Sandbox MMO's are just unfinished games. The only valid approach is a themepark in a sandbox.
'Sandbox MMO' is a PTSD trigger word for anyone who has the experience to know that anonymous players invariably use a 'sandbox' in the same manner a housecat does.
When your head is stuck in the sand, your ass becomes the only recognizable part of you.
No game is more fun than the one you can't play, and no game is more boring than one which you've become familiar.
How to become a millionaire: Start with a billion dollars and make an MMO.
Gw2 is a nice unique game, however, personally my biggest dissapointment is how the areas are very restrictive to the level of a person, and the progression from one area to the next feels very slow.
The movement is slow but it seems whole areas must be completed before moving to the next. That makes the game feel like a grind.
I should be able to travel to different areas, and actually level quicker. I spent several hours and only got 2 levels from lvl 7 to 9. That feels very unsatisfactory.
I am actually angry since I also heard that person got a lvl 80 in 32 hours with a guild and taking crafting mats.
So GW2 feels too grindy. And they should fix that before others comment on that too much and it becomes a major issue.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble
Lol who said a pvp focus game will alive? wow still pwning others mmos because PVE/ENDGAME/RAIDS. ppl want stragegy bosess, dungeons, hard instances, i bought gw2 and give it to my friend for FREE its pathetic , the combat is soooooooooo slow, you cant get your destiny THE GAME DOES.... is almost "ALMOST" an instanced game lol.. im sure this will die in less 1 year..
Ahh!! and another thing, why hell this gw2 start in lvl 80? that is too bad, so in next 2 expansion what will be the level cap? 120? 150? hahaha that is a total fail... and im not a wow lover, im just saying that gw2 IS NOT A GOOD GAME!!
Originally posted by itgrowls He doesn't have very valid points. For one, he's basically saying in conclusion that we shouldn't say anything to naysayers and just let them bash the game to death and that GW2 needs us to save it, as if it's doing very poorly or some nonsense. Really? I've read it has record sales and as far as the naysayers go, no i won't shuttup about the game because they won't and letting them spin nonsense about this title is the equivolent of giving bad news a parrot to repeat lies told to us on television stations daily. It's not right or fair.
Well said!
Personally im getting rather fed up of this arrogant attitude the critics have.. they THEYRE the ones being balanced and the fans are the ones being fanatical.
Sure, both sides have their extremes, but IMO the unsupported, ridiculous, poorly defended points of view are coming from the critic / hater side far more often.
Lmao,i love the douchecanoe rowing down the douchecano comment ...classic.Its true,a lot of GW2 fans are like rabid animals seething and frothing at anyone or anything letting loose a slight hint of negativity about the game.Gw2 is a good game, but in no way is it a genre savior.In fact, id be surprised if it got anywhere near WoW status
The issues I see with Guild Wars 2 (based on personal experience):
- Very limited sense of progression - especially specific to increase in power as you get further in character advancement. I'm level 35 and have unlocked every skill I will ever use and have trained every weapon type available to my class to max potential. Meaning there will be no new skills for me - even though I have 45 levels left in the game. The only changes will be passive enhancements specific to Talents, passive enhancements specific to equipment upgrades... and minor appearance changes specific to new equipment.
This really is my biggest gripe, as I have no new abilities to look forward to... from here on out it's just grind and stare at the landscape; hitting the exact same skill over and over again.. unless I attempt to actively create a unique experience by swapping my axe to a sword for a change of pace...
- Poorly designed quests - this, happens to every MMO, but I guess my expectations were maybe a LITTLE too high when it came to thinking that GW2 would focus more on the sense of "fun" associated to quests.
A perfect example is the Charr Heart quest in which you have to grab meat or wine from the nearbye racks and run back and forth feeding soldiers. Basically turning your "champion" or "hero" or whatever you're supposed to be.. into a servant girl. Now, demoralization aside - the quest is just REALLY poorly done. The racks of meat are literally right next to the soldiers, so you click the rack, click the soldier.. repeat 20 times.. completed.
There is another quest in the general area where you have to pick up Jars, and capture various types of Bugs in order to feed to cows. Feeding cows, feeding soldiers.. same type of demoralization - However, at least with the Cow quest they added a layer of challenge by allowing you to pick your difficiluty level (Easy 1 min, Medium 30 sec, Hard 15 sec). In general a poorly designed quest, but at least I could challenge myself and spent an hour there trying to complete it on Hard mode. Sadly, even though the NPC stated "if you can pull off the entire string of challenges, I'll reward you with a unique gift"... I recieved nothing for doing the chain on Hard mode... the Carrot is a lie.
- Poorly Defined sense of Map Progress - Whereas I have friends who have pleveled to 60++ already, I have decided to squeeze every drop of experience out of each area. As noted above, I am Charr - when I completed the levels 1-15 area, and did my storyline quest up to appropriate level, I headed north into the 15-25 zone. I was immediately assaulted by level 23 mobs - this should not be the introductory experience into the zone. The appropriate level mobs were actually on the complete opposite side of the zone, like they accidently built it backwards.
I stuck it out in the zone, completing the whole area - and that combined with some WvW, put me at level 30. When I clicked my map at the time to figure out what the next adjacant zones was.. the zone to my North was level 60-70, the zone to my east was level 50-60 (see this map: http://www.guildwars2junkies.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Gw2-World-Map-Labeled.jpg Charr area 15-25 is top right hand side of map)
This is a very poorly deisigned map specific to progress. I don't expect a completely linear experience, but this is... simply bad, and probably one of the most annoying aspects of the game so far.
All in all I still enjoy the game, and will continue to play... but this is more based on a lack of other interesting options than it is on being completely in love with the game.
Simply put, I'm enjoying playing GW2 currently. It isn't the universal panacea game for all players to kill all other games. When I inevitably want to play something different, then like every game which has come before it, I will move on to the next new shiny toy on the shelf.
My observation about most MMO criticism is that many complaints tend to come in three basic categories: 1 "game x" doesn't have "play style y" I prefer. (aka a legitimate taste difference). 2 "game x" sucks because "game z" is the leet! (aka fanboi trolling). 3 "game x" was rushed by "company w" and the product doesn't work as advertised (aka a broken game filled with broken promises).
In my opinion many of the "complaints" about GW2 fall in categories 1 and 2. Either someone is a fanboi of "game z" who can't stand that a new game is the shiny toy on the shelf because it takes away from the "cool factor" of their chosen past time, or they simply prefer a different kind of game which GW2 is not. I've yet to see anywhere that Arena Net has fallen into category 3 and delivered a fundamentally broken game.
My advice, play the games you most enjoy, and don't worry that other people might be enjoying something else you're not playing.
Originally posted by otacu I noticed that "mmorpg savior" is mostly used by people who don't like GW2 in a denigratory and ironic way.
I love when GW2 fans trot out this line, as if it's true. Unfortunately, it's not. No, maybe the words "savior," "messiah," or "The second coming of Jesus" weren't used, but you know damn well that it's EXACTLY the message that GW2 fans have been conveying for a couple of years now, on their own forums and on the forums of other games. Stop being so damn literal. The constant gushing over how the game is going to "reinvigorate the genre" has been going on for a while now, and guess what? It's coming 100% from GW2 fans.
So they may not have used the word "messiah," but they certainly have been deifying it as such.
Originally posted by Incomparable Gw2 is a nice unique game, however, personally my biggest dissapointment is how the areas are very restrictive to the level of a person, and the progression from one area to the next feels very slow.
The movement is slow but it seems whole areas must be completed before moving to the next. That makes the game feel like a grind.
I should be able to travel to different areas, and actually level quicker. I spent several hours and only got 2 levels from lvl 7 to 9. That feels very unsatisfactory.
I am actually angry since I also heard that person got a lvl 80 in 32 hours with a guild and taking crafting mats.
So GW2 feels too grindy. And they should fix that before others comment on that too much and it becomes a major issue.
How GW2 feels grindy to you is beyond me, or restrictive for that matter.
It sounds like you're following hearts quests and doing only those. Try going for the Vista points (red triangles), the Discovery points (little squares), and on the way, jump in on any DE that you may come across. Also don't forget about the skill challenges.
How it feels restrictive I don't know, you can level in your races main area, or any other races main area. Heck i'm a lvl 30 Asura Necromancer and last night I did all of Queensdale, 100% map completion and it got me almost 3 levels. That took me an hour maybe a little over. And I didn't even rush. Tonight i'm going for..... Probably Sylvari.
I'm not trying to be rude, but I do think you're playing it wrong. GW2 really has an emphasis on just, "go and do anything". If you want to just follow hearts quests, go do each of the starter zones, than each of the next tier zones, you'd easily be levle 30+ by then. Probably somewhere in the levle 45 range.
If you aren't in a guild, join one. I run a little 3 man guild right now, waiting to get on our feet before we start recruiting, but it makes it so much funner. Tonight i'm wanting to try Ascalonion Catacombs too.
Sorry, I just feel like GW2 has so much to do.
The "Youtube Pro": Someone who watches video's on said subject, and obviously has a full understanding of what is being said about such subject.
I never thought of Guild Wars 2 as a savior of mmo's, but saw it as a breath of fresh air in the staleness of wow clones that most new mmo's tend to be. It also solves alot of the things that make some mmo's unbearable, we all seen it, kill stealing, resource hogging, ninja looting, griefers, etc. There's none of that in GW2 (griefers might popup sooner or later tho).
I believe i see GW2 for what it is, a fun mmo that used some of the best ideas (that didn't work very well on other mmo's) and made them work together. Join that with the great lore and amazing art and it will have a solid fanbase, hopefully more than enough to keep it going for alot of years. Only in one mmo, so far, i've played for more than a year and that was Anarchy Online (5 years, best community i've seen in any mmo, left because of ridiculous decisions by the devs). I believe i found the second mmo that will keep me logging in regularly for a good long time.
MMOs don't need a savior. GW2 is simply a good game that's extremely approachable, which really should be enough for anyone who wants to play it. As for zealotry, you find that everywhere, it's the nature of the fan. Honestly, in these forums at least, I see more talking about Archeage being the AAA gamechanger that will "save" the genre. And soon enough it'll be some other game.
Originally posted by Incomparable Gw2 is a nice unique game, however, personally my biggest dissapointment is how the areas are very restrictive to the level of a person, and the progression from one area to the next feels very slow.
The movement is slow but it seems whole areas must be completed before moving to the next. That makes the game feel like a grind.
I should be able to travel to different areas, and actually level quicker. I spent several hours and only got 2 levels from lvl 7 to 9. That feels very unsatisfactory.
I am actually angry since I also heard that person got a lvl 80 in 32 hours with a guild and taking crafting mats.
So GW2 feels too grindy. And they should fix that before others comment on that too much and it becomes a major issue.
How GW2 feels grindy to you is beyond me, or restrictive for that matter.
It sounds like you're following hearts quests and doing only those. Try going for the Vista points (red triangles), the Discovery points (little squares), and on the way, jump in on any DE that you may come across. Also don't forget about the skill challenges.
How it feels restrictive I don't know, you can level in your races main area, or any other races main area. Heck i'm a lvl 30 Asura Necromancer and last night I did all of Queensdale, 100% map completion and it got me almost 3 levels. That took me an hour maybe a little over. And I didn't even rush. Tonight i'm going for..... Probably Sylvari.
I'm not trying to be rude, but I do think you're playing it wrong. GW2 really has an emphasis on just, "go and do anything". If you want to just follow hearts quests, go do each of the starter zones, than each of the next tier zones, you'd easily be levle 30+ by then. Probably somewhere in the levle 45 range.
If you aren't in a guild, join one. I run a little 3 man guild right now, waiting to get on our feet before we start recruiting, but it makes it so much funner. Tonight i'm wanting to try Ascalonion Catacombs too.
Sorry, I just feel like GW2 has so much to do.
I believe these sentences are somewhat contradictory. What I wanted to do was be able to level my human strictly in the human areas. However, I tried that and was forced to run back and forth between the same few events and hope they were active. I found this very frustrating and almost put down the game. And, yes, I fully explore every part of the area.
Last night I gave in and went to the Charr area and was able to level again. It made me feel a little better about the game, but I still think it is a disappointment that you cannot level a human strictly in human lands without repeating events 5 times, and running around for hours looking for events.
With this or any other game, i could care less if its the "savior" to anything. If its fun, ill play, if its not, I wont. All these threads about it being great or terrible are like when I see someone in any game say "im bored"...really, and you cant think of anything else to do?
When I said i had "time", i meant virtual time, i got no RL "time" for you.
Guild Wars 2 is a good game, it is not a great game. It is almost everything that ArenaNet (Mike) promised, but it is missing a few features that were promised. All of that said, as I see it, Guild Wars 2 is still the best game released this year by a long shot. Is it the Savor of MMO gaming? No. But it is a step the right direction.
I read the OP's comments and agree with most of it, yes I am a fanboi of ArenaNet. Very nice article, I enjoyed it very much. As for the comments, I skipped them as (on this site) they seldome relate to the article itself. Thank you for posting this thought provoking article.
My opinion is that its not a savior, but it is a game changer in the way the game is designed. If SWTOR had been designed in a more balanced way like GW2 is it may have been much more of a hit. It reminds me of when WOW came out and how it got rid of a lot of the annoying gameplay that EQ1 had in it. GW2 has taken it a step further by getting rid of a lot of the annoying features of WOW. For example, in WOW when you are soloing, you don't want anyone else around you stealing your mats and your kills. In GW2 I find myself teaming up with those peeps I would have hated being around me in WOW. I hope all the other companies look at all the thought they put into this game to make it more fun, and apply this mentality to future MMOs.
We live in an era where people have difficulty remaining objective about anything. There is a ton of hype behind gw2, and there are a bunch of people that think anet can do no wrong with the game. Even if a feature is lacking, to the fans it was a magnificent implementation of such a feature.
If you changed the name of guildwars2, most of the gw2 fanatics would have tons of criticisms about the game.
I personally do not believe the game is even close to being the savior of mmos. It took a few okay ideas (perhaps even good in theory) and implemented them in a very simplistic way.
Do dynamic events play like some revolutionary system that cascades and makes you feel like an important part of the game world? Not to me they don't.
Did they get rid of the collection of wolf tails and the kill 20 of X mob quests? No... they just give you a progress bar instead of telling you you are at n of 20 mobs completed.
Is the personal story amazing and properly implemented? The voice acting is mediocre, and the personal stories don't truly have that much depth to them. (I think i enjoyed the starter area sith stories in swtor more than gw2)
Did they make an atrocious game? Not at all, it is pretty polished, and easy to play and succeed at. But that is a far cry from what their manifesto boasted.
Another thing that bugs me about gw2 is that it is called an mmo, in this time and age many games are called mmos that would not be considered mmos back when the genre first started booming. GW2 claims it has a persistent world, but with overflows it is basically just a heavily districted game, sure you can go run around with other players (i'm talking about random players right now, because it is often a pain in the tuckus to get into the same zone as your friends right now) and I guess with technological advancements the number of players you can sit in the same zone with qualify it as "massive multiplayer", but I feel it is not in line with the spirit of the original MMOs. Yes eq1 had zones, and servers, but at least if you were on the same server as someone and went to the same zone, you were going to find them there, there were no districts, no overflows, no zone caps. The big appeal of mmos originally, was that you were doing things together with tons of people. I don't really feel like gw2 captures the spirit of mmos, I also feel like the massive aspects of it, aren't truly fleshed out very well, and they are very shallow forms of content.
Another problem with gw2 in general is that it is just so darn easy, and people will get bored with it sooner rather than later. The appeal or hook of many mmos was that it took some real effort to get to high progress on your character, your character meant something, it was a display of your journeys and effort invested. Progression in gw2 just doesn't seem to have that same level of satisfaction, things come easily, people hit max level in a couple of days... it all seems so trivial.
I wish anet had really taken a risk to try and innovate, they acted like that was what they were doing, but when I play the game, all these big claims they made, were all done in a very safe and familiar way.
One thing that makes me sad about gw2, the launch, and the community, is that if you ever want to be heard and give a real and brutally honest opinion, it simply doesn't work, you have to walk on egg shells just to get them to think about what you've said for even half a second, and usually even if you navigate the egg shells with eloquence, they usually just rawrrawr at you if you don't agree with their fanaticism.
I've never had a AAA MMORPG go stale on me so fast as Guild Wars 2 did. I'm really trying to like it but everything feels so homogenized. The game was built from the ground up to offer a platform for competitive arena PvP and the limited number of choices and options that the player can choose from makes for some pretty dull PvE. The game is obviously well made and has some really neat ideas behind it; it just failed at being all that much fun. I'd be upset if this game had a subscription fee, but I feel like I got my money's worth.
GW2 is like a couple days at the beach. You go there to have fun, after the fun is over you go back home. It isn't the savior of anything. Infact, it sets back the mmo genre tremendously because all of their game feautres have been done before time and time again.
After a few more days playing GW2 , all i have to say is , yes i'm saved.
Finally a game that is worth my money cash shop or not.
And as some other guy said above me , the servers will be there and my cash in my pocket and not in some sub to a low quality product like SWTOR , WoW , and the list goes on just to be able to play it.
I don't even get it how people spend subs to look at those cartoony outdated horrible crap called Blizz games DIABLO 3 included.
Or even buggy single player SWTOR and slow motion RIFT.
If the same features were added to todays WoW like DE's , they would be called innovation cause Blizzard did it.
But now it is same old same old.
Well it is not , Dynamic events scale , pop up everywhere , game world is huge and nicely done , classes are great, u can MOVE around and cast spells (Yes u CAN finally) , game is hard and rewarding , exploration is back finally, ur skills interact with the skills a player casts next to u .
Ur chars scale to lower levels = replayability .
Dungeons are hard to do , i was running dungeons in wow eating pizza same button hitting 1 all the way just to get the reward for no reason at all , next week another set would be there to grind for.
Just a few more days for them to sort out those annoying launch bugs and yes i have a home.
Comments
'Sandbox MMO' is a PTSD trigger word for anyone who has the experience to know that anonymous players invariably use a 'sandbox' in the same manner a housecat does.
When your head is stuck in the sand, your ass becomes the only recognizable part of you.
No game is more fun than the one you can't play, and no game is more boring than one which you've become familiar.
How to become a millionaire:
Start with a billion dollars and make an MMO.
The movement is slow but it seems whole areas must be completed before moving to the next. That makes the game feel like a grind.
I should be able to travel to different areas, and actually level quicker. I spent several hours and only got 2 levels from lvl 7 to 9. That feels very unsatisfactory.
I am actually angry since I also heard that person got a lvl 80 in 32 hours with a guild and taking crafting mats.
So GW2 feels too grindy. And they should fix that before others comment on that too much and it becomes a major issue.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble
Evil will always triumph because good is dumb....
Well said!
Personally im getting rather fed up of this arrogant attitude the critics have.. they THEYRE the ones being balanced and the fans are the ones being fanatical.
Sure, both sides have their extremes, but IMO the unsupported, ridiculous, poorly defended points of view are coming from the critic / hater side far more often.
No
The issues I see with Guild Wars 2 (based on personal experience):
- Very limited sense of progression - especially specific to increase in power as you get further in character advancement. I'm level 35 and have unlocked every skill I will ever use and have trained every weapon type available to my class to max potential. Meaning there will be no new skills for me - even though I have 45 levels left in the game. The only changes will be passive enhancements specific to Talents, passive enhancements specific to equipment upgrades... and minor appearance changes specific to new equipment.
This really is my biggest gripe, as I have no new abilities to look forward to... from here on out it's just grind and stare at the landscape; hitting the exact same skill over and over again.. unless I attempt to actively create a unique experience by swapping my axe to a sword for a change of pace...
- Poorly designed quests - this, happens to every MMO, but I guess my expectations were maybe a LITTLE too high when it came to thinking that GW2 would focus more on the sense of "fun" associated to quests.
A perfect example is the Charr Heart quest in which you have to grab meat or wine from the nearbye racks and run back and forth feeding soldiers. Basically turning your "champion" or "hero" or whatever you're supposed to be.. into a servant girl. Now, demoralization aside - the quest is just REALLY poorly done. The racks of meat are literally right next to the soldiers, so you click the rack, click the soldier.. repeat 20 times.. completed.
There is another quest in the general area where you have to pick up Jars, and capture various types of Bugs in order to feed to cows. Feeding cows, feeding soldiers.. same type of demoralization - However, at least with the Cow quest they added a layer of challenge by allowing you to pick your difficiluty level (Easy 1 min, Medium 30 sec, Hard 15 sec). In general a poorly designed quest, but at least I could challenge myself and spent an hour there trying to complete it on Hard mode. Sadly, even though the NPC stated "if you can pull off the entire string of challenges, I'll reward you with a unique gift"... I recieved nothing for doing the chain on Hard mode... the Carrot is a lie.
- Poorly Defined sense of Map Progress - Whereas I have friends who have pleveled to 60++ already, I have decided to squeeze every drop of experience out of each area. As noted above, I am Charr - when I completed the levels 1-15 area, and did my storyline quest up to appropriate level, I headed north into the 15-25 zone. I was immediately assaulted by level 23 mobs - this should not be the introductory experience into the zone. The appropriate level mobs were actually on the complete opposite side of the zone, like they accidently built it backwards.
I stuck it out in the zone, completing the whole area - and that combined with some WvW, put me at level 30. When I clicked my map at the time to figure out what the next adjacant zones was.. the zone to my North was level 60-70, the zone to my east was level 50-60 (see this map: http://www.guildwars2junkies.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Gw2-World-Map-Labeled.jpg Charr area 15-25 is top right hand side of map)
This is a very poorly deisigned map specific to progress. I don't expect a completely linear experience, but this is... simply bad, and probably one of the most annoying aspects of the game so far.
All in all I still enjoy the game, and will continue to play... but this is more based on a lack of other interesting options than it is on being completely in love with the game.
Simply put, I'm enjoying playing GW2 currently. It isn't the universal panacea game for all players to kill all other games. When I inevitably want to play something different, then like every game which has come before it, I will move on to the next new shiny toy on the shelf.
My observation about most MMO criticism is that many complaints tend to come in three basic categories: 1 "game x" doesn't have "play style y" I prefer. (aka a legitimate taste difference). 2 "game x" sucks because "game z" is the leet! (aka fanboi trolling). 3 "game x" was rushed by "company w" and the product doesn't work as advertised (aka a broken game filled with broken promises).
In my opinion many of the "complaints" about GW2 fall in categories 1 and 2. Either someone is a fanboi of "game z" who can't stand that a new game is the shiny toy on the shelf because it takes away from the "cool factor" of their chosen past time, or they simply prefer a different kind of game which GW2 is not. I've yet to see anywhere that Arena Net has fallen into category 3 and delivered a fundamentally broken game.
My advice, play the games you most enjoy, and don't worry that other people might be enjoying something else you're not playing.
I love when GW2 fans trot out this line, as if it's true. Unfortunately, it's not. No, maybe the words "savior," "messiah," or "The second coming of Jesus" weren't used, but you know damn well that it's EXACTLY the message that GW2 fans have been conveying for a couple of years now, on their own forums and on the forums of other games. Stop being so damn literal. The constant gushing over how the game is going to "reinvigorate the genre" has been going on for a while now, and guess what? It's coming 100% from GW2 fans.
So they may not have used the word "messiah," but they certainly have been deifying it as such.
How GW2 feels grindy to you is beyond me, or restrictive for that matter.
It sounds like you're following hearts quests and doing only those. Try going for the Vista points (red triangles), the Discovery points (little squares), and on the way, jump in on any DE that you may come across. Also don't forget about the skill challenges.
How it feels restrictive I don't know, you can level in your races main area, or any other races main area. Heck i'm a lvl 30 Asura Necromancer and last night I did all of Queensdale, 100% map completion and it got me almost 3 levels. That took me an hour maybe a little over. And I didn't even rush. Tonight i'm going for..... Probably Sylvari.
I'm not trying to be rude, but I do think you're playing it wrong. GW2 really has an emphasis on just, "go and do anything". If you want to just follow hearts quests, go do each of the starter zones, than each of the next tier zones, you'd easily be levle 30+ by then. Probably somewhere in the levle 45 range.
If you aren't in a guild, join one. I run a little 3 man guild right now, waiting to get on our feet before we start recruiting, but it makes it so much funner. Tonight i'm wanting to try Ascalonion Catacombs too.
Sorry, I just feel like GW2 has so much to do.
The "Youtube Pro": Someone who watches video's on said subject, and obviously has a full understanding of what is being said about such subject.
I never thought of Guild Wars 2 as a savior of mmo's, but saw it as a breath of fresh air in the staleness of wow clones that most new mmo's tend to be. It also solves alot of the things that make some mmo's unbearable, we all seen it, kill stealing, resource hogging, ninja looting, griefers, etc. There's none of that in GW2 (griefers might popup sooner or later tho).
I believe i see GW2 for what it is, a fun mmo that used some of the best ideas (that didn't work very well on other mmo's) and made them work together. Join that with the great lore and amazing art and it will have a solid fanbase, hopefully more than enough to keep it going for alot of years. Only in one mmo, so far, i've played for more than a year and that was Anarchy Online (5 years, best community i've seen in any mmo, left because of ridiculous decisions by the devs). I believe i found the second mmo that will keep me logging in regularly for a good long time.
I believe these sentences are somewhat contradictory. What I wanted to do was be able to level my human strictly in the human areas. However, I tried that and was forced to run back and forth between the same few events and hope they were active. I found this very frustrating and almost put down the game. And, yes, I fully explore every part of the area.
Last night I gave in and went to the Charr area and was able to level again. It made me feel a little better about the game, but I still think it is a disappointment that you cannot level a human strictly in human lands without repeating events 5 times, and running around for hours looking for events.
http://f.cl.ly/items/3n15423i0G2i111y3c2b/computer.gif
When I said i had "time", i meant virtual time, i got no RL "time" for you.
Guild Wars 2 is a good game, it is not a great game. It is almost everything that ArenaNet (Mike) promised, but it is missing a few features that were promised. All of that said, as I see it, Guild Wars 2 is still the best game released this year by a long shot. Is it the Savor of MMO gaming? No. But it is a step the right direction.
I read the OP's comments and agree with most of it, yes I am a fanboi of ArenaNet. Very nice article, I enjoyed it very much. As for the comments, I skipped them as (on this site) they seldome relate to the article itself. Thank you for posting this thought provoking article.
Can someone qoute a person who said that guild wars 2 was the jesus of mmorpgs?
Because I never heard anyone say that before, other then critics of the game.
We live in an era where people have difficulty remaining objective about anything. There is a ton of hype behind gw2, and there are a bunch of people that think anet can do no wrong with the game. Even if a feature is lacking, to the fans it was a magnificent implementation of such a feature.
If you changed the name of guildwars2, most of the gw2 fanatics would have tons of criticisms about the game.
I personally do not believe the game is even close to being the savior of mmos. It took a few okay ideas (perhaps even good in theory) and implemented them in a very simplistic way.
Do dynamic events play like some revolutionary system that cascades and makes you feel like an important part of the game world? Not to me they don't.
Did they get rid of the collection of wolf tails and the kill 20 of X mob quests? No... they just give you a progress bar instead of telling you you are at n of 20 mobs completed.
Is the personal story amazing and properly implemented? The voice acting is mediocre, and the personal stories don't truly have that much depth to them. (I think i enjoyed the starter area sith stories in swtor more than gw2)
Did they make an atrocious game? Not at all, it is pretty polished, and easy to play and succeed at. But that is a far cry from what their manifesto boasted.
Another thing that bugs me about gw2 is that it is called an mmo, in this time and age many games are called mmos that would not be considered mmos back when the genre first started booming. GW2 claims it has a persistent world, but with overflows it is basically just a heavily districted game, sure you can go run around with other players (i'm talking about random players right now, because it is often a pain in the tuckus to get into the same zone as your friends right now) and I guess with technological advancements the number of players you can sit in the same zone with qualify it as "massive multiplayer", but I feel it is not in line with the spirit of the original MMOs. Yes eq1 had zones, and servers, but at least if you were on the same server as someone and went to the same zone, you were going to find them there, there were no districts, no overflows, no zone caps. The big appeal of mmos originally, was that you were doing things together with tons of people. I don't really feel like gw2 captures the spirit of mmos, I also feel like the massive aspects of it, aren't truly fleshed out very well, and they are very shallow forms of content.
Another problem with gw2 in general is that it is just so darn easy, and people will get bored with it sooner rather than later. The appeal or hook of many mmos was that it took some real effort to get to high progress on your character, your character meant something, it was a display of your journeys and effort invested. Progression in gw2 just doesn't seem to have that same level of satisfaction, things come easily, people hit max level in a couple of days... it all seems so trivial.
I wish anet had really taken a risk to try and innovate, they acted like that was what they were doing, but when I play the game, all these big claims they made, were all done in a very safe and familiar way.
One thing that makes me sad about gw2, the launch, and the community, is that if you ever want to be heard and give a real and brutally honest opinion, it simply doesn't work, you have to walk on egg shells just to get them to think about what you've said for even half a second, and usually even if you navigate the egg shells with eloquence, they usually just rawrrawr at you if you don't agree with their fanaticism.
Grim Dawn, the next great action rpg!
http://www.grimdawn.com/
After a few more days playing GW2 , all i have to say is , yes i'm saved.
Finally a game that is worth my money cash shop or not.
And as some other guy said above me , the servers will be there and my cash in my pocket and not in some sub to a low quality product like SWTOR , WoW , and the list goes on just to be able to play it.
I don't even get it how people spend subs to look at those cartoony outdated horrible crap called Blizz games DIABLO 3 included.
Or even buggy single player SWTOR and slow motion RIFT.
If the same features were added to todays WoW like DE's , they would be called innovation cause Blizzard did it.
But now it is same old same old.
Well it is not , Dynamic events scale , pop up everywhere , game world is huge and nicely done , classes are great, u can MOVE around and cast spells (Yes u CAN finally) , game is hard and rewarding , exploration is back finally, ur skills interact with the skills a player casts next to u .
Ur chars scale to lower levels = replayability .
Dungeons are hard to do , i was running dungeons in wow eating pizza same button hitting 1 all the way just to get the reward for no reason at all , next week another set would be there to grind for.
Just a few more days for them to sort out those annoying launch bugs and yes i have a home.
Now call me a fanboy who cares anyway.
Have fun in whatever u play