In Guild Wars 2, the cycle repeats itself from April. For weeks, an important new patch was introduced. Now it is here, and parts of the community criticize it sharply.
Before the last feature patch in April, it was the same: For weeks, they presented bit by bit what great things were coming to the players. Then the patch arrived, but instead of the hoped-for cheers, there was much grumbling about the new mega-servers. And the good changes that came in April were somewhat overshadowed by the anger.
Criticism: World too limited, skill poverty, defective navigation
Now in September, the criticism is not as loud, but the new patch did not go smoothly. In particular, the new design of the early levels has received quite a bit of criticism. Guild Wars 2 now feels “too casual”; the world is too restricted, it is said; the charm of the open world has been lost.
New characters are being guided “too strongly”, arrows point somewhere, skills come only later, and the new systems are buggy. A “new compass,” which is supposed to give players orientation, now leads them into high-level areas and thus to their doom, similar to how a defective navigation system can cause cars to end up in lakes.
Parts of the active GW2 forum community on reddit and in the official forum are particularly bothered that the new system is so paternalistic. Most of the new features are anyway taken from the Chinese version of Guild Wars 2, so there shouldn’t have been so much fuss about it.
Response: We are working on it, changes necessary to attract new players
The Game Director Colin Johanson, responsible for game development at Guild Wars 2, now addresses the fans. He says that a lot of effort was put into the patch and they are sure that it will do a lot of good for both twinks and new players in the long run. And GW2 needs new players to stay healthy. The way new players have been introduced to Guild Wars 2 so far no longer meets ArenaNet’s standards. There urgently needed to be a new wind.
However, Johanson also admitted some difficulties with the new features that they are now working on. These difficulties are not only due to the systems but also because they are inadequately explained.
ArenaNet does not want to be stubborn. Although they have worked on these changes for over a year, tested them with new players, and are convinced of them, if it turns out that they were wrong and that some things do not work, they want to communicate that and correct it.
You can find our extensive coverage of Guild Wars 2 on our GW2 topic page.
