Guild Wars 2

A lot of imo justified criticism about the p.story and how anet went about it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aEla26siA0&feature=g-all-u

GW2 isn’t trying to be SWTOR or Mass Effect 3 but I really think that Jeff Grub, Ree Soesbee and the content creation team should take this video seriously and think what they want to improve for the next expansion/content patch. A lot of reviewers think that the personal story is the weakest part of GW2.

The final battle with Zhaitan, the copy-pasted mission templates for every order, choices having no impact, characters dying that you barely knew, fan-service, it all should be looked at. If you don’t have time, don’t rush something out that’s just completely embarrassing.

So I made the mistake of addressing Anet in my thread.

Looking at his other lore videos, does anyone else think they Arenanet should pick him up? He’s really good at connecting dots and coming up with theories that make the world feel more complete (even if some of them don’t come true).

He does have some good ideas and valid points. In regards to the GW2 personal story I agree that there were too many choices and it makes for a less developed story in the end. It reminds me of those books called choose your own adventure or twist a plot that came out a few years back. They have the same problem. In order to provide more choices you have to sacrifice in depth treatment of plot and characters. As WoodenPotatoes pointed out, there were a number of interesting missions that led to dead ends with no further development of that event. I also agree that the cutscenes were not as engaging as they might have been. I wish they had kept the same style as they had in GW1. Some of those cutscenes were memorable….not so for the ones in GW2. In any case, I still think the general storyline is a good one and I have enjoyed doing the missions.

I agree with a lot of what he talks about.

The one thing that didn’t really ‘click’ until there was a brief change, was the way conversations are carried out. 1 on 1 talking. It isn’t really a bad thing, but as he mentions it gets stale quickly and can often take you out of the pace of the game.
This was changed in some dungeons (Where characters would talk to others in the background as you played, if you wanted to listen you would need to move yourself closer. Very much a nice thing) and sometimes in the personal story when a cutscene takes place (Such as when you are introduced to your mentor when joining an order and especially a cutscene involving that said mentor at Claw Island).

I think every comment he made was valid and should be taken with consideration, but I have 100% faith in ANet to improve on this because when looking back at the original game, Prophecies was the worst when it came to story telling and it became amazing and engaging by Nightfall.

The one thing I have said all along was also that I would rather have the conversations actually happen in the world. Anytime Trahearne or whatever NPC has dialog and it happens while I am playing I enjoy that 100% more then my awkward character animations and facial expressions and horrendous Norn female voice. I wouldn’t even mind if my character didn’t talk at all but I could imagine what she would say instead.. I don’t like having any control of it. People have very strong idea’s of what their personalities will be like if they enjoy RP and this just takes all the power away.

The only place I can see the cut scenes having value is in the open world when there are other people around so when you’re the “hero” there isn’t 5 other heroes standing beside you doing the same thing

I completely agree with him and I hope the devs will give his video a watch. (and hopefully take some of what he said to heart)

I’m highly enjoying the majority of the game except the personal story.

I already said it in the other thread about him, though what he’s saying is by no means unique. He’s just summarising what a great many players have said before him and passing it off as it own opinion. Of course, it may be his opinion as well, but he is by no means more important that the countless other individuals bringing up the exact same points.

The personal story does indeed have flaws, but it’s fluff at the end of the day. Let’s be realistic here, it’s a giant ‘what if’ scenario at best – since we can’t all be the sole saviours of Tyria. That’s not to say it wasn’t a little disappointing, but I’m curious as to what people expected from it.

Rannulf.9417:

A lot of imo justified criticism about the p.story and how anet went about it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aEla26siA0&feature=g-all-u

Oh God, that hurt to listen to.
First 7 minutes were nothing but rambling and ‘justifying’ his opinions.

Coulda taken 30 seconds to get that point across.
Had to stop the video for 5 minutes and go do something interesting, and then never bothered finishing the other 28 minutes of video.

If he really wants to be taken seriously, he needs to learn to be To The Point. I mean, this wasn’t some “random rambling while playing the game”. It was a voice recording overlayed onto gameplay footage.

Viro.1526:

Rannulf.9417:

A lot of imo justified criticism about the p.story and how anet went about it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aEla26siA0&feature=g-all-u

Oh God, that hurt to listen to.
First 7 minutes were nothing but rambling and ‘justifying’ his opinions.

Coulda taken 30 seconds to get that point across.
Had to stop the video for 5 minutes and go do something interesting, and then never bothered finishing the other 28 minutes of video.

If he really wants to be taken seriously, he needs to learn to be To The Point. I mean, this wasn’t some “random rambling while playing the game”. It was a voice recording overlayed onto gameplay footage.

So exactly how large is your attention sp – SQUIRELL!!

I know plenty of patient people who find the vast majority of generic Youtube ‘celebrities’ grating, especially when they’re bringing nothing new to the table. This is a board for lore discussion. I don’t see how linking someone’s Youtube channel is meant to encourage that, especially when the OP doesn’t even explain or elaborate on things beyond a generic ‘he brings up good points’.

Garenthal.1480:

I know plenty of patient people who find the vast majority of generic Youtube ‘celebrities’ grating, especially when they’re bringing nothing new to the table. This is a board for lore discussion. I don’t see how linking someone’s Youtube channel is meant to encourage that, especially when the OP doesn’t even explain or elaborate on things beyond a generic ‘he brings up good points’.

I’ve been watching his videos here and there for quite a while now and he’s got literally days worth great material to watch/listen, specially for GW1. He’s seems very enthusiast and passionate in them and I’ve learned so much more in them of Guild Wars than I could have anywhere else, in easy, understandable and fun manner. I don’t always see things as he does when it comes down to opinions, but his knowledge of the lore just seems endless and me disagreeing with some of his views doesn’t degrade the “learning” experience in the least. I used quotes in that because I’ve been blessed with the worst memory ever.

Quick edit.
I just realized what forum section this was and maybe this could be better in the personal story one.

At the very least they should have an historian NPC in an expansion who tells a tale of lore, and have this guy do the voice for him.