There is one thing you dont consider: You dont pay any subscription. It will not only be a different game for the dev cause he doesnt look at the subnumbers. It will be a different expirience for most mmo-gamers too.
- If you dont have fun you stop playing and come back at a later date. You arent "forced" to play cause you just paid that month. You can switch this game on and off. If your are not motivated just play another game for a week and then... oh my god.... just come back to gw2 and play again cause it will still be available to you.
Sure at first it will be a strange feeling but a lot of people will switch on and off with GW2 after the first 2-3 months. Get in check the new things out play a bit of PVP make that cool new DE thats just running and log off again. No subscription is needed. You can come back and leave as often as you wish... just like all those other great games without subscription. Lots of them dont have carrots at all.... and tbh i still play them. Strange isnt it?
Not having any real rewards will make many people leave the game.
You are syaing that people do not play games purely for cosmetic rewards? Do you actually game much outside of gear based MMOs? People will play for HOURS for cosmetic reasons. Hell, even for achievements. Not everyone is motivated by the gear treadmill.
As for the review... it's Pokket... the girl who found it so difficult to be crtiical of SWtOR for whatever reason... /shrug
People play for all sorts of reasons, GW1 endgame was entirely cosmetic gear for a lot of people and still millions play that!
My god, I'm agreeing with Vesavius! O_O
Gdemami - Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
There are rewards in RvR, I got 3 pieces of Mastercrafted armour drop of the mobs that were all part of a matching set, 2 pieces from the Frogs and 1 piece from the Ascalon Archers, You also get an event to protect the Frog/Toad race, but I shall let you guys work out what the reward is. RvR is not all about protecting and attacking players or keeps, thats what a lot of players don't really understand.
Player kills can also reward you with tokens which can be traded for gear, which someone has already pointed out.
There are also token traders in LA where you can get some really nice gear, Pirate weapons from the pirates with Karma, In Divinity's Reach there is Karma traders for high level gear from around level 40 up. There is rewards, just because they dont become available in the same way as you have obtained them in other games, you need to look around a bit more, they are there.
Finally someone that looks past the first experience. Not having any real rewards will make many people leave the game. /quote] There will be more than enough to do. There still is a gear grind. It is completely optional though. Killing endgame bosses will take time. The thing that really will keep people playing is the fact that no one will be hoarding on your turf and grieving in my opinion.
On top of that another point of proof is that when reaching max level in GW and finishing the story
A few loud mouths complained so now most left after they finished the story? I say bullshit. I still saw most of the same people a year in.
Another point of outright criticisme is not having player names shown in WvW.
subjective criticism. You will not gain notoriety with names enabled because of the switching servers every 2 weeks. So to be honest moot point.
Good to finally hear someone that looks beyound the greatness of the first hours of this tremendous game.
Lots of people have done fair reviews from the BWE without praising it into the heavens.
So if Arenanet is truelly listening, they should also listen to this criticisme and not say its not going to happen.
Right Anet should listen to her sole voice, because she doesn't like their philosophy.
As for previous posters: the comparison with Doom and FF and whatever single player game with no loot is just plain wrong. Yes you had progression in those games. Your character progressed thru the game, thru the story. Until you killed the final boss or whatever. Then it was over. After you "finished" Doom, did you just reload the last floor 100 times to play it again and again and again, because "it was fun"? It was fun, no doubt, but now you did it, it's done.
That logic is pretty flawed. For one you're assuming Doom was only a single player game. I dunno about you, but my friends & I had a ton of fun doing multiplayer doom. That had huge replay value. It's not unlike counterstrike, you don't play just to get the AWP, and then go 'okay I have the best weapon, i'm gunna leave now'. Hell no. You play for a lot of different reasons. Customizing your character, trying to win, seeing how good you can get w/ any specific build. It's not as 1-dimensional as a gear treadmill. I don't understand why some people still have trouble seeing this. There are soo many examples of games that do not need a gear treadmill to be fun, and have replayability.
Not having any real rewards will make many people leave the game.
You are syaing that people do not play games purely for cosmetic rewards? Do you actually game much outside of gear based MMOs? People will play for HOURS for cosmetic reasons. Hell, even for achievements. Not everyone is motivated by the gear treadmill.
As for the review... it's Pokket... the girl who found it so difficult to be crtiical of SWtOR for whatever reason... /shrug
People play for all sorts of reasons, GW1 endgame was entirely cosmetic gear for a lot of people and still millions play that!
As for previous posters: the comparison with Doom and FF and whatever single player game with no loot is just plain wrong. Yes you had progression in those games. Your character progressed thru the game, thru the story. Until you killed the final boss or whatever. Then it was over. After you "finished" Doom, did you just reload the last floor 100 times to play it again and again and again, because "it was fun"? It was fun, no doubt, but now you did it, it's done.
That logic is pretty flawed. For one you're assuming Doom was only a single player game. I dunno about you, but my friends & I had a ton of fun doing multiplayer doom. That had huge replay value. It's not unlike counterstrike, you don't play just to get the AWP, and then go 'okay I have the best weapon, i'm gunna leave now'. Hell no. You play for a lot of different reasons. Customizing your character, trying to win, seeing how good you can get w/ any specific build. It's not as 1-dimensional as a gear treadmill. I don't understand why some people still have trouble seeing this. There are soo many examples of games that do not need a gear treadmill to be fun, and have replayability.
I played counter strike for 7years, when the steam let you know how many hours you had on a game thing came out (this was in 2006-07) I was still clocking 100+hours a week in the summer
As for previous posters: the comparison with Doom and FF and whatever single player game with no loot is just plain wrong. Yes you had progression in those games. Your character progressed thru the game, thru the story. Until you killed the final boss or whatever. Then it was over. After you "finished" Doom, did you just reload the last floor 100 times to play it again and again and again, because "it was fun"? It was fun, no doubt, but now you did it, it's done.
That logic is pretty flawed. For one you're assuming Doom was only a single player game. I dunno about you, but my friends & I had a ton of fun doing multiplayer doom. That had huge replay value. It's not unlike counterstrike, you don't play just to get the AWP, and then go 'okay I have the best weapon, i'm gunna leave now'. Hell no. You play for a lot of different reasons. Customizing your character, trying to win, seeing how good you can get w/ any specific build. It's not as 1-dimensional as a gear treadmill. I don't understand why some people still have trouble seeing this. There are soo many examples of games that do not need a gear treadmill to be fun, and have replayability.
I didnt say Doom in multiplayer wasnt fun, i've just said that, for most RPG players, the game ends when your character progression ends. And i'm not talking only about gear here. Not everyone is exclusively interested in PvP, and from those interested, a lot are not in "just for the fun", that's just my assumption. As i've said, i'd love to be proven wrong. GW2 ending up compared with Counter Strike in two of the last 3 posts makes me giggle tho
However, many people wil get upset, as they still want to play the game with the best game mechanics after those 150 hours. but they are missing the rewards system. It will give a very unruly community of MMO ers with no place to go. Playing the best game, and still feeling empty after playing it. Just fun is not enough for the majorrity of the MMO players. and there will be an uprise as they dont want to leave the world of Tyria, but still feel unhappy and uncomplete in it.
GW1 actually still have plenty of players even though a lot quit after clearing one of the campaigns.
But what keep most going there is fun, titles and PvP honor. If you want to grind gear there is almost every other MMO out there.
I don´t play for any of the above reasons, I play for the challenge. As long as the game keep challenging me I will play it, but if you get bored after 150 hours and quit until the next expansion that is fine too.
It is not really about being greedy as some people here say, it is about making a game for people who want something different, and for the ANET fans.
I completely agree, personally i could never find the taste i got from gw1, gw2 gave that awesome feeling to me once again after all these years (even though it was for 2.5 days ).
also I do not think we lack a reward system in gw2, i love getting rewarded by getting better and better and being exceptionally successful without a single gear progression gives a lot more satisfaction to me.
And having expensive skin armors while didnt have any effect had a good prestige imo.
By the way have you guys seen the pvp banker in the heart of the mists?? It has like ~1700 different weapons and runes to choose. I can't wait to fully unlock that awesome chest. (i dont know how that chest works yet but my guess is that once you unlock a skin from the game you can reskin your pvp weapon with that particular skin from the pvplocker anytime you want which is awesome )
I didnt say Doom in multiplayer wasnt fun, i've just said that, for most RPG players, the game ends when your character progression ends. And i'm not talking only about gear here. Not everyone is exclusively interested in PvP, and from those interested, a lot are not in "just for the fun", that's just my assumption. As i've said, i'd love to be proven wrong. GW2 ending up compared with Counter Strike in two of the last 3 posts makes me giggle tho
Yeah, but the reason for that is really how MMOs are made.
The focus of most MMOs is gaining loot and XP, not beating something difficult as it is in many other genres. Changing that will also change what ends the game.
I didnt say Doom in multiplayer wasnt fun, i've just said that, for most RPG players, the game ends when your character progression ends. And i'm not talking only about gear here. Not everyone is exclusively interested in PvP, and from those interested, a lot are not in "just for the fun", that's just my assumption. As i've said, i'd love to be proven wrong. GW2 ending up compared with Counter Strike in two of the last 3 posts makes me giggle tho
Char progression can be many things for people.
For some, in-game wealth can be char progression.
For others, it might be that awesome looking helmet / chest piece / sword / underwear.
And then you have the 'collectors', pets, mounts, misc (heck I knew one who collected CLOTH! in WoW!) items etc
Gdemami - Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
I don't get this need to be rewarded for being entertained. Video games are not jobs, your reward is the entertainment you get for playing the game. If that's not enough for you, there are plenty of games that do give you phat lewtz for having fun.
There are various types of people with different taste on games on this planet so that's nothing new there.
However, what I can surely say is that she:
- didn't quite understood a few or many things
- is not quite well informed what kind of rewards already exists and what rewards are still to come
- had no clue what a reinforced keep means and handled it as if it were that hard by default (which is not the case)
- didn't care to loot the enemies to make enough gold and complained after for being like broke, even it was her own fault since she let her loot/rewards lie on the ground and vanish when she left the area
I'm sure that if she inform herself more and learn the game better, she will see that it's nothing like that and that things indeed make sense in the way they are.
To OP:
End game armors
These are the level 80 ones and you can have tons of different ones that you can buy with glory or create by crafting them or buying with karma among other things.
Of course its as balanced as it was in GW1 with the only upgrades being made by choice without overpowering anyone.
You can modify every piece and create your own set of armor with the buffs/debuffs you want added to it while also dye it the way you want.
Rewards
There are rewards in the game like in GW1 in forms of:
- Titles
- Mini pets
- secret areas that will reward you for finding them
- achievements/accomplishments in your own hall of monuments
- guild hall upgrades if you are in a guild that reward everyone in said guild with storage, crafting area, npc merchants, your own banner to showcase among many other things
- housing that will come later with a expansion
- crafting
- many dynamic and meta events that can give you extra rewards you will get only through them
- dungeons
- armor pieces and other dropping in the WvsWvsW from other players(copy of them since no one is losing what they are wearing) for you to loot and have
So I don't think this game is short on entertainment and neither on rewards.
Some people tend to "touch a game" and no matter how much they like it, run to other games after a few hours because they like to play that one too before they switch back to the game again.
Some people like to have a walkthrough (or rather rushing through content) and whine afterwards that there wasn't "enough" for them to do while playing 24/7 so they can rush through everything (which will be hard in GW2 since you can revisit and find more to do if you care enough to do so).
Some people taking their time and explore every single bit of a area and a game in overall as long as the game keeps them interested.
Some people love collecting, others love crafting, others are pet nerds(raising my hand ), some want to play only pve, others only pvp, others both.
The bottom line is that this game offers something for every type of person and that's a good thing.
Most of all it doesn't force anyone a single linear approach like "now go speak to the next npc with a question mark over its head", but rather gives you a choice and let you decide how you wanna play and were in the world you wanna be.
As about the GW1 and people quitting:
I must say that I stayed there through all 3 chapters and the 1 expansion + the 3-4 updates and I'm still not really done because even I loved the game, after 5+ years I stopped playing actively and only jumped in occassionaly whenever I wanted.
We had a great guild, a great alliance and tons of people of all ages to play with in a balanced and fun game in which skill mattered.
I'm still checking in from time to time and our guild is still there. The game is still full with people that enjoying it 7 years later.
For me GW2 is the same when it comes to that and I'm more than sure that I will be in it for years to come.
All that for the price of 49€ and maybe if I decide to buy a costume or two in the future for like 80€ in overall.
It's a great deal if you compare it to games that costs you like 69€ for 10-15 hours of gameplay that you put on the self to gain dust and barely ever touch again or games that sub you monthly by having you going their own linear way without having a real choice to progress otherwise.
I am not a big fan of gear progression... actually i can live with the current system.
I am more a fan of character progression, and AA systems that are very subtle and accessible. And can be added after release. an AA system should function much like the RvR point system of DAoC, in which it adds only minor bonnuses, but a whole frackload of them, on a very non linear scale. In such a way that noboddy gets even close to the top levels of this system. And that there would allways be a carrot for those in need, but enough easy attainable points to keep the casual lot very happy.
But there never should be differences between players that would allow lesser skilled players to gain an advantage on more skilled players based on their AA points.
In the end there will be progression for everyone, even if it is just minor progression over long times. Most important for a system like this is that it does not force people to repeat the same content time after time after time.
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 didnt say Doom in multiplayer wasnt fun, i've just said that, for most RPG players, the game ends when your character progression ends. And i'm not talking only about gear here. Not everyone is exclusively interested in PvP, and from those interested, a lot are not in "just for the fun", that's just my assumption. As i've said, i'd love to be proven wrong. GW2 ending up compared with Counter Strike in two of the last 3 posts makes me giggle tho
Yeah, but the reason for that is really how MMOs are made.
The focus of most MMOs is gaining loot and XP, not beating something difficult as it is in many other genres. Changing that will also change what ends the game.
I guess we'll have to wait and see what GW2 brings in terms of "endgame progression". I would be thrilled to be something different from gear/xp/cosmetic/titles/mounts/companions, and in the same time to keep me interested. No idea what that would be (actually i'm a big fan of horizontal progression, small perks which bring very small passive advantages, but are there), but i know there has to be something. Waiting for ANet to amaze me (not being sarcastic).
Staying in game as long as it's challenging, beating something difficult might or might not be the answer - 99.99% of the people who still play WoW didnt beat the "final raid" on the hardest difficulty, and that's not enough to keep them not bitching about the lack of content and progression.
The game has hundreds of hours of PVE content. The personal Story is different for members of the same race who chose different biographies and very different from race to race. You never outlevel content, so the entire game remains open to you at the level cap. Run out of things to do with your main character in the PVE world? You have PvP, you have WvW and you have perhaps the greatest level of replayability for alts out of any MMORPG ever made.
What percentage of players Raided regularly in WoW the first year after launch? Based on my experience, it was less than 10%. Everyone else either played casually enough and switched characters enough to have never reached the level cap, or they played an alt when they did reach the level cap.
They had some BGs, but they didn't have WvW and they didn't have a level scaling system that kept the entire game relavent to them.
Now, I would say that the personality types that most fit the top 10% of the game population, based on progression and achievment, also have heavy overlap with those that enjoy PVP and RVR. For those who play and enjoy PVP and/or WvW, they basically are getting two additional games included in the box price, each of which can provide untold hours of fun, with out the need for an artificial incentive to keep them playing.
Will there be some people who take a break once they feel there are no more tangible rewards to follow after? Sure, but a good percentage of them tend to flit from game to game anyway, with only a certain percentage taking up extended residence for some end game gear grind.
WoW didn't retain the majority of it's players during year one due to a handful of raids and end game gear progression. Most people stuck around to play the body of the game, not "end game". GW2 offers a heck of a lot more content for players than WoW offered at launch and a lot more options for spending one's time in game.
Even for the progression crowd, there are skill point challenges to defeat and achievments to earn. One thing I learned from playing the BWE is that leveling wasn't a big deal. It only mattered when it opened up a new slot or capability, or it made me high enough level for the next step in my personal story. Skill points where more an achievment and provided there own progression.
This game will keep a good many people happy and busy for a very long time and any achievers who exhaust all the progression the game has to offer will have gotten their money's worth, even in the unlikely event that they quit the day after they have hit the cap and accumulated all their max stat gear.
I gave up looking for a permanent home years ago, naturally there weren't as many places (MMOs) to visit back in my EQ days, so it was easier to plant roots and settle in and that's what I assumed I needed.
These days, MMOs are released often enough (and are cheap enough) that being a virtual tourist is viable.
If I get 3-6 months out of an MMO I'm thrilled.
I'm sure some people will play GW2 for longer than that (some people have ...somehow...played GW1 since release, but I don't count on it for me personally. Then again, the WvW was amazing, and in the past I've carried on playing other games for the PvP (WoW, Rift, DAoC) long after I'd had all rewards for 6 months or more in some cases, and that's after completing everything else.
Considering the quality of the rest of GW2, the fact that future content can be added to *any* level range and enjoyed by nearly all, and that nothing closer than ArcheAge or Pathfinder even has my interest, there's a good chance GW2 will surprise me. I did not expect to like it nearly as much as I did.
All of that combined with the lack of a sub cost will probably have me hopping in and out for a long, long time. But, I'm by no means going into this thinking I'll never need or be excited about other MMOs again, I'm just aware of how hard it will be for other games I'm anticipating to compete.
I think part of the problem is perception as far as the rewards go. Copper=penny in a few countries and in others copper coins are still the lowest though called something else. In GW1 the lowest form of currency was gold. Not sure why they changed for GW2.
Finally someone that looks past the first experience. So if Arenanet is truelly listening, they should also listen to this criticisme and not say its not going to happen.
As others have written it, the way GW2 works makes a less itemgrind focus needed and the lack of itemgrind in tiered Raids makes GW2 entire philosophy work.
"You" as in, for whom likes "Endgame itemgrind". In GW2 everything is "Endgame".
Concerning your "majority", The majority does not raid in WOW or any other Themepark and the rest has no other choice since raiding is the only thing to do.
Just to clarify, you are not asking them to adjust a few things, you basically ask them to turn their whole game 180° and this is not reasonable, the fact that you and the reviewer did not gasp that just says one thing clearly: GW2 is not for you.
Pvp give you substantial reward, you get this currency i don't recall the name from pvp events (both WvW events and structured pvp), so at one point i went to the mechant that sell you gear for this currency and actually i got my best peice of gear there from all the beta with the exception of a boss drop, so you know a lot of people in there preview are assuming stuff they don't really know about because they just don't saw them. I also missed a huge amount of stuff i'm now learning watching vids from people, so don't take what people say for granted.
If you want a good in dept discussion, watch this, its super long 2+hours i think or something, but you will have really nice comment about real aspects of the game, rather than you know "sentiments" and "first impression stuff" that might not be very very accurate.
I'm just editing to say that the game have tons of stuff, and in a week end it was just not possible for anyone to see all of it, a lot of poeple, me included just never saw a lot of stuff. It was just not possible to get an extensive view of pve, WvW, and stuctured, i now see i personally didn't even scrathed the surface of those since i didn't concentrate in any of those, but wanted to have an overview.
[ ... ]Sad thing is with the no sub system, Anet will care less about people leaving then games with a subsystem [ ... ]
Read through your post ... and that is the only thing that I found truly weird. Care to elaborate on your thought process that led to this assumption? Oo
Some players always need a carrot to chase to move forward... the same kind of players who were confused when they logged into GW2, and where like "where are the NPCs with the quest icon over their head to hold my hand?".
Remember, in GW2, a level 80 is not restricted to a couple of level 80 areas and dungeons, and activities are not restritcted to repeating the last introduced end game raid for better gear.
Respect, walk, what did you say? Respect, walk Are you talkin' to me? Are you talkin' to me? - PANTERA at HELLFEST 2023
I don't share her concerns. You can break a door in less than 20 seconds with battering rams. You get glory in sPvP that you can use to buy skins for your PvP char. Rewards should be given for how well you did, not for how long you did something.
Comments
There is one thing you dont consider: You dont pay any subscription. It will not only be a different game for the dev cause he doesnt look at the subnumbers. It will be a different expirience for most mmo-gamers too.
- If you dont have fun you stop playing and come back at a later date. You arent "forced" to play cause you just paid that month. You can switch this game on and off. If your are not motivated just play another game for a week and then... oh my god.... just come back to gw2 and play again cause it will still be available to you.
Sure at first it will be a strange feeling but a lot of people will switch on and off with GW2 after the first 2-3 months. Get in check the new things out play a bit of PVP make that cool new DE thats just running and log off again. No subscription is needed. You can come back and leave as often as you wish... just like all those other great games without subscription. Lots of them dont have carrots at all.... and tbh i still play them. Strange isnt it?
People play for all sorts of reasons, GW1 endgame was entirely cosmetic gear for a lot of people and still millions play that!
My god, I'm agreeing with Vesavius! O_O
Gdemami -
Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
There are rewards in RvR, I got 3 pieces of Mastercrafted armour drop of the mobs that were all part of a matching set, 2 pieces from the Frogs and 1 piece from the Ascalon Archers, You also get an event to protect the Frog/Toad race, but I shall let you guys work out what the reward is. RvR is not all about protecting and attacking players or keeps, thats what a lot of players don't really understand.
Player kills can also reward you with tokens which can be traded for gear, which someone has already pointed out.
There are also token traders in LA where you can get some really nice gear, Pirate weapons from the pirates with Karma, In Divinity's Reach there is Karma traders for high level gear from around level 40 up. There is rewards, just because they dont become available in the same way as you have obtained them in other games, you need to look around a bit more, they are there.
[quote]
A few loud mouths complained so now most left after they finished the story? I say bullshit. I still saw most of the same people a year in.Originally posted by Lord.Bachus
Finally someone that looks past the first experience.
Not having any real rewards will make many people leave the game. /quote]
There will be more than enough to do. There still is a gear grind. It is completely optional though. Killing endgame bosses will take time. The thing that really will keep people playing is the fact that no one will be hoarding on your turf and grieving in my opinion.
subjective criticism. You will not gain notoriety with names enabled because of the switching servers every 2 weeks. So to be honest moot point. Lots of people have done fair reviews from the BWE without praising it into the heavens.
Right Anet should listen to her sole voice, because she doesn't like their philosophy.
That logic is pretty flawed. For one you're assuming Doom was only a single player game. I dunno about you, but my friends & I had a ton of fun doing multiplayer doom. That had huge replay value. It's not unlike counterstrike, you don't play just to get the AWP, and then go 'okay I have the best weapon, i'm gunna leave now'. Hell no. You play for a lot of different reasons. Customizing your character, trying to win, seeing how good you can get w/ any specific build. It's not as 1-dimensional as a gear treadmill. I don't understand why some people still have trouble seeing this. There are soo many examples of games that do not need a gear treadmill to be fun, and have replayability.
*faints*
I played counter strike for 7years, when the steam let you know how many hours you had on a game thing came out (this was in 2006-07) I was still clocking 100+hours a week in the summer
"I am not a robot. I am a unicorn."
I didnt say Doom in multiplayer wasnt fun, i've just said that, for most RPG players, the game ends when your character progression ends. And i'm not talking only about gear here. Not everyone is exclusively interested in PvP, and from those interested, a lot are not in "just for the fun", that's just my assumption. As i've said, i'd love to be proven wrong. GW2 ending up compared with Counter Strike in two of the last 3 posts makes me giggle tho
I completely agree, personally i could never find the taste i got from gw1, gw2 gave that awesome feeling to me once again after all these years (even though it was for 2.5 days
).
also I do not think we lack a reward system in gw2, i love getting rewarded by getting better and better and being exceptionally successful without a single gear progression gives a lot more satisfaction to me.
And having expensive skin armors while didnt have any effect had a good prestige imo.
By the way have you guys seen the pvp banker in the heart of the mists?? It has like ~1700 different weapons and runes to choose. I can't wait to fully unlock that awesome chest. (i dont know how that chest works yet but my guess is that once you unlock a skin from the game you can reskin your pvp weapon with that particular skin from the pvplocker anytime you want which is awesome
)
Yeah, but the reason for that is really how MMOs are made.
The focus of most MMOs is gaining loot and XP, not beating something difficult as it is in many other genres. Changing that will also change what ends the game.
Char progression can be many things for people.
For some, in-game wealth can be char progression.
For others, it might be that awesome looking helmet / chest piece / sword / underwear.
And then you have the 'collectors', pets, mounts, misc (heck I knew one who collected CLOTH! in WoW!) items etc
Gdemami -
Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
I don't get this need to be rewarded for being entertained. Video games are not jobs, your reward is the entertainment you get for playing the game. If that's not enough for you, there are plenty of games that do give you phat lewtz for having fun.
There are various types of people with different taste on games on this planet so that's nothing new there.
However, what I can surely say is that she:
- didn't quite understood a few or many things
- is not quite well informed what kind of rewards already exists and what rewards are still to come
- had no clue what a reinforced keep means and handled it as if it were that hard by default (which is not the case)
- didn't care to loot the enemies to make enough gold and complained after for being like broke, even it was her own fault since she let her loot/rewards lie on the ground and vanish when she left the area
I'm sure that if she inform herself more and learn the game better, she will see that it's nothing like that and that things indeed make sense in the way they are.
To OP:
End game armors
These are the level 80 ones and you can have tons of different ones that you can buy with glory or create by crafting them or buying with karma among other things.
Of course its as balanced as it was in GW1 with the only upgrades being made by choice without overpowering anyone.
You can modify every piece and create your own set of armor with the buffs/debuffs you want added to it while also dye it the way you want.
Rewards
There are rewards in the game like in GW1 in forms of:
- Titles
- Mini pets
- secret areas that will reward you for finding them
- achievements/accomplishments in your own hall of monuments
- guild hall upgrades if you are in a guild that reward everyone in said guild with storage, crafting area, npc merchants, your own banner to showcase among many other things
- housing that will come later with a expansion
- crafting
- many dynamic and meta events that can give you extra rewards you will get only through them
- dungeons
- armor pieces and other dropping in the WvsWvsW from other players(copy of them since no one is losing what they are wearing) for you to loot and have
So I don't think this game is short on entertainment and neither on rewards.
Some people tend to "touch a game" and no matter how much they like it, run to other games after a few hours because they like to play that one too before they switch back to the game again.
Some people like to have a walkthrough (or rather rushing through content) and whine afterwards that there wasn't "enough" for them to do while playing 24/7 so they can rush through everything (which will be hard in GW2 since you can revisit and find more to do if you care enough to do so).
Some people taking their time and explore every single bit of a area and a game in overall as long as the game keeps them interested.
Some people love collecting, others love crafting, others are pet nerds(raising my hand
), some want to play only pve, others only pvp, others both.
The bottom line is that this game offers something for every type of person and that's a good thing.
Most of all it doesn't force anyone a single linear approach like "now go speak to the next npc with a question mark over its head", but rather gives you a choice and let you decide how you wanna play and were in the world you wanna be.
As about the GW1 and people quitting:
I must say that I stayed there through all 3 chapters and the 1 expansion + the 3-4 updates and I'm still not really done because even I loved the game, after 5+ years I stopped playing actively and only jumped in occassionaly whenever I wanted.
We had a great guild, a great alliance and tons of people of all ages to play with in a balanced and fun game in which skill mattered.
I'm still checking in from time to time and our guild is still there. The game is still full with people that enjoying it 7 years later.
For me GW2 is the same when it comes to that and I'm more than sure that I will be in it for years to come.
All that for the price of 49€ and maybe if I decide to buy a costume or two in the future for like 80€ in overall.
It's a great deal if you compare it to games that costs you like 69€ for 10-15 hours of gameplay that you put on the self to gain dust and barely ever touch again or games that sub you monthly by having you going their own linear way without having a real choice to progress otherwise.
I am not a big fan of gear progression... actually i can live with the current system.
I am more a fan of character progression, and AA systems that are very subtle and accessible. And can be added after release. an AA system should function much like the RvR point system of DAoC, in which it adds only minor bonnuses, but a whole frackload of them, on a very non linear scale. In such a way that noboddy gets even close to the top levels of this system. And that there would allways be a carrot for those in need, but enough easy attainable points to keep the casual lot very happy.
But there never should be differences between players that would allow lesser skilled players to gain an advantage on more skilled players based on their AA points.
In the end there will be progression for everyone, even if it is just minor progression over long times. Most important for a system like this is that it does not force people to repeat the same content time after time after time.
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 guess we'll have to wait and see what GW2 brings in terms of "endgame progression". I would be thrilled to be something different from gear/xp/cosmetic/titles/mounts/companions, and in the same time to keep me interested. No idea what that would be (actually i'm a big fan of horizontal progression, small perks which bring very small passive advantages, but are there), but i know there has to be something. Waiting for ANet to amaze me (not being sarcastic).
Staying in game as long as it's challenging, beating something difficult might or might not be the answer - 99.99% of the people who still play WoW didnt beat the "final raid" on the hardest difficulty, and that's not enough to keep them not bitching about the lack of content and progression.
The game has hundreds of hours of PVE content. The personal Story is different for members of the same race who chose different biographies and very different from race to race. You never outlevel content, so the entire game remains open to you at the level cap. Run out of things to do with your main character in the PVE world? You have PvP, you have WvW and you have perhaps the greatest level of replayability for alts out of any MMORPG ever made.
What percentage of players Raided regularly in WoW the first year after launch? Based on my experience, it was less than 10%. Everyone else either played casually enough and switched characters enough to have never reached the level cap, or they played an alt when they did reach the level cap.
They had some BGs, but they didn't have WvW and they didn't have a level scaling system that kept the entire game relavent to them.
Now, I would say that the personality types that most fit the top 10% of the game population, based on progression and achievment, also have heavy overlap with those that enjoy PVP and RVR. For those who play and enjoy PVP and/or WvW, they basically are getting two additional games included in the box price, each of which can provide untold hours of fun, with out the need for an artificial incentive to keep them playing.
Will there be some people who take a break once they feel there are no more tangible rewards to follow after? Sure, but a good percentage of them tend to flit from game to game anyway, with only a certain percentage taking up extended residence for some end game gear grind.
WoW didn't retain the majority of it's players during year one due to a handful of raids and end game gear progression. Most people stuck around to play the body of the game, not "end game". GW2 offers a heck of a lot more content for players than WoW offered at launch and a lot more options for spending one's time in game.
Even for the progression crowd, there are skill point challenges to defeat and achievments to earn. One thing I learned from playing the BWE is that leveling wasn't a big deal. It only mattered when it opened up a new slot or capability, or it made me high enough level for the next step in my personal story. Skill points where more an achievment and provided there own progression.
This game will keep a good many people happy and busy for a very long time and any achievers who exhaust all the progression the game has to offer will have gotten their money's worth, even in the unlikely event that they quit the day after they have hit the cap and accumulated all their max stat gear.
Want to know more about GW2 and why there is so much buzz? Start here: Guild Wars 2 Mass Info for the Uninitiated
I gave up looking for a permanent home years ago, naturally there weren't as many places (MMOs) to visit back in my EQ days, so it was easier to plant roots and settle in and that's what I assumed I needed.
These days, MMOs are released often enough (and are cheap enough) that being a virtual tourist is viable.
If I get 3-6 months out of an MMO I'm thrilled.
I'm sure some people will play GW2 for longer than that (some people have ...somehow...played GW1 since release, but I don't count on it for me personally. Then again, the WvW was amazing, and in the past I've carried on playing other games for the PvP (WoW, Rift, DAoC) long after I'd had all rewards for 6 months or more in some cases, and that's after completing everything else.
Considering the quality of the rest of GW2, the fact that future content can be added to *any* level range and enjoyed by nearly all, and that nothing closer than ArcheAge or Pathfinder even has my interest, there's a good chance GW2 will surprise me. I did not expect to like it nearly as much as I did.
All of that combined with the lack of a sub cost will probably have me hopping in and out for a long, long time. But, I'm by no means going into this thinking I'll never need or be excited about other MMOs again, I'm just aware of how hard it will be for other games I'm anticipating to compete.
I think part of the problem is perception as far as the rewards go. Copper=penny in a few countries and in others copper coins are still the lowest though called something else. In GW1 the lowest form of currency was gold. Not sure why they changed for GW2.
the poster formerly known as melangel :P
As others have written it, the way GW2 works makes a less itemgrind focus needed and the lack of itemgrind in tiered Raids makes GW2 entire philosophy work.
"You" as in, for whom likes "Endgame itemgrind".
In GW2 everything is "Endgame".
Concerning your "majority", The majority does not raid in WOW or any other Themepark and the rest has no other choice since raiding is the only thing to do.
Just to clarify, you are not asking them to adjust a few things, you basically ask them to turn their whole game 180° and this is not reasonable, the fact that you and the reviewer did not gasp that just says one thing clearly: GW2 is not for you.
I'd like to think that being there in a WvWvW (Hurts the eyes, dunnit? :P) is reward enough. Fun is key, not rewards.
Pvp give you substantial reward, you get this currency i don't recall the name from pvp events (both WvW events and structured pvp), so at one point i went to the mechant that sell you gear for this currency and actually i got my best peice of gear there from all the beta with the exception of a boss drop, so you know a lot of people in there preview are assuming stuff they don't really know about because they just don't saw them. I also missed a huge amount of stuff i'm now learning watching vids from people, so don't take what people say for granted.
If you want a good in dept discussion, watch this, its super long 2+hours i think or something, but you will have really nice comment about real aspects of the game, rather than you know "sentiments" and "first impression stuff" that might not be very very accurate.
http://www.talesoftyria.com/
I'm just editing to say that the game have tons of stuff, and in a week end it was just not possible for anyone to see all of it, a lot of poeple, me included just never saw a lot of stuff. It was just not possible to get an extensive view of pve, WvW, and stuctured, i now see i personally didn't even scrathed the surface of those since i didn't concentrate in any of those, but wanted to have an overview.
Read through your post ... and that is the only thing that I found truly weird. Care to elaborate on your thought process that led to this assumption? Oo
Some players always need a carrot to chase to move forward... the same kind of players who were confused when they logged into GW2, and where like "where are the NPCs with the quest icon over their head to hold my hand?".
Remember, in GW2, a level 80 is not restricted to a couple of level 80 areas and dungeons, and activities are not restritcted to repeating the last introduced end game raid for better gear.
Respect, walk
Are you talkin' to me? Are you talkin' to me?
- PANTERA at HELLFEST 2023
Most of the things the OP complains about as negatives, to me are positives. I guess this game was made for me -- and I'm not alone.
I don't share her concerns. You can break a door in less than 20 seconds with battering rams. You get glory in sPvP that you can use to buy skins for your PvP char. Rewards should be given for how well you did, not for how long you did something.