Guild Wars 2

Ayrilana.1396:

I don’t understand why it matters though. You left the game roughly a year ago so you had to expect and accept that you would miss out on all of the content until you got back. Whether or not there is an option to purchase episodes or not doesn’t matter in this case.

I added emphasis. Now I am back. But I don’t have access to content. I am asked to buy it like this was a DLC or something. That’s not right at all.

Yes I expected to miss on “ocasional event” (christmas, valentine, w/e). I didn’t expect to miss permanent content.
Imagine you played idk what MMO. You go away for a while. In the meantime they add a new map. When you come back you cannot access that new map unless you pay. This is garbage.

That’s why I asked, why do I have access to the new PvP map then? I wasn’t active at that time, so I should be denied access if we are consistent. May I shouldn’t have access to the new traits either.

GW2 wasn’t supposed to be pay to play crap where you have to buy each patch like its some kind of stupid DLC.

An example for why it matters:

Imagine you are using Microsoft Windows. For some reason you don’t have access to your computer for while or chose to run Linux for a few months (the reason doesn’t matter at all. It is your choice.).
Now for some reason, you wanna go back to MS Windows. Sadly, you missed Service Pack 1 and a few other patches. This awesome patch added new features, fixed some bug, w/e. Wouldn’t you mind if you had to buy all those pacthes, one buy one, even tough you already bought your Windows licence a while ago? I would go crazy.

Xaqq.7562:

Ayrilana.1396:

I don’t understand why it matters though. You left the game roughly a year ago so you had to expect and accept that you would miss out on all of the content until you got back. Whether or not there is an option to purchase episodes or not doesn’t matter in this case.

I added emphasis. Now I am back. But I don’t have access to content. I am asked to buy it like this was a DLC or something. That’s not right at all.

Yes I expected to miss on “ocasional event” (christmas, valentine, w/e). I didn’t expect to miss permanent content.
Imagine you played idk what MMO. You go away for a while. In the meantime they add a new map. When you come back you cannot access that new map unless you pay. This is garbage.

That’s why I asked, why do I have access to the new PvP map then? I wasn’t active at that time, so I should be denied access if we are consistent. May I shouldn’t have access to the new traits either.

GW2 wasn’t supposed to be pay to play crap where you have to buy each patch like its some kind of stupid DLC.

An example for why it matters:

Imagine you are using Microsoft Windows. For some reason you don’t have access to your computer for while or chose to run Linux for a few months (the reason doesn’t matter at all. It is your choice.).
Now for some reason, you wanna go back to MS Windows. Sadly, you missed Service Pack 1 and a few other patches. This awesome patch added new features, fixed some bug, w/e. Wouldn’t you mind if you had to buy all those pacthes, one buy one, even tough you already bought your Windows licence a while ago? I would go crazy.

Then don’t buy it. You’re no worse off than you were when you left expecting not to experience the content that you would miss.

Xaqq.7562:

Ayrilana.1396:

I don’t understand why it matters though. You left the game roughly a year ago so you had to expect and accept that you would miss out on all of the content until you got back. Whether or not there is an option to purchase episodes or not doesn’t matter in this case.

I added emphasis. Now I am back. But I don’t have access to content. I am asked to buy it like this was a DLC or something. That’s not right at all.

Yes I expected to miss on “ocasional event” (christmas, valentine, w/e). I didn’t expect to miss permanent content.
Imagine you played idk what MMO. You go away for a while. In the meantime they add a new map. When you come back you cannot access that new map unless you pay. This is garbage.

That’s why I asked, why do I have access to the new PvP map then? I wasn’t active at that time, so I should be denied access if we are consistent. May I shouldn’t have access to the new traits either.

GW2 wasn’t supposed to be pay to play crap where you have to buy each patch like its some kind of stupid DLC.

An example for why it matters:

Imagine you are using Microsoft Windows. For some reason you don’t have access to your computer for while or chose to run Linux for a few months (the reason doesn’t matter at all. It is your choice.).
Now for some reason, you wanna go back to MS Windows. Sadly, you missed Service Pack 1 and a few other patches. This awesome patch added new features, fixed some bug, w/e. Wouldn’t you mind if you had to buy all those pacthes, one buy one, even tough you already bought your Windows licence a while ago? I would go crazy.

But you can’t compare it to an operating system because an operating system isn’t like a game. It’s more like an old D&D game.

If you took time off and everyone else was playing, the game progressed. You can never go back and get what you were missing, because everyone is past that.

Anet was trying to create a living world, much like the old D&D games. It’s like watching wrestling on TV. It’s always going on. Always moving forward. You can take ten years off come back and you will have missed some stuff. But you catch up.

And you can buy DvDs to get the Pay Per Views you missed.

Doesn’t stop you from watching today.

Don’t try to compare stuff that happens in a game with an operating system that runs your computer.

Xaqq.7562:

I added emphasis. Now I am back. But I don’t have access to content. I am asked to buy it like this was a DLC or something. That’s not right at all.

Yes I expected to miss on “ocasional event” (christmas, valentine, w/e). I didn’t expect to miss permanent content.
Imagine you played idk what MMO. You go away for a while. In the meantime they add a new map. When you come back you cannot access that new map unless you pay. This is garbage.

That’s why I asked, why do I have access to the new PvP map then? I wasn’t active at that time, so I should be denied access if we are consistent. May I shouldn’t have access to the new traits either.

GW2 wasn’t supposed to be pay to play crap where you have to buy each patch like its some kind of stupid DLC.

An example for why it matters:

Imagine you are using Microsoft Windows. For some reason you don’t have access to your computer for while or chose to run Linux for a few months (the reason doesn’t matter at all. It is your choice.).
Now for some reason, you wanna go back to MS Windows. Sadly, you missed Service Pack 1 and a few other patches. This awesome patch added new features, fixed some bug, w/e. Wouldn’t you mind if you had to buy all those pacthes, one buy one, even tough you already bought your Windows licence a while ago? I would go crazy.

Actually. It is DLC. I’ve said it time and time again. Content costs money to develop. You know, little things like salaries, power, server maintenance, upgrades, and so on.

Imagine you’re in the automotive business and sold a car to someone. Some time down the track they come back and say
“I heard there are new rims out for my car. I want to upgrade rims, but I want it for free because I already own the car” or maybe
“I heard there are new tyres out for my car. I want to upgrade them but I want it for free because I already have the car”

Would you give it to them? Of course not. You’re running a business and it costs labour, parts, power, water and whatever else to do all that.

Xaqq.7562:

Imagine you played idk what MMO. You go away for a while. In the meantime they add a new map. When you come back you cannot access that new map unless you pay. This is garbage.

ALL other MMOs would charge you, because ALL other MMOs charge you to do ANYTHING beyond the basic game (and some — think WoW — continually charge you for even that!)

Only in the Guild Wars family would this question even come up.

Zombiesbum.3502:

Simply put, if you bought a game, you should receive everything that anyone else received regardless if you put the game down for ANY reason.

You say “… you SHOULD receive everything …” (emphasis mine).

Can you tell me where that’s written? Is that a law of gaming or something game companies are required to do?

ANet is the ONLY MMO game company that gives out real content (beyond the basic game) for free. There are no exceptions (that I know of). So, how did you come up with that rule? Unless you reply with some evidence, there is no basis for that statement.

Content delivery-wise, Living Story Season 2 (LS:S2) is exactly the same as LS:S1, with one exception: They’re ALLOWING us to buy it if we missed it. With LS:S1, we can’t buy it. Seems kind of generous to me, especially at the price. They didn’t have to make it available at later dates at all.

Zombiesbum.3502:

I may just say screw the expansion and go play other games, there are other games out there and companies who strive to treat their customers more like human beings.

Name one. Name any MMO company that gives away free content after the original purchase.

Ayrilana.1396:

Everyone that was playing the game between that announcement and the season was well underway understood this.

While I agree with your overall post, I have to disagree with this. I think it could have been better-advertised to existing players. Now, I’m an old fart with aging synopses, but I am a player, and I almost missed it. Blame it on being old, but still, I did almost miss it the first time.

Don’t get me wrong; I logged in most every day then as now. What I mean is that I didn’t understand that you HAD to log in to unlock the content until my son-in-law mentioned it. From that point on, I made certain I logged in.

They advertised GW2 as a complete product which include all future updates for free. This was obvious lie which finaly solidified my stance towards the current policy of Anet and i rather subed for 12,99€ each month to other game. I have no problem with spending money on games but this was just pure money grab and I can’t stand it.

Zombiesbum.3502:

You don’t play WoW or D3 expecting to buy quests (That’s essentially what Anet is doing with GW2).

Excuse me? WoW is the epitome of charging for content. You pay for EVERYTHING, including the right to continue playing it … next month.

ALL MMOs operate on one of three business models:

1. Pay periodically if you want to play.
2. Buy once and play forever (THAT game; NO company promises to keep enhancing it).
3. Get it for free, but only a basic game. It stays free unless you want … extra content.

In all 3 models, you pay for extra content.

With one glaring exception: ANet doesn’t charge IF you log in during a specified time period. Seems to me that ANet is being exceedingly generous. In fact, they’re in a class by themselves.

kimeekat.2548:

I’m interested to see whether your carefree opinion on S1 changes should they ever release S1 episodes — as they have said they ideally would like to do. Perhaps you’ll think you deserve this for free, too, despite the extra work it’ll take for them to make the episodes instanced and add them into the story journal.

Count me in. I’ve said before I would pay 500 gems per episode if they could pull it off.

But, I’m not being overly generous or just a yes-man. I realize they didn’t write the code to allow for this, so it will be much more expensive for them to convert it to the same motif. So, I’m willing to pay a lot more. In fact, I picked 500 gems because that’s $50 US, about the same price as an expansion. It was 16 months of material, roughly what I would have waited had they made it an expansion.

Which brings up another point: what if they included it as HoT-special? Something akin to Digital Deluxe’s relationship to the basic game.

Now where did I put my wallet … ?

Azrael.4960:

I don’t think I’ve ever played a game where content updates have ever been free. Content patches and tweaks yes, but new content being added to the core game has never been, and given any sane business model should never be, free.

I can think of one, but it won’t help his/her argument: GW1 added Sorrow’s Furnace for free. They added hard mode for free. That place you got armbraces from was (I think) a free later addition. They added quests to Pre-Searing Ascalon. And, my personal favorite, those Terminator-saluting quests in the spring.

But, those were hardly of the caliber of LS. They were more like patches to fill holes, for people who had “done it all already”.

But, I sure hope those didn’t contribute to the sense if entitlement recently on display here.

Brahmincorle.1264:

They advertised GW2 as a complete product which include all future updates for free.

Show me.

Daddicus.6128:

Ayrilana.1396:

Everyone that was playing the game between that announcement and the season was well underway understood this.

While I agree with your overall post, I have to disagree with this. I think it could have been better-advertised to existing players. Now, I’m an old fart with aging synopses, but I am a player, and I almost missed it. Blame it on being old, but still, I did almost miss it the first time.

Don’t get me wrong; I logged in most every day then as now. What I mean is that I didn’t understand that you HAD to log in to unlock the content until my son-in-law mentioned it. From that point on, I made certain I logged in.

They had a blog post which I could link if you do not believe me. This blog post was also linked into the news feed you see every time that you log into the game. All active players would have seen this. You then have this spread across the forums and reddit by other players. It was discussed a lot on map chat when the blog post was released just like all of their other blog posts have been. You also had the YouTube bloggers who made videos about it. Various gaming websites also did articles about the change.

The information was very widespread and available to active players.

I agree with the OP and many others on here. It is ridiculous that people who were promised a “pay once for game content” must pay more because they had lives or something happened that disabled them from logging in longer than they expected. All of you and your “Well, you should’ve done this or that” have no idea what our lives are like and the reason behind why we couldn’t log on. Some of us are newcomers to the game and missed Season 1 and most of Season 2 and are being penalized for that as now he have to pay for it. It immediately puts us in a inferior place that makes us feel like we can’t trust ArenaNet or this community for honestly not being understanding about the issue.

No one was told from the beginning that once you buy the game, you must log on every week or be forced to pay up the $$.

I missed Season 1 because it was happening far too fast and I could only log on a few times a week, and I spent that time on my original personal story and fighting Zhaitan. Season 2 happened when I started my first year of grad school and no way did I have time for any games let alone find out that it was REQUIRED to log on in order to still have access to something I already paid for (unlike what ArenaNet promised from day one).

I rarely rant, but this hiccup and the snarky comments from those belittling our experiences has hit a nerve.

Sorry if this is harsh, but there is much frustration on our end.

I really dont’ get this thread (and the ones similar to this one):
- if you’re a ‘veteran’ player, you get the episodes for free just by logging in and out once every 2 weeks (and only during LS updates which ARE NOT every 2 weeks all year round): waste of time: 10 mins (if patch is REALLY big and/or your internet is really slow :P)
ok, you had grad school, other people had other stuff too (jobs etc…), still they logged in (and out, just that), because they were interested in it.

- if you’re a new player, when you log in for the first time you have so much stuff to do that by the time you’re on LS2 you’ll have the 20g to unlock it.
It’s not much and more importantly, <ins>it’s not real currency</ins>!

- if you have a friend in game that has unlocked it you don’t even have to pay that (you basically just pay for the possibility to get the achievements), but can play the story with him.

-The decision to make LS repeatable was probably made after feedback from LS1 so Anet couldn’t know they’d have this business model at launch.

- Anet is a business after all; yet they’re not charging for anything else, surely we can accept this commercial decision?

Are you guys mad that you have to pay, or that people who logged in at the time got it for free?

Archduke.3817:

I agree with the OP and many others on here. It is ridiculous that people who were promised a “pay once for game content” must pay more because they had lives or something happened that disabled them from logging in longer than they expected. All of you and your “Well, you should’ve done this or that” have no idea what our lives are like and the reason behind why we couldn’t log on. Some of us are newcomers to the game and missed Season 1 and most of Season 2 and are being penalized for that as now he have to pay for it. It immediately puts us in a inferior place that makes us feel like we can’t trust ArenaNet or this community for honestly not being understanding about the issue.

No one was told from the beginning that once you buy the game, you must log on every week or be forced to pay up the $$.

I missed Season 1 because it was happening far too fast and I could only log on a few times a week, and I spent that time on my original personal story and fighting Zhaitan. Season 2 happened when I started my first year of grad school and no way did I have time for any games let alone find out that it was REQUIRED to log on in order to still have access to something I already paid for (unlike what ArenaNet promised from day one).

I rarely rant, but this hiccup and the snarky comments from those belittling our experiences has hit a nerve.

Sorry if this is harsh, but there is much frustration on our end.

Where was it stated that all additional content would be free?

The only thing locked behind payment are the story instances and the associated achievements with their rewards. The story you can experience for free if you do it with someone that has access.

Brahmincorle.1264:

They advertised GW2 as a complete product which include all future updates for free. This was obvious lie which finaly solidified my stance towards the current policy of Anet and i rather subed for 12,99€ each month to other game. I have no problem with spending money on games but this was just pure money grab and I can’t stand it.

I’d love to see where they advertised this. I’m pretty sure I’ve been following this game since it was announced and never saw that stated anywhere.

They did say there would be no monthly fee. They didn’t say that future content would never involve a charge.

If you make this kind of statement I hope you’re prepared to back it up.

Vayne.8563:

They did say there would be no monthly fee. They didn’t say that future content would never involve a charge.

What’s more, before they came up with the Living Story model, it was generally understood that the additional content will follow the GW1 example, and take form of free holiday events, and additional, paid, campaigns, expansions and bonus missions.

They only thing about not charging they did promise was no subscriptions.

Ayrilana.1396:

They had a blog post which I could link if you do not believe me. This blog post was also linked into the news feed you see every time that you log into the game. All active players would have seen this. You then have this spread across the forums and reddit by other players. It was discussed a lot on map chat when the blog post was released just like all of their other blog posts have been. You also had the YouTube bloggers who made videos about it. Various gaming websites also did articles about the change.

The information was very widespread and available to active players.

Oh, I believe you, and even generally agree. But, you’ve made the opening poster’s point for him: 2 emails, 1 blog (that aged out of visibility 2 days later), and a mention in another article. That’s all there was to highlight this in the form of basic communication. If one missed both emails, and were casual enough that one didn’t notice the blog, one didn’t know about it.

Now, you make the point that if one visited the forums or reddit, it was all over the place. But, that’s my whole point and part of the OP’s: those are NOT casual gamer sites.

But, I do agree overall with your statements. It’s just this minor point I quibble with.

Archduke.3817:

I agree with the OP and many others on here. It is ridiculous that people who were promised a “pay once for game content” must pay more because …

We were indeed promised that. But, you are misinterpreting what it means. We were NOT promised ongoing content updates when we bought the game. We EXPECTED content updates, and to a degree they fostered that attitude on our parts. But, there were no promises. In fact, they overtly stated the exact opposite: they specifically disclaimed any future updates.

They do it because they love the game, and they know the game would die if they never changed it. That choice happens to have the positive side-effect that people stay focused on the game. Win-win, IMO.

Daddicus.6128:

Ayrilana.1396:

They had a blog post which I could link if you do not believe me. This blog post was also linked into the news feed you see every time that you log into the game. All active players would have seen this. You then have this spread across the forums and reddit by other players. It was discussed a lot on map chat when the blog post was released just like all of their other blog posts have been. You also had the YouTube bloggers who made videos about it. Various gaming websites also did articles about the change.

The information was very widespread and available to active players.

Oh, I believe you, and even generally agree. But, you’ve made the opening poster’s point for him: 2 emails, 1 blog (that aged out of visibility 2 days later), and a mention in another article. That’s all there was to highlight this in the form of basic communication. If one missed both emails, and were casual enough that one didn’t notice the blog, one didn’t know about it.

Now, you make the point that if one visited the forums or reddit, it was all over the place. But, that’s my whole point and part of the OP’s: those are NOT casual gamer sites.

But, I do agree overall with your statements. It’s just this minor point I quibble with.

What else are they supposed to do? Call each player on their phone regarding every update? They’re expecting way more than what really should be done.

Daddicus.6128:

And they only sent one that forcefully said anything about having to log in often. The other emails were a lot less pressing on that issue.

FACT CHECK!

Log In Today!

While Living World and Journal content is only playable for level 80 characters, you can unlock permanent access to this content by simply logging in while the release is live – no matter what level your characters are! Log in today to unlock the Gates of Maguuma story content in your Journal!

Log In Today!

Log in while the Entanglement release is live to unlock free, permanent access to the Entanglement story content. Once you’ve completed this episode’s story, you’ll gain access to a new set of ultra-challenging achievements meant to put your skills and wits to the test!

Log In Today!

Log in today to unlock free, permanent access to the story of The Dragon’s Reach: Part 1! Once you’ve completed the episode, you’ll be able to replay it through the new Story Journal feature and push yourself to complete ultra-challenging achievements.

Log In Today!

Log in and play today to unlock free, permanent access to the story of The Dragon’s Reach: Part 2! Once you’ve completed the episode, you’ll be able to replay it through the new Story Journal feature and challenge yourself to complete special achievements.

And it stops there with those types of messages, I assume, because they think you’ve got the message.

As to the OP, yeah it’s a pain, but anet did give you a fair warning if you didn’t opt out of their email alerts. Fortunately, while it’s still quite a bit, the chapters ARE affordable at 20 bucks / ~200 gold for the set, and if you don’t feel like grinding for a week or so, like the other posters said, you can taxi into those instances and experience the content that way.

Solstice.2831:

I’m not sure if this is the right forum for this, but I thought I’d express my absolute disgust about Season 2.

I have had to take a leave of absence from the game for personal reasons. Eventually other things distracted me. I heard today about Heart of Thorns. That kicked my interest back up for the game, and I was curious about playing again. I also heard that Living World Season 2 content was actually good and much more story driven, unlike Season 1.

So… let me get this straight, ANet. I’m being penalized because I had personal issues keeping me from the game, and being made to PAY for content that everyone else got for free. If I want to see what I missed, I need to pay 200 gems PER CHAPTER.

This feels like a terrible way to encourage people to come back to the game.

I’ve never been one to rant at a company… or complain, and honestly, my GW2 experience has been great. bought a lot of character slots, have some cosmetic gear. The game experience has been fun, but stuff just happened to draw me away from the game.

This… this just feels like ANet is actively discouraging anyone that stopped playing the game for any lenght of time, from coming back. And has me honestly disinclined to be interested in the expansion.

I was away from the game for about half a year at that time, because I had tons of stuff to do for university, but I got the email that said “log in to unlock permanent” so I did that, and unlocked them. I only played through them about 2 days before the expansion got announced, but I unlocked them before, just by logging in about once every 2-3 weeks whenever I got an email, unlocked the episode and just logged out again. If thats not enough of a reminder for you, then there is no helping, I don’t know about your personal reasons, but thats an amount of effort everybody can do as long as they don’t loose permanent access to their internet, and even then you could have just asked someone you trust to log in for you, many people did that.

It is not even like arenanet is closing you out on the content now, you can still play the episodes with someone that already owns them and is willing to replay them with you, if you just want to know whats happening, just do that.

And even if you have to buy them: it is not like they cost much, 200 gems per episode is either about 2 days of farming or dropping 20€ on the game.

I am not here to white-knight arenanet, they have PR guys for that, and when there are faults within arenanet like their unwillingness to repair the Zhaitanfight, or design some charr/asura helmets gear better, I will not overlook those flaws(in fact I will be one of the first ones to stand up for charrrights, vote Gnashblade now!), but their businessmodel about those episodes is totally fair.

That reminds me a little about all those QQ posts in the forum that came out once people heared they would have to pay for the expansion, or otherwise they won’t get the specializations or access to the new areas, and I only set there and thought “you do realize it is an expansion, those things always cost money!? at least they only sell us the expansion once and the rest is free, not like WoW, where you have to pay for the expansion, followed by a monthly fee thats almost high enough to pay for all of the episodes of Season 2.”

Of course it is always nice to get stuff for free, but at the end of the day, they delivered a kittenton of content till now, and the only price you really had to pay was the one for the game itself, everything else was optional. Maybe I would think otherwise if they charged for the episodes right from the very getgo, but they didn’t.

But you could also just wait for the release of HoT, since all of S2 was a huge buildup for that, they are most likely to release some form of all in pack, where you get all the episoed + the expansion a little cheaper then if you would have bought them seperatly, maybe even an full pakage, basegame + s2 + expansion.

Roda.7468:

Daddicus.6128:

And they only sent one that forcefully said anything about having to log in often. The other emails were a lot less pressing on that issue.

FACT CHECK!

Log In Today!

While Living World and Journal content is only playable for level 80 characters, you can unlock permanent access to this content by simply logging in while the release is live – no matter what level your characters are! Log in today to unlock the Gates of Maguuma story content in your Journal!

Log In Today!

Log in while the Entanglement release is live to unlock free, permanent access to the Entanglement story content. Once you’ve completed this episode’s story, you’ll gain access to a new set of ultra-challenging achievements meant to put your skills and wits to the test!

Log In Today!

Log in today to unlock free, permanent access to the story of The Dragon’s Reach: Part 1! Once you’ve completed the episode, you’ll be able to replay it through the new Story Journal feature and push yourself to complete ultra-challenging achievements.

Log In Today!

Log in and play today to unlock free, permanent access to the story of The Dragon’s Reach: Part 2! Once you’ve completed the episode, you’ll be able to replay it through the new Story Journal feature and challenge yourself to complete special achievements.

And it stops there with those types of messages, I assume, because they think you’ve got the message.

As to the OP, yeah it’s a pain, but anet did give you a fair warning if you didn’t opt out of their email alerts. Fortunately, while it’s still quite a bit, the chapters ARE affordable at 20 bucks / ~200 gold for the set, and if you don’t feel like grinding for a week or so, like the other posters said, you can taxi into those instances and experience the content that way.

I get at least 5 emails a day from other companies telling me to “do X thing now!” Why the hell would I pay ArenaNet any more attention than I pay LinkedIn, Monster, Indeed, Twitter, or Facebook? ESPECIALLY when I have a multitude of other things grabbing my attention, like starting a new job, studying so I can get a better job, or school? Telling me to log-in without telling me exactly why in the subject line gets your email disregarded.

Now, if you tell me to “Log-in today, or you will have to pay real money for this if you miss it!” Would have made me log in.

It’s purely ArenaNet’s prerogative to charge you for whatever they want.

That doesn’t make it any less BS. The fact that people got it for free and now other people, some of whom most definitely had real-life issues to take care of, have to pay money for it, it absurd. It was free then and there’s no reason it can’t be free now aside from a money-grab.

Why you should pay more attention to those: Because you SUBSCRIBED to their newsletter!? Why the hell would you not block newsletters from things you won’t get newsletters from, yet stay subscribed to those that don’t interest you, sry but thats your own fault, no one elses.
Of course it is about money, if you can get stuff for free for just logging in, more people were willing to pick up the game while S2 was going live, but that said, it’s a totally fair way of doing business. Many game companys sometimes give out a game for free for 24 hours, set it back to normal price afterwards, this is called marketing, they could have just charged us all for the episodes right from the very start but they didn’t, thats all there is to it, it was a marketing strategy to bring people back to logging in and/or making them pick up the game in the first place.
You seem to forget that the arenanet businessmodel for this MMO is actually one of the fairest currently out there, compare that to WoW, there you have to buy the boxed game, pay a monethly subsription fee that costs about as much as all of Season 2 AND they sell you cosmetic stuff, and/or levelups for your character in the game!
And even if we stay in the borders of tyria: The halloween content is only available during halloween, wintersday is only avalaibe during wintersday, and S1 was only available while it was live, compare it to that. This is almost the same, the only difference is that you can still access it after the time it was life, simple as that! If they ever brought S1 to the gemstore I would gladly pay for the ability to play that again as well.

funny ppl still accuse Anet for money grabbing…you guys truly must be good businesmen.

XD wow sounds like Anets skipping the road to head right for the bar, they let you pay for season 2 but not 1. sounds a bit like lazyness to me XD

Yeah, let’s update the game forever for free.
All that work should be done solely for no money at all. All updates should be paid for by active players, and players returning who spend zero money at all should be leeching of the loyal player base. Completely fair.

kitten the entire season is only $20. People spend that much on lunch or a movie, which you only enjoy once. Perspective people. Srsly.

McNinja.5417:

The fact that people got it for free and now other people, some of whom most definitely had real-life issues to take care of, have to pay money for it, it absurd. It was free then and there’s no reason it can’t be free now aside from a money-grab.

You’re thinking in the wrong order. They said it would be free for the initial log in and would cost later when LS2 was announced. It was a reward for remaining active and keeping the player numbers up NOT a cost attached at the end.

This was a carrot not a stick. By design it was an incentive to keep the player base active, you not understanding that does not make it an attack on people who weren’t paying attention to the game (it was a reward for those who did).

Reviera.5183:

XD wow sounds like Anets skipping the road to head right for the bar, they let you pay for season 2 but not 1. sounds a bit like lazyness to me XD

Anet said that they wish to include a replayable Season 1 in the game at some point although it’s going to take a while because they have other, more pressing matters to focus on at the moment. The problem with transferring S1 stuff into unlockable chapters like in S2 is that much of S1 was originally envisioned as group-based, temporary content in the open world. To make it work, they need to not only create new map instances for some of the large-scale open world events like Marionette and Battle of Lion’s Arch but also tweak them so that they can become soloable.

I do hope that once S1 is added to the Story Journal that it also includes Lost Shores. Unlike the prelude we had for S2, Lost Shores not only acted as a prelude to S1 but also included vital information, introductions of characters and events into the plot (the reveal of Southsun Cove and karka, meeting certain key NPCs like Canach for the first time), which would be built on in later S1 releases like Secret of Southsun.

You come back to an MMO you abandoned for months, and demand to not be “penalized” ?

People these days…

In most MMO’s if you abandoned the game for months, you had to do real work to get back on-par with everyone else. Yet here people are crying about having to pay 200gems per episode (which can be converted in-game gold)

-sigh-

McNinja.5417:

It was free then and there’s no reason it can’t be free now aside from a money-grab.

yes, it is. So what? I dislike paying for drinks in a bar. A shame that won´t change their policies.

I logged in when ep 1 came out and I though it was great so I though I wait for the final ep to play all at once. Then when I came back I was surprised by the 200gems per ep.

They have all right to do so, but I’m just disappointed and it is discouraging to come back for other ppl.
But personal I’m hooked again due to my new warrior build.

I’m going to agree with the op. I do not consider it a good move on arenanets part. One of the good things about GW 2 was that it wasn’t going to be like other MMOs. I should be able to have a break for a while and still go back to it without missing too much.

When I bought GW 2, I expected to have all the content within it. Like in GW 1. I consider the living story part of it.

I will not pay $20 for it, I will not pay 10 dollars for it. I will not grind for hours to get enough gold to get it with ingame money.

I will simply keep it in mind next time I decide whether or not to invest more money into GW 2 or whether or not to recommend it to a friend.

That’s a consumers power. Whether or not he decides to spend his money.

Arioch.7432:

I should be able to have a break for a while and still go back to it without missing too much.

To not spend money on LS, it’s your choice of course; what you are missing are only the achievements. So yes, you can take a break and not spend any money and still enjoy it.
If missing the achievements is “missing too much”, it’s debatable and entirely personal.

You can still play through all LS2 missions with a friend/guildie who has it (and chances are, you have at least one :P).

Maps are free of charge, forever (with all events/collections etc…)

Arianhod.3485:

Arioch.7432:

I should be able to have a break for a while and still go back to it without missing too much.

To not spend money on LS, it’s your choice of course; what you are missing are only the achievements. So yes, you can take a break and not spend any money and still enjoy it.
If missing the achievements is “missing too much”, it’s debatable and entirely personal.

You can still play through all LS2 missions with a friend/guildie who has it (and chances are, you have at least one :P).

Maps are free of charge, forever (with all events/collections etc…)

Oh, a friend of mine bought them so I plan on doing them with him. More because he wants the help though and it gives us something new to do.

It’s more a principle thing for me really.

On the plus side, even though I find it a very distasteful practice… relative to many other MMOs it’s not so bad. I just choose to hold Arenanet to a higher standard.

So when people take breaks, they forsake everything about the game for as long as they’re gone? No forums, no newsletters, no nothing? I’ve taken 3 extended breaks from the game myself, but every once in a while I checked out the forums to see what was new. I even get emails from time to time despite not formally signing up. I was on a break during the second have of season 2, but still logged in to get it for when I decided to come back.

If you want to take a break from a game, that’s fine. Everyone does it. But it’s pretty stupid to come on here when you decide to come back and complain about stuff you missed while you were gone. Especially when it was announced well in advance that all you would have to do is log in in order to get the stuff for free. It’s like a retail store finally putting something you’ve wanted on sale for cheap, but you were on vacation that week. Then when you find out you missed it it’s everyone else’s fault and you get all mad at the people at the service desk. I worked retail for 5 years. It happens all the time.

Oh, there is one thing that truly bothers me. According to my understanding, there will be no more new content for people who don’t buy the expansion. Although what I really hope is that they meant no more living story. Either way I think it’s wrong. There should be living story for people who didn’t buy the expansion.

Sure, you can say that they can just shovel the money for it but, for some people I know 50 euro is a LOT of money. As in “I’m going to have to find cheaper food” kinda money.

People who buy the game should get the game as advertised. And it was advertised as having a living story. Not “Living story until we put out an expansion”.

Arioch.7432:

Oh, there is one thing that truly bothers me. According to my understanding, there will be no more new content for people who don’t buy the expansion. Although what I really hope is that they meant no more living story. Either way I think it’s wrong. There should be living story for people who didn’t buy the expansion.

Sure, you can say that they can just shovel the money for it but, for some people I know 50 euro is a LOT of money. As in “I’m going to have to find cheaper food” kinda money.

People who buy the game should get the game as advertised. And it was advertised as having a living story. Not “Living story until we put out an expansion”.

If 50 euros is a lot of money, then the last thing someone should be doing is worrying about a PC game.

Hell, if 50 euros is a lot of money to the point of “I’m going to have to find cheaper food”,

1) internet is a luxury
2) cigarettes are a luxury
3) beer is a luxury
4) a PC is a luxury

An intangible luxury like a PC game is going to be so far down the list of priorities, it’s not even a valid argument

I really don’t get what is so hard to understand. I took a good year or so off from the game, missed the majority of season 1 and the first half of season 2. So I bought the first half happily because I ignored the emails telling me to login. Honestly, I thought they would be awkward events like the beginning of season 1 was so I saw no need to login. I could understand people complaining about missing season 1, but complaining that you have the option to experience content you weren’t here for in season 2? Really? I don’t get it….

Oh, there is one thing that truly bothers me. According to my understanding, there will be no more new content for people who don’t buy the expansion. Although what I really hope is that they meant no more living story. Either way I think it’s wrong. There should be living story for people who didn’t buy the expansion.

Wait a minute. Are you being serious right now? Expanding is how MMOs work. You play the game for a few years or so, then they release an expansion with a ton of new stuff all around. Of course there won’t be anything new for people who don’t buy the expansion, you’re still playing the base game. Should be common sense. MMO expansions have ALWAYS cost money to buy. This is absolutely nothing new.

People who buy the game should get the game as advertised. And it was advertised as having a living story. Not “Living story until we put out an expansion”.

Again, what’s the problem. You DO have the exact game as advertised that you purchased. Living story will continue, just in the expansion, because that’s the nature of an MMO.

I’m not going to convince you, and you’re not going to convince me.

The important thing is we show our views no the matter. Perhaps Arenanet might decide to alter how they do things in the future because it increases the chance of people getting other people to join. Or perhaps they’ll decide that the current course is the best.

in any case getting feedback is important.

Arioch.7432:

Oh, there is one thing that truly bothers me. According to my understanding, there will be no more new content for people who don’t buy the expansion. Although what I really hope is that they meant no more living story. Either way I think it’s wrong. There should be living story for people who didn’t buy the expansion.

Sure, you can say that they can just shovel the money for it but, for some people I know 50 euro is a LOT of money. As in “I’m going to have to find cheaper food” kinda money.

People who buy the game should get the game as advertised. And it was advertised as having a living story. Not “Living story until we put out an expansion”.

Living story or living world? I don’t remember seeing any advertising done directly by Anet in regards to the living story to non-players.

from the GW 2 wiki:

“Living World releases were a mix of new story and new features. More recently, new features have been dropped from Living World updates and are now bundled together in releases like the April 2014 Feature Pack.”

Living World – Features = Living Story.

So in this case they are pretty much the same.

It’s really a small amount of money, or you can farm a couple of days and buy them with gems.

Arioch.7432:

from the GW 2 wiki:

“Living World releases were a mix of new story and new features. More recently, new features have been dropped from Living World updates and are now bundled together in releases like the April 2014 Feature Pack.”

Living World – Features = Living Story.

So in this case they are pretty much the same.

Living world was the world progresses as you play. Watch the manifesto YouTube trailer to see what they were talking about. Meta events which impact the map as you progress the story are not the same as actual game updates that add content. The living world that they were referring to was the former.

ProtoGunner.4953:

It’s really a small amount of money, or you can farm a couple of days and buy them with gems.

This. I gladly paid the paltry sum required to play season 2.

I was glad that there is option at all to see that stuff.
And i have gladly paid for it as well, actually i am more surprised that they managed to pull this off with monthly content addition without extra charge, really don’t get some ppl…
Although i am sad that living world events are possible to experience trough youtube only but oh well guess that does make them more special for ppl who actually managed to see them in game.