You missed that part. He tried to categorize me as "Oh, you're a sandbox player, therefore nothing you say matters about themeparks.." which is childish and a completely unacceptable way to shut someone down whom has a differing opinion. It's not even an attempt at a discussion. That's why I got angry.
That and he's wrong, those two things !
IDK it just seemed to me like a "you like X playstyle and this game does not have it, end of discussion"....do you just want to just keep fighting?
I'm confused here, who's fighting? We're having a discussion and he made a horribly rude and childish comment. Moving on now ~~~>
Meant to say arguing
And you should have probably moved on earlier, there was nothing "childish" about his comment
Nothing so far has convinced me I want to buy and play this game. Having said that, I will be watching it and may buy in the future -- regardless I hope it does great !!
I'll be watching it, but unless they throw something in there that really allows you to interact with the world around you (as most themeparks don't) I won't touch it . So far they don't have anything like that.
I want a living breathing world, and not a hayride that I have a chance of falling off from 3months down the road because it stopped on me suddenly without warning.
In short you're one of those "Sandbox only" people. Got it.
An interesting way to try and immediately destroy whatever someone says by generalizing them down to a single tag.
To shoot you completely down, no I'm not a "Sandbox Only" person. I played DAOC for YEARS and loved it, and that was more of a "SandPark", but a WoW player I most certainly am not. I enjoy thinking for myself and figuring stuff out without a massive quest marker handed to me telling me where/what/how to do something.
Then there's a LOT more that goes into a game that simply doesn't anymore to make it fun. Properly made MMOs are about "layers" of interaction. I'm not saying GW2 isn't "properly" made for what it is, a themepark. However, that doesn't mean it has characteristics that will provide longevitiy in my eyes.
I'm simply not seeing anything new coming from GW2 that has any real lasting appeal. I know you feel differently, but that's the nature of these things unfortunately.
Hey it's ok if that is what you like. In your own post you said you will not play GW2 because it lacks sandbox features. Nothing wrong with that. Also just so you know I play and enjoy both types. As for your last point I agree that most people will not play gw2 for more than a couple months, no real lasting power there just like any themepark. But that's why I think it's worth the box price with no sub fee.
"GW2 will be seen as successful due to box sales only, doesn't mean it's an industry changer!"
Who cares? why should ppl care?
i mean, feels like most of ppl (in this website) that like a game are more concerned if that game is gona beat WoW rather than if they will enjoy all the game content or something.
And if a game is very awesome but because it only has 100k subs + couple servers they wont play it and they'll move to an OK game with 5m subs + hundreds of servers.
Ppl should just play a game they seem fun and not by subs decreasing order.
Nothing so far has convinced me I want to buy and play this game. Having said that, I will be watching it and may buy in the future -- regardless I hope it does great !!
I'll be watching it, but unless they throw something in there that really allows you to interact with the world around you (as most themeparks don't) I won't touch it . So far they don't have anything like that.
I want a living breathing world, and not a hayride that I have a chance of falling off from 3months down the road because it stopped on me suddenly without warning.
For example?
Can you place a house where you want in the "living breathing" world of GW2 with respect to obvious quest locations or scripted events?
Can you create cities?
Can you leave a lasting impact on the world around you, or is it simply a respawn/scripted event that has no real dimensional impact on anything you've done so far?
If I save X city from being ravaged by Centaurs will it perminantly leave that town scared if I fail in protecting them, or will it eventually be "magically" repaired & reset for someone ELSE to experience said content EXACTLY the same way you experienced it?
Can you craft armor from items you gathered/looted/mined/collected from the GW2 world that are unique, or are they simply stacks of generic metal/stone/cloth/string with no decernable difference between another piece of similar material?
How is the economy driven? Is it simply based on gear drops from instanced bosses that anyone and their mother can do in an hour thereby demeaning the whole experience?
These aren't sandbox elements mind you. MANY other MMOs from the past have done similar elements (granted not all) and were still Themeparks/Sandparks. This is true immersion, and true interaction with world that creates that living breathing world. A few choices of armor color, armor design, hairstyles, skincolor, class type, and weapon choices do NOT make you unique...only more diverse than a two-sided coin.
Obviously all are my opinion based on my 20years of gaming, but that's besides the point.
ps: I'm not ACTUALLY asking questions here. I'm giving you examples that you can fill in the blanks for yourself with. Most, if not all, are solid "no's".
-Player housing is being disucssed by Anet. They're doing guild halls for sure, but up in the air about player houses. We'll see.
-No you cannot create cities.
-You cannot have a lasting, permanent effect on the world. But, name me one MMO that does this. Even the vaunted sandboxes like UO, Darkfall, EVE, etc. You kill a mob, it respawns. You defeat an enemy, and it appears, or they create a new one to replace it. There is no permanence in a PVE environment of any multiplayer game out there. If you can cite an example I'll gladly eat those words, but near positive it doesn't exist. It can't. If you had that, and the first few people cleared it all, there'd be nothing for anyone else.
Oh but wait, you say. We can make new events with new monsters! Which, in essence, is still a respawn. Just using a different skin. The closest you can come to PvE permanence in a persistent, online world and still manage to provide meaningful content to thousands of players, 24/7, is to create many, MANY random spawn points, and have the spawn table itself be RNG. So you never know what's popping up or when. That gives the illusion of permanence.
-I never quite understand that crafting comment. What exactly do you mean by unique? And can you cite a game that's done it? I know in UO you could discover your own crafting recipes, but all they really did was have maybe a slightly different stat point or two, and have the player's name on them (e.g. "Bob's Super Sword of Awesome"). Is that what you are talking about?
-We can't answer questions about the economy since it doesn't exist yet. however, conjecturing from what we've seen so far, the big ticket items will be:
-crafting materials
-crafted items
-gems
-possibly dyes (if they get this system working the way it SHOULD work)
Dungeon loot can be gotten by anyone. Even if the Tier 1 dungeon doens't drop your chest piece, you gain tokens with which to buy the same piece. And gear is less stat driven than wow, so you're mostly just concerned with aesthetics.
I will agree your vision is MORE a living world than GW2, in the way that GW2 is MORE a living world than wow. Consider it progression.
Theme parks lack long term replayability. The dynamic event grind will wear people's patience thin. Doesn't matter if you change classes or races the event grind will always be the same, go kill x amount of enemies to get to the end boss in events. It will always be the same format starting at level 1. Yeah it will sell well like every mmo does at launch but this is nothing more than your weekend stay at the beach.
Theme parks lack long term replayability. The dynamic event grind will wear people's patience thin. Doesn't matter if you change classes or races the event grind will always be the same, go kill x amount of enemies to get to the end boss in events. It will always be the same format starting at level 1. Yeah it will sell well like every mmo does at launch but this is nothing more than your weekend stay at the beach.
This is a possiblity. but if you make it new enemies, in different areas, and provide different objectives, it can still be fresh and interesting. For many people. many others see ANY quest as a repeat of any other quest; I don't know how those folks play RPGs.
Take a look at SWTOR. The only measurable form of success for modern MMOs is their retention rate of subscribers. However, GW2 really has no measurable way to see how successful they are. It is a Buy-To-Play and if we were measuring box sales as a form of success than SWTOR, AOC, Aion, TERA, and Diablo III (albeit not an MMO) are all true successes in the market, but the reality is that's not how we measure success!
The number of people playing maybe, server loads, stuff like that?
So right now the market prediction is 1.2 to 1.5 million box sales. Cool, a reasonable expectation considering GW1 had a decent following, and given the fact that GW2 is nothing but GW1 on steroids that's a completely acceptable expectation. However, do NOT make the mistake in thinking that GW2 will "change the industry" in terms of gameplay, world design, etc. GW2 is a specific fanbase, and is still a themepark MMO. We won't see major waves out of GW2 for any other noticable benefit other than B2P + CashShop cosmetic cash shop (even though buying experience bonuses is NOT cosmetic) being more popular for MMOs to use. Not a bad thing, but still not the best.
GW2 is not GW on steroids. It's quite a different animal.
SWTOR was predicted as "the game changer", and even got the same amount of hype threads as GW2 is getting about how amazing it will be. It won't be that amazing, but if you're excited for it just realize that there are quite a few more who are using it as a simple time waster for other games to come out (the general admission I seem to get from people IRL).
Only by a few higher ups at EA/BW, the forth pillar, right. Some people were fooled into thinking no MMO would ever be released without VO after SWTOR. Guess what, the VO are so annoying that the vast majority start skipping them quite fast. They're nice, but not for every single quest. And then the choices that rarely have any significant impact. Bleh. The only change to the industry will be that nobody will make the same mistake again. All that effort that could have been spent on things to actually make the game better.
Game Changer, Best MMO Ever, Best MMO Ever Made, Most Successful MMO? Certainly none of these, but successful as a PROPERLY done fan-oriented successor to GW1? Absolutely!
I think G2 will sell to more people than the GW fans. I wouldn't call it fan-oriented, but gamer-oriented.
Gotta say, I won't be playing GW2, but it's about damn time developers properly did a sequel of an original that is actually meant for the fans of the original product.
You mean ME2 and ME3 are not made for the ME fans?
Can you place a house where you want in the "living breathing" world of GW2 with respect to obvious quest locations or scripted events?
Can you create cities?
Can you leave a lasting impact on the world around you, or is it simply a respawn/scripted event that has no real dimensional impact on anything you've done so far?
If I save X city from being ravaged by Centaurs will it perminantly leave that town scared if I fail in protecting them, or will it eventually be "magically" repaired & reset for someone ELSE to experience said content EXACTLY the same way you experienced it?
Can you craft armor from items you gathered/looted/mined/collected from the GW2 world that are unique, or are they simply stacks of generic metal/stone/cloth/string with no decernable difference between another piece of similar material?
How is the economy driven? Is it simply based on gear drops from instanced bosses that anyone and their mother can do in an hour thereby demeaning the whole experience?
These aren't sandbox elements mind you. MANY other MMOs from the past have done similar elements (granted not all) and were still Themeparks/Sandparks. This is true immersion, and true interaction with world that creates that living breathing world. A few choices of armor color, armor design, hairstyles, skincolor, class type, and weapon choices do NOT make you unique...only more diverse than a two-sided coin.
Obviously all are my opinion based on my 20years of gaming, but that's besides the point.
ps: I'm not ACTUALLY asking questions here. I'm giving you examples that you can fill in the blanks for yourself with. Most, if not all, are solid "no's".
While this is something I would enjoy, no game has ever done all these features. This is basically just a pipe-dream that hasn't happened and probably won't for a long time. I do think it would be awesome, but was never something GW2 or most games ever promised.
ArenaNet is delivering on all of their promises I have read so far, and I am sure more stuff will be coming down the pipe at some point. Just whining about getting pizza when you bought ice cream at an ice cream shop makes zero sense, and I am not sure what the heck you were expecting ...
Theme parks lack long term replayability. The dynamic event grind will wear people's patience thin.
Mmhh how do you increase your combat skills in a sandbox like UO... wait, I remember now, you go out in the world and kill (aka "grind") mobs. Sandbox games lack long term replayability, the repetitive grind will wear people's patience thin.
(I'm a big fan of UO, but I just wanted to point out the nonsense of assuming "boring grind = theme park")
Respect, walk, what did you say? Respect, walk Are you talkin' to me? Are you talkin' to me? - PANTERA at HELLFEST 2023
Theme parks lack long term replayability. The dynamic event grind will wear people's patience thin.
Mmhh how do you increase your combat skills in a sandbox like UO... wait, I remember now, you go out in the world and kill (aka "grind") mobs. Sandbox games lack long term replayability, the repetitive grind will wear people's patience thin.
(I'm a big fan of UO, but I just wanted to point out the nonsense of assuming "boring grind = theme park")
Haha yeah, I remember spending a TON of time in UO grinding skills or gold. I probably killed daemons with blade spirits for like 150 hours total. And I remember spending a lot of time just sitting in firewalls in player towns to raise magic resist.
What you are missing Mephster is that community engenders longevity. UO had tons of grind, but it also had a great community that kept people coming back.
I dunno, I think a big difference between older school games and new school games is that in old school games, you played the game for fun and getting exp/skills/gold was just something you did when you wanted to. But in new games, the game is getting exp/skills/gold. And that makes it feel much more like a grind.
I am hoping, with its large variety of things you can do, that GW2 will bring back the days where we just played a game to play.
To me, grinding of the standard sandbox level just screams that it's low quality. It was acceptable like 12 years ago but they need to come up with something better now.
Theme parks lack long term replayability. The dynamic event grind will wear people's patience thin.
Mmhh how do you increase your combat skills in a sandbox like UO... wait, I remember now, you go out in the world and kill (aka "grind") mobs. Sandbox games lack long term replayability, the repetitive grind will wear people's patience thin.
(I'm a big fan of UO, but I just wanted to point out the nonsense of assuming "boring grind = theme park")
Haha yeah, I remember spending a TON of time in UO grinding skills or gold. I probably killed daemons with blade spirits for like 150 hours total. And I remember spending a lot of time just sitting in firewalls in player towns to raise magic resist.
What you are missing Mephster is that community engenders longevity. UO had tons of grind, but it also had a great community that kept people coming back.
I dunno, I think a big difference between older school games and new school games is that in old school games, you played the game for fun and getting exp/skills/gold was just something you did when you wanted to. But in new games, the game is getting exp/skills/gold. And that makes it feel much more like a grind.
I am hoping, with its large variety of things you can do, that GW2 will bring back the days where we just played a game to play.
Best ways to create and foster community in a MMO- (in no particular order)
1. Player cities/towns
2. Shared objectives
3. Cooperative goals
4. Team based competition
5. Economy
GW2 has 4 of the 5.
The fact the game is without a doubt built as an immersive world, combined with the focus on fun and adventure - not gear and levels, hopefully will couple well with the above to create a game where you can indeed play the game to just.. play!
In before GW2 kills WoW's population and becomes the most popular MMO for the next 5 years.
GW2 is an amazing game and deserves as much as that, hats off to arenanet for making such polished game that ill be spending thousands of hours enjoying.
This isnt hype, this is from what i've experienced actually playing the game.
It would take a fool to believe that GW2 wont change the industry, MMO's will be scambling to follow GW2's example.
Theme parks lack long term replayability. The dynamic event grind will wear people's patience thin.
Mmhh how do you increase your combat skills in a sandbox like UO... wait, I remember now, you go out in the world and kill (aka "grind") mobs. Sandbox games lack long term replayability, the repetitive grind will wear people's patience thin.
(I'm a big fan of UO, but I just wanted to point out the nonsense of assuming "boring grind = theme park")
Haha yeah, I remember spending a TON of time in UO grinding skills or gold. I probably killed daemons with blade spirits for like 150 hours total. And I remember spending a lot of time just sitting in firewalls in player towns to raise magic resist.
What you are missing Mephster is that community engenders longevity. UO had tons of grind, but it also had a great community that kept people coming back.
I dunno, I think a big difference between older school games and new school games is that in old school games, you played the game for fun and getting exp/skills/gold was just something you did when you wanted to. But in new games, the game is getting exp/skills/gold. And that makes it feel much more like a grind.
I am hoping, with its large variety of things you can do, that GW2 will bring back the days where we just played a game to play.
Best ways to create and foster community in a MMO- (in no particular order)
1. Player cities/towns
2. Shared objectives
3. Cooperative goals
4. Team based competition
5. Economy
GW2 has 4 of the 5.
The fact the game is without a doubt built as an immersive world, combined with the focus on fun and adventure - not gear and levels, hopefully will couple well with the above to create a game where you can indeed play the game to just.. play!
(no monthly sub fee helps w/ that too!)
Good points, agree 100% .
I also have to bring up that in GW2, I actually enjoyed the battlegrounds just for the fun of them. While in other MMORPGs I tolerate the massive imbalances of the battlegrounds just for the exp gain.
Here's to hoping that GW2 brings back game playing as opposed to exp playing.
To me, grinding of the standard sandbox level just screams that it's low quality. It was acceptable like 12 years ago but they need to come up with something better now.
That is the whole thing, when people talk about UO, DAoC, EQ or whatever, I am not sure I can really call those a sandbox. They were just the first of their kind ... and they didn't have the tech, the knowledge or the design time to do anything better. So you had a bunch of mobs sitting around waiting to be killed. Don't get me wrong, I had some good times in EQ grinding like a champion for drops or experience (I mean, that is all you did), but it did get old after a while. Especially after friends and guild mates started quitting the game ... I quickly lost interest.
And it is the same way for newer "sand box" games. The only ones I have really played recently are EVE and Darkfall. EVE is fun, but I feel it is a little too open ended. I also feel that it is just a total grind fest all the time. Go mine for X hours. Go grind misison quests for X hours. Go kill pirates for X hours. It honestly isn't very fun or exciting. The most memorable moments were all open world PvP situations ... and most of those were simply getting ganked by X number of people. Some people love the game, but the progression (40 days of waiting to skill up ...) and grind for money (this is basically ALL you do in the game ... grind for money) just got really old for me after a while.
Then games like Darkfall, which need a ton of work, are just really boring. Again, the only fun times were PvP'ing against greifers and gankers. But really, if the game revolves around fighting back against assholes that kill AFK people in town/lower level people, it seems pretty lame to begin with. Past that, it is literally just another skill/money grind on stagnant mob spawns that are the exact same ALL THE TIME.
Sandbox games are the exact opposite of dynamic from what I have seen. So you can build a house, a city, or whatever. Who cares, when all there is to do is gank people and kill mob spawns that are there 100% of the time. It is just a total grind fest. Trust me, I have had fun in these titles, but it isn't any different from the so called "theme park" model that everyone likes to trash talk.
And the last thing, if you think UO is so amazing, then go play it. I guarantee you will find it to be "not what you hoped for". Nostalgia is a powerful thing. I always talk about how much I loved EQ, but when I go back, it just doesn't feel the same (it doesn't help they turned it into easy mode either). People need to just realize, nothing is going to live up to your ridiculous expectations. It is impossible. Going into games with an open mind and just enjoying yourself is going to work much better than getting all hyped up about something. It is better to be pleasantly surprsied than let down.
Then again, maybe that is why everyone is being so negative?
While UO and the like were the early pioneers and just didn't have the tech to do what we can today (seriously, quest scripting was a BIG thing once upon a time), I also think they tried hard to emulate the experience of a pen-and-paper RPG, where the only limits were what rules your DM set and what you as a player coiuld think up to mess with him.
I dunno, I think a big difference between older school games and new school games is that in old school games, you played the game for fun and getting exp/skills/gold was just something you did when you wanted to. But in new games, the game is getting exp/skills/gold. And that makes it feel much more like a grind.
I am hoping, with its large variety of things you can do, that GW2 will bring back the days where we just played a game to play.
Best ways to create and foster community in a MMO- (in no particular order)
1. Player cities/towns
2. Shared objectives
3. Cooperative goals
4. Team based competition
5. Economy
GW2 has 4 of the 5.
The fact the game is without a doubt built as an immersive world, combined with the focus on fun and adventure - not gear and levels, hopefully will couple well with the above to create a game where you can indeed play the game to just.. play!
(no monthly sub fee helps w/ that too!)
Good points, agree 100% .
I also have to bring up that in GW2, I actually enjoyed the battlegrounds just for the fun of them. While in other MMORPGs I tolerate the massive imbalances of the battlegrounds just for the exp gain.
Here's to hoping that GW2 brings back game playing as opposed to exp playing.
For me it's because the structured pvp is intentionally more like a MOBA or FPS than your typical MMO battleground.
GW2 makes its money from box sales (expansions) . The cash shop is just a little extra.
GW2 isn't paying out a lot of money for an IP.
It all ready did an mmo, so they have some idea what to do.
They don't seem to be trying to rush the game out the door, but are releasing when its ready.
If lots of people buy the box, play a few months then buy the next box when it comes out, GW2 will be pretty happy I think.
What all this means is while the game will probably do well, its not going to make other game companies follw their example.
Look at TSW. It has no IP. Funcon has done mmos before and yet it still has a sub (for a little while). Even if TSW had come after GW2, I don't see them changing.
Subs are the golden egg. If you can create another WoW. You can make soo much money. Sure you can do what GW2 is doing and you can make a profit, but its not WoW money.
GW2 makes its money from box sales (expansions) . The cash shop is just a little extra.
GW2 isn't paying out a lot of money for an IP.
It all ready did an mmo, so they have some idea what to do.
They don't seem to be trying to rush the game out the door, but are releasing when its ready.
If lots of people buy the box, play a few months then buy the next box when it comes out, GW2 will be pretty happy I think.
What all this means is while the game will probably do well, its not going to make other game companies follw their example.
Look at TSW. It has no IP. Funcon has done mmos before and yet it still has a sub (for a little while). Even if TSW had come after GW2, I don't see them changing.
Subs are the golden egg. If you can create another WoW. You can make soo much money. Sure you can do what GW2 is doing and you can make a profit, but its not WoW money.
From some of the companies pushing towards the "free to play" model (or just no subscription), it is actually very surprising what they are finding. They find when people have the option to spend money, they spend more than if they are required to. Hence, why do you think cash shop/free to play games have done well and basically made the games profitable again?
You have just been brainwashed to believe "subscription games are the only ones that are good/work", which isn't true. Things are going to change eventually. There are many titles like PS2, Firefall and GW2 that are all "free to play". When AAA titles are released in this model, it is going to be a big vice grip on all the current subscription games. Especially with how low quality they all have been lately.
You are also comparing a game that hasn't released and are trying to predict the future of their earning based on zero fact. The fact that ArenaNet was profitable enough with GW to make GW2 is obviously enough to show that they were successful before. Just because something doesn't make a gazillion dollars doesn't mean it isn't successful. And if you really want to go down that road, Blizzard gets shit on by oil companies everyday as far as "successfulness" of their buisinesses.
GW2 makes its money from box sales (expansions) . The cash shop is just a little extra.
GW2 isn't paying out a lot of money for an IP.
It all ready did an mmo, so they have some idea what to do.
They don't seem to be trying to rush the game out the door, but are releasing when its ready.
If lots of people buy the box, play a few months then buy the next box when it comes out, GW2 will be pretty happy I think.
What all this means is while the game will probably do well, its not going to make other game companies follw their example.
Look at TSW. It has no IP. Funcon has done mmos before and yet it still has a sub (for a little while). Even if TSW had come after GW2, I don't see them changing.
Subs are the golden egg. If you can create another WoW. You can make soo much money. Sure you can do what GW2 is doing and you can make a profit, but its not WoW money.
You're right. And it will stay that way until gamers realize they are wasting their money and stop buying P2P games.
You want me to pay to play a game I already paid for???
GW2 makes its money from box sales (expansions) . The cash shop is just a little extra.
GW2 isn't paying out a lot of money for an IP.
It all ready did an mmo, so they have some idea what to do.
They don't seem to be trying to rush the game out the door, but are releasing when its ready.
If lots of people buy the box, play a few months then buy the next box when it comes out, GW2 will be pretty happy I think.
What all this means is while the game will probably do well, its not going to make other game companies follw their example.
Look at TSW. It has no IP. Funcon has done mmos before and yet it still has a sub (for a little while). Even if TSW had come after GW2, I don't see them changing.
Subs are the golden egg. If you can create another WoW. You can make soo much money. Sure you can do what GW2 is doing and you can make a profit, but its not WoW money.
From some of the companies pushing towards the "free to play" model (or just no subscription), it is actually very surprising what they are finding. They find when people have the option to spend money, they spend more than if they are required to. Hence, why do you think cash shop/free to play games have done well and basically made the games profitable again?
You have just been brainwashed to believe "subscription games are the only ones that are good/work", which isn't true. Things are going to change eventually. There are many titles like PS2, Firefall and GW2 that are all "free to play". When AAA titles are released in this model, it is going to be a big vice grip on all the current subscription games. Especially with how low quality they all have been lately.
You are also comparing a game that hasn't released and are trying to predict the future of their earning based on zero fact. The fact that ArenaNet was profitable enough with GW to make GW2 is obviously enough to show that they were successful before. Just because something doesn't make a gazillion dollars doesn't mean it isn't successful. And if you really want to go down that road, Blizzard gets shit on by oil companies everyday as far as "successfulness" of their buisinesses.
It all comes due to certain stigma based on past history.
Triple-A Western MMOs were always 15/mo. For that, you expected regular updates and development. When a game went free to play, it usually meant all development had stopped, and the game was basically dying. Half the time they maintained a sub even then.
Eastern MMOs, for a while, went quantity over quality. They churned out hundreds of games that were basically the same thing. They also made them F2P...but their cash shops were massively imbalancing. it was possible to buy your way to complete and utter domination of a game. And the only way to stay on top was to outbuy the other players. Which meant the shop drove its own sales.
Recently, the focus has shifted. Eastern developers are slowing down and starting to realize that we don't need 12 more Lineages, or Ragnaroks, or MUs. Western developers, noting that Eastern ones were raking money in hand over fist, started taking the F2P/B2P model seriously and started wondering if it might succeed.
Early successes in the f2p conversion like DDO and LoTRO showed the West that sometimes games could actually pay more money if you didn't need to pay for them. The only gripe Western players really continue to hold onto about f2p is the p2w concept. But the closest I can think of to a P2W Western MMO would be EVE (there's stories of people spending thousands of dollars on PLEX and building Titans with the proceeds). And even that's the extreme, not the rule that was the eastern F2P MMO.
I remember when Richard Aoshi started the Free Zone blogs here on this site. I was actually angry. I thought it was propaganda to try to push P2W F2P games on the Western market. In fact, i pretty much believed it right up until I played League of Legends. That was the proof to me that you could build a game with a AAA experience, not charge a dime for it, and have a cash shop that players would WANT to spend money on but wouldn't imbalance gameplay.
I honestly forsee, that if MMOs continue over the next few years, we're going to see more B2P/F2P titles. And more sub titles doing "unlimited free trials" up to a certain point like WoW, Rift, Tor, and others are doing.
There is always someone who wants to stir the pot it seems. GW2 will be a huge success and it will be profitable for a long time. If Anet didn't believe they could make a good profit from the game they wouldn't have designed it like this. Stop comparing apple to concrete. Different business models with different costs.
Comments
Meant to say arguing
And you should have probably moved on earlier, there was nothing "childish" about his comment
Hey it's ok if that is what you like. In your own post you said you will not play GW2 because it lacks sandbox features. Nothing wrong with that. Also just so you know I play and enjoy both types. As for your last point I agree that most people will not play gw2 for more than a couple months, no real lasting power there just like any themepark. But that's why I think it's worth the box price with no sub fee.
My theme song.
"GW2 will be seen as successful due to box sales only, doesn't mean it's an industry changer!"
Who cares? why should ppl care?
i mean, feels like most of ppl (in this website) that like a game are more concerned if that game is gona beat WoW rather than if they will enjoy all the game content or something.
And if a game is very awesome but because it only has 100k subs + couple servers they wont play it and they'll move to an OK game with 5m subs + hundreds of servers.
Ppl should just play a game they seem fun and not by subs decreasing order.
-Player housing is being disucssed by Anet. They're doing guild halls for sure, but up in the air about player houses. We'll see.
-No you cannot create cities.
-You cannot have a lasting, permanent effect on the world. But, name me one MMO that does this. Even the vaunted sandboxes like UO, Darkfall, EVE, etc. You kill a mob, it respawns. You defeat an enemy, and it appears, or they create a new one to replace it. There is no permanence in a PVE environment of any multiplayer game out there. If you can cite an example I'll gladly eat those words, but near positive it doesn't exist. It can't. If you had that, and the first few people cleared it all, there'd be nothing for anyone else.
Oh but wait, you say. We can make new events with new monsters! Which, in essence, is still a respawn. Just using a different skin. The closest you can come to PvE permanence in a persistent, online world and still manage to provide meaningful content to thousands of players, 24/7, is to create many, MANY random spawn points, and have the spawn table itself be RNG. So you never know what's popping up or when. That gives the illusion of permanence.
-I never quite understand that crafting comment. What exactly do you mean by unique? And can you cite a game that's done it? I know in UO you could discover your own crafting recipes, but all they really did was have maybe a slightly different stat point or two, and have the player's name on them (e.g. "Bob's Super Sword of Awesome"). Is that what you are talking about?
-We can't answer questions about the economy since it doesn't exist yet. however, conjecturing from what we've seen so far, the big ticket items will be:
-crafting materials
-crafted items
-gems
-possibly dyes (if they get this system working the way it SHOULD work)
Dungeon loot can be gotten by anyone. Even if the Tier 1 dungeon doens't drop your chest piece, you gain tokens with which to buy the same piece. And gear is less stat driven than wow, so you're mostly just concerned with aesthetics.
I will agree your vision is MORE a living world than GW2, in the way that GW2 is MORE a living world than wow. Consider it progression.
Theme parks lack long term replayability. The dynamic event grind will wear people's patience thin. Doesn't matter if you change classes or races the event grind will always be the same, go kill x amount of enemies to get to the end boss in events. It will always be the same format starting at level 1. Yeah it will sell well like every mmo does at launch but this is nothing more than your weekend stay at the beach.
Grim Dawn, the next great action rpg!
http://www.grimdawn.com/
This is a possiblity. but if you make it new enemies, in different areas, and provide different objectives, it can still be fresh and interesting. For many people. many others see ANY quest as a repeat of any other quest; I don't know how those folks play RPGs.
While this is something I would enjoy, no game has ever done all these features. This is basically just a pipe-dream that hasn't happened and probably won't for a long time. I do think it would be awesome, but was never something GW2 or most games ever promised.
ArenaNet is delivering on all of their promises I have read so far, and I am sure more stuff will be coming down the pipe at some point. Just whining about getting pizza when you bought ice cream at an ice cream shop makes zero sense, and I am not sure what the heck you were expecting ...
Mmhh how do you increase your combat skills in a sandbox like UO... wait, I remember now, you go out in the world and kill (aka "grind") mobs. Sandbox games lack long term replayability, the repetitive grind will wear people's patience thin.
(I'm a big fan of UO, but I just wanted to point out the nonsense of assuming "boring grind = theme park")
Respect, walk
Are you talkin' to me? Are you talkin' to me?
- PANTERA at HELLFEST 2023
Haha yeah, I remember spending a TON of time in UO grinding skills or gold. I probably killed daemons with blade spirits for like 150 hours total. And I remember spending a lot of time just sitting in firewalls in player towns to raise magic resist.
What you are missing Mephster is that community engenders longevity. UO had tons of grind, but it also had a great community that kept people coming back.
I dunno, I think a big difference between older school games and new school games is that in old school games, you played the game for fun and getting exp/skills/gold was just something you did when you wanted to. But in new games, the game is getting exp/skills/gold. And that makes it feel much more like a grind.
I am hoping, with its large variety of things you can do, that GW2 will bring back the days where we just played a game to play.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
To me, grinding of the standard sandbox level just screams that it's low quality. It was acceptable like 12 years ago but they need to come up with something better now.
Best ways to create and foster community in a MMO- (in no particular order)
1. Player cities/towns
2. Shared objectives
3. Cooperative goals
4. Team based competition
5. Economy
GW2 has 4 of the 5.
The fact the game is without a doubt built as an immersive world, combined with the focus on fun and adventure - not gear and levels, hopefully will couple well with the above to create a game where you can indeed play the game to just.. play!
(no monthly sub fee helps w/ that too!)
In before GW2 kills WoW's population and becomes the most popular MMO for the next 5 years.
GW2 is an amazing game and deserves as much as that, hats off to arenanet for making such polished game that ill be spending thousands of hours enjoying.
This isnt hype, this is from what i've experienced actually playing the game.
It would take a fool to believe that GW2 wont change the industry, MMO's will be scambling to follow GW2's example.
Good points, agree 100%
.
I also have to bring up that in GW2, I actually enjoyed the battlegrounds just for the fun of them. While in other MMORPGs I tolerate the massive imbalances of the battlegrounds just for the exp gain.
Here's to hoping that GW2 brings back game playing as opposed to exp playing.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
That is the whole thing, when people talk about UO, DAoC, EQ or whatever, I am not sure I can really call those a sandbox. They were just the first of their kind ... and they didn't have the tech, the knowledge or the design time to do anything better. So you had a bunch of mobs sitting around waiting to be killed. Don't get me wrong, I had some good times in EQ grinding like a champion for drops or experience (I mean, that is all you did), but it did get old after a while. Especially after friends and guild mates started quitting the game ... I quickly lost interest.
And it is the same way for newer "sand box" games. The only ones I have really played recently are EVE and Darkfall. EVE is fun, but I feel it is a little too open ended. I also feel that it is just a total grind fest all the time. Go mine for X hours. Go grind misison quests for X hours. Go kill pirates for X hours. It honestly isn't very fun or exciting. The most memorable moments were all open world PvP situations ... and most of those were simply getting ganked by X number of people. Some people love the game, but the progression (40 days of waiting to skill up ...) and grind for money (this is basically ALL you do in the game ... grind for money) just got really old for me after a while.
Then games like Darkfall, which need a ton of work, are just really boring. Again, the only fun times were PvP'ing against greifers and gankers. But really, if the game revolves around fighting back against assholes that kill AFK people in town/lower level people, it seems pretty lame to begin with. Past that, it is literally just another skill/money grind on stagnant mob spawns that are the exact same ALL THE TIME.
Sandbox games are the exact opposite of dynamic from what I have seen. So you can build a house, a city, or whatever. Who cares, when all there is to do is gank people and kill mob spawns that are there 100% of the time. It is just a total grind fest. Trust me, I have had fun in these titles, but it isn't any different from the so called "theme park" model that everyone likes to trash talk.
And the last thing, if you think UO is so amazing, then go play it. I guarantee you will find it to be "not what you hoped for". Nostalgia is a powerful thing. I always talk about how much I loved EQ, but when I go back, it just doesn't feel the same (it doesn't help they turned it into easy mode either). People need to just realize, nothing is going to live up to your ridiculous expectations. It is impossible. Going into games with an open mind and just enjoying yourself is going to work much better than getting all hyped up about something. It is better to be pleasantly surprsied than let down.
Then again, maybe that is why everyone is being so negative?
While UO and the like were the early pioneers and just didn't have the tech to do what we can today (seriously, quest scripting was a BIG thing once upon a time), I also think they tried hard to emulate the experience of a pen-and-paper RPG, where the only limits were what rules your DM set and what you as a player coiuld think up to mess with him.
For me it's because the structured pvp is intentionally more like a MOBA or FPS than your typical MMO battleground.
GW2 makes its money from box sales (expansions) . The cash shop is just a little extra.
GW2 isn't paying out a lot of money for an IP.
It all ready did an mmo, so they have some idea what to do.
They don't seem to be trying to rush the game out the door, but are releasing when its ready.
If lots of people buy the box, play a few months then buy the next box when it comes out, GW2 will be pretty happy I think.
What all this means is while the game will probably do well, its not going to make other game companies follw their example.
Look at TSW. It has no IP. Funcon has done mmos before and yet it still has a sub (for a little while). Even if TSW had come after GW2, I don't see them changing.
Subs are the golden egg. If you can create another WoW. You can make soo much money. Sure you can do what GW2 is doing and you can make a profit, but its not WoW money.
From some of the companies pushing towards the "free to play" model (or just no subscription), it is actually very surprising what they are finding. They find when people have the option to spend money, they spend more than if they are required to. Hence, why do you think cash shop/free to play games have done well and basically made the games profitable again?
You have just been brainwashed to believe "subscription games are the only ones that are good/work", which isn't true. Things are going to change eventually. There are many titles like PS2, Firefall and GW2 that are all "free to play". When AAA titles are released in this model, it is going to be a big vice grip on all the current subscription games. Especially with how low quality they all have been lately.
You are also comparing a game that hasn't released and are trying to predict the future of their earning based on zero fact. The fact that ArenaNet was profitable enough with GW to make GW2 is obviously enough to show that they were successful before. Just because something doesn't make a gazillion dollars doesn't mean it isn't successful. And if you really want to go down that road, Blizzard gets shit on by oil companies everyday as far as "successfulness" of their buisinesses.
You're right. And it will stay that way until gamers realize they are wasting their money and stop buying P2P games.
You want me to pay to play a game I already paid for???
Be afraid.....The dragons are HERE!
It's success is based on how long box copies sell for. Diablo 2 for example was one of the top 10 best selling PC games of 2008.
It all comes due to certain stigma based on past history.
Triple-A Western MMOs were always 15/mo. For that, you expected regular updates and development. When a game went free to play, it usually meant all development had stopped, and the game was basically dying. Half the time they maintained a sub even then.
Eastern MMOs, for a while, went quantity over quality. They churned out hundreds of games that were basically the same thing. They also made them F2P...but their cash shops were massively imbalancing. it was possible to buy your way to complete and utter domination of a game. And the only way to stay on top was to outbuy the other players. Which meant the shop drove its own sales.
Recently, the focus has shifted. Eastern developers are slowing down and starting to realize that we don't need 12 more Lineages, or Ragnaroks, or MUs. Western developers, noting that Eastern ones were raking money in hand over fist, started taking the F2P/B2P model seriously and started wondering if it might succeed.
Early successes in the f2p conversion like DDO and LoTRO showed the West that sometimes games could actually pay more money if you didn't need to pay for them. The only gripe Western players really continue to hold onto about f2p is the p2w concept. But the closest I can think of to a P2W Western MMO would be EVE (there's stories of people spending thousands of dollars on PLEX and building Titans with the proceeds). And even that's the extreme, not the rule that was the eastern F2P MMO.
I remember when Richard Aoshi started the Free Zone blogs here on this site. I was actually angry. I thought it was propaganda to try to push P2W F2P games on the Western market. In fact, i pretty much believed it right up until I played League of Legends. That was the proof to me that you could build a game with a AAA experience, not charge a dime for it, and have a cash shop that players would WANT to spend money on but wouldn't imbalance gameplay.
I honestly forsee, that if MMOs continue over the next few years, we're going to see more B2P/F2P titles. And more sub titles doing "unlimited free trials" up to a certain point like WoW, Rift, Tor, and others are doing.
Prediction is 1.5 to 2 M boxes at release.... and many many more over the first year if word spreads around.
On top of that their itemshop will generate more income then most sub games which end up with considerably less people playing nightly
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 agree with this, take Lotro for example, it dropped it's sub and made a MT shop. The money they were earning increased by 300%.
tl;dr OP
There is always someone who wants to stir the pot it seems. GW2 will be a huge success and it will be profitable for a long time. If Anet didn't believe they could make a good profit from the game they wouldn't have designed it like this. Stop comparing apple to concrete. Different business models with different costs.