The latest updates in Guild Wars 2 disappointed many players. They offered hardly any new content and recycled boring missions. In a livestream, the Narrative Director explained why the updates were so weak.
What’s going on in GW2? When the ongoing Icebrood Saga was announced in the summer of 2019, the developers promised content worthy of an expansion. However, such content has not been present in the previous updates.
The last two episodes were particularly disappointing:
- The story was shorter than before
- No new areas were introduced
- They mainly focused on new “Dragon Assistance Missions.” These are instanced missions that always follow the same pattern and are not challenging for many.
Even the trailer for the new update sparked more disinterest than hype for me. And I was not alone. On reddit, there were several threads complaining about the quality of the new updates.
Why are the updates so disappointing? In the latest Guild Chat, a livestream of the “Guild Wars 2” developers, Narrative Director Bobby Stein talked about the development of the Icebrood Saga.
He explained that normally plans for the future are established early on. However, the upcoming expansion “End of Dragons” was only decided during the development of the Icebrood Saga. And that led to changes in the plans.
Developers were surprised by the expansion
How did the developers learn about the expansion? Before the announcement at PAX West in the summer of 2019, the developers stated that they knew where they wanted to go with the Icebrood Saga.
Thus, the beginning and end of the story were set, as well as the fundamental innovations.
However, in the middle of the development, plans for an expansion were made. And that surprised the developers:
At one point in the development of the Icebrood Saga, we were gifted with the opportunity to work on a new expansion, which, quite frankly, most or all of us wanted to do.
But it was a bit of a surprise.
Adjustments to the story: Thereupon, the developers had to make adjustments so that the Icebrood Saga could be implemented according to the old plans while simultaneously working on the expansion:
What we had to do then was say: “Okay, how do we deliver a satisfying ending while also working on an expansion? How can we get these things right?”
It was a big challenge to bring the people together and solve the problem as a group. It took time, but we reworked the story, we reworked the way it was told. […]
We had to see which plots stayed in and which we had to cut. It was quite a big change, but I think we have reached a point where we are quite happy.
Why were these changes made? 2019 was a complicated year for Guild Wars 2 and developer ArenaNet:
- In spring, about 1/4 of the studio was laid off
- In summer, Mike Zadorojny became the new Game Director of the game
- In October, the founder and president Mike O’Brien left the studio
- About in November, Mike Zadorojny was also said to have left the studio unexpectedly, and a new director took over
Especially the last point is interesting from the community’s perspective. They suspect that the new director decided on the expansion in November 2019, necessitating the adjustments described by Bobby Stein.
Developers seem excited about the expansion
How is the community reacting to the statements? On reddit, many users feel confirmed in their suspicion that the expansion is the reason for the weak episodes of the Icebrood Saga. Thus, the user Keruli_ writes:
This is confirmation that everyone’s suspicions were completely correct. […]. They could have saved a lot of ridicule if they had been more open about all of this earlier, because proper communication is surprisingly important.
Unfortunately, that doesn’t undo the fact that someone from the top thought a simple new saga with a fancy and meaningless name would be enough to keep the ball rolling, and he was bold enough to continue, wasting a lot of resources and time.
However, some users react positively to the fact that the developers are eager for a new expansion. Thus, the user DiogoALS writes:
The team wanted to work on an expansion earlier, but they couldn’t until they were “gifted” with this opportunity in the middle of Icebrood Saga production.
The second part was easy to guess, but it’s interesting to see that most/all in the team WANTED to work on an expansion. Sometimes it feels from the outside that ANet doesn’t care much about this game anymore, and, well, the top management obviously doesn’t either […].
But still, it’s interesting to get some insight into the developers’ opinions and see that many of them really wanted a third expansion for GW2.
The new expansion End of Dragons must also be successful if Guild Wars 2 is to survive long-term. Because the Icebrood Saga ruined the concept of the Living World for many. How important the expansion really is, we have already summarized from MeinMMO:
2021 sees Guild Wars 2 getting a new expansion, and it needs to be successful
