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The TRUTH about Guild Wars
Uzleb
Member Posts: 162
in Guild Wars
It's starting to bug me that just because GW is F2P everybody throws it into the same pile as all the other F2P.
I've played GW for over 5 years and in that time I’ve tried close to a dozen other F2P just to compare, and found they are not even close. I've also played other P2P games and not just for a couple months, but for years.
(Examples are: EQ,SWG,PS,DDO,EvE,WoW,E&B)
Guild Wars Prophecies 54$
I played the game steady for about 5 months and enjoyed every minute. Had full access to all the games content and mechanics for one price. I was able to create and expand a guild, including a hall and cape {no extra cost or micro ploy}. The updates came fast and furious without interrupting game-play. Guild Wars was everything I wanted in a online game, no time-sink or grinds. Just log in and continue with your adventures.
Guild Wars Factions 49$
I wasn't even finished the entire Prophecies story, quests, side quest, additional content like Underworld, Fissure of Woe and Sorrow's Furnace, when Factions arrived. Two additional classes and a fully stand-alone campaign as with the addition of a strong, balanced PvP that is fast, accessible and always available, it was an easy sell.
Guild Wars Nightfall 54$
Again, 6 months down the road Nightfall come out with two additional classes and another stand-alone campaign. With the additions of customizable hero's that adventure at your side with or without other people made Nightfall a must have for the hardcore Guild Wars players. And again no micro ploy, turbo milk or any other costs needed to enjoy the full array of content.
(Admission of guilt: I had to have the t-shirt so I upgraded my nightfall to collectors addition, cost was 16$, and even though I didn't need them I purchased two other character slots and additional storage which was about 45$)
Guild Wars Eye of the North 44$
The first true expansion of the Guild Wars story made for end gamers with additional content and master dungeons. A Hall of Monuments was also added, which is used to record and preserve your legacy, ensuring you a rightful place in legends and lore. As Eye of the North is an expansion, one of the three stand-alone campaigns is needed to enjoy the Eye of North. As a true expansion should be, you are not weighed down with tutorials and introductions. All that awaits you in Eye of the North is continued story-telling, additional allies to help with greater adventures along with a great sense achievement and recognition.
So.... for a total and quick comparison
If I played a p2p model for 5 years
Prophecies 54$ Client 50$
Factions 49$ Monthly 900$ ((12 months x 15$ fee/month) x 5 years)
Nightfall 54$ Expansion 1 50$
EyeNorth 44$ Expansion 2 50$
---------------- Expansion 3 50$
Total 201$ --------------------
+guilty 61$ Total 1100$
----------------
Grand Total
262$
Now you may be thinking, wait a second, this guy was talking about comparing free to play game models, why is he going off about pay to play games. Well, the comparison will make my point for me. Guild Wars shouldn't be compared with the conveyor belt of F2P Low/no quality games that have infested the MMO world; it should be compared with the leading P2P games. Considering Guild Wars offers everything p2p games do, and more in some cases.
Ha-Ha! I wish I could see the look on your p2p face, all contorted and disconcerted. Your probably saying right now "P2P games have a persistent world you stupid <<add your own colorful noun>>"
In response I would say, having a persistent environment and enjoying it are very different things. Most times you would want go out into an exploreable, persistent area and engage other fellow adventurers in role-play, comradery, adventure, competition or even just a friendly hello, but noooooooooo..... that never happens.
More often than not, your restricted to servers, so how massive is your game, really? or your dealing with kill stealing, campers, ninja looters, gold farmers, obscenities, obscurities etc.... forcing you to turn the ignore list into a database or just turning your local chat off entirely and play with your own band of friends.
Now since Guild Wars has networked world servers (what do you mean you pay to change servers?... your funny, stop making that stuff up) I can obtain that exact type of environment in Guild Wars with densely populated outposts, towns and cities duplicating the MMO feel along with a plethora of group instances for the RPG feel. Since Guild Wars 2 will be released with a persistent world for players along with all the features of Guild Wars plus a new engine this point will soon be mute.
In summary, I think Guild Wars and the like should be given a new category.
Freemium Games for Premium Gamers or somtin like dat.
~
Comments
I find GW being F2P a misconception. 50 bucks is hardly free.
"sub-free" would be more appropriate.
I've heard a few around here call it a buy 2 play. B2P
Joe barely beat me to it :P
I always just saw it as buy-to-play instead of pay-to-play or free-to-play.
My Guild Wars 2 Vids
Buy to Play, that was always their business model.
Now get back to the DiVinci Code. This puzzle was solved in 04.
I kill other players because they're smarter than AI, sometimes.
Guild Wars (and Guild Wars 2) are not F2P and never have been. The only reason people lump them into the same category is out of ignorance.
ok w/e if you want to split hairs, buy to play, but the principle is the same , because you don't pay a monthly fee to play the game the automatic assumption seems to bet Guild Wars is equal to a F2P PoS which couldn't be furhter from the truth.
I get your point; Guild Wars could be equated with P2P games in terms of quality but cost much less to play; that's why it was so popular after all. I'm looking forward to seeing how GW2 is; the original, despite being special because of its quality, wasn't really special in the gameplay department... but the amount of new stuff they're doing in GW2 is phenomenal.
With GW2 it'll be interesting to see how they support it; I'm sure they'll keep with the sub-less model, and they'll be forced to make expansions to keep turning out a profit from the player-base. So if substantial new content stops being turned out, then *shudder* micro-transactions might come into it. Let's hope not.
To be honest, the world needs more games like Guild Wars... actually, scratch that; it would lose sales if there were. Seriously though, it's really intelligent when you look at it. The team has to put out content, all of which costs money, to maintain the game; the lack of sub encourages people to come away from WoW and other P2Ps to give it a try, and the fact that you actually have to buy the game stops the community devolving into what you normally see in F2P games.
"Smacking kids doesn't hurt them, kinetic energy does!"- Doctor Tobia
The OP does have a valid point, many people do look down on GW simply because of its payment methods. Granted, it should be called a B2P, but many people still lump it up with the F2P crowd anyway.
Disagreement Heirarchy
^ This. The correct term is B2P.
If GW was F2P then we could call virtually every game out there that is a box purchase and no monthly subscription F2P :P
Like others have said I have yet to see GW compared to F2P games. It is generally considered to be in the category of B2P. On a side note, we can almost guarantee there will be an item shop present in the game. It may not be there at launch, but like in GW1 it will show its face eventually. However, in GW1 there was absolutely nothing vitally important offered in the shop so it really did not impact anyone's play. Also, it's one of the few item shops I've never heard anyone have a problem with.
Steam: Neph
This
The OP is right to highlight the difference, it is annoying when the B2P model of GW gets confused with F2P, the difference between the two is gigantic, it gets lost on some players when they see no sub, they think F2P and remember the in built frustrations they are shipped with.
B2P - this is just funny to me. What shall we call games like Halo: Reach? Pi2P? Pirate to play? Oh wait...
Guild Wars is a Subscription Free Online Computer Game *counts* 1...2...3...4...5 that could be: SFOCG.... Let's not make a Brangelina for every thing in the world ok?
Want the truth: GW1 is and never was a MMORPG, so not sure why you try to compare MMO's with a Online RPG.
Guild Wars® is an online roleplaying game > http://www.guildwars.com/products/guildwars/default.php
So the truth is you can not compare Guildwars with P2P MMORPG's as it never was a MMORPG.
Will there ever come a day people will realize this??
Now GW2 is looking to be completely different from GW1, as GW2 is going for the MMORPG genre this time.
GW1 is F2P, you don't have to buy anything at all to continue on playing, nor do you ever need to buy the client either, it's free to download.
In GW1 what you pay is the access code. Once you're in, you don't have to pay anything to play.
Sure others can say that GW1 is B2P, that's not wrong either, but you cannot deny the fact that it is also F2P.
Ready for GW2!!!
As others have said GW was not even close to an MMO, so comparing it's cost to an MMO isn't justified. It would be more accurate to compare it's cost to a game like Diablo where you buy the box and then play online with people when you want and don't pay a subscription. You're also assuming all MMOs charge the same and work the same. Take AC for example, they give free monthly updates instead of selling expansions. So in the last 5 years the cost would of been $777 bucks since you don't have to buy the box and don't have to buy expansions and the monthly fee is $12.95 instead of $15.
For that cost I get a persistent world with brand new content every month, and on going changing storyline, and an extremely fun to play MMO. Basically your whole analysis didn't convince me that GW was worth it or good. I tried GW and lost interest in it immediately and hated how it played, so the cost to enjoyment ratio for GW was terrible for me, and MMOs cost to enjoyment have been great.
Ok, I'm stupid, I don't know what I’m talking about, and that’s your opinion. I'm sure you flamers thought long and hard to get out those two sentences. Good for you, I’m glad you didn't hurt yourself trying to come up with a valid observation.
It would be nice if some people actually understood that forums are for sharing and debating ideas, not just calling those ideas or the people that post them stupid. In a way it kind of makes you look less of a collegiate when you can't come up with one point to support your childish statements.
Fine it’s not a MMORPG, it’s a Co-Op RPG, or a Free to Play Online Game, or a Buy to play, whatever you want to call it.
I figured MMORPG.com would be an acceptable forum because it has a large pool of opinions and most all of them are based around ONLINE GAMES THAT HAVE A MASSIVE AMOUNT OF PEOPLE PLAYING THE SAME GAMES IN AN ONLINE ENVIROMENT WHICH CONSIST OF MANY ROLE PLAYING ELEMENTS.
I don’t have any links or exact forums to quote about the topics in my post, and I’ve only seen a couple posts on MMORPG.com about it. For those people who haven’t seen or heard about “F2P style” games getting lumped into the crap pile, and think I’m just blowing wind, well there’s not much I can say to that other than I guess we use a different internet. ???
Thank you all for your opinions and feedback
I don't see how those fancy persistent MMOs offer more content. They just force you to grind and do some boring mundane tasks lacking most of the action GW has. To get to max level takes much longer but that's only because they just push up those numbers. Nothing cool really. What I am doing at level 1 is what I am doing at level 20,30,40,50,60... until cap where I go to instances.Those so persistent MMOs are not so much more different from GW. Why would I care if I play in a persistant world if all I do is quest all on my own to cap. Then do raids which are instanced so you get to the point where most MMOs turn out like GW. Instances all over the place at max level.
So a dumbed down version of what the OP wrote is, "Some people prefer a less expensive , more instanced game than a more expensive persistant game"? So some people prefer other types of games? Awesome, glad that is cleared up. Now on to GW2 which will be persistant because they realized their mistake in making GW 1 too instanced, More people prefer a persistant world and GW2 will make even more money.
"Now on to GW2 which will be persistant because they realized their mistake in making GW 1 too instanced, More people prefer a persistant world..."
Pretty much a matter of opinion, not an established fact.
Many people enjoy instancing because, for one you're allowed to quest without kill stealing to hamper your gameplay. Sorry, but when I'm hunting down a mob and someone races to hit it just before I have a chance to even throw out the first strike, it gets tedious very quickly. And yes, there are people who will attack your mob first, just to torque you. Add that same formula to a newly launched game and the irritation adds infinitum. Ever been in a newly launched game rife with newbies who swamp the mob areas, making it damned near impossible to quest in peace. I'll take instanced in that respect any day.
You also don't face the lag issues of multiple players and NPC's/MOB's in a given area. I could name quite a few games where lag was extremely heavy due to too many players in one area of a persistent world. Warhammer used to zone crash if you had too many players in a given area. I remember when big fight events used to happen early on with Eve: Online and the entire server would see massive wait times for zoning.
I really don't see any major advantages to a persistent world, other than perhaps uninterrupted travel for exploration. Still, let's face it, how many games don't offer some sort of self-zoning or portal transportation options? And who, after some initial exploration, doesn't use the easy travel options between points A and B?
If at first you don't succeed, pay someone who will.
Well put and I quite agree with your sentiments.
It is a bit funny how some parts of this community create their own definitions of an "MMO".
Lets see... An MMO is (according to some): A virtual realization of a persistant world without isolated instances. Let's see how many current (socalled) MMORPG's actually meet those 2 very broad requirements:
WoW: Nope, world is not persistant and has a lot of instances.
Vanguard: Hmm no the "world" is in no way persistant.
Lotro: World is not persistant and there are instances.
AoC: Instanced and the world is not persistant.
EVE: Closer, but hardly a persistant world :-)
Ok so I am an idiot
Sorry that is just MY definition: In a "persistant" world, if you you DESTROY something, example: A shed - This shed will be destroyed for EVERYONE who looks at it (until someone rebuilds it or simply removes and clean up the debris.)
If a truly persistant world MMO exists, please say so - I have yet to see one. (Guess it would be a wasteland).
Instancing is great for storytelling and to instill that "heroic" feeling - Waiting in line to killl the same (endlessly respawning) monster is just... well less "heroic".
You can tell online stories in a persistant manner within instances. A "shared instance" (which is all a realm-locked "open world" is) is different... The bad guy just keeps respawning on a timer...
We dont need casuals in our games!!! Errm... Well we DO need casuals to fund and populate our games - But the games should be all about "hardcore" because: We dont need casuals in our games!!!
(repeat ad infinitum)
Yet you can't deny the fact that some virtual worlds are closer to being persistant than others. GW2 with dynamic events sistem will better simulate a persistant world than a GW does. SWG did a good job in simulating persistant world with player cities and EVE does it with alliance wars over sistems in 0.0.
Same goes with open vs instanced worlds where 'open' means only a major part of the world is not instanced and not neccessarily a completely 'instance free' world. It simulates open world well enough to make it feel that way regardless of the fact that it might be partially instanced.
So, when according to some an MMO is "A virtual realization of a persistant world without isolated instances" , they don't mean it literally.
@Cruise
I too share same concerns regarding open/persistant worlds however ANet in GW2 came up with a good solution regarding quest stealers where participating in battle is enought to get a reward regardless of who attacked the Boss first or who dealt most damadge. I hope it plays out well once the game is finished.
Regarding lag issues, I see it more as a lack of content than anything else. A good MMO should have enough content of high quality and POIs all around the world to spread the population (not too much though) instead of having too few that forces everyone to the same location.
But as you said, it is only a metter of opinion, so I'm just sharing mine here.
This one is definately more debatable. What mmo's are really giving us new content every month? Changing story line, GW's has a storyline like the next mmo. Extremely fun? Well everyone will have their opinion on that. What is WoW today? Sit around and que for an instance for most part, directly teleported to it, no adventure. That's even less open and adventerous then GW's. Their instances as ass in comparison as well and what changing content and story line? In fact WoW gameplay has become more like GW's and even more watered down drivel.
I think that certain types of MMO can benefit immensely from a so-called "persistent world", purely because it increases immersion. WoW, for example, despite background loading, allows you to traverse the world with almost no outright loading screens. AoC, on the other hand, covers a ridiculously large breadth of landscapes but fills the gaps in with loading screens. For an immersion-centric MMO, I prefer a loading screen-less world, for other games it's prettymuch irrelevant until loading screens become a problem. EVE, for example, is not what I'd call a "persistent world" in its truest sense; each group of systems is actually supported by their own server. Each system is separated by a loading screen. And yet I couldn't care less, because EVE isn't about the locations or the immersion.
Any MMO which regards the actual game-world as a significant factor, which includes memorable landmarks, breathtaking vistas and marvels of nature just to wow its fanbase, should keep instancing to a minimum. It ruins the immersion and detracts from the experience, and you can't afford to do that if you're packing as much detail in as GW2 says it is.
"Smacking kids doesn't hurt them, kinetic energy does!"- Doctor Tobia
OMG not another one of these's, listen if you cant afford to play this stuff then get the hell out of online gaming or get something that doesn't require money to play like pogo.
Evil will always triumph because good is dumb....