It was. What was different about this beta?..you all PAID to be in it. A genious move by NC/ANet to turn the tables and instead of paying testers or letting them atleast test for free.
I certainly didn't pay to be in GW2 beta weekend and I don't know anyone who did. If you bought a beta account on ebay then you made a dumb mistake, you should have just preordered the game and you would get access to beta weekends.
As for beta players being paid... haha.
Of course we paid for it....did you not pay $$ for a preorder copy? I did. I paid for a digital delux copy of a game that has not technically been released yet. We have a nonrefundable copy of a game that may not actually be realesed for another year or more, I certainly hope it arrives sooner but we have no release date. We paid for the game ealry and get the "added bonus" of testing their game for them and working out all the kinks. That makes great business sense.
I think no matter what happens with what game people are going to have a reason to B*tich. I've sat here and listened to the whiny people. 2 things, if you like it stay, if you don't move on.
#3 is the only legitimate thing to complain about in my opinion. The overflows simply aren't working well at the moment. They don't work like actual queues (you can bypass overflow by just zoning into the zone back and forth repeatly till you get into the server).
The other complaints are mostly do to it being beta and still being a ways away from release. I did experience major lag (not frame rate, but ping) on Friday and some on Saturday, but like others have said didn't experience any on Sunday.
#3 is the only legitimate thing to complain about in my opinion. The overflows simply aren't working well at the moment. They don't work like actual queues (you can bypass overflow by just zoning into the zone back and forth repeatly till you get into the server).
The other complaints are mostly do to it being beta and still being a ways away from release. I did experience major lag (not frame rate, but ping) on Friday and some on Saturday, but like others have said didn't experience any on Sunday.
Thou shalt not kill pixels on the sabath......less traffic
Oh, and to the commenters who said this is the best graphics they have seen in an MMO......Sarcasm is sometimes lost in internet forum posts.....I cought it but others might truly believe you were actually sincere.....
Yes, they got cut durring early development I am guessing.
4. Cartoonish Character Models – Norn & Human
The art is a weak point for me. Some may love it, but for me it reminds me of Korean mmos like Aion in style.
3. Overflows
They make an already instanced game feel even more, well, instanced.
2. Changing the MMO Game Play Paradigm
I think they did that to make the game more solo and casual friendly. They haven't actually gotten rid of the holy trinity, just everyone can heal.
1. LAAAAAG
Yes, the lag and other game cripling bugs were very apparent to many players at beta.
Here are 5 others.
6. The cut scenes to the PvE story are really bad. No animation.
7. In PvE there are actually sometimes long dialogue sequences where you have no choices but just the one option to click on. It makes the PvE seem very linear.
8. Class balance in the PvP mini games is not great.
9. Lots of instancing. Doesn't feel open world at all.
10. Largest instances such as the city have art to give the illusion of size, when in fact the cities are about the same size as the ones in WoW.
1) stuff like lag and quests that many not work rite were present.Thats expected
2) I would have liked more character detail and crisp graphics
3) My number 1 complaint was a queue for WvW.TO ME that is a cardinal sin.I play this game for the WvW.If its going to be treated like a kidde 15 minute game of tag with a waiting line....I will rapidly move on to a game that takes the feature more seriously.
Overall I was very pleased with the game in its first beta.
I had a lot of fun this beta weekend event but its clear that this game still needs work. What they have is awesome but I had lag on and off all weekend, lots of bugs, crashes to desktop and their UI really needs to be worked on. Not everyone is gona want X,Y,Z skill in the same place as everyone else. I need to be able to change where I want things and that is the basic needs of any MMO UI. Fine no add ons but whats there should be up to me where I want it. I really think this game needs full time testing from gamers. Internal testing only gets you so far and GW2 is in a place it needs full time testing as BWE really are not gona get this game ready for the masses.
These are true enough points, but what is there to bitch about?
We knew about 5, 4 is a subjective but fair point, however i fail to see how that is any different in any other fantasy driven MMO.
As for point 3 it was the first open beta. Dying servers are to be expected. Some people seem to lose grip on the term Beta....
Point 2 is not a point of critisism, it is the greatest thing that ever happend to MMO gaming since its existance. And if this is not your piece of cake, it was a USP for this game from day one. So herp derp if you play it and only found out about that then and there.
1 is same as point 3, busy servers, beta software, wait for final to actually complain about those things. Its called beta for a reason.
In my opinion, even though I had login-issues it was in a better playable state then some other MMO's i've played on Launch day. And those where not even half as popular as this one.
The game needs a lot of work. I am truely surprised how much people are praising this game. Compared to ANY action based game, this games combat is a poor immitation. I've had melee mobs hit me from like 10 feet away. I have circle strafed bosses to death with melee from 15 feet away. I've been hit by unavoidable ranged attacks, I've been hit even when dodging. The fact that they force you to rely on a dodge mechanic that you can only use twice in like 30 seconds. It was bad that I played PSO2 for a week beforehand cause it showed that a F2P game that is still in beta can do better then GW2 did in "B E T A". When Sega announced that they were extending the PSO2 beta into the weekend , I ended up playing that more then GW2 even after playing for a week before.
Please stop trolling. I played in this weekend's event and never experienced any of the problems you have listed. In fact, what you've said is just laughable.
I was frustrated that I couldn't log in at all Friday night, but managed to without any problems for the rest of the weekend, so not so bad. There is a new expectation, for me, anyway, that if I'm having to pay £10 extra to participate in beta weekends that those weekends then need to be available to me from the beginning.
The major complaint I have is that click-to-move was missing. Maybe it will be enabled at some point? Folks who don't like it can always disable the option.
What I loved about it in GW was that combined with the feature of holding down alt to highlight npc names, it meant I could then click on npc of choice and auto-move to her. For me that means no more hours of wandering around in circles, getting more and more frustrated. Yes, I know some people are good at finding their way around, even in cities with different levels, but I'm just not, ok? :P
Other than that, and the queues for WvWvW (sadly I never got in), no complaints.
It was. What was different about this beta?..you all PAID to be in it. A genious move by NC/ANet to turn the tables and instead of paying testers or letting them atleast test for free.
People are bitching about a game in beta not being finished. Personally, outside of overflow, optimization and event scaling issues, there is really nothing to complain about, at least for me. The game is still in beta and certain things are bound to change but so far, it is a solid game, probably one of the best in the genre.
Also, based on the developer posts on the official forums, ArenaNet is taking a very serious look at the melee issues, personal mission difficulty and event scaling issues. In other words, they are listening, communicating and working on the game.
Ugh, I couldn't believe the audacity that Arena.Net had opening a Beta in this state to the public. Granted I didn't get to play until Sunday so I avoided all of the lag everyone else complained about entirely, and I did find the dynamic quests to be thoughtfully entertaining, and the combat system was a big breath of fresh air, O and I was suprised to find out that I do enjoy not having to worry about dedicated healing classes, and the lack of a Mana bar and the ability to dodge, but there was one massive game breaker for me that I cannot just let go, I couldn't set AutoRun as my middle mouse button! I mean, common Arena.Net, how can your otherwise flawless key mapping system not recognize my middle mouse button when it could recognize my mouse buttons 4 and 5? Unacceptable Arena.Net! Next time you want to open your game up for testing so you can uncover bugs that you couldn't possibly uncover internally I demand that you give us more than an outstanding preview of what we can expect when the game is ready for launch!
Ugh, I couldn't believe the audacity that Arena.Net had opening a Beta in this state to the public. Granted I didn't get to play until Sunday so I avoided all of the lag everyone else complained about entirely, and I did find the dynamic quests to be thoughtfully entertaining, and the combat system was a big breath of fresh air, O and I was suprised to find out that I do enjoy not having to worry about dedicated healing classes, and the lack of a Mana bar and the ability to dodge, but there was one massive game breaker for me that I cannot just let go, I couldn't set AutoRun as my middle mouse button! I mean, common Arena.Net, how can your otherwise flawless key mapping system not recognize my middle mouse button when it could recognize my mouse buttons 4 and 5? Unacceptable Arena.Net! Next time you want to open your game up for testing so you can uncover bugs that you couldn't possibly uncover internally I demand that you give us more than an outstanding preview of what we can expect when the game is ready for launch!
Please tell me you are not serious.... I dont know about you but i managed to change hot keys during the beta, granted I never tried the middle mouse button but when you can just hit numlock to auto run its not a big deal.
far from being a game breaker, it would just be your personal feelings of entitlement when it comes to a product.
I doubt most people even rely on autorun to begin with. I rarely ever use it, maybe its because im playing the game and not sitting back and watching.
That said, in regards to the rest of the thread:
Biggest complaints would be disapointing world asset meshes, though I know why they would want to make such simplistic and badly done meshes and tiled texture work, I still dont enjoy seeing it.
Like the article, the character meshes were soso. Norn just look bad entirely, rather the saggy manboobs, and the inability to not be a hulk type character seemed odd to me. A less cumbersome norn choice would be appreciated. Also Norns run in slow motion, perhaps fixing the animation to a light jog as opposed to a run would be better than the slow hulk movements of the norn.
Also the instances are kind of funny... its always something that needs your help to cross maybe like 10 feet. For example, npcs have a caravan they need you to escort... ok, so where do they spawn? in the middle of a road. Where do they need you to escort them to? Maybe 5 seconds worth of running in the other direction. Its completely alienating and stupid how anticlimatic and silly some of these instances are, especially since they use the same level u were on before. They should have just modeled out a seperate instance in which to give the illusion of something different and unique, not tiny patches of land you run through effortlessly every time.
I Pre Purchased the game... why? because I wanted to, I will be playing this game with my other friends so i would eventually have to buy it later anyways, so why not buy it now when there are collectors editions available?? Beta access was a nice addition!
IT IS A BETA... Beta doesn't mean completed product, EVERY GAMER and I mean EVERY gamer should know this, when you sign on for Beta, you should be expecting bugs! Is it frustrating when things don't work?? Sure it is, however mindsets should be its a beta, its expected, not damn i hate this game because it doesn't work...
Optimizations are not completed... ppl again its a Beta, Areanet never said "Hey, buy our game and get access to our almost completed beta sessions" From what I have heard and read was they have no set release date (heard 12/31/12 but???) so I fully expect to see the next Beta incorporate some of the needed fixes and suggestions that were made this time!!! I gaurantee you that they have guys searching the Net for sites like this looking at what people thought and adding to the list of fixes that are mentioned that they didnt have. and at the next beta weekend, they will do the same thing again until all the issues are taken care of. This is how the Beta process works!
I bet all you bitchers and whiners who say the game sucks, will be logging in next time too.
I experienced a couple things, 1.) playing my Charr the 1st night was super laggy and I have the processor / graphics to handle it.. but it was so bad i rerolled as a Norn and had no issues again in the lag dept. i heard that they did fix that. 2.) when i exited game, my pc would lock up for a good 5-10 mins after returning to the desktop... other than that, it was a great experience that left me wanting more... and I just played PvE.
Remember, This was a Beta Test, not a launch, it will only get better from here!
To me, reviewing a beta is a little odd. It's a little early to be taking shots and making criticisms. It's like reading a book a novelist is 85% done writing and saying you don't like the ending.
Still, I guess all this is good to know. It will be on Arenanet to fix them.
I see few actually understand what beta is and what it means. You can judge a game based of its beta and yes you can have certain gripes.
In beta they will not change art assets for example. Those are usually 99% of the time finalized by beta. This is the general practice in the game industry, it wouldnt be qualified for beta classification if the assets were not done. This means, any gripes about character meshes and environment art are legit, even when its beta.
Secondly, beta is usually for adjusting and bug squashing. One cannot gripe about lag in a beta because the point of the beta is to test the servers, usually intentionally made laggy in order to stress the servers. Tweaks are made for performance. They also are gathering data on what is fun and not fun. They wont cut it if its not fun, but they may try to balance out the difficulty of gameplay via stat and numerical changes.
Just because its beta does not mean gripes can not be logically given. What you see is what you get in Beta for the most part and you will not find otherwise outside of the realm of optimization.
Comments
Of course we paid for it....did you not pay $$ for a preorder copy? I did. I paid for a digital delux copy of a game that has not technically been released yet. We have a nonrefundable copy of a game that may not actually be realesed for another year or more, I certainly hope it arrives sooner but we have no release date. We paid for the game ealry and get the "added bonus" of testing their game for them and working out all the kinks. That makes great business sense.
Just in case anyone missed it, ArenaNet stated in the beta forums that the overflow issue will be fixed.
Langsdorff
#3 is the only legitimate thing to complain about in my opinion. The overflows simply aren't working well at the moment. They don't work like actual queues (you can bypass overflow by just zoning into the zone back and forth repeatly till you get into the server).
The other complaints are mostly do to it being beta and still being a ways away from release. I did experience major lag (not frame rate, but ping) on Friday and some on Saturday, but like others have said didn't experience any on Sunday.
Thou shalt not kill pixels on the sabath......less traffic
5. No Asura, No Sylvari
Yes, they got cut durring early development I am guessing.
4. Cartoonish Character Models – Norn & Human
The art is a weak point for me. Some may love it, but for me it reminds me of Korean mmos like Aion in style.
3. Overflows
They make an already instanced game feel even more, well, instanced.
2. Changing the MMO Game Play Paradigm
I think they did that to make the game more solo and casual friendly. They haven't actually gotten rid of the holy trinity, just everyone can heal.
1. LAAAAAG
Yes, the lag and other game cripling bugs were very apparent to many players at beta.
Here are 5 others.
6. The cut scenes to the PvE story are really bad. No animation.
7. In PvE there are actually sometimes long dialogue sequences where you have no choices but just the one option to click on. It makes the PvE seem very linear.
8. Class balance in the PvP mini games is not great.
9. Lots of instancing. Doesn't feel open world at all.
10. Largest instances such as the city have art to give the illusion of size, when in fact the cities are about the same size as the ones in WoW.
A few comments :
1) stuff like lag and quests that many not work rite were present.Thats expected
2) I would have liked more character detail and crisp graphics
3) My number 1 complaint was a queue for WvW.TO ME that is a cardinal sin.I play this game for the WvW.If its going to be treated like a kidde 15 minute game of tag with a waiting line....I will rapidly move on to a game that takes the feature more seriously.
Overall I was very pleased with the game in its first beta.
These are true enough points, but what is there to bitch about?
We knew about 5, 4 is a subjective but fair point, however i fail to see how that is any different in any other fantasy driven MMO.
As for point 3 it was the first open beta. Dying servers are to be expected. Some people seem to lose grip on the term Beta....
Point 2 is not a point of critisism, it is the greatest thing that ever happend to MMO gaming since its existance. And if this is not your piece of cake, it was a USP for this game from day one. So herp derp if you play it and only found out about that then and there.
1 is same as point 3, busy servers, beta software, wait for final to actually complain about those things. Its called beta for a reason.
In my opinion, even though I had login-issues it was in a better playable state then some other MMO's i've played on Launch day. And those where not even half as popular as this one.
Please stop trolling. I played in this weekend's event and never experienced any of the problems you have listed. In fact, what you've said is just laughable.
"illusive Sylvari" : that would be "elusive" ^^
I was frustrated that I couldn't log in at all Friday night, but managed to without any problems for the rest of the weekend, so not so bad. There is a new expectation, for me, anyway, that if I'm having to pay £10 extra to participate in beta weekends that those weekends then need to be available to me from the beginning.
The major complaint I have is that click-to-move was missing. Maybe it will be enabled at some point? Folks who don't like it can always disable the option.
What I loved about it in GW was that combined with the feature of holding down alt to highlight npc names, it meant I could then click on npc of choice and auto-move to her. For me that means no more hours of wandering around in circles, getting more and more frustrated. Yes, I know some people are good at finding their way around, even in cities with different levels, but I'm just not, ok? :P
Other than that, and the queues for WvWvW (sadly I never got in), no complaints.
thanks ! the game is fun! i will!!! have fun playing WoW/Tera/Rift/Wizards 101
Yeah of those 5, I'd say 4 are "cause it's beta" and one is a good thing - glad it is a new paradigm.
GW2 is in pretty good shape if these are the 5 things people are b*tching about!
Also anyone who says no trinity = zerg fest probably hasn't played the game yet lol
5. No Asura, No Sylvari
BETA
4. Cartoonish Character Models – Norn & Human
HuhWTF?
Meaty arms and hands? Yes, that's was pretty odd. /bugreport
3. Overflows
Serious issue that needs addressing.
2. Changing the MMO Game Play Paradigm
That's supposed to be a selling point. If it isn't for someone, play another game with tradtional mechanics.
1. LAAAAAG
BEEEETTTTAAAAAAA...
People are bitching about a game in beta not being finished.
Personally, outside of overflow, optimization and event scaling issues, there is really nothing to complain about, at least for me. The game is still in beta and certain things are bound to change but so far, it is a solid game, probably one of the best in the genre.
Also, based on the developer posts on the official forums, ArenaNet is taking a very serious look at the melee issues, personal mission difficulty and event scaling issues. In other words, they are listening, communicating and working on the game.
Please tell me you are not serious.... I dont know about you but i managed to change hot keys during the beta, granted I never tried the middle mouse button but when you can just hit numlock to auto run its not a big deal.
far from being a game breaker, it would just be your personal feelings of entitlement when it comes to a product.
I doubt most people even rely on autorun to begin with. I rarely ever use it, maybe its because im playing the game and not sitting back and watching.
That said, in regards to the rest of the thread:
Biggest complaints would be disapointing world asset meshes, though I know why they would want to make such simplistic and badly done meshes and tiled texture work, I still dont enjoy seeing it.
Like the article, the character meshes were soso. Norn just look bad entirely, rather the saggy manboobs, and the inability to not be a hulk type character seemed odd to me. A less cumbersome norn choice would be appreciated. Also Norns run in slow motion, perhaps fixing the animation to a light jog as opposed to a run would be better than the slow hulk movements of the norn.
Also the instances are kind of funny... its always something that needs your help to cross maybe like 10 feet. For example, npcs have a caravan they need you to escort... ok, so where do they spawn? in the middle of a road. Where do they need you to escort them to? Maybe 5 seconds worth of running in the other direction. Its completely alienating and stupid how anticlimatic and silly some of these instances are, especially since they use the same level u were on before. They should have just modeled out a seperate instance in which to give the illusion of something different and unique, not tiny patches of land you run through effortlessly every time.
I Pre Purchased the game... why? because I wanted to, I will be playing this game with my other friends so i would eventually have to buy it later anyways, so why not buy it now when there are collectors editions available?? Beta access was a nice addition!
IT IS A BETA... Beta doesn't mean completed product, EVERY GAMER and I mean EVERY gamer should know this, when you sign on for Beta, you should be expecting bugs! Is it frustrating when things don't work?? Sure it is, however mindsets should be its a beta, its expected, not damn i hate this game because it doesn't work...
Optimizations are not completed... ppl again its a Beta, Areanet never said "Hey, buy our game and get access to our almost completed beta sessions" From what I have heard and read was they have no set release date (heard 12/31/12 but???) so I fully expect to see the next Beta incorporate some of the needed fixes and suggestions that were made this time!!! I gaurantee you that they have guys searching the Net for sites like this looking at what people thought and adding to the list of fixes that are mentioned that they didnt have. and at the next beta weekend, they will do the same thing again until all the issues are taken care of. This is how the Beta process works!
I bet all you bitchers and whiners who say the game sucks, will be logging in next time too.
I experienced a couple things, 1.) playing my Charr the 1st night was super laggy and I have the processor / graphics to handle it.. but it was so bad i rerolled as a Norn and had no issues again in the lag dept. i heard that they did fix that. 2.) when i exited game, my pc would lock up for a good 5-10 mins after returning to the desktop... other than that, it was a great experience that left me wanting more... and I just played PvE.
Remember, This was a Beta Test, not a launch, it will only get better from here!
To me, reviewing a beta is a little odd. It's a little early to be taking shots and making criticisms. It's like reading a book a novelist is 85% done writing and saying you don't like the ending.
Still, I guess all this is good to know. It will be on Arenanet to fix them.
I see few actually understand what beta is and what it means. You can judge a game based of its beta and yes you can have certain gripes.
In beta they will not change art assets for example. Those are usually 99% of the time finalized by beta. This is the general practice in the game industry, it wouldnt be qualified for beta classification if the assets were not done. This means, any gripes about character meshes and environment art are legit, even when its beta.
Secondly, beta is usually for adjusting and bug squashing. One cannot gripe about lag in a beta because the point of the beta is to test the servers, usually intentionally made laggy in order to stress the servers. Tweaks are made for performance. They also are gathering data on what is fun and not fun. They wont cut it if its not fun, but they may try to balance out the difficulty of gameplay via stat and numerical changes.
Just because its beta does not mean gripes can not be logically given. What you see is what you get in Beta for the most part and you will not find otherwise outside of the realm of optimization.