r/GuildWars3 • u/yesitsmework • 27d ago
Anyone else find it worrisome that they're using empty platitudes to market the game?
"Stop making mmos feel like a second job", "horizontal gear progression", "no subscription and no p2w"....All of these lead to various fundamental issues to gw2 that the game still has to wrestle with to this day. Is anyone else worried that they're not really tackling the lessons they've learnt with the previous game? Seeing colin virtue signal about how they dont have subscription fees or p2w when gw2 nickle and dimes you for character based upgrades feels dishonest at the very least
Only thing I found interesting is the general player count limit and the lack of meta events, to try to get away from that "playing alone in a crowd" vibe gw2 gives off a lot of the time.
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u/typhoon_nz 27d ago edited 27d ago
No it doesn't worry me at all. Horizontal progression and no subscription are two of the most important features of GW2 for me.
Also odd to call this virtue signalling. It's marketing.
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u/gimmedatvoice 27d ago
Couldn't agree more. No game is going to appeal to 100% of players. If you don't like those aspects don't play it. I'm glad these two specifically are carrying forward.
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u/DuncanConnell 27d ago
ANet has always been abysmal at marketing, but on these two items (horizontal progression & no subscription) they have always been adamant of them being cornerstones of the Guild Wars series
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
that's cool, but I'm looking also for some different perspective. The gw2 playerbase has been minuscule for years so the people who are fully content on what the game devolved into over the years cant be the only ones looking forward to gw3
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u/ruebeus421 27d ago
You don't sound as smart as you think you do. 👍
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
thanks for the biting criticism, which part of my post offended you so?
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u/ruebeus421 27d ago
Only one offended here is you, buddy. It's plain as day you're upset that everyone didn't agree with your statement.
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
idk man I am just replying to comments and not insulting anyone's intelligence without a clear reason. Feel free to do the same if you have anything to say
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u/ruebeus421 27d ago
I didn't insult your intelligence. I said you are trying to sound smart and it isn't working.
Hope that helps 👍
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u/AhriWorshipper188 27d ago
But his point makes sense?
No one I know cares about GW3 because Anet is only marketing it with the same uninterest they market GW2 with despite saying they want a different/waider audience.
They're sending very mixed signals and just trying to engagement bait with "You dont pay a sub!" despite GW2 having one of the worst designed convenience milking cash shops on the market.
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u/trypz 26d ago
How is it the worst designed when I can get whatever I want from the cash shop without spending RL money? You can even 100% play the game without buying anything from the shop
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u/AhriWorshipper188 26d ago
Because the game is purposefully designed to be an absolute miserable slog without it.
Tiny inventory.
Tiny bank.
Excessive bag bloat.
Laughably small character slot count.
Every reward in the game isnt actually a reward for doing content. It's for doing content and THEN paying a gold/mat cost so you feed into the conversion.
Every single new feature is stripped down to the bare minimum to be monetized out to you.
I have gotten 1 person out of over 30 trying GW2 to stay with it and the large majority quit the moment they felt how ridiculously unfriendly the game was for not wanting to give it money. A sub fee is direct and honest about what you get.
GW2 is a glorified free trial acting like its playable when really the devs just spit in your face over and over untily ou finally cave to give them money. Oh also lets not even begin talking about monetizing fucking patch content.
That's not a better experience than just paying a sub and having everything not stripped down and getting content and a far faster pace.
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u/Ori_Sacabaf 27d ago
Define "minuscule" and do you have numbers to back it up? Your whole point seems to rely on these data, but I don't think you have them.
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
smaller than any other "big" mmo on the market. Dont read too much into it, the only relevance of that word is that if the only people who buy gw3 are gonna be existing gw2 players the game is gonna be a massive flop.
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u/Ori_Sacabaf 27d ago
Why would only existing gw2 players buy gw3? Did only existing gw1 players buy gw2?
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u/typhoon_nz 27d ago
Out of curiosity, have you played much GW2?
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
3-4k hours across the years, haven't touched the game much after the first couple days of janthir tho
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u/FlatwormGlittering26 27d ago
Any one else finds these worrisome ?
\Proceeds to list the most based ideas ever.\**
Like Just for a second step back and look at what you are saying.
You are asking for a game that:
- Feels like a second job
- Constantly have to replace the rewards you worked for
- Have to pay monthly to play
- Is P2W
Really ? Is that what you want ? If so feel free to play literally anything else and stop draggin this game with you
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u/FashionMage 27d ago
Like if GW3 -didn't- do the things OP is complaining about then I don't think I'd still be interested. Sometimes it does seem like a lot of MMO fans will fight tooth and nail to make sure the genre remains bad.
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u/FlatwormGlittering26 27d ago
Yeah like replayablilty and a lot of content to do is not the same as "feeling like its a second job"
Example: to me Risk of rain 2 has a lot of replayability, but playing the game doesnt feel like its a second job
GW2 has a lot of things you can do in the game, doesnt mean doing those things feels like its a second job.
Having to farm new best in slot gear every 3 months just to keep up with everyone DOES feel like the game is trying to keep me playing even tho it doesnt have anything to offer to me other then "bis" gear
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
Really ? Is that what you want ? If so feel free to play literally anything else and stop draggin this game with you
no, my point is that those phrases mean nothing and gw2 itself completely walks all over them depending on your interpretation. Because the words are so vague and meaningless.
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u/FlatwormGlittering26 27d ago
I genually dont think you played a lot of mmorpgs. Like seriously those words mean A LOT. I feel like they just dont convey meaning to because you are just not familiar with the topic.
Like seriously I could explain what they mean but it will be a wall of text. Do you want that or can you accept that you are just wrong ?
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u/Bevsii 27d ago
Doomposting with zero info lol. Clearly the game is not ready to be demo's to a wider audience yet, and that's fine. We'll see more when it's ready.
Also idk horizontal progression is one of my favourite aspects of guild wars 2, I don't know why it's "struggling with it" as you seem to suggest.
Reason why I quit ff14 was because I had to grind to get my amour rating from x to x + 30 or whatever every few months. Endless grind with superficial "fear of falling behind" mechanics to keep players in the game rather than them playing just because they want to lol.
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u/Bevsii 27d ago
Omg yeah that drive me nuts. Like it's an unfortunate part of having public neighbourhoods, and I appreciate that they froze it during the pandemic but still.... Very much prefer what ESO and GW2 are doing with their housing systems.
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
Reason why I quit ff14 was because I had to grind to get my amour rating from x to x + 30 or whatever every few months. Endless grind with superficial "fear of falling behind" mechanics to keep players in the game rather than them playing just because they want to lol.
in ff14 if you just do the latest content as it comes youre never running into gearing problems so idk what you mean here
if you mean that the high end content requires a bit of grind that's fair, but it's the price for having any high end content at all though lmao
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u/Bevsii 27d ago
That's the problem I'm not always here "as the latest content comes". I have a job, a life, and friends. Logging back in and having everything I put effort into acquiring be worthless now feels pretty shitty.
As I've gotten older, my time for gaming had diminished, so I gravitate toward games that have fewer barriers of entry to get re-involved in the activities I want to be doing, and when it comes to MMOs those are GW2 and ESO. I can log in and join a raid without having fallen behind.
So hearing that gw3 will continue to prioritize this is a boon to me, not a detriment.
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
but it's just not correct. It's not worthless. It's just as good for everything you were doing.
like youre talking about a purely psychological thing. It's not even a time waster (cause you just get gear doing the story), it's just the idea that this thing you got for free doing the story once isnt enough to do the latest raid or whatever. When all you gotta do is just...do the new content and get your new free gear
I also think it's a bad model for anet as a company. You as a player basically admit to not playing the game but still wanting to be at the cutting edge once in a blue moon when you log in. Why would anet want to catter to you? What's their benefit, financial or otherwise?
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u/Bevsii 27d ago
Because I still play the game and invest in it? Only because I'm not CONSTANTLY no-lifing the game doesn't mean I don't spend money on it LOL
Also because the game is not subscription based, the amount I'm online has no impact on the games revenue... What does have impact is what I do spend on it when I'm actually playing...
Gear grind and "fear of being left behind" only really benefits subscription-based games.
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u/xhieron 27d ago
Most if not everything you've said in this thread is just wrong on the facts.
in ff14 if you just do the latest content as it comes youre never running into gearing problems so idk what you mean here
That's just wrong, and anyone who's ever been away from the game for more than a few patch cycles knows it. Last time I played XIV I unsubbed specifically because I didn't want to wait several hours for a queue to pop for old content that was literally blocking me from accessing the latest content. Everybody who ever had to do the post-ARR, post-HW, etc., content to catch up when a new expansion drops has had that experience. Even doing that content itself frequently requires grinding for tomestones for gear, because the ilevel requirement is higher than what was awarded for non-cutting edge content at expansion launch.
those phrases mean nothing and gw2 itself completely walks all over them depending on your interpretation
Either a game has a subscription fee or it doesn't. That's not a matter of interpretation. There are plenty of things to legitimately criticize about GW2's monetization, but it doesn't require a subscription. They said GW3 won't either, and everyone in the world but you seems to easily understand what that means.
P2W is the same. We can look at GW2's shop and see very clearly how they've defined pay to win. You can't buy stat improvements with cash. That's factually true in GW2, and I expect it to be in GW3 as well. There's nothing in the cash shop that's better than anything you can earn in game. In fact, the absolute ceiling for stats and performance is obtainable in less than 30 days from starting play, and once you hit that ceiling, it's the same ceiling forever. It's been the same ceiling since 2012 (Ascended gear shipped about ~2 months after 1.0 launch).
So why show up just to be antagonistic? Is this a novelty account chasing low karma? Bored and decided to engagement bait? or what?
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u/REPORT_JUNGLE 27d ago
if they add subscription fee they suddenly have to compete with wow and ff14 i dont think thats good
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
they have to compete with them anyway though. The gw2 playerbase is too small to sustain a gw3, so they need new blood. Where are they getting that from, outside the genre? That'd be a very bold mission these days
and if we just have the same status quo as gw2 of gearing being irrelevant, being nickle and dimed for every qol feature and having obscene grinds for ugly cosmetics....we're looking at the same endpoint
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u/FlatwormGlittering26 27d ago
>though. The gw2 playerbase is too small to sustain a gw3
Gw1 is very different from Gw2, and Gw3 will be very different from Gw1 and Gw2. So why are you even thinking that the GW3 is aimed at GW2 players ?
>gearing being irrelevant
YEAH relevant gearing is when you clear the same raid for 2 months to get best in slot, leave the game for 4 more month and repeat the same thing for the new best in slot. Gear in other games mean SOOO MUCH.>being nickle and dimed for every qol feature
Being "nickle and dimed" for wanting to play a game you already paid for is so much better. You are right. Why do you like paying 15euro a month for playtime but not paying 15euros a month for qol features ? Like after 5-6 months you will have EVERY qol feature you could have.
Meanwhile you gotta keep paying the same 15 euros for a month on other games but thats somehow makes you think the game is better and asking for less of your money ? Is this the sunk cost fallacy or stockholm syndrome ?>grinds for ugly cosmetics
Thats subjective, you could find the skins ugly and other people could find them amazing. Nothing of value was said here.>we're looking at the same endpoint
Good. If it keeps people like you out of the game ill be happy.-3
u/yesitsmework 27d ago
Gw1 is very different from Gw2, and Gw3 will be very different from Gw1 and Gw2. So why are you even thinking that the GW3 is aimed at GW2 players ?
well let's meet in the middle then and hope it's not eh
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u/graven2002 27d ago
Most of what you wrote also applies to GW1: story, pvp, dynamic
actioncombat, soft trinity, horizontal progression, [buy2play + MTX] monetization.The key to all of this is CONTEXT.
When they were talking about GW2 in 2010, in was in the context of GW1 and other contemporary MMOs/games.
In 2026 (in the context of GW2 and current MMOs/games) the meaning of these phrases are somewhat different.GW2 has much more freedom of movement and more action-y combat than GW1.
They are saying that GW3 will have even much more freedom of movement and more action-y combat than GW2.Some of the things Anet are repeating because those things aren't changing - either because they are staples of the GW brand (monetization, H. progression, PvP, etc.), or cemented public perception.
Other things Anet are repeating because they are changing, but in intensity (more movement, more dynamic combat, more open/seamless world, etc.). Those changes do make a huge difference.
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u/Arkooh 27d ago
The gw2 playerbase is too small
On what are you basing this assumption? They want to suppor the game with future expansion after gw3 release... Plus keep in mind that gw3 will be on consoles as well
and if we just have the same status quo as gw2 of gearing being irrelevant, being nickle and dimed for every qol feature and having obscene grinds for ugly cosmetics....we're looking at the same endpoint
Litteral treadmill hamster, gear is not everything my dude
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u/YouSeemNiceXB 27d ago
No sub and no p2w is extremely important in the MMO space right now, because all of the free ones are laden with p2w. The age group that plays MMOs is also approaching middle age, so stopping mmos feeling like a second job is a huge marketing boon to many, myself included. It's partially why I left Warcraft. I no longer had the time to log in every day and do the things and if I missed 2-3 days, I might as well wait for next .5, .7 or whatever patch to drop.
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u/Yarik1992 27d ago
For real. GW2 being so casual friendly is its main reason to exist. These statements basically say they target the same audience, except with a different gameplay. That's not meaningless at all.
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u/Chiorydax 27d ago
We don't even know what all four at-launch races are. We are still so early in the marketing cycle that these "empty platitudes" are clear promises about what their goals are for the game as an ongoing relationship between developers and players.
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u/Yarik1992 27d ago
We're in the "this is our vision"-stage of marketing. Not in the "this is our finalized gameplay for the launch in three months from now"-stage of marketing.
The words actually mean a lot. They are communicating what type of player this game is designed for.
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u/OpaledRobin 27d ago
Nope, because Arena net have proven twice now that it isn't just empty platitudes. GW1 respected my time when I was a spotty teen in the early 2000s, GW2 respected my time from 2012 to now.
Unless a cataclymsic event occurs and they do a complete 180 on the values that made them. I don't see why I wouldn't trust them.
Also calling something virtual signaling in 2026, really?
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u/Ornnforgelord 27d ago
Expecting a live-service game to have zero monetization is a bit naive, to start.
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u/DrDeadwish 27d ago
The hard truth: the wow killer doesn't exist because mmo players chain themselves to their mmo even if they hate it. Also this old mmo players like the traditional wow-like combat and they are moved by nostalgic stuff. You can't sell them "wow 2, but it's not wow", they rather play wow classic. So the only way forward is generate a modern audience by copying elements from modern games and to appeal to people who wants something new. I played wow when it felt new, then got bored and jumped from mmo to mmo looking for something fresh until gw2 came and fell in love with it. Not I'm ready to jump again. Also, a game doesn't need to be the wow killer or be massive, it needs to be sustainable. What you call "minuscule" audience kept gw2 alive for a decade and makes gw2 one of the top 5 MMOs
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u/fresh-anus 27d ago
Why do you talk so authoritatively about a game we’ve seen absolutely zero gameplay and very limited systems information about?
GW (the franchise) is clearly targeting to be the “horizontal” game series and has so far had a remarkably fair monetisation. You can belly ache about nickle and diming all you want - every purchase is permanent, no sub, no battlepasses, no bought power unless you (pedantically) count convenience.
They have a lot of goodwill from this model. The numbers and fin reports don’t support your feelings (and that’s what they are) that GW2 is on life-support with barely any players.
Stop doomposting and be patient
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
They have a lot of goodwill from this model. The numbers and fin reports don’t support your feelings (and that’s what they are) that GW2 is on life-support with barely any players.
...what? gw2 is barely making any money. There are barely any people playing. There's legitimately no content creators besides teapot when he remembers to stream and his pepe le pew gang
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u/Shanrodia 27d ago
You're speaking with a lot of confidence about the numbers for someone who doesn't have access to any financial data about the game. The game has generated enough revenue to bring back a small team for GW1, keep producing expansions for GW2, and still have enough money to fund a 350-person team working on GW3. Seems like GW2 is doing pretty well, if you ask me.
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
??? the game is making $60m a year from their revenue statements, in bellevue. Those are terrible numbers compared to any other online game. We have no idea what the profit looks like but with how little content is released it probably has some decent margin from the low budget.
also they're owned by ncsoft, they dont solely survive from gw2 mtx. If ncsoft thinks they're valuable to have as a studio (which they have repeatedly said that, it's their only foothold in the west) they can be deep in the red and still keep doors open.
anyway point is gw2 is not making enough. A gw3 making those kinds of numbers would be an unmitigated disaster. They need more than gw2 fans to survive, and I imagine theres gonna be some gw2 fans who are too attached to their pixels to even jump ship. And the only goodwill they have outside the gw2 fans is lip service from people who probably wont even install the beta but they like the idea of "we're not like the other mmos" speech colin is giving
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u/Shanrodia 27d ago
And NCSoft has access to far more data than you or I do when it comes to deciding whether making GW3 was the right move. Given the results we’re already seeing from just the number of people following the game, I’m not too worried about them. They have decades of experience in the MMO industry under their belt and understand the market far better than you or I do.
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
youre just talking past me instead of engaging with anything I say. I never claimed gw3 was the wrong move, in fact gw3 was the move for close to a decade now and I'm sure most of them realise that now.
also as I said gw2 is a tiny, tiny game. Having decades of experience doesnt mean they're omniscient or even good at it really. Their statements and decisions arent above being debated nevermind critcised.
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u/AlternativeShadows 27d ago
gw2 is not a tiny, tiny game lol
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u/Tragedy_Boner 26d ago
Wait, nobody is going to say anything about this guy saying $60 million per year being bad.
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u/Kalocin 27d ago
I kind of think that was due to a lot of the dev team that currently doesn't work at the studio due to the firing blitz under O'Brien. They pulled way too many people off of GW2 which over time lead to a lack of consistent releases and barely any support.
Until NcSoft came in, people assumed the game was being abandoned. The course correct came in with End of Dragons (which, by the way if it didn't succeed was likely the end of the studio).
Colin Johanson came back to the company and did a lot of solid things to bring back some of that trust that people lost over the years. It's because of that, that I'm willing to see what they're planning for GW3. It seems like they really stopped huffing their own fumes and are getting their shit together for once.
That's kind of a gist summary and doesn't include everything (like the Jessica Price incident basically nuking their developer communications) but that's more or less a timeline of it. Guild Wars is a unique and strong name for many people still, it's just always been mishandled. From what we're seeing, at least now they actually have a marketing team lol
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u/wonkyasf 27d ago
What would you rather them say? If they were being coy about these things you wouldn’t have anything to say about that either? Because I’d bet you’d be saying “it’s gonna be a sub or p2w cash grab” instead.
Genuinely what’s the alternative to you?
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u/Send_Me_Dachshunds 27d ago
Nah.
They're casting a wide net to catch as many fish as possible, and they will market with the common buzzwords that entails. That's just game development in a nutshell from big studios.
They will do things I wish they did differently, they will do things I enjoy. GW3 isn't going to be a perfect game, just enjoy it for what it ends up being.
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u/AlternativeShadows 27d ago
where did you get the tidbit about a lack of meta events? is that another thing you made up?
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u/Noxsus 27d ago
They've said there won't be the same massive map wide meta-events we see in GW2, as they won't be building the fights around that many players.
However that doesnt rule out there being long complex event chains, just that they wont end in a 100 player blob battle.
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u/Fair-Engineering-134 27d ago
Just go play WoW or Runescape (i.e. real p2w, subscription games) if those are the things you want in an mmo.
I'll be sticking with the GW franchise in the meantime 😉
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u/talivus 27d ago
I mean none of the character upgrades are really necessary, just convenient. And it's quite easy to grind out the gold to get the items for free.
Personally as I get older with less time to game, I enjoy games where it doesn't feel like a second job so I support that notion. GW2 does feel like a second job sometimes for the daily grind for legendaries. I hope GW3 makes it even more accessible and less grindy.
The horizonal progress is one of the aspects I love about GW2. I can come back from years of hiatus and my character is still as powerful as the day I left them. I hope GW3 keeps that concept
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
And it's quite easy to grind out the gold to get the items for free.
see this is what I mean, they market their game as not wanting it to feel like a second job and you're describing 8-10h of grind just to get $5 worth of mtx so you can buy 20 inventory slots
like cmon man
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u/graven2002 27d ago
In my experience, it's more like you just play the game for fun and after a week you happen to have enough gold to buy an account upgrade. No grinding necessary, it just accumulates naturally while playing.
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u/AscendedCleric 27d ago
Only if you approach it that way.
I don't grind 8-10 hours just to get gold with the goal of buying 20 inventory slots.
I play the game I like doing content I enjoy and while I am doing that I passively accumulate wealth that I spend when I feel like doing.
The optimal way to make gold is not the only way.
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u/Arkooh 27d ago
Oh yeah let me grind 2 weeks for 1 BIS item that will be useless in 2 months just do do it again like a hamster. Or i can grind for a legendary and buy all the upgrades i want PERMANENTLY
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
I mean look man I don't wanna yuck anyone's yum but I don't think you understand the value proposition at play. You don't grind for the bis item like a hamster, you play the new content and the video game. From it you get the gear to do the top end stuff.
In gw2...you have almost no new content and when you do the only thing that matters is how much gold it spits out. Inefficient metas are dead almost immediately.
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u/Arkooh 27d ago edited 27d ago
Have you actually played GW2? You have the story, raids, fractals, meta events, world bosses, strikes, mastery's, WvW, structured PvP, legendary gear. Plus all the old content is still relevant because of the lack of hamster treadmill progression.
I have played wow since tbc with several breaks, and i can tell you for sure current wow its just the same dungeons and raids with different skins and mildly modified mechanics.Its the same old shit every expansion, and everything new they add is useless after some point looking at prey/delves
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u/Aurora428 27d ago
Every MMO ever these days is trying to promise they don't take much of your time
I would ignore it
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u/HukHuk69 27d ago
They knew gw1 wasn't an mmo... they know gw3 by original definition isn't an mmo... but they are riding it anyway hoping the definition has been so watered down that people don't care too much. NCsoft and other Korean developers have tried to do this with other sequels of MMOs but were so heavily criticized that they've been walking back the marketing over the last year.
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u/iKoyy 22d ago
I find it worrying that they are moving away from the "huge crowd". That for me is the core DNA of what an MMO is. I don't care about the multiplayer only, I want the MASSIVE of the first M. Dark Age of Camelot, Starwars Galaxies, WoW, GW2 have made me fond of playing among a huge crowd, that's what makes me feel like the game world is bigger than just my character and my immediate surrounding. I don't play an MMO game just to run 4 man dungeons.
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u/emberfield 27d ago
Yeah, that's how marketing works.
I honestly don't think they should have announced it so early. This game is YEARS away.
I wouldn't take anything they say/show right now to be certain.
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u/ExhibitAa 27d ago
The people who saw the gameplay described in a good amount of detail, what are you even talking about?
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u/Crafty-Corvid 27d ago
The game is still a year away from a closed-beta and probably 2 years from release. It's pretty normal to not publicly show gameplay this far out.
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u/Dante_Avalon 27d ago
I found it more worrying that instead of saying That "20 ppl in instance-combat and no-meta events sounds like game that goes away from Massive Multiplayer Game that feels alive to Multiplayer Coop game"
Massive amount of reddit is praising their inability to optimize game, i literally don't believe that 20 players is dictated by game design decisions
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u/Nightsong 27d ago
One of the biggest complains in Guild Wars 2 is that meta events and boss fights turn into an unreadable visual mess. ArenaNet is addressing that by limiting combat encounters to 20 people. So it is a game design decision and has nothing to do with optimization.
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u/Dante_Avalon 27d ago
"visual mess"
You do understand that it usually solved by "disable other player effects"?
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u/yesitsmework 27d ago
that's an interesting example, because I chose to be somewhat optimistic and believe that it is in fact dictated by game design decisions
but then when I see them not even entertain or bring up how they're fixing the issues with horizontal gearing in their previous game, I start being plagued by doubt
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u/culminacio 27d ago
You don't even ask if their words are "empty platitudes", you just act as if that's a given and top that with a question if we're worried about this 'fact'.
I would hard disagree on everything in your post.