Category Archives: Guild Wars

[GW2] Pacing and experience points

As more and more feedback on this past GW2 beta weekend is surfacing on blogs and official forums, it gets apparent how different players experienced certain aspects of the game, such as the events, personal story, pacing and leveling process. What becomes all too clear too is that while there are still issues in these departments, many players struggle more with their own mindset, habits and internal “MMO programming” than the game itself. They ask for the kind of guided ride and road to success that is characteristic of WoW’s questing model where it’s hard to go wrong and the game will always tell you where to go next.

GW2 isn’t that kind of MMO. It’s nowhere near a sandbox, but it does return some agency to the player and asks him to find his own adventure. There are different paths to success and while the heart quests are in fact ordered by level, you can easily wander off and lose yourself in other activities. Off the beaten track, players will find surprise and wonder that are easily missed on the highway. To some this presents an overwhelming sense of freedom and disorientation at first. I would claim that this is only temporary – but it’s strong enough a feedback that many bloggers have recently asked the question of whether the playerbase can handle different? Tremayne has gone as far as stating that if it does not, that would be a grave setback for the evolvement of the entire genre. I happen to agree with him.

Azuriel argues that part of at least his own feelings of disconnect spring less from the novelty factor and more from ANet’s failure to accomplish a more open and free playstyle fully: why design a guided personal storyline that is not in sync with the new questing philosophy? And why indeed stick to a leveling system at all, instead of skill-based progression? I have asked this last question before and personally I would have preferred not having any levels in GW2. It seems to run contrary to the game’s overall concept.

Be that as it may, I would like to take the opportunity to point out a few ways of gaining experience points in GW2 while you’re engaged in PVE. I’ve read comments of players claiming that you need to PvP or engage professions in order to keep up a good “speed” or that they were forced to constantly repeat the same events; well, I cannot confirm any of that. There are possibly pacing disparities between some of the maps (apparently Queensdale has such issues), but there are still many more ways to gain experience if you make use of them. This won’t be big news to seasoned MMO veterans, but may be useful to those asking for guidance.

Ways to gain experience points while questing in GW2

The following pointers are based on my own beta experiences. I am the errant traveler / explorer type who likes not to focus on getting the job done as fast as possible. Coincidentally, I never had pacing issues this beta or the issue of not knowing where to go next – mostly because there was nowhere I needed to be. I did plenty of heart quests and events but also general exploration. I did not PvP once nor look into crafting. Here’s what I recommend instead –

1) Zones consist of more than hearts
While the heart quests give you a general sense of direction and offer useful rewards, they’re only an excuse to be at the right place where many events can happen. I found the heart quests rather boring and trivial compared to the rest. If you’re hunting EXP, keep in mind that zones offer many more points of interest than just hearts. Do the trait point challenges, check out special sites and also discover all the waypoints – they yield EXP!

2) Joining / Assisting in ongoing events
All events can be joined at any time and rewards will be dished out according to participation effort. You do not need to wait for an event to re-start, although you are free to repeat them (hearts are not repeatable). Likewise, you can join other players in killing mobs and get EXP for that – grouping is not required.

3) Following through a chain of events
Heart areas have the tendency to literally “be at the heart” of different events being triggered all around them, at various stages of progress. Spend time in these areas and check them out. Often events will continue with a next step or then suddenly the quest NPCs are attacked and offer a next chapter. This can easily occupy you for 20 minutes or more and lead all the way to killing a big baddie with fifty more players.

4) Returning to / repeating events
You may repeat events for EXP. Besides that, it makes sense to return sometime because there’s always a chance for more to happen or to experience scenarios you had missed the first time around. When I visited Hoelbrak and took this picture, I had no idea that other players had previously fought to restore that statue (thanks Rakuno for pointing this out!). For me that means I will be back to see that part of the event myself.

5) Resurrecting allies
Over the course of events many NPCs will die, as much as players. Ressing folk on the way yields plenty of good EXP, in fact more than if you had just killed a mob instead. It is also recommended to res NPC guards and defenders because they will support you in freeing areas or beating bosses.

6) General exploration
Like for most MMOs, wandering around and discovering all parts of a map yields good EXP (and achievements). Don’t forget about cities here and their numerous waypoints. Hunter made a great overview of all the jumping puzzle sites he discovered this beta – did you happen to find any yourself?

7) Gathering / crafting
I did not personally look into crafting yet, but while you’re out there doing events you might as well use nodes or gather herbs on the way. This is not the competitive nightmare it is in other MMOs and is basically easy additional EXP.

8) Personal story
While the personal storyline has some issues at this stage, for myself mainly in terms of difficulty / balance, following through as far as you can yields both EXP and rewards. It is possible to come back later and finish off with more ease or to share your personal scenarios with party members. They will be able to assist you in funny ways. If you are clearly too low to beat the next chapter, the quest tip will say so.

…And that’s pretty much it. Keep variety in your activities and “grinding mobs or events” should be the least of your concerns. Wander off – albeit not into higher level areas. If you still feel bored where you are, take a portal or waypoint to a different map; new hearts, events and trait points await! And lots of EXP for the weary.

ArenaNet really needs character designers!

You’ve probably heard that ArenaNet is hiring character artists, a most prestigious kind of job! After long consideration and making first contact via twitter (to which they still haven’t responded, I can’t quite figure out why), I decided to run for the job and create a first piece of art to illustrate my fitness. The examples given on their page were very helpful pointers in that undertaking…ArenaNet will of course want to find the right type of artists who grasp the art style and aesthetics of Guild Wars 2, keeping things coherent. Luckily all of this applies to me.

(click image to enlarge)

So, what’s your opinion – I believe I have captured ArenaNet’s basic idea for the races and characters in the game? Also, keep in mind this was only a very fast sketch really. I admit I’m not great with the whole environment kind of stuff, but then they’re not looking for landscape artists! ArenaNet pick me, pick me!

[GW2] An altered questing experience

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Maybe the most profound impression this last beta weekend has left me with, is the questing experience in Guild Wars 2. I am reluctant to even call it “questing”, so overused is this term ever since World of Warcraft and so heavy with negative meaning. What I’ve experienced instead in GW2 is adventuring in the truest sense: being a traveler on an unknown road, inquisitive and curious, ready for chance meetings and whatever the world may present me with. Now, we’ve known for a while about ANet’s different approach to quests – the free for all, public and dynamic events. But knowing this or having read about it somewhere does nothing to prepare you for how it really feels to travel the roads of Tyria. You have to do it yourself. You have to be there and spend a couple of hours before the message sinks in with all its gravity.

It was maybe 8 hours into this second beta, when I had seen a big part of the Norn starting area and began to extend my reach, visiting other places like Queensdale (Humans) or the Plains of Ashford (Charr), exploring maps in greater detail. I was around level 18 and had just helped a traveling salesman to get safely to market, when it hit me: there is no quest log.

Ye gods….I have no quest log!

I can’t express properly just how liberating it felt to realize this, that there was no “homework” for my character. No predefined road. In GW2 it is not the quests that drive you from A to B, to discover certain areas or the next quest hub. Instead, you simply wander around and by blundering onto a site (often it finds you), you are presented with an ongoing situation or are asked for help. That is when an event marker or summary will appear on your screen – but it will disappear again as soon as you leave this region or if you fulfilled your mission. This means your screen is empty when leaving events behind and you also don’t just accumulate more and more jobs. The only ongoing, railway type of questline is your personal story and that one waits for you in patient and unobtrusive fashion. The only time I did consult my zone map was in order to avoid too high level content or to check whether I hadn’t accidentally missed a corner.

This difference in approach, that quests and events are tied to locations rather than to your character, makes a huge impact on the enjoyment of exploration. One may justifiably call this a great paradigm shift from the classic, WoW-shaped questing system of MMOs. Rather than already knowing where to go and what you’ll have to do there, you have to figure it out on site. Add to this that events will usually let you assist in several different ways and have several stages or chapters, depending on when you got there.

Things don’t stop there though: the questing experience becomes even less linear once you realize that you really want to go everywhere – that it makes sense to go everywhere. With the level down-ranking in place (your HP constantly changes depending on where you are) and flat leveling curve, it does not matter where you go to do events, gain experience or karma points, as long as you steer clear of higher level content which is rather quick on the ball punishing transgressions. In fact you do want to visit alternative places especially to earn extra skill points. The bottom line is that there are no strict “starting areas” anymore. All the maps are yours and the world feels bigger than ever. Feel that there’s not enough to do on “your map”? Well then, move your butt somewhere else! Pacing is not the same concern when you have so many areas to choose from.

All these innovations have added a great deal to my enjoyment of this beta weekend and made for the kind of immersive gameplay experience I haven’t had since Skyrim. ANet has achieved a splendid thing and I look forward to them improving the system further where balance and rewards, impact and cooperation are concerned. I will not complain about these issues though; at this point in time I am simply too happy with the overall concept realized in this upcoming and visually stunning MMO.

Talking about stunning…

To say that the world of Guild Wars 2 is breathtakingly beautiful, even on a PC as dated as my own, falls horribly short. The visuals and art style are far beyond anything I had personally hoped for and the wonderful soundtrack of Jeremy Soule (which could be more frequent in places) adds further depth and atmosphere. I’ve stood under a pine tree showering me with snow; I felt the sea spray on my face.

My most remarkable moment of the entire beta was in Godlost Swamp though: standing in the middle of a shallow lake, an eagle flew by me and then circled around me maybe four times. Then, he actually plunged into the water, caught a fish (I assume..) and soared up into the sky. I LIVE FOR THIS SHIT!

And because it was all so wonderful, I decided to create a small screenshot gallery (not mobile friendly) with some of the most beautiful shots I’ve taken this weekend. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do! And I hope the third beta weekend won’t be too long!

[GW2] Four degrees of Elementalism: Dyes for every occasion!

The second Guild Wars 2 beta weekend has almost ended, for me anyway, and this time around I can say that I had lots of fun – and no login issues, no overflow, no lag wahey! There’s been worlds between this beta experience and the last one for me, I finally had time to focus and immerse myself in the world, questing and exploration. As can be expected of a beta there’s still work to do, especially in the balancing and functionality / polish department; I personally think ANet shouldn’t rush it, a third beta weekend seems required. There are also group PvP mechanics and the trait system to rethink which I personally found boring after the revamp.

While taking lots of notes for a more in-depth look at questing and force-feeding my screenshots folder (the world is AMAZING!), I’ve taken some time to look at dyes in GW2 and admittedly I spent most of my gems, including the 2000 gems gift on random dye caches from the gem store! The paltry sum of 110 dyes I was able to collect in total does not begin to scratch the surface of the monstrosity that is dyes in GW2 – there are so many hues with the wildest names that you will eventually spend hours sorting and checking them out. Thank God there’s a favorite function!

Since a big part of ingame armor looks the same and does in fact come as a ‘blank’ for you to dye yourself, dying your gear frequently is an integral part of character customization in GW2. As a magic wielder with four different elemental attunements at his disposal, there is no excuse for slack in this department: a mage gotta look his part! Get your dyes straight all ye pyros, rain makers, world shatterers and storm callers, there are combinations aplenty for every type of magic!

The following screenshots show some dye combinations I came up with for my elementalist while bearing different attunements in mind. There is obviously switching going on during and between combat, but I imagine somewhere down the line many elementalists will still choose a sort of ‘home spec’ for themselves, an element they identify with most. Anyway, it was fun experimenting with so many colors and I believe this illustrates the potential of the dye system and just how much they affect the overall look and feel of a character. All combos are displayed on the devout set and all images are expandable – Enjoy! (And don’t you just love how cloth armor actually looks like cloth in this game!)

Fire Elementalist – My personal favorite! (Nr. 3)
Water Elementalist
Earth Elementalist
Air Elementalist

GW2 Beta Weekend – Overflow, Exploration, Combat and a second Look at Customization

Just when I had tweeted the above picture waiting on the GW2 beta on Friday evening, ANet’s servers suddenly went live – over one hour before official beta start. I am tempted to call this a smart move on their side, ~1mio people trying to log on during the same, small time window = not fun.

Anyway, I was an early starter and a rocky start it was! After so many hours of disconnecting and not finding your mates because of cryptic overflow mechanics (I CAN’T SEE YOU!), I went to bed hoping for some fixes. It’s certainly been a good stress test and ANet were fairly responsive in getting the worst issues sorted a.s.a.p. which cannot have been easy. I skipped most of Saturday due to lag issues but finally today, servers were stable and I’ve had ample time for more detailed impressions.

Overflow servers

I’ll start with my only, big annoyance and say that I am very unimpressed with the overflow server mechanics. It’s all beta state so I am not screaming in terror, but it was a big negative that for 95% of my playtime up to now, I was unable to group up with friends. Some of us were constantly sent to overflow servers (different ones too) while others were not – usually without any indication given. I am missing respective indicators on the map/zones and most of all: people who are grouped up should be able to join each other! This is a vital thing in a game that pushes cooperation as much as Guild Wars 2 does, so I hope next beta come they will have solved this.

I’ll also admit that I was surprised to see the overflow mechanic pop up for every zone in the game. I didn’t expect zones to be gated via loading screens and from an explorer’s point of view, it’s rather disruptive to one’s game-flow to be told “sorry, that zone is full”. I’m sad that a consistent world was not an option. Personally, I am capable of judging whether a zone is too full for questing myself. I would still like the choice to travel through though or meet a friend there quickly, and not be told to queue up or go to the overflow. I see the advantages in terms of lag or impatient players doing quests – however to me, it is more important to be able to travel a cohesive world without loading screens and queues. Queues will improve later no doubt, still a minus in my books.

Exploration and combat

I’ve spent substantial time off the beaten track, trying to get a sense for the scale of Tyria. As expected the graphics are beautiful, with elaborate weather and shading effects, banners flowing in the wind and dancing snowflakes. The starting areas are somewhat claustrophobic in space and I have yet to be overwhelmed by a great vista or endless plains; but then I have maybe seen 5 zones so far. The environment is not as accessible as for example in Rift (where you can climb pretty much any peak), but there’s a lot more going on under water than usual, inviting players to test their underwater combat skills. The waypoints are there in abundance for the lazy – having mostly soloed so far however, I was not pressured to use any. This early into a new game, you gotta be particularly goal-driven to already rely on teleports…

Explorers get plenty to do and zone loading screens encourage them: four indicators per map will keep track of your zone progress, points of interest discovered and events partaken in. Special challenges await you when attempting to earn extra skill points. However, a word of caution to the eager traveler: mob level in GW2 is to be taken seriously! As an elementalist I was hard pressed to kill foes 1-2 levels above me and I certainly didn’t manage to kill groups. I died quite often, also because I blundered into areas prematurely which happens easily. If you travel too far ahead, you will get feedback immediately!

GW2 zone tracker explained (click to expand)

The dynamic events (heart shapes) at lowbie level work as intended: assisting others is effortless, rezzing dead players (indicated on the world map) is fun and participation is always rewarded – in fact you gain most EXP by assisting and joining events, not farming or grinding mobs all by yourself. I second Keen in that the quests could be a bit more imaginative than gathering crops and throwing snowballs at children, but then we’ve seen very little. Sometimes these events will also lead to further steps and more demanding objectives. From what I’ve seen of my personal storyline so far, quests are more engaging and I look forward to see my path unfold.

I am enjoying the combat mechanics in GW2, as I knew I would. Auto-attack and circle strafing take some getting used to; due to the mobile combat style, you will easily reset mobs getting too far out of range. It’s a wonderful feeling to cast while running though, I love the elementalist’s mighty AoE effects and different attunements and weapon abilities to choose from.

A second look at customization

Naturally, I also spent some time scrutinizing the Norn female character creation first-hand. It’s funny how impressions can vary once you get to be your own skipper. For one thing, there are not as many facial choices as I thought there would be; the individual sliders are also more or less effective, depending on your choice of face. But judge for yourself in this quick “before and after” picture:

Norn faces – before and after customization

There are a total of 15 Norn female faces currently in the beta, along with 21 hairstyles. For the human females, there are 18 faces and 23 hairstyles. However, the Norn choices have suited me better in every aspect: they have more diverse body options, nicer (especially many longer) hairstyles and colors available for hair and eyes. Make-up is a deplorable given, although degrees may vary. For those who asked about more mature or scarred faces, there’s in fact one older looking face to be found for the humans (if you expand the image you can spot some wrinkles) and one scarred face for the Norn (also the Norn get tattoos):

“old” Human face / scarred Norn face

One thing to take note during customization is that once you’ve made individual adjustments to one face, the changes will appear on all the presets when going back. This way, you are instantly presented with a whole “new set” of variety which might help you find that unique look for yourself.

Temporary bottom line

After a rocky start, the GW2 has been a lot fun; so much to see and explore and especially so much to learn! Guild Wars 2 IS its very own game and that is good to remark at this point! You will not be tempted to compare this MMO to other games you’ve likely played in the past.

ArenaNet will certainly need a few more months (so much has become clear) to take care of some balancing and technical issues now and there is missing polish where ingame functionality (for example on guild management level), menu options and indicators are concerned. Early overflow gripes aside, I have not come across any major disappointments or annoyances though. I think we can agree that GW2 is a safe bet for anyone looking to immerse himself in a fresh and original MMO world this year. I’m off to play some much anticipated WvW now – more on that another time!

So…where to head first in the GW2 beta?

Having arrived back home from a rather lackluster interview experience, my good old PC has finished all its work in the meantime – the GW2 beta hath installeth! My install auto-switched to German, no doubt thanks to blasted IP-detection (I don’t even live in Germany!), but then I sincerely hope ingame language can be changed after logging in.

To those of you who, like myself, did still not receive the official invite email, fret not: head here, follow “News and Announcements”, login and go for “Getting Started”. If you have registered via pre-purchase before, you can download the client and install the game no questions asked. Obviously, it will not let you do much from there as there is no beta game available until this Friday…..when the American sun has made its way to noon. Yeah, that means Friday evening for us EU people (*whine*).

The server lists for the beta are officially out. It comes as a bit of a surprise to me personally that permanent server switches are going to cost 1800 gems, but I guess it’s too big a profit to lose as future item shop service. Alas, beta players will be awarded 2000 gems currency in advance; you still want to plan ahead on what servers to meet up with your friends though!

That brings me to the inevitable question of how people are planning their beta weekend – if there are any plans at all. What will be your personal first stop and what’s your review focus for later?
Alternatively, what would other players like to see and read after this coming weekend?

I am definitely going to have my own thorough look at the character customization, to follow-up a previous post. It’s a shame that the Asura won’t be available especially, but then I understand and support the notion (see second last question) of not giving away everything before official launch. Another major focus of mine will be exploring the setting and WvW – yesh please! I hope playing elementalist will be as interesting and exciting as I imagine.

Oh, and in case you’re about to change your mind about this weekend, the pre-purchase is currently still available! If you’re joining any EU server by chance, drop a note in the comments, twitter or elsewhere and maybe some of us can make it to the same place. Let the weekend come!

[GW2] Asura: The most badass "MMO shorties" ever?

Gibberlings / Gnomes / Taru-Taru

Most traditional MMORPGs with a classic race palette feature them – just as much as they struggle with them, too: short folk. Put in to create racial and character diversity which is usually lacking in customization menus (you cannot create seriously short characters yourself), many MMOs still fall horribly short (!) with their portrayal of short races. In fact, heavy cliches will often overpower the whole purpose behind racial diversity, completely.

Let’s take Allods’ Gibberlings as a first example. One of the most original attempts ever made in an MMO, namely to make the player character appear as a group of three with individual customization and name for each, falls flat on its nose by serving every conceivable stereotype associated with short and therefore less intimidating people. Or as the Allods Wiki describes them:

The Gibberlings are creatures from a destroyed part of Sarnaut. Due to their curiosity, peacefulness and friendliness, they quickly adjusted to the new conditions. They are trusted, reliable friends for their allies and a dangerous foe for those that don’t take them seriously. However, unlike other races, they have no ambitions for this world. Their greatest desire is to return to the times of Isa, when the whole world was open to them for exploration. Will the Gibberlings find a way to be as happy as they were before, or will they think of something new?

The only bone thrown towards the Gibberlings’ prowess is that they’re “a dangerous foe for those that don’t take them seriously”. Oh, wicked! That aside, they are everything you can expect from a friendly, inherently good and physically weak civilization: they have no ambitions, are great pals and wanna explore the world in peace. Ahem…too bad you’re also supposed to pick them for your alter ego in a game mostly revolving around war and combat! Who feels like picking the Gibberlings for battle when they also happen to be all furry cuteness, big eyed with a goofy gait? Don’t get me wrong, I think they’re adorable but that’s about it.

Next up, World of Warcraft’s gnomes. While directly ripped off the awesome gnomish races of engineers established in classic D&D storytelling, I’ve never been a fan of the presentation of gnomes in WoW – despite the odd crazed and power hungry NPC persona among them. Gnomes are no doubt cunning and smart a people, but they’re also awfully cute; freaky hairstyles and colors aside, they come with the classic baby-face effect, a-sexual bodies and childish voices. They appear as infantilized humans when they should be an original race in their own right.

To complete a trio, let’s consider the Taru-Taru of Final Fantasy XI online. A race of powerful magic users, Tarus live in a peaceful and lush Forrest town, deeply devoted to their studies. Unlike other races, they are unable to age physically, they look and move like children, come with a cute button nose and have been referred to posses “chipmunk-like” attributes.

…I think we are getting the picture. No need to continue with Hobbits or other races from the classic fantasy genre. Obviously we are dealing with a stereotype that could be called positive racism – at least as far as the magical or intellectual capabilities of all these races go. And while we do get a degree of stereotyping for most races in classic MMOs, I still need to ask why in fictional, magical worlds especially, small statures must equal a cute, friendly and nerdy personality?

Enter Guild Wars 2: Asura

To follow up my question, I am not opposed to cute or peace-loving characters in MMOs (paradox as it may seem in places…), or even entire races/cultures. What I do object to however, is that the great majority of these characters are also short folk. Surely in a world of powerful magic, body size is not exactly a limiting factor? And how come that traits like being nice and cute are automatically associated with being little? If you follow that train of thought, you’ll end up at the underlying suggestion that having a tall, athletic physique leads to aggressive or evil behavior, whereas a lack thereof takes that choice away and somehow forces short people to be friendly people.

Can the MMO genre not outgrow the idea of small folk as human children already? Add to this that in most games, the short race is always on the good/alliance side if such exists (in WoW too goblins were a neutral faction a long time before getting added to the horde). Why should short races not be inherently evil? Badass, scary and intimidating? Aggressive and combative even? Well, a first and second look at Guild Wars’ Asura has me filled with hope in this department. Already briefly featured in GW1, many players like myself currently waiting for GW2 will not have encountered this unique race before. By no means innovative on every account, a few aspects stood out to me when checking beta reviews and footage. The Asura do come with the same associated knack for technology and study as gnomes in WoW, but that’s where the similarities end.

For one thing, the Asura are not your standard aww-inspiring staple shorties; there is something very uncanny, almost creepy about their facial physiognomy. Indeed, the Asura are about as cute to me as the tooth fairies in the Hellboy movie. It is remarkable character design that evokes such feelings despite the small stature, big eyes and floppy ears. The pointy teeth undoubtedly play a part and then there’s many arrogant looking or grumpy stares to be found in their character creation. I don’t know about you, but I don’t feel like pinching an Asura’s cheek!

Spot the cute Asura!

Naturally, there will still be some cute asuran faces, especially for the females (shocker) which is why I included one in the above picture. However, these appear to be a minority. It gets very obvious that cuddliness is not the standard overall theme for this race. Many Asura look angry, superior or plain ugly – and unlike some players have commented on GW2 Guru, I happen to love it!

I also welcomed the information in an article on Talk Tyria (which beat me to this topic!) that introduces Asura as a very competitive culture, haughty and dismissive towards everyone else to the point of plain racist. There exist dark ambitions within special factions among them (called Inquest), displaying amoral and cruel behavior. The entire article is a very interesting read, especially if you happen to love your lore and roleplay. I also quite enjoyed reading ANet’s developer commentary where Heron Prior talks about the challenge of creating a less boring and fresh look for their shortest race – and how difficult a task this was considering the overall more realistic character design of GW2.

He also mentions that the Asura were given a clumsier movement style to counter their arrogance with an overall “more endearing” feel. I can understand how this choice is unpopular with some GW1 players. From their point of view, the original Asura have been softened down or goofed up to appeal to a wider audience in GW2. Having not played GW1 myself however, they are still one of the most refreshing races in the game, the most badass short race I’ve personally come across and at the very least, the most well-balanced one compared to other games!

For the very first time ever in an MMO am I actually considering playing a shorty; they’re a very close second to my already announced Norn crush. I will definitely spend some time on creating an Asura alt when GW2 finally launches, they are pure win!

Is ArenaNet suffering from Blizzard angst?

It’s an old tale that MMO developers will constantly eye their competition with worry where release dates are concerned and that they withhold or adjust new launches depending on who else is in the race the same year. Frequently, it’s been Blizzard that’s been accused of stalling the entire industry; the reason why Age of Conan did so badly, the reason why Rift was delayed, the reason why SWTOR took so long…..et cetera. You can find a forum discussion for them all. No matter what, somehow there’s a WoW expansion or other Blizzard culprit behind it.

…Or isn’t there?

I generally eye such claims with much skepticism. However, the whole argument was revived for me when reading this insistent comment by Doone the other day:

I’m holding out hope for Arenanet, but they’re even more vulnerable than ever: their lack of reliable release date lies in their fear of Blizzard making plans to absolutely crush them by releasing something from their stock simultaneously. I’ve also written recently on this point too: Blizzard is releasing every game IP they own THIS YEAR. You think that’s coincidence? Arenet is being held by the neck because of this. They want to be sure they can drop their game when it’s not competing with a Blizzard title, and this is even more true because their game doesn’t profit from subscriptions. It only has a chance in hell of making money if players are playing (item shop). The stakes are too high for them”

Now, I don’t doubt that game companies would engage in market analysis and politics when potential multi-million profits are involved; but just how realistic is it to “blame” Diablo III or MoP for ArenaNet’s current release date hesitation? Is it really wise to attribute that much power to a single factor or aren’t we entering the realm of conspiratorial speculation at this point? For what its worth, here’s ArenaNet’s more recent, official statement on the matter:

No, we won’t. It’s not like we have a secret release date and we’re not telling you. We meant what we said: we’ll release the game when it’s ready. And beta testing is where we find out if it’s ready.”

That’s pretty much the reply we’ve heard for a year now. It’s ready when it’s ready – an applaudable approach too. One we can still believe though?

I’m not an MMO developer or publisher, so I cannot make judgements on why/if ArenaNet would be under severe Blizzard angst right now, any more than the other way around. What we probably can say is that GW2 looks very ready and its launch seems imminent. Nobody is under the illusion that the pre-purchase betas are going to serve much testing purposes. It’s safe to say too, that it might prove tricky to find a perfect “launch gap” when trying to dodge major releases this year. But aren’t there many more factors at play and stake when it comes to finalizing MMO release dates? You know, on the development (final polish) or administrative side (servers, retails, community management etc.) of such a great undertaking? And how much power does truly lie in such launch timing, anyway? Maybe ArenaNet are simply looking to push the hype on for a few more weeks? This too would seem plausible to me.

I’d really like to hear more opinions on the matter. When do you think GW2 will be released and is there any close connection to Diablo III (due May 15th) or Mists of Pandaria which coincidentally is still missing a release date too? Personally, I still believe we are looking at late June to July for Guild Wars 2, fingers crossed.

Could we please NOT have targeting highlights!

I hated them in every MMO I’ve ever played. Still hate them bigtime whenever I’m playing Rift.
I mean, just look at this!

Can you see me NAO?

What is it with the white frame all around my target? I have eyes and a target window popping up – I can already see what I got targeted! It doesn’t matter if they are white, green or any other shade; full-body target highlights are obtrusive, ugly and unnecessary!

I am extremely bugged by this type of visual aid in MMOs. I already have a UI with floating symbols, bars and buttons overlaying my illusion; do I really need the immersion destroyed further by bright highlights all over targets, myself included? Am I dealing with people, NPCs and mobs or RTS style units?

There are a few games that handle this more delicately, with a faint shadow or ring on the ground, maybe a brighter name-tag. It’s obviously a big deal for PvP especially, although one could argue that players should just learn to tell opponents or aggressive mobs apart themselves without a visual crutch. Brave adventurers that we all are, we can’t seem to go anywhere without our GPS, quest markers and target highlights…..

Why am I bringing this up now? Because I really do hope Guild Wars 2 will let you switch it off! There’s not just a target ring on the ground and a floating arrow above, but apparently also full scale highlights in different colors for targeting/mouse-hover:

Yikes! A target window is all I need. Add a shadow if you have to – but enough with the highlight disco already! I guess this is the perfect time to name my top 5 UI gripes in MMOs:

  • Bright and colorful target highlights
  • Sparkling quest objects or areas
  • Quest/event markers and paths on the map
  • White/yellow/green/red NPC state indicators
  • Chat bubbles (eugh)

…and pretty much every flavor of not so subtle hints and themepark rails. I know, this ain’t the real thing, I know I’m not really a fire mage but please – please let me delude myself as far as choosing my own path and knowing my own targets will go, thanks!

GW2 pre-purchase ponderings

So there it is at last, lying on my desk. Things are getting more tangible. A white sober DVD case – nothing fancy. Very under-statement. It’s shockingly empty inside, just a card with a serial key telling me to go online and register. Not sure why it comes with the standard case at all, staring at me with a naked eye but there you go. Beta weekends, three days headstart is all I need to know. First time I ever paid for an MMO that doesn’t even have an official release date yet. How odd! But then, I didn’t know either how great the LotR movies were gonna be when I bought out two complete theater rows for the EU premieres several weeks in advance (every year!). I knew my friends were going to be there though; that tends to have a reliably positive effect on one’s enjoyment. There’s also an oddly lackluster trailer full of old footage. For once the goons on youtube got it right. Not that anyone cared.

On the beta weekends

Some players stay away from the beta for spoiler reasons but I’m way past that stage. Not sure what I could possibly spoil at this point; the game is as overdue as a Swedish bus and I just want to FINALLY see something for myself. The only thing the WoW beta did for me was confirming what I already suspected, along with exclamations of “omg I want moar of this!”. I can’t wait for end of April now. I’ve watched too many videos by other people. As for bugs – bugs don’t bug me. There’s something strangely nostalgic about them.

On playing GW1

I’ve wondered briefly whether to follow other players in giving the first title a go. There’s the wait time until release and it might not be the worst idea to have a quick look at GW1. Not sure what it can truly teach me though – aren’t the dissimilarities going to be a lot bigger than anything? I’m still undecided whether I should really expose my eyes to this ancient predecessor. Feels more like spoiling for no good reason to me. The real deal is still out there and in desperate need of an ETA.

Time to part

As I worry about my dated PC specifications a little (will I be able to play in PvP battles of 300 people with a “WoW machine?”), it’s definitely time to pull the plug on an old love. Disc space is running low and it feels strangely well timed: good-bye WoW, time to uninstall. It was fun for a very long time, thanks! I’ll keep the screenshots folder. May GW2 be worthy of your passing. May it bring us new stories and epic memories.

We are waiting. (And definitely prepared!)

P.S. Priest T5 and Anathema forever in our hearts!