Guild Wars 2 intial impressions

Let me first preface this post by saying that this is the first MMO game I have ever played.  So most of this post will be from a "noob" perspective.  There are a few reasons I decided to check this game out, first was because I kinda got into Skyrim, and figured that a multi-player co-op version of this would be interesting, and a couple of my good gaming friends were going to get the game, so I figure it would help ease the learning curve a bit.  I also liked the competitive aspect of the game, the whole server vs server vs server, or as they call it WvWvW.  Last, and most important reason is because Guild Wars 2 does not have a monthly subscription fee really drove me to give this gaming genre a try. 




So, first thing about this game, is its a massive world for the "single" player experience.  I really like how some random events are dynamic, so if you are in the area, you are alerted about the event, and you can join in if you choose to.  There is a questline, which I assume is unique for each race and each class/profession.  So there is definitely a tonne of content even if you aren't into the competitive side of things.  The game also will auto-scale you down if you enter an area with quests that are for lower level characters so that its still somewhat challenging for the player.  So since there is no monthly fee, this game actually works well as a single player game, you don't need to play huge amounts of hours to get value from this game. 

For those who play often enough, there are player versus player sections, and realm vs realm sections to keep you entertained, or you can roll different characters to check out the other quests in the game. 

So I actually joined a guild, and I would definitely recommend it to anyone, its nice to always have someone to help you out, or pass along items.  If you have enough friends to play with, you can start your own as well.

I've only tried the realm versus realm area once,  and that was with the guild I'm in, which is also part of a bigger alliance group, and it was fun, though a bit short.  Since its still early in the game, the fun really only lasted a little bit because the group is so well organized, most of the battles are taken care. 

Later on, I'm told that they will change matchups between the various servers and put the better servers against each other, which should provide for some huge wars.  The game style is similar to domination in call of duty games, for those who've played it, except there are a lot more points to capture and hold, and well, a lot more people playing at the same time.  The more locations your server holds, the more points you accumulate, and those I believe translate to bonuses for your character.  I haven't looked into this in more detail, so I will add more on this later.

Being in a big guild is nice for someone new like myself, there is a crafting aspect in Guild Wars 2 which I imagine is a huge component, and will probably take me days to figure out what I need or even what I want.  So a few guild members are dedicated to this aspect of the game, so I can send any material I find in the game to them, and request items if I need something.  Its a nice community, and everyone, although still taking the game quite seriously are very good at accommodating the less experienced folk.  Even in the single player world (PvE), if you get downed, a random person will usually come by to revive you.

There were a few things I had to adjust to with this game.  The biggest thing for me was getting used to the controls, since the mouse is no longer used to look without holding down the mouse button, and the huge amount of menus.  At first the game was having issues with keeping a party together while traveling between the main server overflow servers, but that seems to be fixed now, which was actually quite fast since the game just launched this past Tuesday.  Other than that, the game has crashed a couple times, which is only frustrating when you are in the main server, and you now have to wait in queue for your spot back.  I hope they implement some way for the server to reserve your spot for a few minutes to allow for re-connects.  I suspect this won't be that much of an issue after the initial rush, but it still would be nice to have.

I'm only at level 15, and I haven't been playing as much as I should (damn Diablo 3 paragon levelling has me hooked), but I'm still enjoying my time in the game.  Currently, I'm playing a human elementalist, on the Henge of Denravi server.  You'll probably find me as a dead body (at least till I level up) LOL.