Guild Wars 2

I love how people don’t want to buy anything in the gemstore, pay for an expansion or do any other kind of payment and then state tha Anet have to offer them what they want all the time becuase that’s how it SHOULD be.

Have you ever played other MMOs? MMOs aren’t Xbox games, they need money to keep going and Anet isn’t a church, they are a gaming company with people who have families and need money to LIVE. Thier job is to create content and get paid for it, they aren’t supposed to be angels who listen to every single player’s wishes and YES, I mean it, people are so selfish nowadays and as long as their wishes don’t become true, it means that Anet isn’t listening to anyone and is making the game worse because they are bad guys. Please mature up.

Sorry if my comment is offending but guys, stop complaining all the time. There is no perfect game and there is no company that will listen to every single player where each one of them want a different thing. I really dislike entering gaming forums to see people literally crying ALL THE TIME. Not only gaming btw, even movies ‘’BAD ACTOR’’ ‘’give me my money back’’ and you see that the forums are filled with 90+ pages of threads with people crying about how unfair life is, how people are dying in Africa and how the gaming or the movie company are responible for that.

Yes, Anet have made alot of mistakes, yes, many bad movies gets released, however you gotta learn to enjoy stuff and give them some credit, just some.

Expansions are normal for MMOs, when I see people commenting with ‘’WHAT? DO I HAVE TO PAY AGAIN. GREEDY!’’ etc. I just lose faith in gaming communities. When a game starts to innovate and changes the model to Buy to play, it doesn’t mean they don’t need or want money because they do. Also you gotta accept that as a fact in the MMO industry, at least you have a game that doesn’t require you to pay 15 dollars/month. This is not paradise, changes for the better come, but you won’t see a game offering you the best quality, expanding their game for ur sake while you refuse to pay for an expansion and you want to experience all the content even though the ones who keep the game running are others who pay in the gemstore AKA not you. Why? because 50 dollars FTW, you paid for the game and you want a company with hundreds of people working for years to keep statisfied as those 50 dollars should make a company opened for a lifetime just for your service.

People need to be realstic and read about the game and the gaming models for that genre before buying it.

nGumball.1283:

I love how people don’t want to buy anything in the gemstore, pay for an expansion or do any other kind of payment and then state tha Anet have to offer them what they want all the time becuase that’s how it SHOULD be.

Have you ever played other MMOs? MMOs aren’t Xbox games, they need money to keep going and Anet isn’t a church, they are a gaming company with people who have families and need money to LIVE. Thier job is to create content and get paid for it, they aren’t supposed to be angels who listen to every single player’s wishes and YES, I mean it, people are so selfish nowadays and as long as their wishes don’t become true, it means that Anet isn’t listening to anyone and is making the game worse because they are bad guys. Please mature up.

Sorry if my comment is offending but guys, stop complaining the time. There is no perfect game and there is no company that will listen to every single player who each one want a different thing. I really dislike entering gaming forums and see people literally crying ALL THE TIME. Not only gaming btw, even movies ‘’BAD ACTOR’’ ‘’give me my money back’’ and you see that the forums filled with 90+ pages of threads with people crying about how unfair life is, how people are dying in Africa and how the gaming or the movie company are responible for that.

Yes, Anet have made alot of mistakes, yes, many bad movies gets released, however you gotta learn to enjoy stuff and give them some credit, just some.

Expansions are normal for MMOs, when I see people commenting with ‘’WHAT? DO I HAVE TO PAY AGAIN. THOSE GREEDY kittenS’’ etc. I just lose faith in gaming communities. When a game starts to innovate and changes the model to Buy to play, it doesn’t mean they don’t need or want money because they do. Also you gotta accept that as a fact in the MMO industry, at least you have a game that doesn’t require you to pay 15 dollars. This is not paradise, changes for the better come, but you won’t see a game offering you the best quality, expanding their game for ur sake but you refuse to pay for an expansion and you want to experience all the content even though the ones who keep the game running are other people who pay in the gemstore and you want all this greatness for 50 dollars because FTW, you paid for the game and you want a company with hundreds of people working for years to keep statisfied because again, you paid 50 dollars, why shouldn’t a company be opened just for your service.

People need to be realstic and read about the game and the gaming models for that genre before buying it.

The Gem Store / Living Story model is not delivering content that I find meaningful, fulfilling, or even fun. I’m sure that numerous players will disagree with what I just said, but I’m also positive that just as many are thinking the exact same thing.

At this point, I would be more than willing to spend money on an expansion pack if it would bring the things that I’m looking for. We’ve essentially been playing the same game for the past year and a half; to put it simply, things have grown stale. I’m hoping that the upcoming feature patch will address these issues, but to be honest, I’m not holding my breath given ANet’s track record.

I’m glad that some people 100% enjoy what ANet is doing and has done. However, that is not the case for myself and many of my friends, and it’s a bit condescending of you to put players like me in a corner and say “You’re so selfish, stop being so unrealistic” because your wishes have been answered while ours are left gathering dust.

Flytrap.8075:

nGumball.1283:

I love how people don’t want to buy anything in the gemstore, pay for an expansion or do any other kind of payment and then state tha Anet have to offer them what they want all the time becuase that’s how it SHOULD be.

Have you ever played other MMOs? MMOs aren’t Xbox games, they need money to keep going and Anet isn’t a church, they are a gaming company with people who have families and need money to LIVE. Thier job is to create content and get paid for it, they aren’t supposed to be angels who listen to every single player’s wishes and YES, I mean it, people are so selfish nowadays and as long as their wishes don’t become true, it means that Anet isn’t listening to anyone and is making the game worse because they are bad guys. Please mature up.

Sorry if my comment is offending but guys, stop complaining the time. There is no perfect game and there is no company that will listen to every single player who each one want a different thing. I really dislike entering gaming forums and see people literally crying ALL THE TIME. Not only gaming btw, even movies ‘’BAD ACTOR’’ ‘’give me my money back’’ and you see that the forums filled with 90+ pages of threads with people crying about how unfair life is, how people are dying in Africa and how the gaming or the movie company are responible for that.

Yes, Anet have made alot of mistakes, yes, many bad movies gets released, however you gotta learn to enjoy stuff and give them some credit, just some.

Expansions are normal for MMOs, when I see people commenting with ‘’WHAT? DO I HAVE TO PAY AGAIN. THOSE GREEDY kittenS’’ etc. I just lose faith in gaming communities. When a game starts to innovate and changes the model to Buy to play, it doesn’t mean they don’t need or want money because they do. Also you gotta accept that as a fact in the MMO industry, at least you have a game that doesn’t require you to pay 15 dollars. This is not paradise, changes for the better come, but you won’t see a game offering you the best quality, expanding their game for ur sake but you refuse to pay for an expansion and you want to experience all the content even though the ones who keep the game running are other people who pay in the gemstore and you want all this greatness for 50 dollars because FTW, you paid for the game and you want a company with hundreds of people working for years to keep statisfied because again, you paid 50 dollars, why shouldn’t a company be opened just for your service.

People need to be realstic and read about the game and the gaming models for that genre before buying it.

The Gem Store / Living Story model is not delivering content that I find meaningful, fulfilling, or even fun. I’m sure that numerous players will disagree with what I just said, but I’m also positive that just as many are thinking the exact same thing.

At this point, I would be more than willing to spend money on an expansion pack if it would bring the things that I’m looking for. We’ve essentially been playing the same game for the past year and a half; to put it simply, things have grown stale. I’m hoping that the upcoming feature patch will address these issues, but to be honest, I’m not holding my breath given ANet’s track record.

I’m glad that some people 100% enjoy what ANet is doing and has done. However, that is not the case for myself and many of my friends, and it’s a bit condescending of you to put players like me in a corner and say “You’re so selfish, stop being so unrealistic” because your wishes have been answered while ours are left gathering dust.

I never said though that my wishes were answered. To be more specific, the game didn’t deilver me alot of the things that I was hoping for however I do understand that all I can do is enjoying what is up atm introducing my opinion in a mannerable way taking both the possitive and the negative sides of the aspect I dislike.

Also, to avoid misunderstandings, my words weren’t directed towards people who aren’t pleased, because we all have different tastes and have the capability of bringing up our personal opinions, hoping for a better gaming experience. My words were directed towards the many ’’hating’’ threads that generalize everyone stating that Anet is a trash company who did nothing that people enjoyed which is obviously false and they just take stuff from their personal taste and perspective and generalize it for the whole community wasting half their days, hating on the game or complaining about stuff already adressed.

It is also annoying to see people, awaiting everything for free. Yes, I do understand that not everyone are ready to pay as much as I do but expansions as an example are supposed to be bought. Complaining about how all the expansions and every single content updates should be free is unrealstic.

I think there is a bit of a misunderstand of what is being said. I dont think anyone said no we dont really want any new zones with new events and new dungeons etc…

What others and I are saying is that we like that they’re splitting content into two categories, IE LS and the other Expansion like stuff for a lack of a better word.

Thing is Arenanet have repeatedly said that they most definitely intended to release new Zones and all the other goodness you find in an expansion regardless if they release it as an expansion or part of the Living story.

What we’re saying isnt what you like doesnt count, what you like is most likely the same stuff we like. What we’re saying is two things.

1. We rather enjoy having this content every two weeks while we wait for the big stuff

2. We take issue with statements such as I wouldnt hold my breath based on their track record.

I mean whats their track record? they already said they’re going to do it, its just a question of form so basically what a statement like this release says is we’re going to ignore what they promise and judge exclusively based on what they release. But if you do that wouldnt every MMO that had an expansion be in the same water right until the last second when it released its expansion? So it ends up being a question of two measures which I personally dont feel is fair.

We have to remember that the Living story isnt free, of course it takes resources to make and of course its going to delay a bit the expansion like content. 1 1/2 years is quite common for a modern day expansion and an extra 1/2 year or even an extra full year in my opinion is a worthy price to pay if it means we get new stuff to do every 2 weeks.

I’d rather wait 2 1/2 years to get the big meaty stuff with new stuff to do every two weeks then wait 1 1/2 year with very little new to do until then personally.

thats the message we’re trying to say as far as I Can tell. I didnt really see anyone say they dont care about content X or Y

I’m sorry but zerg encounters in living story are complete wastes of time. Heres what we have in this game.

WvW: Zergs with massive advantages making the game even more zergy
PvP: Condi meta and point defense
PvE: Fractals that nearly 1 shot you at FOTM 50 (which isn’t a lot of fun) PvE that you try to glitch or gimmick around most of the content
Living Story: Zerging with people who can’t read the abilities of the NPCs and fluff

This game was so much better at launch without all the ‘balance’ changes they made in pvp and wvw, and less zerging in all aspects of the game.

Flissy.4093:

Yes, I’d love for them to stop making free content and instead charge me for it. Oh boy I can’t wait!

Nothing is free. This so-called free content you talk about has to be payed some way.. How? By getting people to buy gems.

So what do they do? Whenever they release content they think… how can we make money with this content.

(Many people did see SAB part 1 as the best released content, maybe thats because they did release it as a joke so that was some of the little content where monetization was not so much on there mind)

Content that is good but will not generate income will be last on the list, making this whole game a kitten gold-grind gets people to buy gems but makes the game worse (as an example).

So the problem with your ‘free’ content is that it’s not really free, it gets influenced by there goal for making money, influenced in a bad way because the question is not only “what would be the best content” anymore.

Yes I would rather pay for good content then get bad quality content for free. And yes I get that content for free as I have never ever and will never ever spend any dime on gems. So when I would ask for them to focus on expansions to generate income I am asking to pay money but then I also expect a product of better quality.

I made a thread about it myself so I would not have to go into details in every thread about this subject so for more details have a read: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/A-focus-on-micro-transactions/first

@Devata

Did you ever consider you made a conclusion and then try to simply fit everything that happens in that conclusion?

Of course they want to make money and of course they’d do what they can to get to buy gems but thats not the same as what you’re implying ie that they’re designing the game in order force you to buy gems.

The problem with your point of view is you use the stuff that fits in your theory but dump all the good stuff that doesnt. Sure you can theorize that SAB part 2 was an attempt to get you to buy a continue coin. Pretty easy to fit the added difficulty into your theory. But the added difficulty isnt just something you do as a cash grab, its actually something people have asked for. Yes they did go a little bit too far with it, Josh Foreman himself said that and not just that be he spent a lot of time to reduce that difficulty right after launch and they had a patch with changes out pretty quickly. I mean this this is Josh Foreman we’re talking about, you can easily tell he’s a great genuine guy. It was apparent he felt bad for overdoing the difficulty. He does great work and is obviously very passionate about his work. But anyhow this is not about that anyway. Thing is when you’re working in hindsight its easy to get the conclusion that you want to get. Hard content, well thats because they wanted to sell continue coins or it could be like Josh said, he merely wanted to challenge players and it was a notch too high.

For everyone of those examples there are also examples where money wise Anet shoot themselves in the food. Things like simply allowing people to buy gems with gold. Things like the wallet that freed a ton of space from everyone bank / inventory. Thing like collection expander that yes you had to buy but essentially gave you what the same space you’d get by buying 17 bag expansions (provided you then crafted 20 slot bags in each one) Or when they allowed crafting from the bank, or when they implemented discovery from the bank. They did do stuff that helped people avoid buying gems. Why would they do any of that if their sole focus was as you suggest to make money?

In short there is more then 1 explanation for decisions. Expensive Legendary weapons might be to get people to convert money or they may simply be a long term goal that cannot be completed in an weekend of gaming.

At the end of the day every single Living story release could be enjoyed to the full without buying a single gem using any currency. All grinding was at the periphery of that. So no respectfully I disagree with your assessment that content suffered because it was designed to suite the revenue. Its simply not true.

I mean simple question what did I have to buy for me to say fully enjoy Escape from LA?

It seems far more efficient to me to produce content around events/story, doling it out every few weeks, compared to dumping a tone of new areas or something on people. For the most part, people would just burn through all that in two weeks anyway, and then complain.

In addition, an expansion that people had to buy, but could choose to avoid, would be problematic. It would split the community, and complicate things that go across the whole world – like map completion and guild missions, just to name 2.

Galen Grey.4709:

@Devata

Did you ever consider you made a conclusion and then try to simply fit everything that happens in that conclusion?

Of course they want to make money and of course they’d do what they can to get to buy gems but thats not the same as what you’re implying ie that they’re designing the game in order force you to buy gems.

~

“Did you ever consider you made a conclusion and then try to simply fit everything that happens in that conclusion?”

No it was the other way around, I did see multiple problems and then I did see a those pointing towards about 3 main issues. Cash-shop focus being one of them. I do agree with you I have never been a fan of cash-shops but thats also because you always see these sort of things in cash-shop focused games.

Besides, is there anybody who wants to debate that for example putting mini’s in the cash-shop in stead of all in the open world has nothing to do with generating money with the cash-shop? The gold-grind might me less obvious but many things are very obvious.

“Of course they want to make money and of course they’d do what they can to get to buy gems but thats not the same as what you’re implying ie that they’re designing the game in order force you to buy gems.”
They do what they can to get you to buy gems.. you know that all they can really do are some design decisions if they want to get somebody to be more likely to buy gems.

I don’t say the whole game is designed around that idea but I do say there is a standard process they have going (like the gold-grind, like temporary items in the cash-shop and so on) and when implementing new content they will look how that can help them to generate money and when the content (much of it fitting into those standard processes) has to change a little bit for that they for sure will also do that because as long as gems are there main source of income they are depended on that.

“Sure you can theorize that SAB part 2 was an attempt to get you to buy a continue coin. Pretty easy to fit the added difficulty into your theory. But the added difficulty isnt just something you do as a cash grab, its actually something people have asked for. Yes they did go a little bit too far with it”

Lets just see what they did exactly. They released a level that you could only figure out by trying. It was not just hard, it was trial and error to find the route. That means a lot of dying. And what do we see at the same time.. a continue coin in the cash-shop. Sorry but no, if somebody sees that connection you can’t say he has just a theory and builds everything around that. It’s more that new things seem to simply fit the theory.

That (the trial and error requirement) did not change after the patch and for sure there are many many people working at ArenaNet that just want to build good content. But there are also monetize people that have a say in this and they are not just looking at making the best content.

So no it’s not about the ‘hard’ part it’s about the trial and error part meaning you will die a lot and then having that item in the cash-shop. That content would simply not be fun without that coin.

Fact that you yourself name some of those examples shows it’s pretty obvious, you also see it but might want to believe elsewhere so who says it’s not me who made a conclusion and then try to simply fit everything that happens but that you might doing that right now?

I don’t blame everything that is bad on the cash-shop but there are many tings I indeed do.

There are many things that have no other reasons. Why don’t we have a barber in the game where you can cut your hair for 16 silver but do we have hair-style kits in the cash-shop, mini’s and Transmution Crystals. Your expander example came after many people noticing 250 items per slot where way to less especially after just being overloaded with bloodstones and Empyreal Fragment. It all takes elements away from the game-world.
And no, converting geld to gems does not perse mean they shoot themselves. It means there is an even higher gold-grind increasing the value of gold making it even more interesting to buy gold for gems.

To answer your last question I just go to the login-screen and let ArenaNet answer you that question: “This week the Black Lion Trading Company brings you deadly new armors!” Likely part of that will be temporary there are also 3 new mini’s in the cash-shop. They did not put those in the open world for you to get but in the cash-shop so if going for mini’s is what you like that is also just a boring gold-grind with those items.

I do understand what you are saying and I am very careful to not fall in that trap. Something I see might not be releated to the cash-shop focus but there is simply to much (and a lot very obviously) to dismiss it as not being cash-shop related.

Naevius.3185:

It seems far more efficient to me to produce content around events/story, doling it out every few weeks, compared to dumping a tone of new areas or something on people. For the most part, people would just burn through all that in two weeks anyway, and then complain.

In addition, an expansion that people had to buy, but could choose to avoid, would be problematic. It would split the community, and complicate things that go across the whole world – like map completion and guild missions, just to name 2.

When doing it correctly would not burn through it in two weeks.

People can avoid gems and problems like the guild-missions would also be easy to prevent. Just make new type of guild-mission for the expansions, to spread the current ones over the new area.

Overflows are a bigger problem if it comes to these sort of examples.

@Devata

If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

You came into this conversation (and game) with a predetermined concept. Cash shops are bad, this always happens. As long as you start from that vantage, you will find problems with the cash shop.

I didn’t come in with that point of view and I don’t find many problems in the cash shop. There are a few. Over all, however, I think you’re judging the game too harshly.

There are plenty of things about this game that make me want to quit, but the cash shop isn’t even close to one of them.

Im Mudbone.1437:

Deimos Tel Arin.7391:

What do You people think?
i think the living story concept is working well and is profitable for them, so it better that they keep on using the living story platform to distribute new expansion content.

Do You also hate LS as I do?
no. i love the living story concept.

Do you also think it is detrminetal for this game?
no. i think it makes the game better.

How many of You would like to see expansion instead?
not me.

i want to see expansion content delivered via living story updates.
this is what they promised earlier.

98% of LS introductions is TEMPORARY content, I can say with a likely 99% certainty that the community would prefer PERMANENT content retail expansions.

My depressing theory is that Anet can’t afford to make a full-blown expansion. The only economically feasible thing for them may be to squeeze these LS updates out and try to entice gem store sales on the side. Keep in mind Anet is the developer. NCSoft is the publisher. NCSoft has the money. NCSoft is supporting the release of Wowstar and other projects. I think Anet is simply not getting any funding from NCSoft for an expansion. By the way, another dirty little secret is that NCSoft probably takes a hefty chunk of those gem store sales as a return on their initial investment in the development of GW2.

I vote we put together some kind of petition to make NCSoft aware of the demand for a GW2 expansion. For whatever reason, the Cantha Thread is just not enough.

@Devata

Dont misunderstand me, I am not saying its either or here, you could be 100% right no one can ever tell. Actually let me move this entirely off the game cause maybe its easier to see the point I am trying to make. So the point is if you decide something is fact its easy to prove it.

Lets say I decide banks are in collusion with the government to charge us more taxes / take more money from us (disclaimer: completely bogus fictitious scenario) With that premise in mind I can point at stuff like hey look car manufacturer Y just took a loan out of that bank to develop a new high performance engine. Then I can say that’s proof right there, the new engine is capable of speeds well exceeding the speed limit so its all a ploy to give us poor fines for over speeding.

We humans are amazing at recognizing patterns, even ones that arent really there. Not saying thats what you’re doing, this is not an accusation. Its just a comment to be something to consider. For example If I were in this ficticious example person’s shoes and I actually wanted to be objective, I’d ask myself but could there be a legitimate reason for the loan? Sure there is, banks make money off loans there doesnt necessary need to be an agenda. Doesnt mean an agenda doesnt exist, while crazy it could actually be true but well you get what I mean.

I mentioned SAB specifically because of Josh, if you follow the forums I am sure you know what a genuine great guy is. if it was anyone else I would say you were probably right but since it Josh, no I dont believe it was a malicious attempt at selling the coin, not for one second. He even said so himself and I dont imagine for a second the guy would lie, he is honest to a fault. I mean thats fact, he even got into trouble cause of his honesty. I think the whole sab story was all just an unfortunate coincidence. (btw for trib mode it wasnt all blind guessing, it was possible to tell where some of the dangers were if you’re really attentive. I mean it was all about looking for the least obvious route. It was pretty obvious if there is a straight route to the piano thingy it was most definitely trapped. And the game gave you infinite continue coins its just you had to start over every 25 deaths or so. which was annoying just cause a problem with sab 2 was levels were too long. But in any case we’re talking about tribulation mode here. This was supposed to be a hardcore mode its not like there is a lot you can play with in these old school platformers its all about 3 things. Co-ordination, reflexes and memory.
What he did there is simply introduce a memory element to up the difficulty. Just like infantile mode essentially removes the co-ordination element by removing the hard jumps all together.

Of course I see it, We’re both mature people, none of us are inventing stuff that isnt really there to prove a point by cheating so to speak. We’re discussing actual factual elements here and I do see your point. Like I said my whole argument is you need to be weary how you interpret such things because like I am sure you recognize yourself there can be multiple reasons for a design decision. Like the memory element in SAB. Of course you could be right and it could be a simple cash grab attempt. It could also be an added difficulty element. Like i said with the bank / government / tax link thing. its about analyzing the situation.

So what reasons could there be for the memory thing?
- added difficulty / induce deaths to in turn induce continue coin purchase.

What facts support each argument?
Its on an added difficulty level and rewards on both level are identical except for a prestige element represented by a colour. / well you did die a lot more in tribulation mode

What could have been done differently to support each case?
diffculty? : pretty much nothing dont know how tribulation mode could be any harder
revenue?: implement it in all modes thus making it inescapable / stop giving out free continue coins.

etc.. Again none of this proves anything either way not saying it was one or the other like i said in my previous post, in truth its impossible to say which case it is. Personally I choose to believe its indeed an issue of difficulty gone a bit too far for the reasons stated above well and because Josh said so and I believe the guy.

But thats exactly the thing Devata. Of course they’re selling stuff and ofcourse they want to sell stuff but none of that means they’re taking the game in the wrong direction to do that or keeping enjoyment hostage until you pay. buying the deadly new armors is not going to make my facing scarlet any more or less enjoyable. It is not going to make me miss any content from this expansion etc.. Yet you seem to be convinced that things like "Black Lion Trading Company brings you deadly new armors!” doesnt make the continent any better / worst in anyway. Yet you seem to feel strongly that it does.

Xenon.4537:

My depressing theory is that Anet can’t afford to make a full-blown expansion. The only economically feasible thing for them may be to squeeze these LS updates out and try to entice gem store sales on the side. Keep in mind Anet is the developer. NCSoft is the publisher. NCSoft has the money. NCSoft is supporting the release of Wowstar and other projects. I think Anet is simply not getting any funding from NCSoft for an expansion. By the way, another dirty little secret is that NCSoft probably takes a hefty chunk of those gem store sales as a return on their initial investment in the development of GW2.

I vote we put together some kind of petition to make NCSoft aware of the demand for a GW2 expansion. For whatever reason, the Cantha Thread is just not enough.

I think there is plenty of reason to come to the conclusion that this is probably not the case. The fact they continue growing since launch team size wise. The fact they’re the 2nd best game in NCsoft portfolio (in terms of money that is). If NCsoft was starving them how would they hire more people? Why didnt they have layoffs like most MMOs do after launch?

Not just that but in the very first quarterly report by ncsoft right after gw2 release their CFO said to the investors an expansion was in the works. Why would they do that if they never intended to finance it?

Its much simpler to come to the conclusion that like Arenanet claimed using Living world as a release mechanicism is a strategic choice on their part. NCsoft have no reason to mistreat arenanet, like they claim every quarterly review they’re very happy with them and they keep exceeding projections quarter after quarter. Thats with them release in 1/2 of NCSoft’s market. Wildstar may very well be a success, it may or may not make more money then GW2 does who knows but that still will not change the fact Gw2 is a profitable franchise for them and they have no reason to leave it die in a corner even if Wildstar turns out to be a bigger success.

Also NCsoft does an astronomical $648m of sales a year of with about $200m are profit. With $16m profit a month do you really think they need to starve 1 game to finance another?

Galen Grey.4709:

But thats exactly the thing Devata. Of course they’re selling stuff and ofcourse they want to sell stuff but none of that means they’re taking the game in the wrong direction to do that or keeping enjoyment hostage until you pay. buying the deadly new armors is not going to make my facing scarlet any more or less enjoyable. It is not going to make me miss any content from this expansion etc.. Yet you seem to be convinced that things like "Black Lion Trading Company brings you deadly new armors!” doesnt make the continent any better / worst in anyway. Yet you seem to feel strongly that it does.

They could make trib mode harder without being trial and error by having the traps activate on and off all the time also when not standing on them. Some things you could indeed see much you could not and was now purely trial and error.

About armor and so on. It depends on your preferred game-play. Thats why I usually use the mini example in these discussions. Thats very obvious for cash-shop reasons and it does in fact impact the game-play element.

In another mmo part of my game-play was going into the world collecting them. That whole game-play element has been removed or been made not fun and everybody can see thats directly related to the cash-shop.

Indeed there are also elements that are less obvious and we will never be able to factually proof or disprove until a ex-developer would say anything about it.

I went into this game thinking it would be B2P so initial cost and then generating income with money. I notice stuff going in the wrong direction before I discovered they where planning to go for a cash-shop focus in stead of expansion-sale focus.

You willing to wait 6 months before the next update then? Because for a real expansion it will be about 6 months or longer and from your point of view they can only work on one thing at a time so if they are working on an expansion (mostly pve) then you will not see any thing else added to the game in the time because of your logic.

Any way your mixed up a good bit the ideal of a LS is to play in a persistent world a world that still goes on even if your not there. Single players games are far better “i am the center of the universe” type of play. Most mmorpgs have system type of persistent world in them mainly holidays but they tend to just keep events going over and over till the end of time with no way of how it fits in a story line. I mean realty think about it if that drill never stops and LA is endlessly destroyed how dose that work if you killed scarlet already?

I like to play in a world that changes even if i am not there i know i am not the center of the universe and i never want to be.

Jski.6180:

You willing to wait 6 months before the next update then? Because for a real expansion it will be about 6 months or longer and from your point of view they can only work on one thing at a time so if they are working on an expansion (mostly pve) then you will not see any thing else added to the game in the time because of your logic.

Any way your mixed up a good bit the ideal of a LS is to play in a persistent world a world that still goes on even if your not there. Single players games are far better “i am the center of the universe” type of play. Most mmorpgs have system type of persistent world in them mainly holidays but they tend to just keep events going over and over till the end of time with no way of how it fits in a story line. I mean realty think about it if that drill never stops and LA is endlessly destroyed how dose that work if you killed scarlet already?

I like to play in a world that changes even if i am not there i know i am not the center of the universe and i never want to be.

If the game would be generating its main income with expansions (in stead of cash-shop or sub) you would expect an expansion every year / year and a half. That in-between there is nothing is not true, usually they at least have one bigger patch in-between but we would indeed see less patches as we do now.

So it’s not true that it would be another 6 months before we would get anything. And yes I would be fine with waiting 1 / 1,5 year for a big expansion with only one bigger patch in-between. Not only would I be fine with it, expecting higher quality and purely permanent content so it would have my preference.

Devata.6589:

Jski.6180:

You willing to wait 6 months before the next update then? Because for a real expansion it will be about 6 months or longer and from your point of view they can only work on one thing at a time so if they are working on an expansion (mostly pve) then you will not see any thing else added to the game in the time because of your logic.

Any way your mixed up a good bit the ideal of a LS is to play in a persistent world a world that still goes on even if your not there. Single players games are far better “i am the center of the universe” type of play. Most mmorpgs have system type of persistent world in them mainly holidays but they tend to just keep events going over and over till the end of time with no way of how it fits in a story line. I mean realty think about it if that drill never stops and LA is endlessly destroyed how dose that work if you killed scarlet already?

I like to play in a world that changes even if i am not there i know i am not the center of the universe and i never want to be.

If the game would be generating its main income with expansions (in stead of cash-shop or sub) you would expect an expansion every year / year and a half. That in-between there is nothing is not true, usually they at least have one bigger patch in-between but we would indeed see less patches as we do now.

So it’s not true that it would be another 6 months before we would get anything. And yes I would be fine with waiting 1 / 1,5 year for a big expansion with only one bigger patch in-between. Not only would I be fine with it, expecting higher quality and purely permanent content so it would have my preference.

What i am suggesting that even if they are doing LS dose not mean they are not working on something else at the same time i am using the point of view of if they can only make one thing at a time is what it means for them to make an expansion and only an expansion.

There been a lot added in by the LS most of it are effects that you cant see unless you do the events them self. Its been mostly foundation add on on-top of some story that is more implied then just simply told. There has been many added bits to zones that been added and 2 full zones (the problem is GW2 is too big atm ppl are way too spread out and if they just add in new zones all the time soon the game would be so big that it will no longer feel like an mmorpg but a solo game that happens to have other ppl with you.

What would you want from an expansion with out just adding more onto a game to more of a means of temporarily keeping ppl doing something? Most LS by the end of them tend to be unused or underpopulated even the major events say dungeons get played for a few months and then ppl want to move on. With out making the game a full on treadmill grind like say WoW (where you get a new gear upgrade ever 6 months or so to where you NEED to get it if you want to keep playing WoW at a high level) what is there to added in that will not cause these problems?

This is where the LS comes into play added in events that are not crazy long tell new stores added new meaningful content as in type of attks that mobs can do and effects and a few new skins ever 2 or so weeks. What makes the content and stores and skins important is the limited ways of them. Humans at the end of the day like items or things that are harder to get then things every one has.

They put value on how rare something is. Take dirt there a lot of it and most ppl would not pay you a lot for a hand full of it but dirt is one of the most importing things on earth for humans. Now take diamond there use is very limited in comparison to dirt but there is a great deal more value put on them to the point of them being there own type of economy. This is true for skins too the ones that are harder to get are wroth more to the players in both the TP (gold) and ideal of looks.

Devata.6589:

Galen Grey.4709:

But thats exactly the thing Devata. Of course they’re selling stuff and ofcourse they want to sell stuff but none of that means they’re taking the game in the wrong direction to do that or keeping enjoyment hostage until you pay. buying the deadly new armors is not going to make my facing scarlet any more or less enjoyable. It is not going to make me miss any content from this expansion etc.. Yet you seem to be convinced that things like "Black Lion Trading Company brings you deadly new armors!” doesnt make the continent any better / worst in anyway. Yet you seem to feel strongly that it does.

They could make trib mode harder without being trial and error by having the traps activate on and off all the time also when not standing on them. Some things you could indeed see much you could not and was now purely trial and error.

About armor and so on. It depends on your preferred game-play. Thats why I usually use the mini example in these discussions. Thats very obvious for cash-shop reasons and it does in fact impact the game-play element.

In another mmo part of my game-play was going into the world collecting them. That whole game-play element has been removed or been made not fun and everybody can see thats directly related to the cash-shop.

Indeed there are also elements that are less obvious and we will never be able to factually proof or disprove until a ex-developer would say anything about it.

I went into this game thinking it would be B2P so initial cost and then generating income with money. I notice stuff going in the wrong direction before I discovered they where planning to go for a cash-shop focus in stead of expansion-sale focus.

They already had traps that activated close, the frogs, the crocodiles, the jumping rocks etc.. does any of that come even close to the difficulty level of the memory traps? Co-ordination was already and element and yes you could make it harder by reducing the time between proximity and trigger but then you’d end up in the same situation. Ohh they made it so hard that if your reflexes arent perfect you die so you buy the continue coin.

rewards aren’t game-play elements though. If game X has you fight world bosses that drop minis the game play element is fighting the world boss not looting the mini. That being said it isnt removed either. Minis can be traded on trading post. You can go play whatever content you like convert gold to gems and buy minis off the trading post as well. And of course plenty of releases offered minis as rewards as well. So I disagree that aspect of the game wasnt completely removed by the cash shop at all. its still there.

This is exactly what I meant in my last post. Josh came out and flately said the difficulty on SAB 2 was a miscalculation on his part and had no relation whatsoever to the continue coin sold in the cash shop. Yet you dont believe him but are stating quite clearly that if an ex-dev stated it was you wouldnt doubt him for a second. Why is it you have no problem believing an ex-dev but will not believe an actual dev? if its because you’re afraid a dev is too biased wouldnt that apply for an ex-dev as well?

for me the living story makes the game worse. That might just be me so i can not say that it hurts the game.
I would much much rather have an expansion.

Here’s Devata’s complaint in a nutshell.

1) Devata collects minis.

2) Devata doesn’t want to pay for minis.

3) Devata thinks an expansion model would mean free minis.

4) Therefore, only an expansion model is acceptable, and has fashioned his/her wordy, convoluted arguments completely around that predetermined conclusion.

Futrzasty.6034:

What do You people think?

This game is too dependent on the Living Story and the regular changes in gameplay. Without the LS, the player base would disappear due to boredom. Unlike GW1, there isn’t enough difficult content to last until the next expansion. I personally thought that LS would be used to add more permanent content to this game. Instead, the LS is used as a temporary content side-show which is majorly disappointing.

Farming and map clearing was allowed in the last game to help pass the time between expansions. I vividly remember farming Raptors for rare loot, and the dinosaurs were often buffed. It was impossible to kill a monster within seconds. GW2, on the other hand, doesn’t allow farming or map clearing. Farming and map clearing are supposed to yeild rewards like special loot, reputation points, and legendary skills / spells with certain groups. If I were to go to the GW2 version of Orr and start killing off undead, I hardly get any drops.

Eye of the North, the epic expansion for advanced GW players, was extremely difficult to get through and very time-consuming to get the reputation points to get certain prizes and titles. The dungeons took a good 2 hours or more to get through. Plus the dungeons had different levels to navigate (like the Nightmare Tower did), and there was a death penalty that made things more challenging.

In GW2, the content is way too easy for hard core gamers to get through. It’s too easy to level. I’m a semi-hardcore player and I was able to get from lv. 40 to lv. 80 within a week thanks to WvW! Many of my fellow guildees can get through a dungeon run within a half hour or less! A Fractal run takes about an hour and a half if there are experienced people in the group. Even Teq can be easily defeated by an experienced group within a short amount of time. The Twisted Marionette, The Triple Wurm, and Aetherblade dungeon are the only events that pose a challenge for hardcore and semi-hardcore gamers. Plus, this game doesn’t have enough solo content for times when our fellow guildies and friends aren’t online.

I think there has been a major change over in developers and creative talent for this game. The style of video game programming is very different, and I don’t think it’s due to the Havoc software either. I can tell that more of the people working at Anet are not video game programmers (no offense Anet). The inexperience shows in the updates having so many bugs, the gameplay for the base game is too easy, and the LS achievements can be finished a couple days after the update is released. Video game developers beta test their games with experienced testers to iron out bugs and determine how hard the game really is before the game update is released. Apologies to the Anet devs. I’m not trying to be mean. As an experienced, long-time gamer, this had to be said. All the other T-rated RPGs on the market have more challenging, time consuming content than this game.

Futrzasty.6034:

Do You also hate LS as I do?

No I don’t. The LS is unique. It’s just that the RPG story presentation needs work. People are getting confused the storyline, and folks aren’t paying attention to details. Players don’t have an emotional connection to the NPCs. Plus, we only get one side of the story: We only see what the PCs see. There really need to be cutscenes that show the bad guys, their personalities, goals, and plans. That’s standard in every story-based RPG I’ve ever played including MMOs like Warcraft.

I like how the gameplay is changed with each update. It looks as if the devs are learning alot from Nintendo and how that company changes their gameplay content while presenting the same characters and storylines.

Futrzasty.6034:

Do you also think it is detrminetal for this game?

No, the game is dependent on the LS.

Futrzasty.6034:

How many of You would like to see expansion instead?

Waiting for an expansion would kill this game’s player base.

I don’t care if it is 5€/month for small bits of permanent stuff or 60€ for a yearly expansion.

Just let me pay for quality content.

chemiclord.3978:

Here’s Devata’s complaint in a nutshell.

1) Devata collects minis.

2) Devata doesn’t want to pay for minis.

3) Devata thinks an expansion model would mean free minis.

4) Therefore, only an expansion model is acceptable, and has fashioned his/her wordy, convoluted arguments completely around that predetermined conclusion.

I use mini’s aa an example. You should make that Devata is more interested in cosmetics or the RPG elements of the game then just in doing a dungeon as fast as possible.. (or getting the fastest kill)

Keeping that in mind, going down your list.

1 I would love to go for cosmetics but I don’t do that anymore in GW2 because it’s not fun in GW2.

2 I want to play directly for cosmetics, not pay indeed not in gold not in cash. True. Who would think somebody wants a game to play it?. Silly me.

3 Define free cosmetics? I think there would be no need for them to be monetized in this way so they could be put in the game with specific ways to get them in stead of general drops (so gold-grind) or cash-shop. Yeah. I don’t want them to just hand them out, thats also boring and devalues them. Like I said, I want to play for them and grinding gold is not playing for them.

4 So far I have indeed not see a cash-hop model being able to deliver here no. I did see sub-models deliver but don’t like a a timer over my head so then expansion-based model come to mind.

I don’t convoluted arguments completely around that predetermined conclusion. I simply came to this conclusion after seeing it happen.

Nice try but if you want to disagree that the the mini’s (to go back to that example) are not in the cash-shop because they want to make money with them then you are the one thats sees what he wants to see, not me.

OP I disagree with literally everything you said. I really enjoy Living Story, and I’m excited to see what ANet does in Season 2.

If you really want to know what I think about the whole “Expansion” issue, here it is:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Why-must-people-keep-shouting-expansion/page/2#post3753940