Guild Wars 2

I hear a lot of complaining that people quit playing GW2, and from the personal experience of my previous 80-man guild, that’s true. After two months since the release I was the only one playing, and after almost a year I’m only one playing.

So my question to you is, why do you think people stop playing Guild Wars 2?

Because there are a zillion games out there, and X number of hours in the day. Because people have real lives that take time. Because people are frustrated with some of the bugs and don’t have patience for bug fixes (they think ten months is a long time in programming terms). Because some people exhausted all the content. Because some people like other games better. Because some people stopped gaming. Because some people have friends that play other games. Because other MMOs have gone free to play. Because new MMOs have come out and they want to try them.

I’ve seen a number of people leave the game and I’ve seen quite a few return to the game as well.

In the end, people leave for all different reasons, not just one.

It’s entirely possible this is a niche game and those who find this niche stay and those who don’t like this niche go to find another one.

I’d say with the possible exception of WoW, every single other MMO is a niche game. There are bigger niches and smaller niches. Guild Wars 2 is actually a bigger niche because it offers an experience most other games don’t. Other games tend to be smaller niches, because they’re all trying to appeal to the exact same type of player.

But you don’t need 10 million people to have a successful MMO. Eve is successful and has half a million.

The days of 10 million player MMOs are pretty much gone, at least until a decent MMO comes out for consoles (because so many people play console games).

- Combat is kittening boring : just go full Zerk and spam dodge rolls, autoattack….
- Lack of skills: most of them are either useless or boring/uninspired , so are the traits.
- Lack of rewards.
- PvP: since GW2 is the successor of GW1 ( which probably had the best PVP ever made)I would have expected something way better than this boring conquest…. absolutely one the worst (if not the worst) PvPs I’ve seen in my entire life.
- DR
- RNG, RNG everywhere.
- Super casual.
- Ascended gear.

I’m sure I did not mention something, but that’s all for now..

What Trollface said but in addition the terrible performance with 0 optimizations in 9 months.

Stormcrow.7513:

What Trollface said but in addition the terrible performance with 0 optimizations in 9 months.

What those other guys said, plus a lack of content to do. Some people enjoy living story. The rest of us would like a big boy update please!

A better question would be, what keeps people playing a game like WoW?

GW2 doesn’t have a monthly fee, or a strong flow of gear progression, or many tiers of content to unlock. WoW is constructed from the ground up to keep you involved in the game, to the point where people feel guilty about walking away from the game while their sub is still active.

It’s like going to an all-you-can-eat buffet and being unable to recognize whether you’re still hungry or not. You can go back for another plate of crab legs, or leave – but if you leave, you’ll wonder if you should have had that plate of crab legs. So you get another, and get up to leave… they just brought out a fresh roast beef…

GW2 was designed so that people can easily drop in and out. Some people will never leave, others will never come back. Either way it’s not a big deal.

They were expecting the game to be just like other MMOs and they wanted to be able to kill stuff in a blow like they can in other game.

There’s no carrot on an ever increasing in length stick.

I think the biggest reason comes from watching all the hyped up trailers/interviews (they’re still on youtube, check’em out), and then playing the game to realize that they did indeed fail to deliver. In addition to that, NCSoft (aka RNGSoft) had way too much of an influence on this game.

They didn’t fail to deliver. They delivered fine. Some people want more than it possible, that’s all. I’ve yet to see an MMO offer this amount of content during their first year.

I’ll have to get home first to look up the videos but there is one small one that I can think of right now.

Breathers. I distincly remember hearing that when you first start playing, you don’t have one and your time under water is limited as you could drown if you stay under too long. To get one required the player to follow through on a quest or quest chain. As it is right now, you start the game with one and you don’t even need it as you can not drown under water.

Oh and I’m pretty sure that there is this:

They also said that the decisions you make during your personal story was suppose to have a persistant impact on your ‘home instance’. Implying that the game world itself was suppose to be a semi-instance (I think there is a better term for this) and that it was suppose to be possible for people to invite others to their home instance.

Instead you’re personal story has no impact on the open world, and I haven’t seen any ‘home instance’.

I don’t think it’s actually all of these things everyone else is bringing up…

I think it’s a lot more … Complicated … than that.
When GW2 finally released, I remember Penny Arcade (one of Anet’s best convention partners over the years) having their main comic character ask “Why isn’t GW2 FUN?”.

Well, it IS fun the first week. It’s even fun the next week you come back to it after a good long break… But it’s not sustainable fun like GW1 was. Nor is it sustainable & endlessly replayable fun like Starcraft/Diablo2 was. It’s definitely not “Actiony” fun like TF2 and DOTA seem to be ….and for most of the people it was obviously Aimed at instead: wasn’t actually TimeSink fun like WOW b/c I guess the feeling of “progression” just stopped dead in its tracks after 80. (especially with crafting & “combat” unlocks)

This doesn’t mean it failed at what it was intended to be. It just means that we don’t actually know*WHAT*they intended to begin with and until we do, we can’t really offer any simple suggestions for fixing how UnFun it is over longer stretches of playtime.

Keep in mind that GW1 even AFTER all its improvements over a 5 year span to become what it was after EOTN, still wasn’t the most inviting experience for any of the bandwagon riders who decided they wanted to get in on the H.O.M. rewards ahead of time == because they all bought the Hype that the industry was getting itself into over GW2’s upcoming release (at the time).

Some of us GW1 people were a lot less enthused about the details that WE SAW of the game and our years of experience with Anet had already tempered our expectations. We knew ahead of time that lots of parts of it still weren’t going to appeal to the widest base possible and a lot of us even dreaded the reality that most of it wasn’t going to even appeal to us “b/c it was being made for a new demographic”.

Deamhan.9538:

I’ll have to get home first to look up the videos but there is one small one that I can think of right now.

Breathers. I distincly remember hearing that when you first start playing, you don’t have one and your time under water is limited as you could drown if you stay under too long. To get one required the player to follow through on a quest or quest chain. As it is right now, you start the game with one and you don’t even need it as you can not drown under water.

Oh and I’m pretty sure that there is this:

They also said that the decisions you make during your personal story was suppose to have a persistant impact on your ‘home instance’. Implying that the game world itself was suppose to be a semi-instance (I think there is a better term for this) and that it was suppose to be possible for people to invite others to their home instance.

Instead you’re personal story has no impact on the open world, and I haven’t seen any ‘home instance’.

They never said your personal story would have impact on the open world and they CERTAINLY never said that you could drown. Drowning skills are like downed skills, that’s all. They said you had a breather from day one that would mean you wouldn’t have to come up for air.

ilr.9675:

I don’t think it’s actually all of these things everyone else is bringing up…

I think it’s a lot more … Complicated … than that.
When GW2 finally released, I remember Penny Arcade (one of Anet’s best convention partners over the years) having their main comic character ask “Why isn’t GW2 FUN?”.

Well, it IS fun the first week. It’s even fun the next week you come back to it after a good long break… But it’s not sustainable fun like GW1 was. Nor is it sustainable & endlessly replayable fun like Starcraft/Diablo2 was. It’s definitely not “Actiony” fun like TF2 and DOTA seem to be ….and for most of the people it was obviously Aimed at instead: wasn’t actually TimeSink fun like WOW b/c I guess the feeling of “progression” just stopped dead in its tracks after 80. (especially with crafting & “combat” unlocks)

This doesn’t mean it failed at what it was intended to be. It just means that we don’t actually know*WHAT*they intended to begin with and until we do, we can’t really offer any simple suggestions for fixing how UnFun it is over longer stretches of playtime.

Keep in mind that GW1 even AFTER all its improvements over a 5 year span to become what it was after EOTN, still wasn’t the most inviting experience for any of the bandwagon riders who decided they wanted to get in on the H.O.M. rewards ahead of time == because they all bought the Hype that the industry was getting itself into over GW2’s upcoming release (at the time).

Some of us GW1 people were a lot less enthused about the details that WE SAW of the game and our years of experience with Anet had already tempered our expectations. We knew ahead of time that lots of parts of it still weren’t going to appeal to the widest base possible and a lot of us even dreaded the reality that most of it wasn’t going to even appeal to us “b/c it was being made for a new demographic”.

Do you realize how many people tried Guild Wars 1 and didn’t get into it at all because it wasn’t fun to them? Fun is very subjective.

Most players walk into a game with expectations.

Some of those are based on the marketing hype, others come from past experiences with other games.

Either the expectations are met or not.

Some players may not have the experience to view the hype with an objective perspective. Some players may have previous experience with only one particular game and therefore base all other games in comparison.

Some players have “comfort zones” and want new games to continue to provide similar content to what has been familiar. Other players may be open to new experiences and weigh the new game based on what it actually provides.

Some players have concerns over whether the developers appear to be listening, responding, are transparent, appear trustworthy etcetera. Other players may care only about gameplay mechanics.

Obligatory list of reasons regarding “casual” vs “hardcore” content, boredom, too easy, too hard, etcetera

All of this is on a sliding scale for each individual player and what they are willing to accept or tolerate in a game they play.

And a sliding scale of whether their expectations (realistic or not) have been met.

I think it’s because the game itself is too simple.

…I think Goldenwing just made another great point

Vayne.8563:

Do you realize how many people tried Guild Wars 1 and didn’t get into it at all because it wasn’t fun to them? Fun is very subjective.

Uhh yeah… because that’s EXACTLY what I said in that post. Or did you just see “fun” and skim past the rest of it?

There isn’t anything left to keep people’s interest except for very casual players. It’s all well and good to add some content to keep them happy like click 100x of this thing scattered on a map, fight a boss that is invulnerable and lead him to traps to damage it, or a zerg fest boss where you auto attack and get 2 rares, but there is nothing left for people that want something that isn’t mindless or that is challenging.

For the past many months and many months to come the part of the game that many enjoyed has stood still and much of it is in a sad state (fractals, arah loot, lack of challenging dungeons, etc) so there isn’t much left for those people to do other than repeat the same content for a small reward that they have done way too many times as is. Many have quit because of this. My long list is getting bare solely from this and the ascended gear.

The direction they are taking with the ascended gear, having to kill 30x bunnies or whatever a day for dailies to keep up with gear, rng from fractals and boxes instead of progression, and other things that they are doing that are the opposite of the manifesto don’t help either.

I quit because I realized I was the rat in the Skinner’s box. Developers were feeding me with inane daily quests and new stats behind repetitive grinding for points. I felt boredom and existential angst: for what end am I playing this game? I realized that this game didn’t respect my human condition and didn’t put value on my time as individual. I realized there are wonderful things in the world to experience and that my life would be wasted hunting for achievement points.

Reading good books, being fit and healthy, having social relationships, experiencing nature and learning new things is so much better than being that guy with legendary weapon and commander title on some pc game.

ilr.9675:

…I think Goldenwing just made another great point

Vayne.8563:

Do you realize how many people tried Guild Wars 1 and didn’t get into it at all because it wasn’t fun to them? Fun is very subjective.

Uhh yeah… because that’s EXACTLY what I said in that post. Or did you just see “fun” and skim past the rest of it?

Of course I read your post. You also said this:

Well, it IS fun the first week. It’s even fun the next week you come back to it after a good long break… But it’s not sustainable fun like GW1 was.

I was commenting on that.

I’m playing this for ten months and it’s been fun for me for ALL of it. That’s why I said what I said.

I’m allowed to respond to the first part of your post as well as the end, no?

For the same reasons players stop playing other MMORPGs. There’s no unique reason why people stop playing GW2. Most MMORPGs don’t have a 100% staying power. From previous experience, about 1/5 people actually continue playing (for any given MMO) after the first couple weeks, and 1/5 of that continue after a few months.

If it’s so fun 10 months out… why do you spend all your time on the forums instead?

ilr.9675:

If it’s so fun 10 months out… why do you spend all your time on the forums instead?

I suggest you look at my achievement points if you think I spend all my time here. I’m still in the top 400. You don’t get that by not playing. I think playing 4-6 hours a day is enough for a ten month old MMO.

Anyway, I tend to play when my guild is active. But I’m in Australia and it’s an American guild, so when there’s less guild traffic, I come here to keep abreast of current developments.

And you know, it’s the kind of game where you can play it for a while, take a break, do the forum, and go back to the game. It’s not like I can’t complete a zone and then take a break.

The monetization system.

They made end-game rewards cosmetics, then started pumping those cosmetics out on a monthly basis, then decided to lock them all behind a mafia casino counter for a limited time only.

Why should a rewards driven people stick around when there is not only one single thing to aim for but that one thing isn’t even available by playing the game but instead by playing the lottery? And there are A LOT of people driven by rewards in any MMO community. I’m actually not one of them and still actively play, but I’ve seen so many people leave who are.

Most of the game is a zerg. WvW, Dungeons, World Bosses, Open World, Living Story, etc. Every time I log on, people are just farming/zerging. One massive group of people going from point A, to point B. It’s all possible because game mechanics are so simple too.

I think it’s a great game to level and to explore in. But pretty much anything else is mundane and watered down. I can’t fathom how people can stomach running CoFP1 100s of times, for days on end.

A new game comes along that their RL friends are playing or a game they’ve been meaning to play and is now on sale on Steam.

Doesn’t have to be an MMO either. As someone else said, only so many hours in a day.

I have not quit playing, per se, but I’m finding I am playing less and less. My reasons?

1. I love dungeons in MMO’s, but I’m not crazy about the mechanics in GW2 dungeons. Trash mobs and bosses with huge HP pools and cheap shot mechanics just aren’t very exciting to me.

2. I typically play tanks in MMO’s, but being tanky in GW2 basically means you do poor dps and slow your team down. Dps zerging is not as fun for me as coordinated teamwork.

3. Most of my friends in game have left, and I’ve been slow to make new ones. That’s all on me, but my friends list has cycled through to empty a few times already so I’ve been finding myself reluctant to put in the effort.

4. I had high hopes for WvW, but I find it kind of boring, to be honest. Zerg or be zerged.

5. I had high hopes for enjoying PvP in this game, but quite honestly, I am terrible at it. I’m old, and not very twitchy, so I get destroyed pretty fast. I also only know 1 or 2 people that are into PvP, so there’s not much critical mass for me to latch onto.

6. I don’t gamble, so RNG boxes aren’t my cup of tea. Temp content built around RNG box sales does not interest me much.

7. I’m not interested in Legendaries, so the grind for one doesn’t keep me going.

8. It’s Springtime in North America, and it’s freaking nice outside, so I’ve been gardening, hiking, camping, stargazing, and not gaming as much.

With ALL computer games there is a law of diminishing returns…GW2 or any other game is no exception…

When you first get a game, everything is new, each mouse/keyboard click uncovers something new and your character leaps and bounds ahead getting increasingly more powerful…

After a couple of months however, progress pretty much comes to a grinding halt and you have pretty much seen, done everything…

At that point, to get that initial, ‘buzz’ back you are probably going to have to buy another game and begin again…

People are quitting ? Every time I log in the servers are full.

Every mmo has the " I quit " crowd. They say they quit but the soon return.

My guess would be that WvWs turned into nothing but a zerg fest, combined with the unbelievably stupid match setups they`re currently screwing over every player over with.
(http://mos.millenium.org/eu)
spvp, all are basically the same tiny rats maze of a map, same tedious goal in each.
(this shocked me, even in warcraft I could sit in bgs from the second I logged on to second I logged off, for over 3 years, yet in this game…. /sigh)
The balance, ye gads, the abysmal balance!!
The “We don`t want a grindy game” & oh my gawd, this has turned into the most grindiest of games I`ve ever played, even worse then Aether farming in Aion lol
I play Guild Wars, not a long timer like some I know, but it just amazes me how much better that game is compared to this, hell, most of my time is spent alt tabbed.
Almost forgot. The story, it just isn`t remotely interesting.

Ah well, Wild Star inc <fingers crossed>

^WvW was always a messy Zergfest, especially in Beta.

Because they hate RNG box’s that rip them off. Because they hate when content comes out (Dragon Ball) and they cant play it with friends/guild mates. Because there guild of friends died when ‘Guild Missions’ came out and people HAD to join a large guild to do the content. Because of the grind/nerfs, etc.

Do they actually stop playing gw2 to a higher degree that they stop playing any other game in the market?

OP question is irrelevant, move along.

Because I got my legendary already =/

Because there is no reason to us to fight anything after the end of personal story.

Why do we fight?

Indeed it is so…

Fishbait.6723:

Ah well, Wild Star inc <fingers crossed>

Just like GW2, Wild Star is still NCSoft.

ilr.9675:

^WvW was always a messy Zergfest, especially in Beta.

Admittedly I have not played all MMO’s…but all the ones I have played…WvW, faction vs faction…bad vs good what ever you want to call it…has always been zerg v zerg…I have never understood and still don’t understand why people complain about that…

Frustrated expectations.

cause they don’t find it fun?

Amun Ra.6435:

Fishbait.6723:

Ah well, Wild Star inc <fingers crossed>

Just like GW2, Wild Star is still NCSoft.

Close, they`re the publishers (but we don`t know if there`ll be a cash shop/bad rng chests etc, time will tell ala gw2-NCSoft-anet) , but Carbine, not Anet, are the creators of Wild Star.

Mentalhead.5721:

I hear a lot of complaining that people quit playing GW2, and from the personal experience of my previous 80-man guild, that’s true. After two months since the release I was the only one playing, and after almost a year I’m only one playing.

So my question to you is, why do you think people stop playing Guild Wars 2?

ok they stop playing because once u reach max lvl, all u have to do is kill the silly bosses that drop nothing, do reallyyyyyy bad designed dungeons that are super ugly and lack creativity and strategy, the fact that they have never added i mean NEVER added any content to PVP at all lol NEVER. so after u reach max lvl u play pvp, u own everybody, get super bored and quit forever. the game is dirt, simple as that.

oh and also, the dungeons drop nothing good and the only good looking armor u can get from dungeons is the flame legion armor from COF……are u serious? LOOOOL SO BADDDD

Vayne.8563:

Deamhan.9538:

I’ll have to get home first to look up the videos but there is one small one that I can think of right now.

Breathers. I distincly remember hearing that when you first start playing, you don’t have one and your time under water is limited as you could drown if you stay under too long. To get one required the player to follow through on a quest or quest chain. As it is right now, you start the game with one and you don’t even need it as you can not drown under water.

Oh and I’m pretty sure that there is this:

They also said that the decisions you make during your personal story was suppose to have a persistant impact on your ‘home instance’. Implying that the game world itself was suppose to be a semi-instance (I think there is a better term for this) and that it was suppose to be possible for people to invite others to their home instance.

Instead you’re personal story has no impact on the open world, and I haven’t seen any ‘home instance’.

They never said your personal story would have impact on the open world and they CERTAINLY never said that you could drown. Drowning skills are like downed skills, that’s all. They said you had a breather from day one that would mean you wouldn’t have to come up for air.

It was certainly a misinterpretation on my part. When they said that the mob knocks your mask off (which doesn’t actually happen, I just tested this) and you enter a drowning state, paired with them saying that we don’t have to worry about equipping it as the game switches to it automatically, it gave the impression that we would drown without it.

Yet you can remove it and spend all the time you want underwater without one which is just a show of laziness on their part as to not code in a breath meter and drowning if you don’t have one.

While I couldn’t find a video (it has been two years now), I do remember hearing about having to complete a quest to obtain your first breather.

Again, I misinterpreted “home instance” as being a game wide thing rather than a single district within the major city of the race you chose. Yet still….

“You save some people but their village was destroyed…”

Lol what? When? Where? I hope they’re not talking about the events….

“There’s an orphanage and a hospital in here, and you have the choice to save one or the other but not both”

Yeah, did that and both the hospital and orphanage are up and running. There is no burned out building. I just checked.

After having just explored my home instance, I fail to see anything that reflects any of the choices I’ve made with my personal story or with the outcome of open world events.

But the biggest one is how they hyped up much of the game and claimed to do all these things ‘differently’ than other MMOs. Honestly, it’s just a face lift. Once you go beyond skin deep, you see that it’s all just the same as any MMO. Except that it is a NCSoft game, through and through. While they go on about not needing to grind/farm for the best gear, there are two things…

Once you have the best gear, there’s nothing left to strive for except to customize the look of said gear which requires you to farm/grind for hours upon hours on end.

Ascended gear through the original concept out the window as that is the best gear and requires you to grind/farm to get.

Last but certainly not least, in tune with being an NCSoft product, RNG. While certainly not as bad as some other titles (cough Aion cough) it serves a single purpose. If fills in a hole. In certain places in the world, you won’t find casinos. Gambling is illegal. The RNG game design sedates the craving, and thus it hooks people just the same.

I think I just grew tired of theme park in general, it’s really nothing to do with Guild Wars. Nothing to fight for (5 minute keeps don’t really count). Also nothing really feels or gives the illusion that something is “mine” (property, housing, mines etc from swg for an example).

No roles at 1st sounded interesting, but kills me now. There’s “optimal” set ups, of course, but not having a job to do, or someone seeking me out because I happen to be good at said job, really hurts the feel of the game to me.

Now with the focus on “Living Story” and holiday events taking precedence over all, it leaves me with the feeling of not wanting to come back(I keep looking for excuses to come back, its a pretty world =) I haven’t played since around February, lurk around and pop in a post occasionally, but what has been added really since x-mas ? Some pink text non visible items, few cute back packs, and some kinda lack luster guild missions.

I’ll stop before folks jump all over me and tell me to play another game(which I am, and is kinda the point!), almost turning into a rant lol.

Quit because I dislike progression. Ascended gear was like a slap in the face, and the WvW progression is iffy, too. The way arenanet handled the reaction to ascended gear was awful, too. Merged all the outcry threads, then locked it without content.

If they focused on more lateral stuff, I’d still be playing. More classes, more weapon types, more skills. But that’s all hard work, so instead they can just add bigger-numbered gear and call it a day. Screw that.

I prefer fewer things that are more involved and fleshed out that keep me wanting to interact with other players in a living world to a bunch of little things thrown in to chew up my time that disconnects me from the world and other players. The game started to feel like early Rift, with all the little grinds and currencies.

Miss, Block, Block, Evaded, Evaded, Miss, Block, 150 (Cleansed), Evaded, Evaded, Miss, Stun (broke), Block, Evaded, Evaded, Miss, Block, Evaded.

Log out

The Master.2893:

Because there is no reason to us to fight anything after the end of personal story.

Why do we fight?

Indeed it is so…

So we dispand the army after we win World Wars 2? Of course there’s a reason to fight. After we killed Zhaitan there was the karka invasion. After that the dredge and the flame legion formed an alliance. And then there was the problem with settlers and the Consortium on Southsun. And now we’re taking a break from fighting to celebrate the destruction of Zhaitan and renew our intention to fight the other Elder dragons.

Most games only give you the vaguest reasons to fight, particularly after you get to the end boss. Most games only give you a reason to farm the same dungeon over and over again to gear up.

I prefer this way, frankly.

I know a lot of my Guildies quit because a majority of the updates to the game have been “push F here, now go there and push F”. And it’s not fun or interactive for them.

Half of the players I knew left after the lost shores update. Because of ascended gear, and because they were gw1 players and hated what ascended might do to the game.

The other half left because of the lack of actual content update. Whether some of that half hate ascended or not, we all enjoyed fractals when they were introduced, and all regretted that this game hasn’t seen a worthwhile update like this one since FOTM was released. Months after months, all we are seeing is useless fluff that disappears from the game. Dragon Bash is probably the worst, most useless update to date.

I could count the number of players I’ve known since launch that still keep playing on two hands.

The first half that left at the lost shore updates were unfortunately right. Anet kept introducing more, and time gated it, and barred access to levels of FOTM that go beyond the level of AR you can get (you can’t do lvl 50+) while adding a ranking system in wvwvw tied to your character, not your account, that gives you advantages over other players and that has a huge grindy component.

Honestly, it’s because they can.

GW2 players can leave and come back any time and do so constantly without being “left behind” on the gear treadmill.

There are other games to play, single player games that are excellent like Far Cry, Bioshock, Metro, etc etc

It’s a much healthier way to game than playing a MMO every day for hours because you need to keep up with the gear rat race.

I think we can all agree the ascended debate was way overblown back when it was raging.

Ascended items have been in for ages now and it hasn’t made any difference at all.