Guild Wars 2

Is it just me, or is GW2’s soundtrack mostly a copy of GW1? With over 2300 hours logged in the first Guild Wars, I can’t help but think I’ve heard the same tracks before when I’m playing GW2, mainly a lot of the ambient music.

I understand that there are themes/motifs that need to be carried over from 1 to 2, and I can appreciate how beautifully done the soundtrack is. I only want to know for the sake of my own sanity :P

The pool of tracks the game uses definitely includes some Guild Wars music. :-)

Off the top of my head, here are few, but there are definitely more:

• Eye of the Storm
• Echovald Forest
• Over the Shiverpeaks

There’s a video in which Maclaine Diemer mentions that since the GW2 soundtrack doesn’t actually have enough seperate tracks they decided to also use tracks from the previous games, also because it would allow people who didn’t play the first game and its expansions that much to hear the music that they’d otherwise miss out on.

Some people hate it because to them, certain songs should only be linked to a particular part of the game or a particular scene, I myself am glad because I didn’t play the GW1 expansions at all so I would have missed out on some great tracks.

If you’re interested in the video, here’s a link: http://www.twitch.tv/guildwars2/c/3104418

Leif Chapelle and Maclaine Diemer talk about the music they’ve written for the game, and also try to answer some of the questions people seem to be having a lot (like why the music from the first game keeps popping up, why Jeremy Soule probably won’t write any new music for GW2 and some other things you might or might not find interesting).

Wait, what? No more Jeremy Soule?

I don’t have the time right now to watch an hour long video. Would someone be able to tell me where to jump in the video when I get more time, or summarize why he’s not doing the music for the game anymore?

Maoric.6132:

Wait, what? No more Jeremy Soule?

I don’t have the time right now to watch an hour long video. Would someone be able to tell me where to jump in the video when I get more time, or summarize why he’s not doing the music for the game anymore?

It’s because they have been doing living story releases which happen constantly. By making the music themselves they can communicate much easier and Jeremy Soule’s contract had also ended when the game released. They don’t exclude a possibility of him working for ArenaNet again in the future but they have no plans for it. Although that stream is 8 months old by now (check around the 21st minute or so, right when the SAB music ends).

Thanks for the summary and video playback time.

That makes me kind of sad because I really enjoy Jeremy Soule’s work in the Guild Wars series and other games. At least Leif Chappelle and Maclaine Diemer have been doing a good job with the pieces I know they’ve done now.