Why so? Customers discussions/opinions/etc does not matter right?
Constructive discussions do matter. Whining on the other hand does not. And there is A LOT of whining on official forums of MMO's. I would say around 90-95%.
The whining remains on fan sites as well or third party forums but the only benefit is that Anet doesn't have to deal with it directly.
I don't use any official forums on any game that I play. I just can't stand all the QQ that floods them. If the purpose of "Official" forums is communication, I think Anet has proven without a shadow of doubt that it can be done very well without them. People keep demanding things from Anet simply because 'other games' do them. This is just not how Anet works - they don't just 'do things' because other folks are doing them. The once exception would be tech support since these issues often require longer questions/explanations and are less likely to hit the 'front page' of fansites/forums.
People can go on and on till they are blue in the face,GW2 will not have official forums.I can see support forums like they have for GW but no official.If anyone does not like it then i'm afraid it's hard luck and get used to guru and other sites.You could contact ArenaNet but expect to be told the same thing ArenaNet have been saying for years.
There's no feedback posted on forums that couldn't be passed on more effectively through an email to the developer.
It'd be more honest to admit that we want our rants and opinions to be seen by others, more than anything else.
As a person who reads through 125-200 emails a day as part of his job I assure you, emails to Developers would not be the most efficent means of commication, no one would get any work done.
As to Darkpony's concern/desire for Realm specific forums to help coordinate activites, I recall back in the day the VNBoards became the defacto DAOC "official" forums which functioned as well as any I've see sponsored by a company, including some reasonable moderation.
So it is possible for a non offical site to fulfill the role, but probably needs to be affiliated with a major gaming website rather than a typical fansite.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
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"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
A.net did not have any forums for GW1. They relied on the fan forums and were heavily involved with them. I guess they are doing the same thing. Not a big deal but not to the QQ'ers out there.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
There's no feedback posted on forums that couldn't be passed on more effectively through an email to the developer.
It'd be more honest to admit that we want our rants and opinions to be seen by others, more than anything else.
As a person who reads through 125-200 emails a day as part of his job I assure you, emails to Developers would not be the most efficent means of commication, no one would get any work done.
I'm inclined to believe that only legitimate, and less superfluous "bitching" would be sent, as opposed to forum feedback which is 90% motivated by peer reaction.
Paying a couple of people to efficiently filter email feedback would be cheaper as well.
There's no feedback posted on forums that couldn't be passed on more effectively through an email to the developer.
It'd be more honest to admit that we want our rants and opinions to be seen by others, more than anything else.
As a person who reads through 125-200 emails a day as part of his job I assure you, emails to Developers would not be the most efficent means of commication, no one would get any work done.
I'm inclined to believe that only legitimate, and less superfluous "bitching" would be sent, as opposed to forum feedback which is 90% motivated by peer reaction.
Paying a couple of people to efficiently filter email feedback would be cheaper as well.
That's what I need, someone to filter all my emails for me.
Year's ago we used to have people who would have done this, they were called Admin assistants.
But somewhere along the way someone decided it was better to let them all go and let us highly paid tech people spend our time doing administrative duties. Go figure.
But you are correct, a properly set up feedback mechanism would likely be a better way to "obtain the pulse" of the user base and far more efficient than reading through forums.
Face it, company sponsored forums are a bonus feature done by companies for the benefit of their customers, and not really a tool that benefits them all that much.
And the reality is, GW2 does not have a sub, so some of the "nice to have" amenities such as forums (and perhaps some of the very necessary things such as good customer service/ in game support) might be lacking under this B2P payment model
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
They don't need an official forum, they have guru. Guru has always been the 'official' forum for guild wars.
Also, official forums are crap. It's the first target for trolls, spammers, and general idiots. So using GW2Guru as a quasi-official forum is far better. Idiots don't sign up for it because they don't know it's 'official', and arenanet gets all the feedback they need.
The arenanet devs also post directly on guru on a regular basis.
This. As far as I'm concerned, they don't need one. Every company of that size has a whole department entirely devoted to marketing, including customer feedback that scan various forums, youtube, reddit and what have you on a regular basis, which in my eyes is a LOT more significant and reliable than giving fanboys a place to rant about mostly irrelevant or misunderstood stuff.
I am talking about OFFICIAL forum, I dont care about random internet web sites and what some devs visit. One dev do not represent a company.
Tell that to DICE, they have an official forum and NEVER use it or read from it, its an abandoned wasteland of angry gamers.
Not having a 'forum' would raise their reputation even more. Official forums are the bane of todays mmo's.
Or a obvious way of giving feedback to a sub par game or reporting in game bugs. Just because TOR got a new a-hole ripped on theirs does not mean all those people are wrong. Not to mention Rift got a new a-hole ripped also when Gersch made Pyros into Bright pyros.
btw if you railed agaisnt Bioware for not having a search feature on their website then you should rail against ArenaNET for not having one. MMORPG community hypocirsy #2 so far.
official forums are the difference between a serious mmo and a game. It's not optional, if they think it is, they are being stupid.
Finally a game where the retards might stay away? Ooh yes please. No really I hope every mong posting here saying it makes them unprofessional stays the fuck away.
If anything, I'd say hosting, allowing, communitcating to; the basement dwelling homopoboc xenophobic vile that is generally generated on a games official forums is unprofessional. Blooy unprofessional at that.
A pro team would think of a better system, like customer support tools and a wiki, maybe some liberal use of social media that both gets answers out there and spreads the word? Oh look, thats what GW2 has done. Why reinvent the wheel, round cannot get any rounder you know.
Anyway, avoid this game because they chose FUN over serious. You know, fun, like games used to be.
No official forums for a game that is based on social activities and social coordination? Seriously?
My only guess is maybe they have an in-game feature that replaces it? Or maybe some facebook integration or something?
GW2 "built from the ground up with microtransactions in mind" 1) Cash->Gems->Gold->Influence->WvWvWBoosts = PAY2WIN 2) Mystic Chests = Crass in-game cash shop advertisements
Games these days need an official forum in the case of GW2 though I dont mind so much because there is no subscription. However I do not play games (with a sub) that do not have official forums + server specific forums for community integration and organisation.
It is essential in today's social media blabla.
Lets look at the top mmorpgs number wise right now in the west
WoW - Forums + Server Forums
Lotro - Forums + Server Forums
EvE - Forums 1 Shard
Heck Ill chuck in a midranged oldie: city of heroes - Forums + Server Forums.
These are the top and the most successful.
How about we add DAOC to your list... no official forum
There are others, even excluding WAR(since it is still mythic), but this is a perfect example... Anyone want to claim that the community in DAOC would have been better with official forums?
Lets take a different perspective.
Forums exist as a place for players to socialize when not in-game. With the extended experience and other, similar, features ArenaNet is trying to keep players connected and interacting IN-GAME even when not in-game.
You also can't (legitimately) use the argument that official forums are necessary to get official info from Arenanet, as most devs lock announcements, etc. and Arenanet makes all their official announcements through twitter, their web-site, etc. Arenanet also interacts with their community all over the place, as well as a strong board presences on gw2guru(as has been mentioned several times).
No official forums for a game that is based on social activities and social coordination? Seriously?
My only guess is maybe they have an in-game feature that replaces it? Or maybe some facebook integration or something?
They have out of game in-game features... look up the GW2 extended experience.
You will be able to interact with people in-game, manage your auctions on the marketplace, be the eye-in-the-sky for your raids, etc... All from your phone or web browser. I'm sure there will be plenty of other features too, those are just the ones I know off the top of my head.
yeah. they really don't need a forum. GW1 worked fine without one, GW2 can do the same. people have this weird idea that forums are somehow necessary, but all forums do is allow people to "interact" outside of the gamespace. i think the hope behind GW2 is that the same things that makes players rush off to the forums to do, the players will just be able to do in game. i dunno. personally i like the no official forums thing. that way, at the very least, anet doesn't have to spend resources patrolling it. and if they want our opinions they can get it through ny number of other avenues.
Comments
My guess: Because GW2 is B2P.
The game itself is pretty high budget for not having a sub fee. Thats one of the drawbacks.
The whining remains on fan sites as well or third party forums but the only benefit is that Anet doesn't have to deal with it directly.
I don't use any official forums on any game that I play. I just can't stand all the QQ that floods them. If the purpose of "Official" forums is communication, I think Anet has proven without a shadow of doubt that it can be done very well without them. People keep demanding things from Anet simply because 'other games' do them. This is just not how Anet works - they don't just 'do things' because other folks are doing them. The once exception would be tech support since these issues often require longer questions/explanations and are less likely to hit the 'front page' of fansites/forums.
Oh I don't think so. The original Lineage 2 forums were a great place to discuss the game as well as dicuss what was going on in your server.
NC Soft didn't have an official forum with Aioin until later and I think it separated the developers from the community.
Personally I don't like fansites as they lack moderation and end up becoming a cesspool of discussion. If you can call it discussion.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
If they'd put out a rediculously overpriced CE, maybe they could afford a forum.
Just a thought.
I want a mmorpg where people have gone through misery, have gone through school stuff and actually have had sex even. -sagil
Because their player base is too cheap to pay subscriptions?
There's no feedback posted on forums that couldn't be passed on more effectively through an email to the developer.
It'd be more honest to admit that we want our rants and opinions to be seen by others, more than anything else.
Still bothers you that a 'AAA' game isn't screwing over its fans with a sub, eh? Poor little fella. The world is moving on and leaving you behind.
/waves
As a person who reads through 125-200 emails a day as part of his job I assure you, emails to Developers would not be the most efficent means of commication, no one would get any work done.
As to Darkpony's concern/desire for Realm specific forums to help coordinate activites, I recall back in the day the VNBoards became the defacto DAOC "official" forums which functioned as well as any I've see sponsored by a company, including some reasonable moderation.
So it is possible for a non offical site to fulfill the role, but probably needs to be affiliated with a major gaming website rather than a typical fansite.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
A.net did not have any forums for GW1. They relied on the fan forums and were heavily involved with them. I guess they are doing the same thing. Not a big deal but not to the QQ'ers out there.
Remains to be seen if GW2 will really be a full featured MMORPG in line with most modern titles today.
If it is, then the entire industry may undergo a revolution in payment structures.
But we don't know yet.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I'm inclined to believe that only legitimate, and less superfluous "bitching" would be sent, as opposed to forum feedback which is 90% motivated by peer reaction.
Paying a couple of people to efficiently filter email feedback would be cheaper as well.
That's what I need, someone to filter all my emails for me.
Year's ago we used to have people who would have done this, they were called Admin assistants.
But somewhere along the way someone decided it was better to let them all go and let us highly paid tech people spend our time doing administrative duties. Go figure.
But you are correct, a properly set up feedback mechanism would likely be a better way to "obtain the pulse" of the user base and far more efficient than reading through forums.
Face it, company sponsored forums are a bonus feature done by companies for the benefit of their customers, and not really a tool that benefits them all that much.
And the reality is, GW2 does not have a sub, so some of the "nice to have" amenities such as forums (and perhaps some of the very necessary things such as good customer service/ in game support) might be lacking under this B2P payment model
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
They don't need an official forum, they have guru. Guru has always been the 'official' forum for guild wars.
Also, official forums are crap. It's the first target for trolls, spammers, and general idiots. So using GW2Guru as a quasi-official forum is far better. Idiots don't sign up for it because they don't know it's 'official', and arenanet gets all the feedback they need.
The arenanet devs also post directly on guru on a regular basis.
Besides, it's a crap ton of work to go through all the useless junk you monkeys would post there. I wouldn't want to manage those forums either!
Tell that to DICE, they have an official forum and NEVER use it or read from it, its an abandoned wasteland of angry gamers.
Or a obvious way of giving feedback to a sub par game or reporting in game bugs. Just because TOR got a new a-hole ripped on theirs does not mean all those people are wrong. Not to mention Rift got a new a-hole ripped also when Gersch made Pyros into Bright pyros.
btw if you railed agaisnt Bioware for not having a search feature on their website then you should rail against ArenaNET for not having one. MMORPG community hypocirsy #2 so far.
I miss the VN days... Mark Jacobs drama, Sanya Weathers drama etc.. etc..
I wish VN would make a comeback... Maybe GW2 can do that?
Finally a game where the retards might stay away? Ooh yes please. No really I hope every mong posting here saying it makes them unprofessional stays the fuck away.
If anything, I'd say hosting, allowing, communitcating to; the basement dwelling homopoboc xenophobic vile that is generally generated on a games official forums is unprofessional. Blooy unprofessional at that.
A pro team would think of a better system, like customer support tools and a wiki, maybe some liberal use of social media that both gets answers out there and spreads the word? Oh look, thats what GW2 has done. Why reinvent the wheel, round cannot get any rounder you know.
Anyway, avoid this game because they chose FUN over serious. You know, fun, like games used to be.
No official forums for a game that is based on social activities and social coordination? Seriously?
My only guess is maybe they have an in-game feature that replaces it? Or maybe some facebook integration or something?
GW2 "built from the ground up with microtransactions in mind"
1) Cash->Gems->Gold->Influence->WvWvWBoosts = PAY2WIN
2) Mystic Chests = Crass in-game cash shop advertisements
How about we add DAOC to your list... no official forum
There are others, even excluding WAR(since it is still mythic), but this is a perfect example... Anyone want to claim that the community in DAOC would have been better with official forums?
Lets take a different perspective.
Forums exist as a place for players to socialize when not in-game. With the extended experience and other, similar, features ArenaNet is trying to keep players connected and interacting IN-GAME even when not in-game.
You also can't (legitimately) use the argument that official forums are necessary to get official info from Arenanet, as most devs lock announcements, etc. and Arenanet makes all their official announcements through twitter, their web-site, etc. Arenanet also interacts with their community all over the place, as well as a strong board presences on gw2guru(as has been mentioned several times).
They have out of game in-game features... look up the GW2 extended experience.
You will be able to interact with people in-game, manage your auctions on the marketplace, be the eye-in-the-sky for your raids, etc... All from your phone or web browser. I'm sure there will be plenty of other features too, those are just the ones I know off the top of my head.
I remember when WAR didn't have a forum. It took a while but EA finally caved in.
yeah. they really don't need a forum. GW1 worked fine without one, GW2 can do the same. people have this weird idea that forums are somehow necessary, but all forums do is allow people to "interact" outside of the gamespace. i think the hope behind GW2 is that the same things that makes players rush off to the forums to do, the players will just be able to do in game. i dunno. personally i like the no official forums thing. that way, at the very least, anet doesn't have to spend resources patrolling it. and if they want our opinions they can get it through ny number of other avenues.