Guild Wars 2 Previews

A bunch of sites got the chance to sit down and play a demo of Guild Wars 2 at the PAX East, as well as get some questions in for the MMO’s developers. Crave Online.

Dynamic events are one more way for ArenaNet to help players build their story. Unlike other games, players’ actions in Guild Wars 2 affect the world around them. Let’s say you pass by a small town being invaded by enemy soldiers. If you attempt to save the town and do not succeed, or simply choose to ignore the soldiers, they will burn the town to the ground. This town will not simply revert to it’s original form the next day or the next time a player passes by. It will remain a smoldering pile of ashes until something is done about it.

Let’s say, for example, you are leaving a nearby city. A group of engineers have been hired to rebuild the old town but need your help. If you successfully escort the crew to the site, they will begin their work. You’ll then be asked to protect them while they work. If you succeed in fighting of returning enemy soldiers, the engineers will rebuild the town. A new chain of events will start from this point which you can chose to participate in.

Shogun Gamer.

For those who haven’t played Guild Wars 2 before, the character creator is a bit unorthodox. You get these strange personality options such as whether you are ‘aggressive’ or ‘charming’. Aside from that you also pick race specific “histories,” such as whether you once lost a family heirloom or got into a bar fight recently. Although I didn’t get to see it, all of these things tie into your personal narrative throughout the game.

Co-Optimus.

The first thing I actually noticed about Guild Wars 2 was that the combat felt much more visceral than your average MMO. Positioning and movement are important skills to learn right from the beginning, and leaping into and out of combat as a lithe Thief was great fun. While it doesn’t exactly feel like a standard action game, it comes about as close as anything I’ve played in this genre. I only wish I had experimented with the (steal) ability my character had.

The dynamic events feel very similar to the concept of Public Quests in Warhammer Online, but they fit much more naturally into the game world. Fighting an enormous ice wurm with an army of NPCs and other players as a level 1 character was definitely a great first impression.

The character creation took me back to ye olden days of CRPGs, and I liked how your character’s story tied into the game world. If ArenaNet can pull off the dynamic events and keep things as fresh as the starting area felt, Guild Wars 2 stands a very good chance at reshaping what we call an MMO.

G4TV (presentation report).

Everything I had heard up to this point sounded great, and then they talked about the sidekick system, and my jaw dropped. Sidekicking works two ways: the first allows you to kick back down to a lower level to help your friend quest in a low level zone. Your skills and gear scale back, but it wasn’t made clear how the experience scales once you’re done helping out. You can also kick your friend up to the level you’re playing at, even if they’re level one and you’re level 20. If this works, it will be incredible, because it will allow friends to play with one another all the time, and there will be no need to wait on others because they’re slower or faster at leveling.

VG Revolution.

This gave me more of a force going into clear the settlement. I was able to do a good deed and also create a small army with this new system. Unfortunately that wasn’t enough and I was still struggling with my new class. Lucky for me, Mike and my girlfriend were closing in on the settlement and bringing reinforcements. With the addition of a necromancer who was creating an undead army and an elementalist wielding fire we started our way to 30 centaur kills.

Apparently we were causing a ruckus because very soon after that we were greeted by more players. This was my favorite part, players showing up and joining in on the mission. All of us being rewarded for fighting and getting completion for the quest while working together is the perfect co-op experience. Now add in the skill combinations and cool fighting animation you will always be entertained by each fight you participate in.