Guild Wars 2

I’ve been trying to talk some friends into getting this game, but there’s no way for them to try it out to see if it’s worth the $50+ for them.

I didn’t get this game for months because I had no way of trying it for myself and seeing if it would really be my cup of tea (Was playing Rift at the time, which is entirely F2P, with a boosts and novelty/costume item shop, and they don’t even require you to register an account until level 10)

Perhaps if we could have a limitless trial with the following restrictions?
- Level cap at 20
- Gold cap at 1g
- Trade/Shop Access disabled, view only.
- Map chat disabled
- Limitations on anything else that could be exploited.

GW2 has released trials in the past, though they probably won’t until after the big China push comes down.

At that point, they should just cap levels at 29. nodnod Yup.

I’d rather see a one-weekend trial every month or something of the like. Also, remember that the game does go on sale. My friend got it for ~$30, which really isn’t too bad even just taking a leap of faith.

There would be so many restrictions to such a feature that the end result would be an undesirable experience.

They’re punting the game out on Amazon for 40 bucks – shop around…you’ll probably get it cheaper.

I know very few people who haven’t goten more than enough worth of the 50$ this game costs, and I know lots of people who have left, none of them paid more than 1$/€ per hour, a show or entertainment can’t get much cheaper than that. So just buy the kitten thing, if you get just one toon to level 40 it’s worth it.

It would have to be even more restricted than this if we didn’t want all chats to suddenly become walls of gold seller spam (/whisper, /say) when accounts become free to use until level 20 with no time limit. Not worth it, IMO, especially with the other restrictions you listed. You can’t really experience a game and know how you’d like it if you’re locked out of the majority of its mechanics or content.

You can find the game for cheaper than $50; it’s really not asking much, considering you don’t need to spend any $ after that if you don’t want to or can’t, unlike almost every f2p MMO.

The problem here, fellas, is that paying a large sum is a leap of faith.
Maybe 40-50$ isn’t a lot to you, but some people really do need to watch their money, and this type of game certainly isn’t for everyone.

I always hated games that had no trial, and so often had to find some unofficial source to give it a test run, to peek inside the box and see what I’m really getting for my money.

your idea is good ,but it’ll add more bots (gold farmer) in the game so.

watching gameplay videos gives you a really good picture of the game, I’d say, even better than a lvl capped trial

Enzo.3906:

There would be so many restrictions to such a feature that the end result would be an undesirable experience.

Exactly.

Not being able to use the auction house, not being able to whisper and not being able to use map chat are one of the things you will see restricted.

Weylin.6478:

The problem here, fellas, is that paying a large sum is a leap of faith.
Maybe 40-50$ isn’t a lot to you, but some people really do need to watch their money, and this type of game certainly isn’t for everyone.

I always hated games that had no trial, and so often had to find some unofficial source to give it a test run, to peek inside the box and see what I’m really getting for my money.

Preordering a game for beta access would be a leap of faith. Buying a game over 1.5 years after release is only a leap of faith if the person insist on not looking. There are probably years worth of gameplay footage and many volumes of written opinions on the game. This is not an unreleased game with tiny tidbits of information being released every couple of months. The only thing you can’t get from any of those would be how the controls feel but that wouldn’t take many hours to figure out.

They might still run more trial weekends. Every time they have trials though, the gold seller spam increases a hundred fold. I’m not against game trials used for legitimate reasons but I am against them being exploited for more nefarious purposes, which they always are. It doesn’t matter if they limit/remove map chat when gold sellers will just use trial accounts to spam players with tells.

A possible solution is buddy trial accounts. Allow people with bought accounts to invite friends to a trial. Have the trial account be limited so they can only whisper the account that invited them as well as speaking in party and guild chats. That allows the trial players to come online, whisper their friend who invited them, get invited to a party or guild, and then enjoy more freedom of speech with others while they play the trial but not be able to directly contact anyone outside of the originating account or those in their party/guild. Remove the restrictions when they purchase.

I did eventually get convinced by my friends, and did watch several videos, but I had no idea if I would even be able to run this, or if I would run into technical problems, even if I do meet the specs there are issues that can crop up.

Khisanth.2948:

Preordering a game for beta access would be a leap of faith. Buying a game over 1.5 years after release is only a leap of faith if the person insist on not looking.

Not really. Buying anything without trying it is somewhat a leap of faith, even if you read up on it. Were I to go buy a new car, even having read reviews on performance/handling/comfort, etc, I’m not going to go buy one without test driving it first. This is the same sort of idea; just looking isn’t the same as experiencing.

The’ve had a few free weekends. They really should do once a month or by-monthly schedule after the patch and mega server is up and running.

Fermi.2409:

Khisanth.2948:

Preordering a game for beta access would be a leap of faith. Buying a game over 1.5 years after release is only a leap of faith if the person insist on not looking.

Not really. Buying anything without trying it is somewhat a leap of faith, even if you read up on it. Were I to go buy a new car, even having read reviews on performance/handling/comfort, etc, I’m not going to go buy one without test driving it first. This is the same sort of idea; just looking isn’t the same as experiencing.

Except with livestreams, all the videos of gameplay, etc, there’s plenty out there to give you a decent idea whether you might have an interest or not. Find someone livestreaming who does requests and ask them to check out different stuff in game.

They could run a test server I guess with very limited content that could give a good enough idea of what the game is all about. Let the player play the first few personal stories and explore say, their starter map.

However to deal with the bot/gold seller issues I would suggest having any such server be totally separate from the main live server and even possibly be more of a solo experience where you can’t even communicate with other test players.

Sure it would not give 100% of a taste of the true game experience but it would give players enough of an idea to know if the combat system, story telling style and general feel of the world maps is up to their tastes.

I agree with Paulytnz.7619
Just have the trial players playing in their own instance with all forms of communication disabled.

The idea is to give players a taste of the game, and to see if it will even run on your computer.

Weylin.6478:

The problem here, fellas, is that paying a large sum is a leap of faith.
Maybe 40-50$ isn’t a lot to you, but some people really do need to watch their money, and this type of game certainly isn’t for everyone.

I always hated games that had no trial, and so often had to find some unofficial source to give it a test run, to peek inside the box and see what I’m really getting for my money.

You are absolutely correct and if money was tight I’d also want to be able to play before making that decision. One thing I would look for are sales and deals, they do happen regularly, the equation changes when you can pick up the game for $30 or less.

GW 2 does have trials but not currently as a permanent feature, alas, in your case. However, if these people are really good friends and you trust them why not let them play for a day on your account? I know its not officially allowed but I doubt they’d ever find out

I am certain that they will have FTP weekends again.

Limiting it to weekends is pointless.
They just need to disable any means for these accounts to advertize gold selling.

And seriously, why do they? Doesn’t the gem market make gold sellers completely pointless?

if $50 is too expensive, there is this new concept of “saving your money” that can drastically aid in the buying of products.

$25 from 2 paychecks
$20 from 3 paychecks
$10 from 5 paychecks

$50 is not that expensive.

Bar the chat, the mail, guilds and the TP/MP features until they cough up. No point in farming if you can’t sell it or remove it from the account.

virus.7581:

your idea is good ,but it’ll add more bots (gold farmer) in the game so.

Lazarus.3970:

if $50 is too expensive, there is this new concept of “saving your money” that can drastically aid in the buying of products.

$25 from 2 paychecks
$20 from 3 paychecks
$10 from 5 paychecks

$50 is not that expensive.

This works great until you run into an issue where your in thousands of dollars of medical debt and already take too much money from your paycheck to begin with.

It’s rather rude to assume no one has financial troubles.

Not to be mean here, but I’ve played quite a few mmo’s, and I just bought them & tried them. No free trials.
There are literally TONS of gw2 videos and gw2 informational sites out there. (you could get lost for days)
Just doing a little bit of internet research could easily help someone to make a decision on purchasing the game. (as well as these forums)
Whenever they do free trials there is an influx of spam/gold sellers, wvw cheat/spy accounts, & an extra high amount of trolling added to the gamers experience.
I really wish they wouldn’t do it at all.

Tell your friends that GW2 has a lot to offer.
It is, by far, the most graphically pleasing game out there, with a unique combat system, and 3 completely separate game modes to dabble in.
It’s also FREE to play, not p2p or p2w.

I can understand your point of view as a friend of mine has tried an MMO with a cheaper box price as he knew he could get a cheap month’s fun from it. He likes it and he’s renewed for a month. If he renews for another month it’s more expensive than GW2 and then each month afterwards it gets considerably more expensive than GW2.

So take your pick really in terms of pricing. Not every pricing plan is going to suit everyone.

Unlimited Trial like Wow Did is a good idea for new playes, with their limits but a nice preview of the game.

Chase.8415:

Lazarus.3970:

if $50 is too expensive, there is this new concept of “saving your money” that can drastically aid in the buying of products.

$25 from 2 paychecks
$20 from 3 paychecks
$10 from 5 paychecks

$50 is not that expensive.

This works great until you run into an issue where your in thousands of dollars of medical debt and already take too much money from your paycheck to begin with.

It’s rather rude to assume no one has financial troubles.

No offense, but if someone is in such a state of financial debt that taking $10 out of a few paychecks is not possible they’ve probably got more things to worry about than buying games(there are plenty of free ones out there, I know I’ve been in that situation and it really kitten).

As for the topic it is possible in the future that they may make some sort of unlimited free trial but I wouldn’t hold your breath gw2 is still going fairly strong and I don’t see them doing an unlimited trial unless the game starts to really lose its population. Best thing you can bet on is that they bring back the ftp weekends at some point. Also if you’re just wondering if gw2 would even run I recommend you check out http://www.systemrequirementslab.com/cyri they can check if your system meets gw2(and just about any other game) requirements(at least you know it would run)

Fermi.2409:

Khisanth.2948:

Preordering a game for beta access would be a leap of faith. Buying a game over 1.5 years after release is only a leap of faith if the person insist on not looking.

Not really. Buying anything without trying it is somewhat a leap of faith, even if you read up on it. Were I to go buy a new car, even having read reviews on performance/handling/comfort, etc, I’m not going to go buy one without test driving it first. This is the same sort of idea; just looking isn’t the same as experiencing.

I don’t think any car dealership offers ‘unlimited test drive’ for their cars either. :p

What if we had a way to invite a friend to try the game?

The one you invite would only be able to talk to you and people in your group, and any kind of trade would be disabled.

Direct your friends to this video. It is about a half hour long, but the guy reviews it pretty well IMO. If I remember correctly, there is some suggestive language.

Good luck to you, them, and I hope to see you/them in Tyria!

Eravyn.7483:

Except with livestreams, all the videos of gameplay, etc, there’s plenty out there to give you a decent idea whether you might have an interest or not. Find someone livestreaming who does requests and ask them to check out different stuff in game.

It gives you an idea if you may have an interest. You still won’t know if you’ll like it yourself.

Khisanth.2948:

I don’t think any car dealership offers ‘unlimited test drive’ for their cars either. :p

That’s why I never advocated something like that. Actually, I’m rather opposed to any sort of unlimited trial.

What? Silly. Research review sites and youtube. They don’t want advice from a friend? Interesting.

Well, it’s 25$ now, maybe it’s a little bit better?

Oh for christs sake, figures they’d go on 50% off 2 weeks after I buy it…
Whatever, this game is worth every single dollar and I mean it.

I’ll notify my buddy and hopefully he goes for it…

Good luck finding a character name you like ever again under that system. They would have to free up any names used by the non-game owners after X-number of days of inactivity.