Re: Thoughts for GW3

by dandeandan
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Thoughts for GW3

★★★★★ Expert

I’ve posted something like this before and under a different thread but considering that the next PvZ shooter, which I presume will be GW3 (although it could be a new take on a PvZ shooter), I wanted to give some thoughts of my own and of course to encourage others to add anything I may have forgotten here.

I want to start off with saying that I thoroughly enjoy both games although I like GW2 a bit more over all, I do miss certain aspects of GW1, especially the maps.

 

It’s going to be long but there’s a lot to cover.

 

Bugs: All modern games have bugs. Between the ever increasing complexity of the systems, engines, graphics, and etc. and often harsh deadlines these things are a fact of life. In GW2’s case though I feel that the excessive amount of such issues that plagued it at launch and we still deal with to some degree have turned people away which is a pity. The fact that I still play pretty much every day even with my normal strong dislike for such issues as bugs are a testament to how much fun the game is for me.

 

Most of the serious bugs like the issue with capturing of gardens/graveyards that was a major problem early on in GW2’s life are solved today but avoiding such serious problems before they go live and frustrate large portions of the player base would not only help with player retention but also present a more refined and therefore desirable product simultaneously. I include the server issues here. So many times it wouldn’t connect or would suddenly drop to the backyard could be aggravating. For people less pleased with the game than I, it must have been maddening.

 

Backyard Battleground: I’ve mentioned this before but this aspect of the game is so good I have to keep bringing it up! I love this part of the game. The constant spawning and fighting, the desire to explore, the mini-games, the hidden jokes, the decorations, and the fact that it serves as a lobby, menu, and playground in its own right make it a fantastic part of the game.

 

GW3 needs to keep this and expand upon it. I’ve voiced my consternation at the lack of epic decoration spots and the abundance of these decorations for that spot before. We really need more backyard battleground; a much larger one to explore (when I saw the cranes outside the bounds of the backyard in GW2 I was sure you guys were going to enlarge it, imagine my chagrin when it never has), more mini-games, more hidden jokes, more events, and more chests to open and decoration positions. Basically more backyard and more stuff to do with it!

 

Maps: Many of us miss the old maps. I know you have stated they need some alterations to work with the mechs but I welcome that if it brings them back plus since the main framework for those maps already exists within an older version of the same engine, it should be easier to alter them than it is to make new ones.

 

I’m not suggesting not adding new ones! I love the new maps although Time Park is a bit off for MP matches (it’s fine for garden/graveyard ops though) and more new maps for the new game would be most welcome but think of the variety if we had most/all the old maps from GW1 & 2 plus any new ones you create! That being said we could use more herbal assault maps since we have only G&G maps in GW1. One of my few complaints besides bugs and balance problems with GW2 is the lack of G&G maps. We have 5 total TT maps but only 2 and 3 with zombies and plants attacking respectively feels like too little variety. They’re all great maps, I love them all, but more would be great.

 

Quality of Life/Polish: One aspect where I feel that Overwatch, a game I play a bit although not as much as GW2, is the game has so much polish and features to aid a personalized style of play that GW2 just can’t match. More refined control, sound, and graphic options would seriously help people to tweak their experience to their personal preference and that would in turn keep them playing and engaged.

 

My biggest complaint here is the customization booth. It took a while to get used to the method of selecting a character instead of exiting the booth and the way you select your customization from the vast array you have; a single linear display of only a few at a time, is very tedious, especially with so many options. I’ve mentioned this before but displaying a square or rectangular grid and allowing us to type in or select code words/letters to make this a smoother, faster experience would be most welcome.

 

Single and Multi-player: Now some lament the high amount of solo content in GW2 compared to GW1 but I love the fact that I have simple but fun single player storylines to play through, can play solo ops, can repeat those quests, and can jump in to private or multiplayer matches at my whim is a fantastic part of GW2. I do all the quests on the board consistently and it keeps me wanting to play even though I’ve been max level for months now.

 

My understanding is that you wanted a scripter for both single and multiplayer options for the new game and that sounds great to me. GW2 is such a feature of my game time and that I can swap between modes whenever I want that I can squeeze games in at almost any time, even if it’s just to pop in the backyard for a little messing about with the NPC spawns. I hope to see improved and expanded single player and multiplayer options.

 

Regardless of any changes please keep the option to have private matches with the MP portal. I love that option!

 

Modes: Taco Bandits was fun. Not my favorite mode ever, that’s TT, but I miss it from GW1. Zombies stealing tacos and taking them to a UFO? I was literally lol when I saw it the first time. Since it uses existing maps surely it wouldn’t be an issue to add it back? As for other modes; King of the Hill and Flag Capture come to mind almost immediately. I know TT is number one and the other modes can be less populated but they are still fun and I like changing it up and trying other modes. I’d like to see more in GW3.

 

Bosses: We need more variety of bosses to fight and to spawn in the backyard. Some never spawn in the backyard like Baron Von Bats or the Zen Sensei, and adding them along with more plant bosses would be enjoyable and again add more variety to the ops and the constant squabble in the backyard. A giant bean stalk boss would both fit the plants and of course the old fairy tale as well.

 

Consumables: While I appreciate the new consumables in GW2 so many classic ones from GW1 are missing. Please give us these old ones back and perhaps even expand upon them. I miss my barrel pirates, laser beans, and the like!

 

Boss Mode: I bring this up for completeness. It never seemed very popular in GW1 but it was a nice changeup at times too. Maybe it won’t come back but it wouldn’t be terrible if it did.

 

The other option for a new Boss mode is to let people play as bosses, maybe this could be a new game mode where each side has a boss player as a kind of VIP and both sides are trying to stop each other’s bosses.

 

Stars: If you keep this currency or some form of it, more places to spend them would be great. After buying all the chests, clearing all the decoration areas, opening up the shooting gallery and such, and maxxing our levels, there wasn’t anything to do with them barring the occasional enchanted garden/graveyard. I’ve been burning them on rainbow stars but some other place to spend them on permanent basis is highly desired, even just more minigames or changing them into coins or something.

 

Leveling: the current leveling system is superior to the GW1 challenge star system but having to go back to your backyard to train was limiting and initially not intuitive. If you had a character you really wanted to level but they were too close to the next rank for an ops as an example, you would either waste a chunk of xp or have to use another character.

 

The ranks and upgrades are fine but make them automatic maybe? Also once you hit cap on all characters the xp is wasted. Allowing that xp to do something, perhaps allowing us to keep leveling even if it doesn’t provide any huge benefit or to give us a small amount of coins in place of the wasted xp would be a good idea.

 

Balance: In a game with so many characters balance is not an easy challenge. The Rose issue at launch was a glaring one and there have been other issues that I feel you have addressed over time decently although with a few changes that didn’t seem warranted but again, getting this closer at launch gives a better first impression. Some changes still need to be made; the party rose’s ammo clip is far too small compared to her sisters for example, and testing plus feedback should help get things closer in performance for the new game, but be sure to weigh feedback appropriately!

 

Four Gestures: Minor but like many people I want to have 4 instead of only 2. The ability to switch to your AI assistants in solo ops is not so needed, out of many solo ops I only used it twice; once to wipe the team due to a bugged challenge wave to retry instead of starting all over, and once to get a stuck scientist AI moving again. If you want to keep this functionality that’s fine of course but people really want 4 gestures back!

 

Customizations: One of the greatest strengths of the GW series is the vast selection of customization options. While we will definitely want new ones, giving us most/all the options from the first two games in the new one will not only satisfy those of us that love the old ones but give us more things to work towards as well without the usual MMO grind feeling many dislike. As someone who has played many MMOs over the years I find the ‘grind’ in GW2 less onerous, even with the rainbow stars, as it is and the satisfaction of getting stuff in packs with the system used in both GW games with no repeats of unique items is one of my favorite aspects of the games.

 

More legendaries would be great and whatever you do, we must keep the everlasting crown! That hat is great, the voice actor is perfect, and it has so many funny things to say! Maybe even give us a tiara or something with a female voice that says more funny things!

 

Characters: Some obvious variants are missing (ice pirate (the cheesy movie) and frozen corn (the freezer section) come to mind immediately) and the new characters are lacking in variants compared to the old ones. I hope to see them all, yes even the party variants, make it to GW3 and to see some new ones too of course! I don’t lament the promo characters from GW1 but I’d hate to lose any more.

 

If new classes are added care must be taken to avoid any more cluttering of roles than we already have. I won’t say no to new classes but I think we have enough base classes and should focus on new variants and balance instead.

 

New (& old) abilities: The new trend to provide more abilities for our characters is a great addition but we need even more, especially for those that lack any variations for their abilities (and not just bling versions). Also the return of the engineer drones is something I want to see. I know the pirate parrot has taken that slot and the big bolt blaster is quite cool, but I miss those drones and we already have the models, sounds, and animations!

 

DLC, Community Challenges, &Trials: DLC is how games keep people interested and playing, especially free DLC like GW2 has mostly had. If you have paid DLC provide maps you will divide the community into haves and have nots and this will reduce the pool of available players when some people lack maps that others have so not a good idea at all. I admit to buying a few coin packs when new DLC comes out even with saving coins to get the new packs en masse but the choice to buy or not buy coins doesn’t keep players from being able to play with each other but paid map packs do.

 

Overall I think you guys did a good job with the DLC and I like all of it. The trials of Gnomus was an odd idea that I do like as well but once I finished the trials I have no reason to return to the trial dimension and this makes the area underutilized. Some kind of incentive to keep using this area would make it more worth your effort as the creators and make the player base appreciate it more too.

 

The community portal and rainbow stars are mostly good and some of the mixed modes have been great fun although some not so much (my least favorite was corn vs. imps), I actually like boss hunts but they could be explained better, and the cats and dinos while ok needs something to make it more interesting for people.

 

The cap on the rainbow stars doesn’t bother me but it does seem to bother others. Not sure if you plan to keep this system in GW3 or not. If so a little more freedom in the system may mitigate some of the complaints about i.

 

Communication & Explanation: I would like to see better communication here between the developers and the players/fans. That still AWOL PC balance patch where my poor epic dillo derby hat has gone has had little fanfare. Please keep us apace with such important news!

 

Also I would like some things explained better to new players. I mean mainly boss hunt mechanics here but also the leveling system. The frustration that those that don’t know the boss hunt mechanics for those of us that do can lead to some nastiness we don’t want to see. My mic is only on in our private discord chat but learning these on the fly can cause a lot of friction in the community that we don’t want and if the frustration is too great they may just stop playing altogether.

 

Final Thoughts: Yes finally after the wall of text! I love both GW games and am glad GW2 came out for PC and both the Xbox and PS4 at roughly the same time unlike the original one. Cross-platform play may not work well but if it could it would give us such a large pool of players instead of dividing us up. I plan to get GW3 on PC as I don’t have any modern consoles and my friend and I play online via PC and communicate via Discord instead of ingame chat and I we both plan to get GW3 if it lives up to the first 2 games, so give us a winner for GW3!

 

Thanks for reading if you got through all that!

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Re: Thoughts for GW3

[ Edited ]
Hero (Retired)

I agree with pretty much all that you had to say here.

 

I remember PvZ, and PvZ2 evolved and expanded that goofy little Tower Defense game and GW1 evolved and expanded it even further. GW2 did the same for GW1, opening it up into a larger world set and bringing with it more details and things to discover.

 

If there is to be a GW3 it needs to keep the expansion and evolution ongoing, and by that I don't mean a never ending parade of new characters and customization items but rather a larger Background Battleground with secrets and mysteries to explore and additional maps or possible modes of play, both Solo, Co-Op and Multiplayer.

 

One thing which I believe is absolutely required is to keep the goofy sort of "WTF" nature of the game intact. I enjoyed the maps from GW1 because they were quirky and you got the real sense of the Zombies invading from the desolate outskirts of civilization and marauding through the neighborhoods and outlying towns.

 

GW2 clearly drew more inspiration from the time traveling aspect of PvZ2 for many of it's maps as well as advancing it's world to the point where the Zombies aren't just invading  but have conquered and have settled in to stay.

 

I, like many other GW1 players, miss that feeling of a gang of Zombies gathering in some backwoods under order from Zomboss to go trash some outlying neighborhood or important landmark to stake out a claim for Brainz and I'd love to see some maps or scenarios which offer this sort of overall feeling to them.

 

We got something to close to that, only from the other side, with the Zombopolis map,where the Plants obviously have made their way through the sewers to invade Zombie territory to destroy their new Zombot, Moon Base Z where the Plants are out to destroy Zomboss' Super Magnet, and the Zomburbia map where the Plants are out to crash the Zombie graduation party and I really enjoy the implied narrative behind those maps.

 

Even Frontline Flats has a small story behind it with the mechanized Zomburbia Wall on it's treads clearly intended to simply bulldoze over the neighborhood while Crazy Dave fights back by throwing big bundles of laundry at it. 

 

Aqua Center carries less of a story, but it's only even there for those Players who recognize it as a Zombie controlled Garden Center from GW1; for new Players it's just a place.

 

Time Park is very much divorced from all of the other narratives with the exception of it evidently leading back to Rose's castle, which the Zombies have a desire to kick their way into and take over for Zomboss.

 

On the other hand Zen Peak, and Boney Island lack any discernible story- they just exist as places loosely tied to Time Park, which as I mentioned is just sort of there.

 

I would hope that future maps maybe take a lesson from Battlefield; design the maps big with the intention of any one of them being a potential Turf Takeover battlefield and have them tell a story about what's gong on and fill them with all those little details which are abundant in the maps we have now. Then carve sections out of those larger battlefields for games of Vanquish, Gnome Bomb, and anything else which doesn't need the rambling space to be played and add in your boundaries and devices and whatever else.

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Re: Thoughts for GW3

Champion (Retired)
I can't elaborate like you guys but I'm glad you did. As well, I certainly thought the backyard was setup for additions and growth. I still think that was the initial intention from the way it's setup. Or it's just part of the zombies growing and rebuilding earth. I love the GW series, however I do miss the simplicity from GW1. Between the two there's a home run potential for a third.
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Re: Thoughts for GW3

★★★★★ Expert

Thanks for the comments you guys and as always I value your input @realitysquared and concur with your views here, especially the maps.

 

With the time travel aspect open to us based on the ever expanding role of the gnomes and as you point out, from PvZ2 (which I play often on my phone), we can use the aspects of the original GW1-the zombies attacking the plants trying to protect Suburbia, the aspects of GW2’s implications of the zombies taking over and the plants fighting a guerrilla war against them, with any other aspect Popcap wishes to add! The crashed zomboss blimp at the beginning of Cactus Canyon, the giant sunflower lighthouse at the end of Driftwood Shore (which is the epic decoration I use in my backyard), attacking or defending Dave’s house at the end of Wall-Nut Hills were some of my favorite moments in the first game.

 

In GW2 I feel that the overall game is better but as you say realitysquared, some of the feeling we loved in GW1 isn’t there. I think part of the reason that frontline flats is such a well-loved map is that it brings the story as you say and the feel of that map as well as its setup is so good. As far as other excellent new maps go; Zombopolis, Zomburbia, and Moonbase Z are just amazing for TT games and while I like Seeds of Time and Great White North they just don’t have the same oomph as the original G&G maps. The end game for Moonbase Z is still my favorite-essentially playing bumper pool while being smaller than the balls and standing on the table is great fun.

 

For the other, smaller maps many do feel themed off the TT maps as you point out and barring Frontline Flats lack some of the background we enjoyed in GW1 although I still like them all, especially frontline flats, lunar landing, and z-tech factory. Time Park is my least favorite map in GW2 due to how it works in MP games. It’s perfectly fine in ops and the concept is cool but it suffers in MP matches due to the nature of the portals.

 

In GW3 having a wide swathe of maps, especially with old and new together, would make the options and variety for games so much better. And yes I would even like to see both Aqua and Garden Center as options, even if the only difference is in the colors (I presume they would tweak Garden Center to be more like Aqua Center in layout but retain the old theme).

 

In the end I feel the best they can do for GW3 is to combine the best aspects of the first two games and expand upon them as you say. Certain aspects of GW1 I miss in GW2 but I have more hours clocked in GW2 due to other parts I enjoy more in GW2. Having a game that is both of these gems and more would be perfect and fully justify the ‘AAA’ moniker that has been mentioned in regards to the new game.

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Re: Thoughts for GW3

★★★★★ Expert

I jumped on GW1 over the long weekend and have a few more observations from my time back in that game, things I missed or forgot about in my large post here. I also found it interesting that I jumped into a G&G queue and it popped into a full match virtually instantly!

 

Nothing huge or game-breaking but a few things I noticed I'd like to see in GW3 and I'm sure some of this has been mentioned by other players here as well:

 

I played my Sky Trooper for one match and I forgot that the rocket backpack reflected the status of my rocket ability. The nose cone in the backpack disappears when it fires and returns once the ability is recharged. Hardly a major issue but a nice touch that I don't see in my GW2 Sky Trooper. This kind of visual representation gives us an immediate visual feedback and adds that little extra touch to your character as well.

 

The gardens and graveyards are more elaborate and the scarecrows on the gardens animate while the plants hold it. The new gardens and graveyards are certainly not bad but they lack this more detailed appearance and character. This has been mentioned before as well. It's a really nice touch that has no game play effect but is still appreciated as it shows more attention to detail.

 

At the end of the match in GW1 it generates that custom map with all the points listed for the trophies at the end. In GW2 it's a simple linear display that doesn't list the points. Again this is a minor thing but it also adds to the ambience. A return to this level of detail in GW3 would be most welcome.

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Re: Thoughts for GW3

I posted this in a different thread:

 

Among my wish list:

 

PLEASE bring back the video tutorials for characters' special abilities.  You shouldn't have to go searching all over the internet to figure out what the heck a particular mech's special abilities are, for example.  I only just finally figured out today that Drake Mech's right bumper ability is a shield.  This sort of information should be available in-game, not up to the community to provide on its own.

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Re: Thoughts for GW3

★★★★★ Expert

Another thing that I'm so used to but has been brought up again here recently is the issue with shooting and terrain; both shooting through objects that should be solid and more often hitting things you are near but can't even see when you are sniping. So many times as a cactus for example that I shot my own tall nut wall, even though I can't see it or barely see it in my reticle and am aiming above it, that it hurts the main purpose we have the nuts in the first place. Having a small branch block a shot but then a rocket goes through a column is something that needs to be fixed for certain.

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Re: Thoughts for GW3

[ Edited ]
★ Apprentice

I am a great player in GW1 and GW2, I would suggest one thing in next GW3:

 

- please you will not use never Hunt Boss... only 4 days each month is very stressful... it forces players to resign or postpone their business and their private life (someone can divorce! Wink ) if they have to do it as achievement hunter. I am one of those.

 

- instead other events are easy and fun, they are ok and doesn't need to search a good fireteam, strategies, etc.

 

I experienced it, beat and won the cheevo.... it was the worst experience for me than other games.
I couldn't imagine and if I knew how was this strict event... surely I wouldn't bought it but DLC is arrived after.

 

I hope PoPCap will not make same error in next GW3. I am only sure of one thing, I will not buy it at day one.
Sorry to be rude but I am confident that a lot of people think same thing.

PoPCap you can do better it than you can imagine.

 

PS: If you will do that in GW3 Boss Hunt then please put in everyday! Wink 

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Re: Thoughts for GW3

[ Edited ]
★★★★★ Newbie

I think you guys should add in a bonk choy class and a mushroom class for plants and add in grave digger like you were originally going to do in GW1 ,also I want you guys to buff the rose class and thank you for reading.

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