Here are some issues i have seen reading posts, videos and reviews and in general following the trends and information on Gw2 and ofcourse playing the game in Betas
Patience: The fact that players require patience to learn the game and to understand its features is a major entry barrier. One they have revamped some general accepted norms of MMORPG's and they have gone to also decide on the philosophy of no hand holding. Hence asking the general player demographic to have to change / relearn thier gaming style when it comes to MMORPG's on their own terms and by them selves which in it itself requires patience and time (it may not be much ) but creates an entry barrier. Yes there are hints that pop up, NPC that explain what is going on. But Anet should know not many players like reading Tooltips and Hints that pop up, Every game does it but also holds your hand across first few levels explaning each feature, hence cancelling that first tooltip that pops up is our habit now and makes no effect on us learning the other game and hence making us think it wont here either.
Fanboism/Hype Train; This is not a Anet creation by itself, but they have encouraged it. I am not saying that they have encouraged the hype directly but they have been releasing info on their game for soo long over 2 years now that it is hard for some one to assimilate if they came to know about a game 3 months back before Betas started. This has lead to some players knwoing almost all features and game philosophy and every thing there is to know about the game for 2 years so when they make comments, you can see how they can be easily be branded as fanbois and blamed for creating hype. Where as some people who know some what about the game and have read a bit about it tend to give the "balanced review" and people who know nothing about it and havnt been hand held in the first few hours of the game tend to give " First impressions"
Marketing: This has been my biggest bane with ANET as a company. They have decided just because we have made a good game is a reason our game will be successful. If i were the CEO or something of ANET i would first fire my marketing team. Just because you have a good product doesnt mean it will succeed. A good marketed product succeds at first then is retained by the product itself. For Ex. Blizzard. They market WoW a 8 year old game with already a large loyal fan base harder and better than ANET has ever done. And i like Blizzards marketing team, they can literally sell Ice to an Eskimo. ANET on the other hand uses game developers / content designers / Lore keepers to market their product ! Seriously ANET ? I hope they know there are professionals who make a living out of marketing products, get in some professionals and market your product better. Half the marketing is being done by gamers and GW2 "Fanbois" and if i may say so some GW2 haters are promoting GW2 better than ANET has.
A clear Example of above is the GEM store. I dont blame those who say it is P2W. It clearly does look like P2W. If you look at a gem store exactly same as this in any other game with no changes made to it at all, this same Gem Store will be a P2W and no one can deny it. Getting gold for cash with which you can buy items ? P2W for me in any other game, faster XP P2W for me in any other game etc etc , Unfortunately ANET fails at explaining how it is not P2W. How items bought with real cash will not give you and your team a significant advantage if any advantage at all. People see game philosophy and CS as seperate entitities. And i dont blame the gamers for it but the ANET team, they have to do a better job of letting the players base know.
Another NO END GAME content. It took ANET 2 years and only a couple of weeks back to give a slight insight into their "END GAME ". ANd even they started by saying " alot of people are asking us about our End game" Well if you ofcourse dont explain people what it is even though you have been releasing info for the last 2 years, ofourse 2 weeks before release people will ask you. I understand they want to keep content as a wow factor never seen before kinda thing but you have to give out info a lot more so people know better and not just your "fanbois".
These are just some my "first impressions" so you cant flame me for something i have said , but please go ahead ANET "fanbois" flame me !
PS: some comments above are sarcastic and back handed in nature if you dont get them i am sorry.
No. Just No. Please go look at the "gem" stores for the games: Battle of the immortals and Luminary. I am positive there are more examples of pay to win out there but those 2 I know for a FACT are seriously P2W and compared to GW2 Gem store they are nothing a like.
Items that are required for gear advancment that drop less 0.1% of the time in game from rare and difficult mobs costing 1-2 dollars in the those gem stores. These things are not optional. Also you can buy item that have a % chance of upgrading your weapon. So your buying a gambling chip. again not in GW2.
I am tired of this arguement. If you arguement that GW2 is p2w because TSW or other A and AAA mmos have similar gem stores then your not informed enough to make the opinion of wether a store is p2w or not.
Play or look at these games where the store is a gamble and you something that only has a % chance to help you out. Or you have to buy an item from the gem store before you attempt your next waepon upgrade because it protects your weapon from DESTRUCTION if the upgrade fails. Do those items sound optional to you? Have another look at the GW2 store and reevaluate your opinion.
TSW and other mmos stores are entirely cosmetic, which can't be said about GW2. However I think you missed the OP's point. It's the perception of P2W, because it does have items for sale the can effect the game. Game mechanics may prevent that, but on face value it's a perception.
It is only your perception that ti is P2W and your perception is wrong. Anything you can get in the store you can get in game. Youo do not have to pay for anything in GW2. How is that P2W? Also, once you hit lvl 80 all the armor is basically the same and it is the difference in looks that is what separates the armor.
EA definatly made more then any other mmo to the date when it came to selling for the first month. Seeing facts makes me a minion. I already said i had a copy of gw2 didnt i? I definatly have more beta and stress test ss then you do on these boards.
And why would we want GW2 to follow ToRs fate and become a desolate wasteland after one year? NCSoft isn't a large as EA and isn't willing to throw cash into a furnace.
And LOL. I don't put up SS on these boards so now I didn't participate in beta? Guess I'll have to put up my reciept of my CE pre purchase later.
Even you yourself said the majority of pop doesnt visit the boards yet i am ignorant to expand? Seriously? It is a waste of money to try and bring in more consumers lol. Doritos has idie funded commercials at every superbowl couldnt be to hard for a no fail marketing game like this one to grease a few palms.
First off, comparing food snacks to video games. Bright lad we have here boys.
Second, super bowl slots are filled years in advance.
Third, there's nothing wrong with trying to push into other demographics. But for launch, doing a massive international campaign for a video game, especially in todays recession, is not the right move.
The first and foremost way to launch a title is through, oh I don't know...actual video gamers? Websites, conventions, game shopts etc.. Hell, when I was at PAX in the last 2 years, ArenaNet had a large advertisement of GW2 on a truck driving around all day in Seattle.
And like I said previously, WoW did not start bill boarding and TV commercial advertising until years after it was launched.
I dont know if your baiting or just specialy educated. It worked for every company thats tried it, or does anet meet some standerd because you love a game that isnt even released yet to much to know when somone else idea might be better?
I'm still confused as to why it's all right for ArenaNet to cash in on GW2 and then leave it to die like, as you put it, other companies that have done it. I don't know what your definition of "worked" is, but if a game is in ruins after a year or two...I don't consider that a good trade off.
If you ask EA where money was wasted they are not going to say commercials.
Of course not. Like I said before, EA is a much larger company than NCSoft. They're known for that style of advertising. Not only that, those mass advertisements work well when you have one of the WORLDS LARGEST IP backing it up. They're different.
Just think about it. It's not hard to understand my friend.
An analogy is you asking a corner store to mark their prices and advertise like say WalMart does. It's just not the same, even though both stores do the same thing in the end.
And after ArenaNets beta sign up and their recent conference call talking about their pre-purchase/pre-order numbers...it's exceeded their expectations. So I say they're satisfied on how they spread the word.
Which is the bird.
So your saying because of GW2's shallow gameplay that if they did mass marketing to rake in a lot of costumers at the start they wouldn't have a steady flow of people playing the game threw out its gamming career?
You live in Canada, USA's recesion is what it has always been, the community depends on other countries to make thier stuff so it can get done as cheap as possible the country raises thier prices sales go threw the roof while we find a cheaper country to make it. Used to be made in Taiwan, then made in China soon it will be made somewhere else ect.
Walmart the US chain is doing better then any store on EARTH, can you say the same about a canadian product, NOPE. So yes I do agree with the way McDonalds and Walmart do buisness because there models speak volumes.
People didn't know sugar would sell itself until it was sold to them, chances are they didn't look at a forum to figure it out either.
I havent seen almost any sign of GW2 marketing yet, I'm afraid the game looks very very popular inside Anets own bubble, but they forget to sell the game outside the bubble. It might affect the final sales more than they know. The game will propably sell very good, but I feel it could sell better.
Here are some issues i have seen reading posts, videos and reviews and in general following the trends and information on Gw2 and ofcourse playing the game in Betas
Patience: The fact that players require patience to learn the game and to understand its features is a major entry barrier. One they have revamped some general accepted norms of MMORPG's and they have gone to also decide on the philosophy of no hand holding. Hence asking the general player demographic to have to change / relearn thier gaming style when it comes to MMORPG's on their own terms and by them selves which in it itself requires patience and time (it may not be much ) but creates an entry barrier. Yes there are hints that pop up, NPC that explain what is going on. But Anet should know not many players like reading Tooltips and Hints that pop up, Every game does it but also holds your hand across first few levels explaning each feature, hence cancelling that first tooltip that pops up is our habit now and makes no effect on us learning the other game and hence making us think it wont here either.
Fanboism/Hype Train; This is not a Anet creation by itself, but they have encouraged it. I am not saying that they have encouraged the hype directly but they have been releasing info on their game for soo long over 2 years now that it is hard for some one to assimilate if they came to know about a game 3 months back before Betas started. This has lead to some players knwoing almost all features and game philosophy and every thing there is to know about the game for 2 years so when they make comments, you can see how they can be easily be branded as fanbois and blamed for creating hype. Where as some people who know some what about the game and have read a bit about it tend to give the "balanced review" and people who know nothing about it and havnt been hand held in the first few hours of the game tend to give " First impressions"
Marketing: This has been my biggest bane with ANET as a company. They have decided just because we have made a good game is a reason our game will be successful. If i were the CEO or something of ANET i would first fire my marketing team. Just because you have a good product doesnt mean it will succeed. A good marketed product succeds at first then is retained by the product itself. For Ex. Blizzard. They market WoW a 8 year old game with already a large loyal fan base harder and better than ANET has ever done. And i like Blizzards marketing team, they can literally sell Ice to an Eskimo. ANET on the other hand uses game developers / content designers / Lore keepers to market their product ! Seriously ANET ? I hope they know there are professionals who make a living out of marketing products, get in some professionals and market your product better. Half the marketing is being done by gamers and GW2 "Fanbois" and if i may say so some GW2 haters are promoting GW2 better than ANET has.
A clear Example of above is the GEM store. I dont blame those who say it is P2W. It clearly does look like P2W. If you look at a gem store exactly same as this in any other game with no changes made to it at all, this same Gem Store will be a P2W and no one can deny it. Getting gold for cash with which you can buy items ? P2W for me in any other game, faster XP P2W for me in any other game etc etc , Unfortunately ANET fails at explaining how it is not P2W. How items bought with real cash will not give you and your team a significant advantage if any advantage at all. People see game philosophy and CS as seperate entitities. And i dont blame the gamers for it but the ANET team, they have to do a better job of letting the players base know.
Another NO END GAME content. It took ANET 2 years and only a couple of weeks back to give a slight insight into their "END GAME ". ANd even they started by saying " alot of people are asking us about our End game" Well if you ofcourse dont explain people what it is even though you have been releasing info for the last 2 years, ofourse 2 weeks before release people will ask you. I understand they want to keep content as a wow factor never seen before kinda thing but you have to give out info a lot more so people know better and not just your "fanbois".
These are just some my "first impressions" so you cant flame me for something i have said , but please go ahead ANET "fanbois" flame me !
PS: some comments above are sarcastic and back handed in nature if you dont get them i am sorry.
GW2
Patience: this is not you daddy's warcraft where you can dive in and think youre gonna know it right away. basically, this is not your typical mmo, that has been stated long before even the beta was opened up, and still continues to be said, i know that for a fact. if you werent listening clean the garbage from your ears. imagine that, you 'L33ts' from WoW are gonna be the noobs again, boohoo.
'Fanboi': paparrazzi of the game world. they did their job for Anet by hyping it, was cheap advertising for Anet, that doesnt mean you have to comment or read it. you have a pc, look up your own info ffs.
Marketing: EVERY company on the planet makes the best of what they make, you act like you never saw the ads for 'New Coke' that everyone hated, or the Atari Lynx that was supposed to put Nintendo and Sega to shame. Again, who cares what or who they use to market it, are you trying to say they are having an unfair advantage by using the devs and other people thay have? pfffft. again, that is advertising, who cares. it doesnt mean you have to read their ads or listen to the nubs everywhere who think they know something, you started out in life with an independent brain, use it.
and if i understand you correctly, youre saying my buying a costume in their online 'store', or a bag with more slots or something else cosmetic will make me be p2w? you can get faster xp in game, FREE, as opposed to buying the gems in their store, there is absolutely no difference. besides, in pvp everyone is the same level so they dont help there, nor do they do any good for endgame when you arent leveling any more, you arent any more powerful. if YOU wanna run thru this game just for the sake of being 80 go right ahead. but AFTER i took the time to level my first toon and explored the entire world to check out things and enjoy my investment on WoW, THEN i blew thru levels to max it. pfffft.
End Game: the game hasnt even been released for anyone yet, why are you wanting to know about what happenes at the end? i bet most of those people are the ones who, as kids, sneaked into their parents closet to find out what they got for christmas then ruined the surprise on xmas day. give it a rest. when you get near lvl 80 with impressive in game gear worry about it, until then theres a long way to go.
Marketing: This has been my biggest bane with ANET as a company. They have decided just because we have made a good game is a reason our game will be successful. If i were the CEO or something of ANET i would first fire my marketing team. Just because you have a good product doesnt mean it will succeed. A good marketed product succeds at first then is retained by the product itself. For Ex. Blizzard. They market WoW a 8 year old game with already a large loyal fan base harder and better than ANET has ever done. And i like Blizzards marketing team, they can literally sell Ice to an Eskimo. ANET on the other hand uses game developers / content designers / Lore keepers to market their product ! Seriously ANET ? I hope they know there are professionals who make a living out of marketing products, get in some professionals and market your product better. Half the marketing is being done by gamers and GW2 "Fanbois" and if i may say so some GW2 haters are promoting GW2 better than ANET has.
FYI, Word of mouth is marketing and it is the best kind of marketing. It is the only marketing most people listen too as most of us have been made numb to any and all marketing tricks at this point in our lives. No need to hire some fantacy marketing firm when your customers will market the game for you (if it is a good product). There are a ton of examples of word of mouth beating out other marketing methods.
Who do you think spends more on marketing each year Microsoft or Apple? Which is the more successful company? (Apple sends more on marketing and Microsoft is more successful)
Word of mouth is the greatest marketing tool that any company has and surprisingly its the cheapest as well.
TSW and other mmos stores are entirely cosmetic, which can't be said about GW2. However I think you missed the OP's point. It's the perception of P2W, because it does have items for sale the can effect the game. Game mechanics may prevent that, but on face value it's a perception.
It is only your perception that ti is P2W and your perception is wrong. Anything you can get in the store you can get in game. Youo do not have to pay for anything in GW2. How is that P2W? Also, once you hit lvl 80 all the armor is basically the same and it is the difference in looks that is what separates the armor.
Did you even read fully what I wrote? Nobody has so far in this thread said GW2 is P2W. Two people, one youself, have jumped on people saying its a perception OTHER people have. The OP has a valid point, as there are quite a number of people who think it is.
Originally posted by OldManFunk My biggest issue with GW2 and Anet is that I've still got a week left before I can begin playing so I'm stuck here reading threads like this.
Your take on marketing seems way off. The fact that mainstream gaming outlets that don't give a rats ass about MMOs for the exception of WoW actually talk about GW2 is a big sign that they are doing their job. Not to mention all sites related to MMOs almost exclusively talk about this game more than any other MMO.
For a game that is not f2p and has a barrier to entry with their purchase price in a market filled of no barriers of entry they are doing a good job to position themselves to get as many people to buy it as they can.
TSW and other mmos stores are entirely cosmetic, which can't be said about GW2. However I think you missed the OP's point. It's the perception of P2W, because it does have items for sale the can effect the game. Game mechanics may prevent that, but on face value it's a perception.
It is only your perception that ti is P2W and your perception is wrong. Anything you can get in the store you can get in game. Youo do not have to pay for anything in GW2. How is that P2W? Also, once you hit lvl 80 all the armor is basically the same and it is the difference in looks that is what separates the armor.
Did you even read fully what I wrote? Nobody has so far in this thread said GW2 is P2W. Two people, one youself, have jumped on people saying its a perception OTHER people have. The OP has a valid point, as there are quite a number of people who think it is.
Just read this and it might explain what you think.
Your take on marketing seems way off. The fact that mainstream gaming outlets that don't give a rats ass about MMOs for the exception of WoW actually talk about GW2 is a big sign that they are doing their job. Not to mention all sites related to MMOs almost exclusively talk about this game more than any other MMO.
For a game that is not f2p and has a barrier to entry with their purchase price in a market filled of no barriers of entry they are doing a good job to position themselves to get as many people to buy it as they can.
It seems to me, looking outside of MMORPG sites, GW2 is at the top of a lot of lists for interest (probably based on unique hits), but for being a week away, not a lot of these places are advertising for GW2 at all. Maybe you can give some better examples.
I don't know if they need to waste any money on TV ads. They are out selling MoP on Amazon which means it's doing pretty damn good as is. Fanboys come with every game and I didn't find it very hard to learn how to play GW2.
Your take on marketing seems way off. The fact that mainstream gaming outlets that don't give a rats ass about MMOs for the exception of WoW actually talk about GW2 is a big sign that they are doing their job. Not to mention all sites related to MMOs almost exclusively talk about this game more than any other MMO.
For a game that is not f2p and has a barrier to entry with their purchase price in a market filled of no barriers of entry they are doing a good job to position themselves to get as many people to buy it as they can.
It seems to me, looking outside of MMORPG sites, GW2 is at the top of a lot of lists for interest (probably based on unique hits), but for being a week away, not a lot of these places are advertising for GW2 at all. Maybe you can give some better examples.
All three of them have touched more on GW2 than other mmos. For example they don't even mention Tera or TSW as much. They mentioned TOR a lot for obvious reasons. Gametrailers is the one I frequent the most and the most popular one of the 3. They touch it in their podcast and they had an upcoming games countdown which it was featured in as well. Right now, they are focused on Gamescon. But just look at their pages for the mentioned MMOs and you can see the difference.
Guild Wars 2 has set a new record for "most-trolled-MMO-before-release". This is incredible. The purpose of this subforum is to create an opportunity for players who are interested in this game to get information and discuss. However, about 50% of all threads are more or less disguised attempts to troll.
I visited the mmorp.com-forums during the betas of WAR, Vanguard and SWTOR, and never was there so much hatred for the game as I see now for GW2. What's wrong with those people? What did GW2 to them, that they feel so upset? Or are they all Blizzard-employees who fear that they are going to lose their jobs (look at what happend in SWTOR and TERA)?
I have been sceptical about some parts of GW2 (we still have no clue, what happens past lvl 30), but now I am shure, that I will buy it, because there would never be such hatred, if the game was not good :P
Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need.
Here are some issues i have seen reading posts, videos and reviews and in general following the trends and information on Gw2 and ofcourse playing the game in Betas
Patience: The fact that players require patience to learn the game and to understand its features is a major entry barrier. One they have revamped some general accepted norms of MMORPG's and they have gone to also decide on the philosophy of no hand holding. Hence asking the general player demographic to have to change / relearn thier gaming style when it comes to MMORPG's on their own terms and by them selves which in it itself requires patience and time (it may not be much ) but creates an entry barrier. Yes there are hints that pop up, NPC that explain what is going on. But Anet should know not many players like reading Tooltips and Hints that pop up, Every game does it but also holds your hand across first few levels explaning each feature, hence cancelling that first tooltip that pops up is our habit now and makes no effect on us learning the other game and hence making us think it wont here either.
Every video game on earth requires people to learn the controls and mechanics, and GW2 is not any different in that regard. And GW2 does have quite a bit of handholding, but it's not in your face like other games. The entire starter zone is basically the tutorial area. The zone progressively gets harder as they introduce more mechanics, more activites, more conflicts in the zone. And they added many "completion" type activities to the map to guide people out into the world and assist them with exploration. And how do you know many players don't like reading tooltips? If you're playing a brand new game, generally you want to read the hints and tooltips, as they can help you get better at the game.
Fanboism/Hype Train; This is not a Anet creation by itself, but they have encouraged it. I am not saying that they have encouraged the hype directly but they have been releasing info on their game for soo long over 2 years now that it is hard for some one to assimilate if they came to know about a game 3 months back before Betas started. This has lead to some players knwoing almost all features and game philosophy and every thing there is to know about the game for 2 years so when they make comments, you can see how they can be easily be branded as fanbois and blamed for creating hype. Where as some people who know some what about the game and have read a bit about it tend to give the "balanced review" and people who know nothing about it and havnt been hand held in the first few hours of the game tend to give " First impressions"
How is it hard to assimilate? It's just like any game and learning the feature list. It doesn't matter if you started 2 years ago or if you started yesterday, you are still doing the same thing. So players who were interested in this game from a long time and educated themselves on the features is a bad thing? I've been following this game since they announced it back in 2007, and decided to release EotN and then work on GW2. Exactly how does that matter to anyone? If someone asks a question, I can most likely answer it. It gives newcomers a sense of community (except on this site, because you are either apparently a fanboy or hater, nothing else).
I have actually found that those who have been following GW2 for a very long time (since they announced it 5 years ago) can give more "balanced" reviews than those who just pick it up, or those who only have been following it for a few months. Those who pick it up won't have done any research about the game, and most likely won't be willing to give it a fair shot. Those who just became interested in the game will still be in that "honeymoon" phase, and probably can't give a balanced review. And regardless, I've seen very few negative reviews of any of the BWEs. When the biggest complaints people have with the game are either cash shop or balancing issue or the lack of raids/endless gear progression, it should tell people that ArenaNet is doing a pretty good job. It means everything they promised is in the game and working.
Marketing: This has been my biggest bane with ANET as a company. They have decided just because we have made a good game is a reason our game will be successful. If i were the CEO or something of ANET i would first fire my marketing team. Just because you have a good product doesnt mean it will succeed. A good marketed product succeds at first then is retained by the product itself. For Ex. Blizzard. They market WoW a 8 year old game with already a large loyal fan base harder and better than ANET has ever done. And i like Blizzards marketing team, they can literally sell Ice to an Eskimo. ANET on the other hand uses game developers / content designers / Lore keepers to market their product ! Seriously ANET ? I hope they know there are professionals who make a living out of marketing products, get in some professionals and market your product better. Half the marketing is being done by gamers and GW2 "Fanbois" and if i may say so some GW2 haters are promoting GW2 better than ANET has.
A clear Example of above is the GEM store. I dont blame those who say it is P2W. It clearly does look like P2W. If you look at a gem store exactly same as this in any other game with no changes made to it at all, this same Gem Store will be a P2W and no one can deny it. Getting gold for cash with which you can buy items ? P2W for me in any other game, faster XP P2W for me in any other game etc etc , Unfortunately ANET fails at explaining how it is not P2W. How items bought with real cash will not give you and your team a significant advantage if any advantage at all. People see game philosophy and CS as seperate entitities. And i dont blame the gamers for it but the ANET team, they have to do a better job of letting the players base know.
I think ArenaNet's strategy is probably pretty good at first. They rely on word of mouth to do the marketing. It's cheap, and in my opinion, a lot better. How many games in the past 5 years have had extensive marketing campaigns and failed to deliver on the promises. This time you have ArenaNet merely stating some of their philosophies, and then the players take it from there. It's probably better than commercials in the beginning. Who's recommendation are you most likely to take? Some commercial or website who's most likely funded by ArenaNet, or you friends/neighbors who have the game and love it? They are obviously doing some marketing through interviews and the BWEs. I think the "raving reviews" from actual players have done more to rocket this game to the top of most charts than any commercial/marketing campaign designed by ArenaNet could. It's actually worked for ArenaNet with GW1. Over the course of GW1's livespan so far, it's sold over 7 million unique boxes, meaning there's over 7 million accounts. For a company that's only had one commercial ever (back in 2007 with EotN), and was a start-up, that's pretty darn good. Not to mention GW2 has had articles on many major gaming websites, and even in Forbes. Every company has their own marketing mechanism that works for them. So far, ArenaNet showing features that are in game and then the players themselves hyping it is probably the best marketing ArenaNet has done so far. Who are you to judge ArenaNet's marketing strategy? Why the hell should you be concerned in the first place? Play the game and let ArenaNet handle marketing the way they think it should be done.
I fail to see how the cash shop is pay to win. Most high-end stuff requires a currency that's not tradable, or able to be bought with gold. Heck even blueprints have supply and people as the limiting factor. So it doesn't matter if you can buy gold with gems, there are limiting factors in place to make it a non-issue. No boost can be used in PvP, and those boosts can be gained in game, or can be bought with gold through the currency exchange. Not to mention those boosts are utterly useless. If you want to spend gold on a 50% boost in exp from MOBS, then by all means do it. It's not going to affect me or anyone else. As for the mystic keys, they drop in game, and people will most likely sell them on the AH because the contents are pretty much worthless. I think when I opened one my reaction was "What is this garbage", and proceeded to delete it as it was taking up inventory space.
Another NO END GAME content. It took ANET 2 years and only a couple of weeks back to give a slight insight into their "END GAME ". ANd even they started by saying " alot of people are asking us about our End game" Well if you ofcourse dont explain people what it is even though you have been releasing info for the last 2 years, ofourse 2 weeks before release people will ask you. I understand they want to keep content as a wow factor never seen before kinda thing but you have to give out info a lot more so people know better and not just your "fanbois".
These are just some my "first impressions" so you cant flame me for something i have said , but please go ahead ANET "fanbois" flame me !
PS: some comments above are sarcastic and back handed in nature if you dont get them i am sorry.
The thing is, you release information on "end game" it contributes to the idea that just because you hit level cap, the entire game should change to revolve around certain things. They said that there were no raids a long time ago.
I don't understand your "first impressions". Your first impressions is more concerned with the hype and ArenaNet's business practices than of the actual game itself. If you've played the game, why don't you offer insights of how you liked the game. That's more important in my opinion. Did you enjoy the game? If yes, then why are you complaining. If no, then why are you not talking about the game?
Your take on marketing seems way off. The fact that mainstream gaming outlets that don't give a rats ass about MMOs for the exception of WoW actually talk about GW2 is a big sign that they are doing their job. Not to mention all sites related to MMOs almost exclusively talk about this game more than any other MMO.
For a game that is not f2p and has a barrier to entry with their purchase price in a market filled of no barriers of entry they are doing a good job to position themselves to get as many people to buy it as they can.
It seems to me, looking outside of MMORPG sites, GW2 is at the top of a lot of lists for interest (probably based on unique hits), but for being a week away, not a lot of these places are advertising for GW2 at all. Maybe you can give some better examples.
All three of them have touched more on GW2 than other mmos. For example they don't even mention Tera or TSW as much. They mentioned TOR a lot for obvious reasons. Gametrailers is the one I frequent the most and the most popular one of the 3. They touch it in their podcast and they had an upcoming games countdown which it was featured in as well. Right now, they are focused on Gamescon. But just look at their pages for the mentioned MMOs and you can see the difference.
Right... I can see that.
But really if you are allowed to consider SWTOR and WoW as part of the equation, ArenaNet doesn't seem to be putting out anywhere near the amount of money into marketing. They've done dev interviews and huge AMA posts on reddit. They seem to be taking a more viral approach to marketing. It's like they are depending on the game itself to carry them.
I think there is a point to be made that there are a lot of people that aren't poring over forums and even the internet that might not get exposed ot the game that might be exposed by things like TV commercials or commercials on various frequented websites that are unrelated to MMOs.
It's expensive though, and to be honest, it appears that the viral marketing and letting the game speak for itself approach is working really well. This game may sell millions in the first couple of months without ever having made a cinematic trailer or tv commercial.
But really if you are allowed to consider SWTOR and WoW as part of the equation, ArenaNet doesn't seem to be putting out anywhere near the amount of money into marketing. They've done dev interviews and huge AMA posts on reddit. They seem to be taking a more viral approach to marketing. It's like they are depending on the game itself to carry them.
I think there is a point to be made that there are a lot of people that aren't poring over forums and even the internet that might not get exposed ot the game that might be exposed by things like TV commercials or commercials on various frequented websites that are unrelated to MMOs.
It's expensive though, and to be honest, it appears that the viral marketing and letting the game speak for itself approach is working really well. This game may sell millions in the first couple of months without ever having made a cinematic trailer or tv commercial.
That I have to agree with. They arent near close to TOR or WoW, but I believe very much above the standard MMO release.
Guild Wars 2 has set a new record for "most-trolled-MMO-before-release". This is incredible. The purpose of this subforum is to create an opportunity for players who are interested in this game to get information and discuss. However, about 50% of all threads are more or less disguised attempts to troll.
I visited the mmorp.com-forums during the betas of WAR, Vanguard and SWTOR, and never was there so much hatred for the game as I see now for GW2. What's wrong with those people? What did GW2 to them, that they feel so upset? Or are they all Blizzard-employees who fear that they are going to lose their jobs (look at what happend in SWTOR and TERA)?
I have been sceptical about some parts of GW2 (we still have no clue, what happens past lvl 30), but now I am shure, that I will buy it, because there would never be such hatred, if the game was not good :P
I actually find it amusing. It's been GW2 vs every single game that's been released in the past few years. Now it's back to Gw2 vs WoW.
To be honest, it's a couple weeks before launch. It's bound to happen on this site. But most of the posts seems to be centered around 1) Cash shop concerns, 2) Lack of Raids, or 3) Hype. I'd say the fact that those are the top posts for the game is a very good sign for the game. And then you've got the posts like "GW2 isn't gonna be <insert favorite game here>", etc. Not realizing, of course, that the more they talk about GW2, the more they click on GW2 link, the more advertisement the do for the game.
Your take on marketing seems way off. The fact that mainstream gaming outlets that don't give a rats ass about MMOs for the exception of WoW actually talk about GW2 is a big sign that they are doing their job. Not to mention all sites related to MMOs almost exclusively talk about this game more than any other MMO.
For a game that is not f2p and has a barrier to entry with their purchase price in a market filled of no barriers of entry they are doing a good job to position themselves to get as many people to buy it as they can.
It seems to me, looking outside of MMORPG sites, GW2 is at the top of a lot of lists for interest (probably based on unique hits), but for being a week away, not a lot of these places are advertising for GW2 at all. Maybe you can give some better examples.
All three of them have touched more on GW2 than other mmos. For example they don't even mention Tera or TSW as much. They mentioned TOR a lot for obvious reasons. Gametrailers is the one I frequent the most and the most popular one of the 3. They touch it in their podcast and they had an upcoming games countdown which it was featured in as well. Right now, they are focused on Gamescon. But just look at their pages for the mentioned MMOs and you can see the difference.
Right... I can see that.
But really if you are allowed to consider SWTOR and WoW as part of the equation, ArenaNet doesn't seem to be putting out anywhere near the amount of money into marketing. They've done dev interviews and huge AMA posts on reddit. They seem to be taking a more viral approach to marketing. It's like they are depending on the game itself to carry them.
I think there is a point to be made that there are a lot of people that aren't poring over forums and even the internet that might not get exposed ot the game that might be exposed by things like TV commercials or commercials on various frequented websites that are unrelated to MMOs.
It's expensive though, and to be honest, it appears that the viral marketing and letting the game speak for itself approach is working really well. This game may sell millions in the first couple of months without ever having made a cinematic trailer or tv commercial.
It's rumored that GW2 has already sold a million copies and it's not even launch yet. NCSoft will neither confirm nor deny it, other than to say GW2 sales have exceeded expectations. And their projected sales for 2012 is 3.1 million. I'd say the viral marketing campaign is working very well.
Marketing: This has been my biggest bane with ANET as a company. They have decided just because we have made a good game is a reason our game will be successful. If i were the CEO or something of ANET i would first fire my marketing team. Just because you have a good product doesnt mean it will succeed. A good marketed product succeds at first then is retained by the product itself. For Ex. Blizzard. They market WoW a 8 year old game with already a large loyal fan base harder and better than ANET has ever done. And i like Blizzards marketing team, they can literally sell Ice to an Eskimo. ANET on the other hand uses game developers / content designers / Lore keepers to market their product ! Seriously ANET ? I hope they know there are professionals who make a living out of marketing products, get in some professionals and market your product better. Half the marketing is being done by gamers and GW2 "Fanbois" and if i may say so some GW2 haters are promoting GW2 better than ANET has.
To offer a serious response to this:
I think the primary purpose of marketing is to garner initial interest. Once there is interest and once you have a guaranteed initial playerbase, any game relies on word of mouth to grow. If the game truly is great, the playerbase will talk about it and coax their friends to at least try it out. If the game is not very good, the best marketing team in the world won't get players to continue playing, nor will it prevent disappointed players from warning all their friends through word of mouth. Such is how the MMO community operates.
GW2 already has a huge initial playerbase. If the 1, 2 or 3 million players who try the game out early love it, word will spread. If player vocalization is overwhelmingly positive, more and more of their friends will come. Not everyone. No game is for everyone. But the game should grow after release. Unfortunately, not since WoW have we actually seen this in practice. But that has less to do with other games' poor marketing, and much more to do with the majority's response to them was that they were all right, or okay, or mediocre, or just good but not great.
Originally posted by Homitu Originally posted by pratikrath86 Marketing: This has been my biggest bane with ANET as a company. They have decided just because we have made a good game is a reason our game will be successful. If i were the CEO or something of ANET i would first fire my marketing team. Just because you have a good product doesnt mean it will succeed. A good marketed product succeds at first then is retained by the product itself. For Ex. Blizzard. They market WoW a 8 year old game with already a large loyal fan base harder and better than ANET has ever done. And i like Blizzards marketing team, they can literally sell Ice to an Eskimo. ANET on the other hand uses game developers / content designers / Lore keepers to market their product ! Seriously ANET ? I hope they know there are professionals who make a living out of marketing products, get in some professionals and market your product better. Half the marketing is being done by gamers and GW2 "Fanbois" and if i may say so some GW2 haters are promoting GW2 better than ANET has.
To offer a serious response to this:
I think the primary purpose of marketing is to garner initial interest. Once there is interest and once you have a guaranteed initial playerbase, any game relies on word of mouth to grow. If the game truly is great, the playerbase will talk about it and coax their friends to at least try it out. If the game is not very good, the best marketing team in the world won't get players to continue playing, nor will it prevent disappointed players from warning all their friends through word of mouth. Such is how the MMO community operates.
GW2 already has a huge initial playerbase. If the 1, 2 or 3 million players who try the game out early love it, word will spread. If player vocalization is overwhelmingly positive, more and more of their friends will come. Not everyone. No game is for everyone. But the game should grow after release. Unfortunately, not since WoW have we actually seen this in practice. But that has less to do with other games' poor marketing, and much more to do with the majority's response to them was that they were all right, or okay, or mediocre, or just good but not great.
To offer a simple response to your serious response:
Impulse buys.
Yeah, GW2 is preselling quite well but there are still a LOT of people that either dont know Guild Wars 2 even exists or have heard of it but dont know it releases in 10 days.
A TV blitz would result in more sales but how many sales and would they off set the cost of the TV spots. Usually the answer is yes.
Originally posted by pratikrath86 Marketing: This has been my biggest bane with ANET as a company. They have decided just because we have made a good game is a reason our game will be successful. If i were the CEO or something of ANET i would first fire my marketing team. Just because you have a good product doesnt mean it will succeed. A good marketed product succeds at first then is retained by the product itself. For Ex. Blizzard. They market WoW a 8 year old game with already a large loyal fan base harder and better than ANET has ever done. And i like Blizzards marketing team, they can literally sell Ice to an Eskimo. ANET on the other hand uses game developers / content designers / Lore keepers to market their product ! Seriously ANET ? I hope they know there are professionals who make a living out of marketing products, get in some professionals and market your product better. Half the marketing is being done by gamers and GW2 "Fanbois" and if i may say so some GW2 haters are promoting GW2 better than ANET has.
To offer a serious response to this:
I think the primary purpose of marketing is to garner initial interest. Once there is interest and once you have a guaranteed initial playerbase, any game relies on word of mouth to grow. If the game truly is great, the playerbase will talk about it and coax their friends to at least try it out. If the game is not very good, the best marketing team in the world won't get players to continue playing, nor will it prevent disappointed players from warning all their friends through word of mouth. Such is how the MMO community operates.
GW2 already has a huge initial playerbase. If the 1, 2 or 3 million players who try the game out early love it, word will spread. If player vocalization is overwhelmingly positive, more and more of their friends will come. Not everyone. No game is for everyone. But the game should grow after release. Unfortunately, not since WoW have we actually seen this in practice. But that has less to do with other games' poor marketing, and much more to do with the majority's response to them was that they were all right, or okay, or mediocre, or just good but not great.
To offer a simple response to your serious response:
Impulse buys.
Yeah, GW2 is preselling quite well but there are still a LOT of people that either dont know Guild Wars 2 even exists or have heard of it but dont know it releases in 10 days.
A TV blitz would result in more sales but how many sales and would they off set the cost of the TV spots. Usually the answer is yes.
I had considered that but didn't want to further lengthen my post.
Certainly initial sales will increase proportionally to the amount of advertising the game puts out among other factors, such as how large a following the series already has (take Diablo 3 or a Final Fantasy game, for example.) I can't imagine Anet hasn't factored this into their equation.
As such, I'm inclined to believe that they must have concluded that the amount of money they would have to spend on pre-release advertising to bolster initial sales would not be worth it in the long run. They might feel the extra players they might grab in the beginning are the same players they are going to grab a month or 2 down the road anyway after word of the game's greatness starts to spread.
I think my point was this: there is an initial sales threshold that needs to be met to allow the game to eventually grow wildly and succeed post release. This threshold was met and even surpassed. There's no need to use more funds to attract mostly players they are eventually going to attract anyway for free.
The question becomes how many completely unique players who would never otherwise ever find out about GW2 do you think the extra early advertising would attract.
This is all just my personal hypothesization of course. I'm no professional marketer. But surely Anet has run the numbers and made various projections.
Comments
It is only your perception that ti is P2W and your perception is wrong. Anything you can get in the store you can get in game. Youo do not have to pay for anything in GW2. How is that P2W? Also, once you hit lvl 80 all the armor is basically the same and it is the difference in looks that is what separates the armor.
So your saying because of GW2's shallow gameplay that if they did mass marketing to rake in a lot of costumers at the start they wouldn't have a steady flow of people playing the game threw out its gamming career?
You live in Canada, USA's recesion is what it has always been, the community depends on other countries to make thier stuff so it can get done as cheap as possible the country raises thier prices sales go threw the roof while we find a cheaper country to make it. Used to be made in Taiwan, then made in China soon it will be made somewhere else ect.
Walmart the US chain is doing better then any store on EARTH, can you say the same about a canadian product, NOPE. So yes I do agree with the way McDonalds and Walmart do buisness because there models speak volumes.
People didn't know sugar would sell itself until it was sold to them, chances are they didn't look at a forum to figure it out either.
GW2
Patience: this is not you daddy's warcraft where you can dive in and think youre gonna know it right away. basically, this is not your typical mmo, that has been stated long before even the beta was opened up, and still continues to be said, i know that for a fact. if you werent listening clean the garbage from your ears. imagine that, you 'L33ts' from WoW are gonna be the noobs again, boohoo.
'Fanboi': paparrazzi of the game world. they did their job for Anet by hyping it, was cheap advertising for Anet, that doesnt mean you have to comment or read it. you have a pc, look up your own info ffs.
Marketing: EVERY company on the planet makes the best of what they make, you act like you never saw the ads for 'New Coke' that everyone hated, or the Atari Lynx that was supposed to put Nintendo and Sega to shame. Again, who cares what or who they use to market it, are you trying to say they are having an unfair advantage by using the devs and other people thay have? pfffft. again, that is advertising, who cares. it doesnt mean you have to read their ads or listen to the nubs everywhere who think they know something, you started out in life with an independent brain, use it.
and if i understand you correctly, youre saying my buying a costume in their online 'store', or a bag with more slots or something else cosmetic will make me be p2w? you can get faster xp in game, FREE, as opposed to buying the gems in their store, there is absolutely no difference. besides, in pvp everyone is the same level so they dont help there, nor do they do any good for endgame when you arent leveling any more, you arent any more powerful. if YOU wanna run thru this game just for the sake of being 80 go right ahead. but AFTER i took the time to level my first toon and explored the entire world to check out things and enjoy my investment on WoW, THEN i blew thru levels to max it. pfffft.
End Game: the game hasnt even been released for anyone yet, why are you wanting to know about what happenes at the end? i bet most of those people are the ones who, as kids, sneaked into their parents closet to find out what they got for christmas then ruined the surprise on xmas day. give it a rest. when you get near lvl 80 with impressive in game gear worry about it, until then theres a long way to go.
FYI, Word of mouth is marketing and it is the best kind of marketing. It is the only marketing most people listen too as most of us have been made numb to any and all marketing tricks at this point in our lives. No need to hire some fantacy marketing firm when your customers will market the game for you (if it is a good product). There are a ton of examples of word of mouth beating out other marketing methods.
Who do you think spends more on marketing each year Microsoft or Apple? Which is the more successful company? (Apple sends more on marketing and Microsoft is more successful)
Word of mouth is the greatest marketing tool that any company has and surprisingly its the cheapest as well.
Sooner or Later
Did you even read fully what I wrote? Nobody has so far in this thread said GW2 is P2W. Two people, one youself, have jumped on people saying its a perception OTHER people have. The OP has a valid point, as there are quite a number of people who think it is.
hear hear!! :P
Your take on marketing seems way off. The fact that mainstream gaming outlets that don't give a rats ass about MMOs for the exception of WoW actually talk about GW2 is a big sign that they are doing their job. Not to mention all sites related to MMOs almost exclusively talk about this game more than any other MMO.
For a game that is not f2p and has a barrier to entry with their purchase price in a market filled of no barriers of entry they are doing a good job to position themselves to get as many people to buy it as they can.
Just read this and it might explain what you think.
http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/473/view/forums/thread/360701/To-clairify-Black-Lion-chest-buffs.html
Sherman's Gaming
Youtube Content creator for The Elder Scrolls Online
Channel:http://https//www.youtube.com/channel/UCrgYNgpFTRAl4XWz31o2emw
I don't know. Like... look at:
Gamespot
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/index.html
IGN
http://www.ign.com/pc
Gametrailers
http://www.gametrailers.com/pc
It seems to me, looking outside of MMORPG sites, GW2 is at the top of a lot of lists for interest (probably based on unique hits), but for being a week away, not a lot of these places are advertising for GW2 at all. Maybe you can give some better examples.
My theme song.
Someone didn't read the whole OP.
All three of them have touched more on GW2 than other mmos. For example they don't even mention Tera or TSW as much. They mentioned TOR a lot for obvious reasons. Gametrailers is the one I frequent the most and the most popular one of the 3. They touch it in their podcast and they had an upcoming games countdown which it was featured in as well. Right now, they are focused on Gamescon. But just look at their pages for the mentioned MMOs and you can see the difference.
Tl;DR
Guild Wars 2 has set a new record for "most-trolled-MMO-before-release". This is incredible. The purpose of this subforum is to create an opportunity for players who are interested in this game to get information and discuss. However, about 50% of all threads are more or less disguised attempts to troll.
I visited the mmorp.com-forums during the betas of WAR, Vanguard and SWTOR, and never was there so much hatred for the game as I see now for GW2. What's wrong with those people? What did GW2 to them, that they feel so upset? Or are they all Blizzard-employees who fear that they are going to lose their jobs (look at what happend in SWTOR and TERA)?
I have been sceptical about some parts of GW2 (we still have no clue, what happens past lvl 30), but now I am shure, that I will buy it, because there would never be such hatred, if the game was not good :P
Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need.
Every video game on earth requires people to learn the controls and mechanics, and GW2 is not any different in that regard. And GW2 does have quite a bit of handholding, but it's not in your face like other games. The entire starter zone is basically the tutorial area. The zone progressively gets harder as they introduce more mechanics, more activites, more conflicts in the zone. And they added many "completion" type activities to the map to guide people out into the world and assist them with exploration. And how do you know many players don't like reading tooltips? If you're playing a brand new game, generally you want to read the hints and tooltips, as they can help you get better at the game.
How is it hard to assimilate? It's just like any game and learning the feature list. It doesn't matter if you started 2 years ago or if you started yesterday, you are still doing the same thing. So players who were interested in this game from a long time and educated themselves on the features is a bad thing? I've been following this game since they announced it back in 2007, and decided to release EotN and then work on GW2. Exactly how does that matter to anyone? If someone asks a question, I can most likely answer it. It gives newcomers a sense of community (except on this site, because you are either apparently a fanboy or hater, nothing else).
I have actually found that those who have been following GW2 for a very long time (since they announced it 5 years ago) can give more "balanced" reviews than those who just pick it up, or those who only have been following it for a few months. Those who pick it up won't have done any research about the game, and most likely won't be willing to give it a fair shot. Those who just became interested in the game will still be in that "honeymoon" phase, and probably can't give a balanced review. And regardless, I've seen very few negative reviews of any of the BWEs. When the biggest complaints people have with the game are either cash shop or balancing issue or the lack of raids/endless gear progression, it should tell people that ArenaNet is doing a pretty good job. It means everything they promised is in the game and working.
I think ArenaNet's strategy is probably pretty good at first. They rely on word of mouth to do the marketing. It's cheap, and in my opinion, a lot better. How many games in the past 5 years have had extensive marketing campaigns and failed to deliver on the promises. This time you have ArenaNet merely stating some of their philosophies, and then the players take it from there. It's probably better than commercials in the beginning. Who's recommendation are you most likely to take? Some commercial or website who's most likely funded by ArenaNet, or you friends/neighbors who have the game and love it? They are obviously doing some marketing through interviews and the BWEs. I think the "raving reviews" from actual players have done more to rocket this game to the top of most charts than any commercial/marketing campaign designed by ArenaNet could. It's actually worked for ArenaNet with GW1. Over the course of GW1's livespan so far, it's sold over 7 million unique boxes, meaning there's over 7 million accounts. For a company that's only had one commercial ever (back in 2007 with EotN), and was a start-up, that's pretty darn good. Not to mention GW2 has had articles on many major gaming websites, and even in Forbes. Every company has their own marketing mechanism that works for them. So far, ArenaNet showing features that are in game and then the players themselves hyping it is probably the best marketing ArenaNet has done so far. Who are you to judge ArenaNet's marketing strategy? Why the hell should you be concerned in the first place? Play the game and let ArenaNet handle marketing the way they think it should be done.
I fail to see how the cash shop is pay to win. Most high-end stuff requires a currency that's not tradable, or able to be bought with gold. Heck even blueprints have supply and people as the limiting factor. So it doesn't matter if you can buy gold with gems, there are limiting factors in place to make it a non-issue. No boost can be used in PvP, and those boosts can be gained in game, or can be bought with gold through the currency exchange. Not to mention those boosts are utterly useless. If you want to spend gold on a 50% boost in exp from MOBS, then by all means do it. It's not going to affect me or anyone else. As for the mystic keys, they drop in game, and people will most likely sell them on the AH because the contents are pretty much worthless. I think when I opened one my reaction was "What is this garbage", and proceeded to delete it as it was taking up inventory space.
The thing is, you release information on "end game" it contributes to the idea that just because you hit level cap, the entire game should change to revolve around certain things. They said that there were no raids a long time ago.
I don't understand your "first impressions". Your first impressions is more concerned with the hype and ArenaNet's business practices than of the actual game itself. If you've played the game, why don't you offer insights of how you liked the game. That's more important in my opinion. Did you enjoy the game? If yes, then why are you complaining. If no, then why are you not talking about the game?
Right... I can see that.
But really if you are allowed to consider SWTOR and WoW as part of the equation, ArenaNet doesn't seem to be putting out anywhere near the amount of money into marketing. They've done dev interviews and huge AMA posts on reddit. They seem to be taking a more viral approach to marketing. It's like they are depending on the game itself to carry them.
I think there is a point to be made that there are a lot of people that aren't poring over forums and even the internet that might not get exposed ot the game that might be exposed by things like TV commercials or commercials on various frequented websites that are unrelated to MMOs.
It's expensive though, and to be honest, it appears that the viral marketing and letting the game speak for itself approach is working really well. This game may sell millions in the first couple of months without ever having made a cinematic trailer or tv commercial.
That I have to agree with. They arent near close to TOR or WoW, but I believe very much above the standard MMO release.
I actually find it amusing. It's been GW2 vs every single game that's been released in the past few years. Now it's back to Gw2 vs WoW.
To be honest, it's a couple weeks before launch. It's bound to happen on this site. But most of the posts seems to be centered around 1) Cash shop concerns, 2) Lack of Raids, or 3) Hype. I'd say the fact that those are the top posts for the game is a very good sign for the game. And then you've got the posts like "GW2 isn't gonna be <insert favorite game here>", etc. Not realizing, of course, that the more they talk about GW2, the more they click on GW2 link, the more advertisement the do for the game.
It's rumored that GW2 has already sold a million copies and it's not even launch yet. NCSoft will neither confirm nor deny it, other than to say GW2 sales have exceeded expectations. And their projected sales for 2012 is 3.1 million. I'd say the viral marketing campaign is working very well.
To offer a serious response to this:
I think the primary purpose of marketing is to garner initial interest. Once there is interest and once you have a guaranteed initial playerbase, any game relies on word of mouth to grow. If the game truly is great, the playerbase will talk about it and coax their friends to at least try it out. If the game is not very good, the best marketing team in the world won't get players to continue playing, nor will it prevent disappointed players from warning all their friends through word of mouth. Such is how the MMO community operates.
GW2 already has a huge initial playerbase. If the 1, 2 or 3 million players who try the game out early love it, word will spread. If player vocalization is overwhelmingly positive, more and more of their friends will come. Not everyone. No game is for everyone. But the game should grow after release. Unfortunately, not since WoW have we actually seen this in practice. But that has less to do with other games' poor marketing, and much more to do with the majority's response to them was that they were all right, or okay, or mediocre, or just good but not great.
I think the primary purpose of marketing is to garner initial interest. Once there is interest and once you have a guaranteed initial playerbase, any game relies on word of mouth to grow. If the game truly is great, the playerbase will talk about it and coax their friends to at least try it out. If the game is not very good, the best marketing team in the world won't get players to continue playing, nor will it prevent disappointed players from warning all their friends through word of mouth. Such is how the MMO community operates.
GW2 already has a huge initial playerbase. If the 1, 2 or 3 million players who try the game out early love it, word will spread. If player vocalization is overwhelmingly positive, more and more of their friends will come. Not everyone. No game is for everyone. But the game should grow after release. Unfortunately, not since WoW have we actually seen this in practice. But that has less to do with other games' poor marketing, and much more to do with the majority's response to them was that they were all right, or okay, or mediocre, or just good but not great.
To offer a simple response to your serious response:
Impulse buys.
Yeah, GW2 is preselling quite well but there are still a LOT of people that either dont know Guild Wars 2 even exists or have heard of it but dont know it releases in 10 days.
A TV blitz would result in more sales but how many sales and would they off set the cost of the TV spots. Usually the answer is yes.
I had considered that but didn't want to further lengthen my post.
Certainly initial sales will increase proportionally to the amount of advertising the game puts out among other factors, such as how large a following the series already has (take Diablo 3 or a Final Fantasy game, for example.) I can't imagine Anet hasn't factored this into their equation.
As such, I'm inclined to believe that they must have concluded that the amount of money they would have to spend on pre-release advertising to bolster initial sales would not be worth it in the long run. They might feel the extra players they might grab in the beginning are the same players they are going to grab a month or 2 down the road anyway after word of the game's greatness starts to spread.
I think my point was this: there is an initial sales threshold that needs to be met to allow the game to eventually grow wildly and succeed post release. This threshold was met and even surpassed. There's no need to use more funds to attract mostly players they are eventually going to attract anyway for free.
The question becomes how many completely unique players who would never otherwise ever find out about GW2 do you think the extra early advertising would attract.
This is all just my personal hypothesization of course. I'm no professional marketer. But surely Anet has run the numbers and made various projections.