I agree 100% with you and so many people in the community agree with your point that they needed to fixed the living world issue. I think they should have put them in as a purchase just like the expansions and then had them bundled for a discount. Would have made it nice and easy to explain to friends.

Season 2 and 3 went on sale for 40% off and I had to get it. I felt so lost when playing the expansions because I completely missed the living world seasons. Thank you for assuring me that it was a good purchase.

One thing you didn't mention (unless I missed it) is the Skyscale mount. You need to have all episodes of Living World Season 4 to access the possibility of getting this mount. There's also a legendary amulet which you can get which requires playing through the seasons and completing tasks on the various maps. Look up the achievement Seasons of the Dragon if you have it available.

as a new player to new players,im pretty sure its mentioned in vid but you actually grind your way to living world seasons,im 400 hrs in and already got the lw4 and icebrood saga

I think the way the LW is monetized is closely related to the release model. Each episode was added as a separete release and if you happened to be actively playing during the weeks when an episode was the current release, you got it for free. And by actively playing I mean you just had to log in at least once during the period. That was true for every single episode in all, but Season 1, which was temporary content at the time of release and it is being re-released in permanent form for free to everyone right now. LW episodes were made free in a similar fashion to when they were originally released a couple of times, although I wouldn't expect ANet to do that again any time soon. But, after they are done with Season 1, they are going to move on to the next LW content, which will be released for free to all active players, just like past LW content was.

The subscription, or lack thereof, makes a huge difference. Seemingly high upfront cost aside, this game is by far the best value per potential hours played on the market right now, at least among MMOs. Has been for ten years.

LW is free if you are playing during their release. They have rereleased LW season occasionally. I always tell my friends that dont yet have them to just get them through gold-->gem conversion.

I saw that you still have the lvl 80 boosters. If you don't want to use it on a character because you enjoy the leveling or maybe you just want access to the shared inventory slot, you can use them on a already lvl 80 character to get the stuff it gives you like dye and some other unlocks.

Thinking about it, in the end, each season is an expansions without subclasses. Maps? check Story? check (you even kill a dragon here) Horizontal progression (masteries - mounts etc)? check achievements? check new gear? check endgame content? check (strike missions IBS) obviously expansions throw in a little more design-wise, but you get the gist...and at release it is free for who logs in, but, well, too late now 😅

I'm torn.. it's great to see all the progress you've made in the game over the last month but I'm bummed that we couldn't be along for the ride for any of it :P

Aren't you locked out of the season zones if you don't own the seasons? Most "easy" ascended gear is in those zones from what I've seen.

Living World seasons are definitely worthwhile, and are *fantastic* cost per value (well, maybe not season2 . . . depends on how much you care about story compared to other content). The problem is optics and accessibility. Like you said, it feels bad to buy the expansion bundle (or even the "complete" bundle), and then realize that you're still lacking so much content. The new mega bundle on steam is a good start, but they need to do more to let people know what exactly they're buying, and why it's worthwhile. The first solution imo is to retroactively remove the "season" nomenclature . . . Icebrood Saga sounds far more interesting to buy than Season 5, but that's exactly what it is. They should change old seasons in similar ways.

Okay, one thing that's a bit wrong here -- the Living World episodes ARE free if you log in while that episode is active, or while you're in that episodes release window. If you miss the release window then you need to purchase it. I've been playing since Launch and never bought an episode.

Just to mention for anyone who might not know, if you are actively playing when a living world season is released, you don’t have to pay for it. You only have to pay to unlock episodes you weren’t playing during.

I pretty much played the game in reverse order just to unlock mounts before doing HoT and then the living worlds, surprisingly enough it didn't detract all that much from the experience, since the stories are somewhat self contained prior to the end of PoF and what comes after. I'm just a lil bit surprised they stopped giving away LWS for free though, they did that a while ago, and I assumed they would keep giving them away on a rotation like they were doing before to mantain the playerbase active and engaged, but I guess that would've been too good to stay any longer. At least you can get the LWs with gold, but ironically enough, some of the best gold-making farms are locked behind specific LWs, so there's that.

Yes for the story alone but some also have great rewards atleast get icebrood saga and living world season 4 for the by far best alt parking gold farm that being eternal ice shards

That is awesome review, thanks man! We in Mortalisgame always wonder how game developers just don't see what their community really would like. That is good that content creators like you will do such good videos for new players to understand game more easily.

I bought the POF and HoT expansion previously but now when I am trying to figure out how to buy Living world season? I see No option on steam other than to buy the complete bundle? which disregards my purchase of previous expansions?

Hey, just started playing the game 2 days ago and I want to buy HoT+PoF and was wondering if LW4 is included in PoF. I habe read on some pages, that it comes with that expansion for free, but Im not sure if its true or just been written misleadingly. I also read I need PoF to play season 4.

People who were playing at the time of release of the LS seasons received the content for free, I'm very sure that is the model that will be adopted moving forwards also; in other words the LS content is both a reward and an incentive to play the game during release. Paying for the episodes after the fact, doesn't seem too unfair to me for 2 reasons. First, being a game that is a non-subscription model, Arenanet have to keep the game funded through ancillary means, and secondly why should all the new players who havn't supported the game for many years, through the gemstore, receive everything for free, simply because they've arrived and are here now. As you said yourself, the Living Seasons aren't mandatory, you can get by without them, but if you're late to the party *and* you really really want that extra content, what's so bad about having to buy it ? I will concede that perhaps they could drop the price a little, to make it more accessible whilst still accruing funding.

Living world are free if you log in the 3 months aster they come out out tho! If youve log during this 3 month you can keep the lviing world for free for ever. Season are kind of end game tho, they are all level 80 map, that give quit good gear quality for hardcore end game content.

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but if you are playing the game when a new Living World launches, you can play it and even if you don't complete it, it is considered yours free and clear. It's the catch up on any Living Worlds you've missed that's the pay wall. I don't know how steep it is either or what bundle offers they have so I can't say on that account. So, that may make some people more amiable toward it.

The most effed up thing about it is that you get no easy option to buy them separately or as a bundle outside the full expansion plus LW offer.

The fact that you can only buy them individually with gems instead of buying them in a pack on steam

This was a good insight into how people view Living World episodes and seasons. I also noticed a number of people in the comments don't like how it is currently set up, so allow me to play devil's advocate for a second. Out of all of the MMORPGS that I have personally played, there isn't a single one that gives players access to content patches for free, which is essentially what each Living World episode is...a content patch. For games like FFXIV and WoW, you pay to rent access to content patches via your subscription price. For new players, it may not feel like that, but for players at end-game...that is essentially what you are paying for. Once the new content patch drops, old content becomes obsolete, so people only play "current patch". Your sub fee is paying to access that content. Cancel your sub, cancel your access. For ESO, they flat out sell content patches as DLC, and therefore you need to purchase them either utilizing in-game crowns, or money. If you have the ESO+ subscription, you are given "rented" access to every DLC (other than most recent chapter/expansion). If you end your subscription, you no longer have access to that content, unless you bought it off their crown store which gives you permanent access. Each DLC costs roughly 15$-30$ (CHAPTERS), so they aren't cheap, but provide permanent access. For games like LOTRO, you either subscribe to gain rented access, or purchase the "quest pack" off of the premium store for permanent access. Anyway you look at it, you will pay to get the new content patch in an MMORPG, it's just HOW that money is acquired is different from game to game. Not a single content patch is really included in the base cost of an expansion for an MMO. They are tacked on, extra content that usually requires the most recent expansion to play, but is not part of that initial release expansion. So, in the case of GW2, Anet is actually very generous with how they monetize content patches. First, anybody who logs into the game when a LW episode is active get's that episode unlocked on their account permanently, for free. Doesn't matter if you are brand new with no expansions or a vet with all of them, the episode get's unlocked on your account. If you miss this window (which, tbh is actually rather generous...we are talking like 2 months), you have 2 options of getting the episode. First, buy it from the gem store stand-alone, which costs 200 gems. Translated to dollars (hint, you can convert in-game gold to gems and buy without spending money), this is about 2.50$. For less than a cup of coffee, you unlock the episode permanently on your account. The second method is to buy the season as a bundle from the gem store. This can still be done by converting gold to gems, but is more pricey. The typical cost of a season bundle is around 1000 gems (S2 is a bit more currently at like 1300 gems). Translated to dollars, this is about 12-13$ per season. So, for less than the price of 1 ESO DLC or a month's subscription to FFXIV/WOW, you get permanent access to an entire season of LW content on your account. Honestly, it's not bad, and Anet needs to get paid for the time it took to create and make that new content, so it's a fair system. That being said, I think it would be smart to include the subsequent seasons in the purchase of an expansion for a higher price to make the entire thing more stream-lined.

Hell you don't even need to get to "endgame" to start grinding gold to buy the LW seasons, start in silverwastes RIBA farm or strikes or fractals then buy some of the more profitable LW maps like drizzlewood cost or something, hell I make 30-50 gold an hour just fishing so it really isn't hard to get the gold for living world episodes just a bit grindy.

I just started playing f2p, save there is a big sale on GW2 on steam currently. just have a question, do I have to do the Living World seasons before i do the expansions or can i go back and do them later?

Hi, great video. Very helpfull as well. Can anyone help me, there 2 expansion and 1 bundle consist of ( path of thorn, path of fire, end of dragon and living world) so this living world as what he mentions in the video is this bundle? Thank you

You can access the 2 season 2 maps without owning season 2, I still don't own season 2. Yet I have done those 2 zones.

They are free if you are online with a paid account when they release!

I think the word season at some point just became a buzz word. Everyone tries to reinvent the wheel when it comes to shows movies video games. I think if it isn’t broken then you don’t need to fix it. They should have just called it story patch 1,2,3,etc

01:00 they ARE in fact free as long as you log into the game when the season is currently running (you will then keep it forever). So I never had to buy any seasons for that reason cuz I always log in

The purchasing options are super confusing. In-game you get Season 2, 3, 4. I assume 1 is free, and 5 is also free because its the current one? On the website shop you get expansions, all expansions, all expansions+gems+character slot, all expansions+all seasons. You cannot get all seasons or any seasons, if you have the expansions already?

This yearif you logged in like every day or week. You got liveing worlds for free I have all of them apart from on episode in like liveing world season 2 or some thing. I haven't done them but I have them

I was pretty dissapointed with the Steam sale they hyped. The sale is really just to get you in so you buy the seasons as the full purchase (DLC and seasons) is only 21% off. I purchased it but I could see this price being prohibitive for many people given the structure of today's gaming industry. Don't get me wrong, for $80 you're getting a massive amount of content that you can play forever (however long that is), but you are being penalized for not playing during a specific expansion. Like you said in your video, trying to get friends to play the game once they see the pricing structure for the Living Worlds seasons is near impossible. I'd rather have the expansions cost more and include the Living World than a separate purchase.

Just a statement about living world, the seasons are free, under the condition that you were logged in during the time of its release.

Living Story Content is super cheap for what you get. And you can get them through in game currency (converting gold to gems) rather than paying a measly ~$2.50 per episode. Sometimes gw2 offers limited time discounts and/or even free and you can earn a gems through achievements every 5k or 10k of achieve pts. GW2 gamers are paying way way more for just one skin, inventory space, keys to chests, etc, so this price you pay for DLC content, ie massive map, story (lore), and associated content is rather trivial in comparison for what you get. if people like the game, playstyle, community of GuildWars 2 then "buying" these locked content should be a non-issue and think of it as either tipping the developers and an investment for hundreds of hours of additional gameplay that your will always have. Not to mention If you go to a restaurant and like the food you can easily tip $5 to $20 or more for a meal, so relatively speaking "paying" for gw2 content is trivial.

What is this class in video

They are free if you are playing when an episode launches. If you don't then you pay for it after. Which seems pretty fair considering it is a buy to play game anyways. It's not even that much money

hmm you forgot that new living season episodes are free till the next episode or expansion if that is the last episode before said expansion and re released season one is free for all forever

Its really annoying because unless you get the complete collection, you can’t just buy the big Living World steam dlc, if you buy the 3 expacs separate because $100 on a new game, you now have to buy the living world seasons separate as well which is really annoying

20 € for season 2 and 30€ for heart of thorns and path of fure bundle😂😂

I consider the fact that there's no subscription as reasoning for the living world season pricing. given that they're free if you're on at the time they're released, the fact you don't have any fee every month for the game, and the fact that they work like entirely new expansions given how many maps they give, the price makes some sense. also, it's really weird to say it's gonna 'slow you down' because "endgame" in this game doesn't really work the same as other games. There's no vertical progression, so you can do all that endgame stuff while doing the seasons, there's almost nothing stopping you. The only things that would slow you down is if you're doing raids and need the specific masteries (like gliding), but i just don't think that's really a good complaint. Fractals are completely available during the seasons, open world pve you experience during the seasons (as you mentioned, each map has a meta!), wvw and pvp are completely available no matter what masteries you have, etc.

to me they are way ahead of their time , living words is seaons in games done right.. most games u just paying for nothing just cosmetics or p2w crap

"You pay for the patches" doesn't feel completely right to say. Sure you buy these living world episodes which is mainly story content, but it's not like you have to pay to be able to play the latest build of the game. I just felt that needed clarification.

Here's my take, if you play GW2 as your main game then why not buy them? It helps the dev to stay in business to make more content, so why not?

back, only to quit because all of the new stuff is locked behind a paywall

I just got back to GW2 after 9 years of absent and I just realized that if you play FFXIV at the end of 5.5/6.5 you only need to pay $20 for the whole 2 years of content and MSQ free for you and that's subscription based! I don't know why GW2 fans/players are not up in arms regarding this but holy shit is the monetization for this game bad considering it's B2P. FFXIV is soo much better in terms of saving your money even if it's a subscription model. You don't have to buy bag space, bank space, transmutation charges and etc. It's all for there for you in FFXIV for $20 a month.

Living world episodes are in fact Free if you log in some time after release, you need to clarify that.

A whole video talking about Living Word without mention Aurora, Vision, Skyscale or the only FREE Legendary Amulet... What a waste.

dont buy story ....they are not fun just more grind

Literally fallin asleep trying to get through the 4th probably long ass boring episode of the 1st season watching this video distracted thats how good it is