Due to a lack of activity on the Guild Wars 2 twitter page explaining the servers being down, I present my best guesstimation of what's happening right now:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFAQif3aCXw
Seriously though, many gamers are well conditioned to launch day woes, and it speaks to ArenaNet's credit that it's taken over 8 hours of mostly faultless gameplay for the servers to cease. So I'll take this opportunity to examine my initial impressions of the game. Please keep in mind I've had no beta exposure to the game, so this evening's events have been my first with GW2.
First thing if first: The game is gorgeous. And I mean flatout stunning. The environments are varied, epic and spectacular. Characters are detailed, and customization options at creation are varied enough to make your character unique. Thus far I've rolled only 2 of the races, a tree person (the universes equivalent of elfs) and a few humans, and both starting zones look stunning. I've tried 3 of the games classes; the thief, engineer and guardian, with my human thief played the most at lvl 7. Classes follow familiar fantasy archetypes; for those wow players a little confused on what class does what, theif = rogue, engineer = hunter, guardian = pally, etc. Only the mesmer seems to tread new ground here, with what I can best describe as a class built around exploding summoned pets similar D3's witchdoctor sacrifice of zombie dogs. Keep in mind it's very early days here, and I haven't had a chance to check out the warrior, hunter, elementalist or necromancer.
Combat feels great, however despite promises from developers, my initial impression is there does not seem to be too much of an evolution from the standard MMO combat; Essentially combat boils down to selecting your autoattack move, then activating one of your more powerful skills whenever they are off cooldown. Sound familiar? That being said, there are a couple of great modifications to the formula that set it apart; Switching weapons immediately changes your role in combat, with each different combination of weapons providing different skills. For example, the thief can use Swords, daggers and pistols, and can dual wield each of the above weapons in almost any combination the player wishes. Each different combination provides different skills to use, and it changes how you play your character drastically. Want to be ranged DPS? Equip dual pistols. Want to slice and dice? Sword / dagger is for you. And each style requires unlocking further skills based on the number of kills you have made with each weapon set. It's a glorious levelling system that provides reward even between the actual character levelling gaps (which are lengthy) and is very well implemented. And once you reach level 7, you unlock a weapon swapout feature that allows you to rapidly change between two preselected weapon loadouts. I'm rocking the pistols for the pull, then switching to 1h / dagger to finish them off. Elegant and fun.
Combat also includes the addition of dodging. This mechanic is suppositevly included to add a degree of skill to combat, allowing dexterous players to avoid attacks entirely, though it is hardly necessary at this stage of the game. I've only once had to worry about this, and it was while fighting an enemy 3 levels higher than myself. Hopefully this will become of more importance later. Also new is the knockdown system, where you continue to fight even when dead, as well as a detailed skill system which encourages you to explore and complete challenges thoughout the world. I'll examine these in a later entry, right now I haven't had enough exposure to them to form an opinion.
Although combat isn't revolutionary, It's clear that ArenaNet want to change the rulebook when it comes to the way we quest. Gone are the question marks above an NPC's head; once you walk into an area, you will immediately be informed of several objectives you can complete. These might include killing monsters or performing environment active tasks, such as watering plants or feeding cows. And every task you complete goes towards filling the progress bar. It gives you something to do regardless of how many people are in the area, and to date I have never felt like I'm fighting the other players for a spawn. Any player whom attacks an enemy, regardless of the damage they deal, receives full experience and loot reward for assisting with the kill. Players are encouraged to help each other, and are rewarded for assisting them with timely interventions and resurrections. While exploring an area, I assisted a lonely ranger with a much higher level enemy. There was no clumsy request for a group invite, I just got stuck in and helped, and walked away with a nice exp boost and a sweet new pistol. It's an elegant system that fosters cooperation. Key class quests are highly instanced and personalised, which is nice considering how crowded it is in the starting zones right now.
The game feels polished to a gleam; there's just so much to do here. Obsessive compulsive achievement hunters beware; deep and fully featured achievement, exploration and platforming systems has been created for your gaming pleasure, and it's all collated and easy to see as soon as you open your map.
That being said, I've encountered a few problems. Initially the game ran extremely poorly on my PC, which I can say with a small amount of pride is not something I run into often. Only disabling the crossfire feature on my 2nd graphics card resolved the issue; for some bizzare reason the game runs at a smooth 60fps at maximum settings with only 1 graphics card enabled, but at less than 15 fps with 2! As for bugs ingame, my initial human character got stuck and was unable to leave the tutorial zone; I had to delete the character and start again to fix that issue, as repeating the quest had no effect. Fortunately the guardian wasn?t for me, but still, that sort of bug can be devastating to a potential new player. Word on the grapevine is that issue was caused by being in a group, and as a result I've stay away from groups since. Finally there's the current server status; as of time of writing, servers have been down for 2 hours and ArenaNet (according to their twitter feed https://twitter.com/GuildWars2 ) are still working on the issue.
Basically, what it boils down to is this; the game is great, really great. I'd happily pay a subscription for a game of this quality, and courtesy of the payment model, I'll never have to worry about that! I have little doubt this game will go on to be a massive success for ArenaNet, and depending on how well they can market the product and keep its community engaged, it may even have a chance of knocking down the powerhouse of the genre.
Servers still aren?t up. This is my story.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFAQif3aCXw
Seriously though, many gamers are well conditioned to launch day woes, and it speaks to ArenaNet's credit that it's taken over 8 hours of mostly faultless gameplay for the servers to cease. So I'll take this opportunity to examine my initial impressions of the game. Please keep in mind I've had no beta exposure to the game, so this evening's events have been my first with GW2.
First thing if first: The game is gorgeous. And I mean flatout stunning. The environments are varied, epic and spectacular. Characters are detailed, and customization options at creation are varied enough to make your character unique. Thus far I've rolled only 2 of the races, a tree person (the universes equivalent of elfs) and a few humans, and both starting zones look stunning. I've tried 3 of the games classes; the thief, engineer and guardian, with my human thief played the most at lvl 7. Classes follow familiar fantasy archetypes; for those wow players a little confused on what class does what, theif = rogue, engineer = hunter, guardian = pally, etc. Only the mesmer seems to tread new ground here, with what I can best describe as a class built around exploding summoned pets similar D3's witchdoctor sacrifice of zombie dogs. Keep in mind it's very early days here, and I haven't had a chance to check out the warrior, hunter, elementalist or necromancer.
Combat feels great, however despite promises from developers, my initial impression is there does not seem to be too much of an evolution from the standard MMO combat; Essentially combat boils down to selecting your autoattack move, then activating one of your more powerful skills whenever they are off cooldown. Sound familiar? That being said, there are a couple of great modifications to the formula that set it apart; Switching weapons immediately changes your role in combat, with each different combination of weapons providing different skills. For example, the thief can use Swords, daggers and pistols, and can dual wield each of the above weapons in almost any combination the player wishes. Each different combination provides different skills to use, and it changes how you play your character drastically. Want to be ranged DPS? Equip dual pistols. Want to slice and dice? Sword / dagger is for you. And each style requires unlocking further skills based on the number of kills you have made with each weapon set. It's a glorious levelling system that provides reward even between the actual character levelling gaps (which are lengthy) and is very well implemented. And once you reach level 7, you unlock a weapon swapout feature that allows you to rapidly change between two preselected weapon loadouts. I'm rocking the pistols for the pull, then switching to 1h / dagger to finish them off. Elegant and fun.
Combat also includes the addition of dodging. This mechanic is suppositevly included to add a degree of skill to combat, allowing dexterous players to avoid attacks entirely, though it is hardly necessary at this stage of the game. I've only once had to worry about this, and it was while fighting an enemy 3 levels higher than myself. Hopefully this will become of more importance later. Also new is the knockdown system, where you continue to fight even when dead, as well as a detailed skill system which encourages you to explore and complete challenges thoughout the world. I'll examine these in a later entry, right now I haven't had enough exposure to them to form an opinion.
Although combat isn't revolutionary, It's clear that ArenaNet want to change the rulebook when it comes to the way we quest. Gone are the question marks above an NPC's head; once you walk into an area, you will immediately be informed of several objectives you can complete. These might include killing monsters or performing environment active tasks, such as watering plants or feeding cows. And every task you complete goes towards filling the progress bar. It gives you something to do regardless of how many people are in the area, and to date I have never felt like I'm fighting the other players for a spawn. Any player whom attacks an enemy, regardless of the damage they deal, receives full experience and loot reward for assisting with the kill. Players are encouraged to help each other, and are rewarded for assisting them with timely interventions and resurrections. While exploring an area, I assisted a lonely ranger with a much higher level enemy. There was no clumsy request for a group invite, I just got stuck in and helped, and walked away with a nice exp boost and a sweet new pistol. It's an elegant system that fosters cooperation. Key class quests are highly instanced and personalised, which is nice considering how crowded it is in the starting zones right now.
The game feels polished to a gleam; there's just so much to do here. Obsessive compulsive achievement hunters beware; deep and fully featured achievement, exploration and platforming systems has been created for your gaming pleasure, and it's all collated and easy to see as soon as you open your map.
That being said, I've encountered a few problems. Initially the game ran extremely poorly on my PC, which I can say with a small amount of pride is not something I run into often. Only disabling the crossfire feature on my 2nd graphics card resolved the issue; for some bizzare reason the game runs at a smooth 60fps at maximum settings with only 1 graphics card enabled, but at less than 15 fps with 2! As for bugs ingame, my initial human character got stuck and was unable to leave the tutorial zone; I had to delete the character and start again to fix that issue, as repeating the quest had no effect. Fortunately the guardian wasn?t for me, but still, that sort of bug can be devastating to a potential new player. Word on the grapevine is that issue was caused by being in a group, and as a result I've stay away from groups since. Finally there's the current server status; as of time of writing, servers have been down for 2 hours and ArenaNet (according to their twitter feed https://twitter.com/GuildWars2 ) are still working on the issue.
Basically, what it boils down to is this; the game is great, really great. I'd happily pay a subscription for a game of this quality, and courtesy of the payment model, I'll never have to worry about that! I have little doubt this game will go on to be a massive success for ArenaNet, and depending on how well they can market the product and keep its community engaged, it may even have a chance of knocking down the powerhouse of the genre.
Servers still aren?t up. This is my story.
