Guild wars 2 is ofc a sequel, but I was just wondering how many peeps are planning on getting GW2 but haven't played GW. Also, I logged into GW today for old times sake(and to check my b-day gifts hehe). And experienced ye old nostalgia. I have to say how much of a brilliant job they did with GW. The total cost of buying all three games + exp. cost me about £100, and I spend a good 1500 hours+ playing GW. It was one hell of a game, had some awesome times with guildies, trying to come up with unorthodox good builds, like the Me/W who weilded a sword, tryna kick ass with illusionary weaponry lol. I really am looking forward to GW2, planning on building a new rig just for it.

Oh I would appreciate if we can keep this one thread for this sort of talk, no critisism of the cash shop or WvWvW, some of us appreciated GW for a damn good reason and will hopefully expect the same with GW2.

I played GW1 for a while.  Some of the limitations of the engine frustrated me and I didn't end up loving it or anything, but I'm really looking forward to GW2.  

Have close to 6000 hours played in GW1

Haven't played much in the past year though. Definitely will pick up GW2.

I have the campaigns and played briefly. I even broke it out again last week to try and get HoM stuff for GW2. I am not slamming GW1 at all and I admire you guys that played it, it wasn't my cup of tea and I can't get into it. 

I am very stoked about GW2 though. I have even started reading the novels! :) 

Played GW for 1month, very limited game, fortunately only lore as anything to do with GW2 and structured pvp

Loved GW although I don't really play it anymore. I did get the 30/50 HoM though, 50/50 requires a lot of gold and I didn't want to grind. One thing that always frustrated me was the lack of jumping but otherwise it's a solid game, especially the Nightfall campaign and the Eye of the North expansion. One thing that I really liked about GW was all of the different builds you can create for your character and your heroes. There was no "one perfect build" to own everything and certain content required a different approach and skill set.

It's a bit hard to pick up but once you get a few decent builds going for yourself and your heroes, it becomes a blast to play.

I loved GW1. 4000+ hours (not including my alt account) playing, most of those were GvG (Top 100 guild, if anyone stills cares about that) but a lot were the holiday events as well as grinding 40 sumodd HoM points.

I really liked the Holiday events, and I hope many of them make a return (Mad King Thorne <3) or better (Roller Beetle Racing could be a lot more fun with the new engine).

Played Guild Wars for about a month.  It sucked balls.  The reason I'm going to give GW2 a look is because it's apparently nothing like Guild Wars.  If it was even remotely similar, I wouldn't touch GW2.  

I plan on using GW2 as my backup MMO, for when I need a break from my current one.  Will probably play it a few hours a week casually.  

All the games cost me around $200 something. Played the first one, but it seems like not a lot of the GW2 fans did.

So... what did you do in those thousands of hours? In my playtime I know I was accumulating gold. Getting prestiege armours. Tried getting FOW armor but way to expensive and drop rate luck crazy. Too bad all the monks got the goodies though.

What do you think the end game PvE side is going to be?

I like GW1.  I only played it for a month the first time around, got halfway through a campaign but then went back to WoW.

Since I heard about GW2 I went back and gave it another chance.  I've since completed the stories for Prophecies and Factions and have made good progress in the other two.

I don't think it's the best game ever.  The camera is pretty bad and some of the interface and mechanics can be clunky.  I do think though that it's an incredible value though for the cost.  I think it tells a couple of pretty good stories and I think they made real progress in those 2+ years.  I probably have 400-500 hours in it and if GW2 wasn't coming out I could definitely see spending more.  Right now I'm just making a point of trying to wrap up Nightfall.

The people who didn't like it, I understand.  I think it tends to be a hit or miss game for people.  If people haven't tried it, it's probably still worth checking out.  You can probably find it for $20 in a sale and they're not going to shut the servers down.  Even if the mechanics are totally different you can still see some of the design philosophy as well as more appreciate the easter eggs in GW2.

I've logged about 2500 hours of GW1 throughout all of the expansions.  I loved the PvP (well, most the GvG) - I still hold it up as the shining example of what structured PvP should be in a MMORPG.  The PvE storylines were fun enough for a run through or two, but they got old after that.  

I'm surprised to find that I'm excited about the PvE in GW2 as much as I am for the PvP.  Maybe it's the dynamic events, maybe is that I have to continue to think in PvE (rather than making sure I have a healer) - I'm not entirely sure.  I'm eagerly awaiting April 10th and all of the following landmark dates that will be announced.

Played GW for a few months around launch. Not really my kind of game. The sharded world, henchmen and lobby cities put me off. Even though I loved the graphics and atmosphere.

Very curious about GW2 but not really convinced yet. More than anything I'd like to hear some long term player reports; people who played the game up to and including level 80 for a considerable time.

And for some crucial things I'll have to wait and see untill after launch I suppose; like the "final" cash shop itterations, WvW mechanics in a match up between full servers (any queues?), length of loading screens, etc.

I played GW for quite a while and loved it.  Planning on the pre-purchase in about a week.

Didn't really play GW1. Yeah, yeah, I know - "GTFO NOOB" and such.

Just never encountered it at the right time, was to busy playing some other stuff. Tried it couple of months ago, and it just didn't seem to be that good. Maybe because now my taste is spoiled with shiny graphics, or I'm just too lazy to go into details. Probably second, because from time to time I still play old games. 

But definetely want to try GW2.

Originally posted by Darknezzzz

Didn't really play GW1. Yeah, yeah, I know - "GTFO NOOB" and such.

Just never encountered it at the right time, was to busy playing some other stuff. Tried it couple of months ago, and it just didn't seem to be that good. Maybe because now my taste is spoiled with shiny graphics, or I'm just too lazy to go into details. Probably second, because from time to time I still play old games. 

But definetely want to try GW2.

GTFO NOOB!! :P

Absolutely nothing wrong with that, I never go into WoW because of the £9 a month sub and £30 cost for the game was too taxing for my pocket money lol, GW was the cheaper option, so maybe I would've really enjoyed WoW. Since you tried it a couple of months ago you probably noticed how dead the outposts in the prophecies and factions campaigns. So I don't blame you for finding it hard to get into the game so long after release.

Loved GW, still play it on occassion. Already fully paid for the collector's edition of GW2 at GameStop.

Me happy.

I played/own GW1 but never really invested much time into it - to be honest I didn't like it very much.

GW2 is top of my list for future games and I cannot wait to pre-purchase in a week and give the game a whirl in beta.

I've heard it said that GW2 really is a completely different beast than GW1 unlike most sequels, but still has all the "Guild Warsy-ness" of GW1.

Never played GW. Didn't appeal to me as a concept. I'm lovin' everything I've seen about GW2, though.

I played GW 1. I think I started playing it with my wife, and we played for 6 months.  the camera angle hurt her eyes so we stopped playing it, but we both left agreeing that, control wise, it was a better experience than the latter games we played.  

I have a few thousand hours in GW1 and have played since launch.  We still play together as a family sometimes.

We're going to wait and see how GW2 plays out.

I think some people might be surprised at some of the similarities between the two games.  I'm not sure where people are getting the idea that the two are nothing alike.  I see GW2 as a much improved and dramatic evolution of GW1.

For example some great improvements or differences I see are: now we have a z-axis, open zones to meet other players, and improvements (streamlines) to character building.  The removal of dedicated healing classes and spreading healing out to all classes might also help improve some balance problems we've seen over the years in GW1.

Some of the things I see as evolutionary but still very similar are: combat mechanics (shutdown, skill synergy, CC), world accessibility, pvp philosophy (WvW being an evolution of alliance battles, jade quarry, etc), world design.

One of the areas that has changed and I'm not sure how it's evolved or different from their current philosophy is the cash shop.  In GW1 the cash shop plays a fairly minimal role.  That doesn't appear to be the case in GW2 so I'm curious how that will work out in practice.

Another change is the relationship with the fansites and power guilds that had a huge impact on skill and class balancing.  That will change due to the nature of the world and due to them hosting their own forums.  That has a potential to really change how development and balancing is approached for the future.