Guild Wars 2

In a market that sees new names popping up all the time, new names that equally disappoint the expectations of their publishers and players, the new magic word is Free 2 Play, an economic model that does not foresee initial costs for users nor a monthly subscription . At the moment only World of Warcraft and EVE Online seem to be able to survive the onslaught of Free 2 Play, while Guild Wars 2 offers a hybrid economic model already used in the past by its predecessor: players must buy the game (the official price it's 55 euros, slightly higher than the average for PC games), but they don't have to pay a monthly subscription to continue connecting to the official servers. NCsoft and ArenaNet will finance and financially support the game thanks to the publication of expansions that will probably introduce areas, equipment and classes, but which will be completely optional to continue playing. Even if it doesn't seem, not having to pay a monthly allowance to play is a big incentive and sales so far seem to give NCsoft reason. The other source of income for developers comes from the gems that can be purchased on the store integrated in the game, which are used to buy aesthetic items and additional inventory space. Their cost in real currency is definitely not cheap, but fortunately it is also possible to buy them using the gold accumulated by playing (at the moment, with about 2 pieces of gold and 50 of silver you get 600 gems).

The creation of the characters is quite traditional and the five races have an excellent characterization, probably able to satisfy everyone's tastes. It is among the eight available classes that we find the first new features of Guild Wars 2 compared to the canons of the genre: there are still classes such as warriors in heavy armor and agile ones in light armor, hunters specialized in the use of weapons such as bows and rifles and magicians, but, contrary to what we are used to, in Guild Wars 2 we do not find predefined roles, such as the sacred trinity of the MMORPG, i.e. tank, curator and DPS (i.e. who does damage in the group). This solution frees players from the obligation to always have certain classes in a group and makes the formation of a party much easier, but it also makes fighting in the dungeons much more confusing than usual, due to the lack of a structure of default game. In addition, players are forced to change their habits, clashes are much more dynamic and staying still for too long often leads to a rapid and painful death, perhaps also due to a not perfect balance between monster damage and ability defensive characters.

The variety of monsters and enemies is impressive.

Each character has at their disposal five offensive and five support abilities; while the latter are freely selectable from those unlocked up to that point, the former are linked to the weapon being contested. So, for example, a warrior will have a set of five attacks holding a club and a shield and five completely different ones with a two-handed sword (and each class has many different combinations). It is a versatile system, which allows you to adapt your character to the contingent situation and the needs of the group, also thanks to the possibility of having two sets of weapons and being able to switch between them at any time. Once all weapon and passive abilities are unlocked, and you can do it quickly enough, you only have to assign the points of the Trait, five branches of passive characteristics that enhance the character's statistics and give access to passive abilities that can be changed at any time. Although initially you have the feeling that the character, once you learn the skills of weapons, stops evolving, in reality the Trait system offers a remarkable freedom of personalization and that I frankly did not expect.

By releasing an MMO game today, producers and publishers are taking a lot of risk . For this reason, all innovations and ideas must be limited to calculated, predictable solutions that will arouse the interest of players. In free-to-play productions, everything is measured - the time users spend with the game, when they log in most often, and how much they spend on microtransactions. In this world, you can easily create a monster like Facebook farm clickers, because this approach earns the most money.

Fortunately, ArenaNet studio and NCsoft are not contributing to this "free" clone front, although they use similar solutions (eg rewarding the player for each activity). Guild Wars 2 does not require a subscription, and offers a ton of content. Content served in an unusual, original and fresh way. Is this a revolution in the genre? I say no, which I will try to explain in this review. Guild Wars 2 is simply a game that is made to be smart and fair and you will have more fun than ever before.

Guild Wars 2 has a standard structure for an MMO and in this aspect resigns from the unusual structure of the "one" . The ubiquitous instances have been replaced with large locations where dozens or even hundreds of players meet. Each area contains a number of activities to complete - here the first interesting feature of the game comes into play. ArenaNet does not hide the content in any way. On the contrary: he boasts about it and pushes it to the fore . So we know exactly how many percent of the world we have visited and how many tasks we have left. We also receive achievements to complete all the time, which in turn increase the influence of experience. One system drives the other, resulting in immersive and satisfying gameplay.

This is a clever procedure or even a well-set trap, because thanks to this, most players will also want to discover side elements, e.g. viewpoints or interesting places that are usually ignored. The more that we get prizes almost always - the title rewards exploration, collecting and creating items, fighting, competition and cooperation. Just everything. The promise of receiving a cheerfully bouncing box with randomly selected items motivates you to act , draws you into the game and makes you complete daily tasks. Work systematically on the next ones, that is, return regularly to Tyria. In return for these returns, the game proposes constant development and new challenges.

The amazing thing is that ArenaNet has lived up to its previously made growth curve promises. Virtually every level gained requires a similar effort . Actually, the day starts with getting another one - this guarantees completing a set of daily achievements. I take this as an advantage, although I am aware that not everyone will agree. For many MMO fans, character development is grinding, work. It's not here, although the challenges can be found in the gameplay diversity itself. To paraphrase a saying, life in Guild Wars 2 begins in the sixties - the game ends with regular encounters with dragons, more and more forays into the dungeon, and the first serious attempts to rule in WvWvW. Before that, the fun is great, but here it reaches its peak, introducing greater challenges, but also incomparably more interesting rewards.

The strength of Guild Wars 2 are well-designed locations filled with unusual attractions . You start the game, see an event that has just happened, and instead of proceeding with it, you take part in it. At the same time, the world tries to remain meaningful. The missions are related not only in terms of plot, but also in terms of mechanics. By carrying out one order, we reach the next. Such sequences of events make the same areas vary and remain interesting . It is characteristic that even when playing individually, we operate in large groups. This introduces a surprising chaos for an MMO. Surprising, but positive, because it does not deteriorate the quality of the game in any way (unless we are talking about sudden drops in the smoothness of the game on weaker PCs).

The tasks themselves are also diverse - usually we can fight or complete side interactive missions . It is a mixture of seriousness, nonsense and absurdity. Let me just mention that the Charr, the breed I play, breed cattle. Within several dozen hours, I had the opportunity to protect cows, wash them, watch their races or help in ... shooting them from a catapult. Over time, the game becomes more serious, because the stakes are higher and higher - from personal matters we move on to the problems of the factions and finally to unite them in the fight against dragons. The plot consists of segments resulting from the choices made in the character creator and during the game. As a result, by passing the campaign with a different character, we get new content.

The changes go further and disrupt the divisions typical of MMOs. Tank, healer, DPS - these definitions in Guild Wars 2 are much more blurry and harder to assign to specific classes . Virtually each of them has several styles of operation. The Engineer, my basic and favorite character for now, can take turrets and play defensively. It only takes a few seconds outside the fight for me to switch him to the owner of deadly gadgets - a flamethrower or a grenade launcher. A few changes and I don't need to use boosters, focusing on drinking potions to boost my attacks. The number of options is also increased by the ability to use different types of weapons and modify your equipment . There are also "features", the equivalent of statistics. In what other MMO game could you change your character so easily? Only one title comes to mind. The first Guild Wars .

These changes are followed by a combat system that rewards certain manual skills . In Guild Wars 2, we must be careful not only about the life bar, but also where we stand. You can even make up for differences in levels by running and jumping. Especially if we properly select the skills to the situation. It may not be as brilliant as the one from the first game, but it still impresses with its design. Instead of dozens of similar abilities that are spammed without thinking, we get interesting attacks, spells, spells, curses, etc. The game may initially frighten you with the enormity of unusual solutions and the need to think about what to use, but it is generally friendly and tries to gradually learn new tactics.

I like almost everything - that's a fact. Guild Wars 2 is a game that in my case meets most of the requirements to stay on disk longer (unlike The Old Republic or a few other recent MMO titles). However, I don't think ArenaNet has used the full potential of MMOs. The second Guild Wars follows the path marked by others. It just steers it differently, offers more comfortable travel conditions, promising that a better future is its goal. Part of my regret is that there are no more themes from open and fully player-oriented MMO titles ( Ultimy Online , Wurm Online ). On the other hand, I realize that most people reject such a hardcore approach, requiring hundreds of hours, per kilometer.

What Guild Wars 2 is weaker in? Well, there are a few things. Actually, I will skip technical bugs, noting that a lot of quests still don't work as they should and the trading system is unstable . The important thing is that ArenaNet tries to make sure that even broken parts are playable and regularly fix bugs. Thanks to this, certain things can be avoided, scored in a different way or postponed. Of course, the lags are quite a problem, at which the dynamic combat system crashes and the game begins to resemble its predecessors from a few years ago. However, I am counting on ArenaNet to stabilize the situation.

What is puzzling is the very construction of the plot . Without going into disputes about her role in MMOs, it can be said that she seems quite selective. It's a bit like the developer throws up certain slogans, themes, locations, and characters to come back to later. On the other hand, the game effectively builds a couple of interesting personalities whose further adventures one would like to meet. This approach prepares the ground for further additions - and it's actually quite an interesting thing, as we don't know exactly how ArenaNet intends to develop its game yet (smaller mission packs, or maybe full-fledged extensions?). What we got in the stand is enough for many hours, although some people have already finished the world in 100%. Will they keep playing? Of course, because there are still many other things to do - including WvWvW and PvP.