Critical of Critics

Critical of Critics

First off I want to say I am not an ArenaNet fan girl nor have I even seriously played Guild Wars (Original). I am not being paid to write this nor do I write professionally (you will be able to tell after this read). I am simply someone who after the BWE1 and the stress test Monday. I found I have been reading everything I can on Guild Wars 2, having read site after site. Talking to different players, over all listening to what I can about Guild Wars 2 and all the Hype that goes with it. I had to ask myself “Why is there some bad criticism over this game called Guild Wars 2”.

One critic says “From hearing the developers talk about the game, to the attention from the media, to what the fans have been saying about the game it sounds to me like this game is supposed to change the way people play MMO’s. It's to be the game to changes the industry.”

This I do not completely agree with. I have to admit, like many of you I have been paying to play mmo’s for years now and every new game that comes out has the same hype to it. The same “omg this game will change the standards of the industry” to “Omg, you must buy this game because everyone else is” but in the end they only leave a number of us disappointed. The real question is though will Guild Wars 2 do the same in the end... disappoint?

After my BWE1 experience I have to give an honest opinion on the way I see guild Wars 2. No, actually I just want to give my honest opinion not that I have to.  I was overjoyed in many areas of the game. Yes, to some it will be “yet another standard of a MMO formula”, to each their own. These critics have the right to dislike what they want to dislike, but to me it is the next game I feel I can drown myself into and play for the next 5-7 years, maybe longer.

My experience with the PvE in Guild Wars 2 was the first time I didn’t feel like I was grinding out quests to level. There were no linear paths that lead me from one quest to another, expecting me to follow them or I wouldn’t be able to progress. Oh sure the map would indicate where I might want to be heading to next, but it wasn’t written in stone that I had to go do that. One critic says “That personal story line looks and feels EXACTLY like questing.”  All I can say is that there should be some structure to a story line as this gave the player an idea of where they are within the game. I, nor do you, were required to stick to that plan. I could go back and do a world event, I could go do my class story line or maybe I just wanted to go play with a new friend in what we would call a lowbie zone. These decisions were left up to me, not being forced by the game its’ self.  

I enjoyed the “dramatic events” They scaled to the players involved. This meant I could go do them at whatever level I chose to do them at, as well as with whoever I chose to do them with. I didn’t honestly try doing some events that were higher than my character only the ones that were lower than my character, but you get my drift.



“Afk while you clear the mobs”-insert friends’ name here

 Having the option to actually play with a friend who was lower level then myself, without it hindering mine or my friends xp was the first time I didn’t try and bag out of helping a lower level friend, or the thought of receiving useless drops that I could not use on my current character because it was too low made me want to actually go redo an event. My experience, as well as my friends experience on grouping together, even though we were different levels was enjoyable for once. I wasn’t the high level character expected to carry my friend through the quests and my friend wasn’t the leech who got bored and went afk while stuck to my character because he/she was useless in the fight anyways. We worked as a team, neither one of us contributed more or less to the encounter. We were on equal ground.

 “And to make things worse, those aren't shared with the people you group with” The personal story lines are not shared by other players unless the other player picked the exact character settings you picked. Not really the worst concept out there as far as a story line goes. In my opinion a personal story line is just that a personal story line. It wouldn’t be personal if 10 other friends had the exact same quest. This alone made me feel like I, not you, had actually created my character, gave my character personality, and made me a bit different then everyone else. Oh I know that someone else might have picked the same options as I did, but it wasn’t every person who made a Guardian.  

I also enjoyed not having to turn in a quest after it was completed. This seemed like it was accepted by the critics as a wonderful idea, which I agree it is. When I was done, I received an in-game email with the appropriate reward and my in-game life moved on. I didn’t have to spend my whole questing experience running back to turn in a quest, receive another one in the same area that I felt I should have been able to pick up in the beginning from the same npc who gave me the first quest. I also enjoyed the mapping system. There were a few critics who disliked the traveling system.

One of those critics says “Once you unlock a teleport stone, chances are you will use them all the time to get someplace quickly, making the world smaller and smaller.” We all know that the game is big in size, you still have to run around to open the teleport stones and Ok yes, I miss the mounts that one can achieve in other games; I just didn’t miss the 20 minutes of travel time to get to an event or to group up with friends. If this makes my world in game feel a little bit smaller so be it. At least I won’t be holding up my group as I run through 4 maps to get to my final destination. It also makes it easier to go back to help a friend in need. The same critic ended up admitting the zones were huge. He writes “The zones are absolutely huge, and there are so many of them it will take hundreds of hours to fully explore everything”. I can only say once again the ability to teleport around the map gives us less waiting time to group up. As far as”hundreds of hours to fully explore everything” Isn’t this really what we all want anyways, hours and hours of exploring. If the game was only 12 hours of game play then it would be a single player game, not a mmorpg.

 I got to travel around the map from event to event, quest to quest without getting lost or wondering where I left off the last time I logged in. The mapping system clearly marked my progress as well as marked what I have not experienced yet. I could always return to an event that I really liked to do or that I didn’t feel I did so great at the first time and redo it without it giving me less experience or loot for the task. The gold, silver and bronze rewards made me want to redo an event to get the gold rewards. The fast travel I have to say is brilliant.

Then there was the critic who mentioned “that no matter how many players will be playing the game after launch there is likely rarely to be enough to create a critical mass of players for every event (or Public Quest) of every level of every area in the game at all times”.

“Not a one woman Band”-Colfy

I disagree with the critics’ statement as I found that I could do the events alone without the help of others in the area. I agree that there really is no critical mass of players that will be needed to do a world event; I don’t think the world events were ever intended by the devs to be done by critical masses. They were intended to be done alone, with some guildies/friends or with complete strangers. Now take Warhammer for instance, as this seemed to be what this critic was comparing with, those public quests were intended to have critical masses to complete. In the end it was just another factor to the games demise as new players could never experience the public quests unless they knew an army of people to come help. To me I want to experience most if not all the aspects of the game without having to rely on friends or guildies to help. Although it is nice playing with others, it is also nice to be able to play alone when I want to, yet still experience a world event. Not all aspects of the game do I think I should be able to do alone because I am not a one woman band but in PvE I would like that option at times.

By complete and utter accident I stumbled upon an event that you had to protect a caravan. I personally liked the fact that I could join in with all the other players who were protecting the caravan while still contribute my skills to the team without having the wait for the event to reset. It was great to find this event happening, since I was heading to open a teleport. It was like running around all day long and suddenly finding a coffee shop when you really wanted a coffee at that moment.

“One such event had me following a girl who was chasing a fluffy little friend. My goal was to make sure she didn't get hurt. I began to feel rather silly chasing this tart around with the 20 other adventurers who were doing the exact same thing. It felt like a swarm of paparazzi trying to get a sound bite from Dakota Fanning while she was chasing a puppy on some farm. It was ridiculous”.

Admittedly this statement made me laugh. Although he felt disgruntled over the fact that he had to chase after a little girl, which to some might not be quite a “manly job”, I found that my caravan event gave me a quick break in running around opening teleports. I didn’t expect the event but was pleasantly surprised at how much I wanted to kill things again.

I think over all they did a fantastic job at creating many events, quests, story lines and dungeon runs. There is a little something for everyone. You can try and do everything offered or you can pick and chose what you want to do. This gives you more freedom of what your time on-line will be spent doing. This is a bonus in my eyes as I generally do not like questing in the first place.

Looking at what combat was like, ended up being a wonderful surprise. But once again I found a critic who didn’t seem to see things like I had experienced it. The critic wrote “staff-wielding mesmer plays very differently than one sporting a blade. However apart from that I didn't notice anything ground-breaking in terms of how combat played out.” Not sure really how this person could not see anything ground breaking. The profession you chose plays differently based on the weapon you are using. As a guardian my character played differently using a staff then when I was using a mace. The ability to switch between the different weapons gave me a different option in my style of play. With a staff I could stand back from everyone else and still hit my target or I could get up close and personal in a mob kill. I could add different styles from the choice of weapon I used in different situations. This is brilliant as it is not the same old, same old of having to be forced to use one or two weapons for your class and no matter what weapon you use the abilities that make that weapon work are the same no matter what weapon you’re entitled to have for that characters class. In wow as a healer I really wanted to be able to use other weapons but was limited by my class being a shaman. On my guardian I can finally use that big two handed sword while doing some damage but if my mood changed from wanting to stand head to head with a mob, I could always switch to a wand and do some range damage as well. I loved the versatility of different weapons and the skills that went with them. 

Guild Wars 2 offers, for those that love to PvE, different experience that are enjoyable, giving you decisions to make along the way with some really enjoyable content that you can do or just skip.

“PvP is not for the weak at heart”-Colfy

“I don't enjoy PvP as much as I used to so I stay away from it now”, claims a critic. Now as an old Daoc player I have to say I wanted to know more about the PvP end of the game. Once I hit level 15 I was in WvW like a dirty shirt in the wash. I didn’t have all my abilities opened but I didn’t care, I wanted in. So off I went to big boys’ land where I was dazzled by what Guild Wars 2 had created. My first reaction was “omfg this reminds me of Daoc” I did a little dance in my chair while singing “girls just wanna have fun”. I could be level 15, join in the WvW and still feel I was helping my server, plus I was getting xp while doing this. I was not just some Level 15 character getting my hiney kicked by the big boys because I went into WvW before I was level 80; I was fighting back and standing my ground. The excitement of camp, towers, keeps and castle taking, the ability for guilds to own a keep or castle, the ability to upgrade the said captured buildings, the joy of having defensive and offensive siege devices to use in your endeavors, the Orb of power that can be claimed to give your server special boosts and the structured PvP, the battlegrounds, tournaments, where you can go yourself or with a group of friends was a real hit in my mind.  I like the fact that I can create a Character, never have to level it, head into a battleground scenario and test out that character at its’ full abilities to see if I really want to play that character or not. Maybe I want to just see which skill tree set I find works well with my game style. I can do that as well.  These are all exciting for PvPers. It gives PvPers options.

“Games are experiences, you either like it or you don’t” -Colfy

Guild wars 2 PvP is not for everyone, but after BWE1 I strongly believe that Guild Wars 2 understands that not everyone will like to PvE, just as not everyone will like PvP so they gave the players options to pick a chose what they want to do.  Guild Wars 2 will have a something for everyone in the end, no matter what style of player you are. So if you’re looking for a MMO that can really give you some versatility then my recommendation is grab a copy at release and see for yourself. If you like what you read or have heard from others how good they think the game will be then pre order and join the BWE’s that are being offered by ArenaNet. There are no monthly subscriptions to tie you down if you find that it is not the game for you. You’re only really going to be out for the price of the game, let’s face it the $60.00 for buying a game you might dislike is less then what you would spend on a dinner and a movie date. I know I spent way more on SWTOR collector’s edition plus a 6 month sub fee and now I refuse to touch it, not because I thought that the PvE was bad or that the game its’ self was bad but because personally I was looking for more of a pvp game like my dear old friend Daoc gave me. SWTOR didn’t live up to my ideal fantasy of PvP in the end. It just looks like Guild Wars 2 will though and just imagine if you end up loving what Guild Wars 2 offers as much as I have, that $60.00 will pay for its self in hours of entertainment for the next coming years. A typical game only has roughly about 4-12 hours of game play; you will get much more then that just out of 1 BWE.

“Doesn’t mean I am always right”-Colfy

I have to say in conclusion I would recommend Guild wars 2 to anyone who loves MMO’s. I won’t say you will always be happy with the game, but I can say from what I know about ArenaNet, they do listen to players as ArenaNet works hard at keeping up with your entertainment needs.

So before you take every article written as solid proof that a game is junk, not worth buying or just a waste of your life, talk to players who are not being paid to critique, or a fan boy/girl who love anything a gaming company puts on the shelves. Make the decision for yourself; not based on others opinion, sign up for beta’s, read everything and keep reading. Talk to friends, family or even your spouse. Just remember not all gamers are moulded from the same cloth.

Disclaimer: None of the imagines belong to me, none of the quotes used, with exception to the ones I put –Colfy beside, are mine. I am not bashing anyone’s opinion but using their opinion as a base of my own opinion. I would like to thank those people whose quotes I used, without your opinion to rebuttal there would not be opinions from others.

"...I won't let it happen. I won't... I won't let this world exist without me!"

Alberta Votes 2012

This election has got me rattled to the core. In layman's
terms "pissed". Both the Progressive conservatives and the Wildrose
parties are behind the Privatizing of healthcare in Alberta (oh hell let’s be
honest here, in the whole damn country; we are just one province so far). This
is a concern every Albertan, Canadian and citizen should be concerned about.
This is our healthcare, the one social program that keeps us alive. Lets’ strip
this apart a bit and break it down. Right now we have Alberta health care which
pays for hospital care (not private wards), surgery, doctor appointments, x-rays,
cat scans, MRI's, and much more. Ok they don't pay for medicine; unless you’re
already in the hospital then they do pay for the meds that nasty nurse who works
night shift come into your room to give you. Shining their little flashlights
into your face and shoving that 2 am pill down your throat cause you need it,
handing you a glass of water while telling you that “you need to try and sleep”.
Was I not already doing that? Oh my bad, I will try again till you come in at 6
am and shove another one at me. Yes folks they are not really nasty, they are
only doing their jobs but at 2 am are you really thinking they are just doing
their jobs or do you think they are trolling you. I think they are trolling me
at 2 am personally. What is trolling? You ask. Trolling, Defined
by Wikipedia, describes intentionally
provocative actions and harassment. So yes, I think that nurse was trolling me at 2
am.
Anyways back to breaking down our health care
as it is now and as it will be after privatizing.
We know that
Alberta health pays for a lot out of public coffers. This is good. We also know
that we need extra insurance to pay for medication which we can buy from places
like London Life, Merit, Alberta Blue cross and many, many more insurance
providers. This usually can be afforded by middle class working Albertans. Some
employment even offers extra health insurance which is deducted from your pay
cheque monthly. This is actually a bonus to many working class Albertans. For the low income working class this isn’t
an option to purchase if the company you’re working for doesn’t offer it. So they
are only left with Alberta health care which is really better than nothing
since they can still see a doctor free. Medicine, glasses, dentistry are all on
a pay bases here in Alberta if you do not have that extra insurance and it is
not cheap. However fall down and break
your arm, it is free to get an x-ray and have it reset as well as casting it. Now
take away this free public service, that fall down break your arm will cost you
somewhere between $5000.00 to $20,000.00. OMG you say how can that cost so much.
Well lets’ break it down a bit further. If we allow privatized healthcare in
the country the public coffers will dry up. No government will keep shoving
money into the public coffers if they don’t have to. This means Alberta Health
care will have to privatize as well to keep paying for the services they
already pay for now, creating” just another insurance company”. In this “just
another insurance company” they will limit, like all the other insurance
companies out there, a cap of funds you and your family are allowed to use a
year. SO say they pay only half of your bill 50%, not going to use dollar
numbers at this time (even though there is a set amount of dollars allotted per
12 months or person, depends on the insurance company you go with) as I don’t
want to make this too much about the math as the idea of what we are facing, so
breaking that broken arm medical attention down you see something like this:
Please note this
was taken from a blog, American women who had this injury. You can find her
blog here (http://dineane.hubpages.com/hub/My-20-000-Arm-A-Rant-about-Healthcare-in-the-US)
Pretend this is
all in Canadian dollars too. Otherwise I would have to up the costs to convert
to Canadian and as I said earlier it is not about the numbers, as much as about
the idea I am trying to make.
Pharmacy
$442.95 (meds they give you to help with pain)
Non Sterile Supply $157.00 (maybe gauze, or a drink of water)
Sterile Supply $1,623.00 (the kit they open to examine you with, rubber gloves
? maybe)
SUPPLY/IMPLANTS $9,702.00 (if you need screws and bolts to keep the arm in
place, say you do )
Diagnostic, Radiology $618.00 (x-rays and the doctor actually looking at them
after )
OR Services $6,050.00 (same as above only split to confuse you more)
Anesthesia $564.00 (this is to put you to sleep, to put the arm back in place
so you don’t have to modify your shirts for the rest of your life)
DRUGS/DETAIL CODE $20.00 (no clue the original girl who I got this from is
trying to still figure this fee out)
Recovery Room $586.00 (the place they take you to after you leave the waiting
room)
Grand
total: $19763.95
so, say now your insurance pays 50% of this total. 9881.98. Woot! This
is great but is it? Nope cause now your portion is also $9881.98. Hmm where can
you come up with this amount of money before creditors start calling you
demanding payment? Sell a kidney? Maybe, an option if you can find a dark alley.
Take out a loan? Opps banks hate your credit. Remove it from your savings? If only you had a
savings. Call your parents? Sure if they weren’t on a pension and barely making
ends meet themselves.
Or you could just decide that it might be worth redesigning
all your cloths to fit that sideways broken arm you have and just let it heal
that way.
Oh! you say things like Albertans would still have Alberta
Healthcare we will just have better options, to pay or not to pay. How many
doctors ran to the USA after they graduated or found out that they could make
more money in the USA? Well I can tell you for sure 3 of my “family” doctors
left back in the 90’s to move to the USA to make more money. This is why today
I don’t have a “family “doctor anymore and I visit Medi centers. At least if
they leave I won’t be attached to them and my health records won’t be sold to
the next doctor because those records belong to the Medi center I visit, not
the individual doctor. Doctors in the USA can set office visit prices, where as
in Canada Public health sets those prices. They also set prices on procedures
and so much more. If you let a doctor or a private health organization set
prices then they will go up. No different from lawyers setting their fees. You think
150.00 an hour is bad to see a lawyer, try paying that out to see a doctor for
a 15 min visit. In fact I walk into a clinic to see a doctor without Alberta health
care today I would have to pay 40.00 min. that does not include anything else
ex. Needing a prescription or a referral to see a specialist.
See Privatizing means the clinic can charge whatever they
want to charge to the patients. Exactly like a Dentist. Oh sure, the dental
association fee guide puts in numbers to say what everything costs; but that
doesn’t mean that dentists can’t set their own price. It is just a guideline of
what insurance companies will pay and what they won’t. The example is scaling
two units; dentist charges 97.00 yet the guideline say 94.82 yet my insurance
only paid out for the 75.86. That leaves me paying not only what my dental
coverage didn’t pay for but the over fee that the dentist charged compared to
what the guidelines says I should be paying. These fees start to add up if the
problem is bigger. If we privatize it also means that Doctors can not charge a
publically funded program like Alberta Health care and can only bill private
health insurance companies. If you can’t afford to take your kid to the dentist
now because you do not have the extra insurance this will mean you will not be
able to take them to a doctor that is privatized either. Some will say “oh well,
this means the people who can afford to pay for privatized health care will not
be using the public health care, which will speed up the system and I will be
moved up on the waiting list”. Does it really speed it up? Sure it does, won’t deny
that but at what cost. Is my child
better than your child because I can afford to pay for a private health care
facility? Yours is still on a waiting list cause remember there are still more
people out there that cannot afford private medical services. While my child is
cured and living a great life. Is this a socialized service? We open the doors
to private clinics; it will only be a matter of time before we open the doors
to private hospital care.
So my child is having a problem breathing , I have a
hospital 2 blocks away that is privatized, I also have a hospital 30 blocks
away that is public, remember my child is having a problem breathing, hmmm
where should I go 2 blocks or 30 . Naturally I am going to hit the hospital
that is 2 blocks away cause now she/he is turning blue. Here is the kicker,
they won’t see her cause I do not have the right insurance plan… They cannot
bill Alberta Healthcare, being it is a public service. OMG! Now I have to drive
the other 28 blocks because I do have insurance for public health. Ok lets’ say
for argument sake they do take her..Yahhhhh they saved her life, home we go, 2
weeks later a bill comes in the mail. Over 10,000.00 dollars in which lets also
say for argument sake they can bill Alberta health 40% of that total
(guidelines for the medical association fee) my out of pocket is now only 6,000
.. Don’t shake your head, because the imaginary list they also sent me was similar
to the one I posted above for the broken arm. Well I can’t afford this so I don’t
pay it. Come one I know some of you out there will not be able to afford it
either. So they now send my account to a collection agency... But 6 months down
the road same thing happens or worst I rush my child into the hospital this
time they say sorry you still owe us money and we can’t see you, sending me off
to the public hospital. Remember it is a business. Don’t pay, they don’t help.
A bit off topic but same issue … Alberta allowed the
privatization of Electricity and because of that privatization we now pay 15
bucks a GJ this winter. Why?, Because they can charge whatever they feel like
charging. There are no guidelines for this at all and no competition either.
When you privatize it becomes a business rather than a public service.
Healthcare isn’t the only reason this election has me in
twists though it is just one of the major problems that both the PC’s and the
Wildrose have on the table. I am not saying vote PC because I dislike the Wildrose
(even though I dislike them a lot) I also dislike the PC party right now as
well. I am saying that instead of voting for either of these parties vote for
one that you know will not win. Don’t give them a majority leadership. As much
as I don’t see any worthwhile candidate we should be voting for the one that
will cause the less damage to our province in the next 4 years. Send the Wildrose
and PC party a clear message. Take privatizing off the dockets’ and keep it off.
"...I won't let it happen. I won't... I won't let this world exist without me!"