This week, ArenaNet are showing off a brand new Guild Wars 2 demo at G-Star, Korea’s premier game show. The new demo has loads of new improvements including some UI updates and character customisation. Players of this demo will experience a localised Korean version that focuses on the human starting experience, as well as three giant boss fights during the last 10 minutes of play; Tequatl the Sunless, the Shadow Behemoth, and the Shatterer. For a more comprhensive view, see the ArenaNet blog post.
When we found out that we had an opportunity to be featured by NCsoft at this year’s G-Star, we knew that it was an opportunity we couldn’t pass on.
The very first thing we had to consider was that the demo would need to be in Korean. This meant adding Korean text and voice to the game as well as overcoming some of the technical issues inherent in displaying the Korean alphabet. Due to these challenges—and the fact that Korean players haven’t had an opportunity to play the game yet—we decided to focus on preparing the human starting experience for the demo. Aiming for this narrower experience allowed us to do the translations and voice recordings that we needed for the demo—and make certain that they were done well.
We also wanted to show off our giant boss monsters, and for each demo to end with an exciting encounter. Because of this, the demo also includes the boss fights against Tequatl the Sunless (seen below), the Shadow Behemoth, and the Shatterer. When they reach the last ten minutes of the demo, players are prompted with a “special demo opportunity” and can go fight one of these three boss monsters.
Source: http://www.arena.net/blog/eric-flannum-on-the-guild-wars-2-g-star-demo
Posted by LittleBoat on November 4, 2011
Remember all those professions we used to talk about so much? What are they up to nowadays? How come they never write? Well they’re not lazing about; the engineers and rangers are hard at work developing their skills and all are working on their cross-profession combos. Practice practice gang! Those dragons aren’t getting any deader! (Well maybe one is.)
When we initially talked about the engineer, only some of the heal and utility skills had corresponding tool belt skills, but as we spent more time with this profession—especially testing for the gamescom demo—we started imagining a much cooler version of the engineer’s tool belt, where every slotted heal/utility skill had a tool belt counterpart.
This improved tool belt system meant that we had to design twenty-three new skills. Since this is ArenaNet, that meant a bunch of meetings, some yelling, a whiteboard, and a lot of sticky notes. After all was said and done, we ended up with a matching tool belt skill for every heal and utility skill—this was how the engineer was always supposed to play!
Skip on over to the ArenaNet blog for the latest skill update.
Source: http://www.arena.net/blog/guild-wars-2-development-update-by-jon-peters
Posted by Fast21 on November 1, 2011
Another info-drought for this week! However, we did receive some awesome postcards from the various places in Guild Wars 2! It’s Halloween again in Tyria, and that means awesome events from both ArenaNet and fan-made sites Anyways, here’s the latest from the community… Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Dutch Sunshine on October 26, 2011
While we’re hard at work to release our eighth issue, ‘Depths of Tyria’, the reboot of our podcast, Dynamically Spoken, and plenty more, we had the chance to bring Issue 6, ‘From the Mists’, into our HTML format so more of you can enjoy our quality articles by the community, for the community. Continue reading for the description of ’From the Mists’, as published alongside the original release.
HTML-version:
In short, this issue talks about the Mists themselves but also takes a look at what the unreleased Guild Wars expansion: Utopia, could have been for Guild Wars. Konig also takes a look at a possible story-plot for the next trilogy if it was not canceled in favor of Guild Wars 2. Next to this we also take at other interesting topics like the Celestials, Humans of Cantha and the Goddess Lyssa. Of course you’ll also find our returning articles like an interesting interview with Ravious from Kill Ten Rats, Title Hunters, Call of the Wolf, and the adventures of Soy Oil. Also, we introduce a brand new the GuildMag Showdown, where we match up two iconic Guild Wars characters to fight for their honor!
• Welcome to the Mists
The beginning. Literally.
• GuildMag Showdown: Prince Rurik Vs Master Togo
Who will come out on top?
• Title Hunters | Legendary Vanquisher
These legendary heroes show no mercy.
• Tyria: A World That Could Have Been
Aztechronotopian markets featuring guildbank mounts!
• The Adventures of Soy Oil: Part 2
So easy, even a Norn could do it.
• GuildMag Featured Artist
Prolific Nolani Academy artist, Tommy’s.
• The Celestials
Learn more about these highly revered celestial deities.
• Dutch’s Talk with Ravious (Kill Ten Rats)
Get personal with our favorite blogging superstar.
• The Team’s opinion on… Edge of Destiny
GuildMag staff review the much anticipated prequel.
• Arachnia and the Insectoid Gods
Skin crawling research on mysterious insect beings
• FanFic: Necklace of Power
Relic lost to the passage of time.
• Lyssa: The Twin Goddesses
Mesmerizing account on the matron of illusion and beauty.
• Humans of Cantha, The First to Walk Tyria
The history and culture of the earliest humans.
• Call of the Wolf
Tender Wolf’s closing chapters.
• End of the Line
Scrumptious morsels.
Posted by Fast21 on October 23, 2011
Hey Guys! Don’t worry, the roundup is back! Although the Guild Wars 2 community has been pretty much silent with an info-drought, halloween is approaching and anything can happen! We’ve got a ton of events for the upcoming weekend. Anyways, here’s the latest from the community… Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Dutch Sunshine on October 20, 2011
On the ArenaNet Blog, James Ackley gives us a look at how the Audio Team of Guild Wars 2 takes care of field recordings. As an example of a field recording, they give us a video of a journey to a large nuclear power plant to record audio sounds which can be found on that location. Aside of talking about the facility itself, they also talk about the process of capturing the sounds in at location.
