Guild Wars 2: Impressions From The Closed Beta

[News Portal]

Over the weekend, the vault doors at ArenaNet opened wide to admit a bevy of friends, family, staff and press to the magical world of [app=6096]Guild Wars 2[/app] for a frantic 48 hours of beta testing. We were lucky enough to score an invite, and now bring you our thoughts. Is it the MMO revolution we were promised?

Read full article by Tim Colwill

[TRB]

and it’s even more rarer

I'm no English expert, but that reads slightly 'off' to me.

more rarer?

more rare?

even rarer?

One of those sounds less 'right' to me, but again, I'm no expert.

[exe3]

THAT'S WHAT I WANT!

So keen for this. The only MMO I actually give a d@mn about and after the horrific taste that was WoW I look forward to a real game in the MMO genre.

[Tim Colwill]

and it’s even more rarer

I'm no English expert, but that reads slightly 'off' to me.

No, you're totally right and I missed that. Thanks! It should just be "rarer".

[TRB]

THAT'S WHAT I WANT!

So keen for this. The only MMO I actually give a d@mn about and after the horrific taste that was WoW I look forward to a real game in the MMO genre.

There hasn't been a real MMO launched since WWIIOL/EQ1/UO IMO.

and EQ1 only counted until they introduced instancing over 100% persistent world they used to have.

IMO of course.
I just can't see the point of MMOs that play like single player or LAN games.

Not saying I'm sure GW2 is like that but I'd be highly surprised if it isn't.

[Slazza]

Hopefully the performance is fixed by release for the large scale battles.

What are your specs btw?

[Lord_PorkSword]

Ahh the news I've been waiting for!
Happy to see that GoN got to partake in the beta!
Thanx for the honest and informative review as well Tim! (psst you're a lucky **** M8!)

Lag is a big concern for me and it was interesting to see that it does appear to be an issue!
Time to Troll their forums for an Oceanic server methinks!! - Auzzie GW fans...time to kickarse and chew bubblegum!

EDIT: I've posted this review on the GW2Guru forums. See here!
I urge Auzzie fans to ask for an Oceanic server in that thread

[Bronze_D]

Unfortunately, what actually happened was that he came back up with four of his friends and I was summarily murdered.

Hahaha come now, surely you expect that to happen... i mean if you just got your face clobbered why come back to him just to get clobbered again if you can have your buddies clobber HIM instead.

On a more serious note, the lag described in article frankly doesn't sound like 'LAG' that a local server will fix.. because from the wording of the article it seems everything worked FINE in smaller scale until the massed event. That doesn't sound like a long distance latency problem sounds to me.

rather it sounded more like the typical problem that most MMO face...

ie: their server cluster cannot handle too many ppl in the same localized area at once without excessive performance drop, and this is what i am afraid of will be a problem with the WvW where you may have large number of players at once in the same world area.

[Marius]

I'm with Bronze here...

Regardless of whether you're in Australia or right on top of the server, mass world PvP lags in The Old Republic and Age of Conan as well. Australian players seem to see oceanic servers as the holy grail, but if players from New York are always complaining about world PvP lag, I'm not sure what people expect local servers to do.

The problem is always pronounced in MMOs with a new engine, too.

Guild Wars 2 seems to be much in the same position as Age of Conan when it launched. Pretty engine, but very new. So I hope they're able to adjust quickly, rather than struggle with it.

Bring on The Secret World.

[Ruckus23]

Great review. Could you possibly elaborate on what Jon said? Just wondering whether he said oceanic servers were a possibility or highly unlikely.

[Syncourt]

I trust that Anet will find a way to remove server performance related lag as an issue. They're pretty good at coming up with ideas to make the gameplay perform smoother. I've played a number of MMOs that looked worse than GW1 but still ran horrible in comparison.

Especially when they got up to Eye of the North. Which looked stunning back then yet ran so well.

However, I'm still dreaming of a real aussie server for GW2. As with GW1 there were a few certain mechanics you simply had to avoid due to the difficulty with high latency. Dodging projectiles being one of the main ones.

I want to experience the game as it was meant to be experienced.

[spitfires_son]

After watching through a lot of the press videos, this has hyped it up even more for me at least.

Any graphics performance issues I'm sure will be fixed. I believe they still haven't optimized the client which is why there is no spec table to go on.

Waiting on the edge of my seat now to see how we can get into the more "open" betas in the coming months. I finished off my Hall of Monuments in Guild Wars 1 the other day 50/50 so I'm pretty keen for a shot at beta.

[Shrew]

there’s no denying that GW2 looks and controls like a generic MMO: WASD to move

Let me just say "NNNNNNnnnnnnnnnnoooooo...."
I'm a big fan of the point and click movement style in GW and I always held a small teeny tiny hope that it would still be included in GW2.

Pure wasd movement sounds way to serious
Totally a step away from the casual play approach that I enjoy in GW.

[spitfires_son]

Let me just say "NNNNNNnnnnnnnnnnoooooo...."

Pure wasd movement sounds way to serious
Totally a step away from the casual play approach that I enjoy in GW.

Gotta have some way to give direction to their main combat mechanic

[Syncourt]

I finished off my Hall of Monuments in Guild Wars 1 the other day 50/50 so I'm pretty keen for a shot at beta.

Grats

I'd like to do the same, but I really just can't be arsed looking for groups these days.

Pure wasd movement sounds way to serious
Totally a step away from the casual play approach that I enjoy in GW.

Guild Wars used WSAD to move as well if you wanted, but it was a lot more laggy than point and click. I'd say the removal of point and click is due to the additions of movement mechanics such as jumping and swimming (which will likely need some sort of vertical control).

It raises your interaction with the environment a lot more I find when you control every little step.