Curse

Shadowmoon · Mar 11, 2009, 07:23 PM // 19:23

I'm curious how casual northrend would remain tbh. WoW was a very casual game at release, but turned into a grind/raid fest after a few months.

Faer · Mar 11, 2009, 07:30 PM // 19:30

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arkantos

Also, graphics are irrelevant. If games with better graphics killed games with worse graphics...

...people would enjoy Sonic Unleashed more than Sonic & Knuckles.

YEAH. I WENT THERE.

Age · Mar 11, 2009, 09:42 PM // 21:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arkantos

No. No game is going to kill WoW.

Also, graphics are irrelevant. If games with better graphics killed games with worse graphics, GW would have killed WoW. If you haven't noticed, GW has sold ~6 million copies, and WoW has 11 millions subscribers.

That is because WoW came out much earlier than GW and PWI was just released late last year. The graphics are what sold most on to to GW from WoW.There are several expansions coming out for PWI.

Lonesamurai · Mar 11, 2009, 09:50 PM // 21:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Theocrat

...people would enjoy Sonic Unleashed more than Sonic & Knuckles.

YEAH. I WENT THERE.

Oh Snap...

you just reminded me to go buy Sega Megadrive Collection

cheers man

DreamWind · Mar 11, 2009, 10:20 PM // 22:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by Age

That is because WoW came out much earlier than GW and PWI was just released late last year. The graphics are what sold most on to to GW from WoW.There are several expansions coming out for PWI.

The no monthly fees is what attracted people to GW. I assure you graphics were much lower on that list.

I'm also not buying the "they attract different crowds" answer. I would make a strong bet that GW attracts mostly the players who aren't capable of paying monthly fees (or don't want to pay) for WoW but would if they could.

Age · Mar 11, 2009, 11:15 PM // 23:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by DreamWind

The no monthly fees is what attracted people to GW. I assure you graphics were much lower on that list.

I'm also not buying the "they attract different crowds" answer. I would make a strong bet that GW attracts mostly the players who aren't capable of paying monthly fees (or don't want to pay) for WoW but would if they could.

GW attracked FPS players who wanted a competive game instead along came the MMO crowd who changed the game that the FPS didn't like.

RedNova88 · Mar 11, 2009, 11:21 PM // 23:21

Guild Wars was designed first and foremost for casual gamers. Not specifically for those that wanted PvP or PvE. People came to GW because of the lack of grind that had became so ridiculously popular in mainstream MMOs. People started bitching because they got bored after beating the game(duh, that's what the devs expected), and thus titles were born, to give the babies something to do because God knows not a single MMO player has the patience to put aside a game and find something else to enjoy until an expansion comes out.

DreamWind · Mar 11, 2009, 11:44 PM // 23:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Age

GW attracked FPS players who wanted a competive game instead along came the MMO crowd who changed the game that the FPS didn't like.

Ok I can agree with this.

Quote:

Originally Posted by RedNova88

Guild Wars was designed first and foremost for casual gamers. Not specifically for those that wanted PvP or PvE. People came to GW because of the lack of grind that had became so ridiculously popular in mainstream MMOs. People started bitching because they got bored after beating the game(duh, that's what the devs expected), and thus titles were born, to give the babies something to do because God knows not a single MMO player has the patience to put aside a game and find something else to enjoy until an expansion comes out.

So let's see...GW was designed for casual players who didn't like grind, yet Anet had to add grind to make people happy. Makes perfect sense.

Gigashadow · Mar 12, 2009, 12:15 AM // 00:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zinger314

Ok, I'll say it again.

Anyone who hasn't played WoW since WotLK (i.e. Nov 13, 2008) has no right to speak since WoW has changed so much since then it isn't even funny.

WoW endgame is more casual than GW. If you don't believe that or know why, you have no right to comment.

Quest design and story design in Northrend is also superior to anything GW has to offer. (Hi, Wrathgate).

PvP in both games is flawed just as equally. Atleast Blizzard does overhauls once in awhile.

I played WoTLK. While WoW is generally quite casual and low on grind these days, doing 25 man raids in on a guild schedule isn't what I would call a casual activity. And that IS the endgame. You aren't going to be trade-channel pugging Ulduar 25.

You can do all of GW's endgame with just 1 other person; that's pretty damn casual. Whether GW's endgame is good or enjoyable is another matter...

WoTLK does get a 10/10 for the 70-80 leveling experience (and the phasing tech used in many places), that seriously raised the bar.

edit: As far as PvP goes, WoW loses because you can't easily switch characters when the game is in a broken state, which arenas definitely have been since WoTLK released, as well as before that (hi season 1-4 resto druids). In GW if something is too good or too bad, at least there is no opportunity cost to switch, so you aren't stuck with a character you spent years investing in. To be fair, there is more skill involved in WoW PvP than people give it credit for (although less than GW GvG for sure), and you'll hear the usual complaints from bad players that they lost "only because of gear".

karekiz · Mar 12, 2009, 02:31 AM // 02:31

I am recently getting a tad bored with WoW so I am taking a spin to head back to GW and start fresh (Go thru each campaign with a set of friends).

All I can say is....I wasn't in a guild that even did heroics (I had to PUG myself thru everything) and I hit 40K hp 32K Armor and 40% dodge on my druid /shrug. Now that im bored of Naxx , OS, etc and the "druid nerf" GW will suit me fine.

PvP....Guild Wars hands down. WOW killed its own PvP. Battle grounds are a joke now and arena's are a grind. You can't "Build" your own character aside from a few different talent points.

RedNova88 · Mar 12, 2009, 03:48 AM // 03:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by DreamWind

So let's see...GW was designed for casual players who didn't like grind, yet Anet had to add grind to make people happy. Makes perfect sense.

More people equals more demands. It's only obvious that quite a few of the people who played Guild Wars after launch weren't content with just beating the game or indulging themselves in the PvP scene. Thus titles and other "elite" things were added in to keep the more hardcore crowd content. It actually does make perfect sense. It's pretty obvious that Guild Wars was designed with casual gamers in mind.

Quote:

PvP....Guild Wars hands down. WOW killed its own PvP. Battle grounds are a joke now and arena's are a grind. You can't "Build" your own character aside from a few different talent points.

I have to agree with this. WoW had a great PvP system going when I joined back in 04, over the years it disintegrated. I miss the old AV that used to literally last days. Never was fond of WSG or AB.

DreamWind · Mar 12, 2009, 05:24 AM // 05:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by RedNova88

More people equals more demands. It's only obvious that quite a few of the people who played Guild Wars after launch weren't content with just beating the game or indulging themselves in the PvP scene.

That is their problem not Anet's. Anet created a PvP endgame. If one of the reasons people came to the game was because of less grind, why did more people mean more demand for grind? Sounds to me like people came to Guild Wars for the wrong reasons.

Quote:

Originally Posted by RedNova88

Thus titles and other "elite" things were added in to keep the more hardcore crowd content. It actually does make perfect sense. It's pretty obvious that Guild Wars was designed with casual gamers in mind.

So casual gamers desire more grind?

Red Sonya · Mar 12, 2009, 05:45 AM // 05:45

Quote:

The graphics are what sold most on to to GW from WoW.

Hardly, what really sold GW from WOW was the fact it has no monthly fee. That has already been shown in several polls now. It's the top reason players bought GW. No monthly $15 fee. I personally don't see the graphics advantage of GW over most offline rpg's. Morrowind and Oblivion have better graphics than GW. Plus the mods for them actually give them more to offer in the long run. There must be thousands of mods for Morrowind out there.
WOW's popularity continues to rise as GW begins to peter out. And as I've said before and have to say again 'grind' is really not an issue. The majority of the rpg and mmorpg/mmo community prefer it. Even GW broke down and came over to it although it's still not really a required grind (though some like to think so, the carebears). GW has and will continue to evolve and anyone can see it's evolving toward the mmorpg and in a grinding sort of way. It tries to offer everything it can to every genre of the fantasy virtual world it can and there's really nothing wrong with that except they are just going to have more complaining from many sides as everyone jockeys for what they want most out of the game(s).
GW is only a few steps away from being the type of mmo/mmorpg I want it to be. It needs more random content (so going back playing an area again isn't so predictable) and it needs more evolving phat loot that has a LOT more ways to improve weapons and armors and offhands, right now they are just too limited. It needs to do away with freebie events that give PVE players a bunch of keys that give them a bunch of phat loot without much effort. Which leads to one of the worst things Anet ever did to this game and that is ruin the value of things and the economy trying to please the carebears.

snaek · Mar 12, 2009, 05:50 AM // 05:50

tbh, i look at gw vs wow very differently. maybe i'm wrong for viewing it this way, but i do think it has merit. the way i look at it goes like this...

wow is the casual game. gw is the competitive game.

casual players like farming/grind because while it takes time, it doesn't require as much dedication as training for skill does. its a very simple process, and the game will reward time spent no matter how skillful u spend that time. this means that for a casual player, he can spend 3 hours at low level play and be rewarded, or a casual player can spend 1 hour at low level play and still be rewarded.

gw's shortcuts were not intended for casual players. they were meant for competitive players who wanted to focus on skill training rather than the annoyingly mindless or easy activities. instead of having to spend 3 hours in a game and only getting a small amount of that time to dedicate to improving his skill level, he can spend much more of that 3 hours to put to good use of strictly skill training.

Quote:

Originally Posted by dreamwind

That is their problem not Anet's. Anet created a PvP endgame. If one of the reasons people came to the game was because of less grind, why did more people mean more demand for grind? Sounds to me like people came to Guild Wars for the wrong reasons.

they came into gw because they were mislead into thinking it was a casual game. then they probably realized that it wasn't, and so anet put more grind into the game to appeal to the casual players moreso since they saw a huge potential for sales.

Quote:

Originally Posted by dreamwind

So casual gamers desire more grind?

yes, because grind only requires time and not skill. casual players have more time than they do skill. simply put, grind is a way to reward low skill-level play.

RedNova88 · Mar 12, 2009, 06:41 AM // 06:41

Quote:

Originally Posted by DreamWind

That is their problem not Anet's. Anet created a PvP endgame. If one of the reasons people came to the game was because of less grind, why did more people mean more demand for grind? Sounds to me like people came to Guild Wars for the wrong reasons.

Yes, it does seem that way doesn't it.

Quote:

So casual gamers desire more grind?

No, as I said the casuals were likely content just beating it and PvPing, or beating it and waiting for an expansion. More people came along obviously, and those people started to become upset with lack of things to do after beating all there was to beat, or buy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by snaek

yes, because grind only requires time and not skill. casual players have more time than they do skill. simply put, grind is a way to reward low skill-level play.

Wow. I had never thought of it like that, good point. It actually does make sense, although do remember that just because someone is casual doesn't mean they are unskilled. However, it does make sense in a way, since grind really doesn't require any sort of skill and anyone can be rewarded for the amount of time they input.

Arduin · Mar 12, 2009, 08:54 AM // 08:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by snaek

yes, because grind only requires time and not skill. Casual players have more time than they do skill. Simply put, grind is a way to reward low skill-level play.

Hmmmm....interesting. [/Vekkvoice]

Arkantos · Mar 12, 2009, 01:18 PM // 13:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by Age

That is because WoW came out much earlier than GW and PWI was just released late last year. The graphics are what sold most on to to GW from WoW.There are several expansions coming out for PWI.

Much earlier? WoW came out November 23rd 2004 for NA/AUS, February 11th 2005 for EU. GW came out April 28th, 2005 for NA/AUS/EU/others (if I'm wrong, please correct me). Do you really think WoW is more successful because it came out 5 months before GW for NA/AUS players, and about a month and a half before GW for EU players? And no, the graphics are not the main reason people from WoW decided to play GW. The main reason was GW did not have a subscription, so players could play it whenever they wanted. Regardless of how many expansions are coming out for PWI, it is not going to kill WoW.

Sjeng · Mar 12, 2009, 01:35 PM // 13:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by snaek

yes, because grind only requires time and not skill. casual players have more time than they do skill. simply put, grind is a way to reward low skill-level play.

*grind only requires time and not skill - true
*casual players have more time than they do skill - not so true. They are casual players, thus they do NOT have more time. If they had more time, they'd surely have more skill too. They play casually, hence their skill isn't as good as a hardcore player who spends lots of time playing.

The casual player can do fine for a loooong time with all the content in GW without grinding titles. It's the hardcore gamer who has more time to play, thus has more skill, thus has gone through the game more quickly, who needs more stuff to do. It's for them the grind was introduced.

As Rednova88 said:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rednova88

Thus titles and other "elite" things were added in to keep the more hardcore crowd content. It actually does make perfect sense. It's pretty obvious that Guild Wars was *originally* designed with casual gamers in mind.

I added a word to clarify more.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dreamwind

So let's see...GW was designed for casual players who didn't like grind, yet Anet had to add grind to make people happy. Makes perfect sense.

Almost, it's more like Anet designed it for casual players, but of course hardcore gamers joined in as well, and it's them that demanded more stuff to do, and anet provided grind for them to keep em busy. The question is: why would they, if they knew the game wouldn't have anything more to offer once you've beaten the game and done all quests? I sure as hell don't know, but i'm glad they did. I actually like HM and *some* titles (exploration / skill hunter are fun).

Zinger314 · Mar 12, 2009, 05:38 PM // 17:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gigashadow

You can do all of GW's endgame with just 1 other person; that's pretty damn casual. Whether GW's endgame is good or enjoyable is another matter...

I'm not sure how number-of-people is proportional to the causality of a game...

snaek · Mar 12, 2009, 06:27 PM // 18:27

^the more people needed to form a group, generally the more work involved. it requires teamwork and communication.

regarding hardcore vs casual:
to be honest, i really don't remember anyone complaining or demanding for more grind during the time when there weren't any titles/hm/etc. anet does not make money from hardcore players who already own the game, they make money from new players buying the game. i was a hardcore player back then, and i always had to convince casual players that lvl20 was -not- the end of the game. to reach a wider playerbase, casual grind is a way to do it.

my definition of a hardcore gamer is someone who seeks to know all about the ins and outs of a game. so by definition they already go beyond titles... they do not need them one bit.

my definition of a casual gamer is someone who plays the game at a low-skill level, generally just for fun. titles give casual players direction because otherwise they would be just randomly blowing ish up.

by definition, a "gamer," whether "casual" or "hardcore," will in fact spend time on games. i do not think you can attach the amount of time spent to the definition. yes, a casual gamer stereotypically might play less often than a hardcore gamer (and vice versa), but it is not part of the definition and not always the case.

one of the reasons a hardcore gamer would demand titles, is because they wan't recognition for their hardcore status, not to become any more hardcore than they already are. which personally, i think is a lame reason to want them.