Point, meet Counter-Point.

Heya, ANet. I've never done this before, so here goes.

I've been playing Factions since thursday, and despite a few issues, such as Togo and Mhenlo not moving in Vizunah Square, I've been loving every second of it. Why? Well, maybe it's because I find it has many new improvements over the first game.

First of all, it's definately more skill over time played. The first mission wants you to be at least level 15, level 20, if at all possible. The quests generally give 1k or more XP each. Hell, several have given me 4k XP. This gives a much faster route to level 20 than anything I've seen on Tyria. And what does that mean now? More high-level content, and more skill required because of it. But did they leave those without skill without hope of learning that skill? No! In the Monestary, there's missions to cover things such as basic healing, and combining attacks. I've only played it through with an Assassin and a Monk, so I can't speak for the other classes, but I can make baseless assumptions.

The PvE. The new environments are amazing. The first time I went past the Estate on the training island, I was awed by how beautiful the trees there were. The Marketplace, although not quite as beautiful, is a much more detailed and urban environment than anywhere in Tyria. Just how tall the buildings go was something I wasn't expecting to see. The textures make them look rather flat, but I can't expect everything to be perfect. The Jade Sea and Petrified Forest are wonderful. The Forest reminds me of what I thought Maguuma Jungle should have been. Less open areas, and more vegetation everywhere. It's wonderful, and I enjoy running around in it.

The PvP. So, there really wasn't much new here. Two classes, and 300 skills. I can't say I'm much of a PvP-er, but I have been enjoying playing the 12v12.

My complaints? Well, I say Factions could have - should have waited a month before they released it. The Alliance system is down, the Faction Redeemers don't work (unless they've fixed it since yesterday), and Vizunah Square keeps bugging Mhenlo and Togo into standing still. Those three things are major enough that release should have been set a month back. Yes, I would have been complaining about it. But only if they actually pushed back the release, as opposed to just announcing it for late May. Three bugs that I find are major enough that a release delay should have been enacted.

Also, what's up with the non-officers being banned from the Alliance chat? From what I read, Alliances were sold as a way to get players organized into larger groups, so they'd have a larger supply of people to form groups with. Now, I guess you were only thinking of GvG when you thought up the ban of the normal folks, but what about PvE players? I am not an officer in my Guild, but I find it frustraiting that if I wanted to ask the other Guilds in my alliance if anyone wanted to do a mission or a quest, that I'd have to go through an officer. Now, say like I'm in a Guild which has 30 or more officers (if that's even possible). An officer will most likely be on at all times. So while it's annoying, it would be doable. But I'm in a guild that has about ten officers, and there's no gurantee that one of them will be on at the time that I want to ask the other Alliance members about doing missions and quests. Oh, sure, I can see the reasoning as to why - cut down on pointless chatter and talk that should be kept in the Guild channel - but if it really got to bothering people, they could mute them, or remove the channel all together.

So thank you, ArenaNet, for making Guild Wars: Factions. I wasn't expecting the One Game To Rule Them All, and I didn't get the One Game To Rule Them All. I got what I consider to be a fun game. Yes, it's flawed, and yes it has bugs. But doesn't every game? Remember when HL2 came out, and people started whining about the bugs? Play it now, and it's fun. There's much fewer bugs than they had before. I guess that's what I have to do with Factions. Wait a couple of weeks for patches to roll out, fix the bugs, and it'll be good. I, for one, am sated by this new release, and I'm starting to look forward to more info on Chapter 3.