I have a few questions for the developers over at ArenaNet.
Like, “Are you proud of yourself?”
Or, “How do you sleep at night?”
“Is this all one big joke to you?”
With the recent release of their new MMO (that’s “massive multiplayer online game” for the uninitiated), Guild Wars 2, I’m a little bitter towards ArenaNet.
With an early access release date of Aug. 25 for customers who pre-paid, and a full release on Aug. 28, this game could not have come out at a worse time.
School is going to be getting underway and you expect me to make time for your beautifully -crafted game? Honestly?
Fine.
With its high-paced gameplay centered around dynamic events and a storyline tailored to each individual character,
ArenaNet is breaking the MMO mold that other popular games such as Everquest and World of Warcraft have set before it.
Gone are logs full of quests requiring you to kill bears for their tongues (when only 1 out of every 100 bears has a tongue).
Or, flying halfway across the continent after waiting for an airship that shows up as often as the O-Train at Greenboro Station on a Sunday.
After completing one of the five starter or tutorial areas, players find themselves thrown into a world churning with activity.
Stumbling upon different events, they’re tasked with fending off bandits, ransacking centaur camps or pretty much any other fantasy-like quest you can imagine.
While not every event encountered will alter the world, ArenaNet has included events that will adjust the makeup of the world based on the outcome of said event.
What’s that, ArenaNet? Centaurs have taken over a camp and Timmy fell down the well?
Don’t worry, I’m on it.
Also helping to increase the pace of gameplay is the reinvention of the MMO fighting style.
Combining sweeping melee attacks with large area of effect spells and abilities, gameplay is dynamic and does not involve just setting up a number of macros or repeated key strokes.
Abilities are based on the weapon combinations the character is using and are limited to 10 in total—five weapon based while the remaining are chosen based on the players’ personal style.
The ability to control one’s avatar in terms of attack evasion is another innovation ArenaNet has included.
The ability to perform dodge rolls, flame-trailing slides or over-head acrobatics keep the player engaged in battle and give what could have been traditional MMO battle style a dynamic makeover.
Speaking of makeovers, players have a seemingly infinite selection of options when it comes to creating a truly individual avatar.
Beginning with the selection of one of the five playable races, be it Asura (think The Brain meets Stitch), the Charr (think of the biggest, meanest cat you’ve ever met and give it armor and a battle axe), the Norn (take vikings, add spirit animals, shake vigorously), the Sylvari (what the characters in Troll 2 would have become had they not triumphed), or human (if your date orders this: RUN!) players can spend hours trying to recreate their favourite celebrities in avatar form.
With eight different classes, countless preset options, sliders, armour skins and dyes it’s going to be hard to find two players that are exactly alike.
Last, but certainly not least, are the player versus player (PvP) aspects of the game. What’s the point of having huge worlds full of real players if you can’t bash each others brains out?
Continuing with its strong grasp of PvP from its predecessor, Guild Wars, Guild Wars 2 implements game styles involving capturing bases to gain points or racking up the most kills to reach a certain goal. Characters are automatically boosted to level 80 and are given some pretty nice-looking equipment to help level out the playing field, though in the end PvP will most like come down to skill. That, or numbers.
ArenaNet has also taken their original concept of guild battles and amped it up to 11. Apparently bored with just 30 or so people battling at once, the developers created World versus World (WvWvW). It’s here that three competing realms (or servers)are forever locked in combat. Allowing for hundreds of players to fight at once, gameplay almost does feel warlike with each realm trying to gain the upper hand, especially when the enemy is banging on your fortress door as you rain down on them from above.
Having been so highly anticipated, Guild Wars 2 does not disappoint. The only downfall to the game is it’s just so beautiful that not every computer will be able to handle it. My laptop included. I’m sure my mother is elated, because, currently, hers is the only computer I have access to that can reunite me with this game.
