What do you think after a year of LS?

What do you think after a year of LS?

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Posted by: Saberfang.4690

Saberfang.4690

I was wondering how the community was feeling about living story so far now that we are reaching its finale?

I was pretty much disappointed…until now. Let me explain myself more clearly.

For the most of this quest, in these months, we found ourself partecipating in some events that we could hardly said tied togheter. Random assault of dredge and chaar, out from nowhere aetherblades that aimed for politic power in LA and then the coming of Scarlet. I liked her, the maniac side of her was good and suited the role of a villain but, apart from that, she seemed flat like the enemy we fought before. She attacked DR because….we don’t know, only thing we know is that she hate everyone and that is pretty much everything we got till now.
Yeah, she came back every once in a while to remember us she is still there, teaming up with those guys we defeated before and getting more allies in the new Tyria threat, random kraits and nightmare court but still there was no point at all.

And that’s is where I got a bit bored of the game with one of the cause being these seemingly pointless 2 week upgrade that I could hardly keep up with.
Today I logged back for the first time after the fall of nightmare tower and, surprise!! Plot! Really?? Suddenly we understand a bit who Scarlet is and her reason? Maybe is nothing special but its much more enjoyable than killing and grinding without a reason.

Why we got to have all the story in the last month when we could have little bits in the whole year we lived it?

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Posted by: Brutal Arts.6307

Brutal Arts.6307

Since they’ve said multiple times they won’t give up on this terrible idea, my hopes are that they’ve learned to tell a meaningful coherent story using the actual game and not posting supplements on a blog noone reads.

You have gotten what you paid for, all that remains is biweekly gemshop pushing.

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Posted by: MastaNeenja.1537

MastaNeenja.1537

If it disappeared tomorrow I wouldn’t mind. Tried it for a year not really my thing. I would however pay good money for a nice campaign or expansion. Kinda sad when you think about it, a year after Prophecies was released they put out Factions. What do we have a year after GW2 was released? Well if you weren’t there to see it you may never know.

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Posted by: Delvoire.8930

Delvoire.8930

I’ve enjoyed it tremendously. It’s given me some great gaming moments that I will remember throughout the entirety of my guild wars 2 experience.

Molten Facility Dungeon – Had some good fun in there.
Crown Pavilion – Was loads of fun
Scarlet Invasions – Loved these when they first came out. Nerfs to the champion farming I didn’t like though.
Nightmare Tower – Loads of fun and very challenging
Marionette – This has been a blast

Those are just some off the top of my head that directly was related to the Living Story. I also enjoyed the Teq revamp, the Wurm addition, WvW Season 1 and many other things.

The amount of content and changes we’ve seen since launch has been awesome and in large part due to the Living Story.

So long story short, I’ve loved it and can’t wait for Season 2 of the Living Story.

80 ~Thief~ Isabella Angel | 80 ~Eng~ Ratchet McClank
80 ~Warrior~ Delvoire | 80 ~Ele~ Azalea Avenir
80 ~ Guardian~ Rag Nor | Server ~ FA

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Posted by: JerekLo.5893

JerekLo.5893

I’ve enjoyed it. It’s cool to watch how the process has developed and grown since fixing signs in Wayfarer Foothills. You can see how it shifted from “lets see if this will work” to “and away we go!”

I hope they’ve learned a lot from working on this for the last year and that Season 2 really let’s this concept take off.

Jerek Lo | Singh | Slagg Blackclaw | Wilhelm von Wilhelm | Viscerious
Sorrow’s Furnace
Kabal of the Righteous [Seed]

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Posted by: AlexEBT.7240

AlexEBT.7240

If you asked me earlier this year, i would say no, even though i loved SAB and Zephir Sanctum. However they have really picked up the ball ever since the tower of nightmares update. The updates are becoming bigger, more story driven and dramatic and if they can keep this up then i am onboard.

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Posted by: Silvercyclone.1462

Silvercyclone.1462

It started off really slow but not i find it very fun. I hope it continues along the path it is following now cause it will only get better.

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Posted by: Naus the Gobbo.5172

Naus the Gobbo.5172

I’ve had a blast with a lot of updates.

Bazaar of the Four Winds, Queen’s Jubilee and Clockwork Chaos were fantastic.
But my favourite is the Tower of Nightmares. The amount of content, story, cutscenes, everything, was phenomenal. And the ending, my god. Seeing that giant phallus explode all over the place was intense.

And the ending of this season looks very promising.

I am very excited about season 2.

What we do in life echoes in eternity
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6zkT2uZAGA – GW2 – A world of wonder

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Posted by: Bob F It.5701

Bob F It.5701

I’ve given up.
I really find it hard to care about when I’m not given the chance to get the full picture. And if I’m meant to research the story beforehand, then what do I gain by playing anyway?

Right click your GW2 shortcut > “Properties”
“Shortcut” tab > “Target”
Add to the end " -bmp"

(edited by Bob F It.5701)

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Posted by: AlexEBT.7240

AlexEBT.7240

I’ve given up. I really find it hard to care about when I’m not given the chance to get the full picture. And if I’m meant to research the story beforehand, then what do I gain by playing anyway?

So basically if they do a recap (Aka the last 2 updates had tons of info, recaps, including trailers, stories, etc) for everything that happened before, whats’ the point of experiencing the content and if they don’t, what’s the point to return, if i don’t know what’s happened in the meantime….am i getting this right?

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Posted by: Blockhead Magee.3092

Blockhead Magee.3092

I’ve given zero dollars to the company since the game purchase. I’d pay for expansions.

From that perspective, I think A-net is following a failure of a business model.

Time will tell.

SBI

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Posted by: MokahTGS.7850

MokahTGS.7850

While I appreciate what they are trying to do with a permanent changing and dynamic world, I personally would have appreciated a more GW1 style of story implementation. If you take a break from the game you lose track of what is going on and feel like you have been left behind.

I really liked the historian NPC in GW1 where I could go at any time and play through content. I don’t know what the right thing is for GW2, I just don’t care for content that feels pushed on you.

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Posted by: Lord Kuru.3685

Lord Kuru.3685

Awful.

  • The storytelling is grade school-level at its best.
  • Technically, the updates are enormously bug-ridden; and they don’t bother to fix the bugs because the content is temporary anyway.

(edited by Lord Kuru.3685)

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Posted by: Bob F It.5701

Bob F It.5701

I’ve given up. I really find it hard to care about when I’m not given the chance to get the full picture. And if I’m meant to research the story beforehand, then what do I gain by playing anyway?

So basically if they do a recap (Aka the last 2 updates had tons of info, recaps, including trailers, stories, etc) for everything that happened before, whats’ the point of experiencing the content and if they don’t, what’s the point to return, if i don’t know what’s happened in the meantime….am i getting this right?

Pretty much spot on. I bought this game to play it, not for it to play itself. And the exposition-dump character is a very dirty solution to the problem.

Right click your GW2 shortcut > “Properties”
“Shortcut” tab > “Target”
Add to the end " -bmp"

(edited by Bob F It.5701)

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Posted by: Dual.8953

Dual.8953

Aside from Flame and Frost’s slow start I’ve been enjoying it. Especially in instances where the devs have twisted the game mechanics around into something that plays nothing like the rest of the game. Such as SAB, Bazaar of the Four Winds and the Dragon Ball Arena.

Registered Altaholic
Part-time Kittenposter

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Posted by: Cormac.3871

Cormac.3871

I’ve always found the writing to be pretty mixed bag in Guild Wars 2. Even the novels while good in general had things that made me wince. While the writing for the living stories has been similarly patchy (Taimi and Braham are great, but the film noir section was heavy handed, if you are being serious noir is too stylised a genre to fit smoothly in, and if you are going for laughs make the detective a quaggan!) I think the overall arc has become quite engaging. I am also glad I held off on judgement about Scarlet, because I now find her an interesting character. The activities have generally got better as well, aside from Molten facility most of the best stuff has come during the second half.

As for the underlying concept, Living Story is by necessity a compromise. One off events as attempted with the Karka don’t work for many reasons, but the aim of having a dynamic world with events progressing over time is a worthwhile one. Fractals are also a nice way of retaining content, and I would fully expect to see more stuff from LS appear there.

I would personally call Living Story a partial success, mainly because it still falls short of the ideal that they are trying to realise.

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Posted by: Belenwyn.8674

Belenwyn.8674

The LW evolved in a good way over the last year when you compare the first chapter with the last one. Arenanet learned a lot that can be shown in LW Season 2.

In Addition the devs are working on large projects behind the curtain. There is a high chance that some projects will be launched via Season 2. Season 1 will reveal a dragon. Season 2 could lead us through several zones to the residence of the new dragon.

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Posted by: Saberfang.4690

Saberfang.4690

Well, I see there are a lot of mixed feeling about it and I understand them well.

I agree that LS had his moments, like the bazaar of four winds with the election, but its also true that the writing its dreadfull and you had to rely on a blog for most of the background.

I think that arenanet have great concepts but for the need of rushing them out every two weeks and get the most out of it, in terms of farming and time waste, they got them twisted.

For example, at the moment I’m trying to get back all I can from the “origin of nightmare” and I’m after the Scarlet’s journal where we finally get some background on her. Too bad I have to farm the Marionette fight to get cyphers for the pages that I need to assemble it. Why it has to be that way? Couldn’t I get a story releated item without grinding a single event till I get bored to the point I don’t ever want to see it again?

They have so many ways to get players in the story while playing the game: living cities with talking npcs that could be added during the events to add atmosphere, instance where you can have longer interactive dialogues, the idea of the hystorian/fractals to somehow get back with the lost bits and many more….But what we mostly get its event farming because that keep us busy for enough time with less effort.

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Posted by: Pixelpumpkin.4608

Pixelpumpkin.4608

Honestly, there were a lot of problem: characters I didn’t quite like, story instances that should have been group-able, fight instances that should have been solo-able, unfair achievements, technical problems (DAT LAG), temporary content that should have been permanent and permanent content that should have been temporary, bad blood when we voted on the fractal, disappointment in the fractal, etc… etc… etc…

But…

The living story did draw me back into guild wars every month; the new story intances did draw me back in every two weeks; the new maps, fractals, dungeon paths, jumping puzzles and boss fights did ensure that after 100% map completion I didn’t just close gw forever to go and explore another world; the new achievements did give me something to do when I’d gotten most of the base ones out of the way.

Admittedly, it was a bumpy ride – my personal assessment is that it was a success.

Because I am still here, and because the release announcements every 2 weeks still excite me.

I have always been a fan of the Living Story concept – I’d rather have new stuff every month than do something else, and after a year come back to play the expansion for 3 weeks. I have criticised many smaller aspects of the execution, but ANet has tried out new things with half of their mini releases, and I give them full credit for that. You have to try things in order to find what works and what doesn’t. I believe that the Living Story will get better – thanks to the forum community’s constructive feedback. (No thanks to the whining.)

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Posted by: Teofa Tsavo.9863

Teofa Tsavo.9863

An absolute failure to me. There is no sense of personal accomplishment, since the events roll out to a preconceived ending that requires Zero input from anyone. Oh, sure, you can participate.. but you won’t change anything, the story will auto-complete, and next episode will launch regardless.

In the campaign storylines of GW1, to finish a story completely meant doing it completely, personally. From beginning to end. If you failed a step, you stopped progress until completed. You had control of the pace, and the completeness of added bonus steps if you wished. When you finished, you knew that the sole factor of that finish was YOUR efforts. (not talking about content skipping runners BTW)

If a step in the story was annoying, hard, frustrating there was no “oh well, I’ll just wait 2 weeks”. There were no awards for failing a mission enough times to somehow get an achievement for it ala Marionette.

I think over time this kind of pre-ordained temporary content will hit the scrap heap of MMO Gaming. I think that people will come to realize that nothing they do really matters or changes anything except what back piece they wear.

Living dynamic events are best when building tangible items that do change the world, as the world events that brought in 2 races, transportation systems, guild halls, worked to return the dieties, and other improvements to Everquest 2. Living events are best when things are added to the world, not when wreaking destruction upon zones and leaving ugly messes and disconnected, meaningless events for new players to go WTF and scratch their heads over. (and try it, only to find out that regardless of new player zone, it is far from new player content)

I really don’t even see this as “Living” content. It is episodic content, temporary, fixed, immutable, unchangeable, and unresponsive to player input.

A good example of Living content is the final months of SWG. My server, one of the few, finished Imperial. We murdered the ewoks on Endor, we crushed the Rebellion efforts, and completely built the 2nd Death Star.. all by player effort. Other servers finished Alliance.. with the canon results, again by player effort.

And bringing up SWG.. I had the good fortune to experience the original, sandbox game that Koster designed. Truly a living world, since players made the Civil War content, the cities, the vehicles.. if it was great armor, a player made it. If you wanted a buff, a player did it. Everything was player made, and resources changed so that no one could stay static and still compete. There was co-dependence on hunters, miners, and originally very very few quests. Cities grew, and cities died, power changed, landscape changed.. all by player activity. Every sentient in game had faction that could change with how players acted towards them. You landed in that game with no golden path, with a survival knife, bad clothes, a melon and a few creds and from that point what you did made your world, and your story.

People don’t want that. People don’t want the reality of an actual “Living World”. People want scripts, paths, steps, and shiny carrots on a stick. Do this.. Get this.

The only change Anet has made it that the carrot changes frequently, and can’t be repeated.

Ley lines. The perfect solution to deadlines and writers block. Now in an easy open Can.

(edited by Teofa Tsavo.9863)

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Posted by: Mastruq.2463

Mastruq.2463

Overall a good idea but several flaws in execution. Also the storyline is pretty meh, regardless of how it’s told.

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Posted by: minbariguy.7504

minbariguy.7504

If ANet would refund my sixty dollars, I would happily leave these forums and never look back. That is how disappointed I am by Living Story. Since they are unlikely to do so, however, I keep speaking up to let them know how I feel.

I do not understand why they thought it would be fun for me to miss out on content just to enjoy the “thrill” of a “Living World”. All it does is punish people who can’t constantly play through content whenever ANet wants them to.

Further, it was the crappiest “bait and switch” I’ve ever experienced in a video game. GW2 was marketed as a game you could play when you wanted because it had no subscription fees, but it was never mentioned that if you didn’t continue to play you would permanently miss out on content at the rate of every two weeks.

And they’ve admitted that they know many of us are upset by this and claim they are looking into solutions, but they refuse to talk about what it is they are planning. Considering they had a Living Story CDI, that would have been a fantastic place to get feedback on whatever it is that they’re planning, but obviously they didn’t’ want our feedback on it.

I’m ready to just hit the uninstall button from their lack of communication alone. I’m tired of feeling disappointed and bitter. I’d love to give more constructive feedback, but since they won’t discuss the issue, I’m not able to.

So yeah. That’s what I think after a year of Living Story.

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Posted by: cheshirefox.7026

cheshirefox.7026

living story tells me arenanet has some very talented people who can accomplish a lot of things in a certain time frame and some people there care about the game.. from the majority of gw2 releases though, it seems the previously mentioned notion is overshadowed by a certain lot that care more about internal meetings than they ever will the players

i can outswim a centaur!
when i’m done on an issue
i start talking in nerglish

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Posted by: Erukk.1408

Erukk.1408

And they’ve admitted that they know many of us are upset by this and claim they are looking into solutions, but they refuse to talk about what it is they are planning. Considering they had a Living Story CDI, that would have been a fantastic place to get feedback on whatever it is that they’re planning, but obviously they didn’t’ want our feedback on it.

I’m ready to just hit the uninstall button from their lack of communication alone. I’m tired of feeling disappointed and bitter. I’d love to give more constructive feedback, but since they won’t discuss the issue, I’m not able to.

So yeah. That’s what I think after a year of Living Story.

It’s because they can’t discuss stuff in development in detail with the public. Much less future development in detail. Most, if not all, major game developers are like that. They do feed your feedback, but don’t expect detailed reply on what they plan to do in the future back. They aren’t allowed.

Back on subject. It started off slow and rocky, with missteps here and there, but overall, it has been a nice progression so far.

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Posted by: Tinsenycro.9206

Tinsenycro.9206

Living story fail!
Cmon Arenanet we want a real massive expansion;Cantha,Elona or whatever! New professions should be fine aswell!

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Posted by: Teofa Tsavo.9863

Teofa Tsavo.9863

The trouble with the CDI topics is, they do not want input. They want feedback on what they have already decided to do.

And then they paint themselves into a corner with no way out.. as this LS illustrates very well.

Ley lines. The perfect solution to deadlines and writers block. Now in an easy open Can.

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Posted by: Jeff.4680

Jeff.4680

Overall I’d say it’s short of a failure.

When it first started it was terrible, and even though it has dramatically improved…

They promised an expansion’s worth of content spread out through the course of a year, yet they’ve been far from doing so. The model also prevents players who missed a release, from ever experiencing it.

Also, for a game that depends entirely on microtransactions, they didn’t even make the list of the top 10 games that made the most money from microtransactions last year.

Don’t get me wrong, the Living Story concept is brilliant. Trying to substitute it for an expansion/campaign (what the players want), is asinine. Now if they were to release Living Story updates while the players are waiting for an expansion, they’d might be on to something.

From the smallest blade of grass to the largest mountain, where life goes—so, too, should you.

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Posted by: Chaosky.5276

Chaosky.5276

Poor writing and characters abound.

No way to replay missed content. (If this were a sandbox game that’d be fine, but it’s not, so…)

Not a fan.

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Posted by: Marcus Greythorne.6843

Marcus Greythorne.6843

I think one of the reasons why people enjoy it lately is because the story is clearly coherent now. What is Scarlet doing in the Mists? What is the Marionette for? A big drill? Leylines below Lion’s Arch? Destruction incoming. It’s not small incoherent parts which make no sense together but instead putting the pieces together paints a pretty interesting picture and leaves room for a lot of epic speculation. Who doesn’t want to experience the rise of an elder dragon?

http://gw2style.com/index.php – show your look and rate others – great filters!!

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Posted by: Carcerus.9107

Carcerus.9107

The “for a limited time only” aspect of the Living Story and some of the associated items makes all the difference to me … in a negative way. It’s one of the significant reasons why, despite the investment I’ve made into game in time and money, and a collection of characters I’m as fond of as I ever was my WoW characters, I have sometimes struggled to log in for weeks or even a couple of months at a time.

Regardless of whether the execution was a bit “all over the place” or not, I think small additions to the game that tell a story can be a really great thing. But making me feel obligated to log in during a very specific period to play the specific LS content or lose the opportunity to experience it forever sacrifices one of the huge advantages GW2 had over the market because of its B2P model and an “endgame” not devoted to the raiding treadmill: the ability of players to play on their own time, in their own way, without feeling like they were missing out.

MMO technology is sophisticated enough now that there are ways key parts of the LS content could probably have been made permanently available (that is, until you’ve completed a part of the story and moved on to the next) to allow players to experience the story and world-changing events at their own pace. Some of the possible tools (as separate from end-all-be-all solutions), such as greater instancing, optional use of a shards like the overflows that are gated by one’s place in the story, and even the use of phasing, might not be ideal for everyone, and they would require some creative management of loot/rewards, but for myself, and I think many others it’s better than what we wound up with. I don’t necessarily want to see them just dumping everything into instances and calling it a day, but creative professionals who want the LS to be a major part of the game should be able to come up with equally creative solutions.

I do think the temporary nature of the content also gives off the vibe that ArenaNet is trying to get away with not balancing and fixing things that break (unless it becomes catastrophic) because it will all be gone in a couple of weeks anyway. That’s a negative way to go about game design IMO.

I know that they have kind of tried to do the right thing by bringing back some of the desirable collectible items, but making them obtainable via a lottery box really adds insult to injury here. Making a more reliable way (even if it requires substantial effort) to acquire a limited number of Black Lion Claim tickets per account would have made a difference to me.

As it is, the Living Story experience has actually made me more resentful of the game and ArenaNet. I don’t want to feel that way about this game, because there are plenty of things that do make me want to keep playing. Happy players spend money in the cash shop; it can really be that simple. I know for sure, I would have spent more had I not felt like ArenaNet was working against me having fun … that neat armor skin, those toys, minis, dyes, etc. don’t mean a whole heck of lot to me if I’m disinclined to log in.

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Posted by: Saberfang.4690

Saberfang.4690

I agree with Teofa Tsavo.9863 post on LS being a story told to the player where they can’t do nothing about it. That’s why I find the “bazaar of the four wind” content to be the most succesful, because for once we decided how the game would develope through a in game event. Sadly, after that, we never saw Ellen Kiel again and we couldn’t influence the story any further…
Don’t know if I would like a whole world of player made event but I’m sure I would love a world shaped by player actions. Problems are that new players would still have issues living back past story fragment and that developers have to put more effort and time to create the next story step, definetly not an easy thing to get expecially in the way GW2 works now.

At the same time I feel the same way Marcus Greythorne.6843 does. We had so little in these months that now that everything is coming togheter in a coherent way I can’t deny that I’m a little excited. Hope that today starting event is gonna be the best thing Arenanet presented us so far and a begin of a new way of GW2 development.

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Posted by: ThiBash.5634

ThiBash.5634

With everything coming together, it is actually getting worse rather than better. And the sole reason for that is that the cram Scarlet down our throat all the time.

If you can read this then it is proof that ArenaNet’s moderators just, kind and fair.

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Posted by: Marcus Greythorne.6843

Marcus Greythorne.6843

Scarlet is not half as bad as you guys make her if you’ve followed her background story

http://gw2style.com/index.php – show your look and rate others – great filters!!

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Posted by: Thalador.4218

Thalador.4218

Scarlet is not half as bad as you guys make her if you’ve followed her background story

If I wasn’t exposed to her background story, I’d be still playing to this day. Frankly, I haven’t been able to log in since mid December without feeling physically ill just from a single glance at the LS UI and the name Scarlet… the more they exposed her, the worse it’d gotten.

Scarlet’s Alliance Wars (a.k.a. “Guild Wars 2”)
A fantasy of sci-fi cyborg implants grafted into the desiccated flesh of Guild Wars’ corpse.

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Posted by: Marcus Greythorne.6843

Marcus Greythorne.6843

Scarlet is not half as bad as you guys make her if you’ve followed her background story

If I wasn’t exposed to her background story, I’d be still playing to this day. Frankly, I haven’t been able to log in since mid December without feeling physically ill just from a single glance at the LS UI and the name Scarlet… the more they exposed her, the worse it’d gotten.

You’ve seen nothing if you only experienced the stuff from mid December

http://gw2style.com/index.php – show your look and rate others – great filters!!

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Posted by: Thalador.4218

Thalador.4218

Scarlet is not half as bad as you guys make her if you’ve followed her background story

If I wasn’t exposed to her background story, I’d be still playing to this day. Frankly, I haven’t been able to log in since mid December without feeling physically ill just from a single glance at the LS UI and the name Scarlet… the more they exposed her, the worse it’d gotten.

You’ve seen nothing if you only experienced the stuff from mid December

Reading the posts and seeing the screens of the dialogues and her secret lair were MORE than enough, thank you very much.

Also, you misunderstood: I experienced this catastrophe first hand from the beginning to mid December and indirectly from mid December until now.

But you make a good point: new players who bought this game mid December probably have absolutely no idea what’s going on, and are most likely put off even more so from ever touching the LS – not even with a ten-foot-long pole.

Scarlet’s Alliance Wars (a.k.a. “Guild Wars 2”)
A fantasy of sci-fi cyborg implants grafted into the desiccated flesh of Guild Wars’ corpse.

(edited by Thalador.4218)

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Posted by: Marcus Greythorne.6843

Marcus Greythorne.6843

But you make a good point: new players who bought this game mid December probably have absolutely no idea what’s going on, and are most likely put off even more so from ever touching the LS – not even with a ten-foot-long pole.

I thought you’ve experienced the living story instances lately, if you did you would have known that there was an awesome instance in Marjory’s bar where you got a really good recap of all the things that happened before.

http://gw2style.com/index.php – show your look and rate others – great filters!!

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Posted by: Astraea.6075

Astraea.6075

Despite the rocky start, I’m loving the LS episodes that ANet have been delivering since the beginning of the nightmare tower chapter and I’m excited for the next episode and the story development that it contains.

Having said that, I can sympathize with those who are turned off by the fleeting nature of most of the LS content. There have been parts of the content I haven’t had time to experience due to a limited play schedule, but that hasn’t diminished my enjoyment of the content I have played.

What do you think after a year of LS?

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Posted by: TehPwnerer.7215

TehPwnerer.7215

Anxiously awaiting it to be over so I can return to the game.

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Posted by: Khisanth.2948

Khisanth.2948

The LW evolved in a good way over the last year when you compare the first chapter with the last one. Arenanet learned a lot that can be shown in LW Season 2.

In Addition the devs are working on large projects behind the curtain. There is a high chance that some projects will be launched via Season 2. Season 1 will reveal a dragon. Season 2 could lead us through several zones to the residence of the new dragon.

Depends on where you think it started.
For me the best release is still the first Halloween. Everything else has been rather disappointing. Some had potential but they were still flawed in ways that made them disappointing.

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Posted by: Blaeys.3102

Blaeys.3102

I think it was a good first start – but it is just a start. They saw what worked and didn’t work with the community.

The latter steps have shown great improvements in both storytelling and playability – a good sign that they are getting their sea legs with this type of game development.

I have high hopes for the future – not necessarily based on all of the past living story steps, but instead based on the steady improvements we’ve seen since the first Karka invasion event more than a year ago.

It still isn’t perfect and there are some rough edges to sand over (most notably, catching people up on the story if they missed steps and some annoying reoccuring minor bugs), but the future is definitely bright.

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Posted by: minbariguy.7504

minbariguy.7504

[SNIP] But making me feel obligated to log in during a very specific period to play the specific LS content or lose the opportunity to experience it forever sacrifices one of the huge advantages GW2 had over the market because of its B2P model and an “endgame” not devoted to the raiding treadmill: the ability of players to play on their own time, in their own way, without feeling like they were missing out.

Yes, yes, and a thousand more times yes. Your entire post is spot-on for explaining how many of us feel, and thank you for writing it. I’ve tried to explain it enough times myself, but honestly I don’t think the devs get it. They have demonstrated a complete lack of comprehension about people wanting to play on their own time.

I wish they would address this. Like you, I feel nothing but a growing resentment.

Honestly, guys, give us something.

Anything.

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Posted by: Vick.6805

Vick.6805

If it disappeared tomorrow I wouldn’t mind. Tried it for a year not really my thing. I would however pay good money for a nice campaign or expansion. Kinda sad when you think about it, a year after Prophecies was released they put out Factions. What do we have a year after GW2 was released? Well if you weren’t there to see it you may never know.

^ this

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Posted by: Teofa Tsavo.9863

Teofa Tsavo.9863

If it disappeared tomorrow I wouldn’t mind. Tried it for a year not really my thing. I would however pay good money for a nice campaign or expansion. Kinda sad when you think about it, a year after Prophecies was released they put out Factions. What do we have a year after GW2 was released? Well if you weren’t there to see it you may never know.

^ this

In a year content was added to GW1. Here, content is removed in favor of shoddy temporary failures.

No matter what destruction Anet scripts Scarlet to perform, at the end of it she is still a laughable cardboard cutout.

Ley lines. The perfect solution to deadlines and writers block. Now in an easy open Can.

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Posted by: Thorn.7963

Thorn.7963

Complete and utter failure. This game needed an expansion, not temporary zergs.

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Posted by: Enokitake.1742

Enokitake.1742

Would trade it all back in for an expasion of Cantha, Elona, or the rest of Tyria (ring of fire, magumma wastes, deldrimor front, blood legion homelands, far shiverpeaks, scavenger’s causeway, crystal deserts, Isle of janthir) at exclusively L80 content…

plus new pvp modes that aren’t conquest with gimmicks or zerg vs. zerg.

Story line was terrible, content temporary, mostly no skill button mash to get credit on mobs for achievements, super zergy.

If they made living story releases group-instances that picked up where personal story left off, required completion to start the next one, and was re-playable… then maybe. They could still have added in open world boss things like 3 wurms or Teq update. But they didn’t.

(edited by Enokitake.1742)

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Posted by: SirusDibley.3716

SirusDibley.3716

Complete and utter failure. This game needed an expansion, not temporary zergs.

THIS. The first zerg was ok but to just keep doing it over and over , jesus what happened to creativity. We need a proper expansion not a travelling zerg fest every few weeks.

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Posted by: Tyger.1637

Tyger.1637

Bored and bitter. The more I’ve got into the story, the less I’ve cared to the point where I’ve only logged in twice this month.

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Posted by: ThiBash.5634

ThiBash.5634

Scarlet is not half as bad as you guys make her if you’ve followed her background story

I have followed it, with great attention, hoping for some scrap of good stuff. But it gets worse every release. To be blunt, Scarlet is the only thing about the Living Story I don’t like, but because she’s the main focal point, she ruins all of it.

Apart from the overly heroic stuff in her background (she ultimate smart and super charismatic and apparently, very powerful because her minions would rather die than face her), she yet again does something completely over the top and unbelievable that spits on everything lore that went before her: she takes over Lion’s Arch.

Yes, that’s right…she does what the Charr, White Mantle, Undead, Karka and the Elder Dragons could not.

For some odd reason, the devs think adding more impossible things to her resume is the answer to people complaining about her being too perfect and being able to do anything.

Then again, the lore writers are mostly too stuck up to take criticism. So instead of offering friendly advice, we’re lashing at them. Because they’re not listening anyway, so it doesn’t matter if we’re gentle to them.

So argue what you will, but don’t insult the naysayers by claiming they don’t know what they’re talking about.

If you can read this then it is proof that ArenaNet’s moderators just, kind and fair.

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Posted by: Enokitake.1742

Enokitake.1742

Yes, that’s right…she does what the Charr, White Mantle, Undead, Karka and the Elder Dragons could not.

For some odd reason, the devs think adding more impossible things to her resume is the answer to people complaining about her being too perfect and being able to do anything.

And did it super easy mode too, even though, you know, notices should have been sent to pretty much everyone this would happen instantly cause we have warp gates and can beam small armies + cannons from 5 racial capitals to lion’s arch’s center directly.

But it goes alongside having scarlet’s lair beneath the priory who digs everywhere but overlooks their own caverns, aetherblades hiding a factory in the mountains outside lion’s arch, and the complete silence/unawareness of destiny’s edge (especially Logan/Rytlock) even though scarlet previously failed to assassinate the queen whose survival tediously holds the human-charr peace alliance (and thus the pact needed to kill the elder dragons) together.

Scarlet writing is bad, but everyone else’s in the LS is equally bad, because literally everyone except marjory and kasmeer are grossly unaware and incompetent.

It’s not because we’re not following, its just bad writing.

(edited by Enokitake.1742)