Guild Wars 2 (official review on pp 21)

[skystride]

Give me a release date or a beta invite!  I don't need no stinkin computer case! 

[CeeKay]

Give me a release date or a beta invite!  I don't need no stinkin computer case! 

how about an invitation to buy it once it's released?

a date with a beta?

[PR_GMR]

Give me a release date or a beta invite!  I don't need no stinkin computer case! 

Calm down, man!

(PR pours a bucket of cold water on Skystride)

[CeeKay]

well, looks like we'll see at least the closed beta by the end of this year.

[greeneggsnham]

Anyone still active in the guild, or is everyone waiting for GW2 to go active? If anyone is still around, and has mats/money/time to help with filling the Hall of Monuments please let me know.

[Blackjack]

ArenaNet's blog finally has some info, from a demo of a new build at a trade show in South Korea:
http://www.arena.net/blog/eric-flannum-on-the-guild-wars-2-g-star-demo

Customization
With Guild Wars 2, we are giving our players many different ways to customize their characters, and we’ve revamped a number of the systems involved: armor dye, hair style and color, skin color, and face style. We’ve also added a physique or body-type feature and a face-customization system. With face customization, we will give players the ability to change the size and shape of major facial features: eyes, nose, mouth, chin, and jaw. With all of our customization options, every player will be able to differentiate themselves from the crowd.
...
UI
Something new that we’re excited to show at G-Star is what we are internally calling our “Big Beefy” UI.

As we progressed further with UI development, we discovered that we really needed more room to effectively display important information, so we came up with a system that allowed for bigger UI elements. A great example of this is in our new Hero panel, which is now a bit larger than it was before.

Preparing for the demo was also a great opportunity for the UI team to go in and refine a few things that help new players learn how to play our game. For example, we updated our hints to stand out from the background a bit more and we added an animated “New Mail” alert that pops on-screen to help guide players when story-related messages land in their inbox.
...
SKILLS
When we first started showing the game, skills were acquired by speaking to a trainer and purchasing them [this is a complaint many have bout SWTOR so far-bj]. This method followed a fairly standard MMO convention, and while there isn’t anything inherently terrible about it, we felt that we could come up with something better for Guild Wars 2. We wanted a system that would better teach how our skills worked and bring back the skill collection aspect that was very much a part of the original Guild Wars. With that in mind, we started to our skill-acquisition system.

The first step for us was recognizing that we have two very different types of skills in the game. First, we have weapon skills, which are tied to a specific category of weapon and based on the profession of the character. Then we have the healing, utility, and elite skills, which make up the right side of the skill bar. These skills are all slotted by the player and can be based either on profession or race.

For weapon skills, like the ones you see below, we wanted to teach that they were tied to the weapon being used. Because of this, we have gone to a method in which killing enemies with a weapon unlocks the skills for that weapon. This also helps teach how the weapon works since the player unlocks the skills in a particular order and learns to incorporate the new skills into their play style. The one thing that we knew we didn’t want to do is to make it feel like a grind—which is always a danger with a system like this. The skills unlock quickly, and once unlocked, they become more powerful as the player levels. At its core, this system is designed to teach the skills and not make the player feel like they are grinding.

The healing, utility, and elite skills (seen below) are now unlocked with skill points. Each skill may cost a variable number of skill points to unlock, but once the player is able to slot a particular type of skill, they may unlock the skills in any order that they choose. For example, if I  unlocked my elite skill slot as a norn warrior, I may choose to spend my skill points to unlock Norn Bear Form (a norn racial elite skill) or Rampage (a warrior elite skill).

Skill points can be acquired by undertaking what we call a skill challenge. There are 200 skill challenges in the game, and they range from defeating tough opponents, to answering riddles, to drinking a particularly potent drink.

Some of our players may recognize “skill challenges” as being similar to a system we spoke about a while back called “profession challenges.” These two systems are one and the same. In the past, profession challenges were specific to a particular profession and were used to acquire traits. In playing these challenges, we found that they tended to split up people who were trying to play together. One player would want to go to one spot on the map to find their profession challenge, while their friend would want to go somewhere else to find a different profession challenge. Because this had an adverse affect on players being able to play together, we decided that it was better suited to skill acquisition than something as profession specific as traits.

This, of course, meant that we needed a new way to acquire traits, and since we were in the middle of revamping our trait system, it felt like a good time to make the change. We’ll talk about our new trait system in an upcoming blog post, so until then, I hope you’ve enjoyed hearing about the G-Star demo and all of the exciting new things going into the game.

[skystride]

Mesmer announcement coming out on Wednesday!

https://twitter.com/GuildWars2

[PR_GMR]

Mesmer announced!

But you should go to the guildwars2.com frontpage and see the joke they pulled in announcing it. 

[skystride]

LOL DAOC Minstrel would have been a pretty awesome class too.

[PR_GMR]

And... holy shit! Looks like ArenaNet got jealous at the launch of SWTOR and finally decided to start their beta... this Friday!!!!

[Teggy]

Now Ritt will be double pissed.

[Blackjack]

[UPDATE: ArenaNet elaborated on the beta information by explaining "We have a studio internal selection process for our Closed Beta that starts on Friday. There will be no public application form."]

While it's nice, it sounds like a wee expansion of an internal, closed test (possibly like Blizzard's "friends and family" testing), not some mega expansion of the test anyone should get upset about. Unless we're gonna get upset we're not related to someone working at ArenaNet.  

[CeeKay]

confirmed for 2012!

[PR_GMR]

confirmed for 2012!

Talk about overstating the obvious. 

I think now the debacle is whether it'll be first or second half of 2012 for its release. Please, please, pleaseee don't let it slip into Holidays 2012. We have waited more than long enough.

[rshetts2]

I highly doubt it will release in the first half of 2012 considering they stated that in Feruary they will invite select members of the press into beta but wont be really expanding public beta invites until March or April.  At that point they will likely have months of beta testing before they are ready for release.  Earliest I can see this being released is August/September.  For marketing reasons if its that late into the year, it just may end up being a holiday '12 release. 

[skystride]

I don't know about months of open beta testing, I think they have probably done several months of in-house testing already.  Didn't GW1 come out pretty soon after the open beta?

[Blackjack]

I'm left wondering if we'll see GW2, Diablo III and Torchlight 2 all out in the same week. 

[Roguetad]

I'm left wondering if we'll see GW2, Diablo III and Torchlight 2 all out in the same week. 

If I were the publishers for Torchlight 2 , I would stay light years away from the Diablo 3 launch.  Even if they have to hold the game and wait a month or two, I would do it.  It's not worth getting lost in the tsumani of D3.  Could you imagine being another publisher and learning that your heavily invested game will be releasing the same week (or month) as D3?  It's good to be Blizzard right now. 

[corruptrelic]

Guild Wars 2 coming to consoles also?

http://kotaku.com/5885566/guild-wars-2-is-almost-certainly-coming-to-consoles

[skystride]

I'm getting it for PC of course since console version will be late if it comes out.  But it would be really cool to get it on the Vita so I can play when I'm not at home.

[PR_GMR]

This is what Guild Wars 2 PVP looks like!!!

Why, oh why can't this game come out tomorrow!!!! I want.. I want.. I want!!!

[Razgon]

This looks really good - The only bad thing about it, is the silly JRPG influnces that is clear to be seen - For instance, the warrior who runs around with a very masculine scepter?? I hope its less than it seems, but at least I haven't spotted any children figthing yet.

[Elmo]

Interesting PvP blog:  http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/staffblog/022012/22638_Guild-Wars-2-PvP-Why-Progression-Doesnt-Matter.html

[Elmo]

Closed beta signup is available for the next 48 hours only.

https://beta.guildwars2.com/

[CeeKay]

their program won't send the info info sent, it's only showing one of my HDD's instead of both, making it look like I have a lot less disk space than I do.

[PR_GMR]

Closed beta signup is available for the next 48 hours only.

https://beta.guildwars2.com/

HOLY GOLDEN TURD! Going home tonight to signup!!

[skystride]

In the Land of MMOs where the doldrum lies.
One MMO to rule them all, One MMO to find them,
One MMO to bring them all and in the darkness bind them
In the Land of MMOs where the doldrum lies.

[PR_GMR]

Signed up!

(PR goes away to sacrifice a random child on a Satanic altar to get into the Beta)

[Arkon]

Bah I am out of town until Saturday. May have to walk my wife through signing me up since I assume it wants to upload system specs.

[Thry]

Bah I am out of town until Saturday. May have to walk my wife through signing me up since I assume it wants to upload system specs.

It's a pretty painless sign up. 

[Blackjack]

I hadn't checked Quarter to Three in ages. Tom Chick is babbling endlessly, I guess he's in a multiplayer press-beta of GW2 or something? Here are some blog entries:

PVP
http://www.quartertothree.com/fp/2012/02/22/guild-wars-2-when-worlds-collide/

A lot of Dark Age of Camelot players will appreciate how world vs. world pits three factions against each other, often trying to carry away each other’s orbs (owning orbs gives everyone in your faction a health boost), capturing each other strongpoints, and bringing powerful siege engines to bear. Many world vs. world encounters include powerful and expensive golems that excel at knocking down doors. Above is me in a catapult helping a bunch of players in the red faction while we try to knock down a door. It felt a lot like some of the battles I played in Warhammer Online. But it also felt different enough that Guild Wars 2′s world vs. world combat is one of the main reasons I can’t wait for this game to come out.

Simpler Yet More Complicated
http://www.quartertothree.com/fp/2012/02/21/guild-wars-2-that-ding-ding-ding/

One of my favorite things about the original Guild Wars is it never turned into that typical late-game MMO interface of rows of hotbars framing the screen, each festooned with tiny icons of impenetrable meaning. In Guild Wars, whatever level you were, however many hours you’d been playing, you only ever had eight skills. Before an adventure, you picked any eight skills you wanted. Your character was always a flexible thing. You could freely rejigger Guild Wars’ equivalent of a talent tree, which tweaked your eight skills in unique ways. But playing Guild Wars was always and only a matter of pressing one of eight buttons.

Guild Wars 2 is both simpler and more complicated. But I’m convinced it’s better for a few reasons, including one reason that means I absolutely, positively, no-question-about-it must go into that swamp pictured up there.

Still an MMO, Yet Not Just Another MMO
http://www.quartertothree.com/fp/2012/02/20/guild-wars-2-diving-in/

Guild Wars 2, for all the cool stuff it does, will not change your opinion on MMOs. It’s very much a part of the genre. It is not the Second Coming of MMOs. It is not even the Reformation; a lot of things I like in Guild Wars 2, I’ve seen in other MMOs.

It is, however, an epiphany. What I saw while playing over the last few days was a very good game, easily more polished than many MMOs at launch, and full of exciting content, bold design decisions, and beautiful artwork.

It does things differently enough, smart enough, and gorgeous enough that the occasional whiff of ennui doesn’t make me any less enthusiastic about playing when it’s released.

[Blackjack]

Ten Ton Hammer also weighed in with press beta impressions:
http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/previews/press-beta-event-impressions

As we ran around the low level charr areas it was readily apparent that we could pick any direction or objective to complete and there was always something incredibly cool and interesting at every turn along the way. Each time we’d pick an area of the map to check out, before we were half way there an event would kick off and keep us occupied and entertained for the next 20 minutes. And there are a LOT of events to check out, each one having the potential to branch in different directions every time you’re in the area.

One of my favorite parts of the game is that you will automatically be sidekicked down to a level appropriate for the area you’re in, so you can always go back to check out events you may have missed the first time through. For example, as our group made our way through the charr starting area we would double back and hit some of the events we hadn’t yet completed. Even though we were level 15, the content in level 5 areas was still just as fun and rewarding as if we were playing it for the first time at level 5.

It’s a brilliant system and one that means you’ll never have to worry about out leveling content, or being able to group up with your friends regardless of any level differences between you. The net result is that you will never get the feeling that you’re playing GW2 “on rails” or being forced through annoyingly linear gameplay just to hit the level cap like you do in basically every other MMO currently on the market.

So even though GW2 does have a leveling system, you'll never feel like you're logging in to grind XP. In GW2 you log in to do one thing: have fun no matter what level you are, no matter which direction you choose to explore that day. Speaking of exploration...

btw, I fixed an inordinate number of typos in the TTH piece. Guy seriously needs to use spellcheck. Probably, he was just excited.

[PR_GMR]

Ten Ton Hammer also weighed in with press beta impressions:
http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/previews/press-beta-event-impressions

As we ran around the low level charr areas it was readily apparent that we could pick any direction or objective to complete and there was always something incredibly cool and interesting at every turn along the way. Each time we’d pick an area of the map to check out, before we were half way there an event would kick off and keep us occupied and entertained for the next 20 minutes. And there are a LOT of events to check out, each one having the potential to branch in different directions every time you’re in the area.

One of my favorite parts of the game is that you will automatically be sidekicked down to a level appropriate for the area you’re in, so you can always go back to check out events you may have missed the first time through. For example, as our group made our way through the charr starting area we would double back and hit some of the events we hadn’t yet completed. Even though we were level 15, the content in level 5 areas was still just as fun and rewarding as if we were playing it for the first time at level 5.

It’s a brilliant system and one that means you’ll never have to worry about out leveling content, or being able to group up with your friends regardless of any level differences between you. The net result is that you will never get the feeling that you’re playing GW2 “on rails” or being forced through annoyingly linear gameplay just to hit the level cap like you do in basically every other MMO currently on the market.

So even though GW2 does have a leveling system, you'll never feel like you're logging in to grind XP. In GW2 you log in to do one thing: have fun no matter what level you are, no matter which direction you choose to explore that day. Speaking of exploration...

btw, I fixed an inordinate number of typos in the TTH piece. Guy seriously needs to use spellcheck. 

What a lovely post  . (Thanks for spellchecking it, BJ) This sounds just like my type of game. No monthly sub fee. No pressure to log on every night just to keep up with friends who are just ravenously consuming game content and leaving you far behind. No 'Oh, I can't play with you because I'm xx levels higher.' Just... Fun!

[Roguetad]

I can't stand having hotbars stacked up on the bottoms and sides of my screen, with 30-40 skills/abilities.  I also liked GW because there were only 8 skill slots, but I could choose whatever skills I wanted to fill those 8 slots.  It made it easy for me to jump back into GW after long breaks away from the game.  I remember trying to take advantage of free welcome back weekends in LOTRO and AoC, and I must have spent the first two hours in each game trying to make sense of the 30+ abilities (some of which had changed since the last time I played).  When did it become fun to have to manage 5 hotbars?     

[Razgon]

What's up with the Qt3 bashing Blackjack? Or did I misread your post about Tom?

Anyways - I signed up for the beta, and am pretty interested. I Actually played GW1 a bit not long ago, and its still fun. I do hope they get over the cardboard cities they tend to make, and make more interesting and interactive cities.

[Thry]

1 million beta signups in ~48 hours.

Given my history of non-luck when it comes to betas I have a better chance at winning powerball. 

[Lockdown]

I have become addicted to watching press videos of this game!!

For those of you who may be less skilled at drumming through hundreds of YouTube vids, I have found a somewhat competent list.  At the very least, it should get you started.   LINK

Also, if you aren't bothered by "spoilers" as far as skills go - there is a very functional skill planner HERE.

[greeneggsnham]

It's looking like the Mesmer is going to be a TON of fun. So looking forward to this....

[Harkonis]

mesmer was always my favorite, then when assassin was introduced I tried all the different ways of mixing the two

[PR_GMR]

mesmer was always my favorite, then when assassin was introduced I tried all the different ways of mixing the two

Harkonis, level 20 Mess-Ass. Niiiiceee.