First off I love WoW or should I say "Loved" in the past tence. WoW provided me with years of fun but this steam rolling juggernaut called Guildwars 2 is finally gonna make me hang up my cloak and staff. Im currently a Alpha Tester for Guildwars 2 because of the NDA i cant give any spoilers but I am allowed to discuss what ive seen when it comes to stuff that ANET has already released.
Yes you can jump and yes they have an auction house unlike GW1 lol and still NO MONTHLY SUB
#1 The Visuals Ive never ever seen a MMO look as nice as GW2 it was stunning. made my jaw drop on more then one occasion.
#2 The Combat is so friggin fun they have more then enough quests to level with but i found myself oddly spending hrs just having a blast killing mobs. experiement with spell combos and enjoying the amazing casting / dmg visuals. Also you can Dodge projectile attacks LoL I was like WTF this is badass. alot of the abilites give you the flexability to move while attacking so your more engaged with your opponent dodging arrows and spells, even melle attacks can be dodged if your skilled enough.
Also There are NO I repeat NO Healing / DPS or Tanking specific Classes. Everyclass bringins something unique to the fight but all classes can heal/ tank/ DPS and rez friendlys.
They even have a Last Stand system like in CoD where if you get defeated by a mob you gain some new abilites while on the ground fighting for your life if you kill a mob you can get your life back. if you die well you know what happens then you gotta rez or be rez.
#3 Bosses scale depending on how many players are engaging the target and also the abilities of the boss change depending on how many players are engaging him. so you can fight a Boss then go back fight him with some buddies and experience a whole new boss encounter the second time. and these are just the boss in the open persistent world not even raid bosses.
#4 Im currently playing a Elementalist (mage) and the versatility of the Elem versus a WoW Mage is incrediable to give you an example a Mage in WoW must leave a raid hearth to a city go to a talent vendor if he wishes to change his spec or only have 2 available talent trees with him at any one time but can only change while out of combat.
In GW2 the Elementalist can change his spec from Frost / Fire / Electricity / Earth while in combat by simple switch stances there of course is a 30sec CD bettewen talent changes but it can be done while in combat which has proven to be mind boggling fun.
#5 Dynamic Events while leveling "THERE ARE NO QUESTS LOGS IN GW2" Thats right ladies and gentle no more boring quests having to go to some dude accepting 3 or 4 quests you dont even really take the time to read and doing mundan tasks like kills 20 rats bring me there skin LoL. You go into a new area youll see active events running you an jump right into battle with some random person who is killing such and such or putting out barns fires and aslong as you help even if its near the end of the event cycle you get credit XP and your own Loot. Thats right no /100 rolls in GW2 if a boss dies everyone gets a piece of loot or item.
Also Dynamic events say you go help this villiage and defeat a invasion which BTW LOOKS AWESOME when you see a horde of invaders storming to yuour location blowing crap up and destroying things as they approach (No static Adds standing around for no reason like in... well you know) if yuo defeat the invasion force it opens a new dynamic event, special vendors and all sorts of things you continue through the event watching it change and giving you a new challenge. But if you fail to stop the invasion then a diffrent outcomes occures the village dies a diffrent form a dynamic event unfolds where you most try to retake the village and so on.
So the replay value is extremely high you could go through the game doing diffrent variations of dynamic events each time.
#6 Weapon slots effect skills if yuo have a staff it gives you access to abilites you wouldnt have if say you had a offhand and dagger. also if you swap the dagger and offhand into diffrent slot positions it changes your dmg and changes some of your abilites.
#7 They have 5 / 10man raid at end game havent sone those yet but the nice thing about GW2 Gear doesnt effect your dmg / healing or defence theres no such thing as a Epic drop thats gonna boost your dps or BiS item. They place skill soley on the player themselves not they gear they wear. Rare gear is purly esthetic but also shows the community youve completed the hardest bosses and you know your class.
#8 PvP Theres no arguement that GW1 had amazing PvP and they have built upon that in GW2. Everyone in WoW has that one server other then thier own that they hate my im from arthas and i hate warsong. but nothing I can do about that, Well In GW2 that prayer has been answered they have cross server PvP not just allaince and horde but full on cross server PvP me personally I cant wait to take on some brazzilians LoL (I HATE YOU WARSONG) HAHAHA.
This is a GW2 vs WoW post cause as successful as GW2 will be like how GW1 sold 5 million copies I know its not gonna kill WoW nore should it. They both offer a great game. but Im looking to the future MMO buyers in a year from now will new MMO gamers go to a plain older MMO that has strong roots or will they go to the new shiny MMO with lots of cool unique dynamics not done in any other MMO to date that also has strong roots.
Age of Crap / Champions Offline / Aion / and Rift they fail because they release thier game to soon to meet deadlines and dont offer anything that you cant already find in WoW.
Guildwars 2 on the other hand has an outstanding publisher who is giving them an endless time frame to work with and they are developing not just 1 or 2 things but many NEW things that the MMO genre has seen yet that WoW has never had. Im keeping my fingers crosses cause ill back any company who stands behind theyre work and believe in making the best possiable product not just meeting share holders time frames and cutting fat for corporate fatcats.