it’s gone, so are all it’s achievements and other aspects. I lose the ability to join in because I was busy during that time. Also, brief updates tend to begin to look and feel the same after several months. At that time, fascination with the system starts to show up.

Not really. Expansions are more temporary then not once the next one comes along. The raids and dungeons from the old expansion dry up and wither, the zones become at best a racetrack for people passing through on the way to max level… you end up with little to unused clutter. You say you can do it on an alt, but what’s reality? You pass through, rarely see anyone else and hate the fact that you had to go through that old zone on your way to max.

Factions, Nightfall, EOTN, where expansions, they brought in new land areas, new cultures, new armor, new weapons and new classes.

Will we ever see that? If not then expansions will not be coming. The Living story is short term fluff content. It’s a cheaper way to add something to do. I’m having a hard time figuring out what a reported 400 people are working on. My only conclusion is they have many separate projects , each their own LS so they can appear to have been created on a two week schedule. When in fact they are being worked on through the year and released every 2 weeks. If all 400 work on one LS event, with all due respect, ON WHAT? The last few events were so buggy they were barely playable. How can that happen with over 400 sets of eyes etc.

Honestly I’m baffled. Colin if you really want the player backing for the LS I think perhaps a series of fireside chats, one a month showing how these are created, what exactly goes into them might sate players like myself and many many others. I definitely think a video chat with yourself and the other teams etc, would be very well received. And a good PR move. As is, just read around the net. The LS is not getting great reviews.

ColinJohanson.2394:

We’ve said this before, so it shouldn’t be a spoiler, but it’s clear that the message hasn’t totally gotten out there yet:

For the past year, we’ve had some larger projects going on in the background we haven’t discussed yet. Our major focus however has been on making the core Gw2 live game as solid as possible, details of what’s coming still to address that core game experience can be found here: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/looking-ahead-guild-wars-2-in-2013/
For the projects cooking in the background, we’ll go into more detail on those in the future.

Colin, I think the problem you’re facing is the old expression “Actions speak louder than words.”

Thus far, you’ve given us a lot of words, and while the glimmers of what’s been revealed sounds interesting, there’s also been a lot of dancing around the topic, which give very little meat to feed the hordes.

People are then basically left with judging your (the Anet collective, not you personally) actions, namely what’s been released. And with that, you get all the comments that you’ve doubtlessly been reading in the forums and other places.

ColinJohanson.2394:

Pacifica.9576:

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

We’ve said this before, so it shouldn’t be a spoiler, but it’s clear that the message hasn’t totally gotten out there yet:

For the past year, we’ve had some larger projects going on in the background we haven’t discussed yet. Our major focus however has been on making the core Gw2 live game as solid as possible, details of what’s coming still to address that core game experience can be found here: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/looking-ahead-guild-wars-2-in-2013/
For the projects cooking in the background, we’ll go into more detail on those in the future.

translation:

there is “expansion-like” content, it’s being worked on, it’s just not being exposed to the public yet, and won’t necessarily be released as a boxed expansion.

Evon Skyfyre.9673:

Factions, Nightfall, EOTN, where expansions, they brought in new land areas, new cultures, new armor, new weapons and new classes.

Will we ever see that? If not then expansions will not be coming.

Colin has said we will see most of those things. Other devs have hinted at returning to Cantha and Elona.

VOLKON.1290:

Celtic Lady.3729:

Expansions tend to be permanent. I can go do a zone two years later with an alt. Not so with the LS. Once it’s gone, so are all it’s achievements and other aspects. I lose the ability to join in because I was busy during that time. Also, brief updates tend to begin to look and feel the same after several months. At that time, fascination with the system starts to show up.

Not really. Expansions are more temporary then not. You say you can do it on an alt, but what’s reality? You pass through, rarely see anyone else and hate the fact that you had to go through that old zone on your way to max.

This is simply not true. Please don’t tell me how I feel or play a game. I appreciate content that I can return to and use months or years later on a game I’m playing and I’m not the only one. Just because YOU do this doesn’t mean the rest of the world does.

As far as I’m concerned Living Story has everything to deliver awesome expansion-worthy content, while keeping more people playing AND introducing content at a much continuous pace. This update has convinced me theyare on the right track and I’m optimistic.

Solid biweekly content beats a buckload of content every year. Period. It’s free and ongoing versus paid and yearly. Plus each expansion is a roadblock for player retention, since they are “forced” investments. It’s either pay or quit the game. It could mean “quit” for a lot of people.

It’s likely been said before, but the “Living Story” is a terrible way to deliver an expansions worth of content simply because it’s all 1 shot. With the trial now on, say you talk to a friend about how great the Molten Alliance events and items were (because you liked it). They want to see that too! Nope. Gone forever now.

If/When they deliver an “expansion” it needs to be delivered forever. They can dole it out, a bit at a time adding zones until they have the full content delivered, but unless they add to the Personal Story it’s just more open world blah blah hearts why-am-i-helping-farmer-hayseed blah “content”.

The Living Story is the actual antithesis of adding new content to a game. It adds temporary content for people that are playing at that moment.

Anyway… look! An owl! /points

/runs

ColinJohanson.2394:

Pacifica.9576:

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

We’ve said this before, so it shouldn’t be a spoiler, but it’s clear that the message hasn’t totally gotten out there yet:

For the past year, we’ve had some larger projects going on in the background we haven’t discussed yet. Our major focus however has been on making the core Gw2 live game as solid as possible, details of what’s coming still to address that core game experience can be found here: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/looking-ahead-guild-wars-2-in-2013/
For the projects cooking in the background, we’ll go into more detail on those in the future.

At this point actions speak louder than words. You’ve been saying this for the last 9 months ever since the first time we heard expansions weren’t planned. We’ve yet to see a single one of these larger projects be ANNOUNCED after 9 months, let alone actually be put into the game.

Unfortunately I just feel like i’m being strung along, it’s always just one more update away, it’s coming soon, etc, etc…

To put it bluntly, it’s time to put up or shut up.

As a consumer, I just like having a choice in when (and therefore, how much) to pay for an expansion. I waited years and years to get Factions b/c it was in my opinion a poor expansion compared to Nightfall which to the opposite extreme I had purchased instantly when I found out what it included (customizable Heroes).

And before anyone says “Well this is free”, uhh uh, there’s no such thing as Free.
And If it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is. All the “Free content” they’ve been handing us lately has only made the Content I actually paid good money for worse, and worse …. and worse still.

We should have another voting session. Let the consumers debate and decide. Hopefully it’ll be less cutthroat than the last time the players voted on something.

AcidicVision.5498:

I don’t like it.

Actually starting to become less and less of a fan. Other posters that recognize me know I have been supportive of the game and Anets design decisions since beta. My posting history reflects that, with my only real criticisms being the black lion chest/key scam, that live action trailer, and the damage WvW still suffers from caused by months of free guesting.

But this living story stuff…while it was interesting and novel to begin with is just starting to feel pointless. We started the Hero’s Journey cycle with the Dragons. And then that just stopped and left us hanging. Then we are dropped into the middle of another Hero’s Journey cycle that seems extremely disjointed and random.

The worst part is Tyria as a whole is just left to whither because the bulk of players run off to do the living story stuff. Not because they might particularly want to, but because they are afraid they will up being penalized if they don’t.

I have seen the villagers outside of DR in QD sick more in the past few weeks than I ever have. In the living story we are trying to keep someone from murdering Krytans, while out in the world we are letting them get poisoned to death by bandits. This is a perfect allegory for the current state of the game. Living story zones see overflow, while the rest of the world dies.

So it’s extremely sad there will be no traditional expansions (and even sadder that apparently no expansion content seems to be in production since they don’t even have a delivery method settled upon). Traditional expansions have their place in MMOs. For instance, new classes and races will cause people to revisit low/mid level zones on alts and allow them to experience old content in a new way. While new high level areas, dungeons and prestige awards give current players large new chunks of content to experience and explore. Instead we get living story: every player in the same place, doing the same thing, getting the same stuff neglecting an enormous, gorgeous world and rich lore that is lucky to hold on to a crumb from living story’s temporary content plate.

For myself, the draw away from expansions and move towards Living story, temporary content and focus on corralling players to one tiny area have me more inclined to give another game a grab at my allotted MMO play time. A few months ago, I never would have considered it.

You make a lot of seemingly well thought out statements; however, they don’t lead to your conclusion.

Whether you like the living story content or not is irrelevant to whether more extensive content should be released via living story type updates or via an expansion. Otherwise, it would be like arguing that because you didn’t like Factions they should never have released another expansion and should just have released Nightfall though living story type content updates.

The content and method of release are two different things.

Also, you’re kidding yourself if you think that existing zones would be any less dead than you’re finding them while players are off playing new living story content than they would be if players were off playing new expansion content. If the new content is something the players like playing, they will be off playing it. All the dead zones you describe are is evidence that most players like the new content and are thus off playing it.

Celtic Lady.3729:

Yeah, the nice thing about a real expansion is that it includes content that I can play whenever I have time rather than over a 2-week and once-hourly time frame when I am likely to be busy with other aspects of my life.

How about incremental and permanent content on a biweekly/monthly basis? All the living story needs now is to become more meaty and permanent, and they are already going in that direction. It’s the coolest way to add content: evolving the world. Living Story all the way.

Well, permanent biweekly content would be more useful than temporary for many players, yes, however, I’ll believe it when I see it. So far almost nothing from any of the updates has been permanent. Even the mini-games can’t be played whenever I like. They’re on a rotation.

Spring 2014 Elder Scrolls Online, Wildstar and likely Everquest Next will roll out.
Around that time you’ll have your expansion because the servers population is gonna drop. Hard.

ColinJohanson.2394:

Pacifica.9576:

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

We’ve said this before, so it shouldn’t be a spoiler, but it’s clear that the message hasn’t totally gotten out there yet:

For the past year, we’ve had some larger projects going on in the background we haven’t discussed yet. Our major focus however has been on making the core Gw2 live game as solid as possible, details of what’s coming still to address that core game experience can be found here: https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/looking-ahead-guild-wars-2-in-2013/
For the projects cooking in the background, we’ll go into more detail on those in the future.

I hope you put out a press release to this effect otherwise this is what others that have left see..

“So right now we’re not really looking at expansions as an option,” lead content designer Mike Zadorojny told me on his visit to London last week.

“It’s something that’s on the table but it’s not something we’re focused on, because what we want to do is – our idea here is that with Living World, we can do what expansions would have done but do it on a more regular basis.”

I pressed him to tell me whether there would be a Guild Wars 2 expansion this year and he shook his head to indicate no. What about next year, I asked?

“If we do this right,” he answered, “we will probably never do an expansion and everything will be going into this Living World strategy.”

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

seeing articles like this, then hearing a different story here is making us a little dubious to say the least.

Basically, from what I’ve been reading over the last year, Anet doesn’t want to do a traditional expansion, but they also don’t want the community to take the psychological hit it would if they all really believed that there was never going to be anything more than the occasional new mini-game, zerg-farming DE repeatables, and new shinies to match the current mini-update every so often. So, they say it’s a possibility without really making any plans for one.

The disconnect is that to the player, Living World doesn’t feel like an expansion because you can’t go back and do all of the content at your own pace. If you only get to do the newest content, to the player all that other time developing things was wasted.

I agree with others here that have said they will believer it when they see it, and in our case, download it. I will go further out on a limb and say they may consider an expansion when and if, China and Korea are a huge success. I think every resource is focused on that.

http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/198469/As_Chinese_release_looms_Guild_Wars_2_sees_record_MMO_sales.php

Valanga.5942:

Spring 2014 Elder Scrolls Online, Wildstar and likely Everquest Next will roll out.
Around that time you’ll have your expansion because the servers population is gonna drop. Hard.

Yeah I’m sure Elder Scrolls is gonna be quite successful with their subscription + microtransaction model.

It’s obvious they’re going to try to milk as much money as they can before they go to F2P.

They’ve been consistent, both in their press releases and subsequent responses. The reason it’s easy to land on confusion is that, much like the “Everything you loved about GW1”, what “typically find in expasions” refers to is vague and open to interpretation.

Huge new area rivaling the original game in scope? New classes? New abilities for existing classes? New dungeons? Large quantity of new skins not attached to free-to-play cash shop Black Lion keys?

None nor all of those are certain as “typically find in an expansion” does not have a definition any more tightly scoped than “everything you loved about GW1”.

Inspired.6730:

You make a lot of seemingly well thought out statements; however, they don’t lead to your conclusion.

Whether you like the living story content or not is irrelevant to whether more extensive content should be released via living story type updates or via an expansion. Otherwise, it would be like arguing that because you didn’t like Factions they should never have released another expansion and should just have released Nightfall though living story type content updates.

The content and method of release are two different things.

Also, you’re kidding yourself if you think that existing zones would be any less dead than you’re finding them while players are off playing new living story content than they would be if players were off playing new expansion content. If the new content is something the players like playing, they will be off playing it. All the dead zones you describe are is evidence that most players like the new content and are thus off playing it.

There was a point I guess I didn’t do a good job of explaining. In living story we see small updates that are largely temporary and may add some small permanent feature that players are generally over in about a week. The entire player base is corralled to one location, leaving the majority of the world barren.

Consider expansion content released in a living story format…

Lets say an event leads of to Dominion of the winds.
Every nook and cranny of that zone will be turned over in a matter of days. At the end of the first two weeks players will have reduced the content to the most profitable/repeatable activity or grinding out whatever list they have to in order to get a back piece. The second two weeks of this content introduces new skills and weapons. These will all be unlocked in minutes. The event ends with a reveal the Tengu are playable. Well by this point everyone is burnt out on the Dominion, has played with the new skills, and will probably roll a Tengu, pop a insta-twenty scroll and then craft to 80, because the next update is starting so they don’t have time to appreciate anything new. And this whooooole mess is wrapped up in a throw away story and salted with a dozen or more minor but very apparent bugs.

Now consider a proper expansion a year in development with a dedicated team…

A profession is introduced. The Tengu are introduced as playable. The dominion of winds contains their home city, 1-15 starting area, and a 75-80 zone with dungeon. Existing professions get a new main and hand offhand weapon and perhaps some skills. This hits everyone at the same time.

Most players will probably roll a Tengu with the new profession, do their starting area and then hop into the rest of the world. Why craft or scroll to 80 when everything is new to experience? A lot of players will roll the new profession of their favorite race. Then they have a new high level area to jump in to when they need a change of scenery, each of their existing characters will play slightly different and there is a new dungeon to attempt. The population is spread out, doing new things or doing old things in a new way. And instead of being rushed through it in two weeks and then having something else thrown at us before we can digest the changes, we would have a few months to let the meta evolve, let the market settle in and really get familiar and comfortable with the new stuff.

That’s a beautiful thing.

I may be wrong. In fact, I would welcome being wrong. But I do not see, given what we have seen so far, how Living story can really provide that expansion experience, freshness and re-invigoration.