GW2 and in-game lore: things I feel need improvement

GW2 and in-game lore: things I feel need improvement

in Lore

Posted by: Lonami.2987

Lonami.2987

Tyria’s lore is pretty good. I love it, it has a good timeline and it’s pretty much retcon-clear. ArenaNet did a great job keeping this jewel getting shinier and prettier since they started the franchise.

But the game doesn’t do it justice. Why? I’ll divide this post in various sections. Note that I’ll focus on details a lot, things that you won’t care about if you don’t care about lore too much.

It’s going to be long, so let’s get started:

(There could be spoilers, you’re warned)
(There’s a TL;DR at the end for the laziest ones, spoiler-free)

==Personal Story and the open world==

Sometimes, the personal story feels completely out of place from what you see in the open world. Look, in the open world, that house is a hunter lodge. On the personal storyline, it’s the hideout of the White Mantle.

The funny part is nothing from one version matches with the another. Nothing. The open world has a series of characters, the personal story version has another. And none of them are present at both places. It’s like if they were two different places, except they’re not, because they’re in the same position on the map, and they have the same name.

And this happens with most of the personal storyline. That character who is important and is standing there? Go on the personal storyline, and he doesn’t exit. No mention. Same for the personal story characters. All of them are virtually missing from the world. They don’t exist. It’s almost if the personal story was a parallel world, and what happens there doesn’t happen on the open world, at all. In the few cases both versions share a character, it’s like if they have amnesia and never where present at the personal story.

It’s awful for the immersion and the in-game lore, when it could be fixed without a lot of work. Want an example on how to fix it?

Let’s take Carys and Tegwen. Two sylvari wardens. Before the personal story, they’re watching a beach, and once you end their arc, they go back to watch it. Guess what, in the real world, they don’t exist. How does this even make sense?

Easy way to fix it: Leave them at the open world, with some kind of generic talk. Make them tell you they’re watching over the beach, they learn from each other, they face lot of dangers, etc.

If you chose the path that leads to them, once you start it, both of them disappear. For those who didn’t chose it, they disappear once they reach the personal story quest of the same level. Once you complete their arc, they reappear, and their dialog changes to the “completed” version, with a subtle change to recognize you, the one who helped them in the story. If you didn’t chose the path that leads to them, then your talk with them mentions some unknown hero (Unknown is unknown, it should be left open, and not assigned to any specific lore character). They would appear when you finish your parallel arc (all arcs start and end at the same levels, so that helps us make all appear/disappear happen at the same time, even if the story of each player is different).

And that’s all. Carys and Tegwen suddenly start existing on the world. Was it that hard? And this can be applied for pretty much all situations. And when there’s different endings? Show what happened to those who played it, and leave it generic and open for those who didn’t.

Those gladiators you fight in the arena on the personal story? Make them appear back, anywhere. I just want to see them, but they aren’t anywhere on the entire world. That powerful guy you killed? Make characters nearby on the open world mention the deeds of an anonymous warrior who slew a terrible beast. If the beast was huge, if you leave a corpse then that would be even better. Of course, always on a generic tone to avoid spoilers from players discussing stuff one sees and the another doesn’t.

And it would be fabulous if you recycled characters, so instead of having random-guy-A and random-guy-B with minor roles, both characters are the same, giving them some more depth. For example, any of those allies that want you to brawl with them for a skill point. When you need a random character on the personal storyline, why not use one of those?

Make the world alive by making its characters alive, and by letting them walk across the world, and meet with you once again. Take advantage of the instanced nature of the personal storyline to combine it with the open world, and make characters grow with you and the world. Make them have their own story, too.

Elonian elite specialization ideas: El: Dervish
M: Bladedancer – N: Scourge – En: Occultist – Ra: Swampstalker
T: Sharpshooter – G: Sunspear – Re: Hierophant – W: Corsair

(edited by Lonami.2987)

GW2 and in-game lore: things I feel need improvement

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Posted by: Lonami.2987

Lonami.2987

==Novel characters missing from the game==

Find me in the novels, miss me in-game. One of the things I usually dislike about videogame novels is they usually make a lot of new characters, which is nice, but sometimes you wish they used already existing characters. This works retroactively, when you see characters created in the novels are nowhere in-game.

Of course, I’m talking about minor characters. Those that “don’t matter”. Well, they do. I don’t care about Dougal Keane being there, because it’s common sense, being a major character and all. What I would love is to see minor people, like Fellblow the Savage. Instead of making a new character to just gossip on that corner of the map, use him. I know you love the details, so why not have this character, sat down near a tree, talking about something that indirectly references the events of Ghost of Ascalon? Don’t tell me that wouldn’t be awesome. Unless you’re saving those characters for something, they should appear in-game. You could even add them (or new texts to characters already existing in-game that appeared in the novel) before the novel is out, to kind of advertise it, or just after it’s released.

I’m not sure how much ArenaNet follows this. I think I’ve seen Crusader Naugatl in Orr, and I haven’t explored every single corner to see if those minor characters are there, waiting to be discovered. In any case, if you do it, then great job, and I’m off to find them.

I think the fans really appreciate when the game and the out-game material match perfectly at every possible situation. When you read a novel, you want to meet those characters in-game. All of them, even that guy that had just one line.

==The story is scarce and hard to find==

I know most of the game’s story is delivered through NPC conversations and hearing what they say, but that’s just too complicated, and it doesn’t work well when you want to detail the past in a good-sized text.

Of course, long quest texts are terrible, and adding them on NPC texts would be pretty annoying, having to click “next” dozens of times.

How could this be fixed?

Collectible lore books.

You have a new tab at your Hero panel, just below “My Story”, above “Crafting”. In this new tab, you collect books. Once you find them, they get unlocked here, and you can read them again when you want, where you want. If you want to go even further, they could have voices, narrator and characters involved. Even more, you could let people “play” them on public. Imagine some friends around a campfire, and one of them says “Hey, I found this horror book, wanna hear its scary story about some golems which grew intelligent and enslaved their asura master?”.

There should be books about everything, like jokes, history, child tales, lab journals… They would be scattered across the world. Kinda like jumping puzzles, they’re there, but you don’t know where. To help find them, you should be able to categorize them by zone (aside from genre, which would be the default classification) on your lore books tab, so you know you’re missing some in X zone, and don’t need to search on the 25 zones.

Just imagine the possibilities of collectible lore books. Don’t tell me it wouldn’t be awesome.

Elonian elite specialization ideas: El: Dervish
M: Bladedancer – N: Scourge – En: Occultist – Ra: Swampstalker
T: Sharpshooter – G: Sunspear – Re: Hierophant – W: Corsair

(edited by Lonami.2987)

GW2 and in-game lore: things I feel need improvement

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Posted by: Lonami.2987

Lonami.2987

==Personal story forgetting about you==

For those who played GW1, this section can be summarized easily: Trahearne, the new Kormir.

I haven’t played the entire personal story, due to a bug, but I’ve started to see reactions to certain stuff. For example, characters from previous parts of the personal storyline you meet again after a while. And not only they don’t remember you, but they praise lore characters for saving them, when it was you who saved them.

Wait, what?

This is insulting. To start with, when you didn’t meet them before, they should praise “anonymous heroes”, to leave it open for those who did meet them. For those who met them, they should praise them.

The personal story model should respect these not-so-small details, in my opinion. I haven’t suffered it myself yet, but I know I will due to what I’ve chosen. It’s not hard to imagine the faces of other players when those they helped get amnesia and praise a lazy dude who did nothing to save them.

Please, some small fixes on this would be nice. It’s totally immersion breaking, and it can be fixed easily, following the same methods I described on the first section, “Personal Story and the open world”.

==Replaying the renown hearts and the personal story==

Both of these have a lot of lore, that gets lost after you complete them. My suggestion? Let players replay them, on some kind of “challenge mode”.

For example, make the renown hearts resettable, and add a timer. If you complete it before the timer expires, you get some kind of reward and your record is saved. Could be done zone-wide, too, so people can replay everything without needing a new character (One of the things I hate most is finding a scout after I completed his hearts, or completing a heart accidentally, both because I miss their pre-completion texts).

As for the personal storyline, I don’t think you should be able to change your decisions, but you should be able to replay the different missions. You could use the “My Story” tab. Just add a “remember the story” button, and let people replay that mission. You could add some special challenge, too, so people want to replay it. One of the bad things of the personal story as it is now is your invited friends get no decent rewards. This “remember” mode could have some nice twists to the enemies, while keeping the story so you can watch the cinematics once again without needing to restart the game or watch videos.

I know you hate when content goes useless, that’s why you scale player level so they can visit each zone without worrying about them being too easy. Don’t you think it’s a pity that the personal story and all the work put into it go to waste once you complete it?

Elonian elite specialization ideas: El: Dervish
M: Bladedancer – N: Scourge – En: Occultist – Ra: Swampstalker
T: Sharpshooter – G: Sunspear – Re: Hierophant – W: Corsair

(edited by Lonami.2987)

GW2 and in-game lore: things I feel need improvement

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Posted by: Lonami.2987

Lonami.2987

And well, that’s all for now. Congratulations if you read the entire wall of text. Feel free to discuss these and other improvements that could be made to how Guild Wars 2 transmits the lore of Tyria.

PS: I know this is more like a suggestion, but since the suggestions forums isn’t open yet, this seems the best place to post it.

A TL;DR for the laziest ones:

  • Personal story should be connected to the open world. Characters should appear in both versions, and they shouldn’t act as if nothing had happened.
  • All characters from the novels should appear in-game, unless they’re being saved for something special.
  • Collectible lore books would help get into the lore better, having longer and more detailed texts than NPC conversations.
  • Personal story characters should remember you if you helped them before, and praise you instead of lore characters.
  • Personal story should be replayable (without changing decisions) just to be able to experience it once again.

I think these 5 points would help the game deliver lore in a better way.

Elonian elite specialization ideas: El: Dervish
M: Bladedancer – N: Scourge – En: Occultist – Ra: Swampstalker
T: Sharpshooter – G: Sunspear – Re: Hierophant – W: Corsair

(edited by Lonami.2987)

GW2 and in-game lore: things I feel need improvement

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Posted by: Homitu.7216

Homitu.7216

==Personal story forgetting about you==

For those who played GW1, this section can be summarized easily: Trahearne, the new Kormir.

I haven’t played the entire personal story, due to a bug, but I’ve started to see reactions to certain stuff. For example, characters from previous parts of the personal storyline you meet again after a while. And not only they don’t remember you, but they praise lore characters for saving them, when it was you who saved them.

Wait, what?

This is insulting. To start with, when you didn’t meet them before, they should praise “anonymous heroes”, to leave it open for those who did meet them. For those who met them, they should praise them.

The personal story model should respect these not-so-small details, in my opinion. I haven’t suffered it myself yet, but I know I will due to what I’ve chosen. It’s not hard to imagine the faces of other players when those they helped get amnesia and praise a lazy dude who did nothing to save them.

Please, some small fixes on this would be nice. It’s totally immersion breaking, and it can be fixed easily, following the same methods I described on the first section, “Personal Story and the open world”.

Spoiler warnings ahead

I agreed with a lot of what you said, but concerning this bit, I almost couldn’t disagree more. I felt exactly the opposite, that I was being endlessly praised as THE hero when I was just one of many who had a hand in helping out. I also didn’t quite buy my character’s ascension up the chain of command during each respective story arc. I was appointed as a Durmand Priory magister, max rank within the organization, after completing just two full missions. What?

Soon after, as the story reaches its macro scope, I’m suddenly the glue that connects all three organizations. I become the freaking commander in the assault on Zhaitan. Me, a Sylvari who was just born last week! I simply couldn’t buy it. I still felt like I was a novice Sylvari, nevermind a novice Priory member or citizen of Tyria.

GW2 and in-game lore: things I feel need improvement

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Posted by: Lonami.2987

Lonami.2987

That’s not the problem I’m referring to. It’s you transition from hero to no one, suddenly. But it’s just a footnote on the real problem: You’re a hero, but then everyone forgets. Be a hero or not, but remove that amnesia away and avoid repeating the awful mistake of establishing Kormir doing what you did, when she didn’t.

Elonian elite specialization ideas: El: Dervish
M: Bladedancer – N: Scourge – En: Occultist – Ra: Swampstalker
T: Sharpshooter – G: Sunspear – Re: Hierophant – W: Corsair

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Posted by: Alucardalina Claire.9825

Alucardalina Claire.9825

I just want to add into the hero part. I feel your concerns, really, but they’re just pulling an old GW1 trick.
A lot of people don’t seem to notice, but you were never the hero in GW1. All the henchmen/heroes and characters you encountered were. It plays it up as if you were, as if everyone were. But really it’s them doing everything. In GW2 it’s actually Destiny’s Edge that are the heroes. You’re there to witness it all, and it’s kind of like self inserting a character into your favorite book. It’s a dirty trick on our minds to make us feel important, but that’s why I like it.

The missing characters as far as the White Mantle hideout thing. Well, I kind of feel as if there’s a small skip in time, but that these people were all hiding secretly. Maybe they get together at ____o’clock and we just had fortunate timing. I dunno. I figure everyone has their own agenda and it’d be too difficult to make anything outside of instanced areas fit with a player’s personal story progression at any given time.

Also, as far as the characters from the books, I recommend visiting Kileen’s grave in the Plains of Ruin. Very often will characters from GoA travel there to pay their respects. They’re not right in your face all the time and I think it’s very fitting.

As for the lore books, it may be good for some people, but I honestly like stumbling upon those random npc’s talking about what happened or through buildings and monuments. I mean, if you pay enough attention to the world around you, slow down and actually try and take it all in, you learn quite a bit. When you decide to play through with another character, you might even find something different. It’s like a surprise and I love surprises. But I understand it’s not exactly the best way for those who don’t want to slow down and take the scenic route. It caters to only one style of gameplay, but I, personally, am fine with all of these things.

But yes, not everyone agrees on all of this, and though I understand where you are coming from, I kind of like it the way it already is.

GW2 and in-game lore: things I feel need improvement

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Posted by: Cancer.9065

Cancer.9065

==Personal story forgetting about you==

For those who played GW1, this section can be summarized easily: Trahearne, the new Kormir.

I haven’t played the entire personal story, due to a bug, but I’ve started to see reactions to certain stuff. For example, characters from previous parts of the personal storyline you meet again after a while. And not only they don’t remember you, but they praise lore characters for saving them, when it was you who saved them.

Wait, what?

This is insulting. To start with, when you didn’t meet them before, they should praise “anonymous heroes”, to leave it open for those who did meet them. For those who met them, they should praise them.

The personal story model should respect these not-so-small details, in my opinion. I haven’t suffered it myself yet, but I know I will due to what I’ve chosen. It’s not hard to imagine the faces of other players when those they helped get amnesia and praise a lazy dude who did nothing to save them.

Please, some small fixes on this would be nice. It’s totally immersion breaking, and it can be fixed easily, following the same methods I described on the first section, “Personal Story and the open world”.

Spoiler warnings ahead

I agreed with a lot of what you said, but concerning this bit, I almost couldn’t disagree more. I felt exactly the opposite, that I was being endlessly praised as THE hero when I was just one of many who had a hand in helping out. I also didn’t quite buy my character’s ascension up the chain of command during each respective story arc. I was appointed as a Durmand Priory magister, max rank within the organization, after completing just two full missions. What?

Soon after, as the story reaches its macro scope, I’m suddenly the glue that connects all three organizations. I become the freaking commander in the assault on Zhaitan. Me, a Sylvari who was just born last week! I simply couldn’t buy it. I still felt like I was a novice Sylvari, nevermind a novice Priory member or citizen of Tyria.

Hey in times of war you work with what you have, when most capable people are either dead or already have a high ranking position you promote whomever seems good enough to do the job and hope for the best.

“I need a corporal. You’re it until you’re dead or I find someone better” Starship Troopers.

Cancer is also a Zodiac sign.

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Posted by: Hunter.6950

Hunter.6950

I just want to add into the hero part. I feel your concerns, really, but they’re just pulling an old GW1 trick.
A lot of people don’t seem to notice, but you were never the hero in GW1. All the henchmen/heroes and characters you encountered were. It plays it up as if you were, as if everyone were. But really it’s them doing everything. In GW2 it’s actually Destiny’s Edge that are the heroes. You’re there to witness it all, and it’s kind of like self inserting a character into your favorite book. It’s a dirty trick on our minds to make us feel important, but that’s why I like it.

I couldn’t agree more

Dragons’ Solstice [SoL]
Maguuma Server

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Posted by: Gmr Leon.1846

Gmr Leon.1846

Shortly before the last beta ended, I suggested something similar to the “lore books” but with what I find to be a somewhat more flexible solution, but only in terms of the style. Scrolls > books, but same basic concept. More or less agree there and especially with the replayable personal story. After completing a recent mission I ran into the issue of recalling the dialogue (which the wiki didn’t have up yet) and finding myself unable to, a big hit in the face after being able to for so long in the first game.

Grydd, asuran engineer perpetually gathering materials.
Member of The Archivists’ Sanctum [Lore], a guild for lore enthusiasts.
The Adventurer’s Log!

GW2 and in-game lore: things I feel need improvement

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Posted by: Lonami.2987

Lonami.2987

As for the lore books, it may be good for some people, but I honestly like stumbling upon those random npc’s talking about what happened or through buildings and monuments. I mean, if you pay enough attention to the world around you, slow down and actually try and take it all in, you learn quite a bit. When you decide to play through with another character, you might even find something different. It’s like a surprise and I love surprises. But I understand it’s not exactly the best way for those who don’t want to slow down and take the scenic route. It caters to only one style of gameplay, but I, personally, am fine with all of these things.

But yes, not everyone agrees on all of this, and though I understand where you are coming from, I kind of like it the way it already is.

The current model is inefficient to tell story in larger contexts. If you want to read something long, dialogs and book items don’t work well. The lore books would fix. Don’t tell me it wouldn’t be awesome to have all the diaries of Ebonhawke packed into a single place you can check whenever you want.

Elonian elite specialization ideas: El: Dervish
M: Bladedancer – N: Scourge – En: Occultist – Ra: Swampstalker
T: Sharpshooter – G: Sunspear – Re: Hierophant – W: Corsair

GW2 and in-game lore: things I feel need improvement

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Posted by: Konig Des Todes.2086

Konig Des Todes.2086

A TL;DR for the laziest ones:

  • Personal story should be connected to the open world. Characters should appear in both versions, and they shouldn’t act as if nothing had happened.
  • All characters from the novels should appear in-game, unless they’re being saved for something special.
  • Collectible lore books would help get into the lore better, having longer and more detailed texts than NPC conversations.
  • Personal story characters should remember you if you helped them before, and praise you instead of lore characters.
  • Personal story should be replayable (without changing decisions) just to be able to experience it once again.

I think these 5 points would help the game deliver lore in a better way.

1) This is already done to some degree. Most NPCs from the personal story appear in home instance after the fact, but others such as the order members who recruit you can often be found in the racial city. Another more closer to what you’re wanting example is in the sylvari storyline – lvl 20-30 arc, forgot which level – you can chose to work with the Whispers for getting the sword back at a pit fight. After it, the maintainer/announcer of the arena will say to you something along the lines of “oh, you’re back? Sorry, there’s no fights today. Got to clean up the mess from the last one.”

2) Most do, at least important ones. Destiny’s Edge is obvious and the only one of semi-importance I don’t think made it into the game is the leader of the Lionguard, which I find odd (Magus the Bloody-Handed or some such). Ghosts of Ascalon’s main characters… well, Almorra’s in, obviously – so is Ember and Dougal as well as Killeen’s graves. I’ve heard Gullix can be found periodically too.

3) Agreed. I’d like.

4) Does exist sometimes, but does need improvements.

5) Yes yes yesyesyesyesyeyseysyesyeysyeyeysyes. At least after completing it all maybe?

Dear ANet writers,
Stop treating GW2 as a single story. Each Season and expansion should be their own story.

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Posted by: Garenthal.1480

Garenthal.1480

I agree with pretty much everything you brought up. Consistency is very important, especially when we’ve got such a huge, richly detailed setting to work with.