Guild Wars Still In The Thick of Battle

1up.com has an interview with community relations manager Gaile Gray. They discuss changes since the launch, and how the company has acted to keep the player-base happy in a title with no fee to keep them grounded. From the article: "August's event showed us that increasing the rewards for PVP play was both necessary and wise. The feedback we received before the event provided us with a lot of guidance on what players wanted most. We reacted with a substantial boost to faction points and with special rewards for PVP accomplishments...and the players loved it. We're going to keep watching the gameplay progression and reward systems to ensure that both PVP players and cooperative players are adequately rewarded."

Comments

Good so far. We'll see.

[Somatic]

I was fascinated when I first heard how well Guild Wars was doing. They seemed to have broken the MMOG pricing model wide open; this is not the first article that marked their success.

It still hasn't been tested by their expansion model, though. For the game to survive long term, they need to sell those expansions, and they need to keep doing it for years.

I'm skeptical whether that will work or not, but we'll see. I'm rooting for them, and not because I play the game (I don't), and not because I think this model is any better than the subscription model (I'm on the fence about that). I'm rooting them because I love MMOGs, live them, and anything that shakes up the MMOG paradigm is a good thing. The market has begun to stagnate as it moves closer and closer to Hollywood budgets.

This pricing model has the potential to allow more newcomers in the field, if it works. Not everyone is a MMOG nut like me, tossing out dollars for subscriptions without even thinking about it. I think a large part of the market is still scared of subscriptions. If this pricing model reaches those people, the whole industry benefits.

If the allmighty dollar is going to dominate this market just like it does everything else, anything that attracts more allmighty dollars is a good thing-- there's a higher chance some of it will reach a good developer.

We'll see.