I'm not a big fan of ranked/competitive modes in the first place. I played some clan wars in WoT (World of Tanks) and it had serious issues, especially for a smaller clan like mine. Certain vehicles were must haves, like the infamous 'Waffle Tractor' which was so OP that it got removed and replaced, but even then, certain vehicles are desired while others are not. Nothing annoys me more than feeling required to play certain characters/vehicles when I want to play the ones I enjoy more, and these often don't synch up well, part of why I stopped playing OW and play the PvZ shooters and TF2 instead; OW is too rock/paper/scissors for my taste and while all these games have that to a degree, it's so blatant and forced in OW that it sucks all the fun out of that game, even before the ridiculous shield meta became a thing.
TF2 does have the issues you listed, @stukapooka but PvZ goes even further as you also point out, in that the teams are different; you don't have TF2's symmetric choices, although I actually prefer how the PvZ shooters have the 2 different, asymmetric sides, it does make competitive/ranked modes more difficult to balance.
I'd also point that the E-sports scene for shooters isn't exactly doing all that well with canceled leagues and teams going broke and so on. I'd rather stick to what we have in the GW games; a fun, silly, and beautiful game where people can largely play what they like and still succeed. I can't speak for anyone else, and BfN has its fans, but part of why it seems so many of our long term GW friends were frustrated with the game and left is it trying to be a more competitive style game and it apparently backfired.
Battle Arena can be fun, and I do like that you can't just play one character, which is great for folks like me that don't have a main in the first place. But people quitting and new people can't join, bots not being all that hot as replacements, and lack of interest with the game's myriad issues (especially hit registration), really hurt this mode. The teams being uneven with an extra zombie to pick from only made the mode's problems more blatant.
I also think that since a lot of the more 'serious' gamers don't take these more light-hearted games seriously means the competitive scene was always going to take a backseat to families playing together, and folks like me that prefer a sillier game in the first place, or at least play it more casually. I've played a lot of online shooters over the years while we certainly have our share of toxic players in the PvZ shooters, it's nowhere near as bad as some of the stuff I've seen elsewhere, and I'd like it to stay that way, but added the more competitive play modes only makes the situation worse. I've seen some behavior in OW and WoT that would make even the hackers on PC pause.
So, I'd say to avoid these modes that bring out the worst in players, don't reflect the more family focused and cartoony style of PvZ well, and aren't what many of us came here for in the first place, and instead add more maps, variants, characters, and play modes that we can have fun with without having players on our team send us hate mail for picking the 'wrong' character.
I loathe e-sports so we're on the same page there. I love video games and have since the Atari 2600 was the console, so that's pretty much since they came into our lives, but making them so competitive and trying to make a spectator sport out of isn't the best idea. I know a lot of YouTubers ans streamers make a living off of it, but it's more for people liking watching the folks that they like play the game rather than the game itself most of the time.
I actually uninstalled actiblizz's stuff over the Blitzchung situation in 2019, but I hadn't played OW for at least a year prior to that, and WoW had become even worse than normal so was an easy choice, but after hearing about their serious internal issues I will likely never return without massive changes on their part. OW2 is a half-baked attempt to deflect from those issues and even if it's halfway decent, which is in doubt, there are better options out there, GW2 foremost among them!
I still play GW2 everyday, even if only briefly on some days. I'm still getting quests done, and enjoying the scenery and world that make up a game that I truly love. I haven't quit GW or BfN, but I have other stuff going on like work and other RL stuff and other games, so can't play them as much and GW2 is my personal favorite of all 3 games as well.
I was more open to BfN's changes than a lot of those that left over time, but I also find it less fun than its predecessors in general. I hate to be a curmudgeon about things ('don't change anything!'), but I also feel that many of the BfN changes were a step in the wrong direction. I do want a GW3, but I also don't want them to feel they can't make some innovations either. GW2 is great but I'd not say it's perfect, and some fine tuning of what we loved, while keeping some of BfN's better ideas, could make a fantastic game.
@Iron_Guard8Yeah I feel like a lot of people watch esports more for the players than the game itself and some are just meh games to watch like compare a competitve rts where they'll spend half the match setting up compared to competitve counter strike where half of both teams can be dead within a minute of the round but then the survivors just camp corners.
I haven't played overwatch in years. Even before the political controversies I couldn't really see what everyone else loved about it so much as other shooters offered way more freedom and depth to gameplay and maps (this was even before I started playing tf2), I also never really cared about the lore or characters, which is funny since i got super invested in the lore and characters of tf2 and gw.
I still go back to gw1 and 2 everyonce in a while but I really haven't touched bfn in a year and I don't see that changing.
I think the problem is that while there can be change as neither gw game is perfect for a variety of reasons things like rework back chomps and make walnut hills finale objective not be a butt became reworking the entire series from the ground up to where things that were already fine like aiming became a mess and butchering the aesthetic.
They can definetly keep some things from bfn like the spotting system and hud changes but overall i think fans would definetly appreciate a more gw centered sequel.
