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I'm so confused about how this game is thriving...
Mkilbride
Member UncommonPosts: 643
So, I bought GW2, filled up my GW1 HoM, had my account stolen, NCsoft said that it was "To much of a hassle" to get it back, their literally worlds, I screamed and wanted to punch things, but got over it, my hype for GW2 was high, and well, ArenaNet is the one who makes the game...so. I got GW2. I played it in the beta and remember seeing "Placeholder" on a lot of things...then waited for the HEadstart...did the Headstart...noticed everything that said "Placeholder" was still there, and not changed from beta...
Played the game for three weeks and tried my best to like it...but after GW1, I couldn't forgive what they did to the series. I hear about how smashing a success it is, 400,000 concurrent players, 3 million + sales,
So I like to log in every few weeks to just see how the game is going. I warp to around 10 different zones, the starting cities ect...and they are empty. I even did map chat in a zone and got that response "No one hears you", you know, when no one is in an area? That's nuts!
I assumed my server, must infact, be a low population. However, upon looking it up, my server is in the top 3 most populated! I wonder around and barely find anyone, and if I do, they are not interested in talking or interacting in any way...it's like they're bots...
So I am on one of the top 3 most populated servers, I can warp to each starting city, and most of the zones around them...and I can't find anyone unless one of those World Boss things are popping(In which case, I see like 60-70 people come outta nowhere...kinda lame, actually.), and the World BOss turns into no threat at all with so many people. Can just press auto-attack and go grab a snack, come back, collect phat lewtz.
I'm not understanding! During events and such in towns I can find a ton of people, but outside of town, it's like a ghost town! I tried 1-20 leveling ares, 20-40, and 40-70 areas and there was enough people in those zones to count on both of my hands! When I asked, people said everyone was doing end-game...
But then there is all this talk about how the game is getting lots of new players...but I can go to Queensdale and at certain hours get "NO one hears you" In Queensdale!
There are Dynamic Events in areas I can no longer complete because they require people...people that aren't there!
Help get Camelot Unchained made, a old-school MMORPG, with no hand holding!
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/13861848/camelot-unchained
Comments
The Enlightened take things Lightly
The only server that has a decent pop across all areas is Tarnished Coast.
Other servers.. yeah.. ANet is trying their best on the 'mid level wasteland' problem but it isn't a 100% solution.
Gdemami -
Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
Help get Camelot Unchained made, a old-school MMORPG, with no hand holding!
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/13861848/camelot-unchained
No lets not get rid of character progression thats part of what makes a MMORPG a MMORPG..
What we need is a good game that people will enjoy playing multiple times..
Honestly, the game just launched with too many servers with a huge world. The number of players it would take to keep every (or even most) areas populated on all of the servers is unimaginable. So while the game's playerbase is thriving, there is too much of a spread to make community interactions thrive. Couple this with grossly uneven rewards and you have entire zones that are largely forsaken (pretty much every below-70 zone with the exception of starter zones and world bosses).
It's just a shame that server mergers have such a stigma of poor game health attached to them, because that's precisely what the game has needed since launch.
GW2 has impressive game quality, especially considering all the crap that's been slung at us over the years. It's the only game to put any sort of dent into WoW in the past 8 years.
That said, the game was sorely missing a key component. A point to playing it after the brief fun wears off.
It doesn't have a sub. That's the only reason it has any success. It's quality enough to put in a box and charge for, but turns into your typical item mall f2p pretty quick, except most f2p games have an end game. The end game is where they usually generate all their money, for GW2, it's box sales and getting people to buy the worthless crap in the item mall.
When it comes time to drop the box price they'll just push out an expansion, and make that money all over again.
http://thewordiz.wordpress.com/
Now there's a problem - why do you need a reason to play a game? "Fun" should more than suffice. Why does your character need bonus stats on his epicly rare legendary sword of fabled shinyness in order for you to continue playing?
If the fun wears off, it's because of a sadly limited number of available skills and a lack of viable builds, not a lack of a purpose.
I missed the part where they mentioned gear. Any other selling points from the dev you'd like to regurgitate?
http://thewordiz.wordpress.com/
It's called Neverwinter, and it gets picked a part for being too instanced.
http://thewordiz.wordpress.com/
Agree 100%
http://thewordiz.wordpress.com/
It was thriving for the first 2 weeks after launch. It has declined steeply since then. According to NCSoft, sales of GW2 dropped 73% from Q4, 2012 (expected due to holidays but it was a significant drop). According to Xfire, GW2 lost 90% of their players since launch. According to Raptr, it is the 5th most played MMO (WoW, Rift, Defiance, Neverwinter) are head of it. SWTOR is just right behind it.
So you are right and wrong. It was thriving at launch, but it took a nose dive quickly as the game lacks content, especially end game content. And there is no reason to stay past max level other than to level alts.
A quick test to check how bad GW2 population is, check the sPvP servers during primetime. There are less than 200 people during primetime in GW2, sPvP servers across all their servers both NA and EU. Those are shockingly low numbers.
Does anyone use map chat? I know I don't. In fact, I don't even have a tab for it. If someone standing next to me was to type something in map chat I wouldn't know. I have my guild tab active all the time and the only other thing that shows there besides guild messages is party ones and whispers. I don't think you can judge population by map chat use at all.
OP. If you don't see anyone, you must be on a low population server no matter what you say. I can go anywhere in the world at any time of day or night and see other players on our server, Of course it's not as busy as when the game was new but it's still doing far better than any other game I've played in recent years with regard to retaining an active population after this many months.
I don't agree that everyone is doing end game stuff making the lower level areas empty either. Just about everyone in our guild is levelling alts and they are spread out across all levels. The character i'm playing at present is level 40 but if I wanted to play my level 80 Engineer there's a ton of content available for high level characters. Our guild has things going on for level 80's nearly every evening for those that want it.. It's true it's not a raiding game and if that's your definition of end game content, then GW2 maybe isn't the game for you but that doesn't mean there isn't a massive choice of other things to do.
im a bit confused
ive 15 characters all between lvl 7 an 70
and im still surprised to meet people in the most out of the way places
a example was the other day at 6 in the morning i was in a lvl 30 zone wandering around and suddenly a event kicks off and out of no where 3 others came to join in
now granted there arn't 100's of players all running around zerging the content but to be honest its not very fun when your doing this and i prefer smaller groups
The go back to lower areas as high lvl character so you can play with your lowbee lvl friends or other lowbee players totally failed most high lvls don't do this they still have feeling they go to noob areas even its downscaled and a challenge they just dont do it.
Many theory on paper in this game have failed im affraid.
Press betaweekends and my own betaweekends where decption they decieved me game is fraction of what it was when i started actually playing at launch.
That's what they are trying to fix with the living story content.
At this very moment most 80s are in southsun cove treasure hunting for the new Living story event.
Last week in Diessa Plateau and Wayfarer Foothills those zones were packed full of players engaging in the living story stuff.
The world zones aren't currently as good as we'd like them to be but once they get used to making the living story work for them we'll see most zones utilized at some point or another. Just not every single zone at once.
Play for fun. Play to win. Play for perfection. Play with friends. Play in another world. Why do you play?
Reading this thread made me think...Did you guys (90% of you who replied here at least) ever PLAYED the game?
Zones are empty because people are doing "endgame" ? WHAT ENDGAME? When did they add a specific endgame for level 80s and nobody told me about it ?
People "abandoning levelling zones"? GW2 doesn't quite work that way does it ? Levelling content ? Since the game downscales you to zone level then it's all endgame isnt it? I mean, you go for jumping puzzles, map completion, gathering materials or group events whatever -everywhere- in the world. Sure some are easier than others, some need more people or are less challenging but doesn't matter since effectively you can play anything at any level and get some reward from it tha suits you.
I've recently levelled up my guardian up to 53 and I am seeing people *everywhere*. Depends on time or if there's an event going on but I bumped into a lot of level 80s in low level areas either helping, doing some guild related event or just going for map completion...
I am not here to defend GW2 in any way but I do get the feeling that on these forums people just discuss and judge based 90% on assumptions alone...
Actually if you don't like the game you will say it is dead in one sentence and in the next (if not the same) you will say everything is a huge zerging.
Apparently it is empty but at the same time so full everything is zerged - the marvelous world of GW2 haters.
The game is so so empty they just had problems with the mass of people logging to do the new content,
Currently playing: GW2
Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
I've started playing 3 weeks ago on Ring of Fire server and only had the 'problem' at the 50/60 zones. Just seemed to be able to do less of the events due to people being more spread out.
Do mind I said less, most events where doable with the small groups out there just that I had to skip a few champion events.
Maybe it's the server (some are more pve minded) but you can guest on other servers to see if it is that. Might be the wrong time.
I can see how it would effect your view and enjoyment of this game if you have a hard time doing events/seeing people around.
I only joined a guild at lvl 80 since I never had a NEED for it. It is however more fun in a guild. But it's nice to see that you can take your time choosing one and still have a lot enjoyment in the game and not being punished because you are guildless.
Quite possible actually. The people that are playing are zerging the content that is there.......
James T. Kirk: All she's got isn't good enough! What else ya got?
if that was true they wouldn't be complain the world was empty.
Either it is empty or everything is a zerg - it can't be both at the same time.
If you don't like zergs you go to an emptier place. If you don't like empty places you go to where the people are massing.
Currently playing: GW2
Going cardboard starter kit: Ticket to ride, Pandemic, Carcassonne, Dominion, 7 Wonders
"Lots of new players" is a relative thing. I would bet that the vast majority of players are at or near the top levels in the game and are doing whatever it is people do in GW2 at the top level.
I would also bet that people don't play nearly as regularly as they would with a subscription game. The people play when they want to play, instead of playing every day because they've spent the money on the sub.
Combine these two things and you can have a "booming" game, where a new player doesn't see too many other players.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.