To all you Guild Wars 2 fans, if you haven’t seen this trailer for gamescom yet, crank up your speakers and start buffering this video! For those who aren’t into MMOs or haven’t heard of Guild Wars 2, please check it out! This game is going to shake the foundations of the MMO platform and raise the bar for the genre.
Best of all, there are no monthly fees. So honestly, why wouldn’t you give this game a shot? At least take a look at this video and the manifesto.
I really like how ArenaNet starts the video off with a gorgeous display of the style of their game — the stylist look — and really match it up to the beautiful music, which we haven’t heard before. One thing I did see and recognize was that they were using the new model for Caithe (sylvari), and it worked extremely well. The graphics on the model were smooth, and solid and didn’t stick out as something that is brand new. It meshed well and was well implemented.
I’m not going to lie though, those weird things with the colored coral (?) freak me out a little. I’m going to make the assumption those will be one of the main enemies in underwater combat. Speaking of underwater combat, I appreciate how they’re slowly releasing media and information on it, especially since the take they have on it is relatively brand new.
Speeding things up with some more epic music that we’ve never heard before is what I can only assume to be one of the dragonspawn making its appearance. This next part shows off that this game is all about the action and what its in-game graphics engine can do while at the same time keeping up that “stylist” aesthetic they have been shooting for.
However, there are two things that bother me a little bit. The first thing being that the human faces look… flat. I don’t know how else to describe it, but the quality clearly doesn’t really match up with the rest of the character models. The rest of the body is fine, but the face looks like it was just glued on instead of being part of the character model, as it looks with the rest of the races. I suspect the models were just recycled from the original Guild Wars. Probably something they won’t work on improving, but also consider that is me nitpicking to the extreme.
Second, getting even pickier with my criticisms, I think it was cheesy in the video when the ice wurm sprayed ice onto your computer screen. This is purely a stylistic thing, but I’ve never liked it in other games either.
However, when compared with no monthly fees, persistent game play, stunning graphics, and beautiful music, the pros greatly outweigh the cons. Stay tuned for more news, and don’t forget Guild Wars 2 is scheduled to be released before the end of 2011, though there’s been no exact date given yet.
