I know some are concerned about whether ArenaNet is communicating with you and listening and responding to your feedback. As you saw with yesterdays announcement, we do. All of us at ArenaNet play the game with you, chat with you and read your forum posts, and work on the things that we think will most delight and entertain you.
Weve set a clear policy in the past year: we dont talk speculatively about future development. We dont want to string you along. Creating fun is an uncertain business: sometimes things work out and sometimes they dont; sometimes we go back to the drawing board over and over before we get something right. If we make optimistic promises and then cant deliver on them, everyone suffers. So when we attend a trade show or give an interview, were there to talk about what were getting ready to ship, not to speculate on what we might ship someday.
Dont read that as meaning that we dont want to talk with you about the longer-term roadmap. The intention of the CDI threads is to talk with you about the roadmap. We want to talk design philosophy with you and hear how you want to see the game evolve. When those discussions trigger development, well work internally until we have something were proud of before well announce it.
A lot of the questions Ive seen posted this week are as simple as this: does ArenaNet have an agenda to never do something? Thats almost never the case, and if it is the case you deserve to know and well make sure we get more clear. In general the simple truth is this: when were not currently working on something, its because were working on something else instead that we think is more important for the game and community.
Our developers post on these forums on a voluntary basis, and in addition to developers, we have a community team who can clarify and be the bridge between players and developers. Theyre ready to engage you on these topics. And I know its hard for the community team to engage players across all the forums and sites where these questions are being discussed, so Im going to support the team in consolidating and focusing as necessary, so that we can be clear to the community where you can go to get a response.
See you in-game, Mike OBrien