New Expansion Looks Desperate...

[Larry]

I've been playing GW2 since it launched, thoroughly enjoyed Elementalist from the start of the game. The animations were, and still are, top of their game(Elementalist Meteor animations are so damn good) but in the last few years the game, it's narrative and the locations it explores have been going down hill.

The base game is great. It embodies everything GW2 was all about: Exploration, narrative, group content without forcing you to be in a group and it felt like a proper massively multiplayer online role playing game. The jumping puzzles, boss fights, story, characters(While some hit or miss); it was great. Each zone was interesting and had it's own story to tell. It was great!

Heart of Thorns came out and it was a bit of a stinker. This was mainly because it veered far away from traditional methods of play where you would play through an entire zone and move onto the next. In HoT it was designed so you would come back to each zone to finish it off a couple of days or even weeks later when you unlocked specific abilities. Usually beating the expansion would net you enough experience to unlock much needed abilities to traverse the HoT areas which made playing through on a second character much more enjoyable. They shot themselves in the foot here because it ticked a lot of people off based on first impressions. Still, it was a good expansion in my opinion with the caveat being it was good after your first time through and is still a very good expansion to come back to for events even now eight years later.

Path of Fire was excellent. The story, the progress, the mounts to unlock, revisiting old areas from GW1 and adding a bit more lore to it. All great! Plus the mounts really added a new layer onto the base game and each expansion. Too much good to say about this but, contrary to HoT, in my opinion it was only really enjoyable to play through once unlike the base game and HoT.

Then there was the latest expansion,End of Dragons... End of Dragons is a slog to play through. The characters are insufferable and ones that were entertaining have either taken a back seat(Canach, Taimi who they slowly made uninteresting and unlikable through living seasons) and some who they just flat out removed never to be heard from again(Logan for one). The setting is boring, the story is bad, the new characters are uninteresting and the main villain is annoying not to mention they basically turn the bad guys into "good" guys because they're "misunderstood." That in itself has basically killed off any interest in the plot.

Living seasons were interesting at first especially the living seasons after PAth of Fire as they added genuinely interesting large areas with a lot of cool things to do and reason to play through them(Skyscale for instance), however... Living Seasons were just an excuse to pad out the lengthy time between expansions.

So, what did they do? They announced they were removing living seasons and bringing us expansions more frequently by... calling living seasons expansions and charging us €25 for two zones and "more to come further down the line". They basically started charging for living seasons and slapped "expansion" mark on them.

Moreover this latest expansion looks pretty lazy. From the sounds of things it's only two zones and all the content sounds like it's going to be "fractals" which is basically a boss beat down. Likely: You have a tower that's the main hub for players(One map), maybe a few enemies to kill and one or two fetch quests then a fractal zone where you beat waves of enemies and tackle bosses. Some people like this kind of content. I call it for what it is: Lazy design. Afterall, there's not much talent required when you make a room and spawn waves of enemies in on top of players. I'm pretty sure most of this content is going to be Trial of the Crusader/Grand Crusader from WoW: Wrath of the Lich King.

This game has gone so downhill in especially with the last expansion. The exploration is gone, there's a lot of pandering going on, an inexcusable amount of pandering, there's a lot of strange story decisions that don't make sense, a lot of characters that are just in positions with no explanation or reason and then "secret" alcoves for these characters where their motivations are spoon fed to the player - because they had to include these areas to try make some sense of why certain characters are where they area.

This next "expansion" which is just a living season, don't pretend it's not, looks incredibly lazy. I honestly wouldn't be surprised if the game was shuttered after this "expansion". The writing isn't going to be good, the characters not interesting and those who are willing to pay for stuff are going to leave because of how uninteresting the world and it's characters are.

The devs need to lean into the original game design and build upon it. Not place all their eggs in the "bite-size" boss arena basket that, yes, people like... but only in small amounts. Anyone can be down for a boss fight one or twice a day but not all day and not the essence of the game and it's core content.

[Joker]

Living story has always been payed content
They gave away the episode if you logged in while it was active
Good way to keep people active in the game

As someone who takes many breaks, I've might just have bought most of it

They never had to give the episodes away.
It was a strategy (a quite generous one), seems they've changed strategy.
I don't understand the complaints.
We are not entitled to free stuff.
Think people should just appreciate getting free stuff for so long instead

A lot of positve could come out of this (them getting more funds)
But we will have to wait

[amarrminer]

hot was more than a stinker, it was a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ disaster.
and pof was never "excellent", it was only marginally better than hot.

[mysaga]

It is something in between the old expansion and a living world season. More like what they tried Icebrood Saga to be, but this time as a smaller expansion. You are only looking at maps and story, not at the other changes and content included. And you disliked EoD, which is okay. But we have not much info about the story of SotO yet, so I don't see how you already can judge it.

[ah_puch]

Originally posted by Larry:

Then there was the latest expansion,End of Dragons... End of Dragons is a slog to play through. The characters are insufferable and ones that were entertaining have either taken a back seat(Canach, Taimi who they slowly made uninteresting and unlikable through living seasons) and some who they just flat out removed never to be heard from again(Logan for one). The setting is boring, the story is bad, the new characters are uninteresting and the main villain is annoying not to mention they basically turn the bad guys into "good" guys because they're "misunderstood." That in itself has basically killed off any interest in the plot.

Living seasons were interesting at first especially the living seasons after PAth of Fire as they added genuinely interesting large areas with a lot of cool things to do and reason to play through them(Skyscale for instance), however... Living Seasons were just an excuse to pad out the lengthy time between expansions.

So, what did they do? They announced they were removing living seasons and bringing us expansions more frequently by... calling living seasons expansions and charging us €25 for two zones and "more to come further down the line". They basically started charging for living seasons and slapped "expansion" mark on them.

Moreover this latest expansion looks pretty lazy. From the sounds of things it's only two zones and all the content sounds like it's going to be "fractals" which is basically a boss beat down. Likely: You have a tower that's the main hub for players(One map), maybe a few enemies to kill and one or two fetch quests then a fractal zone where you beat waves of enemies and tackle bosses. Some people like this kind of content. I call it for what it is: Lazy design. Afterall, there's not much talent required when you make a room and spawn waves of enemies in on top of players. I'm pretty sure most of this content is going to be Trial of the Crusader/Grand Crusader from WoW: Wrath of the Lich King.

This game has gone so downhill in especially with the last expansion. The exploration is gone, there's a lot of pandering going on, an inexcusable amount of pandering, there's a lot of strange story decisions that don't make sense, a lot of characters that are just in positions with no explanation or reason and then "secret" alcoves for these characters where their motivations are spoon fed to the player - because they had to include these areas to try make some sense of why certain characters are where they area.

Exactly. Anything post IBS reeks of desperation. EoD and the Steam launch were both colossal failures. Gyala Delves didn't do the trick after an empty 2022-2023 either. Now fans are trying to explain why everyone should buy the ultimate edition of a dlc even emptier than past living worlds because they are called "mini expansions" now. What they've done to this game is just sad.

[tatiana]

My opinion of the Living World seasons:
Pros:
- They can be bought "as you go" from within the game.
Cons:
- Players who had the game while the season was ongoing get it for free. Everybody else has to buy them. Unfair...
- Seasons come between expansions, so can't be bought in a bundle.
- The only way to buy them in a bundle is to purchase all expansions at once. Unless you are rich or very committed to the game, you wouldn't do that.
- Living World seasons are virtually never on sale.

So I'm actually glad they are getting rid of them in favour of "smaller, more regular expansions"! Which are potentially also less confusing for new players...

From what I've understood, the new Astral Acclaim currency will replace login and achievement rewards. About time too - the current system is over-bloated.

I will wait until the new expansion releases and watch some video reviews before forming an opinion of my own.

[Tasha Vulpine]

This new mini-expansion seems to fix a lot of things that had to be fixed for a long of time;
-Boring daily quests system
-Obnoxious skyscale acquisition
-Weapons locked behind elite specializations, limiting buildcrafting
-Somewhat sub-par flying mounts, limiting the map design creativity.

Then again, this game has its issues. Balance team SUCKS, and i'm not sure if devs have any clear idea of what they want to make GW2 into.

[Rhapsody]

Originally posted by Larry:

Heart of Thorns came out and it was a bit of a stinker. This was mainly because it veered far away from traditional methods of play where you would play through an entire zone and move onto the next. In HoT it was designed so you would come back to each zone to finish it off a couple of days or even weeks later when you unlocked specific abilities.

Players loved it though, and that's why they are still playing the HoT metas almost ten years later.

I don't agree with some of your points but the final assessment is sound enough. Unfortunately GW2 is more than a decade old MMO and there just isn't going back to the past.

It's impossible to judge SOTO by its cover without playing it. There'll probably be various reactions but the game will go on anyway.

[Tuathaqin]

My, I didn't know you can review stuff prior to release.

[armyguy]

Indeed it does look like a desperate attempt. They're opening the weapons related to the class not the spec/trait lines. So while the star struck zealots are cheering "build diversity" they forget that the weapons were assigned around an elite spec. Deadeye is a good example of this. In theory, core thief will be able to use rifle. They will not be able to stealth on evade, will not have extra power per malice, will not generate malice, will not have boons and initiative returned for reaching max malice nor any other "benefit" of the deadeye without purchasing the appropriate expansion and using the deadeye trait line.

Making skyscale, legendary armour easier to acquire is a slap in the face of those who did all the requirements. It's another case of AssNet pandering to the FOMO and "I want it now" crowds", hoping to draw in more players just to shank them into buying the older expansions anyways. As for not having a clear view of where to go and game "balancing". That's the incompetence of the "leadership". Yes, a clear signal that they are choking the game to death.

[Joker]

Originally posted by armyguy:

Making skyscale, legendary armour easier to acquire is a slap in the face

No it's not?
Why should legendary armor be exclusive to raids?
If exclusivity is something you care about, then the raid armor will only be more exclusive now, since most will go for the other easier set.
You have your achievements and skins from your raid set.
It would have been different if they had copied the raid legendaries to rest of PVE, but that's not what they're doing.

If you do both masteries you will have bonus abilities.
So we will get extra use out of our skyscale
New players aquiring skyscale the easy way will have to do the old mastery track still for those abilities

[DarkSlayer197]

Originally posted by armyguy:

Making skyscale, legendary armour easier to acquire is a slap in the face of those who did all the requirements. It's another case of AssNet pandering to the FOMO and "I want it now" crowds", hoping to draw in more players just to shank them into buying the older expansions anyways. As for not having a clear view of where to go and game "balancing". That's the incompetence of the "leadership". Yes, a clear signal that they are choking the game to death.

Skyscale will have an alternate path to acquire. Those who have it already can work on improved masteries that make your skyscale more useful than those that are getting their skyscale the first time there.

No one knows how the new Legendary Armor will be acquired as the details around it is currently unknown. Legendary Armor is already pretty easy to get. WvW and PvP are great examples. PvP has 3 sets and WvW has 2 sets. If anything, it gave PvE an additional set since PvE only has 1 set.

And even IF they are made super easy to get, how is that a bad thing? People have easy access to Legendary Armor and then can freely customize their armor without difficulty to suit their builds. A real QoL thing for a lot of players.

And balancing is a constant battle especially for MMOs. It is why MMOs have a lot of balancing patches. Nothing new or exclusive for GW2.

[Bladestorm]

One of the things gw2 did right was really nail down the open-world immersion via the event system. Of course, being that this is an mmo, that immersion is player-dependent. mmos just aren't the same without a bunch of players and eventually players do get bored.

As far as narrative goes, I'm sorry, but it's bad. As I've aged over the years that I played this thing, I've realized that the story is pretty shallow except for the expansions. The 'living world' is basically just like a saturday morning cartoon or sitcom, with all its goofy one-liners and campy dialogue. It's honestly jarring revisiting it and contrasting it with the game supposedly being 'rpg fantasy'.

And the combat (supposed gw2's jewel among players) is not really all that impressive. It's pretty much move around, spam all the abilities and dodge AoEs. It plays like an action game. If gw2 was an action game, it could work but it marketed itself as an action-RPG. Every class just ends up playing the same way. And I've seen too many action-RPGs that age poorly. (Looking at Kingdom Hearts...)

To me, gw2 peaked at HoT and PoF and then it went downhill from there. IBS was...meh...but I can forgive that since this was deep during covid19. EoD and up though...nope. Low-effort, desperate. A CLEAR sign that gw2's best days are behind it.

[amarrminer]

Originally posted by Rhapsody:

Originally posted by Larry:

Heart of Thorns came out and it was a bit of a stinker. This was mainly because it veered far away from traditional methods of play where you would play through an entire zone and move onto the next. In HoT it was designed so you would come back to each zone to finish it off a couple of days or even weeks later when you unlocked specific abilities.

Players loved it though, and that's why they are still playing the HoT metas almost ten years later.

I don't agree with some of your points but the final assessment is sound enough. Unfortunately GW2 is more than a decade old MMO and there just isn't going back to the past.

It's impossible to judge SOTO by its cover without playing it. There'll probably be various reactions but the game will go on anyway.

a very small minority loved it, the rest of us took a long a break, and waited for the inevitable nerfs. not that it helped much, you cant polish a turd.

[Flushing]

Originally posted by Larry:

I've been playing GW2 since it launched, thoroughly enjoyed Elementalist from the start of the game. The animations were, and still are, top of their game(Elementalist Meteor animations are so damn good) but in the last few years the game, it's narrative and the locations it explores have been going down hill.

The base game is great. It embodies everything GW2 was all about: Exploration, narrative, group content without forcing you to be in a group and it felt like a proper massively multiplayer online role playing game. The jumping puzzles, boss fights, story, characters(While some hit or miss); it was great. Each zone was interesting and had it's own story to tell. It was great!

Heart of Thorns came out and it was a bit of a stinker. This was mainly because it veered far away from traditional methods of play where you would play through an entire zone and move onto the next. In HoT it was designed so you would come back to each zone to finish it off a couple of days or even weeks later when you unlocked specific abilities. Usually beating the expansion would net you enough experience to unlock much needed abilities to traverse the HoT areas which made playing through on a second character much more enjoyable. They shot themselves in the foot here because it ticked a lot of people off based on first impressions. Still, it was a good expansion in my opinion with the caveat being it was good after your first time through and is still a very good expansion to come back to for events even now eight years later.

Path of Fire was excellent. The story, the progress, the mounts to unlock, revisiting old areas from GW1 and adding a bit more lore to it. All great! Plus the mounts really added a new layer onto the base game and each expansion. Too much good to say about this but, contrary to HoT, in my opinion it was only really enjoyable to play through once unlike the base game and HoT.

Then there was the latest expansion,End of Dragons... End of Dragons is a slog to play through. The characters are insufferable and ones that were entertaining have either taken a back seat(Canach, Taimi who they slowly made uninteresting and unlikable through living seasons) and some who they just flat out removed never to be heard from again(Logan for one). The setting is boring, the story is bad, the new characters are uninteresting and the main villain is annoying not to mention they basically turn the bad guys into "good" guys because they're "misunderstood." That in itself has basically killed off any interest in the plot.

Living seasons were interesting at first especially the living seasons after PAth of Fire as they added genuinely interesting large areas with a lot of cool things to do and reason to play through them(Skyscale for instance), however... Living Seasons were just an excuse to pad out the lengthy time between expansions.

So, what did they do? They announced they were removing living seasons and bringing us expansions more frequently by... calling living seasons expansions and charging us €25 for two zones and "more to come further down the line". They basically started charging for living seasons and slapped "expansion" mark on them.

Moreover this latest expansion looks pretty lazy. From the sounds of things it's only two zones and all the content sounds like it's going to be "fractals" which is basically a boss beat down. Likely: You have a tower that's the main hub for players(One map), maybe a few enemies to kill and one or two fetch quests then a fractal zone where you beat waves of enemies and tackle bosses. Some people like this kind of content. I call it for what it is: Lazy design. Afterall, there's not much talent required when you make a room and spawn waves of enemies in on top of players. I'm pretty sure most of this content is going to be Trial of the Crusader/Grand Crusader from WoW: Wrath of the Lich King.

This game has gone so downhill in especially with the last expansion. The exploration is gone, there's a lot of pandering going on, an inexcusable amount of pandering, there's a lot of strange story decisions that don't make sense, a lot of characters that are just in positions with no explanation or reason and then "secret" alcoves for these characters where their motivations are spoon fed to the player - because they had to include these areas to try make some sense of why certain characters are where they area.

This next "expansion" which is just a living season, don't pretend it's not, looks incredibly lazy. I honestly wouldn't be surprised if the game was shuttered after this "expansion". The writing isn't going to be good, the characters not interesting and those who are willing to pay for stuff are going to leave because of how uninteresting the world and it's characters are.

The devs need to lean into the original game design and build upon it. Not place all their eggs in the "bite-size" boss arena basket that, yes, people like... but only in small amounts. Anyone can be down for a boss fight one or twice a day but not all day and not the essence of the game and it's core content.

Do you realize all classes get a new weapon and skills?

That, and it's just released Feb 2022. Before that, Path of Fire was released in 2017.

Play the game or don't, how you chose to spend your own time is up to you, but I think the perspective in your essay glosses over every meaningful content addition.

And, instead of being happy with a faster content update between expansions, your poo pooing it without even mentioning what's being offered.

To say it's just a living world update is a joke. I'd encorage anyone reading this to read about the new content and changes being offered.

https://youtu.be/shkMzU4-Kow

[armyguy]

Originally posted by DarkSlayer197:

Originally posted by armyguy:

Making skyscale, legendary armour easier to acquire is a slap in the face of those who did all the requirements. It's another case of AssNet pandering to the FOMO and "I want it now" crowds", hoping to draw in more players just to shank them into buying the older expansions anyways. As for not having a clear view of where to go and game "balancing". That's the incompetence of the "leadership". Yes, a clear signal that they are choking the game to death.

Skyscale will have an alternate path to acquire. Those who have it already can work on improved masteries that make your skyscale more useful than those that are getting their skyscale the first time there.

No one knows how the new Legendary Armor will be acquired as the details around it is currently unknown. Legendary Armor is already pretty easy to get. WvW and PvP are great examples. PvP has 3 sets and WvW has 2 sets. If anything, it gave PvE an additional set since PvE only has 1 set.

And even IF they are made super easy to get, how is that a bad thing? People have easy access to Legendary Armor and then can freely customize their armor without difficulty to suit their builds. A real QoL thing for a lot of players.

And balancing is a constant battle especially for MMOs. It is why MMOs have a lot of balancing patches. Nothing new or exclusive for GW2.

It's a bad thing because people have spent weeks and months getting the legendary items just to have ANet minimalize what they have accomplished. Why do you twist yourself into a knot to justify the blatant disregard ANet has for the people that have done the content? Why do you revere their incompetence, lack of leadership and laziness?