Apparently, to entice new customers to try out their game and hopefully buy the upcoming expansion Arena.net have made the GW2 base game free for everyone, and not in the usual scummy free-to-play way but honest-to-goodness completely free.

Seems like every time this game went on sale I was tempted, but the whole MMO shtick always made me refrain from buying - the ones I've tried previously just always left me cold. I'm definitely going to give it a whirl now... eventually. ;)

Sounds too good to be true.

Only if it had a single player offline mode.

Would be hard because it is an MMO ;)

Sweet! GW was the only MMO I ever really got into. I'll have to check it out. Thanks for the news. +1

There is no monthly fee to play.

Don`t go in expecting anything like Guild Wars is though, there`s very little similarity between the two :(


As for anyone tempted, gw2 has gone the route of SWtoR via restrictions too - https://help.guildwars2.com/entries/95982157?_ga=1.240955781.78332403.1436571105


One heads up for any PvP fans, the balance in this game goes way beyond embarrassing (& even in PvE, but matters less there), but free is free, so you can all test to your hearts content ;)

Warning, check forums etc for servers news & more so for WvWs (three servers fighting each other), check out this link - https://leaderboards.guildwars2.com/en/eu/wvw.

Queues don`t really bother gw2, except for WvWs, but don`t go on lower servers because you`ll just get wiped constantly..

If you can tune out everyone else running around, I found it pretty easy to play as single player. At the least, there's no shortage of content you can do alone, and if you stumble on group events it's set up to where you don't really spend much time mucking with finding/dropping groups at all.

I bought it pre-release (something I don't think I've ever done for any other game) after having played the beta a bit and played for 10-12 months and quite enjoyed it. Great variety of options for playstyle and some really good zone designs.

I suspect they've made the base game free because they're marketing the expac, and it seems they do make a significant amount of $$ from their in-game shop. I think you can still buy everything in the shop with in-game currency, but at least at the time I stopped playing things like extra char. slots would have been prohibitive for new players because of the exchange rate.

IIRC, you start with something like 3-4 character slots and a moderate amount of storage space. If you really want to play every class and craft, etc. you likely will end up wanting to invest in those, whether with $$ or hard-earned gold. If all you want to do is explore/quest/putz about with 2-3 race/class combos, you can totally do that without buying anything in the shop for cash.

I wish a lot of MMORPGs to have single player offline modes. World of Warcraft, Everquest 2, Ultima Online, Final Fantasy 11 and 14. Asheron's Call, Dark Age of Camelot, Lord of the Rings Online, Dungeons and Dragons Online.

I really liked the classes and class systems in Guild Wars so I tried the sequel. The classes sucked. They played no way like the first. Nice somewhat laid back wizard class? Nooo hello aoe and the like attacks. Blood necromancer? Nope no more leech play. Bah!

If Guild Wars 2 is anything like the first game you'll need the addons to stay up to scratch.

The first game was quite enjoyable with the core classes.

PvE was secondary - worth a single playthrough.

PvP was very good indeed and the game's focus.

I watched many a battle with the Koreans ([url=http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Guild:War_Machine_(historical)]War Machine[/url]) vs Europeans & Americans ([url=http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Guild:Idiot_Savants_(historical)]iQ[/url]) at the World Events.

Even had a few fights with them in the Random Team Arena, etc.

Skill unlocking was grindy with it's PvE requirement (later fixed with PvP arena points)

The balance went completely to the dogs once they added in the Ritualist, Assassin & all the other goofy stuff.

And I left it there.

Never played the second.

Jeff Strain (Starcraft, Diablo) went on to make the recent zombie game State of Decay.

Mind giving a rundown of the restrictions? Thinks like "grind super hard for the UBER end game raid / PVP stuff" don't bother me, but a restricted inventory or some such might.

I always wanted to give this game a shot and this might just be enough to entice me.

I think later on tonight or next weekend I might take a look at the EULA and if I like what I see I might grab this and give it a shot.

I've played this game a little, just didn't get into it very much. I should pick it back up.

I was going to say there`s no raid, but apparently in the new expac they`ve added one hehe

The items you farm for crafting can be sent straight to your personal bank via your bag, so no wandering back mid` fights when bags are full.
You can also craft whilst mat`s are in bank too.
Mat`s wise, there`s a lot, but if you craft/sell as you level it, bags shouldn`t be too bad, but I had 8 char`s full of mat`s to level whilst I was levelling my main. It will get messy with such small storage.

Restricted sell/buy from TP (gw2` version of warcrafts` AH), means your bags may be full constantly, but time`ll tell.).

no map chat is going to be bad, as you won`t be able to ask/offer help on any bosses that spawn or ask for the waypoint to one that has just spawned. I guess this was to stop gold sellers, but it`s OTT tbh & very anti-social ;)

You can`t WvWs until level 60? o0 Now that is terribad, as that is all I ever did (apart from the odd bg or twelve). You`ll miss out on that.

As for grind/super-duper gear, a lot say there is no grind. They`re wrong, gw2 was the grindiest mmo I`ve played. They also say that ascended gear isn`t required. Whilst it does help in PvE (mainly the max` dungeon, forgotten its name) that gear can mean life or death in WvWs.

Also legendary gear means higher stat`s with the advantage of being able to buy these via the TP, hence the often pay2win arguments ;) (they also have stat` reset, meaning when dev`s mess the balance, anyone with leg-end gear has huge advantage).

EDIT:

Almost forgot. Loot drops about a gazillion times higher in PvE/questing/worlds etc.
WvWs you have to grind for eons to get even a hundredth of that.

I played for 1.5 years`ish, had one epic item drop in WvWs.
You can almost guarantee that in minutes in rest of the game :$


EDIT2:

Yet more display of how WvWs players are third class citizens - https://forum-en.guildwars2.com/forum/game/wuv/Were-is-our-Legendary-Reward

probably try it again, gotta check what are the restrictions first