Smart move by ArenaNet?

[Fencers]

I don't understand the OP. Nobody remembers the wait for a great game- they just remember the game.

[Larynx]

Look at TOR.

Look at GW2.

Now look at TOR again.

[StationaryHawk]

Absolutely yes. After seeing so many games with great potential come up short due to being rushed out the door, they should not release the game before it's ready to be released.

[Spritely]

I remember when they announced it and getting SO excited to go out and get PC Gamer Magazine or whatever it was to get the Asura pet code...

That said, I'll wait as long as I have to as long as the game they release is amazing.

[Deleted]

Look at TOR.

Look at GW2.

Now look at TOR again.

I lol'd

But back to the point; 5 years is good for a game of this quality. We all want more but I'd rather have the game done properly to be honest.

[Naposim1337]

look at swtor, ea pushed release but BW could use another 6 months to perfect the game. I wouldnt mind much if GW2 would come 1q 2013 if it would be in perfect shape.

[Speedy92286]

There is "perfecting it" and then there is delaying it for no reason. I think it the game is released after the summer, it falls into the ladder. The game in beta looks amazing right now. A few minor adjustments are needed at best and with the beta weekend that is coming up, I am sure they will get all the player feedback they could possibly want.

The only things right now I am worried about are some elites, some particle effects (burn on large creatures) and certain weapons not feeling as done as others. Besides those things, all easily fixed, the game is fine. It looked fine last fall, too.

[Oerba Yun Fang]

Look at TOR.

Look at GW2.

Now look at TOR again.

This is the game your game could be like?



I see a lot of people saying "the game looks really good in beta" but... aren't the betas only a chunk of the game? If they were going to show something off, it would make sense they'd show off the most completed part of the game. I don't think the beta tests are necessarily a good thing to judge by. :/

[aevitas]

If every game developer would take their time to polish their games before releasing it like Anet is doing right now, I think there would be a lot less failed and crappy games out there...

Then again, I've still got to play GW2. Just judging by what I am seeing on youtube.

[Ashgar]

I think everyone is tired of games releasing early and having to pay for a game that should still be in beta. Nobody enjoys playing through a bug riddled game waiting several months for it to be fixed. It's sad many games have come to this model of lazy developing or distributors forcing the company to release it early.

From what I saw in the video's there still many bugs to fix so I hope they take their time and bring the game out when it's ready.

[zardon3001]

I think everyone is tired of games releasing early and having to pay for a game that should still be in beta. Nobody enjoys playing through a bug riddled game waiting several months for it to be fixed. It's sad many games have come to this model of lazy developing or distributors forcing the company to release it early.

From what I saw in the video's there still many bugs to fix so I hope they take their time and bring the game out when it's ready.

There are definitely things that need to be fixed, and so far it doesn't seem like they plan to rush anything, and hopefully that doesn't change.

[Cuchulainn]

ANet is making an extremely smart move. It's also a great help that NCFail@OtherMMOs is giving them a shit load of leeway. Pretty much NCSoft is banking on GW2 to bring their reputation for making great MMOS back into view (even though they didn't make GW2).

When you really sum it up, GW2 very well might take the title for "most successful launch" in MMO history; a title that no other MMO could ever compete against. And if you really want to take it a step futher, GW2 might take the spot as "The most successful MMO". Imagine that!

November? That seems a bit too far in the future. Or maybe it's wishful thinking on my part... *sigh*

Well, you may think you're dreaming big, but I'm right there with you.
BTW, I love how your signature subtly implies that GW2 is a champion of MMOs, thus the "champions" word. I completely agree, though, MMO-C should expand their horizons beyond the dying juggernaut (WoW). After all, if this site wants to survive, it will have to go with the strongest man standing...or both.

[Hockeyhacker]

5 years of development time is well within the normal range for MMOs.

Agreed with this statement, I mean heck how long was ToR in development? how long was WoW in development? The only difference here is back when WoW was coming out many people still had dial up in their homes and MMOs where very niche.

Yes, a very smart move in my opinion. I've seen far too many games with great potential ruined because they were rushed out to meet some arbitrary deadline set by investors.

Agree'd with this as well, using ToR as an example again, don't get me wrong I like ToR very much, but it launched as a very incomplete game that still needs a lot of work before I would consider it in what should be minimum launch quality, what (we) have in ToR right now is basically a live sub costing early beta version with a lot to do still. And this was not the developers fault but rather the publisher, marketing department, and investors forcing the developer to release for holiday sales rather then take a few extra months to get it into a "full game" state.

[vizzle]

BTW, I love how your signature subtly implies that GW2 is a champion of MMOs, thus the "champions" word. I completely agree, though, MMO-C should expand their horizons beyond the dying juggernaut (WoW). After all, if this site wants to survive, it will have to go with the strongest man standing...or both.

I think the signature is less of a metaphor and more of a siganture for the MMOC GW2 Guild Especially since it's on the front page of the MMOC GW2 Guild thread.

[EdisonTrent]

There's always the chance we'll end up with another Daikatana or Duke Nukem forever, but let's look on the bright side.
Do any of you remember the agonizing 5-year wait for Ocarina of Time? Remember how revolutionary that was at the time? Lock-on systems and context sensitive actions likely wouldn't be nearly as prevalent, even commonplace as they are today were it not for OoT. The odds seem to be in favor of having another OoT-caliber game changer on our hands, something that'll really give things a good shake-up.

So I don't mind waiting a while.

[willowe]

It's better that a game is released 'when it's ready,' than for it to be rushed and, well....flop.

We've seen many a 'WoW Killer' pop up, get hyped to oblivion, then release comes and there's too many bugs, nothing to do at level cap, and the PvP/PvE is horridly balanced. The Dev team scrambles to 'fix' it, as droves of players throw away their copies of the game.

You only have ONE chance to drag in the soul of the player on the other end of the screen, or you lose them, probably forever. Playing it safe and doing things 'right' is the best option.

[Leben]

GW2 is not a WoW killer. It may be in the same genre, but its a different kind of game entirely. It would be like thinking that the latest Ridge Racer release would end all interest in Gran Turismo.

Look, Im getting as impatient as anybody. Ive been waiting for this game for close to 4 years now. As impatient as I am, Im more interested in Arenanet actually finishing production on the game and releasing the completed article. When WoW was released, it was great but there were gaping holes in the gameplay. Dungeons missing from certain level ranges, bugs in quest chains that made them impossible to complete, lack of quests at max level and so on. These things were patched in reasonably quickly, but it did sour the initial experience somewhat. Id rather have a "complete" game released than something launching with bugs, missing content untested large scale events.

[lordjust]

I'm not sure where you're coming up with a release date in November from. And yes, the Press Beta looked polished - that is, to clarify, the level 1 to 30 experience for Human, Charr and Norm. That leaves level 31 to 80 for those races, and level 1 to 80 for Sylvari & Asura that we haven't seen yet, and cannot judge "polish level" on. I'm not saying they're not mostly complete etc - but we haven't seen them.

In answer to your question, you're really asking "Do you want a completed, tested and polished game, or a game with potential bugs and issues" - if you boil down what you're saying (and discarding the time frame comments).

It strikes me one does not need to be Leonardo Da Vinci to come to a logical conclusion as to what product us gamers would rather be playing - just take a look at the QQ on other forums when a game/expansion/patch is released with bugs (not saying that some level of upset isn't justified, but some of the QQ you read is over the top).

The real question is if they can make profit out of the game because of the long development time. The thing is that you buy the game and then it's free to play and therefore they need to make enough money with selling the game copies and with the in-game shop. You can't compare GW2 to WoW or ToR because they have monthly fees to get their money back and to create profit. In GW2 you have only the in-game shop with things nice to have but not necessary.

[Larynx]

The real question is if they can make profit out of the game because of the long development time. The thing is that you buy the game and then it's free to play and therefore they need to make enough money with selling the game copies and with the in-game shop. You can't compare GW2 to WoW or ToR because they have monthly fees to get their money back and to create profit. In GW2 you have only the in-game shop with things nice to have but not necessary.

I think they'll very easily make a profit just from release sales.

Unless they spent like 500 million dollars for development...

In the ~48 hours of the Beta sign ups, a million people signed up.

Compare that to TOR, which I hear had about 1.5 million, and it was open for years.

Assuming GW2 will therefore do at least as well as TOR did, they'll make everything they spent back ,and more. Take into the account the very frequent expansions and the cosmetic store (which people will most likely be much more willing to buy from since there's no sub). Plus they have very easily have 5 years for the game to run its course, and probably more.

So yeah, it's safe to assume that only the early arrival of Apophis could make the game unprofitable.

[pleaserelax]

The real question is if they can make profit out of the game because of the long development time. The thing is that you buy the game and then it's free to play and therefore they need to make enough money with selling the game copies and with the in-game shop. You can't compare GW2 to WoW or ToR because they have monthly fees to get their money back and to create profit. In GW2 you have only the in-game shop with things nice to have but not necessary.

I'd imagine they have a pretty good idea of how to make money from the B2P model since they already have a successful game using it. Making money is a factor in their deciding when the game releases, no doubt, but there hasn't been any suggestion that they're getting down to any kind of deadline yet.