GW2 First Pulic Beta (Apr27-29) -- What's your opinion?

[DrakeWurrum]

Another example of difficulty not scaling right: I've earned several gold medals by noticing that there were 30 other players working on an event... so I'd equip my shortbow and just spam #1 and #2, aoeing everything in sight.

I did nothing but AoE mindlessly, and I got a gold medal. :|

[Spellsword]

Everything I would expect form a beta, much lag and login problems.. same as any beta, but yea mostly optimization issues like event balancing and such, but I am stubborn and was able to make it through to the higher levels where it smooths itself out.

I am very impressed with the game but this stress test only leads me to believe that the game is going to be delayed even LONGER... fucking killing me, smalls. I think I will be playing D3 before GW2 even hits the shelves. I voted very good but needs polishing.

I am in love with the trait system.. first mmo that ever let me make a real thief.. it's great. A lot of the thief traits remind me of Zidane from FF9, like thievery doing damage and such.

I do feel that I am in far more danger than a ranged player but I actually like that, it just means I need to play smarter and combat is always on edge. For the more lax players you can play at range and not have to worry as much about dodging etc, although I don't think that is ANet's goal? We'll have to see.

[DrakeWurrum]

leads me to believe that the game is going to be delayed even LONGER... fucking killing me, smalls.

Am I the only one who's been expecting a fall/winter release? :S

---------- Post added 2012-04-28 at 01:29 PM ----------

An addition to my earlier complaint about lack of direction: the scouts are a great source of information for telling you where things are at, if you want some kind of direction...

But the game doesn't really tell you about the scouts until you run into one,and you only know where a scout is by your map. Often they're located in the areas that they reveal to you anyways, so your only option is to just explore the unexplored areas.
Not a bad thing in and of itself, but newer players could really benefit from easy access to scouts to help them figure the game out.

[mpaskin1]

Would have been nice to actually LOG IN to the game... *sigh*

[Lillpapps]

An addition to my earlier complaint about lack of direction: the scouts are a great source of information for telling you where things are at, if you want some kind of direction...

But the game doesn't really tell you about the scouts until you run into one,and you only know where a scout is by your map. Often they're located in the areas that they reveal to you anyways, so your only option is to just explore the unexplored areas.
Not a bad thing in and of itself, but newer players could really benefit from easy access to scouts to help them figure the game out.

As a human you get a quest to talk to a scout just outside the building you get teleported to after the tutorial.

If you find it hard to find stuff then write bug reports. Tell them if you think there are too few mobs for quests or objective items have too long spawn timer etc. Write bug reports!

[Deleted]

The login problems have almost ruined it for me!
I think I've had about 5 minutes playtime!

Voted "Disappointment - Was expecting more, fails to deliver"
EU - Ireland

[Exzious]

QUESTION : Is that game very bugged?

I've encountered 2 bugs so far (I am level 15). In the Norn area at level 12-13 you fight a big bad shaman where NPC's are supposed to help you. They just stand outside of the reach of his abilities and derp. The other I found is a coding bug where a guy was hitting the ground with a smithing hammer where an anvil was standing.

[Deleted]

I've played from level 1-15, completed 100% of Queensdale so i've given it a fair whack within the PVE (going to try PVP later).

All on a human elementalist (dropped the ranger idea after level 2).

First thing that struck me was the poor performance. I don't have the best system but its fairly decent (i3 4gz, 12GB RAM, 6950ATi 2GB) and when first logging it I instantly noticed the poor FPS. Was partly network lag as well, but I actually got motion sickness when trying to play last night. MUCH better today, its fairly smooth (apart from when you spin the camera) but they've said that the game isn't optimised (I get same performance regardless of GFX options).

Why on earth do an open beta for people who've bought it BEFORE doing optimisation/gfx support?! - its really NOT gone down well with their player base, tech forums are full of nerd rage and tbh they have a point. Few people from closed beta have said that these issues had already been reported numerous times and they've gone into open not having sorted it out. With expected release being June/July - my main worry is they won't have fixed it prior to launch. No update from devs (apart from to say it currently does not rely on GPU.. now does "currently" mean it will do?!) people willl want answers after this weekend... I can already see the threads asking for refunds lol.

Apart from that (rant over)... I love the game... some highlights.

The dynamic events work really well, feels quite natural and I seem to know where i'm going most of the time - not really got lost yet (well for a long period of time). One thing I think the game could use is when you are doing the heart quests in a zone, they could have a rough area as to the boundaries of that quest when you hover over it or something. They do have that for some of the open world "events" (big orange circle to an area), so hopefully they might add this for ALL quests. Its not a game breaker, think it would just help players new to the game.

Travel is great - lot of people saying they should add mounts, imo doesn't need them at all. The waypoint system is superb - and to pick them up, you have to actually explore the areas (which are beautifully done) and I kept finding myself going off in various directions to open world quests that happen to be going on.

Combat is great, really engaging - even though you don't have THAT many skills (compared to some other MMOs) its got just the right amount. I find myself using ALL of my skills and switching out weapons for a bit of variety. Hopefully there won't be one cookie cutter builds for each class - certainly enough traits and skills etc! The dodging is easy to use, I've only played ranged and not quite sure how you'd go about that as a melee - I found it fairly easy to kite mobs around, and did find the combat challenging in parts - difficulty seems pitched about right so far, not found anything faceroll or impossible, have to use your brain a bit and not spam 1 button.

Grouping.... this is actually one of the highlights for me. They've nailed it. I played a bit with a friend and it worked well being in a party. Love the sidekick leveling down system - think they could maybe have removed levels all together they arent needed! hehe. In open world when I've been soloing, people help, join in, help res - i found myself just following some people around and visa versa questing together without being in a group - really feels like you are playing an MMO with actual people. WoW is very much a solo affair when questing as everyone is out for themselves (generally) so the fact everyone gets their own loot (blizzard have taken this for MOP raiding) and there is no negatives for helping other people - superb, absolutely superb.

Graphics are really good - another reason why the FPS pains me at the moment, that should be running along at 60fps+ constant and we could appreciate it properly :s Character models/animation etc are REALLY well done. The cut scenes are nicely done too, and the personal story is keeping me engaged. I found myself dipping in and out of the personal story mixing it up with some questing as well. Impressed.

Overall glad i've paid out for it - nervous about how capable they are as a developer to sort my main concern about the performance (never played a game by them before). The performance issue IS a gamebreaker for me, it kinda ruined the beta weekend for me. Its way better today, playable and i've had a good time but its crying out to be optimised. Definately will not replace WoW for my raiding fix but I could easily see me getting addicted to it.

[DrakeWurrum]

As a human you get a quest to talk to a scout just outside the building you get teleported to after the tutorial.

If you find it hard to find stuff then write bug reports. Tell them if you think there are too few mobs for quests or objective items have too long spawn timer etc. Write bug reports!

That first scout is easy enough, it's scouts after that which become a PITA to find. Most of the time I only come across them after I'm done doing my hero work.

So far, it seems a little weird for my character, sometimes, to just run in and start being like "Huh. I'll start checking bushes for bandits." when nobody specifically told him they want help with that. It's great that I don't have to go accept quests, but it just seems weird that I run into an area and start doing stuff, with some psychic voice telling me that the people in the area need help with that.

---------- Post added 2012-04-28 at 02:01 PM ----------

Why on earth do an open beta for people who've bought it BEFORE doing optimisation/gfx support?!

It's not an open beta, it's a closed beta, only available to people who already purchased the game. These BWEs are specifically for optimizing and stress testing.

[Flappy]

Despite the fact that I've been on for a grand total of 10 minutes a lot of hope remains for this game. Forum support is already miles ahead of a certain other MMO already, I posted the problems I was having and under 5 minutes had several *helpful, not trolling* replies from fellow testers and an answer from a developer. This fixed the problem but just in time for me to not be able to get in. I will speak of what I know, character creation: it's amazing. They were very creative in things like naming your character and there is a good amount of options in customizing your character.

[Kryos]

The skybox effect that they add when you are far away from terrain is beautiful. It looks like a painting. Check out the dam in the human 1-17 area to know what I mean.

I don't understand:

What do you mean?

[Haven2011]

i love it. its three times better than wow and yes it needs more work because this beta.

and i dont think they will publicly test the last two races i think the want them to stay new

[Deleted]

Takes couple of days to get used to new surroundings. Otherwise good work. Needs some performance optimisation.

Graphics are incredible.

[Edge-]

We've already got a few threads discussing beta reactions/feedback, we don't need any more of them. I'm trying to keep the forums somewhat clean this weekend so I'm gonna close this down.