Archive for Guild Wars

It’s Time to Let my Hero Rest…

Posted in Grumblings with tags , , , , on August 6, 2023 by chemiclord

I have been very uncertain for quite a while about what I was going to do with the newest announced Guild Wars 2 expansion, Secrets of the Obscure.

On one hand, I have been a devout follower of the series since quite literally it’s start on April 28th, 2005. I was literally a Day 1 player. There have been very few times where I’ve not been wholly certain that I was going to open my wallet for whatever content Arena.Net produced for this series.

Until now.

The entire narrative arc of Guild Wars 2 completed with End of Dragons. Everything this generation of Guild Wars characters fought for concluded with the resolution of the Elder Dragon problem. That should have been the end of the story for the heroes I leveled, geared, and ground out hours of work for.

Secrets of the Obscure should have been Guild Wars 3. It should have been an entirely new game with a new generation with a new experience with a new narrative arc. They should have been putting in the work to make this a complete title, not tacking it on crudely to a game that was already narratively complete.

Because Arena.Net has gone the way of so many other studios, and have leaned into the eternal “Games as a Service” model that emphasizes quick turnaround with as cheap of production as possible.

And I’m not interested in that.

I would have much rather given Arena.Net more money for a fully featured experience.

I would have opened the wallet for Guild Wars 3.

I have no desire to do so for Secrets of the Obscure.

It’s time to let my heroes rest, and for me to walk away from the franchise I’ve supported for eighteen years. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think my time was wasted. I don’t feel cheated. I don’t think this is a “slap to the face” or some sort of insult done to me.

I just wish I could have been compelled to spend more time and money in Tyria, and unfortunately Arena.Net wasn’t able to convince me.

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On Entitlement (Again)…

Posted in Grumblings with tags , , on June 18, 2015 by chemiclord

It should come as no surprise that I cringe at the invocation of the word, “entitled.”  It also should come as no surprise that when it comes to fan entitlement pertaining to content decisions of the creator, that I will near always side with the content creators over the fans.

The word has come to have an extremely negative connotation, one that isn’t always deserved.

The term has emerged again most recently in Guild Wars 2 fandom (a game that I still play with some degree of frequency), pertaining to the impeding release of the games first expansion pack.  Many “veteran” fans are furious for a bevy of reasons, and in the spirit of total fairness, the fans aren’t entirely in the wrong.

The first complaint is that $50 is simply too high of a price tag for what has been presented.  I’m not in disagreement, in all honesty.  That’s something that can be rectified as more information pertaining to the expansion is released, but at the moment, it’s not enough for the “industry standard” price tag that has been slapped on it.  You’re asking for fans to fork over money sight unseen, and Arena.net hasn’t particularly given a compelling reason to do so yet.

Still others are angry that purchasing the base expansion doesn’t come with a free character slot, something that previous games under the Guild Wars umbrella has done in the past.  Again, I’m in agreement.  There needs to be a compelling reason to break from precedent, and Arena.net has offered pretty much nothing but silence.

Entitlement doesn’t always have to be a bad thing… and in these complaints, you are seeing the positive side of it.  Standing up for what you think is a fair price to you is something that should be applauded as sound customer thinking.  And if the protest actually stirs a change in the original plan, then it can only be a victory for customers everywhere.

But, unfortunately, I can’t completely side with the fans, because once again, we have the shitty, toxic element whose beef isn’t the price or the lack of bonus perks… but that purchase of the expansion will come with the base game at no extra cost for new players.  In summary, they aren’t angry because they feel cheated, they’re angry because they feel someone else is getting more than them.  If you’re a member of this group, let it be known you’re a terrible person who needs to be summarily ignored and your complaints dismissed without merit.

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