Guild Wars 2

Is the expansion a good value?

Given that they’re making content across such a disparate player base, trying to keep explorers, crafters, pvp-ers, story experiencers, etc. happy, I think it will be. I think as much as players tout the game’s versatility to others as a selling point, they’ve forgotten (or don’t care) how much development resources it takes to go in any one direction, let alone all the directions.

Will there be lots of new content? Probably. Will there a whole lot of content for how I play? Probably not. Is it easy to try a different branch of content? Yes.

The only other way I can think of how they could have done this is by making a pvp specific expansion or an exploration specific expansion or a living story based expansion, etc. which would displease the players who enjoy the different modes of play by ‘favoring’ one playstyle over the other. Or, if the other playstyles got updates while the expansion halted progress for a major update for a specific playstyle, there would be more grief about having to pay for it while the others get theirs free.

I will say that I think the game needed an expansion if for no other reason than to drum up excitement and press under a unified title. Living story updates were not doing that. Large balance updates were not doing that. There’s a small corner of my brain that protests that all the stuff in the expansion was probably going to be in the game without paying for an expansion, but if this helps keep the game population healthy and not stale, then the price is comparatively small.

Sadly, I had made my monetary contribution to Anet in the form of gems just before they announced an expansion. See, I believed what they said about no expansions and adding on through living story updates, etc. Their communication with their player base sucks. So – I bought a significant amount of gems thinking I’d pitch in to the game and not worry about paying more for content, etc.

Then the expansion was announced and I thought “crap, I’ve already spent what I was going to pay towards the game” and I played a bit less, but didn’t write it off. I eventually figured, fine, it was my fault for assuming the interviews and such were gospel and I should have known they’d switch stance on their business model at some point. After a while I came to the conclusion that sure, I’d buy the expansion. I just wouldn’t buy anything else until then.

Then this happens. I’ve seen nothing that justifies kitten price tag for the new content. Like another poster said elsewhere, they’ve padded at least $10 into the $50 for new players to have the base game. Nothing is ever “free” in business and if you believe otherwise then you’re living in a fantasy world (…) The fact that I’ve given money to the company to help pay for it means nothing at this point. I’m being expected to fork out $50 for a sub-standard amount of content. Not even an additional character slot as a carrot to lead me on.

I think at the heart of it, I’m just too tired of Anet shifting their stance on everything. I’ve thought they have no idea what they’re doing before and I keep thinking that every time they change things around… again… and I think I’ve hit my limit this time.

$50 can buy a whole new game with new worlds to explore.

I’ve said in my other post that I’ve never agreed with the economical arguments that “you could have done something better, so you lost ‘x’ amount”. That sort of envious deficit thinking leads to jealousy (and jealous whining), in my opinion. So I don’t care that new players get a $10+ value in the base game free. I’ve gotten free hats, boosts, living story updates that can’t even be played anymore (yet) just for playing the game since launch that they will never have. And for playing the game and getting achievement points, a few of the rewards included gems, essentially paying me back for playing. My account is worth more and worth far more to me than what I’ve paid money into it. I’m sorry you don’t feel the same way about your account.

I believed them when they said “buy the game and that’s it”, too. That’s what my last sentence in the initial post was about, but unlike you, I don’t blame them for changing their minds. Circumstances change and nothing lasts forever. I also said in my other post that I’m guessing that it will be added to the gem store (just like the deluxe edition of the base game), which may mean it can be earned through trading gold for gems and keep their original statement true.

Not all “whole new game”s have as many ways to play as GW2. It’s like calculating the area of a circle then seeing how much more radius you get if you apply the same area to the outside of the circumference. Even though you’ve doubled the area (same amount of work to make), you aren’t getting getting double the radius (progress in one direction). So even if they took as much time to make this expansion as it took to make the base game (excluding developing the UI and engine), there still would be this perception of “it’s not enough for the price”.