Guild Wars 2

It occurred to me that GW2 begins as a Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery game that changes into a Survival Horror game. The HoT maps seem like something that H.P. Lovecraft could have written about. Writhing vines, zombies and other horrific creatures sprouting from the ground all around you, darkness and the constant feeling of being under attack all seem more like survival horror than anything else. What do you think?

Still enough S&S fantasy for me. HoT is the “endless epic battle” part. Luckily it’s more entertaining playing it through than reading about it.
However, genre cross-over is fine too.

Dark Souls is a S&S Fantasy, with pretty dark elements and horror,
then there is Doom as FPS with big horror elements.

Since you seems to draw a line between S&S fantasy and horror games, should all S&S games be without any scary enemies and thematic?
I can’t remember a single fantasy game without any element that could be from a horror setting.

Like … Demons and Undead are used in many S&S fantasy genres, GW2 has all the unread too it was just not so well delivered i guess.

So how would an S&S look like that sticks only to this genre?

To my mind survival horror is defined more by the mechanics than the type of enemies or the colour scheme.

The focus is on trying to survive – you need to carefully manage your resources and need to take more care to manage each puzzle/fight/whatever well. It’s very unlikely you’ll be able to run like hell to get out of combat, wait for your health to regenerate automatically and then go back in for another go.

And as other people have said fantasy games have always included ‘scary’ enemies like zombies, demons, horrific tentacle monsters with eyes in weird places etc.

(Also I think Lovercraft would like the idea of the Elder Dragons in general – gigantic ancient beasts who awake once every few centuries to consume all the magical energy they can find and in the process destroy the majority of life on the planet, defending themselves with minions created by corrupting things around them while they do it. Then they sink back into oblivion so they’re almost completely forgotten by the time they do it again.)

Timberfox.3961:

It occurred to me that GW2 begins as a Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery game that changes into a Survival Horror game. The HoT maps seem like something that H.P. Lovecraft could have written about. Writhing vines, zombies and other horrific creatures sprouting from the ground all around you, darkness and the constant feeling of being under attack all seem more like survival horror than anything else. What do you think?

I get the feeling that I’m entering a warzone when I step into VB, which makes perfect sense because that’s exactly what it is! The storyline introduces you to the scene, where the Pact assault that was so successful against Zhaitan was halted instantly by Mordremoth. You see the aftermath of that everywhere you look in VB, in particular from the cliffs as you enter the zone from the Silverwastes.

I wasn’t impressed with the storyline overall, but I thought the introduction and entrance to VB was perfect and I absolutely love the feel of these maps. But obviously, your mileage may vary!

Secret World is survival horror, I wouldnt say GW2 really crosses too heavily into that. What it has in zombies, crazies and corruptions it lacks in the atmosphere needed to jump into that genre. I suspect that is deliberate to ground the genre in fantasy.

Lets not forget GW1 prob strayed closer with the Afflicted in Factions, so some horror crossover precedent exists in the franchise.

I don’t think you can call a game “survival” where you can die and respawn anytime.
Survival game should have a, you know “survival” aspect.

Even Skyrim is more “survival” game than Secret World or GW2, since you have only one live.

Danikat.8537:

To my mind survival horror is defined more by the mechanics than the type of enemies or the colour scheme.

The focus is on trying to survive – you need to carefully manage your resources and need to take more care to manage each puzzle/fight/whatever well. It’s very unlikely you’ll be able to run like hell to get out of combat, wait for your health to regenerate automatically and then go back in for another go.

I agree- both horror and survival games often share a particular theme; you can’t necessarily confront/kill the thing that’s killing you… and that you’re alone or in a very small group. The game might conclude if you manage to escape the creature/concept, or the whole game is a tactical plan to obtain what you need to defeat it. You often don’t have nearly enough of what you need to survive which heightens the desperation and tension. Here in GW2 enemies are immediate and can be tackled head-on. I feel that jump scares are a staple too as well as lots of risky situations.

The first genres that spring to mind when thinking about GW2… RPG (MMORPG), action-adventure, fantasy. Other aspects of the game could be labelled as other genres: puzzle, platformer etc. But the thing is, you don’t really label a game with its mini-games. A lot of games have easter eggs, mini games etc that are wildly different to the main feel or genre of the game.

I mean, GTA5 has a tactical side with the stock market, Watchdogs has the absolutely crazy digital trips that could be likened to arcade games or platformers… and any other reasonable examples are slipping my mind right now lol

My point is, themes have to be consistent throughout the game in order for it to be labelled as such. I get that the night/day changes in VB could be likened to survival games, but it’s not a theme you see commonly elsewhere in game.