Why is this news? Why are people happy about this? Given the fact that it was announced so long ago now and the PR since it had to be released this year. Its hardly a revelation.
My response was a resounding Duh!
Jade Quarry [SoX]
Miranda Zero – Ele / Twitch Zero – Mes / Chargrin Soulboom – Engi
Aliera Zero – Guardian / Reaver Zero – Necro
Isn’t there some sort of lead time they need between an announcement of the date and that date? If they are going to be selling the expansion in stores then they need to make all the boxes and discs that they hope to sell and ship them out, as well as the time needed to sell all these boxes. So, there’s manufacturing, shipping and selling time that has to be factored in to the release date.
Be careful what you ask for
ANet may give it to you.
Isn’t there some sort of lead time they need between an announcement of the date and that date? If they are going to be selling the expansion in stores then they need to make all the boxes and discs that they hope to sell and ship them out, as well as the time needed to sell all these boxes. So, there’s manufacturing, shipping and selling time that has to be factored in to the release date.
Box copies of MMO’s are just a physical copy of the patcher. A CD with a file that points to the GW website download is all they need.
Isn’t there some sort of lead time they need between an announcement of the date and that date? If they are going to be selling the expansion in stores then they need to make all the boxes and discs that they hope to sell and ship them out, as well as the time needed to sell all these boxes. So, there’s manufacturing, shipping and selling time that has to be factored in to the release date.
Box copies of MMO’s are just a physical copy of the patcher. A CD with a file that points to the GW website download is all they need.
Yah. No doubt that shortens it. But they even if they already have them assembled, then they still need to have the boxes mailed out to retailers and then give them to time to sell, which is the point I was trying to make, that there needs to be a certain amount of time between the announcement and the date just for that and that could be a couple of months.
Be careful what you ask for
ANet may give it to you.
Unless they’ve already shipped them. They may be sitting in warehouses; either at the retailer’s end, or manufacturer’s end.
I have no idea when the release date will be, or will be announced. At least, the Devs have said something more concrete, now, though. =)
Oh yah. If they have already assembled them and If they are sitting in the manufacturers/retailers warehouses (which I personally very much doubt as that ties up the manufacturers inventory and passes storage cost on to those businesses for an indefinite amount of time, possibly several months) there is still the time needed to sell the expansion, one or two months, which needs to be factored in to the guesses of when it will begin.
Be careful what you ask for
ANet may give it to you.
Anet I already stopped playing 6 weeks ago, even if I have the game hearing it’s coming out this year intead of this summer is not gonna make come back any sooner. I quit because I was fed up with your slow pace and silence if Fallout 4 comes out first I’ll be sort of uninterested in coming back. Over 3 years for an expansion is way too frack’en slow. Somewhere between GW and now you’ve lost my admiration and respect for the company. Ever since Utopia’s debacle it’s been one blunder after another.
Unless they’ve already shipped them. They may be sitting in warehouses; either at the retailer’s end, or manufacturer’s end.
I have no idea when the release date will be, or will be announced. At least, the Devs have said something more concrete, now, though. =)
Oh yah. If they have already assembled them and If they are sitting in the manufacturers/retailers warehouses (which I personally very much doubt as that ties up the manufacturers inventory and passes storage cost on to those businesses for an indefinite amount of time, possibly several months) there is still the time needed to sell the expansion, one or two months, which needs to be factored in to the guesses of when it will begin.
I don’t know. Maybe they don’t need such a firm commitment to boxed editions. I mean, they announced pre-purchase with only a few boxed editions available, or so it seems. Maybe they rely on digital distribution more. Boxed editions were supposed to be available all over a week after the announcement, but….
It’s hard to say if leaving two or three months for distribution when speculating on a release date needs to be considered, or not. /shrug
I just hope it’s sooner rather than later. Pre-purchase came as a surprise (to me).
Unless they’ve already shipped them. They may be sitting in warehouses; either at the retailer’s end, or manufacturer’s end.
I have no idea when the release date will be, or will be announced. At least, the Devs have said something more concrete, now, though. =)
Oh yah. If they have already assembled them and If they are sitting in the manufacturers/retailers warehouses (which I personally very much doubt as that ties up the manufacturers inventory and passes storage cost on to those businesses for an indefinite amount of time, possibly several months) there is still the time needed to sell the expansion, one or two months, which needs to be factored in to the guesses of when it will begin.
I don’t know. Maybe they don’t need such a firm commitment to boxed editions. I mean, they announced pre-purchase with only a few boxed editions available, or so it seems. Maybe they rely on digital distribution more. Boxed editions were supposed to be available all over a week after the announcement, but….
It’s hard to say if leaving two or three months for distribution when speculating on a release date needs to be considered, or not. /shrug
I just hope it’s sooner rather than later. Pre-purchase came as a surprise (to me).
Undoubtably they are moving towards Digital as much as possible and only use box sales to pick up a small fraction. I know I’ve seen advertisements for this game in various popular sites I read. With more and more people having access to the Internet and getting used to buying through it, boxed sales are probably not near the importance they used to be.
Be careful what you ask for
ANet may give it to you.
Bought the pre-purchase deluxe 1 week ago, got everything except the extra char slot that was promise to vets. When will i receive this extra char slot?
They give them out every Friday. If you purchased late in the week, you may have missed the cut off for getting the slot last Friday. If you do not receive the slot by this Friday, then I would submit a ticket to support.
Unless they’ve already shipped them. They may be sitting in warehouses; either at the retailer’s end, or manufacturer’s end.
I have no idea when the release date will be, or will be announced. At least, the Devs have said something more concrete, now, though. =)
Oh yah. If they have already assembled them and If they are sitting in the manufacturers/retailers warehouses (which I personally very much doubt as that ties up the manufacturers inventory and passes storage cost on to those businesses for an indefinite amount of time, possibly several months) there is still the time needed to sell the expansion, one or two months, which needs to be factored in to the guesses of when it will begin.
I don’t know. Maybe they don’t need such a firm commitment to boxed editions. I mean, they announced pre-purchase with only a few boxed editions available, or so it seems. Maybe they rely on digital distribution more. Boxed editions were supposed to be available all over a week after the announcement, but….
It’s hard to say if leaving two or three months for distribution when speculating on a release date needs to be considered, or not. /shrug
I just hope it’s sooner rather than later. Pre-purchase came as a surprise (to me).
Undoubtably they are moving towards Digital as much as possible and only use box sales to pick up a small fraction. I know I’ve seen advertisements for this game in various popular sites I read. With more and more people having access to the Internet and getting used to buying through it, boxed sales are probably not near the importance they used to be.
Also…any boxed edition is basically a box with a code and some leaflets. Everyone who wants to play GW2 needs to install HoT, no matter if you buy it or not. As a matter of fact. It is allready in the game (hence why beta players dont have to install anything). The only thing the code does is granting your account access to this area.
So yes, it might as well been allready shipped. It is not the time consuming part of it anyways.
I agree that digitally is the way they prefer it to be sold. The money goes directly to NCSoft’s and Arenanet’s pockets instead of retailers also making a profit on it.
Arise, ye farmers of all nations
Arise, opressed of Tyria!
This is not a good news at all IMHO.
It can only mean the release is well far and we will probably not see the expansion before Christmas.
No it is no news at all. We allready knew it will be released in 2015. All that is said is repeating the existing statement. At this moment they are not ready to reveal a releasedate yet, but it will be in 2015. That has been the statement for 6 months now.
Arise, ye farmers of all nations
Arise, opressed of Tyria!
I think those speculating on a Christmas (or at least November – December) release are probably right. If it was any earlier than that I think they’d have announced the release date before now.
Which is good, although I hope it’s not too close to Christmas because that’s when I generally have the least time available to play due to being away a lot. It also means I may have to try and explain to family and friends that actually the expansion to my favourite game wouldn’t be a perfect present because I already bought it months before it was released….
Unless they’ve already shipped them. They may be sitting in warehouses; either at the retailer’s end, or manufacturer’s end.
I have no idea when the release date will be, or will be announced. At least, the Devs have said something more concrete, now, though. =)
It’s highly unlikely it will have reached the retailers yet. As someone else said retailers don’t want their storage space (which can be very limited) tied up with products they can’t sell for weeks or months.
When I worked in a video game store we’d usually get copies of new releases just a few days before they came out. If I remember correctly we usually got our main delivery on a Wednesday and then release day was usually Friday. Some things didn’t arrive until the morning they were due to go on sale – when Wrath of the Lich King came out for example we got the delivery at 8am on release day – one hour before they went on sale. One of my colleagues was freaking out because he’d pre-ordered the collectors edition and was worried he wouldn’t get it.
(I’m not sure if that was intended or if there were problems somewhere along the line, it was just my job to get everything out on the shop floor on time and take the blame if it didn’t happen, not to know why it didn’t happen.)
Danielle Aurorel, Dear Dragon We Got Your Cookies [Nom], Desolation (EU).
Because GamesCom 2015 started today, I was expecting a release date for Heart of Thorns expansion.
Many products and shows and events from companies are being presented at GamesCom 2015, yet ArenaNet decided not to increase sells of their product by giving a release date. To me this is quite strange.
This is not a critic or offense towards ArenaNet, but a misunderstanding of their marketing plans, when such a big international gaming event comes up.
Any ideas why ArenaNet decided not to surprise us with the announcement of Heart of Thorns release date, on GamesCom 2015?
Theres the panel about masteries Saturday evening (some info already announced here: http://t.co/G23CWH904E)
And theres whatever the announcement is during the WTS finals on Saturday morning (though I think its something PvP related).
Would be nice to get the release date as the morning announcement, but I highly doubt thats what it will be.
Any ideas why ArenaNet decided not to surprise us with the announcement of Heart of Thorns release date, on GamesCom 2015?
Because you wher eexpecting it so it wouldn’t be a surprise at all??
Reality is, if you look at the BWE-announcement
Specially this part:
The jungle content is predominantly the same content we showed to a small audience in closed beta testing earlier this year, but it’s more polished. We’ve done a lot of work to balance creature difficulty, and we’ll be looking for your thoughts on the overall experience. Do you feel the need to use your entire skill bar in battles? Does teaming up with other players feel more rewarding? Do you find yourself wanting to change your skills and traits to overcome encounters? Warning—creatures will be more challenging than in the existing Guild Wars 2 world. (Note: This is not what we meant when we said “challenging group content” at the expansion’s announcement—we’ll announce the details of that in the future.)
The way I see this is that the closed beta showed some issues they wanted to solve. Now they have changed things based on that feedback, they first want us to test it again to know it is right now.
That is what they mean by “when it is ready”!!
It clearly isn’t ready enough yet to announce a release date. So don’t expect one either.
I honestly get very very annoyed with those companies that keep info for themself till some stupid kind of convention so they can announce something. I’m happy that Arenanet will share the date with us when they know it themself. Not a minute later or earlier!
Arise, ye farmers of all nations
Arise, opressed of Tyria!
Theres the panel about masteries Saturday evening (some info already announced here: http://t.co/G23CWH904E)
And theres whatever the announcement is during the WTS finals on Saturday morning (though I think its something PvP related).
Would be nice to get the release date as the morning announcement, but I highly doubt thats what it will be.
This. The height of GamesCom hasn’t happened yet. ANet has told us there is at least one big announcement coming Saturday, plus a big PoI on Friday. It’s like the OP is reading a mystery novel and is annoyed the detective hasn’t solved the murder in the first chapter.
Gamescom started yesterday actually. But yeah, the main thingies is on Saturday and there is still plenty of time for ArenaNet to announce stuff (even though an release date is almost guaranteed to not happen, due to not actually having had any large scale beta yet).
If their schedule is similar to GW2’s original launch, the release date will likely be revealed at the end of this month. Considering it’ll also be the anniversary, perhaps they’ll leak it a few days early as part of the 3rd year birthday, though likely in code. The official announcement will likely be at PAX.
Announcing the date at Gamescom was never an option. They haven’t concluded their first beta yet, and ArenaNet isn’t one to prematurely announce something.
Theres the panel about masteries Saturday evening (some info already announced here: http://t.co/G23CWH904E)
And theres whatever the announcement is during the WTS finals on Saturday morning (though I think its something PvP related).
Would be nice to get the release date as the morning announcement, but I highly doubt thats what it will be.
This. The height of GamesCom hasn’t happened yet. ANet has told us there is at least one big announcement coming Saturday, plus a big PoI on Friday. It’s like the OP is reading a mystery novel and is annoyed the detective hasn’t solved the murder in the first chapter.
Actually the big POI will be “show off the Central Tyrian Mastery line”.
Not saying its not big, just thought you might not know yet :p
I would rather Anet let us test the game with BWE’s before they release an announcement of date of release. A better polished expansion is better than a rushed release expansion
First of all i thought maybe they are just planning to release it this summer but thats just the general plan and they arent sure yet. Lets see the official autumn beginn is on the 23.09.2015 so we still got a good month.
Arena net has already confirmed big features like guild halls will come after the realease of the expansion and now ign said there will be only 3 legendarys at the release of Heart of Thornes. I got more and more the feeling Anet is going to realese the game unfinished and way earlier we have thought before so while we playing the first part of the expansion Anet is going to finish the second part and then we are going for the living story sasion 3. Maybe we dont even get all pve maps who knows. What do you guys think about making an earlier release so Anet could stop this big down time without any content and would get more time for finishing the other features before starting living story again.
They’d have to refund A LOT of veterans’ money if they pulled that stunt.
Maybe the new players that paid only $10 for the expansion would be ok with it, but the vets that got screwed out of $50 would go through the roof.
So you would prefer to wait another half year without any new content ? Anet would just delete the content hole we are into at the moment when they would release HoT in 2 parts. First part summer second part winter and 2016 the next sasion living story could start.
Releasing “this summer” was never an official date and shouldn’t have been said. The guy is a part of the marketing team, so that would have been their internal goal. This summer was the most optimal launch window after all, since they would get the most out of their holiday events, which would keep players active.
Releasing before October however is quickly becoming very unrealistic. They would really have to rush at this point and announce the date as soon as possible. Generally, there’s a 2-3 month gap between the announcement and launch, which would put a realistic release around November. ArenaNet isn’t exactly standard however and I suspect to see a living world styled expansion delivered over time, since that’s their thing. I really wouldn’t be surprised to see only the one main map at launch.
As for the confirmed to be delayed content, it really doesn’t matter. The core content that the majority wants is all they really need to launch with. Most people are going to be busy with the core game and masteries anyways for the first month, or however long it’ll take. They really only need to launch with a sample of everything else. Guild halls can be swapped, so only 1 is really needed. Although I would expect to see a sample of “challenging group content”, they could easily delay it by requiring certain masteries, such as gliding and combat/lore, and guild perks (assuming they’re guild raids).
most likely on 3rd anniversary of gw2, if they can rush it out
Highly unlikely. They have their first large scale beta this weekend. The anniversary is in 3 weeks. That is not even remotely enough time to work on feedback gathered during this weekends test.
We also know that there will be at least one more BWE, and it is quite pointless to have it without first having worked on issues from the first one. Thus it is unlikely that we will see BWE2 before the anniversary.
No one paying attention thinks they’re going to hit the anniversary. Saying “definitely this year” is saying “definitely not this month”. That’s seizing massive wiggle room. They want to gather live feedback on four elite specs this weekend. The other 5 aren’t done yet and they’ll need that kind of live testing too.
My guess would be their internal Do-or-Die has become Black Friday for holiday sales. Since even the folks normally stocking the gem store every week seem to have vanished into the resources black hole of HoT-is-running-late, I’d guess they are sprinting pretty hard even to hit that date.
Oh, and having 3 new Legendaries ready to go out of SEVENTEEN is a sick joke.
“You keep saying ‘its unfair.’
I wonder what your basis for comparison is…”
- Jareth, King of Goblins.
NO one paid 10 bucks for the expansion… how do you come up with this stuff?
Using math of the “1 + 1 = 11” kind:
Newbies could buy the base game for $40 from 3rd party vendors.
Alternatively for $50, they can buy the expac, which includes the base game.
$50 – $40 = $10 for the expac, or so goes the math.
That could be a fair interpretation if ANet were still selling the base game for $40. Instead, ANet only offers the expac, which costs $50 and includes the base game.
John Smith: “you should kill monsters, because killing monsters is awesome.”
NO one paid 10 bucks for the expansion… how do you come up with this stuff?
Using math of the “1 + 1 = 11” kind:
Newbies could buy the base game for $40 from 3rd party vendors.
Alternatively for $50, they can buy the expac, which includes the base game.
$50 – $40 = $10 for the expac, or so goes the math.
That could be a fair interpretation if ANet were still selling the base game for $40. Instead, ANet only offers the expac, which costs $50 and includes the base game.
Not only that but before opening up pre-purchases, GW2 had been on sale multiple times for 10 dollars.
In addition, Anet themselves argue that the expansion is 50 dollars and that the base game is given for free and that the expansion would’ve been 50 dollars even if the base game wasn’t included (of course not everyone believes Anet but that is the official statement regardless).
Ok so I was having some fun. Below is past gw release dates.
Guild wars – Thursday April 28th 2005
Factions – Friday April 26th 2006
Nightfall – Thursday October 26th 2006
Eotn – Friday August 31st 2007
Gw2 – Friday August 28th 2012.
So it appears overall they like to release games on the 26th and the 28th. They also like to release on Thursdays and Fridays. So the next time a 26th or 28th lands on a Thursday or Friday is thanksgiving.
No I’m not saying this is the release date. Could be like the random eotn expansion. Was just for fun thinking, that I hope it comes out before December
Most major releases are on Thursdays (at least NA) for most publishers. Unless you’re Nintendo, who are special snowflakes. They like Sundays.
Anyway, I believe those dates are coincidence. I’m questioning if it’s even this year.
ANet devs made several comments at GamesCom that HoT is launching this year. Given their extreme reluctance to ever commit to any release until they’re very sure of themselves, I don’t anticipate a delay to 2016 barring major catastrophe.
It’s clear now, however, that it won’t release for the anniversary. They aren’t even revealing the challenging group content until after the anniversary date and they still have four more elite weeks on tap.
I just noticed that one of their official retail partners has put HoT on sale with 15-10-2015 as release date.
Sadly still no CE, so if you want a hard copy, you can now buy the standard pre-purchase edition, or if you really want a disc you can buy the normal edition as that will have a DvD but then you won’t get the pre-purchase advantages.
I figured you guys might be interested in this information.
