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[Poll] - Launch problems that WON'T be affecting GW2
HoLy_MoLy
Member Posts: 6
in Guild Wars 2
I caved in and bought SWTOR and am currently in a typical MMO launch...
I still think SWTOR is a good fun MMO, but man, I am getting tired of the same old problems the plague almost all MMOs.
What's the worst problem that affects typical MMOs?
Is there anything I've missed?
Comments
1) Queues/Segregated servers
The typical way -
Choose high-pop server = queues all day and forever to come
Choose mid-range server = queues during launch and peak times
Choose low-pop server = no queues, risk of merger or declining player base later on
The ANet way - I'm not sure if GW2 will use the same system as the first one, but I'm guessing there would be around 3 server clusters, one for each world region with options to transfer between them. (US, Euro, Asia)
- There would likely be no queues, and if there were, you just transfer to another cluster.
- Everyone in the same region can form a giant community and theoretically anyone could group up with anyone else.
- You can play with anyone you meet outside the game, without having to reroll characters/transfer servers.
2) Subscription problems
The typical way -
30 days free game time!* *with an active subscription No sub, no play.
Many people earlier this morning were having major problems with their website and couldn't subscribe, and therefore couldn't play the game they already paid for.
In the case of free-to-play games, its either spend cash or be hampered in levelling speed and/or power.
The ANet way -
Buy the game, it's fully funtional and it's yours forever.
3) Quest resource/boss competition
The typical way -
Queue to get into the server, and then queue to kill the quest boss...
Group up with people to kill the quest boss, then disband immediately...
Use instances, game gets criticised for too much instancing...
The ANet way -
Get credit for the kill by partipating in any way.
Sure, you'll get leechers, but it's much more preferable to queueing up to kill a boss (massive immersion killer) or having to worry about doing enough damage on a boss, (even though you were healing others like mad, or your team was simply not big enough to do 'sizeable damage').
4) Lack of polish, released too early
The typical way -
SWTOR is in my opinion, unfinished.
It's lacking in many graphic options, UI options and quality-of-life features.
It was obviously released early to cash in on the holiday sales period and to recoup some of the investment costs.
The ANet/Valve way -
It's done, when it's done. While it may often cost them in terms of innovation (other products will implement their announced features), but at least the finished product is highly polished and fully functional out of the gate.
Guild Wars 2 won't use the same system as the 1st one. It will use the typical server structure that pretty much every other MMO uses, so it will potentially fall prey to the same server queue problem people have been QQ'ing about with SW:TOR. However one major difference is that ArenaNet will likely allow players to freely switch between servers (with some kind of limit for WvWvW). See in SW:TOR, a lot of people with early access rolled on medium or high pop servers. Then more people came, before Bioware could add more servers and now all those people are suffering some major 20min-1hr server queues. With no way to transfer between servers, these people have 2 options, queue queue or leave their server and re-roll.
Also the last point you made about polish is something that has yet to be seen, so it cannot be used as a point in Guild Wars 2's favour. Also no MMO will ever release that is 100% polished and bug free. Games like Rift & SW:TOR are about as good as you can get, when it comes to the state of a freshly launched MMO.
Alot of the problems listed in the poll atleast don't affect your ability to play the game, lot's of games launched with bad technical specs and came out like AOC at launch.
I personally have been lucky enough to only be affected by a few minor bugs mentioned in the poll and have avoided games that had truly horrendous launches (as far as unplayable games).
Im trusting that the long delay on GW2 launch by ANet is an effort by the developer to make sure that game launches with the minimum impact on gamers patience.
Theres no need to mention other recent mmorpgs that were plagued by a number of problems due to bad decisions by rushing them to early launch, and many of them didnt succeed not because they were not good games, but because they were incomplete and, trust me on this, most gamers dont like to be played around. They want a finished product when buying it, what is a simple thing to ask, as all things a consumer may buy, they want it ready to use the moment they buy it.
ArenaNet knows this, and they know, has by now all devs do, that this genre is been bleeding supporters these last couple of years. So, for me, i dont mind waiting days, weeks, months for the release if the game comes shinny and ready to play.
About the poll, eveything that is not ready or finish, can spoil the gamer experience.
This isn't a solution at all. The problem is not that you need a subscription, but that you can't set up an account. And that problem could happen in GW2 just as well, if the website is overrun or buggy.
Hmmm isnt every point of you ust a guess how it might be??
Well maybe the quest mob one is not but the rest is a guess at best or just blind fanboy talk at worst.
Calling SWTOR unfinished is rather harsh nothing that might be missing right now is in any form game breaking.
Correct me if i am wrong but you do still need an account to play GW2 right? So if all ppls would try to sign up for it at the same day (like many did try to create a sub for SWTOR at the same day) the side would suffer no matter if you need to set a a sub or not....of course if not enough ppls would want to create an account the side would not be in probs....but the game prolly would be than lol
I put "Other"...
as in "Not taking a chance on creating something original"
more gw2 hate on swtor....why am I not surprised.....
You cant make a GW2 thread that is supposedly meant for GW2 discussion and then mention anything about TOR in the original post, the odds are too high of that thread being over before it even begins if you do that. Also, mmorpgs are "unfinished" the whole time they are ran, that's why they get updates all the time, content, UI, support, features etc. They need to be launched sooner or later and if you are going to wait for "everything" to be in, you'll have to wait forever.
Anyway, I hate the account problems most, even queues you can wait till they pass, but if you are having account problems you might have to wait for days to get in touch with anykind of customer support to get anything working.
I'm not going to speculate about the GW2 problems at launch, maybe it will have some, maybe it wont. No one here really has crystal balls to see the future, unless if they have been surgically added, even then they will only get pain in their groin, not visions from the future.
Let's day dreaming all together and vote "all".
You certainly did not need anything but the gameclient for GW1, no additional accounts needed, and as far as I know, you will not need any additional accounts for GW2. I'd have to say that you are wrong.
And you know this from?
Why would they throw away a good working, scalable server-solution for something that doesn't perform as well?
Of course you had to register an account to play GW1. What do you think your characters are saved to? It's not a paid account, but an account nonetheless.
Their good working, scalable server-solution was great for a lobby based instanced game world, which GW2 isn't. The common shard/world-based server setup makes a lot more sense for a MMO with that structure.
Launch problems are in every game, so we will just see what GW2's will be.
The truth may be puzzling. It may take some work to grapple with. It may be counterintuitive. It may contradict deeply held prejudices. It may not be consonant with what we desperately want to be true. But our preferences do not determine what's true.
Carl Sagan-
LoL well it was more a rhetorical question for i am actually 100% sure you do need an account its just not possible without one and i know for a fact that GW1 had accounts as well i have one myself so yeah......might it be that you have no idea what you are talking about?
The biggest launch problem they'll likely have is launching while I'm at work, making me wait until I get home to get in.
Those evil, evil bastages.
Unless... "Honey, I'm taking today off... GW2 is launching!"
Oderint, dum metuant.
The worse launch problem MMOs have, as a rule, is an unfinished/unplayable game. I can understand them underestimating sales, which causes server queues. But an unfinished/unplayable game is unforgiveable.
I don't expect this to be a problem with Guild Wars 2. I figure they are planning on launching with at least two million players, just to have some buffer room.
I'm setting aside some vacation time myself.
ArenaNet have said this in at least one of their numerous interviews and I'm not going to waste my time finding it for you. Also ArenaNet call their server's "worlds", so how else are they going to incorporate World v World v World, without having the multi-server structure we are used to in other MMOs. It's you're choice to believe me or not, but I know I am right about this, because I watched the original source.
The account you would be making for GW2 is an ncsoft account which a lot of people already have, including me. You just need to add the game to your account.
In GW1 you registered your account directly with the gameclient, there was no registration through a website, there was no account to setup through a website and thus there was no chance that an overrun website could get in the way of setting up your account.
Afaik GW2 will not require you to setup an account throuhh a website and thus you will face any chance hat an overrun website can get in the way of setting up your account.
You can use multiple servers for a single world or shard, so I don't see why it would it be a problem to scale up servers when the load of players increases.
Problems that won't affect GW2 at launch, hmm...
It won't have the problem of a lack of people flooding the servers spamming "trade" with as much hate as they can muster.
It won't have the issue of people running to online forums to complain about how they can't do x, y or z and how the game is going to fail within minutes.
It won't have a lack of people who for whatever reason can't just enjoy a game and not compare it to something else in every single minute detail.
…Though I guess this list is pretty generic as pretty much every game can claim rights to it.
The last thing it won't have is me saying it took too long to come out. I'll gladly sit idly by and play whatever is fun for now while they finish up. I won’t say it will be the end all game of the century to make all other MMOs irrelevant, however the developers seem to be making an effort towards what can be considered a next generation MMO Understandably that’s not for everyone, but it is what I'm waiting for.
How are we supposed to vote for this, is this just voting on what we guess will or will not happen? Sorry, but this poll baffles me a bit.
Personally i think SWTOR was the best most ballanced MMO release ever.
They staged the release perfectly, and people could allways play as there where allways servers with room. Sadly everyone somehow wanted to play on the same servers, But Bioware was not to blame as they added enough servers overtime.
The game was rocksolid and everything was functional and worked as intended, so again nothing to complain about.
If GW2's release is just as good as SWTOR, ill be very happy, personally i think Bioware set a new level for problem free releases. Which i base onatleast a dozen MMO release since EQ.
Best MMO experiences : EQ(PvE), DAoC(PvP), WoW(total package) LOTRO (worldfeel) GW2 (Artstyle and animations and worlddesign) SWTOR (Story immersion) TSW (story) ESO (character advancement)
I'm not so concerned about the game be released with tons of bugs, and game breaking glitches. Obviously there will be bugs here and there still. Not even beta can catch them all. It's gonna take a lot of time, and a lot of players to find all the bugs...and even then. I am positive, though, that there will be no bugs or glitches that completely prevent you from playing the game.
As for server queues, lag, and just being cluttered, the guys at ArenaNet aren't miracle workers. When you have thousands upon thousands of people trying to log in at the exact same time, and are in the same exact area at the same exact time, there will be problems. It's just plain inevitable. Not to mention, you've got people who just refuse to move from a high-population server to a lower population server, and instead just choose to complain about queues. Every game will suffer from things like that at lunch. The only thing that will resolve it is time.
Because of WvWvW, they will have to add servers 3 at a time, so that may prove to be our advantage. But at the same time, it could prove to be a disadvantage.
Bit of a misleading title op, but regardless, I think gw2 biggest concern will be server queues. Evena launch that went as relatively hiccup-less as swtor had a bunch of people bitching about server queues. And maybe I'm mistaken, but GW2 doesn't have the little instancing feature to phase off big loads of people. Hopefully their testing process is extensive enough to iron out all the little other problems, which I think it will be.
The thing that annoyes me with any launch is that players have absolutely no patience for a game. It's understandable because your a consumer, but with mmo's I just naturally expect thigns to get better. Yet a lot of players approach mmo's like the problems at launch will always be their. Love or hate mortal online for whatever reason(and the game has a lot of problems), that game has made loads and loads of progress with a tiny team and communtiy. If sv can survive and improve the game, then certainly any of these AAA companies can. But once a game has a bad launch, no one wants to even give a second look at it.
But oh well, I don't think that will be a big problem in the future becaus devs realize this now, except for indie games.