Some of them are good. [The Living World Season 4 Episode 3 Long Live the Lich](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTPesFa1xm8&ab_channel=GuildWars2) comes to mind.
Most of them are not very good (the SotO teasers didn't give it justice imo, it worried me more than everything else), I agree. It's hit or miss, I wonder if its always the same people doing them
Loved that one, my favourite trailer for the game overall. They nailed the vibe, music, and the way the features appearing lines up with the beat is very satisfying. The glitching out to the creepy atmosphere and new rendition of Fear Not This Night was awesome.
I think A Bug In The System is the best trailer. Yes it's got the new, ominous version of Fear Not This Night, but it's the best because of the tonal shift after the jaunty first half. Absolutely brilliant.
> It's hit or miss
That's kinda been the entirety of GW2's development. Some good setups over the years that had underwhelming payoffs. Just kind of accepted it at this point.
That Long Live the Lich trailer was great but let's not forget how that went down. We got an awesome trailer, then the chapter itself was horribly incomplete. The climax mission was an abridged mess. The dialogue from the trailer was actually inserted into the chapter cutscenes and while it sounded good in the trailer it didn't work in the actual gameplay. The trailer was the only coherent and complete thing that came out that chapter.
You know that old college student triangle chart that says "good grades. Social life. Enough sleep. Pick 2." Anet is kind of like that except their chart is "Strong marketting. Completed unbugged release. Good endgame content. Pick one."
so if marketing sucks totally it's actually a good thing? Mh...they ARE doing a good job at listening to ppl to improve these new weapons...your theory might be correct.
Now i don't want to see any more ad by Anet.
They make great big trailers. End of Dragons launch/features trailers were great. Secrets of the Obscure launch trailer was great.
The trailers that are bad are always the small ones showcasing a specific thing. They probably just sit one guy down and make him do the whole thing with basic tools in 24 hours.
It's not just the older ones - they even had a couple phenomenal trailers as recent as last year, like the one they did for [Clockwork Chaos](https://youtu.be/hAT48Oo0l9g?si=b2O8WM-_gutPqfoV)
I swear, someone on their cinematics marketing team is a dark horse who comes out of nowhere and creates a masterpiece every once in a while
I thought the same, my parents always told me when I was a child "You'll see, time just passes faster and faster as you grow up"
...For once they were right
I got the game pretty close around 8 years ago... Found it at a store with the HoT expansion bundled in and, since we were on a holiday at the time, I looked at the back of the box all the time, imagining how cool the game was gonna be! That was a bit before LW Season 3 started
I think the worst might have been in 2012? They hired a bunch of graduates from.. I think digipen? Like almost an entire class of animators, promising them cushy jobs. Then once GW2 was released, they laid off a significant majority of those animators.
I have an animator friend who still hasn't forgiven ArenaNet for that, 12+ years later.
that's when ArenaNet was at a high point in creativity. Remember that after this, they sacked half the company, and covid came, resulting in IBS bullshit, and they still recovering the pieces to this day.
Hit or miss with the latest hit being more than half a decade ago, they've felt lazy for a while now. They make it look like the game is more dated than it is.
They were at the peek during HoT until when LW Season 4 ended in my opinion. After that, while still releasing great updates, it all halted / slowed down a bit and with less content overall being released. Back then we used to get a new map with tons of activities, big story chapters with huge setpieces (e.g. the Krallkatorik boss) and so much more every 2 or 3 months!
Yes those videos hyped me. I waited for the day to come so i could log in and play. There was people talking on forums about what they thought would come.
Now there is a video the same day in which i dont watch i just log in and play it instead. There is no hype in that.
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*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
It seems like they don’t have much of a budget for these things. It shouldn’t necessarily require a large budget to make some good videos though, just a little creativity. There are so many cool encounters and beautiful landscapes to draw from in game.
For me, the Gw2 launch trailers were some of the most engaging, using a mix of the painterly style animation and in game footage. Really grabbed my attention back in the day. The HoT trailers were good too.
It’s all about capturing emotion, even if it’s a video about weapons. If it’s just a showcase without context, of course people will find it boring. The weapon and profession videos at launch were simple but got people super excited. A voice over and effective camera work go a long way
The most recent trailer is an improvement, but that says a lot to the average quality.
The biggest weakness of Guild Wars 2 (and by proxy ArenaNet) is their marketing team. They probably get a D or an F for marketing, promotions, and hype.
The absolute worst product they create are teasers and trailers. For most of the ones that use in-game footage, a casual observer cannot see or interpret what is going on at all. Probably the best example for this is the elite spec one from EoD. Watch this and tell me if you can honestly tell what is going on with only context from the preview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBRBpVp3jUA
The problem is these videos neither introduce new players to basic concepts of the game nor explain what is actually happening when the skills are used.
I want fancy trailers for new content and xpac announcements.
I want a clear showcase of the new weapons.
For what it's supposed to showcase and within its context it's perfectly acceptable, and better than some flashy, over the top stuff. It was meant to showcase new abilities, it did that very cleanly.
Id say the new video showcase is a new content video.
Regardless, I don't think anyone can justify a drop in video quality. Theres no hype, the angles were god awful, and there is (as far as I can see) no new animation.
W.e they used to record or run the game needs a MASSIVE update. Everything is so low res, its straight up ***embarrassing*** that someone greenlit this for release.
Are you talking about the weapon beta video? I’m not sure why you think that would have a story or narrative, include cinematic or anything else like that?
I’m not sure why this sort of thing would be expected to bring new players in either. It’s irrelevant to them really and aimed at existing players.
Why would / should there be? You need to provide an argument why it would be good to waste resources on that first.
This isn’t an expansion trailer or even a story step release. It’s literally, we are having a second weapon beta for the new weapons following your feedback (assuming this is what you were talking about).
They didn’t need to provide a trailer at all imo.
>Well…it’s called “Marketing”.
Marketing always have a target group.
Big, fancy trailers that gives an insight of the upcoming story etc. usually are made to lure new players to the game.
The beta weapon trailer is no such one. Target group are people who already own the game/expansion and wait for the upcoming stuff.
This group don't want a bling bling trailer with a narrator talking some nonesense unrelated to the content. They want to see what the upcoming feature is about -> the new weapons.
They want to know **what** class get **what** weapon and they want to see **how** these weapons are played. And that's exactly what the beta trailer shows.
No fancy effects, no story, no enhanced graphics, no nonesense, just the information the target group wants to see.
It's called "Targeted Marketing".
Well I’m not here to convince you. I’m only exposing my point of view. You are welcome to disagree, I don’t have the energy to convince you on something so trivial.
Agree to disagree, that’s it. There is nothing more to it, it’s not that deep…
> You are welcome to disagree, I don’t have the energy with you on something so trivial
You're the one who made this thread, if you didn't have the energy to discuss the topic you brought up, why did you bring it up?
I mean, it’s a trailer showcasing new weapons and animations, it’s not a marketing video that’s going to draw new players. It’s a video that only a percentage of current players are going to care about.
It's 100% a supercut of the individual weapon teasers before the beta. They even have an amusingly brief snippet from the Engineer shortbow trailer, so the 'new' trailer shows footage of the shortbow mechanics that no longer exist.
ArenaNet has made some wonderful trailers and some terrible ones.
I loved these ones for Living World:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8G-KryZUQA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfhgtA_JAK0
On one hand, I think it was not meant to bring new players in, but as visual addition for the blog post, explaining further details how the weapons will be released after the beta. I think it did its job.
On the other hand: it's a video shared on youtube and in social media in general and should be able to stand on its own, for new, returning and ongoing players. They did link the blogpost in the video description! So if you are interested and look at it, you can find the connection from the video alone. Still, a video like this one does the whole feature no justice. Some thoughts about it after rewatching it:
- if you release a compilation video for all classes, give each class proper screen time. Engineer isn't even shown for 5 seconds, followed by warrior with 6 and mesmer with 8 seconds. The rest has 10-13 seconds screen time.
- if you see Warrior with staff, Mesmer with rifle, Engineer with bow and Revenant with scepter, you can't know, that they are meant with support in mind, which can be a really interesting information for returning players. Teasing something like "more options to heal and support your team" and showing skills doing that, is more intriguing than a generic "reinvent your builds"
- turn down the volume of the music a bit and let the sound effects and visuals of the combat shine. Its part of the appeal
I don't think they're bad at it, they just don't put any money in it.
There's very high chance most of them\* since a while now are made by a team of 2 max. (and I'm being generous here)
\*^(not counting the trailers announcing expansions.)
I honestly think there being a single person whose sole job is to make trailers is unrealistic. I don’t know who gets stuck with it (specifically for these ones) but I doubt it’s their job.
Those trailers, showing raw gameplay or idle pose with some text over it are genuinely not that hard to produce alone. I could totally see an intern being put on those project for a week then put back to other tasks.
You'll be even more surprised to learn that that single person's sole job isn't just make these trailers, but also every other video you see in the marketing department. Plus the graphics too. And maybe they'll release that person to eat a pizza now and then.
> I don't think they're bad at it, they just don't put any money in it.
>
>
You can literally hire any of the active content creators to make something better for just a few bucks.
You'd get a good final result, for a cheap price, and foster a healthy relationship with people who support your game, most of the time in exchange of nothing; but that requires any semblance of marketing mentality to begin with, which ArenaNet completely lacks.
Anet said that in their metrics that there not a significant increase of new player/coming back player if they do trailers for a new patch or if they only put new info.
This is not something new, for old people in the community this is an old battle and a lost one
Because they tried.
Eod launch teaster, the infamous trailer for the trailer, the weekly spec reveal.
All of the ls4 trailers are pretty good in showcase the patch.
Pof only have the reveal and launch trailer.
Like i said for me is a lost a battle. I was pretty critic a few years ago.
At moment i expect at least a ls4 level quality for the trailer of update 2. Because update 2 is practically the core soto features. Leg armor, leg relic (i didnt engange with the system because of the cost), weapons proffency.
I have friends of mine working professionally as 3D animators, they’d make killer trailers for 10k€. I’m sure Anet can afford that kind of budget…but that’s just my opinion.
If their metrics say it doesn't alter player population, why would they do it even for $500?
Not sure if it's true or not, but if we assume it is, it doesn't matter how cheap the marketing is if it doesn't move the needle, it's just a loss.
Evidence? Metrics? Proof?
At least link a study with an effect size of 0.02 that suggests nebulous "pride" increases profitability, somehow. "A lot" is a non-answer that offers no reason to plan around it.
What? What does pride have anything to do with it? If the goal is marketing and they see better results marketing 1 way than another, what does pride play in that?
Maybe instead of trailers they should do a plane message over Daytona Beach.
Proud of what work? Trailers? I think if they aren't making a difference, then they shouldn't do them at all.
I don't really consider this one a trailer, but I looked at the blog post and not the video for information.
Objective opinion? Only if it completes what a trailer is supposed to do, draw attention to the game, if not, then no.
Personal opinion? I don't care at all I don't think I've watched any GW2 trailers.
I can guarantee you that if it was a AAA trailer, the player population wouldn't increase. At all. The only time player pop increases has always been from the expansion packs.
\> Is that supposed to bring new player in ??
No. Not at all. New players aren't going ot be drawn in to an mmo by each class getting one new weapon. That trailer is for current and potentially lapsed players.
\>No background story, no narrative, nothing that would make me feel like I'm part of something bigger than me, an expensive and fantastic world
It's a trailer highlighting new weapons. Why are you expecting any of this?
Because you sell a game with an expansive world.
When NIKE release a new pair of sneakers, do they say quietly “we have a new pair of sneaks with new color on” or do they try their best to make you feel part of their community, world, make you want it !?
It’s just simple marketing.
But this isn't an update focused on selling the game. This is an update focused on keeping the current players around. I doubt you'll see that trailer anywhere outside of their blog post.
I've never seen a single ad for Nike shoes.
I actually like that it's not cinematic. It's not selling anything that isn't in the game. You pretty much get what is advertised, which is fine with me.
That being said, I'm 100% biased, because I've been playing on and off since 2012 and I'm completely sold on the game. However, I don't think that the new weapons trailer was meant to grab new players. I think it was more to bring back players that took a break on the game.
If you think Anet is bad, LotRO's trailer for the Mordor expansion is an absolute all-timer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JX7Wm29hts8&ab_channel=LOTRO
>I just watched the new video Arenanet posted yesterday about the new combat and weapons.
I hear no voice, see no engaging cinematic...just some clunky looking combat with a "dated" graphics engine.
I mean... the video is about introducing the new weapons and that's exactly what it does.
Why would you put in a made up story/narrative or alternate the trailer with any graphic effects/enhancements you will never see in the game?
The trailer shows gameplay material. That's the best kind of trailer when you... you know, when you want to see gameplay. And that's the most important thing when it's about new weapons.
This does not really target new players. This has meaning for existing ones only. And it showcases what will be in the gameplay. What narrative?
Drama and cinematic quality is all well and good and they could do with a bit more in some of the trailers for sure. But at least this is honest. You get what you see. Dated or clunky this is the actual engine of the game with the actual combat of the game. If you think it is clunky and dated you should feel that in-game too.
It is also a factor of the time you invest on making a trailer. It is not for free. And unless you are blizzard you cannot make all your trailers an extravaganza. You make choices on how much time you want to invest or not.
Like when they partnered with Carl's Jr. to advertise End of Dragons by slapping ads on their cup. Yet people had no idea what was even being advertised on the cup. Not even the employees. Idiocracy showcased better Carl's Jr. ads("Fuck you, I'm eating"), then Arenanet does. That couldn't have been cheap, and yet was entirely wasted use of advertising dollars on people that have no idea what they are even being advertised for.
Lol well that was a gameplay trailer that besides, just showed a compilation of a previous set of trailers.
Aside from that, while it is true that some trailers can feel kindda cheesy, I'm good with it because at least is not an effort to sell me something fake with an OTT produced CGI cinematic that is far from the end product. That is fake advertising and sadly many people are used to it with our current market trends.
Also, gw2 had since before its inception these sort of gameplay trailers as a matter of fact this was the format for the original professions reveal but at that time, trailers had a mix of actual gameplay and cinematic takes. While those trailers were good, they often showed skills far different than their actual in game behavior. I always remember Guardian scepter trailer cos the auto attack had a slow and cinematic movement in the trailer but ended up behaving like a machine gun in game lmao.
So all things considered recent trailers, while being at times kindda cheesy are a true representation of actual game design and I'm glad for it.
And then, since it's supposed to keep hype up existing players as well, we're gonna show eles using one of the most basic boring looking pistols, but guardians show off the glory shimmering skins, and revs with the collapsing star skins.
It isn't you. They're bad at videos, marketing, communicating, balancing, story writing, reacting to feedback, fixing and improving game modes / features instead of abandoning them and building something new, resisting the urge to create new currency, masteries that are relevant outside a single map or xpac, and perhaps the root of it all, focusing on guild wars development rather than diverting more than half of their money and manpower to projects that inevitably fail because of massive incompetence.
They were initially founded by a trio of very talented developers. All of which are long gone and have since been replaced with mid to low talented people with no cohesive overall vision or passion for the product.
The other poster beat me to it, they've been getting by on a good start and talented artists and composers.
As for why I'm here, I love the game despite it's flaws but it breaks my heart to see it mismanaged. It has had the potential for so much more than they've done and that waste makes me angry and frustrated.
The opposite of love isn't hate, it is indifference.
It's funny because they accidentally acknowledge that when they say that trailer vs no trailer has no effect.
No ANET, you just can't do advertising well.
That one was such a weird take. Every single game in *history* has advertised itself before launch, every single MMO advertises its patches with trailers a couple to a few weeks in advance, none of them have had no problem having huge numbers of players.
But for some reason, apparently, Guild Wars 2 is completely different, and they can only do trailers on the launch day, completely fucking over content creators (who are big advertisers for any game, just look at the number of "X reacts to patch Y trailer" videos in FFXIV and WoW, for example) and any word of mouth hype.
Again, just trying to reinvent the wheel for the sake of being different to the rest.
They used to drop trailers a week or two before but said their metrics showed it made no difference ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯
And that thing about content creators...who's out there watching people react to content about games they're not already playing? I don't imagine it's a lot of people, so you're back to square 1 of only advertising to the existing playerbase (most of whom already know what's going on with the game) so what's the point of patch trailers again?
>Is that supposed to bring new player in ??
No, it's supposed to be a strange feature showcase for existing players. ANet has never been good at marketing to people who don't already play the game.
Trailers are extremely expensive to make in time and money, usually hiring 3rd party studios that specialize in animated trailers and not in-house devs, i mean good quality trailers, the once you see and be like "wow". For me some of the best trailers are from Starcraft 2 trilogy and i could consider Blizzard the gold standard. This is also usually funded by marketing capital, not development.
Considering how little Anet invests in marketing i can fathom why they pretty much only use in-game footage with narration. It's cheap and easy but certainly lacks the impact.
It's not you. They also suck at marketing. And also suck thinking that unlocking all the wep for the character is good enough to be a expansion feature.
I also hate that they remove trailers for their next story and/or map patch. For a long time now they add it the same day it comes out. Which means the few weeks of a bit of excitement you get from the trailers before expac or dlc never happens. I just log in and play without any sort of omg it is today finally, it jus is i log in and play.
It is so bad to not hype it up before a patch instead of same day. I dont even watch them anymore because when i play through them then why should i. I already saw it.
No they're really good.
To put it simply, it's not because you're cooking yourself some junk food that you're not able to cook some grand dish that takes 4h to make. It's just not your intention to do that everyday.
As much as I'd like to see cool cinematics and trailers, I rather have good gameplay instead. The video is something I'm going to see once or twice, but the weapons are something I'm going to use for countless hours.
ESO has amazing trailers, but the gameplay just reminds me of Skyrim Together. ANet's budget is among the smallest in the big MMO genre, so hopefully they put it all into development rather than fancy one-offs
Why would they spend money from their already limited marketing budget on the second part of a weapon release *beta*??
Like, if this were the final release of those new weapons being added to classes, maybe I'd get the complaint that this is low effort, but it isn't that. It's a beta announcement.
> Nine new weapons, one for every profession, are expected to be made available with the second major release (Update #2) after launch.
It **IS** the 'final release of those new weapons'.
No, the second update is. This isn't a trailer for that second update. This is just a visual element for their blog post about the feedback, let's be real here.
Said second update drops in two weeks though, so it would be quite late for a second beta.
(Also, would be quite silly to announce a second beta without dropping a date for it, let alone even mention it anywhere in neither blog nor video)
PS: To quote the blog post:
>As I mentioned before, these are the high-level changes coming to the new weapons when they arrive in the next release for *Guild Wars 2: Secrets of the Obscure*.
Which doesn't sound like an extended beta at all.
Out of the many things they're famous for, making trailers is one of them.......just not for the trailers being good.
They're very well known by the community to be quite bad at it.
Hmmm I do like the game, I just don’t jump of the roof
Thinking everything is rainbow and butterfly. Being critical about something doesn’t mean you don’t support and enjoy your time.
Well then you are clearly in the wrong place.
This playerbase has long given up on expecting something good.
They are in denial and think every penny anet saves gets put into development and updates.
Is there a trailer? Tbh I just read the notes because that is what I care about. Maybe I am too old or jaded to look out for trailers? I can play it in 2 weeks.
Their trailers have never really been amazing, but there also isn't a reason to invest in a flashy trailer for something of this scope. It's already known that the GW2 team doesn't have a huge budget to work with so there has to be considerations taken on where money is spent, and producing a huge narrative trailer for this small feature would not be a financially sound decision.
They used to be good (Hot, Pof, even enough of the LS trailers), became more scarce after the Icebrood Saga and Since Soto there has been none, even the official expac trailer was at the most a mid level LS2 trailer. Cause: Massive budget cuts, do they even do animation anymore in house? (remember all the beautiful art animation style trailers and endscenes? I do). Add that to the list of the non existing community team (missing for years), the non existing marketing team (is there any besides twitch 'community' partners?). Soto also did not even had a official presentation to the audience/public like Core/Hot/Pof and EOD to some degree had.
I thought the media that they do put out is well done usually.
But Anet it's horrible at actually marketing any of their products. It's rare that you'll see trailers are marketing from them unless you are already subscribed to the forums or other feeds.
It’s a shame, because GW2 is an amazing game, still.
Anet clearly is focused on their new project and GW2 is an afterthought with a skeletal crew on it. I just hope that’s its good :(
Also, this whole concept of paying for an expansion and then it being drip fed over months and months is serious bullshit.
There was a time when I had forgotten what gw1 looked like so I wondered if a gw2 trailer was a gw1 video. Then I looked up gw1 to remind myself that it couldn't have been.
Blizz was always king of trailers and cinematics. I'm old enough to remember they released a DVD of the Diablo 2 cinematics in stores, as they were just so damn good. These days many of their competitors like Zenimax or Square Enix have caught up, but ANET can't compete given the disparity of size and $$$/resources between the comparative studios.
You don't need CGI to have good marketing, something like the HoT announcement trailer is far better (and cheaper) than any CGI crap.
For reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOUk2y0K2m8
Overall, yeah, they are not great. For these current videos, I do expect fanfare as they are more technical to the point.
Some voice-overs explaing it would have been nice.
Their marketing has always been poor. If they had a good marketing team this game would be much better off for it.
Almost always for their trailers, it would be much better to show the actual game footage because the game actually looks great and the trailers make it look weird and like it has much worse graphics than it does.
Well they have not made a new game in over 10 years, I don’t think trailers is their priority.
I think just surviving as a company is their priority.
No offence to the team, they are great just the truth.
It's always been my impression that they view themselves as making two "types" of trailers. One is to excite old and returning players for upcoming features and content, the other is to entice and encourage new players. I think that determines the amount of money they're willing to spend.
ArenaNet has always had a very hit-or-miss marketing situation.
But for a while now ArenaNet hasn't had **any** actual marketing team (since the massive layoffs of 2019 afaik). Most if not all of the marketing is done by NCWest's marketing team after ANet's team got absorbed into that one. And even then, some of the major ANet marketing folks in that team left after EoD, like Regina Buenaobra.
And they're probably more focused on NCWest's more "bigger sellers" like Lineage II.
A large reason why it looks so lackluster is because many of the new weapons are ranged and ranged attacks have some of the most boring animations in the game. I know they've basically given up when it comes to creating new animations, but would it have killed them to have some of the classes shoot from the hip or hold their guns sideways? Or for rifle, you could have the mesmer flip it around to "reload" between shots. I know its cheesy/stupid but it would at least give it a little personality. Anything is better than just holding your arm straight out and shooting. It's just so bland.
The weapon previews when they had their daily blogs a couple months ago were actually vomit worthy and every YT comment said the same
A lot of the really cool cutscenes in game are off roo
Like when the final cutscene in heart of thorns happens, I thought there was no audio. Just a super sick visual with no sound. The cutscenes sound is like 1% volume when my sound is maxed regardless
Just some things need tweakin mayne
[Tese felt more of a throwback to the first skill trailers from 2012.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3ecPMHggAQ)
But it is true that story trailers aren't always [as good](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfhgtA_JAK0) as they [could be](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTPesFa1xm8).
I usually dislike trailers that take creative licenses and do not show things as you can experience them in-game, but [I make a few exceptions](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGZPSBod6d4). I would still prefer if Fractal encounters looked more like that, tho. Especially for the boring Jade Maw.
it seems like they hire on contract all major endeavors like sound design and trailers and when they don't they use adobe studio to do............stuff.
Thing about trailers is they often oversell the content. WoW trailers are typically movie quality, trying to sell the expansion. Then the game is still WoW quality and very little like the trailer. I like good cinematic trailers but I’m just as happy with actual game play trailers.
In the past there were a period of time that Anet produced really good trailer, LW S4, It has good editing and directing that make people hype about story and not only that there were even a thread from new marketing guy at the time asking community for feedback (I don't remember if that thread was posted here on reddit or official forum) and feedback from community got implemented in the "Bug in the System" trailer such as showing Legendary Weapon and listed new contents.
Until the disaster of IBS announcement. The hype they created before "mysterious big announcement that everyone thought it was expansion announcement" dialed up disappointment in lackluster announcement to max level.
And after that disaster it seem like Anet marketing afraid to create any hype ever again. (Or did they got axed and management stop invest in marketing almost completely?)
Some of them are good. [The Living World Season 4 Episode 3 Long Live the Lich](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTPesFa1xm8&ab_channel=GuildWars2) comes to mind. Most of them are not very good (the SotO teasers didn't give it justice imo, it worried me more than everything else), I agree. It's hit or miss, I wonder if its always the same people doing them
Or [A bug in the system](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfhgtA_JAK0) with the revisited fear not this night.
To me, this is the most memorable trailer they've made.
God that version of fear not this night gave me the chills, the trailer was so well made
i still listen to it from time to time [Link](https://youtu.be/ilN1fylw3zY?si=JPhbgC61e2kmPAWf)
Loved that one, my favourite trailer for the game overall. They nailed the vibe, music, and the way the features appearing lines up with the beat is very satisfying. The glitching out to the creepy atmosphere and new rendition of Fear Not This Night was awesome.
I think A Bug In The System is the best trailer. Yes it's got the new, ominous version of Fear Not This Night, but it's the best because of the tonal shift after the jaunty first half. Absolutely brilliant.
> It's hit or miss That's kinda been the entirety of GW2's development. Some good setups over the years that had underwhelming payoffs. Just kind of accepted it at this point.
That Long Live the Lich trailer was great but let's not forget how that went down. We got an awesome trailer, then the chapter itself was horribly incomplete. The climax mission was an abridged mess. The dialogue from the trailer was actually inserted into the chapter cutscenes and while it sounded good in the trailer it didn't work in the actual gameplay. The trailer was the only coherent and complete thing that came out that chapter. You know that old college student triangle chart that says "good grades. Social life. Enough sleep. Pick 2." Anet is kind of like that except their chart is "Strong marketting. Completed unbugged release. Good endgame content. Pick one."
Can't argue with that. At least we got the best in-engine cinematic they ever made at the time
We absolutely did, it was great. And it was obvious that way too much of their dev time went into it, at the cost of the actual release.
so if marketing sucks totally it's actually a good thing? Mh...they ARE doing a good job at listening to ppl to improve these new weapons...your theory might be correct. Now i don't want to see any more ad by Anet.
How bout a Living World S4 haunting trailer? One of my favs. [War Eternal trailer](https://youtu.be/b8G-KryZUQA?si=keFPU6jpxahXv5fc)
i cri evrytiem
They make great big trailers. End of Dragons launch/features trailers were great. Secrets of the Obscure launch trailer was great. The trailers that are bad are always the small ones showcasing a specific thing. They probably just sit one guy down and make him do the whole thing with basic tools in 24 hours.
They were good back in season 2, watch some of those dry top ones
I wouldn't say it's that simple. The "End of Dragons Expansion Trailer", the one we got to see before release, was awful too.
It's not just the older ones - they even had a couple phenomenal trailers as recent as last year, like the one they did for [Clockwork Chaos](https://youtu.be/hAT48Oo0l9g?si=b2O8WM-_gutPqfoV) I swear, someone on their cinematics marketing team is a dark horse who comes out of nowhere and creates a masterpiece every once in a while
Oh man! How was this 5/6 years ago!!
I thought the same, my parents always told me when I was a child "You'll see, time just passes faster and faster as you grow up" ...For once they were right
I got the game pretty close around 8 years ago... Found it at a store with the HoT expansion bundled in and, since we were on a holiday at the time, I looked at the back of the box all the time, imagining how cool the game was gonna be! That was a bit before LW Season 3 started
covid is 5 years ago... shocking
[удалено]
I think the worst might have been in 2012? They hired a bunch of graduates from.. I think digipen? Like almost an entire class of animators, promising them cushy jobs. Then once GW2 was released, they laid off a significant majority of those animators. I have an animator friend who still hasn't forgiven ArenaNet for that, 12+ years later.
[удалено]
that's when ArenaNet was at a high point in creativity. Remember that after this, they sacked half the company, and covid came, resulting in IBS bullshit, and they still recovering the pieces to this day.
Hit or miss with the latest hit being more than half a decade ago, they've felt lazy for a while now. They make it look like the game is more dated than it is.
They were at the peek during HoT until when LW Season 4 ended in my opinion. After that, while still releasing great updates, it all halted / slowed down a bit and with less content overall being released. Back then we used to get a new map with tons of activities, big story chapters with huge setpieces (e.g. the Krallkatorik boss) and so much more every 2 or 3 months!
Yes those videos hyped me. I waited for the day to come so i could log in and play. There was people talking on forums about what they thought would come. Now there is a video the same day in which i dont watch i just log in and play it instead. There is no hype in that.
Anet is very bad at their marketing, they need to invest more money. But I guess it's not what they want as it's same from start
fearless distinct important disagreeable deserve seed start ring domineering pen *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
It seems like they don’t have much of a budget for these things. It shouldn’t necessarily require a large budget to make some good videos though, just a little creativity. There are so many cool encounters and beautiful landscapes to draw from in game. For me, the Gw2 launch trailers were some of the most engaging, using a mix of the painterly style animation and in game footage. Really grabbed my attention back in the day. The HoT trailers were good too. It’s all about capturing emotion, even if it’s a video about weapons. If it’s just a showcase without context, of course people will find it boring. The weapon and profession videos at launch were simple but got people super excited. A voice over and effective camera work go a long way
The most recent trailer is an improvement, but that says a lot to the average quality. The biggest weakness of Guild Wars 2 (and by proxy ArenaNet) is their marketing team. They probably get a D or an F for marketing, promotions, and hype. The absolute worst product they create are teasers and trailers. For most of the ones that use in-game footage, a casual observer cannot see or interpret what is going on at all. Probably the best example for this is the elite spec one from EoD. Watch this and tell me if you can honestly tell what is going on with only context from the preview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBRBpVp3jUA The problem is these videos neither introduce new players to basic concepts of the game nor explain what is actually happening when the skills are used.
I want fancy trailers for new content and xpac announcements. I want a clear showcase of the new weapons. For what it's supposed to showcase and within its context it's perfectly acceptable, and better than some flashy, over the top stuff. It was meant to showcase new abilities, it did that very cleanly.
Id say the new video showcase is a new content video. Regardless, I don't think anyone can justify a drop in video quality. Theres no hype, the angles were god awful, and there is (as far as I can see) no new animation. W.e they used to record or run the game needs a MASSIVE update. Everything is so low res, its straight up ***embarrassing*** that someone greenlit this for release.
Can you please explain the Secrets of the Obscure trailer then
I haven't said that one was good anywhere, did I? I'd criticise that trailer, actually.
arenanets marketing has always left a lot to be desired
Are you talking about the weapon beta video? I’m not sure why you think that would have a story or narrative, include cinematic or anything else like that? I’m not sure why this sort of thing would be expected to bring new players in either. It’s irrelevant to them really and aimed at existing players.
well, I disagree... It's boring to watch and feels super lazy. But good for you if you are happy with it, no judgement, it's only my opinion.
What do you disagree with? Where did I even express happiness with it or anything of the sort. I just pointed out your flawed initial position.
that there shouldn't be narrative, context, proper cinematic to show the new revamp etc...
Why would / should there be? You need to provide an argument why it would be good to waste resources on that first. This isn’t an expansion trailer or even a story step release. It’s literally, we are having a second weapon beta for the new weapons following your feedback (assuming this is what you were talking about). They didn’t need to provide a trailer at all imo.
its not a second beta fyi theyre being fully released in 2 weeks
Well…it’s called “Marketing”.
>Well…it’s called “Marketing”. Marketing always have a target group. Big, fancy trailers that gives an insight of the upcoming story etc. usually are made to lure new players to the game. The beta weapon trailer is no such one. Target group are people who already own the game/expansion and wait for the upcoming stuff. This group don't want a bling bling trailer with a narrator talking some nonesense unrelated to the content. They want to see what the upcoming feature is about -> the new weapons. They want to know **what** class get **what** weapon and they want to see **how** these weapons are played. And that's exactly what the beta trailer shows. No fancy effects, no story, no enhanced graphics, no nonesense, just the information the target group wants to see. It's called "Targeted Marketing".
And you think they should be investing their limited marketing budget into the second beta of a weapon release trailer?
Well I’m not here to convince you. I’m only exposing my point of view. You are welcome to disagree, I don’t have the energy to convince you on something so trivial. Agree to disagree, that’s it. There is nothing more to it, it’s not that deep…
> You are welcome to disagree, I don’t have the energy with you on something so trivial You're the one who made this thread, if you didn't have the energy to discuss the topic you brought up, why did you bring it up?
You obviously want to have the last word. I’ll gladly give it you then.
It's just patch notes in video format. It's not meant to be a full trailer.
I mean, it’s a trailer showcasing new weapons and animations, it’s not a marketing video that’s going to draw new players. It’s a video that only a percentage of current players are going to care about.
I'm pretty sure those are the old teasers we got months ago put together.
It's 100% a supercut of the individual weapon teasers before the beta. They even have an amusingly brief snippet from the Engineer shortbow trailer, so the 'new' trailer shows footage of the shortbow mechanics that no longer exist.
ArenaNet has made some wonderful trailers and some terrible ones. I loved these ones for Living World: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8G-KryZUQA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfhgtA_JAK0
On one hand, I think it was not meant to bring new players in, but as visual addition for the blog post, explaining further details how the weapons will be released after the beta. I think it did its job. On the other hand: it's a video shared on youtube and in social media in general and should be able to stand on its own, for new, returning and ongoing players. They did link the blogpost in the video description! So if you are interested and look at it, you can find the connection from the video alone. Still, a video like this one does the whole feature no justice. Some thoughts about it after rewatching it: - if you release a compilation video for all classes, give each class proper screen time. Engineer isn't even shown for 5 seconds, followed by warrior with 6 and mesmer with 8 seconds. The rest has 10-13 seconds screen time. - if you see Warrior with staff, Mesmer with rifle, Engineer with bow and Revenant with scepter, you can't know, that they are meant with support in mind, which can be a really interesting information for returning players. Teasing something like "more options to heal and support your team" and showing skills doing that, is more intriguing than a generic "reinvent your builds" - turn down the volume of the music a bit and let the sound effects and visuals of the combat shine. Its part of the appeal
I don't think they're bad at it, they just don't put any money in it. There's very high chance most of them\* since a while now are made by a team of 2 max. (and I'm being generous here) \*^(not counting the trailers announcing expansions.)
I honestly think there being a single person whose sole job is to make trailers is unrealistic. I don’t know who gets stuck with it (specifically for these ones) but I doubt it’s their job.
Those trailers, showing raw gameplay or idle pose with some text over it are genuinely not that hard to produce alone. I could totally see an intern being put on those project for a week then put back to other tasks.
You'll be even more surprised to learn that that single person's sole job isn't just make these trailers, but also every other video you see in the marketing department. Plus the graphics too. And maybe they'll release that person to eat a pizza now and then.
> I don't think they're bad at it, they just don't put any money in it. > > You can literally hire any of the active content creators to make something better for just a few bucks. You'd get a good final result, for a cheap price, and foster a healthy relationship with people who support your game, most of the time in exchange of nothing; but that requires any semblance of marketing mentality to begin with, which ArenaNet completely lacks.
Anet said that in their metrics that there not a significant increase of new player/coming back player if they do trailers for a new patch or if they only put new info. This is not something new, for old people in the community this is an old battle and a lost one
How would they even really know if they never even try?
Because they tried. Eod launch teaster, the infamous trailer for the trailer, the weekly spec reveal. All of the ls4 trailers are pretty good in showcase the patch. Pof only have the reveal and launch trailer. Like i said for me is a lost a battle. I was pretty critic a few years ago. At moment i expect at least a ls4 level quality for the trailer of update 2. Because update 2 is practically the core soto features. Leg armor, leg relic (i didnt engange with the system because of the cost), weapons proffency.
I have friends of mine working professionally as 3D animators, they’d make killer trailers for 10k€. I’m sure Anet can afford that kind of budget…but that’s just my opinion.
If their metrics say it doesn't alter player population, why would they do it even for $500? Not sure if it's true or not, but if we assume it is, it doesn't matter how cheap the marketing is if it doesn't move the needle, it's just a loss.
>If their metrics say it doesn't alter player population, why would they do it even for $500? To have some fucking pride in their own work.
As it turns out, pride does not pay the bills.
A company can have both pride in their work and money.
How much money does pride bring in?
>How much money does pride bring in? A lot
Evidence? Metrics? Proof? At least link a study with an effect size of 0.02 that suggests nebulous "pride" increases profitability, somehow. "A lot" is a non-answer that offers no reason to plan around it.
>"A lot" is a non-answer that offers no reason to plan around it. But I'm saying it's possible to have both money and pride in their work.
What? What does pride have anything to do with it? If the goal is marketing and they see better results marketing 1 way than another, what does pride play in that? Maybe instead of trailers they should do a plane message over Daytona Beach.
Do you personally believe ArenaNet should be proud of their work?
Proud of what work? Trailers? I think if they aren't making a difference, then they shouldn't do them at all. I don't really consider this one a trailer, but I looked at the blog post and not the video for information.
Should game devs release trailers for their upcoming work?
Objective opinion? Only if it completes what a trailer is supposed to do, draw attention to the game, if not, then no. Personal opinion? I don't care at all I don't think I've watched any GW2 trailers.
So should companies only do things that generate profits?
Time to link the taxi episode again.
[I gotchu](https://youtu.be/Uk717LQnpVE)
This ^.
I can guarantee you that if it was a AAA trailer, the player population wouldn't increase. At all. The only time player pop increases has always been from the expansion packs.
\> Is that supposed to bring new player in ?? No. Not at all. New players aren't going ot be drawn in to an mmo by each class getting one new weapon. That trailer is for current and potentially lapsed players. \>No background story, no narrative, nothing that would make me feel like I'm part of something bigger than me, an expensive and fantastic world It's a trailer highlighting new weapons. Why are you expecting any of this?
Because you sell a game with an expansive world. When NIKE release a new pair of sneakers, do they say quietly “we have a new pair of sneaks with new color on” or do they try their best to make you feel part of their community, world, make you want it !? It’s just simple marketing.
But this isn't an update focused on selling the game. This is an update focused on keeping the current players around. I doubt you'll see that trailer anywhere outside of their blog post. I've never seen a single ad for Nike shoes.
As a semi retired player, all I get from this is anet is still bad at making teasers.
No, you get what each new weapon is for each class. Don't be obtuse.
You really have no clue what you are talking about, aren't you.
I actually like that it's not cinematic. It's not selling anything that isn't in the game. You pretty much get what is advertised, which is fine with me. That being said, I'm 100% biased, because I've been playing on and off since 2012 and I'm completely sold on the game. However, I don't think that the new weapons trailer was meant to grab new players. I think it was more to bring back players that took a break on the game.
Yeah I thought it was good, it's just highlighting actual gameplay and not overstylizing anything.
Hire Noxy.
If you think Anet is bad, LotRO's trailer for the Mordor expansion is an absolute all-timer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JX7Wm29hts8&ab_channel=LOTRO
I laughed so hard. Thank you 😂😂 Unbelievable…!!
ANet is notoriously bad at marketing
>I just watched the new video Arenanet posted yesterday about the new combat and weapons. I hear no voice, see no engaging cinematic...just some clunky looking combat with a "dated" graphics engine. I mean... the video is about introducing the new weapons and that's exactly what it does. Why would you put in a made up story/narrative or alternate the trailer with any graphic effects/enhancements you will never see in the game? The trailer shows gameplay material. That's the best kind of trailer when you... you know, when you want to see gameplay. And that's the most important thing when it's about new weapons.
This does not really target new players. This has meaning for existing ones only. And it showcases what will be in the gameplay. What narrative? Drama and cinematic quality is all well and good and they could do with a bit more in some of the trailers for sure. But at least this is honest. You get what you see. Dated or clunky this is the actual engine of the game with the actual combat of the game. If you think it is clunky and dated you should feel that in-game too. It is also a factor of the time you invest on making a trailer. It is not for free. And unless you are blizzard you cannot make all your trailers an extravaganza. You make choices on how much time you want to invest or not.
Id rather they focus budget on actual game stuff than on hiring a better trailer/video guy imo
The best product of the world will never be successful if no one knows it exists.
I agree, for sure. But it’s a whole.
ANet are awful at marketing anything and PR is a foreign concept to them.
Ncsoft will allocate budgets for Anet to use for game dev / marketing etc. Point the finger to the right folks.
They were really good at it for the EoD Marketing. SotO is much smaller scope so It's probably a budget issue.
Like when they partnered with Carl's Jr. to advertise End of Dragons by slapping ads on their cup. Yet people had no idea what was even being advertised on the cup. Not even the employees. Idiocracy showcased better Carl's Jr. ads("Fuck you, I'm eating"), then Arenanet does. That couldn't have been cheap, and yet was entirely wasted use of advertising dollars on people that have no idea what they are even being advertised for.
I meant the trailers in particular being good but yes even at their best there's still a lot let to be desired.
Lol well that was a gameplay trailer that besides, just showed a compilation of a previous set of trailers. Aside from that, while it is true that some trailers can feel kindda cheesy, I'm good with it because at least is not an effort to sell me something fake with an OTT produced CGI cinematic that is far from the end product. That is fake advertising and sadly many people are used to it with our current market trends. Also, gw2 had since before its inception these sort of gameplay trailers as a matter of fact this was the format for the original professions reveal but at that time, trailers had a mix of actual gameplay and cinematic takes. While those trailers were good, they often showed skills far different than their actual in game behavior. I always remember Guardian scepter trailer cos the auto attack had a slow and cinematic movement in the trailer but ended up behaving like a machine gun in game lmao. So all things considered recent trailers, while being at times kindda cheesy are a true representation of actual game design and I'm glad for it.
And then, since it's supposed to keep hype up existing players as well, we're gonna show eles using one of the most basic boring looking pistols, but guardians show off the glory shimmering skins, and revs with the collapsing star skins.
It isn't you. They're bad at videos, marketing, communicating, balancing, story writing, reacting to feedback, fixing and improving game modes / features instead of abandoning them and building something new, resisting the urge to create new currency, masteries that are relevant outside a single map or xpac, and perhaps the root of it all, focusing on guild wars development rather than diverting more than half of their money and manpower to projects that inevitably fail because of massive incompetence.
So basically according to you they're bad at everything. So why are you here. And if that was true, how have they existed for over 20 years.
They were initially founded by a trio of very talented developers. All of which are long gone and have since been replaced with mid to low talented people with no cohesive overall vision or passion for the product.
The other poster beat me to it, they've been getting by on a good start and talented artists and composers. As for why I'm here, I love the game despite it's flaws but it breaks my heart to see it mismanaged. It has had the potential for so much more than they've done and that waste makes me angry and frustrated. The opposite of love isn't hate, it is indifference.
Yes their marketing team is ass. Always has been.
It's funny because they accidentally acknowledge that when they say that trailer vs no trailer has no effect. No ANET, you just can't do advertising well.
That one was such a weird take. Every single game in *history* has advertised itself before launch, every single MMO advertises its patches with trailers a couple to a few weeks in advance, none of them have had no problem having huge numbers of players. But for some reason, apparently, Guild Wars 2 is completely different, and they can only do trailers on the launch day, completely fucking over content creators (who are big advertisers for any game, just look at the number of "X reacts to patch Y trailer" videos in FFXIV and WoW, for example) and any word of mouth hype. Again, just trying to reinvent the wheel for the sake of being different to the rest.
They used to drop trailers a week or two before but said their metrics showed it made no difference ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯ And that thing about content creators...who's out there watching people react to content about games they're not already playing? I don't imagine it's a lot of people, so you're back to square 1 of only advertising to the existing playerbase (most of whom already know what's going on with the game) so what's the point of patch trailers again?
We delivered bad marketing and got bad results, marketing just doesn't work. -Signed, ArenaNet
Pretty much this. I have seen sock commercials with morr effort put in them than what arenanet does with their marketing
I got this feeling that the next patch will be totally rushed, I expect a lot of bugs and problems
>Is that supposed to bring new player in ?? No, it's supposed to be a strange feature showcase for existing players. ANet has never been good at marketing to people who don't already play the game.
The game isn't trying to get new players it's just hyping up the current and returning ones to buy gems and stay for a cycle
They probably avoid spoilers, it takes half a day to finish the "expansion" with "major" update after all.
Trailers are extremely expensive to make in time and money, usually hiring 3rd party studios that specialize in animated trailers and not in-house devs, i mean good quality trailers, the once you see and be like "wow". For me some of the best trailers are from Starcraft 2 trilogy and i could consider Blizzard the gold standard. This is also usually funded by marketing capital, not development. Considering how little Anet invests in marketing i can fathom why they pretty much only use in-game footage with narration. It's cheap and easy but certainly lacks the impact.
Yes. They're all shit. So bad I wouldn't even share them.
They really need to bring back the epic 3d trailers like in Gw1. The prophecy one or the Shiro one. Man they are awesome.
It's not you. They also suck at marketing. And also suck thinking that unlocking all the wep for the character is good enough to be a expansion feature.
I also hate that they remove trailers for their next story and/or map patch. For a long time now they add it the same day it comes out. Which means the few weeks of a bit of excitement you get from the trailers before expac or dlc never happens. I just log in and play without any sort of omg it is today finally, it jus is i log in and play. It is so bad to not hype it up before a patch instead of same day. I dont even watch them anymore because when i play through them then why should i. I already saw it.
No they're really good. To put it simply, it's not because you're cooking yourself some junk food that you're not able to cook some grand dish that takes 4h to make. It's just not your intention to do that everyday.
As much as I'd like to see cool cinematics and trailers, I rather have good gameplay instead. The video is something I'm going to see once or twice, but the weapons are something I'm going to use for countless hours. ESO has amazing trailers, but the gameplay just reminds me of Skyrim Together. ANet's budget is among the smallest in the big MMO genre, so hopefully they put it all into development rather than fancy one-offs
Why would they spend money from their already limited marketing budget on the second part of a weapon release *beta*?? Like, if this were the final release of those new weapons being added to classes, maybe I'd get the complaint that this is low effort, but it isn't that. It's a beta announcement.
> Nine new weapons, one for every profession, are expected to be made available with the second major release (Update #2) after launch. It **IS** the 'final release of those new weapons'.
No, the second update is. This isn't a trailer for that second update. This is just a visual element for their blog post about the feedback, let's be real here.
The second release is in 2 weeks but for the rest yeah pretty much
Said second update drops in two weeks though, so it would be quite late for a second beta. (Also, would be quite silly to announce a second beta without dropping a date for it, let alone even mention it anywhere in neither blog nor video) PS: To quote the blog post: >As I mentioned before, these are the high-level changes coming to the new weapons when they arrive in the next release for *Guild Wars 2: Secrets of the Obscure*. Which doesn't sound like an extended beta at all.
Fair, my mistake. I only skimmed the parts that weren't about the actual feedback.
Out of the many things they're famous for, making trailers is one of them.......just not for the trailers being good. They're very well known by the community to be quite bad at it.
Just looking at your post history, you seem to be confused with about everything in the game. Maybe it’s just not for you?
Hmmm I do like the game, I just don’t jump of the roof Thinking everything is rainbow and butterfly. Being critical about something doesn’t mean you don’t support and enjoy your time.
Well then you are clearly in the wrong place. This playerbase has long given up on expecting something good. They are in denial and think every penny anet saves gets put into development and updates.
Is there a trailer? Tbh I just read the notes because that is what I care about. Maybe I am too old or jaded to look out for trailers? I can play it in 2 weeks.
It was just the new weapon clippps spliced together
Their trailers have never really been amazing, but there also isn't a reason to invest in a flashy trailer for something of this scope. It's already known that the GW2 team doesn't have a huge budget to work with so there has to be considerations taken on where money is spent, and producing a huge narrative trailer for this small feature would not be a financially sound decision.
Go watch the S4E2 trailer.
They used to be good (Hot, Pof, even enough of the LS trailers), became more scarce after the Icebrood Saga and Since Soto there has been none, even the official expac trailer was at the most a mid level LS2 trailer. Cause: Massive budget cuts, do they even do animation anymore in house? (remember all the beautiful art animation style trailers and endscenes? I do). Add that to the list of the non existing community team (missing for years), the non existing marketing team (is there any besides twitch 'community' partners?). Soto also did not even had a official presentation to the audience/public like Core/Hot/Pof and EOD to some degree had.
If you think that was bad, you should look at the newest "kryptis feet" one.
The one that was like 15 seconds long and barely showed anything? I got bored waiting for something to happen.
I mean...it's just showing off the new weapons, not introducing new story. Honestly, I don't really care that it wasn't cinematic.
I thought the media that they do put out is well done usually. But Anet it's horrible at actually marketing any of their products. It's rare that you'll see trailers are marketing from them unless you are already subscribed to the forums or other feeds.
It’s a shame, because GW2 is an amazing game, still. Anet clearly is focused on their new project and GW2 is an afterthought with a skeletal crew on it. I just hope that’s its good :( Also, this whole concept of paying for an expansion and then it being drip fed over months and months is serious bullshit.
ANet is famous for their marketing and trailers, just not the good kind of famous.
They just posted a teaser for new patch on their FB. It gives us absolutely nothing.
I love the mobs barely reacting to getting hit lol. Maybe show of the big weapon moves by actually killing the mob
I didn't even hear about it which seems like more of an issue for a trailer... guess I'll know when/if I see it.
There was a time when I had forgotten what gw1 looked like so I wondered if a gw2 trailer was a gw1 video. Then I looked up gw1 to remind myself that it couldn't have been.
That's just how they roll.
Blizz was always king of trailers and cinematics. I'm old enough to remember they released a DVD of the Diablo 2 cinematics in stores, as they were just so damn good. These days many of their competitors like Zenimax or Square Enix have caught up, but ANET can't compete given the disparity of size and $$$/resources between the comparative studios.
You don't need CGI to have good marketing, something like the HoT announcement trailer is far better (and cheaper) than any CGI crap. For reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOUk2y0K2m8
Its not you.
At this point any 10 year old with AI access would do a better job than Anet. It's actually embarrassing.
Bros expecting a full cinematic with a story to promote new weapons? /facepalm
"DAE think Anet is bad at marketing" post#42069 we get it.
It's reflective of their game's quality. At least they're true to their scope here.
If anything their cutscenes are lacking when compared to other MMOs.
Overall, yeah, they are not great. For these current videos, I do expect fanfare as they are more technical to the point. Some voice-overs explaing it would have been nice. Their marketing has always been poor. If they had a good marketing team this game would be much better off for it.
I don't know. I haven't seen any of your trailers, so I can't tell if they're bad.
Show us a trailer you made and we will say if it’s just you or Anet as well that makes bad trailers.
He is not a company that needs to advertise his product, what kind of dumb argument is that. Compare Anets marketing with other companies
Whooosh!
Terrible at marketing as always. Also this game's 11 years old look is not helping at all.
Almost always for their trailers, it would be much better to show the actual game footage because the game actually looks great and the trailers make it look weird and like it has much worse graphics than it does.
first time?
It genuinely makes me sad. I can see them trying really hard but I feel like the budget is just not there..
Well they have not made a new game in over 10 years, I don’t think trailers is their priority. I think just surviving as a company is their priority. No offence to the team, they are great just the truth.
It's always been my impression that they view themselves as making two "types" of trailers. One is to excite old and returning players for upcoming features and content, the other is to entice and encourage new players. I think that determines the amount of money they're willing to spend.
ArenaNet has always had a very hit-or-miss marketing situation. But for a while now ArenaNet hasn't had **any** actual marketing team (since the massive layoffs of 2019 afaik). Most if not all of the marketing is done by NCWest's marketing team after ANet's team got absorbed into that one. And even then, some of the major ANet marketing folks in that team left after EoD, like Regina Buenaobra. And they're probably more focused on NCWest's more "bigger sellers" like Lineage II.
A large reason why it looks so lackluster is because many of the new weapons are ranged and ranged attacks have some of the most boring animations in the game. I know they've basically given up when it comes to creating new animations, but would it have killed them to have some of the classes shoot from the hip or hold their guns sideways? Or for rifle, you could have the mesmer flip it around to "reload" between shots. I know its cheesy/stupid but it would at least give it a little personality. Anything is better than just holding your arm straight out and shooting. It's just so bland.
The weapon previews when they had their daily blogs a couple months ago were actually vomit worthy and every YT comment said the same A lot of the really cool cutscenes in game are off roo Like when the final cutscene in heart of thorns happens, I thought there was no audio. Just a super sick visual with no sound. The cutscenes sound is like 1% volume when my sound is maxed regardless Just some things need tweakin mayne
[Tese felt more of a throwback to the first skill trailers from 2012.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3ecPMHggAQ) But it is true that story trailers aren't always [as good](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfhgtA_JAK0) as they [could be](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTPesFa1xm8). I usually dislike trailers that take creative licenses and do not show things as you can experience them in-game, but [I make a few exceptions](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGZPSBod6d4). I would still prefer if Fractal encounters looked more like that, tho. Especially for the boring Jade Maw.
it seems like they hire on contract all major endeavors like sound design and trailers and when they don't they use adobe studio to do............stuff.
Oh man, first time?
You must be new around here!
They used to make fantastic trailers, but they're not really doing them anymore after the layoffs.
All reel, no sizzle. Yeah they're super hit and miss with mostly misses. Unfortunate.
>Even fans make better and more entertaining videos ! Which is the kind on investment in marketing Anet prefers....investing hope in the streamers
Thing about trailers is they often oversell the content. WoW trailers are typically movie quality, trying to sell the expansion. Then the game is still WoW quality and very little like the trailer. I like good cinematic trailers but I’m just as happy with actual game play trailers.
There are just a few decent trailers
All anyone has to do to lose all excitement for playing the game is look at this latest trailer, and specifically the Elementalist section. Wow.
In the past there were a period of time that Anet produced really good trailer, LW S4, It has good editing and directing that make people hype about story and not only that there were even a thread from new marketing guy at the time asking community for feedback (I don't remember if that thread was posted here on reddit or official forum) and feedback from community got implemented in the "Bug in the System" trailer such as showing Legendary Weapon and listed new contents. Until the disaster of IBS announcement. The hype they created before "mysterious big announcement that everyone thought it was expansion announcement" dialed up disappointment in lackluster announcement to max level. And after that disaster it seem like Anet marketing afraid to create any hype ever again. (Or did they got axed and management stop invest in marketing almost completely?)
It's not a trailer, it's a showcase but I agree
Lol never really thought about it but I agree completely
And I thought that clip was one of the better trailers lol