How about having good constructed story instances? LS3 Had them, Pof, LS 4 also. And now the story is put in the open world. That doesnt work for obvious reasons. All about reducing costs and development time. Add to that the cluster of flashy mount skins, armors, weapons, infusions and the explosion of special effects of the zerg of players on top of the story telling, and its only stress and dizzyness left. Flash, zerg, grind, repeat is the only thing i can call it. Look at what LS3 brought in content (6 unique maps, story instances, fractails and raids, followed by the Pof expac 3 months later. The difference in quality and quantity is noticable. If they communicated that development is hindered by Covic lockdowns, working from home etc, i would understand, its a team effort afterall. And would find delays totally acceptable. But thats the problem, communication is in lockdown. And thats makes me unsure of the games future.
At first i was thinking this was a constructive post, and i agreed. But when you end with your hardcore vs casual polarisation rant, you discredit yourself. Their is no one 'casual players' entity. You have normal players (hate the term casual) who play 1 hours a week, you have who play 15 hours. You have players with light skills, medium skills and good skills. I am not a hardcore player. But i do have big concerns over the drop in quality of the content (recycling, tedious repetitive vertical walls to artificially gate everything, that feels like classic ftp asian mmos).
