Guild Wars 2

Introduction

Hey there! Some people on this forum may recognize me from previous threads and posts that I’ve made in the past, and if you do, kudos to you.

But unfortunately, that’s not the point of this thread. So what is the point of this thread? Well, you see, I noticed that a lot of people don’t seem to have recognized errors in their thinking regarding Living World.

Living World Doesn’t Produce Enough Content

For example, some say that Living World does not produce enough content, but what I’ve noticed is nobody seems to be capable of answering how much they would like to see. Often, I see comparisons to other games, such as WoW, and how their patches are the equivalent of four to six GW2 patches.

But, here’s the thing. GW2, minus the various breaks, has a release schedule of approximately 2 weeks each. Other MMOs, like WoW, will take 3 to 4 months to release a patch. Other games that take only a month, while they do exist, tend to be an oddity in the genre, with the only big example coming to mind being ESO.

The Calculations Don’t Match Up

So, if we go based off WoW’s release schedule of 3 months, and if we judge that 6 GW2 patches are equal to one WoW patch, how many times does 2 weeks go into 3 months? There are 4 weeks in a month, so that means two releases per month. 3 times 2 is 6, thus in the same timeframe, is not the same amount of content being produced by that logic?

I think we need to be asking ourselves if the amount of content is really the issue, or if it is the release schedule. You get the same amount of content as other MMOs if we go by timeframe. The raw amount of content per release doesn’t work when judging how much content you get compared to other MMOs.

Conclusion

With that in mind, my conclusion is that people who are more used to having content given to them in one big chunk rather than little pieces, are getting tired with breadcrumbs being thrown at them. I think that the rapid fire releases are giving people sort of a mental illusion, for lack of a better term. As in, it feels like a lot more time has passed than actually has.

What do you think?

I think you’re spinning pretty hard…

you completely missed the expansions that WoW launches every 18 months or so, and you clock in GW2’s releases as every 2 weeks, even though we only had 7 LS story episodes and 2 feature patches over the entire year…

So really it is closer to 3 to 1, not 6 to 1, and then you have to add in expansions where the bulk of the content comes from.

When you add it all together GW2 comes up short. In a typical expansion WoW adds 10-12 zones, with each zone containing an entire self enclosed story arc, with an additional continental story arc. The zone arch is equivalent to what we have gotten as LS seasons(10-12 hours of story missions/quests), except WoW launches them 12 at a time. So at the current pace it will take GW2 12 years to launch the same amount of content as 1 WoW expansion, excluding total zones, dungeons, raids, additional classes, additional races, additional weapon skills, additional traits, and additional PvP content.

So no… I don’t think it is the pace, I think it is the amount.

What guy above me said + new WoW content is permanent therefore your argument is invalid. If you leave WoW now and return back after 6 months, you will have 6 months worth of content waiting for you (a.k.a whole expansion and at least one content patch) that will entertaint you for months to come. But if you leave GW2 now, and return 6 months later, you will find 1 active episode which may take you at best an hour to complete and if you are crazy about achievements it wont take you more than a week of casual gaming to get them.

I am best example of this. I left GW2 in march and returned about 8 days ago. What I found was 2 new zones (cool) and 1 hour of boring story chain quest that I have no idea what is about because I missed 6 other chain quests before this one. The only achievements that I am missing from silverwastes are gold coins (I hate jumping puzzles btw) and randomly spawning minibosses to kill. :-/ Same old dungeons, same old PvE and PvP meta. I have 3 lvl 80s in exotic gear and I cannot be bothered to level up 4th 80 and experience new trait unlocking system.

^ You are aware that you can still access the other parts of the story, right?
So everything since the start of S2 have been permanent as well.

I could only grudgingly accept LS content as an acceptable replacement for expansion models only if they manage 2.5 8 episode seasons per calender year with 5 zones per year, adding a new world boss and new dungeon for each season; I could live with that.

lordkrall.7241:

^ You are aware that you can still access the other parts of the story, right?
So everything since the start of S2 have been permanent as well.

yea for 1200 gems… can we call it paid expansion?

The living story content length is fine. They just need to decrease the quantity of breaks.

The content is not enough, indeed.

Living world is made only by a fraction of Anet. The rest is working on “two big side projects”. Conclusion: we are not getting the large volume you might expect from living world because what they will present at PAX later this month has kept most of the devs busy. I count that as a good thing.

Sorann Peace.9056:

For example, some say that Living World does not produce enough content, but what I’ve noticed is nobody seems to be capable of answering how much they would like to see.

I think most players would be happy if the delivery schedule for the Living Story met the announced timetable. This would be fortnightly updates with some breaks and seasonal content. At the moment the developers are not even meeting their own expectations. As soon as they can deliver updates to their own schedule, we can begin to see if we are satisfied with the new content.

I really feel that there is a serious lack of content in this game, and anyone arguing that “we have an expansion worth of content, we just got it a little bit at a time” needs to do some research as to what type of content is typically delivered in an expansion (new continents, new races, new professions, new skills, new weapon types, etc.)

Anet your playerbase is starving and you are continuing to feed us crumbs.

We need a meal!

TheBlackLeech.9360:

Anet your playerbase is starving and you are continuing to feed us crumbs.

We need a meal!

Actually, feeding a starving person a meal might kill it. It is better to feed it crumbs…

lordkrall.7241:

^ You are aware that you can still access the other parts of the story, right?
So everything since the start of S2 have been permanent as well.

The fact that he’s joined mid way is what u should be paying attention to. He has one episode unlocked so it makes sense he would try it.

Unless someone has OCD tendencies or is some kind of lore/story telling junky. Most people will typically play whats given to them and see if its worth the investment.

The first GW1 expansion was released after 2 years, and also WOW came out in 2004, and the first expansion was released in 2007, The second expansion set, Wrath of the Lich King, was released on November 13, 2008. The third expansion set, Cataclysm, was released on December 7, 2010. The fourth expansion set, Mists of Pandaria, was released on September 25, 2012.The fifth expansion set, Warlords of Draenor, was released on November 13, 2014, which works out at an expansion every two years roughly, with less content released in between.

So If GW2 releases an expansion this year I think it is pretty on track with content, and I think overall we should be happy with the amount of content added, as this is all new stuff that has to be created and worked on which takes time, so content every two weeks, and a feature patch twice a year is pretty good.

This of course is only true if there is a full expansion this year.

Sorann Peace.9056:

What do you think?

What do I think? I think we haven’t gotten any new classes, very little new explorable area (though I do like what we were able to get) and no new weapon skills or even alternate usable weapons for the classes we have.

Blockhead Magee.3092:

Sorann Peace.9056:

What do you think?

What do I think? I think we haven’t gotten any new classes, very little new explorable area (though I do like what we were able to get) and no new weapon skills or even alternate usable weapons for the classes we have.

To be fair, there aren’t too many themes a new profession could occupy that isn’t already covered by one or more existing professions mechanically. Even fewer that are broad enough to create a GW2 profession, since they all have to be versatile.

I think some people seem to believe Guild Wars 2 has been out a lot longer than it has. Considering the time it has been out we have had alot of small updates and some big patch’s. Yes we need a big expansion, but as I posted above 2 years is pretty normal for these games.

John.8507:

I think some people seem to believe Guild Wars 2 has been out a lot longer than it has. Considering the time it has been out we have had alot of small updates and some big patch’s. Yes we need a big expansion, but as I posted above 2 years is pretty normal for these games.

Except we are at 2.5 years, and there hasn’t even been an announcement yet. Usually the announcement is 6 months before launch. At this point we are looking at slightly over 3 years before the first expansion. But there is the possibility that Anet is going to launch it very soon after an announcement in which case it might be sooner.

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Except we are at 2.5 years, and there hasn’t even been an announcement yet. Usually the announcement is 6 months before launch. At this point we are looking at slightly over 3 years before the first expansion. But there is the possibility that Anet is going to launch it very soon after an announcement in which case it might be sooner.

Historically ArenaNet have released expansions/new campaigns around 3 months after the announcement though.
Which could easily mean announcement at PAX and release around the 10th anniversary of the series.

Oldirtbeard.9834:

I could only grudgingly accept LS content as an acceptable replacement for expansion models only if they manage 2.5 8 episode seasons per calender year with 5 zones per year, adding a new world boss and new dungeon for each season; I could live with that.

Yeah everyone asking for expansions some how magically think that bundling the content together would somehow lead to more content or that because it’s called an expansion somehow they’d be able to produce more content faster. I don’t know (because I don’t know what goes on inside Anet) but somehow the assumption seems broken.

Farzo.8410:

The content is not enough, indeed.

Yeah true enough. Although maybe the measurement of content is wrong. If we think of a game like WoW their content patches usually come in the form if a raid. Unfortunately a raid is frankly not a lot of content. What like 6 new bosses? Maybe a recycled model here and there, some copy paste mobs to litter the path between boss A and boss B. But somehow people consider a raid to be more content because it takes longer to do. So I guess that means Anet needs to start giving us not more content but content that takes longer to complete?

Brahmincorle.1264:

lordkrall.7241:

^ You are aware that you can still access the other parts of the story, right?
So everything since the start of S2 have been permanent as well.

yea for 1200 gems… can we call it paid expansion?

Nah, but we could call it paid DLC

TheBlackLeech.9360:

I really feel that there is a serious lack of content in this game, and anyone arguing that “we have an expansion worth of content, we just got it a little bit at a time” needs to do some research as to what type of content is typically delivered in an expansion (new continents, new races, new professions, new skills, new weapon types, etc.)

Which is an interesting comparison, because everything except the new continents are more examples of content variety than content amount (races, professions skills, weapons etc.). Or at least those things take a very different shape and form from say a new map and require different interactions.

lordkrall.7241:

TheBlackLeech.9360:

Anet your playerbase is starving and you are continuing to feed us crumbs.

We need a meal!

Actually, feeding a starving person a meal might kill it. It is better to feed it crumbs…

Technically true. But I think we’re entering false analog territory here :P

lordkrall.7241:

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Except we are at 2.5 years, and there hasn’t even been an announcement yet. Usually the announcement is 6 months before launch. At this point we are looking at slightly over 3 years before the first expansion. But there is the possibility that Anet is going to launch it very soon after an announcement in which case it might be sooner.

Historically ArenaNet have released expansions/new campaigns around 3 months after the announcement though.
Which could easily mean announcement at PAX and release around the 10th anniversary of the series.

That’s nice, so no having to wait for a whole year.