If you read any articles addressing speculation regarding a launch date, however, there seem to be tons of people saying that the game is rough to the point of being broken, and that they would expect months of extra polish before the game launch. We’d be lucky to see it by December, if at all, blahblahblah. What the actual frack? Were we playing completely different games? Or do some people feel so entitled that they would be happy to pay for a game and then wait over half a year to actually play it, just to have a highly-polished experience? I just don’t understand that viewpoint.

I think that GW2 is going to suffer from a miscalculation in its marketing timeline. ArenaNet has been hyping the hell out of it, and they’ve actually done a very good job to this point. But we’ve reached saturation level, and rather than building toward a peak of interest, it is going to start to die and turn to ennui and resentment. Also, even though Blizzard and the Mists of Pandaria beta have taken a pretty good thrashing to this point, if I were a game company I really, really wouldn’t want to go head-to-head against Warcraft’s latest expansion. I would expect a MoP launch sometime in November-December, and waiting that long with GW2 would be sheer insanity.

These are the features that I feel are totally broken, and would have to be fixed before the game launches:

1. The server overflow system. As implemented, it is horrible and breaks immersion. I would prefer to see different channels on the same server than this.

2. On a related note, we need the ability to party up with friends. I am amazed that we would have made it to an open beta without this working. What the hell, ArenaNet?

3. If you can’t get server overflow working, you need a queue system. It was really horrible experiencing error after error while trying to log in, knowing from reading the forums and Twitter that it was possibly due to servers being full, possibly due to some other unspecified actual problem.

4. Yes, the game still needs to be optimised, but surely that has been built into their launch timeline.

Secondly, there are some “nice to have” features that I would like to see. I wouldn’t delay launch for them, but it would be nice to see them before if possible.

1. Better human faces. This is the only thing that would be nice to fix prior to launch, as my main will be human and I wouldn’t want to run around forever with a little-girl doll’s face. Would I push launch back because of it? No.

2. It would be nice if the auction house worked better. I was confused during the beta that I seemed to be able to successfully buy things, but never received them. I later read that you have to visit a certain NPC to receive your goods. This is quite odd, and if they’re going to handle it that way, then there needs to be some dialogue to tell you where to receive the items that you have purchased. Easy fix.

Aside from that? If the game went ahead and launched with the first section of issues above addressed, I would be happy. I don’t need a perfect, problem-free world for the first launch of a game, and there will always be issues to address. I would be more demanding if this was a game with a monthly sub – I pay for that polish, damn it. But as it is? I have already paid for it, I just want to be able to play.

And that is part of what is contributing to my general irritation and ennui regarding the wait until launch, and why I would prefer to launch with minor issues rather than wait until the end of the year. I have paid for this. I like ArenaNet as a company, and I have a lot of goodwill towards them. This summer (aside from the probable June launch of The Secret World) is yawning pretty much MMO-free. I am no longer playing SWTOR or Rift. I haven’t played Warcraft in ages, although I did pay for the Annual Pass. The Secret World is better than I’d thought it was…but I still wanted to be playing GW2 in June.

But perhaps I’m crazy, and my experience was vastly different from the experience that other players had. Your mileage may vary.

When Funcom debited my credit card for the pre-order (not pre-purchase, mind you) I was furious. For two people squeaking out a living on very sporadic freelance work, a new game is a huge purchase. It has to be something that you really, really want to play. Double or triple that if it is a subscription game. The Secret World just wasn’t going to be one of those games.

Recently, though, I went back and played during the open beta and the game has greatly changed. The combat system still feels disconnected, and the skill system isn’t very intuitive, but there is a lot of new polish and more content in the game. It feels more like a real world. Although I’m still pissed off at Funcom for prematurely (and possibly illegally) debiting the money, I think it is worth the purchase price. The game is enjoyable now, enough so that I am actually looking forward to launch.

One of the things that they haven’t changed, unfortunately, is the butt-ugly and limited character creation tool. For someone who will twiddle face sliders for ages, that is unfortunate. However, my character does manage to actually retain her hair rather than going bald upon entering the game like my original one, which is a big bonus. More clothing choices would be great. But definitely, definitely, please put some work into character creation! I totally admit that that was one of the reasons why I couldn’t get into LotRO – my character was just so damned ugly.

I haven’t seen much of the overall conspiracy theory plotlines – in the beginning, you mainly kill zombies. Lots and lots of zombies. But I look forward to experiencing the mystery behind the world. And you know what? I am really looking forward to this game.

Click for credits on stock used

I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.

- From Dune by Frank Herbert

But the wild things cried, “Oh please don’t go – we’ll eat you up – we love you so!”

And Max said, “No!”

The wild things roared their terrible roars and gnashed their terrible teeth and rolled their terrible eyes and showed their terrible claws but Max stepped into his private boat and waved goodbye.

Rest in peace, Maurice Sendak. Where the Wild Things Are was a book that I loved as a child, and one that my daughter loved in turn. I still have her copy, complete with crayon scribbles. We all have wanted to be the King of all Wild Things now and then.

If GW1 was a person, I would totally smack them right in the face, and not feel guilty about it at all. Totally.

Much of my frustration has to do with lack of information. Now, I know how to Google, I’m not an idiot. It’s not as though I haven’t tried to find information to fill the gap left by inadequacies in the original (admittedly very dated) game design. They just aren’t there, for the most part. Take Zaishen dailies, for example. Oh, sure, the various wikis list all the rotating quests and a bit about what you need to do on them (which is taken from the quest text). What I haven’t been able to find is things like how you get to wherever you’re supposed to go to do them. Basic stuff, amiright? I took a mission quest at Embark Beach which informed me that I needed to rescue hostages in The Wilds of the Maguuma Jungle. Fine…but I have no frickin idea where said jungle is. It’s not on my map, I’ve never discovered anything called the Maguuma Jungle. I haven’t completed all the expansions yet – is that why? Surely I shouldn’t have been eligible for that quest in that event?

Everything through the whole damned game is like that.

I was levelling an Elementalist on Phil’s account so that he could do some of the HoM stuff with me. He doesn’t like GW1, and wouldn’t level one on his own, but if I got a character to 20 for him, he could help me with a few things. And I got stuck at level 15 with no Nightfall quests, sent to Cantha and Kaineng City, where all mobs are level 20+ and travel in massive packs. Even with a full group of heroes I get slaughtered over and over and eventually log off.

Do me a favour…the next time I start talking about Hall of Monuments stuff? Smack me in the face, really really hard, until I come to my senses. OK?

Case in point? I’d been casually thinking of things that I could do for my husband’s birthday given that we have no money to spend and that there are no games out at the moment that sound interesting. During the day yesterday I realised that it was his birthday and it was too late. Too late for pressies and birthday wishes during the morning cuddles, too late for something that he may have liked. Too late to not look like a total ass, too late to say anything other than I’m sorry. Bah.

I’ve been trying to work on notes and outlines for the next project, with a similarly spectacular lack of success. I’ve had an image in my head for years of something that I wanted to write, and the basis of a story. I have the characters, and the threads that tie them together, and the place where it all happens. What I don’t have is an actual story.

Meh.

1. I had fun. I really, really enjoyed this game. I had gone into the beta with some specific things that I wanted to do, and yesterday I ended up exploring just for the pure joy of it and in appreciation of the gorgeous environments.

2. Overflow servers. Well, I agree with Keen and Graev on this one, they really do need to be implemented better. When first reading about this system, I had thought that it was a way to avoid long queues, and it seemed like a brilliant system. It didn’t work at all for that (perhaps it wasn’t supposed to) but where it did come into play was when you were changing zones once you were in game. Quite a few games place players in duplicated instances of a server or zone. There is no need to inform the player that this has happened, because it should always feel as though you were playing on your server; if you are in a party, you get the option to switch to the channel that they are in. A party leader can gather all party members in the same shard or channel. It’s been done before, and it’s not something new. In GW2, however, you get a message that you can either wait for your server or switch to an overflow server…when you are going to different zones on the map. This breaks immersion and makes it feel like the original instanced game, which is one of the main things that I thought we were getting away from. To make things worse, this breaks up parties. Phil and I were trying to get together to do some quests, and even though we were in a party and in the same place, we couldn’t see each other.

I think the original idea of overflow servers (or the original impression I had about how they would work) would be wonderful and ground-breaking. Rather than queueing, tell us that we were going to be placed on an overflow server and then moved to our server of choice once there was room. That is a great idea. Once we’re on that server, though, you shouldn’t see any immersion-breaking messages about being moved to a different server as soon as you set foot outside the city. Just invisibly place us in whatever channel has room for us, and then allow us to easily move between channels to play with friends.

I spent a lot of time this weekend trying to get online after crashes, etc., failing and then getting one of several error messages which basically just meant that the server was full. Since there was no queue system, it meant that we had to keep trying to relog in blind faith that the servers were still up. It took me over four hours on Friday. This is where the overflow system should have come into play.

2. Not being able to trade anything is very weird. Mailed items appeared hours later, or not at all – I am assuming that this was a beta bug. We should be able to trade, though.

3. Was the auction house working for anyone? I tried to buy items, but nothing would happen. On other occasions I think I managed to buy, but never got the item. I don’t know if it mails the item to you, or it appears in your bags or what. Again, this is a beta issue.

4. Being able to send mail, buy from the auction house, and deposit crafting mats in the bank while out questing is a very nice feature. Even nicer would be full bank access. Another nice feature to implement would be the SWTOR feature of being able to craft by using mats in your bank, without having to carry them in your bags. Again, that would be a “nice to have” feature, and it is not gamebreaking at all.

5. I did a lot of playing with the character creation tool. I still think that Norn have the nicest hair and face options, damn it. Also, the face options seem to have differences based on the class that you are creating. If I did a necromancer, I got a certain set of face options. If I went to build an elementalist or mesmer, the faces were changed slightly, as though they were distorted somehow. They all looked a bit more anime-esque, more childish. Strange – but I haven’t heard anyone else mention that. There is one older female face for human, and it’s not a very nice one. All others are extremely young-looking. I’d love a better range of starting heads, or a range of complexions to choose such as SWTOR had. In the meantime, I can play with a teenage-looking character and just imagine her having the correct age and look.

6. WvW is an amazing amount of fun, even though big fights turn into slideshows. I’m not a big pvp fan, but I love this. What isn’t as nice is the lack of waystations once you die. In my experience, they usually showed as contested, so I only had one spawn point which was on the far corner of the map. Once ressed, there was a very long trek to get back to where the fighting actually was.

7. Give roleplayers some love! I hate it when games won’t allow you to sit on furniture.

8. We need to be able to view armour and weapons when looking at them at a merchant, or in the auction house. Being able to link something and view it would be nice as well.

9. Lots of explanations. I couldn’t figure out how to get into WvW for ages. I saw rangers with named pets, and didn’t see a way of naming my own by right-clicking it and looking at pet management. Explain things a bit more.

Those are my main points about things that need to be fixed. That said, I am going to suggest the following:

They need to launch the game.

Yep. Even with the problems, which mainly seem to be involved with their server infrastructure (judging by the fact that they fixed so many connection problems on their end, and there were no client updates). Fix those issues, and then launch.

Arenanet have stated something to the effect that these beta events would be going on roughly one a month for an unspecified time, and if that goes on too long it’s really going to affect them negatively. We’ve had a massive wall of hype on this game for a couple of years now, and I’ve always been worried that they would oversaturate everyone with their marketing and all of the information that was released. Surely they can’t continue on like this over the summer and launch in fall? Even given the massive amount of goodwill that this game has, and that Arenanet has in general, I think the tide may turn for them and that would be a shame.

A real beta (when it is not used as a marketing tool) is basically an exchange. In return for players testing the game and providing feedback, they are allowed an early sneak peek at an anticipated game. But we have already paid for this game. I would hope to see perhaps one more beta weekend to make sure that they have worked out all connection issues, and then a launch. No, it won’t be perfect…but give us what we’ve paid for. Goodwill is a fragile and immensely valuable thing, a lesson that Blizzard has hopefully learned recently. I always felt much love for Blizzard and for Warcraft, and I would have forgiven them a lot. The MoP beta and the Annual Pass bait-and-switch changed my feelings for the company forever.

QQers will always cry, but most players will forgive a few glitches in a game. (Not to the level of this weekend, to be sure – but most of the stuff above? Not such big issues.) Fix the connection issues, do what you can to allow players to party up, and then launch. Everything else can be forgiven.

I haven’t been able to get into WvW yet – I don’t know if there are problems, or if it’s just really popular. I did do some instance pvp which wasn’t bad while I was trying to figure out how the hell one actually got into a WvW map. Won one and lost one. Killed some people, died a bunch, but so far no obnoxious stunlock abilities, which is the main thing that I hate about pvp.

I’ve been trying various professions. Necromancer had been my choice for main prior to the beta starting, and I do still enjoy it. Ranger is great as well, much better than in the original game. I’ve dipped my toes into Elementalist, Mesmer, etc., and will take those a bit further.

Norn have better hair choices than humans do, damn it. And all female characters look like underage girls. I’d like to see some badass armour, rather than the frilly maids-0utfit stuff that looks very Asian. Sexy, long, black robes, that’s what I want!

Divinity’s Reach and Lion’s Gate are stunning, so gorgeously designed! It’s difficult to take screenshots, though, because you are limited in your camera view (you can’t swing it into a first person view so your character’s ass isn’t in centre stage, which is a shame).

All in all, I’m having a lot of fun this weekend. In fact, I’m jumping right back in now (if I can get back on after a crash which seems to have kicked a lot of people out of game). Having fun – wish you were here? :)

I know that there are people who hit “random” a few times to get an acceptable look and maybe move the boob slider up, and then they’re good to go. I am not one of those players. I spend ages over character creation and am not satisfied until it clicks and a unique person is born. I would love a game that either had an online character creation tool on the site, or allowed you to access one via the game and save it. Once the game launches and you finally log in, then you would be given the option to load your saved character, tweak if if necessary, and accept it – or start all over again if you wished. It would give people something to do while waiting for headstart and it would also give the perfectionists the ability to get every cheekbone and eye rotated just so.

I think it’s a great idea.

If Guild Wars 2 had a working character creation tool on their site, I probably would have logged approximately fifteen hours on it by now. :)

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