PC Gamer May 2007 Information - "Guild Wars Reborn"

Wow. I'd say half the people in this thread need a timeout for how they're acting. Not surprisingly it's the usual suspects I see...

Anyway, I'd like to know more about the combat system, skill build system and if they're planning to bring in completely new skills. Seems like it would be a shame to completely trash this old system.

Nope I loved the original and I plan on getting GW 2 and having fun with it. I'm sure there are quite a few others out there, maybe the majority, but I doubt it..that know Guild Wars 2 isn't Guild Wars 1.2, but something totally different and unique in it's own way.

But all in all, it's a game and yes I've wasted a lot of my life playing, probably lot more than most of you guys and I still say this. Oh well that's life things change and basically you grow with them or just pass them by. No sweat of their/our shoulders. If you're dead set on getting revenge by ruining Anet cause they ruined you're oh so favorite GAME, then you have issues.

Game bolded there to tell you that you don't have to take it so seriously as you all seem to be doing. Just chill. Also a lot can happen in 1 year and some odd months.

Way to far from GW2 to start complaing. I'm looking forward to the last expansion for GW1 and the 1.5-2 years we have left to play GW1. I have logged ungodly hours in GW1 and will play tons more b4 GW2. I hope GW2 is something totally new and has major changes. I know some will be turned off by the changes but others will join the game for the changes, but by 2008/9 I will be ready for something new and different.

I think that the best thing for ANet to do with "Guild Wars 2" is to turn it into a spinoff game instead of a sequel. ANet releases a stand alone spinoff game while ocassionaly releasing new campaigns for the current game. This would mean that ANet can give current Guild Wars fan a completely new game to try out without forcing them to leave their current Guild Wars characters behind. However, the developers already said that they're tired of making new campaigns, so this is all just wishful thinking..

This is a lot for me to take in all at once. I want to be able to say right now that I hate almost everything I read, but I believe in A-Net and feel that I just can't pass judgment yet. The only thing that I really fear right now is that everyone will be stretched even more thin amongst GW 1 and GW 2. I know we always flame PuGs in here, but I honestly have had some great times with them and to see them dwindle further makes me a bit sad.

Hard Mode's coming out in the next month. They say in the article they're going to continue to dedicate a team to giving GW new content.
As for why keep playing...
1) For fun. Playing this game is supposed to be fun, an enjoyable experience on its own. Eventually most people will be gone, yes...I'm sure people will come back occasionally for nostalgia, but it's no different from any other online game; when the sequel comes out, its playerbase mainly moves on. Not that that's a bad thing; when CS:S came out, I didn't whine that CS was getting "abandoned", I played the new game and had fun =)
2) Monuments. Apparently acheiving stuff in GW1 will have some kind of benefit/recognition in GW2. No idea how that will be implemented, but hey, sounds cool.

I will play GW2. I've played GW for 2 years now, there's no way I could pass it up. In the meantime...can't wait for GWEN.

For all those that are leaving and are now complaining of heartattacks and strokes due to the news, I will personally escort you off the servers.. of course you could leave your money with me.. :P

ANyways, griefers come and griefers go. Nobody can say much untill we've tried the WBE of Gw2.

The only sticking point I see for GW2 is the "limitless level cap". It could be done well, but I'm worried that it'll just make the game a huge grindfest like so many MMOs before it.

On the other hand, if they hold to their idea of quest oriented game play, then it'll be a lot more like WoW in that regards (which as far as I know is the only MMO on the market that has quests like Guild Wars). I also like the idea of being able to transfer achievements, even if it'd only be through a monument. The additional races are intriguing, but I'd like to see what they have in mind for them before I put my chips on the table for sure.

Mostly I'm happy about the no monthly fee. I'm positive that's the #1 draw for the game in the first place. Although I do worry that there could be some hidden fees somewhere along the lines, and since the game is so far off into the future it may not stay this way. But I will hope.

I'm also concerned about the fate of Guild Wars as we know it. Very likely there will be no further additions to the game (such as playable races, an auction house, and any number of other suggestions). It's also possible that the population will start to dwindle as anticipation for GW2 mounts. Which is understandable.

But, all things considered I remain optimistic. I see potential. A great deal of potential. This could be the MMO many of us thought Guild Wars or WoW would be. It could very well be that the limitless level cap is nothing but for show with the effective level being closer to what we know now. It could very well be that GW2 will have no monthly fee and no hidden fees. It could very well be just the game I'm looking for.

I'm going to wait. I'll wait until after the release of GW:EN to see if I'm going to put my money on that title. Then I'm going to wait and see about GW2, and I'm going to wait until I hear some clearer details on the game. I know what it is to wait, and I'm willing to do so if it will be for a game that I will come to love.

Hell, if I can roll a sword Ranger, I'm all for it.

To all QQers:

Cry more about the Exdous to GW2 if you want. It will happen regardless of what we think. You are free to stay in GW1 and its old forums as much as you want.

As always Anet already has made all the money from you once you purchase the game and possibly GW:EN later in the year. Threatening to leave or whatever wont attract sympathy to your cause. You wont be missed.

What about guildies/friends/random nice people (yes they are in the game IE me when I'm feeling nice) to help you out in those missions? IF there was something like that going on. Even so there will always be henchies, you also get to have a companion with you now that doesn't take a slot.

You all can say that people whining are just stupid, but yet, they're people, they're GW players, and they ARE unhappy. You, as a forum ass (you know who you I'm talking to), might be able to dismiss their unhappiness or even laugh at it, but Anet shouldn't if they know what's good for them.

The simple fact is that GW2 has been announced TOO EARLY.

No, nobody truly expects characters to carry over to a whole new game, but they do expect to play their existing characters until they're tired of them.

Obviously, judging by the reaction on these forums from the first day of the Inquirer article, people are NOT yet tired of playing GW1. They don't want to move on. It's not old yet. GW2 is, simply, too early.

Heck, I haven't even played through Nightfall yet. Maybe I should HURRY and do that before the servers close down and I can no longer play the game I still have fun with.

Yes, yes, I know it's a year or two away. I might very well be tired of GW altogether by then. Still, do you remember as a kid, when you were outside on a balmy summer evening, shamelessly enjoying every moment of the cooing pigeons and chirping crickets, when your mom leaned out the door and said, "Ten more minutes and you have to come in!"

Were those ten minutes as fun as the first thirty? Was the last day of summer vacation as fun as the first, glorious week? Is the last gasp of GW1 as fun, now that mom has come and told us we only have ten minutes?

In marketing, timing is everything.

They missed.

And how lame is that? A promise of new content every 6 months and then they get "tired" what does this say about Gw2? That they get "tired" and decide to sink that ship as well? Seriously, Wc3 has gotten more updates then GW has in the recent past in terms of balanced pvp. There is absolutely no reason to work on the existing engine on graphics since it doesn't even need direct 10, but is only supported.

ANet would have kept more customers if they shot their mothers and asked for forgiveness.

wtb more information on GWEN? We're all discussing something 2 years away, let's talk the game coming out THIS YEAR

Most of this actually sounds pretty cool. I'm relieved and excited, except for one thing:

"GLF MORE LEVEL 1000+ ONLY!"

I will play GW:EN but this also proves to me that maybe i should give Lord of the rings online a try. Maybe after a couple of years they won't kill off the present world for a future one.

The server structure for GW2 highly interests me. One of the main reasons i luv GW is the fact it's global - no separate servers/shards that other MMOs have, so you can meet every single person playing the game online. Having a persistent world in GW2 makes separating the world into smaller parts a must, as no server would stand dozens of thousands players in one place. The question is - will players/characters be able to move freely between those 'districts'/'instances'/however-they-will-be-called-zones or just bound to the realm they've chosen ?? ?

O.o

2008 Beta?

Guild Wars was released on April 28th, 2005 and it is getting a massive expansion before this year is out. ANet/GG has already said that GW1 isn't going away.

GW1 will still be providing ANet with income from the people that want to play a free to play quality online game. Especially, a franchise that will tie in with the new GW2.

I can see myself having both GW1 and GW2 installed on my computer.

Also, consider the fact that ANet still reserves the right to add content to any current campaign.

The franchise is alive and well.

I haven't bought the mag yet (but I will this coming weekend) and I'm speculating that reaching level +1000 as someone says maybe will not involve killing million of monsters.

I would expect such zones to be a lot like towns, but with more to do.

Seriously, it would be pretty awesome for a whole district's worth of people to be able to gang up against a behemoth.

Sad truth time...

What we all love about GW is NO MONTHLY FEES. Know what that translates to, in business-language?

"The more people that leave, the less money we have to spend keeping these old servers running."

In most MMORPGS, the old game hangs around for a long time, because diehard fans are still playing it and paying their monthly fee.

GW, on the other hand, will become a useless money sink for Anet as soon as GW2 is up and running.

No new GW expansions? No new money for Anet. The GW1 servers, however, will still cost just the same to run.

Hope you all have fun with GW:EN quickly, because mark my words, no matter what anyone says, GW1 servers won't last a year past the launch of GW2.

I'll buy EOTN and probably enjoy it, then I'll wish you all a fond farewell. This is the same thing that happened to me with Everquest, which I invested years in. Then EQ2 came along. Although Sony maintained EQ, it was obvious that it was just a red-headed step child. GW2 might be a good game, who knows at this point? But it seems to remove the things that make GW great. Skill caps at 20, for instance -- what a great idea. A game based on skill (and time taken to develop it) rather than grinding. Here's hoping I'm over-reacting with many others, but I doubt it.

Well in truth, WHO CARES? End of the day sales figures is everything, profit and margins is what draws the line. Are you saying that Anet made a wrong business choice with GW2 and its info release? lol. And yes this whinning is indeed stupid. Go ahead and QQ more since its your god given rights sadly.

A good thing for me to take away from all this is knowing that at least those who hate GW2 will either stay in GW1 or leave and spare the rest of us of their tiresome and senseless whinning when GW2 comes around.

/bow to Thallandor. He knows what he's saying.

Ya'll need to calm down. For one, it's two years from now. Two, Guild Wars will still be running when the sequal comes. Everquest, anyone?

So please, chill. Ya'll are overeactin'.

To qoute the awesome: "So in the end. There will be many people who do not wish to leave GW if there is a GW2.....but those of us who do play GW2 will be kicking ass in awesomeville! Ahhh-yeah!" -Redfeather

They said there would no new stand-alone campaigns and hinted at expansions instead.

GWEN sounds nice for the current games direction.

GW2 sounds like Guild Wars of Warcraft (GWoW). Which is fine too, just a different kind of game.

When you leave and go to WoW, can I get all your stuff? PM me.

...And so many WoW comparisons and disses, as though WoW is the only MMORPG.

/sigh.

Except that you forget that Guild Wars Server architecture is extremely scalable and relatively inexpensive in its upkeep. So, as a population shrinks, so does the infrastructure.

Additionally, the GW1 Trilogy will still be available for purchase by people for a long time to come. In some ways a smaller community could even bring about a positive change to the social aspects of GW1, but I digress. The game will be a great value for people looking for their online gaming fix.

The graphics of Guild Wars is not even close to being considered outdated. Indeed, most computer owners are not playing from brand new machines. Often the average home PC is 2-3 years old.

So, I disagree with your prophecy of impending doom. Everything dies, but I have seen other games hang on for a very long time even when they haven't had anything close to the success of the Guild Wars franchise.

I like the low lvl cap. I'm not sure but why would they increase the lvl cap if there is no inherent benefit to being a higher lvl? We'll see how it is but I def. love the low lvl cap.

I hated wow since my friends more than I and I was left in the dust. With gw's even though I'm behind in the story I'm still able to do pretty much what they do in terms of skills since we are all lvl 20's.

Also a low lvl cap allowed me to try and play so many different professions. If the lvl cap was increased I doubt I"ll have that much time to invest in as many as I do now.

well, im not liking what im reading about GW2. But I will wait and see. At this moment in time, I wont be buying it. I like my charicters, I like the cap on levels, I like that I can take my charicters to the other lands. But like I said I will wait and see. There is a lot more info about the game that must be told before I make a final decission, and plenty of time to think about it. So who knows.

I've seen a few people posting their conspiracy theories about Guild Wars: Eye of the North.

• The 'Big Bad' is known as 'The Destroyer'
• Guild Wars: Eye of the North gets abbreviated to GW:EN
• GW:EN = Gwen
• Gwen = The Destroyer

I for one hope this turns out to be true, it would be a nice way to wrap up the series and provide a fresh start for GW2.

As for all the "OH NOES GW2 R GONNA B TEH WOW CLONE!!!11!SHIFTONE", I say bring it on. GW is a great game, and adding some of the popular mechanics used in other MMOs can only make it better. I'm quite frankly bored of the cookie-cutter-build driven, basicly point-and-click path that GW has gone down. Well, that's how it feels to me, at least.

I want to play a game, not sit around and stratagise!
I want to be able to jump and swim, and dodge (real dodge, not just strafe), I want to leap off a ledge and ambush my foes or throw myself from a bridge to try and escape being slaughtered.

I'm sure someone will reply to my post by saying "Go play WoW then!", but I don't want to play WoW, I don't like WoW.
I love Guild Wars, I love the story and the graphics, I love the community (well, most of the community) and the way that the dev team listens to that community.
To sum it up, I want a more action packed GW, and GW2 sounds like it's going to deliver exactly what I'm after.

I think this is a really good point, actually. Anet, what about it? Are we really going to see any of these mentioned improvements? Personally I highly doubt it. They've been working on improved trade for about two years. I don't think that in the approximately one year of activity left in this game, that they're even going to continue. After all, why should they? They've got this shiny, spiffy new game coming out. It's the shiny thing in the left hand they're distracting you with so you don't see what's forgotten in the right hand.

I don't think Anet got "tired"; campaigns simply became unsustainable and "bloated" (the summary post says as much). I'm actually very intrigued by Anet's decision to scrap the 6-month campaign model, partly because I thought it was a good idea (in theory), and party because discussing GW2 in detail isn't feasible at the moment

As the devs said, campaigns - being stand-alone products - had to be newb-friendly.

A new campaign must:
a.)have enough new content to encourage current players to buy it
b.)transition newbs into the gameworld as a whole without overwhelming them
c.)be balanced with all the other campaigns
d.)not outright force players into buying it

The precedent of introducing two new classes was simply unsustainable and presented a game-balance nightmare.

I wonder how Anet will approach expansions with GW2. Will we get Burning Crusade-like expansions - infrequent, but sizable and virtually required? Or will Anet offer "booster packs" every few months for $10? Perhaps a combination of both?

It's funny, because I hear talk from the Industry Heads about how episodic content is "THE FUTURE," yet no studio has really pulled it off. Valve's episodes are perennially delayed and Anet has found their quasi-episodic idea unsustainable...

We play as a family (4 accounts all 3 campaigns for each account and about 12 extra slots. We will buy 4 ETON editions, and 4 copies of PC Gamer) and right now looking for the Hard Mode. We will buy 4 copies of GW2 also, but what I really want to know after reading 20 pages (11 when I started) is how to sign up for beta testing if you can.

also i love how everyone says this game is becoming like wow.

That would be true if not for the fact that there were many mmos before wow that had all those features. diffrent races and high levels arnt anything new.

And i really love how people didnt like the asurans for looking childish, but all they do is act childish.

GW2 or not, GW will end someday, and yes everything you did will be worthless, but its a game, so everthing you already do is worthless in it. its for fun, and its not real life. some mmos end without getting a sequel so be lucky for that much, and im sure that if they didnt do this, people would complain about the graphics someday.

either way GW still has at LEAST 2 years left to it

I'm going to ignore my initial feelings about the summary - reason has kicked in and I'm going to do a wait and see.

What brought me to GuildWars was three factor's"

• No Monthly Fee
• Skill vs Grind
• Anet's Creativity

• Now GW2 has fulfilled one of the original draws to GW (no online fees)
• There is not enough information on GW2 game play for me to determine skill vs grind
• If I were to "bet" I think Anet can pull off the creativity do I put a yes in here for now.

GW pulled me away from Final Fantasy XI... you want to talk about grind...

I will be watching pve play in GW2 closely and make my choice when I get a "feel" of the new game.

I just *hope* titles are not main focus going to be used to unlock stuff in GW2 via EON.

If I decide to drop out of GW, I can't bash Anet. No other game for amount of play / enjoyment vs "money" can compare to what Anet pulled off.

Unlike most people, I am very disturbed by nearly every concept in Guild Wars 2. By all looks, it's World of WarCraft without a monthly fee and better graphics. I play Guild Wars NOT because it lacks a monthly fee (good plus, for sure), but because it's so much different from every other MMORPG out there. It's different, but in all the good ways. To support this, I'm going to go through new Guild Wars 2 features, why they don't seem like they'll be good for the franchise, and how it relates to Guild Wars as it is now.

I love the low level cap, I know a ton of great players who love it too. It may seem "too easy" to get to Level 20, especially in the newer chapters, but that takes the focus off of the grind of getting to the next level, and puts it onto enjoying your character, trying new builds on him/her, advancing through the campaign, farming, etc. With a high, if even, level cap, all that ease of use is lost in favor of "oh gosh, gotta get to Level 50 before I can take this area on, ugh, time to grind." Knowing ArenaNet, I'm sure they're going to come up with some terrific fix to this problem, perhaps going so far to make Level a prestige thing with your character still maxing out hit points and attribute points at Level 20 (plus the 2 15 AP quests), with skill points thereafter.

Big plus about Guild Wars: the people new to the game HAD to get into the roleplaying game at first purely to have enough skills to be competitive in PvP. That was good, it kept the quality of play at a higher level and made everyone happy. If you let all the skills be available at the start, that invites newbs to charge into PvP and degrade all quality from the non-GvG forms. It would be the sheer unintelligent nature of Alliance Battles at points (c'mon, who hasn't laughed at the build the guy attacking them is using?) scaled up to the entire realm.

Cool feature, but how is that going to reconcile with the 8-skill idea that makes Guild Wars both easier to play and harder to master? Do you have to enter an "in-between zone" just to change your skills up? Or will it be abandoned completely?

In conclusion, I'm not that fired up about Guild Wars 2. It seems like a significant move away from what attracted me to Guild Wars in the first place. I know the same design ingenuity that made Guild Wars accessible yet complex will be present, but it adds in features that are done everywhere else. I like my different MMORPG, and I'm sure others do too.

From the point of view of a Guild Wars player, it is the only other one out there. All the other ones are even farther from all the good things of Guild Wars that they're beyond comprehension.

Compare Guild Wars to WoW to Vanguard and you'll see a nice step from one to the next to the next, but you'll see no semblances between Guild Wars and Vanguard.

Although it may be cliche to say, believe me, I sincerely hope you're right and I'm wrong.

I've been laughing my @$$ off at most of these posts for the last two hours. People flipping out about the level cap and what the implications are for GW1 and how GW2 is totally awesome or is going to totally suck. We don't know jack yet people except a short little blip in a magazine or a summarization on the web about a game that is at least a year away from beta. I'm going to make a reference to Diablo 2 like so many others have, the level cap there was 99, but you most definitely didn't have to get anywhere close to 99 to beat the game. And the skills were capped at a certain point so that you could still gain level but your skills would stay the same. Seeing how the people who made Diablo founded ANET....get my drift?

Those of you threating to leave GW forever and never look back, as has been said, ANET already has your money and the less bandwidth you use the better for them. P.S. Don't let the door hit ya where the Lord split ya on your way out. Other than that GW2 is looking like a cool game. So does Final Fantasy 13, neither of which we much about, do we?

To something we do know something about, GW:EN, I do hope that we will be able to make new characters of some kind and not just only have the option to bring old characters through. With all the posts it's hard to distinguish what is going to happen to which game but I think it would be cool to start a new character as like a settler just out side of char territory or norn(?) or something like that and have a story line go from there. Really wish I had that magazine to find out more about GW:EN but all in time I guess.