Temporary content working against GW2 [Merged]
snip
First in response to your earlier reference to WoW and the Cataclysm. That was the result of the release of an expansion, which is almost certainly in the works for GW2 and had no foretelling or back story to predicate it at all so it was terrible fro ma lore point of view.
Also the living story is leaving behind more and more concrete pieces that shape the world going forward. Also much of its fits in with the established lore of the game and some sets new precedence for the lore lovers to get excited over.
Why must the content be permanent? In every other MMO players play the new content tons and tons until the next new content comes out then 80% of the population never touches the previous content again and it just sits there dusty, taking up world space that could be reused in the future and bloating the game files. Why not remove it, if not to make it feel like the players are actually changing the world, then to allow for re-purposing of the space in the world?
Has a lot of the temporary content been a bit silly and unrewarding? Sure it has, but they are working on changing that. This is something utterly new and as such will take some time to perfect.
This keeps people logging in and playing the game at least once every 2 weeks. Which is good for the economy and the community. Permanent content will keep people logging in less since they know it will be there anytime and less people ingame is rarely a good thing.
Either way, why complain about free content? You missed it, there will be another one in 2 week…. and another in another 2 weeks… and another.
It will not only attract people to come every two weeks it will also scare people away. Many MMO players are completionist. With so many temporary content they will at some point miss one event, meaning they have achivements they can never complete anymore and for many of them that is enough reason not to come anymore because they are not able to complete anything anymore anyway.
And the temporary skins means that if you make a char next week that would be great with an skin from a past event you will not be able to get it anymore so thats just to bad.
Temporary stuff in the form of events that do not really reward anything but slightly change the world (Remember the big karka event where you cut down tree’s) and cutscenes are fine. And are even good for a living story feeling.
Temporary content in the form of achievements or rewards / skins you will later not be able to get anymore is bad.
That does not mean that is is never possible then there is an item you can not get anymore. Like a reward for playing the first year or a CE or whatever, but that would then be maybe 10 items over 10 years. But having a lot of that like with monthly events is bad.
The question becomes will it scare away more people than it gets playing.
My guess is no. But since Anet has the numbers, and they KEEP doing it, I’ll go ahead and assume less people are being scared away than you might think.
Obviously if it wasn’t working for them, Anet would stop doing it.
Seems like you have not been following the news. ArenaNet did say they would do less temporary content and more content that stays. So they are changing it, the problem however might be (I don’t know that until we see those patches) that just ‘less’ is not enough when it still involves achivements that can’t be done later and items that can’t be get later.
And why would temporary content keep people playing? You seem to mix stuff up. I don’t say.. do not come with new content in patches (Even do I would not mind if it where less patches but of higher quality) I say, do not make it temporary. New content will get people coming to the game but for that it’s not required to be temporary.. the only reason why that might work is for those same completionist I was talking about. They have to come to complete it but like I said there will be a point where they miss one and then it will also not work for those anymore. So new content might help people to stay playing but the temporary part it not required for it, however it might scare people away. So keep the content (that gets people) but don’t make it temporary.
Temporary content DOES get people to log back in. I know this because I know people who log in on patch day until the get all the achievements and then take some time off till the next patch. So at least some people ARE logging in.
Furthermore, on patch days, I always end up seeing overflows in areas around the events. The crowds generally dwindle as events progress, but next patch day, overflows again. That’s how I know.
SOME people obviously won’t be motivated by this patches, but even from these forums, it would be naive to say that some people aren’t.
No strategy is going to get EVERYONE to log in. But this strategy is giving me a whole lot of people to play with. I mean my guild has over 100 members for the first time. The strategy is definitely doing something.
It shouldn’t be “in the pipeline” it should already be here by now. If they hadn’t put so much effort into these monthly updates, we’d have it by now. People have already lost patience and quit with many more thinking of doing the same soon because of a lack of deeper content.
Want to give evidence of that mass leaving?
Peace? What peace? Last I checked there were still other dragons and evils all over the place that exists.
You really think permanent story should be exclusive to an expansion? That is selfish. You get to enjoy the “small skirmish” while a large portion of players that want deeper content have to wait longer for permanent content that according to you should be exclusive to an expansion pack since ANet is too busy making more temporary events.
It’s peace in Tyria. We beat what was bothering Tyria. Where are the other dragons? Likely in between continents or in other continents. That’s a lot of content. Enough content for a new game. Did you complain that Ellona and Cantha wasn’t included as free content in GW1? No? Why not? You’re essentially asking now for more content than that to be given to you for free.
Please stop with the temporary content!
You might be thinking “We are keeping old players in the game.” but that way you are also “locking new players out” and “sending quitted players away”.
A player who left sometime near launch and is thinking of rejoining, will dreadfully realize that “not much content have been? added (besides pvp stuff), despite the gigantic patches”
A new player who is thinking of joining, will be told “There was a lot of story behind this the latest content, but you have to read about it on a wiki to catch up”.
In this forum we are all GW2 players, so it’s hard to get to that mindset…
…but the idea of Temporary content can actually be an obstacle for people in the process of deciding whether they should join/rejoin the game.Also, its a big pain when for whatever reason you are in a situation that you can play for a long period of time. (exams, vacations away from home, job, being drafted for military service, being temporary occupied with a new other game).
I’m currently struggling to keep up with all the temporary stuff wille studding for my exams, getting ready for my 2 week travel in Germany and playing Dragons Dogma on my PS3, and if for whatever reason I have to stay away for some long period of time, getting back won’t be an easy choice for me, since I know there won’t be much new stuff to come back to…
Your opinion is wrong. Sorry, but it’s true. The developers, who know best of the game, find that the Living Story temp content updates are helping the game and pushing it forwards with it’s own unique thing in the MMO genre.
They won’t stop it because some random forum poster demands it, and are even increasing frequency as mentioned in yesterday’s blog post.
Edit: After further reading your post, I’m going to say that you’re completely wrong about the “only things being added are PvP”, because that’s a contrived statement of falsehood.
Things added permanently within the game:
-Southsun Cove (with about 13ish Dynamic Events) and 1 jumping puzzle
-Karka Queen World Boss
-Guild Missions: Rush, Trek, Bounty, Puzzle
-Daily Laurels
-Aetherblade jumping puzzle
-Mini-dungeons
-Traveling NPC brawling guild
-Skritt Thief (traveling as well)
-Moa Racing (dammit Moot!)
-WvW Ranks
-WvW Ascended items
All this is BESIDES the Living Story events that are constantly happening in the game. That’s right, CONSTANTLY, as in “if a player leaves and comes back, they’ll come back during the active, happening Living Story and will find that as a change in the world”.
(edited by Siphaed.9235)
Temp content that comes and goes is not good for the game and it’s been proven that most aren’t logging into it because it has no ‘progression’ of the story that can be played at any time. That is why they are going to permanent content.
If you don’t log into the game for say 6 months and they release 6 content patches…then you should be able to see those 6 patches worth of content and then catch up to the 7th. Right now its if you don’t log in, you missed 6 patches worth of content.
Not sure why people are so against progression content. A-B-C-D-E etc isn’t a bad thing. Where it was bad was in WoW, they required you to have 10-40 people to see end game progression content. Here there is no real progression content.
People want a carrot that isn’t grinding. They want to do Story/Dungeon A then move onto Story/Dungeon B, which required completing Story/Dungeon A and so on.
There is nothing wrong with that. Right now, GW2 is just a complete mess at end game with no direction except a massive gold grind and no content.
Multiple snips
I have seen absolutely zero complaints about the content being temporary in the game. The people playing are happily enjoying everything about the game. It is only the doomsayers on the forums complaining. Everyone wants the game to be perfectly tailored to them, but that is not physically possible. ArenaNet has and will continue to develop the game in a way that suits their vision and aligns with profit because that is how the software industry works.
Also people quit games all the time, all reputable sources of information for population degradation say that Guild Wars 2 is a very healthy game. It is only the doomsayers once again that preach how so many players have quit and continue to point at the statistics from the first 3 months after release. However the first 3 months population graphs show the same population degradation curve as every single other game including World of Warcraft in the first 3 months.
Now you have two options, go enjoy the game or continue listening to the doomsayers and becoming one yourself. Personally I would much rather be playing the game right now, but sadly I don’t have that option sitting at my desk at work eating lunch.
You’re on the forums aren’t you? There’s plenty of evidence here and on other forums. Threads complaining about their servers dying, their friends left and so they are soon, and of course the “I quit GW2 because” all over the internet.
And yet this is not what I see in game. Who is to say that those people on the forums even log into the game instead of just sitting there complaining? Some of the biggest complainers on the forums I’ve blocked in-game. Guess what? That was over 5 months ago and I did not see them log in once. Do those people on the forums have proof of mass leave? If the game is such a fail and everybody are mass leaving, why is Anet still allowed to expand? Why in the newest blog they mentioned that they’re hiring? Surely if all the players are leaving, nobody buys gems and they lose money. Why are they not firing then?
Yes temp content is great once in a while, but when temp content is the majority of the content things go down hill…
Players will only tolerate these tedious and grindy achievement based content with very little rewards for so long, already so much of the populations have moved on partially due to these things adding zero to the game..
What Guildwars 2 needs is some very real permanent content that increases its longevity of play..
Agree , I didn’t even bother with Pirates because it was a recycled tedious grind as well as forced wvw maps etc. The Ranger nerfs and changes to orr didn’t help either. Anyway, my time in the game has been decreasing.
No, I’m asking them to stop pushing out faster temporary content and instead, use that time, man power and resources to give us permanent content faster.
So you want to take away content that I enjoy so that more people would work on content that you enjoy? both content groups are being worked on. Why should our day be ruined so that you could enjoy stuff faster?
Zones are already dead, been leveling up 2 my alts for the last 2 weeks.
Supposedly high population server.
I’m saying people want permanent content. I didn’t say they don’t want the temporary content or that it should be removed. GW2 is a healthy game and it could be a helluva lot healthier across all servers if they would focus more on bigger content rather than side shows.
And who says that they’re not working on it? There has been talks about conference calls between Ncsoft and Anet about expansions. Ncsoft wants them to work on one right now, while Anet thinks that the game is doing great as it is and the expansion should come later. Expecting an expansion 1 year from release is unrealistic, so even if they stopped working on living story all together you won’t have that huge amount of permanent content any faster. Look at WoW. They don’t do free updates and when they do update it’s normally just balancing updates. Does that mean that they throw an expansion out every 2 months? Not really.
I would much rather wait 3 months for 3 different dungeons than have 12 different Living Stories that are temporary and doesn’t add anything new to the game when they’re gone.
This is a working model in other non sub games that I know of.
(Constantly releasing temporary events for people to participate in)
And Gw2 may need it even more since they don’t have hardcore level grinding.
“Caithe, someday you’ll see, Tyria needs me. -Scarlet”
So everyone who suggest improvements to the game carry no value and are just complainers then?
No, I’m not saying that all people that criticize the game are complainers. There’s plenty of places where the game could improve. Bugs fixes, low FoV that needs fixing, people are still waiting for the promised scavanger hunt, people are still waiting for the promised extra waypoints and the fixed rewards in dungeons. There’s still a lot of balancing to be done. Places like Spvp would also benefit from extra modes, etc.
However I don’t see anything wrong with free temporary content. The same way that I don’t see anything wrong with other intended design decisions in this game like for example very little gear progression.
If that’s “not what I see” then you’re blissfully ignorant I suppose to what a lot of people say about GW2. Doesn’t mean it isn’t true.
I know they’re looking for more people to work at ANet. They kitten well better. Because if they don’t do something impressive soon, I assure you, people we flock to the next MMO when it comes. And they’re coming soon…
But you see these two different points contradict each other. If people are leaving so much that whole servers are becoming empty then how they can afford to hire?
I’m so done talking to you. You haven’t paid attention to what I said from the beginning and just getting more defensive in fear of losing the argument you started.
Oh sorry for typing this long message and waisting my time. Just read that. I suppose I’m done talking with you too.
One Time Events Are Good?
“I think that players are starting to mature past the point of wanting to be on that
treadmill, of being in that obvious pattern of every time I catch up you are going to
put another carrot in front of me” – Mike O’Brien right before Ascended weapons
treadmill, of being in that obvious pattern of every time I catch up you are going to
put another carrot in front of me” – Mike O’Brien right before Ascended weapons
I would much rather wait 3 months for 3 different dungeons than have 12 different Living Stories that are temporary and doesn’t add anything new to the game when they’re gone.
Then this game is not for you. Period. If you don’t like it, move to a different one. This isn’t a game that adds dungeon after dungeon after dungeon, raid after raid after raid, and add more power creeping gear to those.
This game is about it’s world Dynamic Events, and the Living Story, which are essentially Meta Dynamic Events that are on-time. In fact, this is what many fans asked for pre-release while the game was in production; that is something that A.Net said they wanted to do. Not just keep adding and removing one or two Dynamic Events per zone, but instead having a larger Dynamic Event that’s participated by the players during a set time, and never happens again. That is what the Living Story is!
I have to quote this again:
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/living-world-in-guild-wars-2/
Final Thoughts: Hello (Living) World
“When we decided to make Guild Wars 2, we wanted to make something unique and different; we didn’t want to make the same MMO you’ve been playing for all these years. As a live game, we want to continue to build on that goal, to take the core concepts that inspired GW2 from the start and see if we can push the boundaries and explore even further what they can mean in the MMO space.”
You want something like another MMO has. That’s fine, but GO PLAY THAT OTHER MMO. Don’t demand that GW2 change what it is to something it’s not just to be like something else.
I was happy that Colin gave a nod to adding more permanent content to the game. As has been said there are numerous problems associated with temporary content. I have long advocated for a longer development cycle (longer than monthly) as well that would give developers time to think, write code, test, and deploy quality content of a more enduring nature. Well, no surprise, they are moving in the opposite direction to a two week cycle. As a software developer I was happy to see the “Hello World” allusion in the blog post to the K&R C book where a lot of us old timers started our serious programming. But contemporary approaches to software development really don’t alter that fact that it takes time to develop quality ideas and quality code.
(edited by Raine.1394)
The permanent content will come. I keep say it (and I don’t think most people believe me), but it will. All it is is a matter of time.
Generally speaking, it is better to shut the proverbial barn door at some point before the horse has bolted.
Obligatory examples of missed opportunities that owe their non-existence to Living Story:
Southsun: What if all the time and energy devoted to Living Story had been applied to making Southsun a full-fledged (dare I say it) living zone with all the bells and whistles? Would also have been a great place to add those underwater blue guys as a playable character race.
Orr: Okay, so you defeated Zhaitan, gratz, here have some nummy Zhaitaffy. What if all the time and energy spent on Living Story had been used to add boatloads of new Orrian content in the form of new Hearts and DEs and side story quests and maybe a dungeon or two and mass quantities of who knows what other fun and innovative stuff they might have thrown in there devoted to the post-victory mop up of that unhappy place if they’d applied themselves to it – (deep breath) – as a massive reward for those who completed the PS! Now, I know what you’re thinking. “If post-Zhaitaffy Orr and pre-Zhaitaffy Orr were in effect (gasp!) different zones, it would split the player base! The sun would go nova! The dish would ditch the spoon and run off with the fork!” But you’re wrong. It should be no trouble to make it so that anyone who wished to replay Old Orr (out of nostalgia or the desire to team with friends, or who knows, maybe omnomberries only grow in old Orr) could —
1. team up with someone who hasn’t defeated Zhaitan, or
A. talk to a handy NPC and say, “Hey, handy NPC, I want to go back to the Old Orr for a while!” Kinda like guesting to another server, ’cept different.
- Join a guild.
So much potential for greatness sacrificed on the altar of stubborn adherence to a bad idea. Alas!
PS: Are there no surviving descendants of Orrians? You know, people whose Orrian ancestors were away from home when all the bad stuff went down, people who now might want to return to the lands of their forefathers/mothers/uncles/aunts/whatever and start a new life there. Think of what fun the Consortium could have had with those poor slobs instead of all those unappreciative and volatile Norn and Charr…
The table is a fable.
Last time. I’m not saying stop making the temporary content they’re making. I’m saying we don’t need it faster. We need permanent content faster. At least understand that if nothing else from what I wrote.
I disagree with you. I won’t repeat myself from what I wrote there, but most reasons have been stated on that other topic. Your idea about adding a story that builds over the course of 6 months isn’t a good idea – not only players are not patient enough to wait for resolution after that much time, but a new player who began following the game in the middle of that period would feel somewhat lost.
“I think that players are starting to mature past the point of wanting to be on that
treadmill, of being in that obvious pattern of every time I catch up you are going to
put another carrot in front of me” – Mike O’Brien right before Ascended weapons
treadmill, of being in that obvious pattern of every time I catch up you are going to
put another carrot in front of me” – Mike O’Brien right before Ascended weapons
One Time Events Are Good?
Reply in context to what was written within the thread, not just the title. You’d want to same for your thread.
Last time. I’m not saying stop making the temporary content they’re making. I’m saying we don’t need it faster. We need permanent content faster. At least understand that if nothing else from what I wrote.
They have enough developers to work on temporary and permanent content at the same time. Permanent content will STILL take longer.
And contrary to popular belief, throwing more bodies at a programming problem doesn’t necessarily speed it up. Sometimes, in fact, it can slow it down.
The permanent content will come. I keep say it (and I don’t think most people believe me), but it will. All it is is a matter of time.
Generally speaking, it is better to shut the proverbial barn door at some point before the horse has bolted.
Obligatory examples of missed opportunities that owe their non-existence to Living Story:
Southsun: What if all the time and energy devoted to Living Story had been applied to making Southsun a full-fledged (dare I say it) living zone with all the bells and whistles? Would also have been a great place to add those underwater blue guys as a playable character race.
Orr: Okay, so you defeated Zhaitan, gratz, here have some nummy Zhaitaffy. What if all the time and energy spent on Living Story had been used to add boatloads of new Orrian content in the form of new Hearts and DEs and side story quests and maybe a dungeon or two and mass quantities of who knows what other fun and innovative stuff they might have thrown in there devoted to the post-victory mop up of that unhappy place if they’d applied themselves to it – (deep breath) – as a massive reward for those who completed the PS! Now, I know what you’re thinking. “If post-Zhaitaffy Orr and pre-Zhaitaffy Orr were in effect (gasp!) different zones, it would split the player base! The sun would go nova! The dish would ditch the spoon and run off with the fork!” But you’re wrong. It should be no trouble to make it so that anyone who wished to replay Old Orr (out of nostalgia or the desire to team with friends, or who knows, maybe omnomberries only grow in old Orr) could —
1. team up with someone who hasn’t defeated Zhaitan, or
A. talk to a handy NPC and say, “Hey, handy NPC, I want to go back to the Old Orr for a while!” Kinda like guesting to another server, ’cept different.
- Join a guild.
So much potential for greatness sacrificed on the altar of stubborn adherence to a bad idea. Alas!
PS: Are there no surviving descendants of Orrians? You know, people whose Orrian ancestors were away from home when all the bad stuff went down, people who now might want to return to the lands of their forefathers/mothers/uncles/aunts/whatever and start a new life there. Think of what fun the Consortium could have had with those poor slobs instead of all those unappreciative and volatile Norn and Charr…
Time and energy that may very well be being spent on making new content. You don’t know that new content isn’t being made.
Guild Wars 2 works on teams of developers. They’re making content to keep CERTAIN people happy and that’s not a waste. Because those people are still playing, still spending money on the shop which funds the permanent content you’re after. It’s not going to come from nothing.
If Anet had no plans to introduce any permanent content, I might agree with you, but as things stand, I don’t.
The permanent content will come. I keep say it (and I don’t think most people believe me), but it will. All it is is a matter of time.
Generally speaking, it is better to shut the proverbial barn door at some point before the horse has bolted.
Obligatory examples of missed opportunities that owe their non-existence to Living Story:
Southsun: What if all the time and energy devoted to Living Story had been applied to making Southsun a full-fledged (dare I say it) living zone with all the bells and whistles? Would also have been a great place to add those underwater blue guys as a playable character race.
Orr: Okay, so you defeated Zhaitan, gratz, here have some nummy Zhaitaffy. What if all the time and energy spent on Living Story had been used to add boatloads of new Orrian content in the form of new Hearts and DEs and side story quests and maybe a dungeon or two and mass quantities of who knows what other fun and innovative stuff they might have thrown in there devoted to the post-victory mop up of that unhappy place if they’d applied themselves to it – (deep breath) – as a massive reward for those who completed the PS! Now, I know what you’re thinking. “If post-Zhaitaffy Orr and pre-Zhaitaffy Orr were in effect (gasp!) different zones, it would split the player base! The sun would go nova! The dish would ditch the spoon and run off with the fork!” But you’re wrong. It should be no trouble to make it so that anyone who wished to replay Old Orr (out of nostalgia or the desire to team with friends, or who knows, maybe omnomberries only grow in old Orr) could —
1. team up with someone who hasn’t defeated Zhaitan, or
A. talk to a handy NPC and say, “Hey, handy NPC, I want to go back to the Old Orr for a while!” Kinda like guesting to another server, ’cept different.
- Join a guild.
So much potential for greatness sacrificed on the altar of stubborn adherence to a bad idea. Alas!
PS: Are there no surviving descendants of Orrians? You know, people whose Orrian ancestors were away from home when all the bad stuff went down, people who now might want to return to the lands of their forefathers/mothers/uncles/aunts/whatever and start a new life there. Think of what fun the Consortium could have had with those poor slobs instead of all those unappreciative and volatile Norn and Charr…
Time and energy that may very well be being spent on making new content. You don’t know that new content isn’t being made.
Guild Wars 2 works on teams of developers. They’re making content to keep CERTAIN people happy and that’s not a waste. Because those people are still playing, still spending money on the shop which funds the permanent content you’re after. It’s not going to come from nothing.
If Anet had no plans to introduce any permanent content, I might agree with you, but as things stand, I don’t.
I’m not talking about future content they may or may not be working on. I’m talking about content we might have had right now if not for Living Story.
The table is a fable.
The permanent content will come. I keep say it (and I don’t think most people believe me), but it will. All it is is a matter of time.
Generally speaking, it is better to shut the proverbial barn door at some point before the horse has bolted.
Obligatory examples of missed opportunities that owe their non-existence to Living Story:
Southsun: What if all the time and energy devoted to Living Story had been applied to making Southsun a full-fledged (dare I say it) living zone with all the bells and whistles? Would also have been a great place to add those underwater blue guys as a playable character race.
Orr: Okay, so you defeated Zhaitan, gratz, here have some nummy Zhaitaffy. What if all the time and energy spent on Living Story had been used to add boatloads of new Orrian content in the form of new Hearts and DEs and side story quests and maybe a dungeon or two and mass quantities of who knows what other fun and innovative stuff they might have thrown in there devoted to the post-victory mop up of that unhappy place if they’d applied themselves to it – (deep breath) – as a massive reward for those who completed the PS! Now, I know what you’re thinking. “If post-Zhaitaffy Orr and pre-Zhaitaffy Orr were in effect (gasp!) different zones, it would split the player base! The sun would go nova! The dish would ditch the spoon and run off with the fork!” But you’re wrong. It should be no trouble to make it so that anyone who wished to replay Old Orr (out of nostalgia or the desire to team with friends, or who knows, maybe omnomberries only grow in old Orr) could —
1. team up with someone who hasn’t defeated Zhaitan, or
A. talk to a handy NPC and say, “Hey, handy NPC, I want to go back to the Old Orr for a while!” Kinda like guesting to another server, ’cept different.
- Join a guild.
So much potential for greatness sacrificed on the altar of stubborn adherence to a bad idea. Alas!
PS: Are there no surviving descendants of Orrians? You know, people whose Orrian ancestors were away from home when all the bad stuff went down, people who now might want to return to the lands of their forefathers/mothers/uncles/aunts/whatever and start a new life there. Think of what fun the Consortium could have had with those poor slobs instead of all those unappreciative and volatile Norn and Charr…
Time and energy that may very well be being spent on making new content. You don’t know that new content isn’t being made.
Guild Wars 2 works on teams of developers. They’re making content to keep CERTAIN people happy and that’s not a waste. Because those people are still playing, still spending money on the shop which funds the permanent content you’re after. It’s not going to come from nothing.
If Anet had no plans to introduce any permanent content, I might agree with you, but as things stand, I don’t.
I’m not talking about future content they may or may not be working on. I’m talking about content we might have had right now if not for Living Story.
I don’t think we’d have permanent content right now with or without the living story.
I mean Anet put 30 new dynamic events into the game back in November, and on one cared at all. Hardly anyone spoke about it. So they’re trying something different.
What they’ve been doing is using the temporary content as a poll of sorts to see how many people play/like X and how many people play/like Y. They’ve said as much.
Then they start thinking about the permanent stuff. It’s not really that bad to get the pulse of the player base before you put tons of effort into new stuff.
Evidence if this is the redo of Ascalon Catacombs. By comparison, very few people run it since the fix.
The MMO genre isn’t attractive to new players until some studio takes enormous risk by doing drastic changes. Good luck with that when you’re average MMO project is in the tens of millions and takes about 5 years to build.
Ask Blizzard how their campaign to attract new players went in Cataclysm. Complete failure.
There’s a sizable market of players in the MMO genre and they are getting older. Step away from the childish Disney crap; create challenging content that is repeatable; keep players invested with vanity items and housing and you’ll have you’re own personal gold mine.
(edited by Calae.1738)
I mean Anet put 30 new dynamic events into the game back in November, and on one cared at all. Hardly anyone spoke about it. So they’re trying something different.
How old was the game in November?
The table is a fable.
Ok, so here’s my 2 cents….
I have no issue with the temporary content. I like the story arcs, I like the effect possibly for the world. Living story has potential to be a great thing.
However, I do see the gripe as it pertains to the time limit. To me, its ok to miss some of the stuff. I’m perfectly willing to go look on the wiki for the backstory I missed, since (let’s face it) each arc leads into the next. To me, the events you attend and those you don’t are the ‘life experiences’ of your character/account.
Other’s don’t necessarily see it this way. They don’t want to miss out on the content because its time gated, and they have lives.
There is a potential solution to this, which I think might acceptable to most, but it would take a lot of work and patience – let them overlap. Yes, eventually it has to have a finite end point, just lengthen it.
I realize there are some technical issues with doing this, such as making sure people do them in the right order, certain things needing to removed from the world for the next one, etc etc. I don’t have all of the details ironed out, but I’ve put a decent amount of thought into it (not that anyone really cares).
Instead of just 2 weeks, and then boom, gone, let them run….say, 6 weeks, but still releasing the new story arc each 2. During the first 2 weeks, the story achievements would run like normal – beat the pinatas, light effigies, that sort of stuff. After those 2 weeks, the things that need to be removed from the world, can be. Yes, this locks out the ability for late comers to get the achievements, but the ‘important’ part of the arc is the story…the information you need for the next one to make sense, that can be left in, since most of it is (or can be) instanced. For those that have completed it, it would just ‘poof’ like normal. When the late comers have done it, it can then ‘poof’ for them as well. There are a lot of details, but I just wanted to give the general idea of my thought line. I could go into a lot more depth to address all the pros and cons, and potential issues and solutions, but I won’t right now.
Don’t look at me like that. Whatever you’ve heard, it’s probably not true.
How old was the game in November?
Does it matter? It already had over 2 million sales and people did not care for the DEs introduced.
Ask Blizzard how their campaign to attract new players went in Cataclysm. Complete failure.
1. It did better than Pandaria http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-10-04-world-of-warcraft-mists-of-pandaria-week-one-sales-less-than-cataclysms-day-one
And better than Lich King http://massively.joystiq.com/2010/12/13/wows-cataclysm-demolishes-lich-king-sales-record/
2. They sold 4.7 million in the first month. http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/709665/world-of-warcraft-cataclysm-sales-pass-47-million-copies-in-first-month/
Indeed Cataclysm was one of the better sellnig expansions for WoW. I don’t know why would you think that one of their best selling expansions is a failure. Also if an expansion outsells the expansion previous to it, shouldn’t the logical conclusion be that more people joined the game and therefore are now buying the expansion?
There’s a sizable market of players in the MMO genre and they are getting older. Step away from the childish Disney crap; create challenging content that is repeatable; keep players invested with vanity items and housing and you’ll have you’re own personal gold mine.
Yes, a sizable market of MMO genre players are older now. Who is to say though that this kind of content that they’re provided by GW2 is not to their liking? I know 40 year olds that play this game and are happy to play it. Really hard/ easy content is all a matter of taste and not age.
Multiple snips
I have seen absolutely zero complaints about the content being temporary in the game. The people playing are happily enjoying everything about the game. It is only the doomsayers on the forums complaining. Everyone wants the game to be perfectly tailored to them, but that is not physically possible. ArenaNet has and will continue to develop the game in a way that suits their vision and aligns with profit because that is how the software industry works.
Also people quit games all the time, all reputable sources of information for population degradation say that Guild Wars 2 is a very healthy game. It is only the doomsayers once again that preach how so many players have quit and continue to point at the statistics from the first 3 months after release. However the first 3 months population graphs show the same population degradation curve as every single other game including World of Warcraft in the first 3 months.
Now you have two options, go enjoy the game or continue listening to the doomsayers and becoming one yourself. Personally I would much rather be playing the game right now, but sadly I don’t have that option sitting at my desk at work eating lunch.
I’m not a kittening doomsayer so stop labeling.
I’m saying people want permanent content. I didn’t say they don’t want the temporary content or that it should be removed. GW2 is a healthy game and it could be a helluva lot healthier across all servers if they would focus more on bigger content rather than side shows.
Now you have two options, open your eyes and pay attention to what people are typing and stop assuming you already know what they’re saying or don’t participate on the forums so we can have less confusion.
I’m sorry if I offended, but you didn’t pay attention much when reading my post. Despite mocking my last paragraph you completely missed that I wasn’t calling you a doomsayer I implied that your change to a “People are leaving” statement to support your argument is the first step to going becoming one.
You have some valid arguments for what you want, but you completely missed my main paragraph about how ArenaNet is trying to do something different and is clearly seeing success with the living story because they are both hiring and increasing its cycle time.
I for one feel the living story is a great change of pace from the typical mmo content model.
How old was the game in November?
Does it matter? It already had over 2 million sales and people did not care for the DEs introduced.
It does actually. Even now I can encounter a DE I have not done before even though I have 3 characters with 100% world completion. Those few DE’s got completely lost in the already large amount of DE’s in game so most people would simply not have noticed the difference, which is not the same as not caring, at that time in GW2 short lifespan.
As it is being done now, yes I do think the Living story is bad for the game. It’s sole function is to keep people playing, which in itself is not bad, but people that have gone through the content they like and have stopped playing, will not return or if they do not for very long. Simply because no real new content was added. The content that was added permanently is not content that keeps people playing. On top of that and this is just my opinion, the living story isn’t much of a story.
What real impact did Flame and Frost have really. The Molten Alliance was formed and are we to believe disbanded right after?
Why was Southsun left in disarray after Secrets of Southsun. Wasn’t the entire point of that story to make it safe for people.
I somehow doubt The Aetherblade will be around much longer after Sky Pirates end
As it stands the Living Story needs a much larger permanent part. Be it in the form of a dungeon or a redesign of a zone/area. It needs to leave a statement saying we were here, because currently the world does not care on bit. It is the same old same old after each story has come and gone. I’m not counting Southsun as that was just very poorly done. Evidence lies in the fact it became deserted again after Secrets of Southsun. The Karka Queen rarely gets killed on most servers and my server had a 2 week timeframe between kills.
How old was the game in November?
Does it matter?
How likely, given the game’s age at that time, were these new DEs to be noticed – not praised to the high heavens as new and wondrous additions to the undying miracle that is GW2, but just noticed – as, you know, ‘new’ DEs?
In November, had all the game’s copious launch content been so thoroughly exhausted by all the millions of GW2 players playing since launch that anything that wasn’t in game at launch would be like unto a drop of water to, say, Aquaman dying of thirst in a desert?
“Does it matter?” Yes. Yes, I think it does.
The table is a fable.
1. It did better than Pandaria http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-10-04-world-of-warcraft-mists-of-pandaria-week-one-sales-less-than-cataclysms-day-one
And better than Lich King http://massively.joystiq.com/2010/12/13/wows-cataclysm-demolishes-lich-king-sales-record/
2. They sold 4.7 million in the first month. http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/709665/world-of-warcraft-cataclysm-sales-pass-47-million-copies-in-first-month/
Indeed Cataclysm was one of the better sellnig expansions for WoW. I don’t know why would you think that one of their best selling expansions is a failure. Also if an expansion outsells the expansion previous to it, shouldn’t the logical conclusion be that more people joined the game and therefore are now buying the expansion?
What those statistics don’t tell you is that the majority of the new players quit before level 10. Old players (especially in Asia) had free to play MMO’s competing for market share and player retention was extremely difficult. Blizzard is still bleeding heavily in Asia; which is where most of their player base is.
What those statistics don’t tell you is that the majority of the new players quit before level 10. Old players (especially in Asia) had free to play MMO’s competing for market share and player retention was extremely difficult. Blizzard is still bleeding heavily in Asia; which is where most of their player base is.
What that doesn’t tell us is that it’s exactly Cataclysm that killed the game. What it shows is that people that tried WoW at any stage of WoW’s life mostly did not like it. Customer retention was always hard for WoW, however WoW still ended up being the giant that it was in its time. What does that tell us? That a single MMO can’t fulfill everyone’s taste, but at the same time it doesn’t have to.
About Blizzard bleeding heavily – WoW for the most part is a dying giant now. Why? Because there are new MMOs with new combat styles giving completely new things to the market. However the MMO survived for 10 years so far and is taking its time to die. For an MMO that’s very good.
However neither of that suggests that updates that change the world are bad.
However neither of that suggests that updates that change the world are bad.
Trying to attract new players to the genre is bad; which was my point.
Player retention is what you need in an MMO. Why? Because those players come from other MMO’s. All these large budget MMO’s that failed couldn’t keep their customers.
This keeps people logging in and playing the game at least once every 2 weeks. Which is good for the economy and the community. Permanent content will keep people logging in less since they know it will be there anytime and less people ingame is rarely a good thing.
Either way, why complain about free content? You missed it, there will be another one in 2 week…. and another in another 2 weeks… and another.
It will not only attract people to come every two weeks it will also scare people away. Many MMO players are completionist. With so many temporary content they will at some point miss one event, meaning they have achivements they can never complete anymore and for many of them that is enough reason not to come anymore because they are not able to complete anything anymore anyway.
And the temporary skins means that if you make a char next week that would be great with an skin from a past event you will not be able to get it anymore so thats just to bad.
Temporary stuff in the form of events that do not really reward anything but slightly change the world (Remember the big karka event where you cut down tree’s) and cutscenes are fine. And are even good for a living story feeling.
Temporary content in the form of achievements or rewards / skins you will later not be able to get anymore is bad.
That does not mean that is is never possible then there is an item you can not get anymore. Like a reward for playing the first year or a CE or whatever, but that would then be maybe 10 items over 10 years. But having a lot of that like with monthly events is bad.
The question becomes will it scare away more people than it gets playing.
My guess is no. But since Anet has the numbers, and they KEEP doing it, I’ll go ahead and assume less people are being scared away than you might think.
Obviously if it wasn’t working for them, Anet would stop doing it.
Seems like you have not been following the news. ArenaNet did say they would do less temporary content and more content that stays. So they are changing it, the problem however might be (I don’t know that until we see those patches) that just ‘less’ is not enough when it still involves achivements that can’t be done later and items that can’t be get later.
And why would temporary content keep people playing? You seem to mix stuff up. I don’t say.. do not come with new content in patches (Even do I would not mind if it where less patches but of higher quality) I say, do not make it temporary. New content will get people coming to the game but for that it’s not required to be temporary.. the only reason why that might work is for those same completionist I was talking about. They have to come to complete it but like I said there will be a point where they miss one and then it will also not work for those anymore. So new content might help people to stay playing but the temporary part it not required for it, however it might scare people away. So keep the content (that gets people) but don’t make it temporary.
Temporary content DOES get people to log back in. I know this because I know people who log in on patch day until the get all the achievements and then take some time off till the next patch. So at least some people ARE logging in.
No strategy is going to get EVERYONE to log in. But this strategy is giving me a whole lot of people to play with. I mean my guild has over 100 members for the first time. The strategy is definitely doing something.
You do NOT get it. New content DOES get people to log in it but has NOT to be temporary for that. The new JP is not temporary and is also done a lot in the beginning. I did not say new content does not get people to log in I did say it did not have to be temporary to get people to log in.
But at the same time temporary content might scare people away.
Oow and we just kicked a 100 members for inactivity.
(edited by Devata.6589)
Trying to attract new players to the genre is bad; which was my point.
Player retention is what you need in an MMO. Why? Because those players come from other MMO’s. All these large budget MMO’s that failed couldn’t keep their customers.
Yet WoW had really bad retention, yet was the biggest giant in the genre so far. Doesn’t that tell us that retention doesn’t really matter if enough people are sticking with the game to make the game really popular?
Also at some point a game will encounter his first MMO. Without trying to attract players that never played MMOs the genre will shrink and die. Why? Because old MMO players will die one day, now you’re not trying to attract players that never played an MMO, so new players don’t join and then some people will leave the genre eventually, because not a lot of people have the exact same tastes trough out all of their lives.
Then you and everyone else doing it can stop talking about people that don’t relate to me or my message about one-time/temporary content.
I say the game has lost players, which is has and people call me a “doomsayer”. I say the game needs improvement and people say “why change anything? I’m happy” Clearly a lot of people are not! And they left and/or are leaving because they are not satisfied with just getting temporary updates. Not a threat! Just a fact!
If what we propose doesn’t tread on what you are getting/already have then it’s completely unfair to dismiss what we have to say to make more people happy with the game. Also when I say we, I mean myself and many people I know.
For the 100th time, I’m not against the one time events. You say I didn’t pay attention to your message well so far nobody has kittening paid attention to mine either when I say that.
ANet! By all means, give these people their quick biscuits but don’t let that stall you in giving other players deeper content they crave this game to have!
I don’t think what people want, necessarily, is permanent content [for pve]. Not in the traditional sense. Let’s face it, permanent static content gets boring/stale and then abandoned to gather dust.
I think more people would be happy is the living story content was simply available a little longer, before going away. Let them glut themselves on running the new story a few thousand times in say…6 weeks, and then when its shininess wears off, remove it. It can be reused later, or added as a fractal to revitalize at a later date. (Anet has a love of reusing content)
At the same time, they have to keep the new content coming to keep -the locusts- cough cough the harder core, more hours a day players entertained. So I propose overlapping the releases, with the twist that once you move onto the next release, the previous one becomes no longer available to that character. Heck, make it re-livable on the alt, since most of it is instanced (or could be) anyway.
I think the biggest kitten about the ‘temporary’ content is simply not being able to access the important parts of it (the story) that tie into the next piece. I think that should be available to your character, but not necessarily the achievements for it if you missing its “scheduled” arc (got to have some motivation to do it in its time window after all).
Hopefully, now that Anet is coming out of their ‘testing phase’ for the living story, we’ll start seeing more impact, and more depth going forward. This may still take time. Given Anets story-telling ability, they do have broad branching, interesting lore, but sometimes have a hard time bring the pieces together for their players. Prophecies story was a mess, and I found it muddled. It got better with Factions onward. Hopefully it will be similar here….better with time.
Don’t look at me like that. Whatever you’ve heard, it’s probably not true.
Trying to attract new players to the genre is bad; which was my point.
Player retention is what you need in an MMO. Why? Because those players come from other MMO’s. All these large budget MMO’s that failed couldn’t keep their customers.
Yet WoW had really bad retention, yet was the biggest giant in the genre so far. Doesn’t that tell us that retention doesn’t really matter if enough people are sticking with the game to make the game really popular?
Also at some point a game will encounter his first MMO. Without trying to attract players that never played MMOs the genre will shrink and die. Why? Because old MMO players will die one day, now you’re not trying to attract players that never played an MMO, so new players don’t join and then some people will leave the genre eventually, because not a lot of people have the exact same tastes trough out all of their lives.
The MMO genre in it’s current state will die eventually. Subscription fees, tanks, healers, leveling, gear grinds ect. This kind of stuff appeals to a segment of the market that will keep shrinking over time.
The MMOs that will succeed in bringing new players are the ones that continuously innovate by creating new systems and challenging conventional wisdom.
The MMO genre in it’s current state will die eventually. Subscription fees, tanks, healers, leveling, gear grinds ect. This kind of stuff appeals to a segment of the market that will keep shrinking over time.
The MMOs that will succeed in bringing new players are the ones that continuously innovate by creating new systems and challenging conventional wisdom.
But that’s not a death of a genre, but rather a genre evolving. And that is exactly what we see in Guild Wars 2, Dragons Prophet, Tera, etc. All these new MMOs actually do something new. And each one is unique in its own way. It means that right now the genre is going trough insane amount of experimentation. and that is good. That means that we will see even more unique MMOs in the future. Which ones will end up surviving in the long run – that’s something for the consumers to decide.
Then you and everyone else doing it can stop talking about people that don’t relate to me or my message about one-time/temporary content.
I say the game has lost players, which is has and people call me a “doomsayer”. I say the game needs improvement and people say “why change anything? I’m happy” Clearly a lot of people are not! And they left and/or are leaving because they are not satisfied with just getting temporary updates. Not a threat! Just a fact!
If what we propose doesn’t tread on what you are getting/already have then it’s completely unfair to dismiss what we have to say to make more people happy with the game. Also when I say we, I mean myself and many people I know.
For the 100th time, I’m not against the one time events. You say I didn’t pay attention to your message well so far nobody has kittening paid attention to mine either when I say that.
ANet! By all means, give these people their quick biscuits but don’t let that stall you in giving other players deeper content they crave this game to have!
But that is just it, they do relate to your message. They are using that same false, loaded words about players leaving to try and incite strong emotional response for why the game should be tailored to what they want from it. Clearly the current model is working quite well for them financially and all signs point to a very healthy supply of new players compared to departing players. So your and others’ arguments that they should change the game because players are leaving is completely invalidated by evidence.
I am not saying that they shouldn’t be working on and adding some permanent content, but I am saying that bi-weekly content even if it is largely superficial far exceeds what I have come to expect from the industry. In fact its whats keeps me checking the forums and logging in regularly so that I don’t miss anything and can see whats next.
I don’t think what people want, necessarily, is permanent content [for pve]. Not in the traditional sense. Let’s face it, permanent static content gets boring/stale and then abandoned to gather dust.
Is that the state of all the permanent content we have now then? Because I don’t think so. I don’t see the harm in the content remaining in the game for players to repeat such as dungeons and surely would be nice for new players to enjoy if they were to join the game later.
Most content in MMORPGs becomes abandoned because of the typical steep vertical progression. Because of that, it doesn’t get revisited except for the experience of it. All the other aspects of it are completely useless.
GW2 is a different game though, built on horizontal progression. Because of that, every aspect of it is still relevant and rewarding, including the loot obtained.
Do a search on the forum looking for people complaining about everything from dungeons to empty zones to spvp:
“Maps are dead”
“Nothing new”
" No one does ‘x’ "
Just to give a few complaints. You think adding more static content will help?
Sure, there are always some that enjoy going back and doing the same old things, but when its always the same, it does get stale and then people stop doing it. How many people do dungeons outside of CoF p1? Better yet, how many people do AC now thakittens been revamped to be harder, which is. what. they. asked. for! The answer, not a whole heck of a lot….you can find a long list of complaints here on the forums about it. Anet has even stated that they will revamping all of the dungeons, would they do this if they were popular?
How many people are complaining that they don’t care to level alts because its boring? No compelling reason to do so? Does this sound like wanted to repeat the existing static content? Even with other racial story lines, they just dont care to do it.
Heck, people don’t play the static content that DID get left behind, which supports my theory as to what people are looking for – once you’ve done it, you’re ready to move on and experience something new. Sure, you might come back to it, but not often.
True, the living story isnt the be all, end all answer to all issues. Everything cannot (and shouldn’t) be temporary. Last effects are required. Depth is required. Challenge and thought are desired. We’ll see how it pans out.
Don’t look at me like that. Whatever you’ve heard, it’s probably not true.
I should imagine big new permanent content will be part of paid expansions, as in GW, while the “living story” content is stuff that will have mostly temporary content, with some bits staying.
I really don’t see any problem with this at all. It’s actually more than most MMOs manage, in terms of “a succession of different things to play”.
I think the subtext is that we’re being “fobbed off” with temporary content. I don’t think that’s the case at all, and I don’t see any reason to think it.
Yes, I do! It’s content that because of GW2 horizontal progression will still remain entertaining to old and new players! It won’t hurt will it? Just because you don’t want it or you assume it will go unused, doesn’t mean that’s the reality of it.
No where did I say that I did not want permanent content. In fact I bluntly stated that not all content should be temporary, implying that I do indeed feel that there should be SOME static content. However, there is a very delicate balance that needs to struck here.
The temporary content allows for an engaging, evolving world, giving us the chance to experience new stories, new events, what have you. Each one needs to leave a lasting effect on the world, just by happening. It could be subtle ( new jumping puzzle), it could be drastic (a whole new map), but something. However, like all ‘events’ I don’t think it should last forever. That’d be like saying Dragon Bash should be in LA all year around so that new people can experience is any time they want. It creates stagnation, and paradox (Zaitan being killable more than once on the same character is enough paradox for me, personally). These are the experiences of your character’s ‘life.’
So you make a new character or are completely new to the game and you can’t experience it again, ok I can see part of the issue here. Technically, this new character wasn’t “alive” when this event happened, so I can understand missing out on the experience. (Its like not being able to make it to the hospital to watch your child be born, your wife sure as heck isn’t going to shove the kid back in so you can relive the moment. Just ow.) Its unfair that you missed the content because you simply werent there.
Others have brought up the point that with tv shows, they can tivo it if they cant be there for it, and even in my given example, someone could have video taped the child’s birth, so you could experience it after the fact. Perhaps having some type of NPC that could give you some backstory/cut scenes might be good. Maybe giving the option for those characters to access the instanced content to catch up, but not get the achievements would work. I call out not getting the achievements because you do need something to encourage/reward people playing at the time of the arc release to do it in its allotted time window. Those that don’t care about the achieves, can then do it later at their own leisure.
I do see both sides of the issue with the temporary content. (In fact had a loooong debate with my husband over it last night, because he’s missed pretty much all of it). I don’t think just leaving it all in the game will solve the issues though.
Not to mention, leaving in a lot of unused content makes for huge downloads with a lot of wasted space.
Don’t look at me like that. Whatever you’ve heard, it’s probably not true.
(edited by LanfearShadowflame.3189)
I always like phasing. You do a quest chain, follow a story line and you see the results of that story in the world. And it will always stay that way as a reminder to you.
I mean Anet put 30 new dynamic events into the game back in November, and on one cared at all. Hardly anyone spoke about it. So they’re trying something different.
How old was the game in November?
It was about three months old, but I don’t think that’s the point. People were complaining that there was no new content. Anet added fractals, new jumping puzzles/mini dungeons and new events. Everything got talked about but the events.
I always like phasing. You do a quest chain, follow a story line and you see the results of that story in the world. And it will always stay that way as a reminder to you.
Phasing came with some major drawbacks though, including making it harder to play with friends. So if you were on a quest chain and at a different place in the chain, you’d be seeing different stuff than your friends and they really couldn’t play with you.
Anet made intention design decisions (including downscaling) so people could play together. They simply don’t want to divide the player base any more than they have to.
I mean Anet put 30 new dynamic events into the game back in November, and on one cared at all. Hardly anyone spoke about it. So they’re trying something different.
How old was the game in November?
It was about three months old, but I don’t think that’s the point. People were complaining that there was no new content. Anet added fractals, new jumping puzzles/mini dungeons and new events. Everything got talked about but the events.
Unless they were lvl 80 events that gave attractive rewards, it isn’t hard to see why.
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I mean Anet put 30 new dynamic events into the game back in November, and on one cared at all. Hardly anyone spoke about it. So they’re trying something different.
How old was the game in November?
It was about three months old, but I don’t think that’s the point. People were complaining that there was no new content. Anet added fractals, new jumping puzzles/mini dungeons and new events. Everything got talked about but the events.
Unless they were lvl 80 events that gave attractive rewards, it isn’t hard to see why.
Right and since Anet isn’t going to keep making just level 80 events, that give better rewards (since that defeats the whole point of what they’re doing) they had to try something else.