Guild Wars 2: The One Thread

[rhandric]

Didn't really explain much.

It's not the same. Does that help?

In all seriousness--it's the way everything works together to make a living, dynamic world. Events happen. Rather than being told that a farm is under attack, the farm is under attack. Combat - even in the world - requires (at higher levels, lower levels not to the same degree) focus, you don't just swing your sword, and swing your sword again. The environment is beautiful. There are no set combat roles, meaning you can play how you want, when you want, with who you want. And, you can't grief or be griefed, since there is no mob tagging, and DEs are strongly tested before being added to the world to find ways to grief them.

All in all, it's how I started - the reason GW2 is amazing is because it's built from the ground up to be a living, dynamic world.

[DrakeWurrum]

Why in the world do server xfers cost money on the stress test, when they'll be free at release? :<

You think testing that feature out to the extreme would be smart.

[Arrowstormen]

Why in the world do server xfers cost money on the stress test, when they'll be free at release? :<

You think testing that feature out to the extreme would be smart.

Maybe it would cause too much stress on the already intentionally stressed servers.

[Derah]

Can anyone tell me what makes GW2 so great? I played it during a beta weekend and it was a really fun expierence but it didn't really feel new to me, but then that may be because I only got to see a handful of content. The dynamic events didn't at all intrest me, because it has already been done in other MMO's, just different and the Renown system is basically questing. So what makes GW2 so fun to all you people?

Not trying to cause some anger, just a interested gamer wanting to know some things.

Mostly a combination of many different factors.

Take a giant pot, put in it SWTOR's deeply personal storyline with a highly customizable plot that changes as you do multiple choices before and after gameplay, add in the randomized large-scale event battles of Rift, season it with music made by Jeremy Soule (the genius behind the music of games like Skyrim Oblivion and Morrowind), add gorgeous graphics and art style, remove the necessity of tanks and healers, remove the need of high level gear in order to be efficient at your job, allow the capacity of battling multiple servers on large-scale battles, and spice it up with some great voice acting, and highly customizable appearance of your character, and there you have it.

IMO, without trying to offend anyone, GW2 isn't exactly a genre-buster revolutionary MMO, but rather a game that mixes the best of a lot of great games, while removing the worst of each, creating as an end result a really fun engaging game that also doesn't requires a montly fee to play (this right here is the main reason I even started to dig up info about it)

It does features some unique features, such as the cross-class combos, and a completely different mechanic for fighting on land than it is for fighting on water. But otherwise, its still at its core, an MMORPG.

[Deleted]

Mostly a combination of many different factors.

Take a giant pot, put in it SWTOR's deeply personal storyline with a highly customizable plot that changes as you do multiple choices before and after gameplay, add in the randomized large-scale event battles of Rift, season it with music made by Jeremy Soule (the genius behind the music of games like Skyrim Oblivion and Morrowind), add gorgeous graphics and art style, remove the necessity of tanks and healers, remove the need of high level gear in order to be efficient at your job, allow the capacity of battling multiple servers on large-scale battles, and spice it up with some great voice acting, and highly customizable appearance of your character, and there you have it.

IMO, without trying to offend anyone, GW2 isn't exactly a genre-buster revolutionary MMO, but rather a game that mixes the best of a lot of great games, while removing the worst of each, creating as an end result a really fun engaging game that also doesn't requires a montly fee to play (this right here is the main reason I even started to dig up info about it)

It does features some unique features, such as the cross-class combos, and a completely different mechanic for fighting on land than it is for fighting on water. But otherwise, its still at its core, an MMORPG.

I see, I have to agree, its not revolutionary, it does just seem to take the good things from many MMO's and smash them together to make something great, But I probably won't play GW2 till about a month after release.

[Arrowstormen]

I see, I have to agree, its not revolutionary, it does just seem to take the good things from many MMO's and smash them together to make something great, But I probably won't play GW2 till about a month after release.

Yes and no. It's not revolutionary, and we very rarely see anything revolutionary in gaming, but the game is evolutionary, like WoW was it during the times of EverQuest. Revolution would mean they make something completely new and intriguing, but they don't. They take existing aspects and things of MMOs, and find ways to improve those systems, AKA evolution.

The reason I think GW2 is the new thing is not just because it doesn't have the old and no longer needed sub fee; it's because they did what WoW did, which was evolve the Representation system, as I call it. In EverQuest, as far as I know, there were barely any quests. Mostly, it was grinds, where you killed lots of creatures, so you could advance and kill a lot of bigger and tougher creatures. WoW was the first game, as far as I know, that really just made a whole bunch of quests and hubs of them. Now everybody uses quests, and as so, it's time for a new step, which I believe is events.

A lot of people say events are just quests in the disguise, but quests are grinds (or hunts, as they were called I think) in disguise, which is why I call it the representation system. It's about giving the feeling that what you do is not just killing stuff, it's shown in a way that makes it give meaning.

[Derah]

The reason I think GW2 is the new thing is not just because it doesn't have the old and no longer needed sub fee; it's because they did what WoW did, which was evolve the Representation system, as I call it. In EverQuest, as far as I know, there were barely any quests. Mostly, it was grinds, where you killed lots of creatures, so you could advance and kill a lot of bigger and tougher creatures. WoW was the first game, as far as I know, that really just made a whole bunch of quests and hubs of them. Now everybody uses quests, and as so, it's time for a new step, which I believe is events.

Brilliantly put. I agree, more often than not, its evolution rather than revolution that makes games go forward.

For example, prior to wow, all bosses were world bosses, and only a handful few could ever kill them, because there were only a finite amount of them on the world, and everyone wanted to kill them, so they had to fight amongst themselves to get the right to fight the big bad dragon.

Wow completely teared that down with the concept of Instances, where every group gets their own personal copy of a dungeon, and now you no longer have to fight other players just to earn the right to fight a boss, instead, each player is given a copy of the boss to fight with.

In that regard, GW2 has added a couple of aspects that I believe will be the staple, and standard future of most online games:

A: shared mobs. No longer is the exp and gold divided among the people who kill them, if you kill a boar and gain 100 exp and 10 silver, and then you and 3 friends kill that same boar, each of you still get 100 exp and 10 silver. On top of that there is no more "tapping" of mobs, if I want to, I can stalk you forever, killing what you kill, and not only you still get the full rewards, exp, and credit for the quests, so do I. IMO that's the future, its MILES better than having to fight other players for mobs. Again, just as wow applied an elegant fix for this with bosses, GW2 also applied an elegant fix for this with mobs and quest items.

B: This is not just exclusive to GW2, since SWTOR also has it, but......... Voice Acting. In wow, on the past, only bosses in instances were voiced, and even then only on aggro, death, and specific attacks. Then they added SOME voice-acting on A FEW quests (which were zero on vanilla and TBC, and were only a handful on WOTLK) and on CATA they added voice-acting to several more quests. However, the majority of quests are still voiceless. On GW2 almost everything is voice-acted, as is the case with SWTOR, and this is the direction games like wow will have to step in if they don't want to fall behind (there's hints of this already, on MoP already over 60% of the quests in pandaria are fully voiced)

C: The concept of a monthly fee. I bet within the next 10 years or less, not a single MMO will remain with a monthly fee if they want to stay competitive. Its an obsolete business model, heck, its almost proven that Free2Play games most of the time bring in MORE revenue than paid games, because most people (I'm not included in that category I'm very careful with my money) tend to spend more when they think they don't have to, than when they have to.

They can add lots of pets and mounts and charge outrageous amounts of money for them and people will still pay them, but groan if they have to pay a monthly fee just to play the game. its the same principle behind DLCs and why they are slowly replacing expansions. Companies make a hell of a lot more money by simply making lots of shorter, cheaper DLCs and selling them all together, than making a big expansion and selling it at a larger cost.

I'd bet my life savings that not even wow will remain pay2play for long, sooner or later it, along with every other game in the market will go free2play. Regardless of their success or lack thereof.

[Deleted]

Played for the first time tonight and I love it. Id been holding out until I got a new graphics cars and when it arrived today the first thing I did was buy the game. It's really nice looking I spent little time fighting and more time just exploring the starting zones they are amazing especially the Sylvari. Not got a clue what class to play but if im honest melee felt a little weird (I did only try it for 20 minutes though) so I will probably go with an elementalist or necromancer

[Derah]

Played for the first time tonight and I love it. Id been holding out until I got a new graphics cars and when it arrived today the first thing I did was buy the game. It's really nice looking I spent little time fighting and more time just exploring the starting zones they are amazing especially the Sylvari. Not got a clue what class to play but if im honest melee felt a little weird (I did only try it for 20 minutes though) so I will probably go with an elementalist or necromancer

Truth be told though, there is no such a thing as a "melee" or "ranged" class on this game. All classes can fight at range, or at melee with equal proficiency if you so desire.

As an elementalist you can equip dual daggers and all your spells will be VERY short range, but real bursty, or a staff, in which case your spells have a longer range, but not as bursty.

As a warrior, you could dual-wield axes and slice&Dice everything close to you, OR you could equip a rifle, or longbow, and be equally deadly.

Not a single class in this game specializes on short range or long range, they're all equally proficient at both (and its in fact encouraged that you keep a short and long range weapon equipped).

[Niku]

Played for the first time tonight and I love it. Id been holding out until I got a new graphics cars and when it arrived today the first thing I did was buy the game. It's really nice looking I spent little time fighting and more time just exploring the starting zones they are amazing especially the Sylvari. Not got a clue what class to play but if im honest melee felt a little weird (I did only try it for 20 minutes though) so I will probably go with an elementalist or necromancer

Welcome onboard.

[DrakeWurrum]

Hey look, another place to vote: http://www.theguildlife.com/promotions/g/DragonSlayer/

[Exroyal]

Ah that was good, dont want to play to much. 3 hours 15 min should be enough. Didnt come across ANY problems this time with smooth fps. Just had the leap bug which teleported you cross map. Tested the currency like they asked me the last 15 min and no problems. Hope there will be no more stress test and a launch next.

[Deleted]

*Change of subject here*



Unoriginal, I know.

Just gotta say that I really love that dance. I'm happy they gave it to the humans.

[DrakeWurrum]

Ha, that's a good choice for them.

I couldn't quite tell what Charr were doing. It seemed kinda tribal.

[barackopala]

Oh god my game runs so smooth! No change on my PC AT ALL i love anet :V

and char's do the haka dance omg O:!

[Kadeth]

and char's do the haka dance omg O:!

Fill me in here, what's a haka dance? >.> Youtube has lots of videos related to rugby?

[Mif]

Fill me in here, what's a haka dance? >.> Youtube has lots of videos related to rugby?

That's the one
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haka

[Arkenaw]

I made a video of me and some others doing the charr dance

[Maarius]

just played the Norn-personal story and was totally ok with it... I've no idea what you guys (the ones who didn't like it) were expecting. I just like it and I'm sorry for those who can't like it.

[barackopala]

Fill me in here, what's a haka dance? >.> Youtube has lots of videos related to rugby?

You've played/heard about rugby before? is a dance that the all blacks do, it's from the natives of new zealands afaik.
I'm actually not a fan of rugby at all, but most of my friends are and when I saw it... something in my heart got happy to see it o: