My opinion is that in the long rung the b2p model gives you much more content than a sub based MMO. If I look at the expansions that Anet brought out for GW1 between 2005-2007 (3 campaigns and 1 expansion pack), they each have so much content that they could be sold as a seperate game. They each had a huge campaign comparable to the main game, 2 new classes, new PvP modes, hundreds of new skills and new game mechanics (like Heroes in Nightfall). While your typical p2p MMO's bringt out two new dungeons every two months or so. 

The items in the itemshop of GW1 are purely cosmetical and you do not need to buy them at all. Skill unlock packs are only for PvP and heroes. The rest is just extra slots for your storage chest, character slots, hero slots and costumes and a bonus pack that offers much more hours of play than your typical DLC pack, but isn't mandatory at all to enjoy the game. If they do the same for GW2 I dont have any problems with it.

Originally posted by Timukas

Maybe people just want to see what this insane hype is all about. I also applied and only because I just hope to see if this game is any good or at least half as good as fanbois say. With hype like this I cannot hope for much onjectiveness in reviews. If it's any good I'll buy it and play as a 2nd game. My 1st will be TSW.

Guess you stopped being a SWtoR fanboi and moved on, I had interest in TSW to but I'm not going to let myself be forced to P2P with a cash shop, that will probably turnout to be a P2W game anyway.

Originally posted by gw1228

   Anyone want to predict how many boxes they will sell in their first year  I say 3 million.  GW1 has sold over 5 million accounts.

When this game comes out it's going to drag a lot of gamers from other MMO's where you pay monthly fees like SWTOR.

These greedy companies don't understand yet that a F2P model is the way too go.  Most new MMO's are testing the waters with Paying monthly fees but eventually they take the F2P route.....

It's B2P, that means buy to play, which means you buy the game, then you play it. They also have a shop.

When will you greenhorns learn, MMOs that started out P2P and go F2P are crappy games, that is why they went F2P.

Originally posted by RagnorMalak

My opinion is that in the long rung the b2p model gives you much more content than a sub based MMO. If I look at the expansions that Anet brought out for GW1 between 2005-2007 (3 campaigns and 1 expansion pack), they each have so much content that they could be sold as a seperate game. They each had a huge campaign comparable to the main game, 2 new classes, new PvP modes, hundreds of new skills and new game mechanics (like Heroes in Nightfall). While your typical p2p MMO's bringt out two new dungeons every two months or so. 

The items in the itemshop of GW1 are purely cosmetical and you do not need to buy them at all. Skill unlock packs are only for PvP and heroes. The rest is just extra slots for your storage chest, character slots, hero slots and costumes and a bonus pack that offers much more hours of play than your typical DLC pack, but isn't mandatory at all to enjoy the game. If they do the same for GW2 I dont have any problems with it.

This. Most people on this website don't even have the slightest idea of how much content this game received through expansions. Factions and Nightfall introduced 2 HUGE continents, 4 new classes, and over 800 new skills, gazillion new items and skins, a lot of new features. These two expansions were released in 1 year. The only reason they stopped pumping xpacs like crazy was because they started working on GW2 (I hated that game at the time). They even had a new xpac planned called Utopia which was to introduce yet another huge continent and 2 new classes (one of them being a chronomancer!)

Even now GW1 has more content than the vast majority of MMOs on this website. GW1's world is huge and would've been the biggest world in the genre if they continued to release new xpacs for GW1.

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by RagnorMalak

My opinion is that in the long rung the b2p model gives you much more content than a sub based MMO. If I look at the expansions that Anet brought out for GW1 between 2005-2007 (3 campaigns and 1 expansion pack), they each have so much content that they could be sold as a seperate game. They each had a huge campaign comparable to the main game, 2 new classes, new PvP modes, hundreds of new skills and new game mechanics (like Heroes in Nightfall). While your typical p2p MMO's bringt out two new dungeons every two months or so. 

The items in the itemshop of GW1 are purely cosmetical and you do not need to buy them at all. Skill unlock packs are only for PvP and heroes. The rest is just extra slots for your storage chest, character slots, hero slots and costumes and a bonus pack that offers much more hours of play than your typical DLC pack, but isn't mandatory at all to enjoy the game. If they do the same for GW2 I dont have any problems with it.

This. Most people on this website don't even have the slightest idea of how much content this game received through expansions. Factions and Nightfall introduced 2 HUGE continents, 4 new classes, and over 800 new skills, gazillion new items and skins, a lot of new features. These two expansions were released in 1 year. The only reason they stopped pumping xpacs like crazy was because they started working on GW2 (I hated that game at the time). They even had a new xpac planned called Utopia which was to introduce yet another huge continent and 2 new classes (one of them being a chronomancer!)

Even now GW1 has more content than the vast majority of MMOs on this website. GW1's world is huge and would've been the biggest world in the genre if they continued to release new xpacs for GW1.

I know right? Sub games cost a guild wars expansion every 2 months. So GW is still cheaper and you don't have to do expansion.

Originally posted by loeslein

F2P, B2P, WTF, LOL.  Have you guys booted up GW1 lately?  I can't wait to see the rage quit from the GW2 fans when they finally figure out how Arenanet is going to milk this monster of a game. 

They will have you "buy" the tail.  Ha!  but seriously.  You think you're going to get a game of this scope for just the price of the box?  Somebody will be paying the money.  Look at GW1,  right out of the box you can hit up the store and go buy every skill, unlock every equipment upgrade and whatever else.  I took a look at the store last night and cringed.  I thought "What's the point of even trying this game out again?" 

It was pretty creepy.  I expect GW2 to be a killer product but I know there's going to be a catch at some point.  Wether it's that $9.99 "perk" that makes things so much easier, or endless amounts of "downloadable content" that will get ya for a few bucks here and there.

It'll be interesting to see how it pans out.

 

 

 

Edit:  And don't get me wrong, I could give two shits about paying good money for a product.  I have bought, payed for, tried out hundreds of games over the years.  I'll drop $60 on a game and play it for 2 hours and never look at it again, the money I spent on gaming doesn't bother me.  But don't get all spoiled brat cranky when a lot of you fan boi's figure out that in a lot of ways there's going to be a subcription attached to this product.

You honestly have NO idea what you are talking about. The GW1 store was brilliant, and contained NOTHING, I repeat NOTHING you actually needed to play the game and be competitive. All it had was stuff like character slots, heroes, etc. etc. The GW1 store was done EXTREMELY WELL, and GW1 was not "pay to win" at all.

Want proof? I have over 800 hours played of the original guild wars, and I never once bought anything from the store, and I honestly didn't notice. There will not be a "subscription fee attached" to GW2, if it's ANYTHING like the original Guild Wars. I just want to make sure people are aware of this.

Originally posted by LadyNoh

Originally posted by NaughtyP

I have no problems paying for a game giving me enjoyment, no matter what payment model they use as long as it is within reason.

That being said, 1 million beta sign ups within 48 hrs? Impressive.

actually its higher then that, they were forced to cut it off at 1 million.

That's not true, they kept it open for 48 hours and had almost one million, so they kept it open a little longer to go over the 1 million mark.  For fun.

"Forced."  Lol.  Quite the opposite.

Originally posted by Thrage

Originally posted by LadyNoh

Originally posted by NaughtyP

I have no problems paying for a game giving me enjoyment, no matter what payment model they use as long as it is within reason.

That being said, 1 million beta sign ups within 48 hrs? Impressive.

actually its higher then that, they were forced to cut it off at 1 million.

That's not true, they kept it open for 48 hours and had almost one million, so they kept it open a little longer to go over the 1 million mark.  For fun.

 

"Forced."  Lol.  Quite the opposite.

Yeah, they kept it open a whole 2 extra hours and got 6,000 more sign-ups. They were really struggling there. Just squeaked by.

I wouldn't say 6000 registrations in 2 hours is "squeaked". It was on relatively short notice, it was only 48 + 2 hours.. 1 million sign ups is pretty good i'd say. They left it open because they wanted to see it break the 1 million, they probably would have closed it after the 48 hours if the sign ups were really slowing down, like only a few hundred if at all, or if it would have dropped significantly far below 900k.

About the Guild Wars 1 cash shop:

I can only say that i clocked over 2000 hours in Guild Wars and never felt like i have to buy something. Sure, an extra storage chest pane would have been nice often enough, especially as i missed the one from the 4h anniversary, but if you buy all the campaigns, you got 4 already, and if you do not keep *everything* it's okay. Also, buying new char slots is actually the better way of acquiring new storage, as a character has more slots then a single storage pane.

I also got 8 char slots, 4 initial + 2 per campaign, so 8. Every profession once. If you do not like a profession, make another twice, or make a PVE char because you like a profession, but also make a PVP char of that profession because you do not have to wait.

The costumes are nice and all, but they have absolutely no stats. No, not *bad stats*, but no stats. Visuals only. And they only added an extra costume slot long after release. The costumes also fit into the holiday events or ingame events like War in Kryta/Winds of Change, allowing you to look similar to an enemy with the later. It's not just random stuff. Still, they have no advantages in game,. I also think they are disabled in PVP like minipets or transformation tonics are, so they do not offer any advantage by looking different there aswell.

You can acquire all minipets and transformation tonics ingame, from other players. Some have only been offered as exclusive items for some versions of the game, like an collector editiion or Korean Promo Versions..but they are tradeable, and most can be acquired through characters birthdays, drop from enemies or as random content from special gifts acquired from NPCs for doing ingame stuff. Unless you are bound on acquiring *all* the pricy ones, you can easily make enough money to fill your Hall of Monuments AND get that one or two you or your (often girl)friend love so much.

It's not like the Celestial Steed from WoW, $25 for a special looking mount with hours of wait time in the queue that was there because they could.

The skill packs are for PVP, which you do not need if you played PVE, as you can unlock all skills there, either by visiting a trainer of your (secondary) profession, or by using tomes, which are quite cheap for normal skills. Even the elite skill tomes are nothing to worry about if you played for a while. And you can acquire them cheaper by capturing them from bosses.

I considered buying the bonus mission pack, because of the back story, and the new weapon skills, but like someone else here, i felt it was not worth it. And even if, there are full blown games that offer less content if you're set on doing it the fastest way possible.

There is also the make-over pack which allows you to change some things about your character, like the hair style and stuff. Not sure what you can change, as i never felt the need to buy it. I know someone who bought it more or less regularly, but she never complained about feeiling "forced" or it being to pricy. She simply loved to change her char, so why not? Still less money then a subscription.

If there ever was reason to trust someone with the cash shop, ArenaNet has proven it to me in the last 7 years - by the time Guild Wars 2 will be released, maybe already 8 years (since the world preview events..Guild Wars itself will not have hit the official 8th birthday) that they can make a sensible cash shop.

Of course, developers and publishers change, i wouldn't have imagined some things other companies do some years ago, but seriously, why being suspiscious of ArenaNet, when you do not really care what EA or Blizzard etc. are doing? ArenaNet is no miracle worker, they can make mistakes like everyone else, i do not always agree with the thigns they do, like, fixing "perfectly fine" classes like Mesmer or Elementalist while leaving the Paragon in the dust, who really isn't needed for anything, not even as the sole thing they can truly do, as the main skill for the "Imbagon" is a warrior skill, and the other skills are not related to the primary attribute, either.

ArenaNet  also wants to make money, yes, but so far i have seen nothing that even suggests that they might do something stupid with Guild Wars 2, whether it be the cash shop, not having enough content,  or having the idea of leaving game breaking bugs literally everyone *WILL* encounter in to see how people react when they discover the main quest/opening the inventory/having sound being played by the game/whatever *WILL* make you crash, like some other developers, whether MMO or not, seem to love.

There is absoutely no indication for anything this.  Many of the initial members of ArenaNet are from Blizzard/Blizzard North, which then was considered to be the pinnacle of what a developer can achieve, and they put out a game that had a somewhat fresh setting (no major IP at least), tried a new payment model, had a cash shop that was fair, and are still adding new content to the game - for free.

In the meanwhile Blizzards reputation has suffered quite a bit, like most other developers,, and yet people go and buy the 20th iteration of the same game from the developer/publisher they swore 19 times to never touch anything from them again simply because they put up that page from 3 years ago up again (including the date), where they promised to finally have fixed all the bugs that made you swear not to touch anything made by them in the previous 10 installments - instead of thinking "hey, there was a reason i liked Blizzard back then, they were great, those guys were involved before the shit hit the fan, but not after" or "there is a reason i swore not to touch anything made by xyz ever again every year again (and broken subsequently, like new years resolutions..), so even if ArenaNet will turn out as bad as they, at least there is chance this will not happen"

No, people try to the skeleton in the closet of some games (not only Guild Wars 2, but it's one of the most popular, so more people try to find it) so they can go back to whatever game they were playing before, ignoring the graves dug by themselves, only to demand something new on the next occasion - and the cycle continues.

Sometime i feel like ArenaNet and some other folks doing a good job should do it the Vorlon way.  It's no longer "when it's done". It's "you are not ready for Guild Wars 2".

Originally posted by eluldor
Boxes being sold for a f2p what? ;)

price to buy, free to play. = buy to play. The best thing since sliced bread. thumbs down to monthly fees :)

I see LadyNoh and Snaylor blabbing about that this isn't a one time buy, but the thing is if it follows the same model guild wars did then its not necessary to buy the expansions, it doesn't give anyone an advantage, I could still use my first warrior in pvp to this day, effectively, its not like wow where you fall behind everyone because you didn't dish out the extra 120 bucks or w/e it is for the expansions. You're making assumptions and running with them, because what you're saying is entirely opposite of the truth.