I can’t see Anet doing this, but you know, if you feel you’ve done something wrong, and you grow from it, that’s all anyone can ask. I’ve been in your shoes too many times in my life to not understand.
You’re a day late to the protest and holding up a picket sign for something not happening mate. Can we put down the pitchforks now and have one week of complaining about the new patch instead. lol
Well it may come as a surprise to most of you, but I never doubted Anet would come through and do the right thing. I even may have said so once or twice. lol
Thanks for post, Anet!
I spent $60 on something the newbies are getting free. If you think that’s fair, you go right on supporting ANet as they keep kittening you.
You also spent $60 on something that new players could get for $50 a year or so later, and for $10 a year after that. Videogames depreciate, often fast. It’s preposterous to expect otherwise. Every player that buys Fallout 4 for XBone in the fall will be getting Fallout 3 for free, that doesn’t mean that people who bought Fallout 3 for full price have reason to be salty about it. They got the game they paid for and had years to play it before these new players are getting it, Bethesda owes them nothing more than that.
If ANet asking a fair market price for a great product is them kittening me, then that’s how daddy likes getting kittened.
When GW2 came out, did it include GW1 for free?
No, cause GW2 is not a GW 1 expansion. But if you buy the base WoW package and the current expansion you get EVERY SINGLE OTHER EXPANSION for free. That’s a lot of money you’d have spent if you’d been around buying expansions the whole time.
Then why bring up Fallout 4/Fallout 3?
Short answer, your example just fell apart.
Sorry I compare MMORPGs to MMORPGs, because, get this, they’re basically the same genre. I don’t compare single player games to MMORPGs, because they have completely different logistics.
Short answer, you’re terrible at examples.
See, and I tried comparing MMORPGs to MMORPGs when I asked about GW1/GW2.
You need to learn the First Rule of Holes: when you find yourself in one, stop digging.
Guild Wars 1 wasn’t an MMO. Even according to Anet it was a CoRPG. It wasn’t an MMO because it had no persistent world. Enjoy the shovel.
Edit: To be clear, we’re talking about an expansion for an MMO. Not two different games as GW 1 and GW 2 are, and not other games that aren’t MMOs.
I spent $60 on something the newbies are getting free. If you think that’s fair, you go right on supporting ANet as they keep kittening you.
You also spent $60 on something that new players could get for $50 a year or so later, and for $10 a year after that. Videogames depreciate, often fast. It’s preposterous to expect otherwise. Every player that buys Fallout 4 for XBone in the fall will be getting Fallout 3 for free, that doesn’t mean that people who bought Fallout 3 for full price have reason to be salty about it. They got the game they paid for and had years to play it before these new players are getting it, Bethesda owes them nothing more than that.
If ANet asking a fair market price for a great product is them kittening me, then that’s how daddy likes getting kittened.
When GW2 came out, did it include GW1 for free?
No, cause GW2 is not a GW 1 expansion. But if you buy the base WoW package and the current expansion you get EVERY SINGLE OTHER EXPANSION for free. That’s a lot of money you’d have spent if you’d been around buying expansions the whole time.
Then why bring up Fallout 4/Fallout 3?
Short answer, your example just fell apart.
Sorry I compare MMORPGs to MMORPGs, because, get this, they’re basically the same genre. I don’t compare single player games to MMORPGs, because they have completely different logistics.
Short answer, you’re terrible at examples.
Yes, it is free forever. You can continue to play the game you bought, Guild Wars 2 forever. Guild Wars 2 Heart of Thorns is a separate registered trademark. A separate game that expands the game you are now playing.
But it doesn’t stop you from playing the game you purchased for free.
I spent $60 on something the newbies are getting free. If you think that’s fair, you go right on supporting ANet as they keep kittening you.
You also spent $60 on something that new players could get for $50 a year or so later, and for $10 a year after that. Videogames depreciate, often fast. It’s preposterous to expect otherwise. Every player that buys Fallout 4 for XBone in the fall will be getting Fallout 3 for free, that doesn’t mean that people who bought Fallout 3 for full price have reason to be salty about it. They got the game they paid for and had years to play it before these new players are getting it, Bethesda owes them nothing more than that.
If ANet asking a fair market price for a great product is them kittening me, then that’s how daddy likes getting kittened.
When GW2 came out, did it include GW1 for free?
No, cause GW2 is not a GW 1 expansion. But if you buy the base WoW package and the current expansion you get EVERY SINGLE OTHER EXPANSION for free. That’s a lot of money you’d have spent if you’d been around buying expansions the whole time.
They are offering a better deal to new players. They are not offering an equivalent deal to existing players.
Therein lies the rub.
Yes they are. Existing players are getting the core game for free. They just already have it, so they aren’t going to really notice any difference. What you mean to say is that existing players are not being offered bonus candy on top of what the new players are being offered, which is true, nor do we deserve it.
I spent $60 on something the newbies are getting free. If you think that’s fair, you go right on supporting ANet as they keep kittening you.
You might be right if this wasn’t more or less standard for MMOs. But since it is, maybe there’s, I don’t know, a reason for it?
Maybe because GW2 was supposed to be something different from the “standard MMO”?
And it is different. But it still needs to make money. Taking down a barrier to entry is one way of making money. Regardless of the fact that it does some things different, there’s no reason to believe it’ll do every single thing different.
I love how when Anet does something that other games do, they are guilty of being like other MMOs, but when they do something different, they’re guilty of doing something different for the sake of being different.
Just about any other MMO you’d have bought you’d be in far far worse shape in the same type of comparison. Think of people who paid for a year of $15 monthly fees and suddenly everyone was playing the game with no monthly fee. Or the people who paid for games that went free to play, including paying sub. Or all the WoW players who bought ever expansion all along, where a new player saves a couple of hundred dollars.
Giving a new player a reason to play takes away a barrier to entry and believe it or not, new players are good for the game. That is good for veteran players.
They are offering a better deal to new players. They are not offering an equivalent deal to existing players.
Therein lies the rub.
Yes they are. Existing players are getting the core game for free. They just already have it, so they aren’t going to really notice any difference. What you mean to say is that existing players are not being offered bonus candy on top of what the new players are being offered, which is true, nor do we deserve it.
I spent $60 on something the newbies are getting free. If you think that’s fair, you go right on supporting ANet as they keep kittening you.
You might be right if this wasn’t more or less standard for MMOs. But since it is, maybe there’s, I don’t know, a reason for it?
The expansion doesn’t cost more than the base game at launch though. Comparing a new expansion to a 2.5 year old game, when all games go down in price, is a bit strange to me. I’m pretty sure it sold for $60 when new.
Edit: Anyway if you consider expansions from most games as a percentage of the price of the main game and take into account how much content they add, there’s virtually always a massive imbalance.
Well everyone can think about the meeting that led to that decision and make their own decision. I think this is a ludicrous assertion.
The very same meeting, based on the very same chain of thought, should have resulted in changes to the “free core for new players, nothing for vets” expansion bundle plan, simply because the FAQ change was a direct consequence of that decision. They couldn’t arrive at a decision that keeping the FAQ unchanged would be bad idea without also thinking that the bundle idea as it is isn’t exactly wise either. And if there was no backlash to the bundle, nobody would have called them on FAQ change.
So, either the bundle decision was a mistake due to oversight, or they didn’t realize there would be any bad PR at all.I know which of those two choices is more ludicrous.
I’m saying the liklihood of Anet not realizing the fan base would react this way, after years of experience with this particular fan base borders on surreal.
And yet they clearly did not predict the effect bundle caused. And no matter how surreal it sounds, the only other option is they released the bundle (knowing it’s going to cost them in PR), apparently by a complete mistake. And the likelihood of that happening is way, way lower.
Right, overlooking something is one thing. Intentionally trying to pull one over on this fan base is something else. They KNOW this fan base. Really. They know us.
So if they do something that’s obviously not well thought out, the simplest explanation is they didn’t think it out. But there’s very little chance they could intentionally do something that was intentionally in our worst interest and think the could get away with it. Again, if you’re intentionally doing something, you’re going to question how the fans will react. When you’re giving somethign away for free, you’re doing something good and it’s easier to miss the fan reaction.
In my opinion, Anet knows us well enough by now where they’d be gunshy about doing something underhanded even if they wanted to. But that’s just me.
All I’m really saying is that it takes one person assigned to make a change to a FAQ to not get to it and another person who is overseeing that person to not follow it up, for a FAQ change to be missed. It really is that simple.
Yes, it might have been a mistake. Still, not changing that FAQ until the very last moment was definitely in Anet’s best financial interest (as this way they could continue to milk people longer for content they were already planning to give away for “free”), so i have a reason to be suspicious of their motives. Funny thing that mistakes in player’s favour either don’t happen at all, or are fixed right away, butr mistakes in Anet’s favour always keep persisting.
snip
Anyone who had looked it over with a critical eye would have seen the implosion. They KNOW this community. It’s not going to let Anet get away with anything and Anet KNOWS this.
Put yourself in the position of Anet management for just a second. Do you really think that they sat there at a meeting and said, I have a great idea. Let’s sell a bunch of copies of this game to people, telling them they need it and then, at launch, we can change it and give the game away free?
Does that make sense under ANY circumstance you can think of? No. This was a mistake. It was ludicrous. Even the most cursory examination would have shown this to be a fiasco. It was always going to cost Anet from the moment it happened.
There’s no way this was some master plan. Hell, if this was a company of evil geniuses, making a plan to take money from us unsuspecting fans, you’d think they’d have come up with something that people wouldn’t have seen through in one second.
That is an exteremely strong assumption for someone who does not work for Anet. How do you know what their plan was?
It COULD have just well been “let’s milk all possible and attract new players when the expansion come out”. How do you know that this couldn’t have been the case? You don’t and that’s a fact.
Well let’s put ourselves in Anet’s place. Anet, the sinister mastermind, who believes that they can get away with what you’re claiming. You really think, really believe deep down in side that 15 seconds worth of consideration wouldn’t show them that people will ask for refunds and people will be dissatisfied and knowing this community it wouldn’t go viral. Let’s picture this theoretical meeting between “criminal masterminds”.
Boss 1: I have a great idea. Let’s charge everyone like $10 for the game, so we can make like a lot of money. Then, after we charge everyone $10 for the game, we can do a complete about face and include it free.
Boss 2: Yes, great idea. We’ll have all this extra money. I mean if we sell 100,000 copies, we’ll have made 1 million dollars. This is great.
Boss 3: But won’t the people realize when we include the game and they have to buy the expansion that they’ve been ripped off. I mean won’t they notice? Don’t you think the community will call us out, and give us a lot of bad press and a lot of bad publicity. Don’t you think we’ll have to offer refunds.
Boss 1: No. This community is so loyal and understanding. They barely pay attention to anything we do or say. Every single thing we’ve tried to do, we’ve gotten away with. Remember those 300 gold commander tags. Almost no one in the fan community even realized it.
If you guys think that this was some master plan to defraud a few purchasers of the game out of $10 bucks each, you really don’t know that much about business.
It’s actually much easier for me to see how they could have missed changing the FAQ than it is to see how they could have made the change intentionally.
First of all I said COULD, not they did this, I have opened my mind now.
And what the?? How can you even think to try and display what you think in their voice? It makes no sense. That’s one way of looking at it, which even you (I know you are not stupid) can admit. Why should that be the only explanation? Its easier for you to think what you believe, which COULD be wrong?
Understand the word could.
I’m saying the liklihood of Anet not realizing the fan base would react this way, after years of experience with this particular fan base borders on surreal.
Any second I could die of a heart attack, but you know, it’s pretty unlikely. It’s just as unlikely that Anet made this pricing plan or didn’t change the FAQ just to rip people off. They know this fan base too well to believe they can get away with anything. This is probably why they don’t want to talk to us half the time.
So we shouldn’t say anything about a deal that penalises existing players and seems unfair?
Just meakly except it ?
No I think not.
I’m sorry but you’re not being penalized in any way. Saying that someone else is being rewarded, does not make you penalized, and saying it over and over won’t make it truth.
The most you can say about it is that you want something since the new players are getting something. Apparently having a bunch of new players in the game doesn’t mean anything to some players.
So maybe Anet should give you people who feel you’re shafted something for your trouble, just to keep you happy. I would if I were Anet.
But you’re complaining about something most other MMOs are already doing.
In Anet’s best financial interest? Really? Do you really think Anet’s negative publicity and the refunds they’ll have to give and the bad blood they’ve created are in their best financial interest. To me that’s the biggest clue that this was a mistake.
That’s why i said financial interest. Yes, i believe that due to bad PR it is going to ultimately cost Anet more than they have gained, but we both know that Anet’s PR has always been terribad and they are not good at prediction at this level.
It would not have been first time when they tried a cash grab that led to bad PR backlash (just think back to the changes to gem exchange UI).So yeah, currently i think that they intentionally “forgot” to update the FAQ in order to get more core sales before HoT prepurchase announcement, and if they had made a mistake, it was in not predicting that they will get called on it.
Well everyone can think about the meeting that led to that decision and make their own decision. I think this is a ludicrous assertion.
And I think after we see Anet’s reply and I believe we will, this will be even more obvious.
I think you shouldn’t say we get a map. We get more than a map certainly, at least 3 and possibly more. So saying we get a map is wrong.
How about until we judge the final expansion we actually get to find out what’s in the final expansion. Or doesn’t that make sense?
Not offering refunds for people who bought the game over a month ago. But you’re right, it’ll never happen because nobody here wants to go through the trouble. I was thinking of the deceptive advertising when a CA popped into my head. Mainly switching up the wording of their FAQ.
The problem is, changing a FAQ isn’t against the law. Changing policy for a sale isn’t against the law either. Neither of these things is against the law.
Now, the FAQ said that the game was required to play HoT and get this, the game IS required to play HoT. You just get the game included. So the first FAQ wasn’t even factually incorrect.
Anet will offer refunds and I’m sure anyone who wants a refund who’s had it longer than 30 days who pushes can probably get one, and I’m pretty sure Anet is even going to announce something like this sometime this week.
All I’m really saying is that it takes one person assigned to make a change to a FAQ to not get to it and another person who is overseeing that person to not follow it up, for a FAQ change to be missed. It really is that simple.
Yes, it might have been a mistake. Still, not changing that FAQ until the very last moment was definitely in Anet’s best financial interest (as this way they could continue to milk people longer for content they were already planning to give away for “free”), so i have a reason to be suspicious of their motives. Funny thing that mistakes in player’s favour either don’t happen at all, or are fixed right away, butr mistakes in Anet’s favour always keep persisting.
In Anet’s best financial interest? Really? Do you really think Anet’s negative publicity and the refunds they’ll have to give and the bad blood they’ve created are in their best financial interest. To me that’s the biggest clue that this was a mistake.
Because it’s in Anet’s worst financial interest. They were at E3. They were looking for a flawless huge launch. What they got instead was some very bad press at a time when they were looking for momentum.
Anyone who had looked it over with a critical eye would have seen the implosion. They KNOW this community. It’s not going to let Anet get away with anything and Anet KNOWS this.
Put yourself in the position of Anet management for just a second. Do you really think that they sat there at a meeting and said, I have a great idea. Let’s sell a bunch of copies of this game to people, telling them they need it and then, at launch, we can change it and give the game away free?
Does that make sense under ANY circumstance you can think of? No. This was a mistake. It was ludicrous. Even the most cursory examination would have shown this to be a fiasco. It was always going to cost Anet from the moment it happened.
There’s no way this was some master plan. Hell, if this was a company of evil geniuses, making a plan to take money from us unsuspecting fans, you’d think they’d have come up with something that people wouldn’t have seen through in one second.
That is an exteremely strong assumption for someone who does not work for Anet. How do you know what their plan was?
It COULD have just well been “let’s milk all possible and attract new players when the expansion come out”. How do you know that this couldn’t have been the case? You don’t and that’s a fact.
Well let’s put ourselves in Anet’s place. Anet, the sinister mastermind, who believes that they can get away with what you’re claiming. You really think, really believe deep down in side that 15 seconds worth of consideration wouldn’t show them that people will ask for refunds and people will be dissatisfied and knowing this community it wouldn’t go viral. Let’s picture this theoretical meeting between “criminal masterminds”.
Boss 1: I have a great idea. Let’s charge everyone like $10 for the game, so we can make like a lot of money. Then, after we charge everyone $10 for the game, we can do a complete about face and include it free.
Boss 2: Yes, great idea. We’ll have all this extra money. I mean if we sell 100,000 copies, we’ll have made 1 million dollars. This is great.
Boss 3: But won’t the people realize when we include the game and they have to buy the expansion that they’ve been ripped off. I mean won’t they notice? Don’t you think the community will call us out, and give us a lot of bad press and a lot of bad publicity. Don’t you think we’ll have to offer refunds.
Boss 1: No. This community is so loyal and understanding. They barely pay attention to anything we do or say. Every single thing we’ve tried to do, we’ve gotten away with. Remember those 300 gold commander tags. Almost no one in the fan community even realized it.
If you guys think that this was some master plan to defraud a few purchasers of the game out of $10 bucks each, you really don’t know that much about business.
It’s actually much easier for me to see how they could have missed changing the FAQ than it is to see how they could have made the change intentionally.
It would cost more to prosecute the case than anyone would make.
It’ll never happen. The worst case scenario would be Anet would have to offer refunds, which they’re going to do anyway. Silliest post of the entire episode so far.
All I’m really saying is that it takes one person assigned to make a change to a FAQ to not get to it and another person who is overseeing that person to not follow it up, for a FAQ change to be missed. It really is that simple.
Yes, it might have been a mistake. Still, not changing that FAQ until the very last moment was definitely in Anet’s best financial interest (as this way they could continue to milk people longer for content they were already planning to give away for “free”), so i have a reason to be suspicious of their motives. Funny thing that mistakes in player’s favour either don’t happen at all, or are fixed right away, butr mistakes in Anet’s favour always keep persisting.
In Anet’s best financial interest? Really? Do you really think Anet’s negative publicity and the refunds they’ll have to give and the bad blood they’ve created are in their best financial interest. To me that’s the biggest clue that this was a mistake.
Because it’s in Anet’s worst financial interest. They were at E3. They were looking for a flawless huge launch. What they got instead was some very bad press at a time when they were looking for momentum.
Anyone who had looked it over with a critical eye would have seen the implosion. They KNOW this community. It’s not going to let Anet get away with anything and Anet KNOWS this.
Put yourself in the position of Anet management for just a second. Do you really think that they sat there at a meeting and said, I have a great idea. Let’s sell a bunch of copies of this game to people, telling them they need it and then, at launch, we can change it and give the game away free?
Does that make sense under ANY circumstance you can think of? No. This was a mistake. It was ludicrous. Even the most cursory examination would have shown this to be a fiasco. It was always going to cost Anet from the moment it happened.
There’s no way this was some master plan. Hell, if this was a company of evil geniuses, making a plan to take money from us unsuspecting fans, you’d think they’d have come up with something that people wouldn’t have seen through in one second.
Yes and no, a larger business should have employees that know what they are doing, you’re not going to let the intern handle the operations that could potentially land you with a law suit (I’m using that as an example). You would expect a multi million dollar company to have employees that are capable of handling their position. A small business may be easier to run because it just less work, less employees, less everything but in most cases (depending on the nature of the business) your employees do not need to have a degree to handle a cash register.
I’ll agree there is definitely an organization/communication problem.
And you’re talking about a FAQ. It’s something easily overlooked. At any rate, probably this week, they’ll be some communication about this from Anet.
Did not, I think. EotN came in with 18 instances that were actually a lot of fun to play. And the content was enjoyed and abused for many years to come.
And I believe that people who purchased FFXIV didn’t have to buy it again after it got reworked. And that they’ve were compensated for their purchase during the rework by not having to pay the sub. However, FFXIV did come with a pwetty new name afterwards… Guessing that adding “Heart of Thorns” to the game name doesn’t justify the $50 either then?!
No but people who bought it didn’t get refunded for the $15 a month they spent before it got reworked and they had to wait a long long time for it to be reworked as well. The game got a second chance, which is kitten ed rare. It’s also more of a traditional MMO and I don’t particularly like playing it at all, not that I got very far. It feels antiquated though to me.
But if they will tell this NOW – much less people will pre-purchase HotT. “Would be funny if not sad” situation.
Yup. Less people would get kinda scammed indeed. Ppl who already purchased will be a bit mad for having payed half the price just for beta access. But this particular kittenstorm will pass and with some honest statements (not sneaky PR policies) there will be a boost in good-will and trust levels. As such, I don’t know what’s better: Getting a good financial boost now with this approach or have a larger, healthy player base that will support the company in the years to come?!
Sadly, the answer to that is somewhere in calculations, and it could be bad for us.
If Nexon goes further with their influence on NCSoft and Anet – we can expect random armor and weapon boxes in gemstore and donate-only unique equipment. Yay. :/I’ve seen some
kittenNexon games. That’s not good at all.You really really are out of the loop of you think that Nexon influences this game. In fact, NcSoft has taken public steps to defend themselves against influence from Nexon who tried to influence NcSoft quite publicly and failed.
Your assertion that this is something that has to do with Nexon invalids any argument that comes after it.
Good if so) But everything before is based on th situation only. I don’t think they’ll anounce any changes soon, because if they do that will damage current sales.
You really need to do some research, because you’re wrong. Nexon has NEVER had influence over NCsoft and when they tried to exert influence, publicly, they were publicly rebuked. This is all a matter of public record.
Nexon did buy 15% of NcSoft, which is what all the rumors are based on. They had no people of their own on the Board, though, and the board makes all the decisions. Their stake in the company was silent.
Nexon didn’t like the direction NcSoft was going and so they produced a document, outlining the changes they were basically demanding. They also demanded a seat on the board. NcSoft replied to that document with a very public refusal.
NcSoft then entered into a stock sharing arranged with a third company to protect their company against a hostile takeover from Nexon.
The only reason anyone ever thought Nexon had influence over NcSoft is that Crystin Cox originally worked for Nexon, left and was hired by Anet. That logic is really poor. By that logic, Anet is run by Blizzard, because the three founders left that company and started here. People move around in this industry all the time. Reference URLs:
http://massivelyop.com/2015/02/17/ncsoft-buys-netmarble-stock-to-block-hostile-takeover-by-nexon/
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/tech/2015/02/133_173838.html
https://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/2v7uyg/nexon_vs_ncsoft_official_proposal_revealed_to/
http://www.tentonhammer.com/news/guild-wars-2/nexon-versus-ncsoft-its-going-get-messy
There’s a lot more, but you get the idea.
As have I, but it is fair to say oversights of this nature are typically avoided by larger businesses because they are so much more liable then the little guy with 1 employee. It is pretty kitten amateur for a company as large as Anet to be this negligent about something that could possibly cost them a lot of revenue.
Actually I find this to be untrue. Very often smaller businesses are run better than bigger ones, because bigger businesses have to have better communication for things to get done. When I ran a small business and I was in charge of it, I was there pretty much all the time and I could see pretty much everything that went on. When I worked in middle management for a much larger company, I saw far far more mistakes that should have never been made, because one hand doesn’t always know what the other is doing. This happens with alarming frequency even in medium sized companies. Again, a lot of it has to do with focus.
Frankly I think Anet was used to being a 50 person company and they haven’t really developed the skills to deal with 300 people. There’s clearly an organizational problem there.
But if they will tell this NOW – much less people will pre-purchase HotT. “Would be funny if not sad” situation.
Yup. Less people would get kinda scammed indeed. Ppl who already purchased will be a bit mad for having payed half the price just for beta access. But this particular kittenstorm will pass and with some honest statements (not sneaky PR policies) there will be a boost in good-will and trust levels. As such, I don’t know what’s better: Getting a good financial boost now with this approach or have a larger, healthy player base that will support the company in the years to come?!
Sadly, the answer to that is somewhere in calculations, and it could be bad for us.
If Nexon goes further with their influence on NCSoft and Anet – we can expect random armor and weapon boxes in gemstore and donate-only unique equipment. Yay. :/I’ve seen some
kittenNexon games. That’s not good at all.
You really really are out of the loop of you think that Nexon influences this game. In fact, NcSoft has taken public steps to defend themselves against influence from Nexon who tried to influence NcSoft quite publicly and failed.
Your assertion that this is something that has to do with Nexon invalids any argument that comes after it.
Yes assume, they announced you would need the core game how many months ago ? This whole rolling it in with the expansion would have had a procedure they followed to come to the decision, it would have taken time. It would not have been a one or even two week decision. Of course I also am assuming that they know how to run a business professionally.
I’ll go with the idea that you don’t really know when that decision was finalized. I don’t know either. I simply learned over a lifetime of kittenumptions, never put down to malice what you can attribute to oversight. Too many mistakes are made that way. Yes, I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt, because I’ve been on both sides of this divide.
Now you’re just assuming that they rushed, I’ll be honest, it is sounding like you are running out of counter arguments so now you’re just throwing assumptions of time frames around. Maybe you’re right maybe they were rushed, in the end this is not how a multi million dollar company operates, especially when it pertains directly to the customers wallet.
Assuming they rushed? lol This is burn time for them. E3 is coming. One of the biggest updates to the game is coming. The people who work at Anet are being pushed to the limit, which is always what happens in crunch time. This isn’t just some assumption, it’s an educated guess based on years of experience.
I can pretty much guarantee you that everything right now is “rushed” or at very least, work done under pressure. It’s not like a small patch and we’re fixing a few bugs. E3 was last week and this huge patch is this week. And the expansion work still goes on. If you don’t think everyone is working near peak capacity, I’m not sure what to tell you.
Alright seeing as you refuse to scroll for whatever reason, they could have made the announcement that the core game would be available with the expansion when it became available for purchase. At which point they could have proactively offered refunds, and made the core edition unavailable for purchase.
They could have done all this without hinting towards a prepurchase, making their announcement exciting without all the bad publicity. Yeah there would still be people that would complain, I will agree that some of the complaints seem silly buthey who am I to tell them they shouldn’t have an opinion, even if I don’t agree with it.
Again, this wasn’t the focus. Have you ever been to a big show with a company, like E3? Do you have any idea of how much work is actually involved in setting up, meetings, everything you have to do? I have and let me tell you, it’s nuts.
The big event at E3 and the focus was on Guild Halls more than anything else. They were going to announce the preorder too, of course, but the actual change that was made to what they were going to do, if not thought through, would probably seem like a very minor change. People don’t always think when rushed and under pressure, that’s just the way it is. No one saw it as this huge backlash. They didn’t push it, because it was on a back burner. Other things were going on. By the time anyone realized, it was already all over reddit. That’s what I believe happened. I’ve been too shows before, and I know how easy it is for things to fall through cracks. Easier than most people would think.
Sure they should have. Sure they messed up. I believe there should be a character slot with the base version. This was a mistake, for sure.
But I don’t think it was more than a mistake. And in the weeks to come, they’re going to have to issue tons of refunds to people because of it. No company goes out of their way to set up a situation where they’re going to have to issue tons of refunds.
Wow what a terrible analogy.
It’s more like every other MMO is doing. If you buy the current EQ game you get every single EQ game that came before. If you buy the original WoW and the current update, you get all the updates in between free.
I’m not sure why people are so attached to the idea that they’re paying more, or not getting something. If the expansion was always going to be $50 then you’re not paying more for it. If the original game was already being sold at times for $10, then it was likely not worth marketing separately anyway, and adding another barrier of entry to new players.
Come on Vayne, You’re obviously intelligent. You don’t have to agree with it, but there is a perception created by poor marketing that there’s less value for an existing customer.
I agree that the way it was released and handled could have been done better. I agree there is a perception that it’s unfair.
I disagree that it’s unfair. It’s pretty much everyone else is doing, because you have to remove whatever barriers to entry you can for new players. It’s a business decision, not a slap in the face to veteran players in my opinion.
As for the perception, I’m not really sure how far that perception extended, even with all the publicity. We’ll find out soon enough if Anet tells us how many preorders there are.
I love every aspect as well all 3 explorable zones of it but only for $30 or less.
I’m sorry where did you see it was 3 zones. Because I’ve not seen that number yet.
@Vayne.8563
You mean just as you have been doing ?It really is common practice to make an announcement to the public before you just change a business plan that affects them, more so when the customers money is involved.
You are entitled to believe whatever you like, and argument or debate is generally separate beliefs or opinions. They wouldn’t be an argument or debate if everyone just agreed. I’m sorry if you do not like the fact that people have different beliefs than you, you really should get used to it though because it is part of life.
Of course I feel my belief is more plausible, I would be agree with you if I felt yours was more plausible.
But the business plan wasn’t the main annoucement. The business plan was part of a much much larger announcement. It’s the ramifications that weren’t considered. Regardless, what I didn’t do was come online and make a post that said Anet did nothing wrong. I’m responding to a post that claims they did, That’s the difference.
Once again, the white knight cannot stand it and must derail the thread, miss the point and twist the facts.
I twisted no facts, and you can’t name one I did twist. The answer is yes Anet really edited their FAQ because that’s exactly what you’re supposed to do when a FAQ is wrong. It’s the only answer. If you don’t like the answer, that’s sorta too bad, because it’s the only answer.
The other comments brought up, though are off topic. Thanks for playing.
I’m not trying to change your mind, I fully aware from your post history what your stance is and that is perfectly fine. You should also accept that just because people have an opinion that is not the same as yours does not invalidate it, especially when their counter arguments are accurate.
Simply put go the mile if you want to debate it or agree to disagree and move on.
Right this is an opinion, not a statement of fact. Any wrongdoing here is something you BELIEVE happened and that’s it. You’re making it sound like your believe is far more plausible than my belief. That to me, means you find my belief less likely.
Anet was focused on Guild Halls for E3 and the preorder. They were less focused on the idea that you did or didn’t need the game. When schedules are tight, oversights become easy. I know that from personal experience.
And since it’s just a question of belief and nothing else, I’m as entitled to express my belief as you are. But when people try to make it seem as though their belief is in fact what actually happened…that’s a problem for me.
Scroll up and read my previous posts I already covered that argument.
Nah not worth the time. You can believe the worst if you want, and that’s fine, but it’s not really relevant anyway. You’re not going to change my mind and I’m not going to change yours.
No actually you are missing the point, you keep focusing only on the FAQ’s, while that is a big part of it your forgetting the public announcement that should have been made regardless of the FAQ’s. The FAQ’s should have been changed before E3, sure that was an over site it happens whatever, forgetting to inform thousands of people that they need to stop throwing their money at the company is negligence.
When something get’s recalled do you think they wait until to corrected model is ready to go before they announce the recall ? Do they just let the product start blowing up all over the place ? No they recall the moment they know, that is how business works in the real world.
I don’t think the public annoucement was made, because before E3 they wanted to keep the secrecy, as you do before a show/annoucement like that.
I won’t be buying it at all nor will I ever spend another dime on any ArenaNet or NCSoft product ever again. From everything they’ve shown its all complete garbage and not at all worth the asking price. That’s funny considering I’ve spent thousands of $$ on their lame gem store items since launch. Also now their flawed system has caused items I purchased through their Gem Store to disappear without my consent and they refuse to replace it. If I see or hear people ask about GW2 I’m gonna tell them don’t even bother with it and find something else. I’ll post as many negative reviews and boycott it as much as possible. I hope they go bankrupt.
You hope the go bankrupt. You hope hundreds of people are out of work, because you don’t like a game? I hope people are kinder to you in your life, than you are to Anet.
How long do you think E3 went on for ? This decision was made before they went to E3. It wasn’t a case of one person forgetting just the FAQ’s, it should have been announced (as I have already said) when it was finalized which would not have been the day of.
The FAQ was edited during E3 as far as I can tell. Almost immediately after there was a thread on Reddit saying that ANet changed the FAQ with a bunch of people calling them names, and accusing them of wrongdoing.
Once that happens, you have to word your response a lot more carefully. Once you’re accused of wrongdoing, any firm that’s ever had a legal department knows you have to start consulting. That takes time.
That’s how business works in the real world. responses take time.
They only brought it up on reddit AFTER the players caught it. They didn’t volunteer the information until they had no choice.
You’re missing my point. They probably only changed it after it was pointed out to them. Almost as soon as that was done, it came up on reddit. I’m sure the time between the change and the discovery was pretty fast. So they didn’t have time to talk about before they were accused.
I think I’m being pretty clear, not sure why you can’t follow this.
What your saying is, it went through all the stages that would have been necessary (which takes time) and not a single person there brought up the fact that it was suggested people should purchase the core game ahead of time and were still purchasing it and that it might be a good idea to inform the community ? Or at the very least make it unavailable for purchase ? That doesn’t jive for a multi million dollar company.
I’m saying oversights happen all the time in business. All the time. This isn’t the first or last time. You think a FAQ is something that people focus on? No, they put it up and don’t think about it once it’s up, because if nothing changes, there’s no need to do anything about it. Honestly I don’t even know what you’re on about.
Wow what a terrible analogy.
It’s more like every other MMO is doing. If you buy the current EQ game you get every single EQ game that came before. If you buy the original WoW and the current update, you get all the updates in between free.
I’m not sure why people are so attached to the idea that they’re paying more, or not getting something. If the expansion was always going to be $50 then you’re not paying more for it. If the original game was already being sold at times for $10, then it was likely not worth marketing separately anyway, and adding another barrier of entry to new players.
How long do you think E3 went on for ? This decision was made before they went to E3. It wasn’t a case of one person forgetting just the FAQ’s, it should have been announced (as I have already said) when it was finalized which would not have been the day of.
The FAQ was edited during E3 as far as I can tell. Almost immediately after there was a thread on Reddit saying that ANet changed the FAQ with a bunch of people calling them names, and accusing them of wrongdoing.
Once that happens, you have to word your response a lot more carefully. Once you’re accused of wrongdoing, any firm that’s ever had a legal department knows you have to start consulting. That takes time.
That’s how business works in the real world. responses take time.
I’m actually shocked you went this far to hide your blunder. Would it not have been easier to say “oops, we made a mistake” or simply explain why you felt this was the best course of action.
Q: Do I have to own Guild Wars 2 to play the expansion?
A: Yes, but Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns includes the Guild Wars 2 core game.This is not what your FAQ’s read a couple days ago, I mean one needs to ask, is this even legal ?
It’s an FAQ not a license agreement or terms of service so of course it’s legal. That’s what an FAQ is for. To even ask this question is beyond ridiculous
I don’t claim to be a lawyer but I think his question is a legitimate one, they advertised one thing and then changed it after sales had occurred. I would think thats a grey area of the law at the very least.
It’s not a gray area of the law. A FAQ is to answer questions. If an answer changes due to changes in the game, then you change the FAQ.
Let’s say that there was a FAQ for skill points. After the update it will have to be changed to hero points, because the answer to the question has changed.
Companies do have a right to change their minds.
Now, if you have purchased something from a company based on a FAQ and it’s changed and that change has somehow changed your purchase, then you have the right to a refund or some sort of compensation.
But it’s not illegal to change a FAQ. It’s not even immoral. If the FAQ is wrong, its’ pretty much a necessity. Why would you leave bad info on the website?
Why continually defend a company that is not willing to defend it’s own actions ? You can spin it any way you like, they should have given the customer base notice when the decision was finalized and then changed the FAQ’s. Anyone who knows business knows this was not a one night decision, it would have been require to be discussed, reviewed, approved, and a business plan set in motion. They let people buy the core right up until the moment they announced prepurchase, that is where they went wrong.
You can try and argue that they didn’t want to ruin the prepurchase announcement, but that is not a valid argument either, they could have announced that the core game would be available bundled with the expansion when it becomes ready for purchase without announcing when that would be.
Neither he nor I said it was illegal, he asked if it was, which is a valid question. Are you a lawyer ? Are you qualified to give an accurate answer or are you you saying what you want to believe ? As for it being a grey area, if it were not they wouldn’t be handing out refunds.
Seriously, again, why make excuses for them ? Their not even willing to make their own excuses.
Being reasonable isn’t making excuses. While that whole thing was going on, most of the brass was at E3. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to a show as an exhibitor, but it’s exhausting and requires a lot of focus.
The person who edited the FAQ…pretty sure they weren’t at E3. They were back in the office.
It’s easy enough to have something like this happens. You make it sound like editing a FAQ when a mistake is found is a bad thing to do. It’s a good thing to do.
Annoucing a specific FAQ change after the whole thing exploded? How would that look?
Anet will make a full statement when they figure out how to fix the situation. Not before.
I think Anet should change the base package to include a characters lot for players who are adding it as an upgrade. That would give new players the base game free and existing players the character lot for the revenant. Everyone gets something and everyone goes home happy.
waaait a second
“As a structure the MMO has lost the ability to make the player feel like a hero. Everybody around you is doing the same thing you’re doing. The boss you just killed respawns ten minutes later. It doesn’t care that I’m there”
-Ree Soesbee, game designerdid they actually fix that somehow without me noticing, I must have been busy in a zerg somewhere
Immediately after the manifesto was posted, there was a clarication. Colin is talking about events. Ree is talking about the personal story.
Just like immediately after the pre-purchase announcement they changed their FAQ.
I’m sure they changed their fact as soon as they realized it was wrong. What makes you think once it was announced that someone didn’t complain and cause it to be changed?
I’m actually shocked you went this far to hide your blunder. Would it not have been easier to say “oops, we made a mistake” or simply explain why you felt this was the best course of action.
Q: Do I have to own Guild Wars 2 to play the expansion?
A: Yes, but Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns includes the Guild Wars 2 core game.This is not what your FAQ’s read a couple days ago, I mean one needs to ask, is this even legal ?
It’s an FAQ not a license agreement or terms of service so of course it’s legal. That’s what an FAQ is for. To even ask this question is beyond ridiculous
I don’t claim to be a lawyer but I think his question is a legitimate one, they advertised one thing and then changed it after sales had occurred. I would think thats a grey area of the law at the very least.
It’s not a gray area of the law. A FAQ is to answer questions. If an answer changes due to changes in the game, then you change the FAQ.
Let’s say that there was a FAQ for skill points. After the update it will have to be changed to hero points, because the answer to the question has changed.
Companies do have a right to change their minds.
Now, if you have purchased something from a company based on a FAQ and it’s changed and that change has somehow changed your purchase, then you have the right to a refund or some sort of compensation.
But it’s not illegal to change a FAQ. It’s not even immoral. If the FAQ is wrong, its’ pretty much a necessity. Why would you leave bad info on the website?
thats what i was referring too my comment about why it took so long was to other saying they knew about the changes for months. im thinking whomever edits the forum didnt know about the price change. ive never knew everything about every company i worked for so im thinking the forum didnt know about the change til it was posted on website then he changed it to correspond
All I’m really saying is that it takes one person assigned to make a change to a FAQ to not get to it and another person who is overseeing that person to not follow it up, for a FAQ change to be missed. It really is that simple.
seriously all they did was correct an error on their faq page. i honestly expected them to do that already wonder what took them so long
The fact that it took them so long is why people are suspicious of their motives. Besides, they didn’t correct an error exactly. The FAQ was accurate. It was the way they had us purchase the game that changed.
The question is when Anet decided to make the change. I’m not convinced that Anet put that you had to buy the game on the FAQ when you didn’t. I think the decision to make it so you didn’t have to buy the game was decided relatively late in the day, and at that point, with E3 coming and with the big expansion coming, the FAQ got overlooked until it was pointed out that it was wrong. The people who edit FAQs are not the same people who make decisions.
I’m actually shocked you went this far to hide your blunder. Would it not have been easier to say “oops, we made a mistake” or simply explain why you felt this was the best course of action.
Q: Do I have to own Guild Wars 2 to play the expansion?
A: Yes, but Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns includes the Guild Wars 2 core game.This is not what your FAQ’s read a couple days ago, I mean one needs to ask, is this even legal ?
It’s an FAQ not a license agreement or terms of service so of course it’s legal. That’s what an FAQ is for. To even ask this question is beyond ridiculous
I don’t claim to be a lawyer but I think his question is a legitimate one, they advertised one thing and then changed it after sales had occurred. I would think thats a grey area of the law at the very least.
It’s not a gray area of the law. A FAQ is to answer questions. If an answer changes due to changes in the game, then you change the FAQ.
Let’s say that there was a FAQ for skill points. After the update it will have to be changed to hero points, because the answer to the question has changed.
Companies do have a right to change their minds.
Now, if you have purchased something from a company based on a FAQ and it’s changed and that change has somehow changed your purchase, then you have the right to a refund or some sort of compensation.
But it’s not illegal to change a FAQ. It’s not even immoral. If the FAQ is wrong, its’ pretty much a necessity. Why would you leave bad info on the website?
Hilarious… Without even looking the author’s name of the first post in the 2nd page, I said “This is a Vayne post”.
So did you miss me?
Hey OP, I have a question for you. With all the great comparison work you’ve done, and all the comparing, how come you left out dynamic events which the game is centered around. For example Guild Wars Prophecies had 209 quests.
If you add up all the quests in all four Guild Wars 1 products, you’ll find it was less than the number of dynamic events than Guild Wars 2 launched with.
This is just silly.
Because of the nature with dynamic events most players will barely see yet even half of the dynamic events in Guild Wars 2. In the later development of Guild Wars 2 they had to add in hearts because testers were complaining they had nothing to do. Quests on the other hand can be played on demand. You cannot simply ask players to wait around for an event to kick off. (People only do this with World Bosses simply because they are on a fixed timer and give rare loot)
I am not saying quests are better than dynamic events, both have their strengths and weaknesses. But in terms of content, quests can be accepted on demand whereas dynamic events (while they can be triggered) take place randomly (the content will be running regardless of you being there).
You also left out species and starter areas. Seems to me I can play five races in this game, but only play 1 race throughout all of Guild Wars 2.
Saying Guild Wars 2 has more content because it has more races is completely illogical.
While yes it does give you access to new story arcs/instances it does not change the fact that they are playing in the same world as everyone else. ArenaNet have even stated that the racial story branching system was silly because none of the players would even experience that half of all that content (Rough Diagram) . Hence why with HoT there are no branching story arcs that are dependant on your race).
My point was, depending on what you count or look at, different things look differently. With less than 220 quests in Prophecies, that game at launch didn’t have nearly as much actual content as Guild Wars 2 at launch.
But here, the OP is comparing zone numbers, but that doesn’t necessarily represent content either. If I were going to get a comparison, I’d like to know how many quests were in those expansions, compared to how many dynamic events are in this expansion. I’d like to compare how expansive this story is to the story missions.
You can compare things all you want, when you have enough information to compare. So far we don’t have enough information and thus the comparison is premature.
Maybe you can answer this for the round table of white knights – What does it really matter to you if existing players are asking for a cheaper base expansion price? how does that affect you in the long run?
still can’t answer this vayne Q_Q_Q_Q_Q_Q
I don’t have a problem with people asking for a cheaper price. I don’t have a problem with people not being satisfied with what’s on offer so far. I don’t even believe it was right for Anet not to include a character slot in the base version. I think it should have come with a character slot.
I have a problem with threads that circumvent forum rules to emulate curse words when the same thing could have been said in a reaosnable manner. Sometimes it’s all about tone. Maybe I’m just old and used to a different level of decorum. I should probably stay off the net.