Are ye laughin’ yet?
Temporary content is a really bad idea
No, not a new thread at all… in fact, in just about every thread regarding LS, at least one person will make the remark that it shouldn’t be temporary. We all know this, and you will find you have many allies. However, Anet clearly disagrees and has no intent on changing their policy. That being said, I’m not going to discuss the pros and cons again, which have been uttered so many times, I’m certain there’s a big black whole developing somewhere in the internet.
Well, they are aware that many of us feel this way about missing out on temporary content, and they claim they are “looking into” ways of addressing our concerns.
However, what they have in mind or how long it will take to implement is anyone’s guess. So in the meantime, I will continue to not log in or purchase gems. Ultimately, that is really the only feedback that will matter.
The most painful part of all the Living Story stuff up until this point is sitting behind the screen knowing I could do it so much better.
I will never play WvW until Map Completion there is removed.
ZenonSeth, while I can see where you are coming from, but I think you do not completely understand what the Living World is supposed to be. ANet has explained it so many times and well, lemme try to explain to you in simpler terms what the Living World is supposed to be.
Ok, so in real life, events come and go, a due date for a school paper, someone’s birthday, an election (of which we did have in game, do you expect an election to be permanent content? sigh) a solar eclipse, an avalanche, an earthquake. Those kind of events in life cannot be replayed, will you be there for all of those things? That’s up to you and what you want to make time for in life, but if you miss out on those events, that’s just the way it is, you can’t replay an election, or a natural disaster, you can’t replay a specific date in time, and that, in essence, is what the Living World is supposed to more or less entail, those events that happen, whether you are there or not, in a world that is LIVING and that changes from day to day. Or in this case two weeks by two weeks.
Now, ANet will be adding in permanent content, in fact they have added quite a bit of new permanent content, maybe not in the way of brand new zones, but that is coming, there just hasn’t been a real reason to open a new zone yet, story wise. But when the Living World story takes a turn towards, lets say Kralkatorrik, I can assure you we will get Crystal Desert zones, that will be permanent, those zones will be left in the game forever as a result of the temporary events of the Living World.
That is, in the case that they decide to ultimately do away with any expansions in the future. However, recent comments would suggest otherwise.
So to just sum all of this up, crying over the temporary stories of the Living World is like crying over missing fleeting moments of life that you can’t replay, THAT is what the Living World has always intended to be, and I think they’re doing a pretty darn good job at it considering it’s new to the MMO scene and they aren’t just copy pasting this formula from some other MMO and doing their own twist on it. If this isn’t what you want from an MMO there are a lot out there that you can play. I hate to put it that way, but this is the model that ANet has chosen and it’s not going anywhere anytime soon.
It’s not a bad idea if it’s used as a buffer between 2 permanent contents. In this case:
Game release <—-buffer LS nobody cares about—→ Permanent content with lots of “pew pew” and shiny stuff in it.
I consider LS a huge “hiatus” between perma-content
On another note, I have never understood complaining over free content….. Now if we had to pay $15 a month to play this and got mediocre content (not saying that the content we are getting is mediocre, but that is certainly the feeling of many people who infest these boards) then I could see your genuine concern, but everything we are getting is free of charge. Who complains about free stuff? It baffles my mind.
I consider LS a huge “hiatus” between perma-content
This.
It will remain to be seen in the coming months if they indeed do have an expansion in the works in the background with their secret teams working on their secret projects.
But even if they don’t, we will still get permanent content as a result of the Living World stories, new zones ARE in the works, it’s not even a subject for debate, they have said that there will be new zones, and other perma content. It just comes down to whether they decide to do it in an expansion format, or via free Living World content.
Another side note, lets give ANet some slack with the Living World, this was their first time doing it, heck, the first time any MMO has churned out that much content in that amount of time, on a regular basis. I really consider Season One of the Living World to be their test run of sorts. They have learned a lot, and judging from the last few Living World events (Tower of Nightmares anyone?) I feel like we’re gonna be in for a great Second Season of the Living World.
As with anything new, it always takes time to hit your stride. Keep up the good work ANet!
I bet u they get a lot more earnings from the gem shop then if it were 15/month and no ingame shop. That “free game” excuse is old really.
+ what’s wrong with wanting good stuff that makes me play the game and entice me to use the cash shop even more?
Indulging in the idea that it’s free and we should accept anything because of that results into 0 progression in quality. The only time progression is made in any kind of company that offers things like this is when their customers QQ. That’s how the world works. Give a company a chance to win $$ for doing nothing and they will do that.
Read more on the interwebz about how f2p cashshop mmos work and what earnings they have and u will change your perspective on these so called “free” games. GW2 is not a p2w game because there are no items in the gem shop that make u more powerful and so on..but remember this is not a “best item” game…this is a “cosmetic” game. So the true win in this game are not the items itself but how they look like. People buy dyes..buy skins…buy character remakes..buy transmutations galore…buy bl chests and other items that make their life easier like infinite picks and so on.
800 gems = 10E/$… and get u just 1 item for ex a skin/helm/pickaxe/5transmutations…and that is just 1 buy in 1 day of 1 month….and people don’t just buy 1.
Long story short..the only reason u have seen even the smallest amount of progression in this game is purely because of ppl who QQ..not because of ppl that go full flower-power, hold hands and say “but everything is ok like this”. If it were up to ppl like that, the game would be very similar to the way it was on day 1 release.
On the other hand there’s constructive QQ and useless QQ..but that’s a completely different topic so let’s not deviate way to much :P
(edited by Rebound.3409)
So Rebound I get what you’re saying, that people buy cosmetic things which keeps this game going. However, in my argument about “free stuff” I was specifically referring to the story content of these updates, not what items they offer in the gem store. Of course people are buying up what they offer in the gem store, that’s how this game thrives, but people will buy stuff regardless of whether the story is great or mediocre. I was saying that people complain about the story content, which is free, and I don’t understand why. I am a firm believer that most MMO players out there really don’t care a whole lot about the story, I mean, I have been in a ton of guilds and not a single soul in each of them seemed to care or want to care about the story at hand when I would try to bring it up for discussion.
And as for the quality of these updates as a result of QQing, well, that’s just a bit presumptuous, I don’t know if you are a GW1 vet, but in GW1 they had great stories, lore, etc and they didn’t need QQing to get that. The team for GW2 is just as great, and they are good at telling stories. Thing about the Living World though, is that it was a new platform in which to tell their story. Imagine a TV episode, in a single episode, you get the story told to you from multiple perspectives from multiple characters. I think that ANet had this kinda thing in mind when developing the Living World, gradually tell the stories of multiple characters over the span of Tyria, however, in each Living World update (I would consider each update an episode) you can really only tell the story from one perspective, and then in the next episode you tell another perspective of the overall story, and slowly the pieces come together.
The thing about this format though, is it confuses players so I can see why players QQ. But ANet has acknowledged this, they are going to change how the Living World story is told in the Second Season, they have said this. Once again, people complain so much about the Living World but this is brand new, a new frontier in the MMO space and lets give them some leeway here to make things right. The finale of Season One is sounding pretty epic at this point.
On another note, I have never understood complaining over free content….. Now if we had to pay $15 a month to play this and got mediocre content (not saying that the content we are getting is mediocre, but that is certainly the feeling of many people who infest these boards) then I could see your genuine concern, but everything we are getting is free of charge. Who complains about free stuff? It baffles my mind.
Free doesn’t always mean good and by the quality of the living story and that we get it for free… Well, all I can say is you get what your pay for.
On another note, I have never understood complaining over free content….. Now if we had to pay $15 a month to play this and got mediocre content (not saying that the content we are getting is mediocre, but that is certainly the feeling of many people who infest these boards) then I could see your genuine concern, but everything we are getting is free of charge. Who complains about free stuff? It baffles my mind.
Free doesn’t always mean good and by the quality of the living story and that we get it for free… Well, all I can say is you get what your pay for.
This, I will pay for an expansion, campaign, what ever you want to call it. In the mean time I’d rather they fix the core of the game (balancing, bug fixes, QOL updates) than add another layer of fluff and potentially more bugs.
On another note, I have never understood complaining over free content….. Now if we had to pay $15 a month to play this and got mediocre content (not saying that the content we are getting is mediocre, but that is certainly the feeling of many people who infest these boards) then I could see your genuine concern, but everything we are getting is free of charge. Who complains about free stuff? It baffles my mind.
Free doesn’t always mean good and by the quality of the living story and that we get it for free… Well, all I can say is you get what your pay for.
This, I will pay for an expansion, campaign, what ever you want to call it. In the mean time I’d rather they fix the core of the game (balancing, bug fixes, QOL updates) than add another layer of fluff and potentially more bugs.
Well said Master Neenja, I couldn’t agree with you more!
Ah, the “Real Life” argument rears its head again. Setting aside the point that this is a fantasy mmo and not a “sim” game, can I assume that people who want “real life” in their game won’t mind a bit if we also include:
1. Permadeath
2. Necessary bio breaks for your character
3. Necessary food consumption or death
4. Aging (leading to reduced stats and, of course, more death)
5. Permanent injuries to your character (shame about that one-armed ranger…)
And so on and so forth. ’Cause, you know…reality, amirite?
No? Yeah, that’s what I thought. I have a hunch people wouldn’t be using the “But it’s real life!” defense then…
Ah, the “Real Life” argument rears its head again. Setting aside the point that this is a fantasy mmo and not a “sim” game, can I assume that people who want “real life” in their game won’t mind a bit if we also include:
1. Permadeath
2. Necessary bio breaks for your character
3. Necessary food consumption or death
4. Aging (leading to reduced stats and, of course, more death)
5. Permanent injuries to your character (shame about that one-armed ranger…)And so on and so forth. ’Cause, you know…reality, amirite?
No? Yeah, that’s what I thought. I have a hunch people wouldn’t be using the “But it’s real life!” defense then…
Not to mention having to use the little norns room mid battle! The coldness of the shiverpeaks is hell on my bladder!
I agree with the original poster. I am too a returning player and I thought that the episodes would be gathering up in a form of new quest line. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. I only played one episode and therefore the only thing I can say about the living story is that “I don’t care” (I have no reason to). Also having met the living story by-products, the “normal” mobs with Raid Boss Level abilities made me care even less for the living story. Honestly, I haven’t encountered normal mobs with so much insane CC abilities.
I even bought 2 char slots to get a feel of the character stories from the start and all I managed was to move faster toward a decision that my choice to return was a bit premature. Getting my human out of Queensdale and into Kessex Hills, surrounded by 5 group events and dungeon grade mobs, I grew desparate at some point. And I got tired already, which is a real shame.
The fact is this: I used to be utterly active last year and my friends’ list used to have at least 15 people online. Sometimes more than 30. Now it barely has 5. That speaks volumes.
There are some things that could use some finetuning in this game to set the base for something truly magnificent. I don’t know how often those have been discussed and I don’t wish to make this reply longer than it already is.
In my humble opinion, I don’t think it’s only balancing (I don’t want to mention respawns lol). Some roles need to be cleared up and revamped. Right now it’s a game of “kill fast or be killed, nothing else is accepted” with a chaos of CC/condition/cleanse conflicts everywhere. Survivability is still a paramount issue for non heavies (I have 11 level capp’d characters with 2 guards and 1 warrior) and with the current living story inteference in leveling zones, the game isn’t new player friendly.
Last but not least, with the story chapters disappearing, returning players will disappear as well. One use content is a waste of resources. What is ArenaNet trying to do with this?
To OP your not on your own, loads of players feel exactly the same way.
Well ArenaNet have started introducing more permanent content, they still feel the need for a lot of temporary content too. I can only assume its to keep players hooked, sell more gems etc…
I don’t see it changing ever.
So I changed my mind, I will post after all.
This is a video game, not real life, and while a sense of realism is necessary for a player to connect to the story-line, game-play, and mechanics -to feel like it is real, like they are actually there- another important credential is the ability to draw you away from real life. After all, is it not for this very reason that you are playing a game, and not living real life?
To that end, fantasy, mystery, action, Sci-Fi, suspense; many of these concepts that we desire in a game or story, while told with realism, must also draw away from it. Certainly a fictitious event must be told in a way to achieve credibility, but it is fictitious none-the-less. You have to accept that what you’re playing, is not real, or that it is a reality in an alternative form, which does not play by the same rules. It is termed ‘fiction’ for a reason.
As for the argument that this is a ‘living world’, and thus goes on without us, I ask you:
-Would you prefer that movies not have a pause button, “because life goes on even if you are not there to see it”?
-Or perhaps you skip a chapter of a book when you come back from work, because “the characters obviously didn’t freeze, waiting for you to pick it back up before the timeline continued”?
-Should movies and books erase themselves as you read/watch them, “because you cannot relive experiences”?
More to the point, if this is indeed a ‘real living world’, how the hell can you disappear from it? It makes more sense for you to simply edit out, or freeze, the time you are away, because these are two different worlds and do not cross. Just because you leave, doesn’t mean your character does. Yes the time line continues, but it continues with your character in it.
If you are having a problem conceptualizing this, think of the time you play, as watching a documentary. A true record of real life, of past events; that you can pause, play, rewind, and watch as often as you like. Even if you hit pause and don’t watch the movie for a month, your character is still there from the beginning to the end.
No, we read a story and watch a movie because we want to see, to know, what happens. And we play a video game, because we want to experience, to be a part of it. Which we lose, if things happen without us. Furthermore, one of the greatest aspects of video games is replay-ability, to relive the adventure after you completed it. Which is impossible if they erase content. And if players cant replay the video game, then there is no need to pick it up ever again, thus you lose players.
(edited by Mia Lunarfang.5826)
On a side note, I can accept certain time limited content, such as an election and festivals, which cannot continue indefinitely due to their mechanics and themes.
Mia, I am just reiterating what ANet has said, pretty sure this is how it’s gonna be from now on, I doubt they’re gonna change their formula that much.
ZenonSeth, while I can see where you are coming from, but I think you do not completely understand what the Living World is supposed to be. ANet has explained it so many times and well, lemme try to explain to you in simpler terms what the Living World is supposed to be.
Ok, so in real life, events come and go, a due date for a school paper, someone’s birthday, an election (of which we did have in game, do you expect an election to be permanent content? sigh) a solar eclipse, an avalanche, an earthquake. Those kind of events in life cannot be replayed, will you be there for all of those things? That’s up to you and what you want to make time for in life, but if you miss out on those events, that’s just the way it is, you can’t replay an election, or a natural disaster, you can’t replay a specific date in time, and that, in essence, is what the Living World is supposed to more or less entail, those events that happen, whether you are there or not, in a world that is LIVING and that changes from day to day. Or in this case two weeks by two weeks.
Now, ANet will be adding in permanent content, in fact they have added quite a bit of new permanent content, maybe not in the way of brand new zones, but that is coming, there just hasn’t been a real reason to open a new zone yet, story wise. But when the Living World story takes a turn towards, lets say Kralkatorrik, I can assure you we will get Crystal Desert zones, that will be permanent, those zones will be left in the game forever as a result of the temporary events of the Living World.
That is, in the case that they decide to ultimately do away with any expansions in the future. However, recent comments would suggest otherwise.
So to just sum all of this up, crying over the temporary stories of the Living World is like crying over missing fleeting moments of life that you can’t replay, THAT is what the Living World has always intended to be, and I think they’re doing a pretty darn good job at it considering it’s new to the MMO scene and they aren’t just copy pasting this formula from some other MMO and doing their own twist on it. If this isn’t what you want from an MMO there are a lot out there that you can play. I hate to put it that way, but this is the model that ANet has chosen and it’s not going anywhere anytime soon.
I’m pretty sure that there isn’t anybody who doesn’t understand this. The point is that it just isn’t as great an idea a Anet insists it is. Video games should not try to emulate real life; just one of many reasons being that you can’t be present on Tyria all the time the way you are present on Earth all the time.
Temporary content, when it’s the primary focus, does more harm to the game overall than it does good, which is quite easy to illustrate with a bullet point list of pros and cons. It’s not some revolutionary notion of how to make a better MMO; it’s never been done before because it doesn’t really pan out in practice. Most players want to see significant growth/expansion much more than they want to see forced changes to the existing world that they may or may not have played any role in facilitating. Most players want to be able to experience new content without having old content deleted. Most players also want to see substantially more new content than the LW has offered so far.
(edited by Einlanzer.1627)
Mia, I am just reiterating what ANet has said, pretty sure this is how it’s gonna be from now on, I doubt they’re gonna change their formula that much.
As I have likewise stated… and I don’t recall directing my arguement at you, so there is no need to be defensive, lol. Simply after reading all the remarks, I felt spured to leave one of my own, which at the risk of sounding arogent and closed minded, is the most logical perspective, if not the most common one.
(edited by Mia Lunarfang.5826)