Part #1
[Disclaimer] I don’t post often but I do read a variety of forums, both official and non-official, YouTube videos, developer live-streams, etc. I also played guild wars 1 for years, BUT i am no way an expert, but I did want to voice my opinions for once. I ask my audience to respect those wishes and I will treat anyone kindly in turn.
I could go on about all the ways that I was disappointed in the fractal storyline that many of the lore fans and GW1 veterans were expecting, and some of the ‘upcoming dragon hopefuls’, but the one point I have not seen anyone bring up was how the planned book for the Thaumanova Incident and the fleshed out origin stories of the Infinity Coil Reactor were completely scrapped for Scarlet, despite the general consensus of mild annoyance to fits of rage towards her character.. I think that was one of the biggest disappointments that occurred today, because a chance to get insight into a project that was planned and subsequently scrapped would have been an amazing lore opportunity. This was a massive letdown for me personally. In the previous game, they hinted at events and then delivered massive lore, back story, and extremely polished high quality, immersive content. (The introduction of Cantha as a new continent is a great example, it was always referenced as ‘A Place’ but actually getting what we did for how little emphasis was placed on it originally was incredibly hard to comprehend at the time and was more then a pleasant surprise).
It seems that a vocal faction (large or small who knows?) of the player-base is never satisfied, but with each release it seems to grow more and more, even to the point of second level news outlets and YouTube personalities openly criticizing elements of the game, a game they obviously are invested in, and a game that obviously many players have strong feelings of hope about because they care about its continued development and growth, and continue to invest their time and money into, just like a child.
To me, Guild Wars 2 seems to take the roll of the wayward child, one who lacks any sort of Filial Piety to the original product or vision.
“in Confucian thought, one of the virtues to be cultivated, a love and respect for one’s parents and ancestors”
Guild Wars 2 seems to constantly stray from it’s roots time and time again, from the decisions made which could be seen as going against the manifesto (I understand time and circumstances change), to including and using limited amounts of lore from the previous game (which I understand is intentional); yet these incidences are becoming more consistent (armor re-skins which devalue those who worked for the cultural armor, be it through gold or real life money invested in gems) are not reassuring to the community (scaling back fractal levels, as an example) and the overall lack of substance from updates.