Guild Wars 2

I think that the idea of living story content is great. Getting new things to do each month is great as a concept.
- However, there are a few problems with it.

First of all, I’m a fan of it. Living story is great, but I am not really enjoying the story all that much, if I have to be honest.
- I saw the introduction to the Consortium and I wasn’t intrigued at all. A company with decision makers, who can’t figure out why their plans to make a paradise out of Southsun Cove (a place where all of Tyria should know that Karkas roam free) has failed.
- Reading about Canach at the wiki, I found his story to be more to my liking. He started it all back in the Lost Shores, and now he’s at it again. Cool.
- My problem is that I read it on the wiki. Didn’t really get a good introduction in the game.

So, where am I going with this?
- My point is that Living Story as a concept is great, but I’d rather wait three months for a new storyline (which I have nothing against playing out over the next few months) if that meant it would be more thorough, have cinematics (and I mean like the ones that introduce our character and the three orders. I also kind of liked Rox and Braham’s cinematics, but I’d like to see them stick to the original design for GW2 cinematics) and more compelling content.

It would also mean that players can take time off hunting achievements for each Living Story event and get out into Tyria. Personally, I wouldn’t mind everything going back to “normal” for a couple of months before something new comes along.
- Actually, I’d like for the other teams of ANet to make more permanent content (more DE, and maybe like quest-hubs in the form of triggerable DEs) and improve the core gameplay designs.

tl;dr
- The Living Story team should take the time it needs to make the Living Story content more compelling and intriguing. It could do with some cinematics to introduce characters or the problem at hand. All kinds of neat things to improve our experience of it in the game and not on the wiki page or on the GW2 page.

The living story needs more polish. F&F still was ok in that regard but Southsun seems very unpolished, like they ran out of time. Most of what you suggest would fall under that umbrella.

I agree. Even the storytelling of the personal story isn’t that compelling so I think first place to improve, for me… is storytelling. It was brilliant in GW1. I started on Nightfall but it had such a gripping storyline, I loved it and there were so many twists. Characters like Trahearne made me want to beat my skull in with a hammer he was so boring, so generic and he was there for like 75% of the story just saying “commander please help” “commander do this” “commander why are there zombies everywhere” “Commander i have a weird accent and i won’t say anything surprising for the whole time i’m here”. Sorry for a bit of a rant but it’s true and lame. I’ll stick to just doing events they’re more fun than story missions…

this is something i stated several times i feel like they rushed stuff too quick. i feel like they rushed release and trying to release content too quick. it seems to me they try to do too much in too little time. maybe they should double all there timetables. i think they should more quality over quanity and make a better product. i understand with this living story we are in a sort of hit and miss mode and they will get better as they go. everyone learns from mistakes

normyp.8671:

I agree. Even the storytelling of the personal story isn’t that compelling so I think first place to improve, for me… is storytelling. It was brilliant in GW1. I started on Nightfall but it had such a gripping storyline, I loved it and there were so many twists. Characters like Trahearne made me want to beat my skull in with a hammer he was so boring, so generic and he was there for like 75% of the story just saying “commander please help” “commander do this” “commander why are there zombies everywhere” “Commander i have a weird accent and i won’t say anything surprising for the whole time i’m here”. Sorry for a bit of a rant but it’s true and lame. I’ll stick to just doing events they’re more fun than story missions…

I didn’t find it to be a rant (maybe it was, but there is a point to it )
- GW1 had such an amazing story in all of the campaigns and EotN as well. I was emotionally integrated in the story as well.

- GW1 had amazing stories for each campaign. I am baffled that GW2 haven’t had that same impact on me that GW1 had. I really want them to break through because GW2 has so much more potential than this (and in many more aspects than just the storytelling. I don’t get why some of the key features you’d expect from the GW franchise like Guild Halls, GvG, Capes and other cosmetics to represent your guild hasn’t made it into the game yet, when they should’ve been there at launch. And people who say that Capes are hard to make… well, cloth simulations are not hard to make, they are already in GW2, so tinker with that, ANet).

- Needless to say, my patience is running short with ANet, but I’m not going to quit. I’ve seen what they can do, and as soon as they realize that all they really need to do is improve the core gameplay (when they have “perfected” the core gameplay design, or improved on it, we can expect a better quality of content in expansions yet to come) and add some basic features that people have come to expect from MMO’s and the GW franchise.

ricky markham.8173:

this is something i stated several times i feel like they rushed stuff too quick. i feel like they rushed release and trying to release content too quick. it seems to me they try to do too much in too little time. maybe they should double all there timetables. i think they should more quality over quanity and make a better product. i understand with this living story we are in a sort of hit and miss mode and they will get better as they go. everyone learns from mistakes

They polished the game for many years, but I wonder if it was the visual aspect of the game that was polished instead of the game content itself (facial expressions and such was. I saw some early screenshots where the faces seemed a lot like the ones from GW1 but with better textures).
- This isn’t bad, necessarily, but graphics are not the most important part of a game. They are needed, sure, but limited amount of stuff to do in a game makes it boring in the long run.

- When I think of every time someone on the forum have suggested something that was actually a good idea, people were quick to say “This isn’t WoW”, even though the game concept was actually a part of GW1 (such as Druids. Although the guy suggesting them wanted them as a class, when they were more like a group of Krytans that wanted to live in harmony with nature and moved to the Maguuma Jungle… and some people who were against Druids were quite fond of another guy suggesting Chronomancers… which was just an insane thing to suggest. They are not part of the lore at all, and no one have been able to alter time in the history of Tyria).

Anyhow, if you think of game concepts as content and then how the game design is going to, well, “design” it IN the actual game, you will come to understand how the game concept isn’t equal to the game going bad. Mounts have been a part of GW2 since the very beginning, as a concept at least. They are “designed” differently as vehicles, but the concept is the same.
- Same thing goes for combat, which as a game concept have been used in games for many, many years now. The GW2 game design have given a new perspective on it, and no one seems to complain that combat was part of WoW as well.