Colin Johanson - Jan/Feb/March Releases

https://forum-en.guildwars2.com/foru...st#post1136181

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Hey guys,

Just to help provide some clarity on this, we’ll be releasing within the next couple of weeks a high level summary of our big plans for the first half of 2013 to help provide more transparency into our plans with the game going forward. This will include providing more details about our goals for the game, information about the stories and features that you’ll see in the Jan/Feb/March releases.

To set expectations accordingly, the January release will be a relatively small release that sets the table for the stories and features we plan to roll out with the Feb/March releases and beyond. Also, there will be no new race, profession, or new region with these larger Feb/March releases. One of our major goals with these releases is making our existing world as strong as possible, ensuring there are reasons to go to all the locations in the world we’ve already built, and strengthening the core game we’ve provided. In saying this will be an expansions worth of stuff in these releases, we’re talking about the number of new features that will be rolled out across PvE, WvW, and PvP in early 2013, which usually you’d only find in an expansion for a traditional MMORPG.

More details and specifics to come in the next couple of weeks, but I hope that helps provide some more insight into what to expect at a very high level.

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So it looks like they're finally trying to avoid the bad PR nightmare that they keep running into with their terrible communication. I guess it's cool that they're telling us that they plan to be clearer but I think it probably would have been better to just tell us all at once instead of

"Hey guys. We're gonna tell you everything about the upcoming stuff in the next couple weeks" ... At least they're trying.

However!

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we’re talking about the number of new features that will be rolled out across PvE, WvW, and PvP in early 2013, which usually you’d only find in an expansion for a traditional MMORPG

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That is a BOLD statement. And I'm pretty hyped to see if they deliver on it or not. Especially since their ideas on certain things in the past hasn't quite lined up with the general communities consensus (dungeon difficulty for starters) so I'm kind of skeptical... But still excited.

Skeptically excited. That's a thing right?

I kind hope they will will fix existing issues as the post does not clearly state such. >:(

Bullwinkle (as magician, in bumper): "Hey Rocky, watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat!"
Rocky: "Again?"
Bullwinkle: "RIP Nothing up my sleeve."
Lion: "ROOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAR!
Bullwinkle: "Must have the wrong hat."

They'll fix some existing issues..but that's been happening all along. They don't document everything they've fixed but I can think of quite a few things that have been fixed. The thing is, some fixes break other things. Most MMOs have bugs in them, and they're always being fixed. It's the nature of MMOs in general. Guild Wars 2 had more bugs in it than many MMOs because they released it earlier than they would have liked. But it had to be released at some point. It's a better game now than at launch, but it still has bugs.

It will always have bugs, though...just like very other MMO.

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Originally Posted by trechenda

I kind hope they will will fix existing issues as the post does not clearly state such. >:(

Bullwinkle (as magician, in bumper): "Hey Rocky, watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat!"
Rocky: "Again?"
Bullwinkle: "RIP Nothing up my sleeve."
Lion: "ROOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAR!
Bullwinkle: "Must have the wrong hat."

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Sadly i read that with the original cartoon voices and still LOL'd at work.

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Originally Posted by Vayne

It will always have bugs, though...just like very other MMO.

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Yeah, there's no avoiding it. Computer code is ridic. Fix 1 feature, break 5 others. It couldn't hurt to give us a more detailed log of bug fixes though. I know they list the major ones, but hotfixes are nice too just to let us know that they are addressing things despite popular belief.

lol turns out ANet still causes their own PR nightmare by phrasing things not entirely correctly. It's not "an expansion" I really didn't expect it to be in the first place but the fact that they said it still caused all this commotion. Obviously it's still going to be a huge patch and as I've said before, the amount of updates they've done already is incredible (even if most of it was only fluff events).

Maybe they're doing it on purpose? Bad PR is still PR.

I think it's hard to phrase anything well, because everything they say still gets analyzed. If you say it's a large expansion, everyone has a different definition of what large is. I've watched people on these forums say the world is small. I'm thinking, compared to what?

I don't really think anything can be said unless everything is understated to death, which isn't good for a company either. They can't come out and say, "We're coming out with an update, that may or may not be all that big, depending on how you see things, and may or may not be worth it, depending on what you like to play." It's just not the way to write copy.

It's like people taking that line from the manifesto and saying Anet lied to us, because they said there'd be no grind. They really can't say anything, because people are looking too closely at what's being said, and everyone has their own interpretation.

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Originally Posted by Vayne

I think it's hard to phrase anything well, because everything they say still gets analyzed.

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I agree. But when they literally say "An expansion worth of content" ... they really kinda shot themselves in the foot at that point. Especially when they rephrased it as

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One of our major goals with these releases is making our existing world as strong as possible. Ensuring there are reasons to go to all the locations in the world we've already built, & strengthening the core game we've provided.

In saying this will be an expansions worth of stuff in these releases, we're talking about the number of new features that will be rolled out across PvE, dub v dub & PvP in early 2013, which usually you'd only find in an expansion for traditional MMORPG.

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See, they could have just told us THAT ^ in the first place and everything would have been fine. But literally saying "an expansions worth of content" which most people translate to "an actual expansion"... Like come on. They can't be that dense?

It's gotta be on purpose or something.

But besides the bad phrasing, it's definitely very exciting news.

There's already been a ton of content, but when I see an expansion's worth of content, I see it as what it meant. The amount of content that you'd find with an expansion, as opposed to the kind of content. The English is pretty clear. As I've already said, the problem is people reading into stuff something that's not there. What was said originally doesn't imply you're getting the same type of content, only the same amount. Anything else is inferred.

But I think you're right. I think they phrased it that way because they wanted the clarification to come out.

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Originally Posted by Vayne

There's already been a ton of content, but when I see an expansion's worth of content, I see it as what it meant. The amount of content that you'd find with an expansion, as opposed to the kind of content.

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Yeah, you and I and other people get what they mean. But the rest of their consumer base doesn't. When the MMO population sees "Expansion", they're going to take it literally. This is why I keep saying ArenaNet seems to have no idea how the internet actually functions.

Every time they announce a big change they're extremely vague and leave key details out and don't tell us about them until much later leaving the community wayyy too much time to speculate and argue and get their hopes up and etc etc. It's a freaking nightmare.

They need to just bite their tongue and give us the actual details instead of these extremely vague summaries.