Community Review: Guild Wars 2

47 responses to “Community Review: Guild Wars 2”

1. 

   bob

   September 3, 2012 at 11:06 am

   As soon as I’m finished with the project I’m on at work, I’m getting it. Looks and sounds awesome!

   Reply
2. 

   Nighthawk

   September 3, 2012 at 11:19 am

   It’s very good. Extremely challenging though. As a person whose first experience with MMO’s was World of Warcraft, I struggled through the first ten levels. Apart from that, there’s never nothing to do and the individual quest lines are a lot of fun so it rates pretty high. I’ve not had any issues with servers yet but I do tend to start off the game in an “overflow”, which is basically where they dump people while they’re queuing to enter their actual world (which they can’t do immediately due to high population). You’re still able to do the same things you normally would so it’s not that big an issue.

   Reply
3. 

   Sent2Strike

   September 3, 2012 at 11:20 am

   Yeah i’ve been playing it a bit. I’ve started 4 different professions: Thief, Elementalist, Warrior and Guardian. They all feel quite unique and the starting areas for each race are too. The gameplay is a lot better than most mmo’s and it feels more like an action game/ mmo hybrid which I like! The storyline is good but not great. PvP is where it shines though as you can use your environment to your advantage and some of the 1 v 1 battles can go for several minutes.

   It’s definitely worth a try as its a fairly casual mmo. You can actually play it for 1 to 2 hours and still get some progression compared to other MMO’s this is not really feasible.

   Reply
4. 

   matt30822

   September 3, 2012 at 11:25 am

   A fantastic game that is very fresh due to the multiple ways to complete quests, the incentives to explore beyond achievements is also fantastic and the combat is simple but effective. Easily have sunk 30-40 hours into it already and no sign of slowing down until i finish up some end game content in 3-4 weeks time. There are many things done right in the game and i am sure they will all be mentioned below.

   However there are a few things that are holding this game back for me from being THE game, even though i understand it is still only been a week since launch and some of these issues can be fixed quite easily while others might never change and will turn me off the game eventually.

   1. While there are no set roles like the MMO’s of late (healer, tank, DPS) in this game which i think is great, they haven’t applied that model to dungeons at all. Dungeons are what kept me coming back to other MMOs after i finished the main quests and after playing the first 2 dungeons i was quite disappointed how they essentially required the same old healer/tank/DPS but due to the simplistic combat and being limited to 9-10 moves…. it can be quite dull and frustrating. Also the fact that if you die while fighting a boss, you can simply teleport to a waypoint in the instance, go rep, go back into the boss fight and keep going. This makes reviving people pointless and incentive to die even less so unless you are the last one or two people because you don’t want the boss to reset. Quite frankly any boss can be beaten and it is not a matter of difficulty but just endless kiting the bosses around until your firends come back in 10 seconds after respawning, damage him, die, repeat.

   Will this change? Maybe – hopefully it does otherwise i don’t think i will be interested in dungeons for very long.

   2. The story. Or lack thereof. There are some nice cutscenes in the game but really the story is just terrible. Not really an issue for some MMO players i know and it isn’t for me but already i am missing SWTOR and feel i might roll an alt when it goes FTP and i am taking a break from GW2.

   3. The little things. These will/should be fixed over time which will make this game great but for now… Trading post is a mess, either down or not working properly and not enough filters. Inability to trade directly with other people, have to use mail system even if they are 2 feet in front of you. Overflow being held on Euro servers (sometimes) even if your main server is in the US. Going from Overflow->Main Server->Story Instance->Overflow->Main Server, repeat is not fun, have an option to stay in overflow.

   So yes great game and in time even better game. But i still can’t see myself playing this very much beyond a few runs of end game content and max level.

   Reply
   1. 

      Mark Serrels

      September 3, 2012 at 11:31 am

      Thanks for the post!

      Reply
   2. 

      alinos

      September 3, 2012 at 12:05 pm

      have an option to stay in overflow.

      Technically their is an option to stay in overflow it’s to simply tell the server you would like to re-enter the queue. However the thing is that there are multiple overflows. So you might say stay in overflow when coming out of an instance but it likely won’t be the same overflow.

      The overflow shouldn’t be a huge issue once the playerbase spreads out. I played for a good 5 hours yesterday without entering overflow once.

      Reply
   3. 

      meh

      September 4, 2012 at 11:58 am

      You do get the option to stay in overflow. and as for this:

      “Dungeons are what kept me coming back to other MMOs after i finished the main quests and after playing the first 2 dungeons i was quite disappointed how they essentially required the same old healer/tank/DPS but due to the simplistic combat and being limited to 9-10 moves…. it can be quite dull and frustrating. Also the fact that if you die while fighting a boss, you can simply teleport to a waypoint in the instance, go rep, go back into the boss fight and keep going. This makes reviving people pointless and incentive to die even less so unless you are the last one or two people because you don’t want the boss to reset. Quite frankly any boss can be beaten and it is not a matter of difficulty but just endless kiting the bosses around until your firends come back in 10 seconds after respawning, damage him, die, repeat.”

      1. Dying damages your equipment. Die enough time and they start to break, so you can’t just endlessly respawn and run back to the boss.

      2. The reason why you are having problems is because you are playing with the healer/tank/dps setup. Don’t. It is DOABLE that way in the early dungeons, but it is not efficient at all. If everybody knows how to take care of themselves, dungeons becomes a lot more fun (And easier too). I did a dungeon yesterday with a party of 5 high mobility, high damage builds. We were all essentially highly mobile glass cannons and we had a ton of fun and did really well with very few deaths. The key is deliberately bouncing the mobs off each other, leading them to AoE areas etc. And making sure that you don’t run into another pack of mobs accidentally while kiting.

      Reply
5. 

   Coltzer

   September 3, 2012 at 11:27 am

   The graphics are pretty awesome for an MMO, especially when you see some of the scenery and landscape as a whole from a distance (or one of the vista’s around). On that note, the whole world is littered with little places to find which reward xp, but it’s just awesome to go and see all the amazing models and art the developers made.

   Combat feels very similar to the standard mmo model, but a lot faster especially with dodging. The skill system is most interesting in how it affects the game, as half your skills are based on the weapons you equip, the others you choose. The game is really smart in how it encourages coop too, and you’ll often be teaming up with players and getting all the bonuses of group play without having to be formally invited (or invite someone) to a party (but you can anyway). Features such as instanced loot and shared xp (in that you get the same amount if you kill something by yourself, or 2 other people are helping you, whether they’re in your party or not. And so do they). And questing is a little more open ended with the ‘events’, so it won’t feel nearly as grindy or linear as other mmo’s. Add the level scaling (if you go into a lower level area, your stats will scale accordingly, but you’ll still have an advantage with high level gear), which makes it more than worthwhile to explore low level area’s you haven’t seen yet.

   On top of that, once you start getting good at the WvWvW PVP, you can get some pretty decent xp without having to play the normal game at all. PVP works extremely well since it also level scales, but this time everyone just goes straight up to 80 (the max). Again, like in the normal environment, you will haver an advantage (albeit slight) by having higher level gear, but even a lvl 1 could jump into PVP and get some kills. The normal PVP also scales you, but you get a seperate ‘PVP’ gear so the advantage is nullified completely here.

   All of these features add up to an MMO that addresses many of the common downfalls as seen in most modern MMO’s, as well as coming up with some innovative new approaches to other systems which make the game enjoyable right from level 1.

   Reply
6. 

   Jordaan Mylonas

   September 3, 2012 at 11:28 am

   I will say this for the payment model: Not having to pay an ongoing fee removes the pressure to keep playing for risk of wasting subscription money. However, buying the game outright prevents the flood of F2P scabs. Such a good payment model.

   Reply
7. 

   Dire Wolf

   September 3, 2012 at 11:30 am

   I’m having fun with it. My initial reaction was, this is sort of average, but then the game would do something amazing that would really draw me in and as I kept playing I found myself liking it more and more. Structuring my review in Kotaku’s typical love/hate fashion:

   [b]Loved:[/b]

   [b]The World Design:[/b] GW2 is a very pretty place and and scale of some things in the game is just mind boggling. Divinity’s Reach looks amazing, as do the other cities in the game. The landscapes are also quite nice looking, though less varied than I would have liked (more on that later).

   [b]The Combat:[/b] GW2 still uses typical MMO combat, but it’s a lot more action oriented than most other MMOs, with pleanty of moving around the place to dodge enemy attacks. The way skills are based on what weapons you’re holding is an interesting twist and it’s cool to find things out in the world you can pick up and also use as a weapon. The animations are all top notch.

   [b]A reason to explore:[/b] Unlike a lot of other MMOs, GW2 really wants you out and exploring the world. Between events, skill points, Assassin’s Creed style view points, you’re never going to want to explore every nook and crany you can.

   [b]A different sort of questing system:[/b] After playing so many MMOs where I run up to an npc, grab a quest to kill 10 X and then return for my reward, GW2’s questing system feels really fresh and fun. I wouldn’t say it’s better, it’s just new, and MMOs really need something new at the moment.

   [b]World PVP:[/b] This is a lot of fun. A lot. It’s the big battles most MMO have been missing with the industires general move to arena, small scale e-sports type pvp. Running around on such a large map, laying siege to enemies keeps and defending your own, it’s all a blast.

   [b]Hated:[/b]

   [b]Playing from Australia:[/b] Like most MMOs, GW2 does not have Oceanic servers, and as such it suffers from a certain degree of lag. It’s nothing that can’t be compensated for, but as this is a more action oriented game it is more noticeable than other games.

   [b]Bland story/questing:[/b] I am playing a level 35 human thief. So far my personal story hasn’t been terrible, but it hasn’t been all that engaging and some of the dialogue is laughably lame. It’s the general quests that are the real problem though. For 35 levels I’ve fought almost nothing but bandits and centaurs who have been attacking farms or guard outposts. Who are these bandits? Who are these centaurs? Why are we at war with them? Who knows. The game makes no effort to explain. They serve as nothing but boring cannon fodder as you journy through the world. There’s supposed to be dragons or something that server as the games main villains, but the game so far hasn’t really gone into it, they’re never really introduced to the player. There’s been an odd mention here and there but that’s about it.

   [i]Interlude time cause I’ve got to go catch a train. I’ll be adding more to this review later (about 1.00 or 1.30).[/i]

   Reply
   1. 

      Dire Wolf

      September 3, 2012 at 11:32 am

      And bold and italics didn’t work. Why is that? Been a while since I’ve mucked around with html. Was I supposed to use different brackets?

      Reply
      1. 

         Jordaan Mylonas

         September 3, 2012 at 11:37 am

         Do angle brackets work?

         Reply
      2. 

         TheLastQuestion

         September 3, 2012 at 11:40 am

         <> and > I think.

         Reply
         1. 

            Dire Wolf

            September 3, 2012 at 1:15 pm

            Right, right. How could I forget.

            Reply
      3. 

         Eko

         September 3, 2012 at 11:51 am

         Spot on with the monster variety to be honest, I made the point myself after rolling an alt. Centaurs, undead, pirates, ogres, repeat basically for 1-80.
         The dragons are out there, and you do fight more than one during the story line, and there are some dynamic event ones that spawn out in the world that I was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time for.

         Lag hasn’t been all that noticeable for me except for some rubber banding issues with my ranger’s leap attacks, and some of the sPvP games I join I have to leave because the delay is a couple of seconds worth, although if I join a different game it seems to go back to normal.

         I levelled the whole way by 100% completing every zone I went into, thats completing every quest hub, finding every skill point and discovering every point of interest on each map, and that to me was refreshing after playing WoW for years and doing every quest in the same order every single time…

         Enjoying this game so far, I will see how the end game is panning out to make my own final judgement tbh.

         Reply
         1. 

            meh

            September 4, 2012 at 12:06 pm

            uhh, on top of what you mentioned, I have also fought:

            Harpies, Bears, Sons of Svanir, Bats, Wolves, Nightmare Court, Inquest, Grubs, Drakes, Skale, Fish, Sharks, Skritt, Hylek, Moas, Kraits, Aatxe, Ettins, Spiders, Skelks, Ghosts, Dolyaks, Wurms, Jaguars, Fire Elementals, Ice Elementals, Stone Elementals and many many more and that’s only in the first 5 starting areas. Obviously if you only stick to certain areas you will only see certain types of enemies

            Reply
   2. 

      Dire Wolf

      September 3, 2012 at 1:33 pm

      Okay, on with part two, in which I’ve forgotten half the stuff I was originally going to write. Still sticking with the Hated, even though I thought of more stuff I loved.

      Sexist armour: Okay, I’ll admit there are some armour sets out there for guys in this game that are quite revealing, but like most MMOs GW2 suffers from bikini armour for female characters. You need only hit up the character creation screen and compare female warrior armour to what the men are wearing to see this. I know some people don’t think this sort of thing’s a big deal, and I’m not going to go into a whole debate about it here, but I think it’s really time games, and MMOs in particular, move past this sort of thing.

      Crafting: GW2 has your typical MMO crafting set up. Have mats in bag, click create, watch bar fill up. Nothing really special. It does seem to be quite grindy though, which is a shame since the game’s done a great job of not feeling grindy in most other aspects. Hopefully when the auction house is working I you can buy mats from other people easily it won’t seem like such a grind but at the moment I can’t really see myself getting too much into it.

      I will have to mention though, as something I loved but forgot to stick in the love section, that the way anyone can gather anything, provided they have the right tools, and the way you can send things from you inventory to your collectables slot in the bank, is really, really cool.

      I’ve also got to mention the auction house/trade post. It was working for me for about half an hour the other night and I got to mess around with it a bit. At the moment purchasing things from it is pretty laggy, with no guarantee you’ll even get the item you tried to purchase, and it overcharged me by several silver, but aside from the bugs that will get ironed out it was a pretty good auction house. It was very easy to navigate and find exactly what you wanted.

      For my last hated I’m going to have to mention the gem store/cash shop. First up, I’m generally against these types of stores, but I’m willing to give GW2 a pass because it has no subscription fee. Despite my dislike of them though, if there is one in a game I expect it to have worthwhile things to purchase. At the moment the story in GW2 hardly has anything in it. Some xp boosters, which may come in handy when leveling an alt but for your first character why would you even want to rush past the leveling content, a few okay looking clothes options and some minipets. At the moment I just can’t see myself purchasing gems as there’s nothing that interests me in the store.

      To conclude, I’ve probably listed more things I’ve hated (hated is probably too strong a word, but as I said, I’m going by Kotaku’s normal user submitted review format), but that’s only because it’s easier to remember and write about things you dislike. When it comes down to it the positives of this game far outweigh the negatives and with no subscription fee it’s an MMO that’s well worth picking up.

      Reply
      1. 

         lichbane

         September 3, 2012 at 2:44 pm

         Have you tried the discovery section of crafting? It speeds the whole process up massively!

         Reply
      2. 

         meh

         September 4, 2012 at 12:08 pm

         The game has both sexy armor and practical armor for both genders and all armor types. It is unreasonable to expect them to cater to only a single taste

         Reply
   3. 

      Jo

      September 3, 2012 at 2:46 pm

      As far as blandness goes it sounds like the problem is you are playing as a human. Humans and their areas/quests are always the most boring in most games but mmo’s especially imo.

      Reply
      1. 

         Jo

         September 3, 2012 at 2:54 pm

         On that note, fantasy games should move away from giving humans a stereotypical European themed culture I think.
         How much more interesting would the human faction in games like this be if it was based on feudal China or Persia or something? Way more I say.

         Reply
         1. 

            ZaneStriker

            September 3, 2012 at 3:44 pm

            Actually GW does have a Japanese culture. But it’s cut off from the main land in GW2.

            Reply
8. 

   HindenLagen

   September 3, 2012 at 11:44 am

   Fun and refreshing. My brain is still in “WoW” mode so Guild Wars is taking a bit of getting used to. I keep thinking that I have to be in an area set at my level to get xp and gear, but this isn’t the case; being in a lower level area (and being scaled down), keeps it fun, and you get just as much xp and level-appropriate gear!

   Reply
9. 

   Seltox

   September 3, 2012 at 11:48 am

   I’ve been playing it heaps, and overall.. i’m very pleased. There are definite improvements i’d like to see, but they’re things I can imagine coming out with content updates or expansions. Not too many complaints for a vanilla release.

   One of the big things a lot of people seem to either love or hate, is ArenaNet actually enforcing their policies strictly, with a LOT of temporary and permanant bans already going out (for exploiting, insulting people in public chats, racist comments & names, etc). Some people think it’s ridiculous, but i’m totally in favour of it. From the first two days of pre-release to now, the community has seen a VAST improvement in quality. During the first two days or so, no one would help you, you’d just get trolled if you asked a question.. now, most people are willing to help and be nice, and you see very little flaming going on in public chats. People just get along better, so i’d say that enforcing their policies was a really good move.

   There have definitely been server issues. The biggest issue to me is the trading post being offline for about 95% of the time since release. But server issues like this are things that I don’t really mind, ESPECIALLY because i’m not paying a subscription to it – I don’t feel like i’m losing out on my money when I can’t play, I just have to do something else instead. So server issues, annoying, but not a big issue to me personally.

   Gameplay-wise, I think its fantastic. I love the way most of the stories progress (Zojja is awesome,) and all of the races are pretty cool. I expected the Charr to just be a ‘LET’S FIGHT EVERYTHING’ bestial race, but they turned out to be much more in depth than that, and I was really pleased by it.

   I think my biggest gripe so far is the skill system. While I love the way it works, if you want to, you’ll have unlocked every single one of your abilities by level 5, and it leaves nothing left for the rest of the game to really be excited about with skills (except your utility & elite skills, but they’re almost always on long cooldowns, and not too impressive anyway). I’d like to see something introduced that will allow us to learn more skills later on, or maybe even just make it take longer to learn some of them.

   Reply
   1. 

      os42

      September 3, 2012 at 12:04 pm

      Apparently the trading post is only available to around 33% of people atm while they run tests, and they’ll gradually add more people over time until they reach 100% (or the thing falls over). Take that with a grain of salt, tho – I’m only going on what I’ve heard in-game.

      Reply
10. 

    ZaneStriker

    September 3, 2012 at 11:54 am

    It’s amazing but very addictive.

    Reply
11. 

    Bunny

    September 3, 2012 at 11:56 am

    I’m having an absolute blast with it!!!
    MMO’s have never really hooked me because of the grind.
    But this has me!
    I’m pretty sure I’ve got most of my levels from just wondering around finding stuff.
    There have been a lot of times when I’ve dinged and have been like, wow I wasn’t even doing anything..
    Last night was the best, I was just wondering around minding my own business, and, Bam 20 man boss!
    This game is an absolute blast, I’m having the time of my life!

    Reply
    1. 

       Lil Timmy

       September 3, 2012 at 12:55 pm

       Sweet life you got

       Reply
12. 

    os42

    September 3, 2012 at 11:59 am

    I’ve been playing it every other night during the last week, and sunk a lot of time into it over the weekend, and am loving playing an Asuran Necro. The Asurans have a really great sense of humour, and the personal story is actually pretty interesting. As someone that quit WoW due to irritation – an MMO that actively discourages temporary groups – GW2 seems to have solved my main annoyances.

    1. No kill-stealing: experience and loot is the same irrespective of how many people are attacking the same mob (which pretty much encourages you to team up with random people around you to progress through the area easier).

    2. Interesting low-level content and epic bosses: The story, as I said, is pretty interesting, and makes me want to level to get to the next part (not that levelling is difficult – grinding is carefully obfuscated, and off-quest grinding is pretty much useless, except for material farming). There are also some pretty amazing bosses: the Fire Elemental in north-western Metrica had about 15 of us getting our butts kicked for half an hour (couldn’t get near it for all the minions it spawned), and a giant wurm in the Caledon Forest swamp actually made me forget I was playing an MMO. The quests and events are all given context too, which is something I loathed about WoW – why am I bothering to collect these items for you? In fact, a lot of quest NPCs have a “Why can’t you do this?” dialogue option.

    3. Level scaling: At times a pain (having these boundaries near boss fights is not a good idea – had my arse kicked because I accidentally kited a boss into a slightly lower-level zone, and got one-shotted by it thanks to the scaling), but for the most part, it’s awesome to be able to run around the starting zones and experience all the content without being completely overpowered for the area.

    4. The community: The way Anet enforces good behaviour, combined with the incentive to form temporary groups leads to a generally nice community. If you need help with a quest or are stumped by something, asking in the chat actually works. People are helpful, and that’s encouraging.

    There are some things I found irritating, of course. The scarcity of mats – even salvaging everything I found, I still find it hard to level my crafting high enough to use the mats in the 15-30 area, despite being level 27. This means that the equipment I can make at any time is worse than what I get off drops, so I just end up re-salvaging items I make to keep crafting. This scarcity of mats seems to necessitate grinding, just for mat-farming (or maybe they’re encouraging people to buy some in the Trading Post when it comes online). Or maybe it’s just because I’m juggling three crafting professions…

    Needless to say, I’m enjoying my time in Tyria. Would I be playing this game if it used a subscription model? No – it’s a good game, but not worth the compulsory, perpetual drain on my finances. Am I thinking about buying gems to get pieces of in-game cosmetic content that my rational brain knows is actually rather expensive for what it is? As much as it pains me to say it, yes; that top hat looks awesome, and so do the round glasses. And when the trading post opens for everyone, I’ll likely be getting them.

    Reply
    1. 

       meh

       September 4, 2012 at 12:11 pm

       For mats, the answer is yes it’s because you’re juggling 3 crafting professions. You can do 2 and be perfectly fine

       Reply
13. 

    nicuma

    September 3, 2012 at 12:03 pm

    I’ve never played MMOs before but this got me too hooked! to the extent i went out to get a better gaming mouse lol.

    Reply
14. 

    Mawt

    September 3, 2012 at 12:08 pm

    I hope this formatting works:

    Eye of the Beholder.
    It looks nice. Its “fantasy art” style feels refreshing, particularly compared to the cartoonish style of WoW or TOR. My rig is 3 years old and everything seems pretty smooth to me.

    Easy, like Sunday Morning.
    Its accessible. Subscription-less MMO, cross server guilds/parties/etc, overspill servers all lend themselves to letting you get online, get in the game and get playing. I’ve not experienced any server issues at all – by comparison trying to play WoW post-5.04 patch, I’m getting disconnected from the server and dropped to the WoW Client login screen every hour or so.

    Access All of the Areas.
    Its accessible. Didn’t I just make this point? It’s also accessible from a game play perspective. Daily and Monthly ‘challenges’ that award experience both for incremental steps and overall completion mean that you should always feel like you’re making progress, whether gathering craft resources, slaying monsters, or completing shared world events. Hunting down Vistas, and Points of Interest also grants experience and rewards exploration.

    War! What is it good for?
    Guild Wars 2 doesn’t faff about with split factions. It’s probably the number one thing that sets it apart from WoW and post-WoW MMOs. In Guild Wars 2 everyone’s working together to fight evil. If you see someone fighting a monster there is no penalty for jumping in and assisting them – you will both get experience and loot, there’s no ‘tapping’ mobs or kill stealing. There’s also no node stealing for resources, so if you’ve got to fight an ogre to get to that patch of berries, some jerk can’t slip past you and take it while you’re doing all the hard work. As a result, crafting feels like a lot more of a grind, but that’s a bit of a pro for me anyway.

    Nunchucks, Bow Hunting, Computer Hacking…
    It’s kept a lot of the core structure of the Guild Wars action bar/skill system that I enjoyed; the limited number of slots means you have to actually think about what you want to be using, rather than just having everything splayed across your screeen (a la WoW). I’m still a little unsure about the static weapon skills. I’ve unlocked each of the abilities for each weapon type that the Guardian class can use and I’ve only just hit level 15 (out of 80), which means combat will likely feel very similar for the next 65 levels.

    Only the lonely.
    GW2’s accessibility may be it’s greatest detriment. It’s only early days, but I don’t feel compelled to group with any of the players around me. I’ll still get loot and experience by flying solo, and I can chat to my friends playing on other servers or fellow Kotaku-ites in the guild that we’ve got going. It doesn’t have the “feel” of a single player game that way SW TOR did, even though the main quests are focused around your character’s “story”, but co-operative play should be the key feature keeping people playing an MMO. Perhaps after I’ve levelled a little more there’ll be more reason to group up. I noticed some people around level 25 looking for more players to tackle what I assumed was a dungeon.

    Slow Burn
    I think GW2 is a pretty good game, but it at the moment I’d say it actually requires a bit more dedication than some of the other MMOs on the market. You’ll get out what you put in, but since ArenaNet isn’t chasing subscriptions, there’s less “instantaneous” rewards being handed out.

    Reply
    1. 

       Mawt

       September 3, 2012 at 12:13 pm

       Aw yeah, I really wanted to emphasize that point on skills!
       Otherwise, formatting success!

       Also, to re-iterate a point made by others, but which I neglected: the community is great, and ArenaNet banning people for breaches early is great – it means that, for the most part, trolls will be very disinclined to play GW2 – AU$70 for a handful of racial slurs isn’t very cost effective.

       Reply
       1. 

          Wander

          September 3, 2012 at 1:37 pm

          Just about those skills – actually, no you haven’t unlocked them all at 15.

          First, you can use a variety of weapons, both land and aquatic. Have you unlocked all of those?

          More importantly though there are Slot Skills which you can only unlock with points and time levelling. These include Elite Skills which can be pretty darn entertaining. E.g. the charzuuka.

          Reply
          1. 

             Mawt

             September 3, 2012 at 2:45 pm

             I’ve unlocked every weapon skill for the Guardian.
             1h sword, 1h mace, 2h sword, 2h mace, scepter, staff, shield, torch and focus, plus trident and spear for underwater.

             I’m aware that skill slots unlock through progression, however with 1-5 taken up by weapons, 6 is a healing spell, that only leaves 7-9 for skill slots.

             My concern was that, having unlocked all of the “weapon” skills already, that combat might become a little stale. It might also have to do with my class choice; a large percentage of the Guardian’s skill have passive effects (such as +regen or +power) and an activated ability that either applies a stronger version of the passive to all allies within radius for a short duration or provide a different short term effect (there’s an ability that removes one debuff every 6 seconds that can be activated for a medium sized heal instead). I’ve already narrowed down the two most efficient builds for fighting large groups of enemies. I’m interested to see what trait skills get unlocked, as those appear to be the only “hidden” abilities.

             I think that a lot of what I’ve worked out won’t apply to group scenarios, but as stated, I haven’t had a chance to test anything like that out yet.

             Reply
             1. 

                meh

                September 4, 2012 at 12:41 pm

                Some traits will change things up considerably, others not so much. But as far as combat feeling the same (ignoring different enemies and enemy AI). That’s pretty much by design. Their whole philosophy is that if you enjoy the game in the early levels, you will enjoy it at max level because there’s no sudden shift in what you do. Of course this also means that if you hate it in the early levels, you will likely hate it in the later levels. The only exception to that philosophy would be the size/scope/frequency /impact of DEs. Those change in the higher levels, affecting the world more and becoming more complex in structure.

15. 

    Steve

    September 3, 2012 at 1:33 pm

    Even though its an MMO, i found it a lot more fun playing alone than with friends. Started it with three others, and we were all learning at different speeds and playing at different speeds. Its a fast paced game, you have to just speed your way through it. When you have to keep coordinating where to go with your friends it really slows it down and gets boring. And no, you cant see where your party members quests are on the map like in swtor.

    Its frustrating trying to stay in range of friends too. You dont want to get too far ahead or you have to redo content with them. I now have three level 15 characters, one for playing with each friend as they arent always all on at the same time. I guess thats a problem with all mmos though, guess thats why we find minecraft so appealing. Can just jump on any time and do wharever.

    Reply
    1. 

       meh

       September 4, 2012 at 12:44 pm

       “And no, you cant see where your party members quests are on the map like in swtor.” you actually can, but it’s currently bugged so it doesn’t always work. But yeah, normally you can. As for redoing content, if you simply roll a different race, you don’t have to “redo” content. And as far as content goes, considering that every single time I pass through a zone I discover than there’s actually something I didn’t see last time, be it a DE, a jumping puzzle, an area etc, I seriously doubt you’ve done all the content in one area.

       Reply
       1. 

          Steve

          September 4, 2012 at 8:36 pm

          “You can, but it doesnt work” still means you cant.
          As for redoing content, i’m a completionist. So, I dont leave an area until i’ve done everything, which means new chars = repeating content.
          The game does allow for multiple play styles.. But, not in a group.

          Reply
16. 

    Neon Jackal

    September 3, 2012 at 3:03 pm

    The combat is pretty bad, everyone keeps claiming it’s skillful and intuitive but it controls just like any other MMO.
    If you don’t already like MMOs then this won’t change your mind.

    Reply
    1. 

       meh

       September 4, 2012 at 12:50 pm

       that’s because you’re playing it like it’s just another MMO. Mobility while using skills is a big deal. No longer am I forced to stand in one spot pressing 1, 2, 3, 4 rinse and repeat. I mean I can do that if I want to, but I’ll die pretty quickly. No longer am I forced to stand perfectly straight underwater while using the exact same skills that I used above ground. No longer am I forced to go to the surface every few seconds to breathe.

       Reply
       1. 

          Neon Jackal

          September 5, 2012 at 5:08 pm

          I move around heaps, it just doesn’t feel good.
          My expectations of combat in MMO-like games have been greatly increased playing games like Monster Hunter Tri and Phantasy Star Online 2, there’s some solid combat.

          Reply
17. 

    effektd

    September 3, 2012 at 3:14 pm

    My only complaints are;

    – The trading post not being avaliable, which ties into my next whinge
    – The utter lack of bank space, 30 slots is no where near adequate especially when you can’t sell your loot on the trading post and are forced to salvage or sell to a vendor for a lower price.

    Other than that, it’s a pretty good game, the questing doesn’t feel like questing at all, it’s not linear and I think that’s a key aspect. The level progression (and zone progression) is however.

    Reply
    1. 

       Mawt

       September 3, 2012 at 6:01 pm

       Make mule alts and mail stuff to them until the trading post becomes available?

       Reply
18. 

    Prodigal Saint

    September 4, 2012 at 11:57 am

    Aussie Guild, Light Horse Brigade (LHB) are recruiting . feel free to hit us up in game, very active guild in all fields, questing, PvP and WvW.
    alternatively find me in game Prodigalsaint.1026

    Reply
19. 

    t

    September 4, 2012 at 12:10 pm

    Myself and half my friends think it’s a single player game with multiplayer elements, much akin to diablo, with no real goal to keep you playing. The other half of my friends think it’s the greatest pvp experience around… but they keep going back to WoW, so go figure. It’s fun and delightfully streamlined for an MMO, just not amazing or game changing in any important capacity.

    Reply
20. 

    fashion articles

    September 13, 2012 at 11:36 pm

    I was just chatting with my coworker about this today at Outback steak house. Don’t remember how in the world we landed on the topic in fact, they brought it up. I do recall eating a outstanding fruit salad with cranberries on it. I digress
    http://bizark001.blog.com/2012/09/13/the-difference-amongst-jute-bags-together-with-cotton-bags-a-breakdown-to-the-rewards-of-jute-and-also-cotton-bags/

    Reply