Curse

4thVariety · Jul 20, 2009, 12:55 PM // 12:55

When a developer has a title out the door, they either have a new project with new financing, or they all get the pink slip.

MMO developers are different, they can pay the team with revenue from monthly subscriptions. So all they care about is keeping subscribers happy, which is usually done by feeding the players some crumbs, fragments and delayed bits. Meanwhile they develop the new real expansion for which they OF COURSE are going to charge you full retail. If a developer does not attract enough subscribers, e.g. Flagship, they go extinct or move on to the next pre-financed project.

ArenaNet did something different right from the start. They did not want to charge monthly fees, so naturally they had to move on to the next project after finishing Prophecies. They did not make an expansion, simply because a stand-alone product can be sold to more people: Factions. ArenaNet wanted to make iterations every six months, but as it turned out their production pipeline was a little bit longer than that. Not even EA cranks out sequels at this rate!

Realistically we have to assume that ArenaNet can only work on one game at a time. EotN was released September/07, then everybody took a break and full scale production on GW2 did most likely start around November 07. So GW2 is 21 months into development at best. When GW1 was released, its focus on story telling set it apart. Meanwhile Bioware starts entering the ring, they will also release a multiplayer RPG with a big license and their storytelling pedigree behind it. Sure, the GW fans are excited about GW2, but those not playing are hardly excited for GW2. Yet they will be the ones raking in the sales numbers. As hard as that might be for the forum dwelling hardcore fans, they are the irrelevant sales fringe and GW2 is too far away to feed them anything.

Amon Warrior · Jul 20, 2009, 01:17 PM // 13:17

I'd say that the mistake with GW2 is the over-extended silence around its development. Three years with nothing but crumbs is ridiculous.

How about a blog? A gameplay demo? SOMETHING!

Aljasha · Jul 20, 2009, 01:28 PM // 13:28

still, anet fear their competitors for no reason. on second thought, there are no direct competitors to anet or has anyone sighted a worthy alternative to gw during the period between the initial release of gw and its 4th anniversary? if anet truly want to revolutionise their own franchise and exclude themselves from the standard mmorpg market, there is no reason not to talk about the game's progress.

even with aion as an inhouse competitor there will be so much differences between the two in gameplay, mechanics, priorities etc that gamers might buy both (heck, who plays only one game at a time anyway?).

if they had any substantial info on the game, they would share it with us.

Ravious · Jul 20, 2009, 01:29 PM // 13:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by 4thVariety

So GW2 is 21 months into full-studio development at best.

Fixed your typo because unless you worked for ANet/NCSoft you won't have a clue as to when Guild Wars actually started development. I would guess they had teams start on it prior to if not at the time that big daddy NCSoft gave the okay to cancel Utopia. They had to come to NCSoft with a plan including a feasibility study to make GW2 how they wanted to make it (no subs, persistent zones, etc.).

Mordakai · Jul 20, 2009, 03:31 PM // 15:31

Like Ravious says, it all depends on when they stopped working on Utopia, and started working on GW2.

We can assume Utopia began development after Factions was released (remember, ArenaNet has 2 teams working on two campaigns at once, to meet their 6 month release date goal. It's also worth mentioning only one Chapter met that goal: Nightfall, released 6 months after Factions.)

Anyway, assuming they started working on Utopia right after Factions, at some point they realized they weren't going to to release it, and instead started (both teams?) on Eye of the North (GWEN). (It's also possible ONE team was working on GW2, while the other was probably changing Utopia into Eye of the North.

We have no idea how much work was put into Utopia before it was cancelled: did they have new professions? New skills and weapons and armor for those professions? How much of GWEN had to be done from scratch, and how much was "taken" from Utopia?

So, best case scenario GW2 was started sometime after Factions (when Anet decided Utopia was not what they wanted to do), worst case scenario it started (in earnest) after GWEN. That's a 16 month window!

4thVariety · Jul 20, 2009, 03:53 PM // 15:53

From what we can piece together, Utopia had a central city called "Hub of Time", the Chronomancer was one of the original classes and at some point it got drastically reworked into Eye of the North as one of the Art guys put it on his blog.

ArenaNet once had the idea of having two teams each on 12 month release schedules, resulting in a 6 month release rhythm, but that targeted manpower was not achieved. If you compare the credits for the games, you will see, it's the same people all the time and there are no two teams as was initially intended. They fused in the process of making the expansions.

ArenaNet licensed Umbra technology in 11/08. By my count that would have been 12 months into real development of GW2 and around the first time somebody made efforts to fire up the 3D engine in a real time environment for the first time.

Mordakai · Jul 20, 2009, 04:11 PM // 16:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by 4thVariety

ArenaNet licensed Umbra technology in 11/08. By my count that would have been 12 months into real development of GW2 and around the first time somebody made efforts to fire up the 3D engine in a real time environment for the first time.

How do you figure that 12 month time? GWEN came out in 8/07, they took 3 months off after GWEN?

I really hope (although it will never happen) someone will give an "in-depth" story on the development of GW2 after it is released. I know not everyone cares, but I find the inner workings of development fascinating.

4thVariety · Jul 20, 2009, 05:00 PM // 17:00

Gwen did come out at the very end of August. With crunch time over most of the team most likely took the vacation they couldn't before, and nothing really happened for the whole of September. So when everybody was back in October the real planning began. Before you know it's November, but my guess is by then at least everybody knew what he was doing for the foreseeable future.

So there are your three months. August was still crunch time, September was vacation and October was orientation. Considering that they are programmers and designers not factory drones, the whole process might took some time to get off the ground. But again, even telling the community that is good news. Nobody is going to hate ArenaNet for not overworking themselves.

Mordakai · Jul 20, 2009, 05:19 PM // 17:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by 4thVariety

Gwen did come out at the very end of August. With crunch time over most of the team most likely took the vacation they couldn't before, and nothing really happened for the whole of September. So when everybody was back in October the real planning began. Before you know it's November, but my guess is by then at least everybody knew what he was doing for the foreseeable future.

So there are your three months. August was still crunch time, September was vacation and October was orientation. Considering that they are programmers and designers not factory drones, the whole process might took some time to get off the ground. But again, even telling the community that is good news. Nobody is going to hate ArenaNet for not overworking themselves.

Actually, now I think about it, it was August 31. Then there was patches, fixes, downtime.

Yeah, I agree with your points. Actually, if you figure in November / December vacations, it's possible it wasn't until January 2008 ArenaNet really started full production on GW2.

Of course, if we theorize all that, it becomes very hard to reconcile the soft plans for a 2008 Beta...

EDIT: Actually, I'm still convinced there are 2 teams, and at least some people were working on GW2 as soon as a few months after Factions.

Kondichael · Jul 20, 2009, 05:22 PM // 17:22

Im pretty sure I read somewhere that they began on GW2 development, shortly after they released Nightfall.

Mordakai · Jul 20, 2009, 05:29 PM // 17:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kondichael

Im pretty sure I read somewhere that they began on GW2 development, shortly after they released Nightfall.

It would be cool if you could find the quote.

Ravious · Jul 20, 2009, 05:32 PM // 17:32

You might be thinking of the part where Jeff Strain and Co. said something to the effect of 'after Nightfall we sat down to figure out what to do next, and decided we had to make a whole new game with all the ideas we had,' which likely appears in all the reviews related to EOTN and GW2.

Lishy · Jul 20, 2009, 05:32 PM // 17:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kondichael

Im pretty sure I read somewhere that they began on GW2 development, shortly after they released Nightfall.

They began Utopia, which they said would take place in a "frigid" region.
That region became the Eye of the North.

Ravious · Jul 20, 2009, 05:39 PM // 17:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ravious

You might be thinking of the part where Jeff Strain and Co. said something to the effect of 'after Nightfall we sat down to figure out what to do next, and decided we had to make a whole new game with all the ideas we had,' which likely appears in all the reviews related to EOTN and GW2.

http://pc.gamespy.com/pc/guild-wars-2/784302p1.html

Nearly the first question, which also leads to we know Utopia was "concepted" but we don't know how far, or if, it actually got into content creation in game. It is possible that Utopia was being concepted, etc. by Team 2 while Nightfall was going to release. Like Mordakai said, it could be a pretty big window when development/concepting actually began.

I remember somewhere (and now I can't find the interview) where I think Mike O'Brien or someone said how they were really concerned about the Guild Wars engine being able, at all, to handle persistence, and it was actually easier than they thought. I am pretty sure that was pre-EotN.

Kondichael · Jul 20, 2009, 05:41 PM // 17:41

Quote:

You might be thinking of the part where Jeff Strain and Co. said something to the effect of 'after Nightfall we sat down to figure out what to do next, and decided we had to make a whole new game with all the ideas we had,' which likely appears in all the reviews related to EOTN and GW2.

Yea think that's it.

acerbity · Jul 20, 2009, 06:05 PM // 18:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arkantos

They had to explain why there would be no more campaigns/expansions. GW2 was released in 2007. It's now mid 2009. If they didn't announce it, do you know how pissed off the community would be? It's almost been 2 years since the last expansion. They couldn't have just said 'we're working on something huge, but you have to wait another few years to find out'. They were stuck between a rock and a hard place.

guild wars 2 is released?

Inde · Jul 20, 2009, 06:06 PM // 18:06

March 2007, gw2 development started. I have no idea why that date is sticking in my head though. Will have to find reference also.

Mordakai · Jul 20, 2009, 06:09 PM // 18:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by Inde

March 2007, gw2 development started. I have no idea why that date is sticking in my head though. Will have to find reference also.

Well, that's when GW2 was announced.

Surely, it was being developed before then?

Inde · Jul 20, 2009, 06:12 PM // 18:12

Yeah, just found the reference:

http://www.massively.com/tag/guild-wars-2/

I guess they could have announced it at the time that the decision to make it a new game was decided though. Doesn't mean they had started development yet. Just that the execs had made a commitment to a new game.

Mordakai · Jul 20, 2009, 06:21 PM // 18:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Inde

Yeah, just found the reference:

http://www.massively.com/tag/guild-wars-2/

I guess they could have announced it at the time that the decision to make it a new game was decided though. Doesn't mean they had started development yet. Just that the execs had made a commitment to a new game.

Can you link the article? I skimmed through all that and did not find a specific development date. (Unless you are just saying they announced it in March, 2007. I found that).

If they were really planning on having a beta in 2008, I can't see them just starting in March, 2007.

I think they at least had a small team working on it as early as after Factions, but after Nightfall for sure.