I’m happy to spend $50… when the game actually comes out and I deem it worth $50.
Otherwise, no sale. One thing I won’t do is pre-purchase, but that’s just a general philosophy than any personal rage towards Arena.net.
See, a lot of this reminds of the smaller firestorm from people with two legendaries losing their minds that they weren’t going to get anything special with the new wardrobe.
They aren’t kittened about what they’re getting. They’re kittened because they think someone else is getting more, which is honestly a VERY kittenty way to approach anything. Those people need to be ignored.
You are still measuring with duration. hundred of hours of video gaming can not be equal to go on a romantic vacation with your beloved one for one week in a beautiful foreign country, it’s simple as that, if you are just satisfied with the duration then you have no idea how to value your money worth.
I could also buy some good games, which i already know they are good on steam sales and still have hundred hours of gaming experience then some thing i’m not even sure if it’s worthy.
and yea, just because you liked a game, doesnt mean the next game will be good.
Well, of course I’m measuring it by duration. There kinda comes a point where if I’ve spent THAT much time with something, that I obviously like it and feel it’s of a quality I am comfortable with and feel I’m getting my money’s worth. If I didn’t… why would I still be doing it over such a long duration?
Entitlement is not a negative thing. American media has really ruined the word.
Much like anything, entitlement can be positive OR negative. It really depends a great deal on what you feel “entitled” to.
For example, feeling “entitled” to speak freely or have a fair trial. Those are examples of positive entitlement, the comfort of knowing certain things are afforded to you is a bedrock of being a civilized society, and fighting for those rights is not only reasonable, but expected.
Entitlement turns negative real quick once it starts entering the realm of “first world problems.” Once you start demanding certain things and getting into a frothing rage over things that in the broad sweep of things are trivial, then you just start looking like a kittenbag.
By your logic everyone should be happy about monthly fee, yet it’s a dying business model.
and btw you don’t value an entertainment on duration, you value an entertainment on quanlity
I dunno, personally if I’ve dropped 1500 hours on something over the course of three years, I better kitten well think it’s quality. I’m not sure why I’d invest that much of my time into something I think sucks.
Maybe there’s a lot of people who hate themselves?
Seems like they decided to screw the loyal players, and reward people who waited two plus years to get into the game. Should be the other way around, don’t you think?
I guess?
I dunno. That’s the way games are now. The profit margins can be so paper thin you HAVE to constantly try to entice new players. You HAVE to. Your “veteran” players are a constantly degrading group (players will always leave for whatever reason), and the only way to stay afloat is to get new players in.
For all the people griping about $50 expansions… bear in mind that if games had followed the rate of inflation over the last 25 years, you SHOULD be paying close to $90.
Well, you have to be careful when accusing people of entitlement.
There IS a lot of sentiment that $50 for an expansion is simply too much money. That’s not entitlement, that’s simply not seeing the value in what they’re being asked to pony up for. You might not agree, but it’s not entitlement.
Entitlement is effectively, “I deserve [x] because I did [y].” Entitlement is fans demanding a free character slot because that’s how it was done in the past. Entitlement is demanding 800 or 1600 gems because they’re veteran players and “deserve” it. The latter complaints can (and should) be dismissed without merit.
Take a second and look at the content/features of the “comparable” MMO expansions. Without listing anything else, Warlords of Draenor includes eight new dungeons and two raids.
Would you honestly say that what we’ve seen so far for HoT is anywhere near that? I can’t, and I would assume that anyone OBJECTIVELY looking at HoT would really squint their eyes at kitten price tag.
As I have pretty much gone out of my way to AVOID the hype train and have no intention whatsoever to pre-purchase as a matter of general principle, I’m not the guy to be asking that question, honestly. I really don’t CARE about a comparison of X and Y. I really don’t CARE what you think has “more.”
Hell, if you listen to WoW’s forums, you’d think Warlords of Draenor has killed the game for good.
What I will tell you is that regardless of what you think the finished product holds, you weren’t going to see a cover price much lower than what we got. Whether that’s a good or “fair” price is pretty much irrelevant.
Unless a significant enough portion of the players were deluding themselves that it means they don’t meet sales projections. Then it is their problem.
Not saying that will happen, just pointing out that it all comes down to the bottom line, whether the price is “fair” or not.
That’s an entirely different argument though, and that’s something that will only suss itself out once the numbers show up in Arena.net’s ledgers. But there was ZERO chance that this expansion was going to cost anything less than $40 out of the gate at the very best. If you were expecting differently, that’s YOUR problem, not Arena.net’s.
“The industry standard”
Is entirely made up.You know there are some entirely free to play MMOs.
Every time I hear “industry standard” I think of EA.
By “industry standard” I am (obviously) referring to the price of expansions by other MMO makers.
You have Final Fantasy XIV with an upcoming expansion at $40.
World of Warcraft’s latest expansion was $50.
Lord of the Rings online had their expansions priced at $40-$45 upon release, as I remember correctly.
Heart of Thorns is certainly not cheap, but it’s not overly expensive either. I’m not sure what price tag you were expecting, but if it was much lower than what we got, you were deluding yourself, and that’s frankly not Arena.net’s problem.
I dunno if I’d say the price is “fine” or that they shouldn’t lower it (why would I want to spend more money if I didn’t have to, after all)…
But at the same time, it’s not like the price tag is completely out of left field without any precedent either. That $40-60 range is pretty much the industry standard, the lowest realistic cover price for this expansion wasn’t going to be much lower than it is.
I think people know it too. The REAL kittening about this is pretty much entirely centered around not getting a new character slot. Entitled brats don’t want to admit the rage is that shallow though.
Oh, I know, Beldin.
I’m also not surprised that “veteran” players are losing their kitten about it. Veteran players will lose their kitten over a balance update. Of course they’re going to be in riot mode when asked to pay money for something.
I just have to repeat to myself, “This reaction isn’t new. This is how MMO players have always behaved. Relax.”
(edited by chemiclord.3978)
Nah, even World of Warcraft has jumped onto “just buy the latest expansion and you’re good to go.” You DO still have to buy the base game, but you certainly don’t need to buy every single expansion.
This is pretty much the industry standard now. What Arena.net has done (both with the bundling and the pricing) isn’t particularly new.
No. They won’t. And they shouldn’t.
The price is right in line with what MMO expansions cost. Deal with it.
HoT Price Feedback + Base game included [merged]
in Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns
Posted by: chemiclord.3978
The price is not fine, it is borderline.
If it was fine people would not be complaining.
Yes they would.
Hell, Arena.net could charge $9.99 and someone would be complaining.
MMO players kitten. About EVERYTHING. It’s like their superpower.
$50 is pretty much industry standard for an expansion pack. The current expansion including “previous versions” is ALSO pretty much the industry standard.
You deserve the nothing you think you got.
Not too amazed, it’s almost the norm.
In my opinion people today are being regularly brainwashed by the mmorpgs industry, a business that is slowly killing/reducing any social interaction and challenge in their virtual worlds to ship contents that relies heavily on people void and deleterious addictions.Because it’s safer to cater to a mass that chase some virtual goods (weapons or armor tiers/masteries,/skins) delivering a narrower variety of activities and requiring the players to repeat a content over and over and over to reach the “cap” or to obtain what they want.
Considering that every attempt by developers to “change the game” in the MMO market has met with almost uniformly abject failure, I can’t imagine why developers would reach the conclusion, “WoW clones is what the people want…”
Not to mention every time Arena.net has tried to mix things up with THIS game it has been met with endless kittening on these very forums…
The problem with games are gamers. We’re our own worst enemy.
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Save the quaggans?
Dude, I’m the sort of guy that, during the Quaggan guild rush challenge, runs into the first kitten mine he sees, solely so that there will be one less quaggan in the world.
And that is what it boils down to… a significant cadre of GW1 veterans who really would have been content with their old game rebooted with new graphics, and remain very upset that Arena.net changed the whole game entirely.
What’s a troll-cursor?
A named exotic that potentially has the LOOK of a precursor but outside of a unique name has next to no value.
I suppose it could be mathematically possible… but I suspect even if it was that it likely hasn’t ever happened.
The story is good… as MMOs go. It’s nothing impressive by purely subjective standards, but it’s not terrible.
You won’t ever confuse it for George R. R. Martin… but you won’t confuse it for L. Ron Hubbard either.
as long as the mobs in GW2 are not as intelligent as in GW1 (they heal their allies), zerker meta will always be on top….
And even if they bring the AI up (let’s be perfectly blunt, GW1 AI wasn’t exactly brilliant either), it’ll just change the meta to something else.
If the “meta” is killing GW2, then it kills every MMO on the market, because the “meta” is something that will ALWAYS exist.
The “berserker meta” isn’t a problem in the sense that there’s ALWAYS going to be a meta. Nerf power, and then it becomes “Assassin’s or GTFO.” Nerf crits and buff conditions and then it becomes, “Sinister or GTFO.” Increase enemy attack speed and damage and it becomes “Knight’s or GTFO.”
Now the “berserker meta” IS a bit of a problem in the sense that a small section of the player base has deemed that if you don’t use that particular gear set, you’re a scrub that deserves to be kitten on, even if there’s little content that actually requires all out DPS in order to be successful. But THAT is a player-side problem.
The simplest solution is for people who are dead to understand two things:
1) You are not helping anyone while splattered on the ground.
2) You will still get the event rewards even if you aren’t present when the end of the event occurs.
I’m not sure why this isn’t common knowledge at this point, but it doesn’t seem to be.
No..for an mmo and for the CONSTANT demands and expectations of an mmo that IS a micro team. For a single player that’s an OK team…but even then not that big.
The vast majority of f2p mmo’s have developer employee numbers barely in the 10’s, let alone the hundreds
For MMOs that are effectively in maintenance mode or free-to-play, you’re right. For an MMO in active development at the scale GW2 is trying to do… 300 is pretty much the bare minimum you can get away with.
This is how it works. Even Blizzard with their staff will have long droughts of content as they gear up an expansion. And even there (where they should be well used to that phenomenon), they have players complain about it and their sub numbers drop off a cliff.
There’s nothing to see here. Move along. We’re getting what we claimed we wanted.
The bulk of my character list is norn, actually, with some humans, an asura, and a sylvari mixed in.
One race I just can’t play is the charr. Can’t get over that ol’ Guild Wars 1 racism, I guess.
Why are people so obsessed about getting to do a few events in a PvE map?
Because it’s early access to content, and gamers are entitled and impatient by nature.
The concept seems interesting, at least giving a niche that the Guardian didn’t have before.
Lukewarm on the traps, unimpressed by the name.
We don’t have enough challenging content in GW2. Making things less RNG or require kittentones of tokens would cause huge inflation. Solution -> wait for HoT. If there’s enough of very challenging content, we’ll be getting 60% droprates for killing bosses only 10% of the gw2 population can beat. #HOPE
And congratulations, you’ll have merely set off an entirely different kittenstorm from the 90% who complain that the content is “too hard” and “not fun.”
We’ve already been down this road, and a lot of the dungeon content was nerfed into the ground because of it.
Welcome to the generic expansion model. Content updates become scarce as the developers gear up for the expansion pack.
We’re getting what we claimed we wanted.
I get what you’re saying, but if they’re not able to properly balance a large number of options/combinations of options, then surely it would be better to have fewer, more balanced, ones?
Remember, they not only have to try to balance these options/combinations with each other, but also with all the other options/combinations the other specs and classes have.
I mean, how many possible combinations is that? A lot…
I haven’t watched the video of them discussing it and I am certainly no expert in how all this works (far from it), but I am slightly concerned (from what other people have said) that people will, basically, be forced to use certain weapon types to get the full use out of any traitline.
I hate that idea.
I don’t think you should have to choose a traitline based on your weapon choice (or vice/versa).
I think all weapon choices should, ideally, be equally valid in all traitlines.
I may have misunderstood what people were saying (or they may have misunderstood, I guess), but still.
The problem is that it is clear that some people view the main skill, in a game like this, as being in the choices you make before you even actually start (physically) playing.
So, of course, some of these type of people will try to cling-on to the advantages they have from the existing imbalances, even though other people can just look up the metas and copy, if they want to, anyway.
To be perfectly honest, that isn’t even the way it is NOW. Your weapon choice is pretty much inexorably tied to the traits you choose for that weapon, if for no reason that your weapon choice is inexorably tied to the skills you have available to you.
For example, as a Ranger, if you have a longbow, there’s little point going down the Wilderness Survival line (there’s pretty much nothing you’d do with that weapon that would get any benefit from increased condition damage). You’d go further into Nature Magic as a Greatsword user than if you were sword/offhand. You’d be less inclined to use Skirmishing with a Warhorn than an Axe or Shortbow.
You’re kinda worrying about the game drifting away from a system that really doesn’t exist as it is.
Totally agree with this. Im largely in favour of the new system, but it cant ruin existing builds. WoW Has had the exact same talent setup for a couple of years now, but the difference is that the talents you choose dont “define” your build. They simply add utility, enhance a certain playstyle, etc. They add flavour to your either your role as tank, healer, or dps. It seems were getting a similar system, which is great imo. Im super excited for this. But my only apprehension comes from the fact that our ability to create a certain build is limited to where those traits are located in the tier. And if they compete with another trait that is inportant for that build to work, theres going to be issues.
Honestly, I think I disagree with this.
I think current builds NEED to get broken up, and the player base kinda going back to step one. Your WoW example? You pretty much couldn’t be more wrong. The “meta”, ideal builds, optimum rotations… you can count on them changing (often times drastically) with each expansion, and you can even expect to retool your entire approach with every content patch.
I say let it ruin what the players have become comfortable with. The game needs a shakeup.
One thing that you discover very, very quickly in game development:
SOMEONE is going to be complaining at some point. It is entirely inevitable. Someone (and usually many someones) is going to kittened off at you no matter what you do, what you change, or what you fix, and chances are they will voice that displeasure very, very loudly and in the most obnoxious and combative way possible.
You accept it, filter out the noise, and keep working (to varying degrees of success). Players could do with learning how to do that themselves.
(edited by chemiclord.3978)
To gain a pet you would need to sacrifice something else. You’re not weak without the pet, it only defines your playstyle. A lot of people have complained about the pet for over 2 years and the AI for pets sucks. In GW1 the ranger was much more ideal and the pet system there actually worked.
The pet mechanic really didn’t work in GW1 either, to be perfectly honest. The only thing that “worked” was the part that you could use a secondary profession to cover up the flaws and not use a pet at all.
Honestly, the simplest “fix” that would make pets at least not a burden would be to reduce AoE damage pets take by something like 75% and make it so that they can’t trigger enemies or structure attacks (like from automated cannons or Nightmare Court blossoms).
The pet is GOING to be stupid as kitten without revamping the entire AI (which will just kitten players off like it did in the first open betas), the only real thing that can be done is to remove the burdening portion of it.
But what’s the point if they don’t make a profit on it? I would imagine they wouldn’t keep buying new accounts if they weren’t making a profit on it.
Of course there is always someone who buys from them so it’s a moot point now isn’kitten Because they would only stop if literally no one was buying.
Well… it depends on the game and the person involved.
In some games, it’s to legitimately sell gold. These sort of groups will have people grinding out currency and sell it to other players.
In others, the goal is to take control of the account, either to skin the entire account for rare materials (like salvaging or disenchanting rare gear that can be given to the thief’s account). Or the purpose can be to take control and sell the account itself. I remember during my raiding heyday that top raiders would get offers to sell their account for over $1,000 or so.
It sounds like the goal is that instead of grinding EotM to gain levels and skill points, they’re trying to encourage players to explore and find these hero challenges while they level characters.
Simply put… a company does NOT owe you transparency. Period. They are under no obligation to discuss ANYTHING with you.
You are NOT a shareholder. You are NOT an executive. You are the CUSTOMER. They owe you nothing but the product they put in front of you. Is it nice to get more? Is it courteous? Yes. Does it make you feel good to be “involved”? Absolutely.
If you don’t like Arena.net’s policy with communication… LEAVE. Walk away. I don’t know when that became a dismissal, because it’s not. Your power, the customer’s power, is in your wallet. Walk away. THAT’S how you deliver your message.
True people will tend to gravitate towards certain builds, but I feel this could possibly help to make a more ambiguous “best stat combo”.
For all of ten minutes before a number cruncher calculates that best stat combo, I suppose. Then you get maybe a month of novelty while people learn the new best rotation, then within three you’ve got the same bitter “meta” whining again.
It is a difficult situation really. If you make healing more needed, it runs the risk of going back to the old hard trinity, which I do not want. But if you do not reward other roles in open world PvE (which is where the biggest issue is) players will be reluctant to play other builds.
Well, what I will tell you is that by my experience, open world PvE, regardless of game, is a “all random, all dps” deal. One of the biggest grumbles among the player base in World of Warcraft pre-Wrath of the Lich King and the multiple build setup was that healers felt compelled to respec every time they wanted to do open world PvE because being a healer out there was (1) less efficient damage and (2) barely, if ever needed.
So, I’m exactly sure if that is something that CAN be fixed, or if it really should or needs to. It seems pretty inexorable to the MMO experience.
I agree that it is great that in GW2 you do not need to have a healer in the group. However, it should still be just as rewarding to play a healing and supportive role, if that is what you prefer to do. I don’t think anyone here is asking for there to be healing in the traditional trinity sense, at least I am not asking for that. I am glad Anet done away with the hard trinity. But it would be nice to have more of a benefit to having them. I’m not saying they should be vital, but there should be events that would go smoother with supportive players in the group. And supportive characters should be rewarded just as much for their efforts as zerkers are for their damage.
At the moment the open world can be conquered by zerkers, and that does nothing to encourage build diversity. Hopefully HoT will offer some solutions to this issue.
I think the problem is that (outside of a very small percentage of people who like the role), the only way to really make healing roles viable is to make them essential (because otherwise why would groups bring a healer when 5 dps does the job just as well). And once you’ve made them essential, then you’ve shattered the “no roles” thing GW2 is trying to do.
If they’re continuing to make outfits rather than armor sets, it’s because they sell. If armor skins sold better than outfits, they’d make those. If I had to take an educated guess at a major reason outfits sell better, I’d probably hazard that it’s because you don’t have to pay every time you want to put a different one on. Now, let’s see, how could we make armor skin sets sell just as well, if not better, than outfits…?
I dunno if they sell better than armor pieces would, but that the return on investment is better (and probably a lot better).
For example, for one outfit which is pretty much one size fits all, to make it into an armor set requires one of two things:
1) Either effectively make it three times (as each armor weight has different rigging issues that would require it to literally be three separate armor sets even if they look the same), and such tripling the resource investment.
or
2) Making it available to one armor weight only (in this case light armor) and effectively chopping it’s available market by around a third.
When it comes to armor, outfits, and town clothes… I suspect the reason is the same.
The amount of return on investment for the work put in wouldn’t be worth it. I think that sort of customization would appeal to a very small niche of players that wouldn’t be able to support the resources put into it.
But that’s just my guess based on the entire town clothes debacle.
In fact GW2 is one of the few games I know where most maps are (near) perfect squares and the game doesn’t even do a good job at hiding that fact. The fact that most mountains look perfectly straight and form perfect squares has always bothered me, but I’ve learned to live with it in the past 2 years.
Well, that’s a separate argument that I’d actually agree with. But the question from the OP as I read it was “why are the maps all square?” to which the fairly simple answer is, “because all game maps are square, some are better at hiding that fact better than others.”
Now, I won’t argue that Arena.net is very lackluster at hiding it.
That is factually not true. How many games have you played to think this?
Just look at this map from The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess and tell me that’s square (the bright green lines are the borders of the maps):
In a programming sense, it’s absolutely true. The “map” as far as the files are concerned, would be that entire image. If you could “break” through the walls, you’d be able to explore that empty space until you hit one of the edges.
Since the original Devs came from WoW and were familiar with that game’s seamless maps then I’m going to assume there was a particular reason why they didn’t put it into this game, as nice as that would be.
Perhaps someone with computer knowledge can say what the disadvantages of a seamless world are to the game’s engine.
I think the reason is simple – they had a working engine in GW1 which rely on instancing (ie restricted and focused maps) and they just went with a that design instead of rebuilding it from the ground. You dont just “put” something like a seamless map into a game. Its a core part of its server architecture, how transitions are handled.
But I dont know what Anet was really thinking. I am hoping it was “we just want to make a great game!” but it may have been “a new engine is going to cost us what?!?!?” :P
My guess (judging from the loading times when you transition between zones) is that there is something in the rendering process of Guild Wars games that makes it impractical for the world to load seamlessly as one map.
Anet increasingly like their 75% sales. It’s led me to list some statements below. I would be interested to hear the extent to which you guys agree or disagree with any of them.
1. New players spend real life money in the Gemstore. Veteran players much less so.
2. Stuff in the game that veteran players would like to see change is not profitable to address so doesnt matter very much. They dont spend real life money anymore and will continue to stay around regardless of irks or unfulfilled wishlists because they have already got this far.
3. Due to the lack of subscription, the most important thing for GW2 financial prosperity is to continually attract and cater to new players.
4. Retaining and appeasing veteran players is less important in this business model than in games that have a monthly subscription.
5. Anet loves new players more than anything else in the world.
1) I dunno… a lot of the gem store items seem to be aimed at old players who might have pangs of nostalgia. New players will look at Tormented, Zodiac, or Balthazar stuff and wonder what’s so special about it.
2) I think it’s more that a lot of “veterans” want GW2 to be more like GW1, which the developers of this game have already decided they DON’T want. As a result, requests to make GW2 more like GW1 are largely ignored.
3, 4, 5) I think you’ll find that’s true for pretty much ALL video games (and even all entertainment, really), regardless of what genre or style. Your “hardcore” fanbase is in a state of permanent decay almost from the moment it is formed. For most forms of entertainment, you can handle that decay for a while. But for video games (where the profit margin can be paper thin to begin with), you pretty much HAVE to be searching to expand your consumer base right from the start in order to stay solvent.
Why spend the resources to make 10 outfits that people will only buy 1 of when they can make 1 outfit that’s one size fits all and make just as much (if not more) profit?
I think this is the same problem that Arena.net had with the town clothes… there simply aren’t enough people willing to support a side element that robust.
I get the feeling that Arena.net has kinda abandoned the idea of racially or even armor class exclusive things at this point. I’m guessing they’ve decided the investment isn’t worth intentionally limiting your purchasing pool.
Which is a shame, because I really like that idea.