Guild Wars 2

Great original post here. I don’t have issues with the FOV, but I find the camera bouncing off of and hanging up on world geometry to be very frustrating. It feels like the larger races, Charr and Norn, get the worst of this.

I’ve also found a few places where the camera can get completely trapped. Off the top of my head, standing on one of the spear launchers in the Norn areas when it is destroyed seems to instantly trap the camera beneath the wreckage.

No game update today, really hope its because theyre testing a better camera…lol

Apotheosize.4293:

No game update today, really hope its because theyre testing a better camera…lol

Don’t expect any new features and drastic changes (such as a camera rework) until they iron out all the game – breaking bugs, skills, balance, etc.

The forums being up is a good sign though.

5,6,8 and 9 cause me the most problems. They’re particularly noticable when trying to do jumping puzzles in confined areas. Can’t see the branch to jump on because the camera is stuck pointing to the other side, or just too darn close!

Baxuz.1943:

Both cameras turn around your character, both when using LMB and RMB, not directly turning your own character. Both have the “free camera” and “turn 180” keybinds which are an unneccesary leftovers in this day.

Just a couple of things -

1. LMB and RMB both pan the camera only if your character is not moving. If you are moving, in any direction, RMB will turn your character while LMB will continue to pan your camera. This is the way it should be and the way it is in most MMORPG’s, including World of Warcraft, which easily has the best camera implementation in the genre.

If, for whatever reason, you really want to turn your character while standing still, you can just press A or D while holding LMB. However, I can’t really think of any functional reason to spin your character around in circles while standing in one spot.

2. Free camera is completely necessary. Without free camera, panning the camera to the rear while running forward in order to target/attack things behind you becomes nearly impossible because the camera will instantly snap back to its default position the moment you let go of LMB.

A lot of games today still use smart camera with no way to disable it. It’s very bad and infinitely inferior to free camera. However, some people like it, so the option is (IMO) necessary.

In WoW, the left mouse button behaves like “free camera”. Noone needs a camera that snaps back. The right mouse button will turn your head around how far it can go (90 degrees), further movement will turn your character.

So, left button = camera, right button = character. There is a lot of connection lost with your character in gw2 compared to wow for that reason alone, that your mouse doesn’t control your character, just the camera facing. The fact that your character realigns himself with the camera facing when pressing forward is just a side-effect.

This also causes the horrible behaviour that the game auto targets the enemy in front of your character, not the camera. Sometimes you don’t even see the target. If both were tied, that wouldn’t happen.

Baxuz.1943:

In WoW, the left mouse button behaves like “free camera”. Noone needs a camera that snaps back. The right mouse button will turn your head around how far it can go (90 degrees), further movement will turn your character.

So, left button = camera, right button = character. There is a lot of connection lost with your character in gw2 compared to wow for that reason alone, that your mouse doesn’ control your character, just the camera facing. The fact that your character realigns himself with the camera facing when pressing forward is just a side-effect.

I don’t really understand what you’re trying to say.

Camera functionality in terms of LMB and RMB is identical in GW2 and WoW. If your character is standing still in either game, both LMB and RMB will only pan the camera. If your character is moving, LMB will pan the camera and RMB will turn your character.

This is the same in both games.

WoW also has options for smart camera. You can enable it, thereby causing the snap back effect that occurs whenever you release LMB while panning. Or you can disable it, which allows you to pan freely without the game auto-resetting the angle for you. This isn’t a side effect of anything. It’s an explicit and intentional camera option that can be toggled on or off.

This is also the same in both games.

So, I guess I just don’t see where the disconnect is. The behavior of LMB and RMB in the context of camera and character movement is 100% identical in both games. The only differences are in responsiveness (inertia, accel), FoV, zoom, and some of the other items you mentioned originally.

I played WoW for a long, long time and it took me all of no time at all to get accustomed to camera and character control in GW2 simply because it’s the exact same thing (albeit less responsive).

Noctred.6732:

Camera functionality in terms of LMB and RMB is identical in GW2 and WoW. If your character is standing still in either game, both LMB and RMB will only pan the camera. If your character is moving, LMB will pan the camera and RMB will turn your character.

That is simply not true: http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BSuXriiiVng

In wow even when you are standing still, your character turns with the camera when using RMB which is the turn key. LMB pans the camera around your character.

In GW2, while standing still, both keys do the exact same: they pan the camera.

+1 This has really been bothering me lately.

All those possibilities with mouse camera control you talked about should be customizable … everyone has their habits and preferences.
It’s a PC game, not a casual/console game.
Camera is the main and first interface with the game, it should be more efficient, and above all, under the control of the user.

A major problem for me during the last 2 beta events and now is the fact that I cannot RMB direction control while running 100% of the time. Sometimes I need to click the RMB several times until I see the cursor disappear, granting me control. It’s very frustrating in combat to say the least. I stick through it because I love this game so much though.

+1 this needs to get fix.

The camera controls, both distance and how loose it feels, are an issue for me as well. It is the only thing I do not like. I wish it was tighter, more precise, where it didn’t feel like there is input lag. I look forward to this being patched/fixed/adjusted also as it’s the only thing keeping me away from the game.

+1 for this, add me to the list of people that are experiencing the disorientation, dizziness, headache/migraines, nausea and just plain frustration with the way the camera and mouse behaves. It’s extremely disconcerting sometimes, and often I wondered if it was just me, but I’m (not quite so) glad to see that it is not.

There are so many times I’ve just had to stop, and stand still, or log off out of frustration because my camera FOV feels like it got sucked into a tornado. Or I’ve completely had to put off doing a jumping puzzle, which I love the jumping puzzles, I do however, not love my cam getting stuck in a wall, or the floor, or playing ping pong with obstacles that are not even the height of my characters knees.

I also discovered that I tend to ‘lose my mouse’ a lot, the pointer completely disappears for a few moments, and after a lot of fiddling around it’ll reappear in the center.

I utilize both the keyboard and the mouse for turning/maneuvering/moving and while it’s more physical to do that and rather tiring, it helps me sometimes counter all the hinky camera movements, albeit it should be very unnecessary to have to play like this. Please do fix this somehow Anet, sliders, full camera rework, whatever, something needs to change.

I don’t know about everyone else but I’m having a really irritating problem with the RMB recently. As we all know, when you hold the RMB down to change camera angle, the cursor disappears and should reappear in a position depending on where you moved your mouse. For example, if the cursor is on the left of the screen and I hold down the RMB and move the camera(and the mouse) to the right, then the cursor should reappear on the right side of the screen when i release the button. This isn’t happening for me, the cursor reappears at the position it was when I initially pressed the RMB. This really makes it difficult to coordinate as I have to reposition my mouse on the pad and the cursor in-game each time I move the camera. Is there a fix for this? I’m sure it hasn’t always been like this.

Alright, so I made these 2 videos just so Anet can get the idea of what is exactly wrong with their camera in GW2, and what they had right in the first GW. I posted this on here and on reddit, but it didn’t get much exposure. Hopefully this does since its an active topic.

GW2 camera = http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWnk6CEniYw&list=UUMsYsPp7qOhFcHFzt2A-B2A&index=1&feature=plcp

GW1 camera = http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfRBp5LX2Ss&feature=youtu.be

This is absolutely the most important camera feature that requires attention – The players ability to adjust the acceleration and deceleration of BOTH the camera swing and automatic zoom.

An accelerating and decelerating camera may seem like artistic and fluid design feature, but as someone mentioned earlier it actually causes motion sickness. Consider the behavior of the human eye. The eye’s acceleration and deceleration speed are so fast that they are nearly undetectable, even under close observation. The camera MUST be allowed to reflect that behavior or the result can cause people to experience disorientation and motion sickness.

I implore the designers to address this situation ASAP!

+1 for FOV, inertia, smoothing… the combination of them is making it really uncomfortable to play for more than 5 minutes, I get headaches. I hope that options to disable smoothing and increase FOV are added.

And yeah, in addition to headaches, I can’t even see the world clearly because the FOV is too narrow. Can’t even take good screenshots of landscapes or anything because barely anything is visible. Attached an example… only a sliver of the landscape is visible.

+10000000
/signed

Me and my GF are playing MMo’s together since we met. We bought Gw2 together and from the first Beta she could not play more than 10 mins because the camera inertia/FOv/movement literally hurts her eyes to the point where the game is not playable for her. we tried every trick in the book. she has a top end gaming rig etc, nothing worked.
We like the game but she is just refusing to play due to those issues. Hear head hurts up to 1 hour after she plays for 10 mins. No other game gives her this kind of problem and we played every mmo that is out there.

It’s such a shame that a game like this stumbles on idiotic issues like camera inertia.

But as the hoard of fanboys are raising the game to high heavens, I’m sure Anet will not give a kitten about a small minority who can not play because the bloody camera makes their eyes bleed.

Aestru.2671:

…we tried every trick in the book…

the horizontal FOV can be increased by playing in windowed mode with a high aspect ratio (decrease the windows vertical extent). that helped me a little (~21:9 aspect ratio), but the viewing range sucks if you dont keep the camera angle flat to the ground

+1

The camera locking is my biggest issue. I do not use the “smart camera” option. I hold right-click to free-look, but many times the camera will just stop rotating even though I’m holding right-click and moving my mouse. It makes PvP very difficult and frustrating.

Love the game. Brilliant.

But the camera, and mostly the FoV drives me nuts.

I would be one happy kitten if you fixed the FoV to be more in line with normal PC games.

Love,
Mark xx ;-)

gene helo.1590:

Alright, so I made these 2 videos just so Anet can get the idea of what is exactly wrong with their camera in GW2, and what they had right in the first GW. I posted this on here and on reddit, but it didn’t get much exposure. Hopefully this does since its an active topic.

GW2 camera = http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWnk6CEniYw&list=UUMsYsPp7qOhFcHFzt2A-B2A&index=1&feature=plcp

GW1 camera = http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfRBp5LX2Ss&feature=youtu.be

Excellent example videos. Show exactly how detrimental the “character must be visible at all times” effect is in GW2.

Found another post that goes right along with this one, should have probably been part of this in the first place.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/players/FOV-in-GW2-headaches-and-claustrophobic-sensations

When a game has any other issues that have to do with gameplay/quest/events/pvp etc thats all things you can get used to etc.
But when the game itself is hurting you phisicaly, then the devs SHOULD look into it, esp if it’s something they can prolly fix w/o much hassle.
It’s a 100% gamebreaker for some people, and more and more seem to suffer from it. You just can’t play because your get literally in pain. I have played MMo’s and single player games for more than 10 years and have never ever experienced something like this.
If some can stand it and like it even, thats ok, make it AN OPTION that you can turn off/on.
But for the love of god make the game playable.
I can’t even cancel my sub in protest
They got my money for the box for a game I can not play AT ALL.
I should not have to look for tricks and do all sorts of artificial workarounds to be able to move the camera which is the most basic thing in an mmo.
I am glad at least that they are aware of it and hope that I can play the game in the near future when they fix this horrible bug

Now that the Suggestions forum is open, maybe this whole thread should be moved there? I’m not sure if this topic fits in the Game Bugs section.

Baxuz.1943:

Now that the Suggestions forum is open, maybe this whole thread should be moved there? I’m not sure if this topic fits in the Game Bugs section.

A version of this thread already does exist in the Suggestion forums: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/suggestions/Camera-Related-Issues-Compilation-and-Lengthy-Anaylsis/first#post86991

A second one won’t hurt though =D

I don’t think I’ve seen the issue I’ve been having and it’s been driving me insane. Whenever I try to move the camera it actually moves too fast! I can either get completely overhead or a look into the sky, no in-between and my camera doesn’t reset when I move it stays stuck like that. I have my mouse speed turned all the way down and free camera turned off. I don’t know what else to try, but I’m otherwise loving this game!

To summarize, may I suggest (as many others) to :
- (above all) add a Field of View Slider from whatever you want to at least 130 degrees horizontal angle
- add a First Person View, simply like GW1
- add character movement by mouse click on the terrain, like GW1
- add option to get rid off automatic movement of camera (while dead for example), smoothing and so on
- add transparancy to the character when zooming and to the objects that the camera goes through
- add options on Left and Right Click (turn the camera or turn the character)
- add better object selection (be able to target even if not in line of sight)

Thanks for the others necessary fixes and all the good work !

I play the game in a window which is not as tall as my monitor because it increases the FoV. Please add an FoV option so i can play in fullscreen.

+1 Excellent post

I’m already halfway to quit playing just because of the issues with camera

Movement controls (WASD) are a pita too. the character didn’t react in a linear way
to key presses which makes control movement just a pain. often times there is
no reaction at all and I have to press the key again to get my toon moving. I guess it’s
because some kind of animation-lock-out or something. sometimes my character
doesn’t move at all and I have to release key and press again to get it to move.
so annoying.

“normal” behaviour in this game is like that:
press a key – wait 1/2 second – character starts to move.
release key – character still moves for 1/2 second before stopping.
and this without any lag!

precise movement is impossible with that kind of behaviour!!

Jumping puzzles and vistas are a pain. I didn’t bother with them anymore.

Overall moving & fighting feels very sluggish, slow and often time unresponsive.
It’s just plain annoying and no fun at all.

This already had poisoned my gameplay.
I only login occasionally to test if there were changes made in that regard.
In the current state, the game is unplayable for me.

Because of a plethora of more pressing issues,
I have not much hope that this will get fixed soon.

so sad.

A great example of 60° vs 100° field of view, and responsive controls.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4-CnTvRe_U

The funny thing is, if you go http://www.gaikai.com/games/tera, and play Tera by essentially streaming a video, you still have more responsive controls than on your own PC (if your ping is around 50ms).

Baxuz.1943:

Now that the Suggestions forum is open, maybe this whole thread should be moved there? I’m not sure if this topic fits in the Game Bugs section.

This thread should NOT get into Suggestions, because IT IS a bug. People can not play the game because of it.
It’s not some cosmetic fluff that needs to be adressed, it makes ppl sick.

So it should stay here untill they solve this problem

Please fix the camera and control issues. The most vital, of course, is the FoV problem, which can literally make me – and quite a lot of other people – ill. As for the rest, the game plays like a bad port from console, and it shouldn’t do.

All of which, should I deign to play for more than 20 minutes at a time, makes me very cranky and I start hating the game. I really, really don’t want to hate the game. I’d like to be able to play it – without getting sick and only being able to play for a few minutes every other day.

Simply put: “+1”
Absolutely love this game, but the camera inertia is so frustrating it almost made me quit first week within game release.

And the problem is a lot worse playing a melee class in sPvP.

I CANNOT fathom why a company in the whole world would implement such an idiotic thing and not even add an option to turn it off.

The graphics in the game are beautiful… but you end up having to wrestle with camera to try and see it. I’m sure most people don’t even notice half the work anet has put into the game, because the constant fight with the camera is such a pain.

Please let your game breath! I feel like I’m stuck to my monitor and wearing blinkers.

Aestru.2671:

Baxuz.1943:

Now that the Suggestions forum is open, maybe this whole thread should be moved there? I’m not sure if this topic fits in the Game Bugs section.

This thread should NOT get into Suggestions, because IT IS a bug. People can not play the game because of it.
It’s not some cosmetic fluff that needs to be adressed, it makes ppl sick.

So it should stay here untill they solve this problem

What? It is not a bug… all of this stuff was done intentionally, except maybe 6. Bug would be if it was unintentional. It’s just really bad design.

Jason King.2647:

Hey everyone,

Thanks for the feedback! While there hasn’t been an “official” post on this subject until now, I want to assure you all that we are taking your thoughts and concerns into consideration. As one of the previous poster’s noted, we are currently spreading our resources among a large number of issues (account security, game security, etc.) and working towards a point where we can improve the camera functionality.

In the meantime, if you have suggestions or comments on ways we can improve the camera, please keep your feedback concise, constructive, and consolidated to this thread. While we may not reply to every comment, we’re constantly going through the forums and reading your suggestions.

Thanks again!

+1

Hi everyone, I’d like to add my voice to this topic.
Every time I play Guild Wars 2 more than 30 minutes, I get horrible headaches and nausea plus the felling of having my eyes popping out of their sockets.
At the beginning I did not think the game was in cause but then I decided to make some search and found that a lot of people have the exact same symptoms.
I want to point out that I have played computer games for 20 years and I’ve never felt like this. I think I will pause playing the game (which is sad because I love it) until this is resolved.
Please ArenaNet, do something about this issue, somebody can’t pay the price of ruining his own health to play a game.

Looks like Kripparian shares the same sentiment with us: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0i0dS7lHNM#t=0m48s – Good example linked right there. It’s so true, the fluidity is just amazing.

Jason King.2647:

Hey everyone,

Thanks for the feedback! While there hasn’t been an “official” post on this subject until now, I want to assure you all that we are taking your thoughts and concerns into consideration. As one of the previous poster’s noted, we are currently spreading our resources among a large number of issues (account security, game security, etc.) and working towards a point where we can improve the camera functionality.

In the meantime, if you have suggestions or comments on ways we can improve the camera, please keep your feedback concise, constructive, and consolidated to this thread. While we may not reply to every comment, we’re constantly going through the forums and reading your suggestions.

Thanks again!

Extremely good news! Now it is noticed by Arenanet, we just have to patiently wait for some fixes =)

Many of the listed options are problems however a couple to add.

1. Options>Keyboard Commands>About Face
- I assumed this would mean reverse camera view. I’ve assigned to mouse scroll bar as in Aion. It does nothing. Is it broken?

2. Scrolling FOV – Not able to scroll far enough, nor scroll from 3rd person to 1st person Fov. This is very odd.

Are there plans to fix these issues at some point?
Using Razer Naga

Worst camera i have seen in recent years. It’s frustrating, disorienting and not up to current game standards. Games 10+ years old have a better camera management than this game.

I agree with the OP. Also features I’d like to see include a full function zoom that not only allows me to zoom into first person, but zoom far out (at least twice as far as currently possible).

I don’t know if the mouse functions are tied to the camera functions, but I’ll mention them because the mouse controls the camera. There is no sticky targeting. When you turn your camera by clicking with LMB it deselects your target. This is particularly troubling for ground targeted abilities. RMB causes the character to attack. This causes you to accidentally attack mobs you did not intend to when running around. It gets you killed.

I don’t want to compare games, but quite simply, the best camera controls I’ve experienced are in WoW. Camera options there include camera follow options (bounce, etc), terrain options, water options, distance, speed, etc. You can set the camera exactly how you want it and it works beautifully. The mouse camera controls don’t make the mistakes that this game does and the whole thing just performs better. If the Arena Net team wants this to be the best game possible, these controls should be at least as good. Controls make or break the game. Bad controls in an otherwise good game equals a bad game. The camera is the most important part of those controls.

Tyestor.7028:

Looks like Kripparian shares the same sentiment with us: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0i0dS7lHNM#t=0m48s – Good example linked right there. It’s so true, the fluidity is just amazing.

Yep. That’s what I miss most. I have to be brutally honest, and I really tried not to rant.
After picking up Fall of Cybertron yesterday, I just can’t get myself to play Guild Wars 2 again. The controls are that bad, and so is the framerate. The game feels like trying to steer a rubber raft.
Hopefully this will be fixed soon, because I really want to continue playing the game.

Excellent write up, thank you.

Points 5 and 6 make jumping puzzles and anything in caves or indoors a pain instead of a pleasure. I find myself fighting with the camera instead of enjoying the world – I doubt that’s what ArenaNet is looking for. The camera and it’s controls should just fade away and be unnoticeable.

Also, +1 to a first person view. Why can’t we just scroll in all the way? I doubt I’d actually play from that view, but taking screenshots would be fantastic.

Ugh. It is really hard to patiently wait for these camera issues to be fixed because Its difficult to enjoy the game with the frustrating camera behavior. Hasn’t this been addressed during the beta?

Is it Anet’s priority to get it fixed and implement a few things to the camera controls? Because honestly, the camera design should be priority and should have been fixed by now. If one guy was able to make the camera controls similar to Tera, then I really don’t know how a big team of developers hasn’t already fixed the camera issues by now(Sorry its just REALLY frustrating to play a game I want to play for long sessions)

Anet, please pelase please stop allowing the camera to act like a physical object in the game by snapping and zooming so close to your character when the camera runs into objects or walls in the game. It is essential for that to be corrected.

as it was already a hot topic during BWE1 and throughout all betas,
So ArenaNet knows this a long time…
I’ve not much confidence left that this will get changed soon.
And there are a lot of other pressing issues too.

This game’s camera is not only making the game difficult and uncomfortable to play but it is making people physically ill.

I can understand why this is not a high priority for ArenaNet (confirmed by their single response to this issue), but for me it is priority number one. And there appears to be many others who feel the same.

No longer can I tolerate the camera and no longer do I play GW2. Needless to say I am very disappointed that a game oozing so much potential is ruined by something so basic as the camera.

It’s one thing if your popular mob does not pop or some event is bugged or some loot looks pink instead of blue. These are all things that you can live with.
Broken content can be avoided while it’s broken, but you can still play.
Broken loot can be avoided while it’s broken , but you can still play.
Broken class abilities can be replaced with others, but you can still play.

Broken camera that make you physically ill can NOT be avoided, and you CAN NOT play at all.

But I guess as we are just a few hundred ppl who have this problem, and the rest of 1.99 milion do not, we are just colateral damage.
If all the people that have this issue will stop playing it’s no big loss for Anet. They got our money from the box anyway.

I didn’t notice on the box saying that the game might cause severe headaches and nausea for some people with sensitive eyes.
If it did I would not have bought it. I wonder if thats not against legal regulations, in which case I might have a chat with my lawyer friend