Once I saw "The Manifesto," I was pretty well hooked.  After that I watched every video on GW2 that I could find, from interviews to gameplay vids....whatever I could find.

After the announced it during the EoTN expansion and ever sense then anytime news came out in mage news papers what ever I went out and bought it. If it was web news I put it in my bookmarks. And can't wait for it.

When they release the very first logo, at the beginning of the development...ages ago

I became interested when I first watched Anet's MMO Manifesto probably back in early 2009.  I kept tabs on the game's blog for a while and it quicly became clear that I agreed with almost all of their design philosophies.  I constantly debate the merits and inadequacies of various games' designs and features among friends and have subsequently formulated a pretty good idea of what my ideal MMO would look like--or what kind of MMO I myself would make if I were in the position to do so.  GW2 has very nearly matched my ideal game every step of the way.  

Originally posted by bookworm438

So my question for everyone is when did you become interested in GW2? What drew you into GW2? Did you play GW1 at all? 

1) BWE2

2) Yes... hated it due to the UI

I played the first iteration of Guild Wars to the max and beyond.  Never nabbed the sequels but I did get EOTN.  I just loved  how ANet did it and have looked forward to GW2 since it was announced.

Back when it was first annouonced. I was playing gw1 at the time, and knew I had to get their sequel. I've developed a lot of trust in anet through their first game.

<-------- GW1 player since 2005, found out about GW2 in 2007, took a break from gaming 2007-2009 and started closely following the development of GW2 at the end of 2009/beginning of 2010.

After watching that Shaterrer video at 'Gamescom' i was excited. They finally bought me with the sentence:

"We thing that all these major bosses need to be available for everyone and not at the end of some big dungeon, available only to people who spends whole day to get there".

It was an instant buy for me, despite how will they turn out to be. Fight with dragon who can barely stand on your screen is epic nevertheless :D.

When my attention was drawn to this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7rBhD9dwfc in a guild forum post. It's been sitting in my favorites list ever since.

No fixed roles, even more flexibility than RIFT. No more LF tank, LF healer.

No monthly fees.

Dynamic Events, even if there are a lot of "heart quests" now too. :/ I hope those will go away as we get higher level. The linear quest hub to quest hub kind of thing just needs to go alltogether.

Personal Story, even if after TOR I'm a bit weary about this. It's optional though, so that's a plus anyway.

No kill stealing or mob tagging. Dynamic grouping.

WvWvW with server matching. Not two factions on one server that is more likely to result in imbalanced battles than anything else, without much hope of things ever getting much better to boot.

Level scaling.

I mean, is this different from what you're playing now or not?

Oh and I got a BWE3 beta key, played a few classes and realized this game would be my game for the next couple of years at least. The different classes and weapon combinations are simply amazing.

A few months ago though I've known about it a lot longer.  Being so far from release and caught into other games it wasn't until I did some research into the mechanics that I got hooked.  To me it's the closest thing to a real MMO out there.

ArenaNet's MMO Manifesto video - that caught my attention!

burned out on  SWToR  back in July and I needed a new game. Almost went back to EVE  and still have a LoTRO lifetime but knew I would not last more than a month in either so in desperation bought GW2. I also gave TSW a long look and trial but was not impressed.  I  figured wtf worst thing that wil happen is I will hate GW2. Did a stress test and still had my doubts about the artwork but I tried different professions and races in the last BWE and am tickled to death with it's possibilities.

6 years ago ,iwas bored  and wanna try mmo,play few then try gw1  love it ever since then  5 year and half  thinking on gw2  every years playing other mmo wishing year pass fast ,and here it come finally .funny how to think i play a game and have a grifrined and wating for gw2  and now im amrried whit same person and have a 10 month year old boy and here comes the game lol and still have time.

The Manifesto video, which has made it impossible to truly enjoy any mmo since, so although on some level I know Rift, Swtor, TSW and others have good elements, at the back of my mind there is the reality that GW2 is THE mmo. And we all know it.

for me it was dynamic events system and nonexisting quest log

i did play gw1 a little, but really just a little, when it was released

One of my friends is a former DAOC player and always told me how great that game was. He told me GW2 was going to have a similar concept, and since I loved large scale PVP in Shadowbane, I started following the development of GW2.

I played GW1 but only for about a week or so. It didn't really appeal to me, so that wasn't a factor in my interest.

I had my interest piqued for GW2 way back when ANet first announced they were working on it.  Although I never did manage to get into GW1, I followed it since it was released because I liked the "idea" behind it and had a lot of respect for what ANet was saying and doing.   My only problem with GW1 was how some of it was implimented, so over the years I kept track of it's progress, changes, etc.  

When they first announced that one of the GW1 expansions was being scrapped in favor of it leading to GW2 and talked about why and what was involved, I thought "wow, that sounds good, I might actually enjoy playing it once it comes out."   And I have been following it ever since.

When they put up their design Manifesto video is when I got truly excited and eagre.

Then when I got to actually play it, in BWE1....I was ruined for all other games. *sigh*

Originally posted by Christooo
When it was announced 5 years ago ... I don't think you realise how excited I am for this game

Oh I think I do lol. I remember getting into debates over on guru over what professions should be in and out, and how long it will take for release. I always said 2011 at the earliest, 2012 at the latest. Turns out my prediction was right, no matter how many people disagreed with me.

 

I think it's quite amazing how many people became interested in GW2 with the Manifesto video. I loved the video because after almost 3 years of silence, I finally saw something about GW2. 

Originally posted by Jagarid

I had my interest piqued for GW2 way back when ANet first announced they were working on it.  Although I never did manage to get into GW1, I followed it since it was released because I liked the "idea" behind it and had a lot of respect for what ANet was saying and doing.   My only problem with GW1 was how some of it was implimented, so over the years I kept track of it's progress, changes, etc.  

When they first announced that one of the GW1 expansions was being scrapped in favor of it leading to GW2 and talked about why and what was involved, I thought "wow, that sounds good, I might actually enjoy playing it once it comes out."   And I have been following it ever since.

When they put up their design Manifesto video is when I got truly excited and eagre.

Then when I got to actually play it, in BWE1....I was ruined for all other games. *sigh*

Yeah same here. I couldn't play any other MMO after BWE1. Though I was pretty burned out of current MMOs in the first place. I've avoided playing BWE2 and BWE3 and the stress tests so I didn't ruin anything else about the game. I figured if I've waited 5 years at this point, I can wait a few more months.