Guild Wars 2

I’m a fairly avid GW2 player. I get on almost every day, play a lot, and have a lot of fun. In my opinion, it’s a really wonderful game for many reasons, but that’s not the point of the thread. I’ve never played GW1, and thus know absolutely nothing about it aside from the lore I’ve learned from/about GW2.

Should I go back and play GW1?

I enjoy MMOs a fair deal (hence why I play this so much) but I also love a good single-player RPG when I find one. From what I understand, GW1 has a mix of both. I also recall hearing that GW1 plays drastically differently, so will having played GW2 “punish” my enjoyment of GW1?

Thanks in advance

Gw1 players are on the increase, i log in every so often and ive noticed a big increase, log in and see.

It’s a very different game. The big things about it that are different are that you can’t jump….it’s pathed…and it’s much more complex to get into…it’s not as accessible. For example, you have hundreds of skills, but you have to unlock them and each profession can have a secondary profession, so you can use two sets of skills.

For people who like to think it’s a great game. Unfortunately most people don’t like to think too much. lol

They are linked only by lore. GW1 is an excellent game, but very different from GW2. That’s not a bad thing mind you. GW1 also works very well as a solo player experience – 99% of pve is soloable making the lowered population irrelevant.

It still has the dire storytelling this game has, but it has a certain charm of its own.

Well worth playing and has some very challenging content in places. It does feel a tad clunky after GW2 though, just be warned!

Imo, GW1 was so much better than GW2. I actually enjoyed playing it, and didn’t get punished for not playing like Anet did with the dailies. You should try it, but if you like GW2 that much, you probably won’t like GW1.

The PvP due to the complexity of skill selections and interaction is better by a country mile.

If you are more into PvE, I would not give it a go, but for PvP it has to be one of my favorite MMOs of all time, especially the arena.

Its good if your willing to put in a lot of time to get the items that link from GW1 to GW2 and the added AP but that is a lot of work and time to get to that point GW1 was a major time sink game.

i try sometimes to play to gw1 again, but it feel a little weird. it is a great game, but i find it difficoult to come back to no dodge, no jump and relearn all those skills to use it effectively

GW1 is much more “complete” than GW2.

While GW2 is more modern, I would rate GW1 a better overall game because of the complexity and customization available to players.

If you’re someone into a hardcore RPG experience build-making, then GW1 is for you!

A game which has been out for years is more complete and complex than a game that is just approaching its first anniversary? Imagine that.

You missed on gw1. Now its deserted and not worth a purchase but if this thread was made in 07 i’d say get dat game over anything released

It can be an enjoyable game even solo, so my personal suggestion would be to go for it. Especially if you are interested in lore, or in understanding why there are all those players in the “cantha” thread :P Keep in mind it’s vastly different from GW2 though.

I say try it. If you are not sure, get NF only. Campaigns are stand alone. Nightfall Heroes will soften the blow of less people. It is a unique game, different from any I have played. Possibly unique enough where you will hate it, or love it, without a lot of middle ground.

One thing I loved was that getting to level 20 was… in essence, a tutorial. At max level (20) the real game began. I used to laugh at people who bragged about “winning” the campaign by finishing the storyline.. heh, they hadn’t scratched it.

I play it still daily, you rarely find Kamedan without an almost full, or full and 2 districts now. There is a slow trickle returning. This week I met with 2 old friends coming back after leaving at GW2 launch, and I normally have 4-5 on friends list online.

I’ve always soloed the game, so population isn’t an issue with me. My heroes are not the brightest bulbs at times, but they have elite skills, good skillbars, synergy, maxed gear and runes, and do what I tell them to without question or ragequits. Not a lot of pugs can beat that. For some profs and builds, hero AI and reaction time are far superior to human, one reason they were removed from all PvP.

The game is more fun imo. If you like the game for story, gw1 does a much better job to entertain you.
You can’t jump, which will feel weird coming from a game that allows you to. The learning curve is a bit higher and it is harder to get into

I would recommend nightfall first.

I still play GW1 and as far as I can tell there is a constant increase of people filling in the gap that was made after the release of GW2.

Basically GW1 can be described as an RPG with MMO elements which makes some of the aspects of the game really shine in the eyes of RPG players (if for nothing else then for the simple lack of modern MMO “features” plaguing the game). It is more oriented toward good story telling and player experience with less time wasted on things like mini-games etc. The story itself is miles away from the generic “kill the dragonzis” of GW2. It has some breathtaking moments which, ironically, through instancing provide a more realistic feeling of players actually influencing the world than GW2 does through it’s dynamic events. I.e. once you progress past a certain point of the story you’ll notice a difference in your environment (mob spawns etc.)

As for differences in game mechanics, don’t worry. Aside from jumping and dodging everything else like targeting, skill usage etc. is exactly the same as in GW2 (which is not that good considering that GW2 is a way more action oriented game). You’ll get used to the non-existence of jumping and on the positive side visual effects in GW1 are way more toned down (you won’t have to deal with VFX fireworks every time you engage in larger fights). Professions also feel much more natural because they weren’t that much “streamlined” like the ones in GW2 (everything is either direct damage or conditional damage), offering players a real unique way of experiencing their roles. If you were a necromancer you weren’t able to just raise minions without a corpse. Charming pets as a ranger felt much more natural because it required of player to actually use skills and survive the charming phase, something that wasn’t that trivial when doing it with level 20 pets.

As for difficulty yes, GW1 does have a much steeper learning curve but it also allows players to experiment way more with builds and skills since its almost trivial to completely switch from one build to another. Additionally, missions are way more unforgiving (especially in hard mode) which makes progressing even more satisfying. If your team wipes during a mission there is no checkpoint! You have to start over. It made people realize how important it was to play well and give their best.

PvP was (and still is) way better. It has a multitude of game modes, some of them which are still considered as the elite zones in the game (Hall of Heroes etc.)

To cut the long story short, try the game (and all of the expansions if possible). But do take into account that some of the best parts of the game are reached after couple of tenths of hours into the game. I would personally start with prophecies because that is the place where it all started (you’ll have enough time to familiarize yourself with the game mechanics in Presearing). Then Factions (great scenery and some of the most appealing sights in the game like Echovald Forest and Jade Sea), Nightfall (you’ll get a chance to fight a god!) and then Eye of the North with it’s stunning landscapes.

It’s a very enjoyable game with a combat and skill system far superior to GW2. The fact that every mission and area are centered around team play gives it a great deal more depth. Heroes are a mixed bag. On the one hand, they caused a move away from all player teams, on the other, the full customization of them lets even single player people have a lot of fun. GW1 is one of my favorite games of all time.

It depends what you like, but personally I think Guild Wars out shines gw2 & then some.
I bought Guild Wars along with some warcraft mates, we were/are all pvp nuts, arena/rbgs etc, but to get into the game, did the usual storying about all over the place.
Guild Wars is the only game that has hooked me with the story (except for Stalker series) so much so that we never got around to the pvp, which the game is famed for.
I`m not a long timer like lots are (1.5 years main account 0.5 second account) & I`m still enjoying exploring, story etc, something which gw2 has never remotely even glanced my direction as interesting. Each to their own though.
combine this with the fact you can buy town clothes, they`re yours for any character you have & can get as many times as you want & you can fight in these!! 8D
P.S. You can jump, but have to “/jump”
P.P.S. Trehearne isn`t in the game, worth the price alone ;p

I love GW1 and played it almost every day for about 5 years. When GW2 came out I fully expected to split my time between both. But honestly I’ve barely played it in the last 8 months or so.

I think in my case it’s largely that I was running out of things to do. I have 10 GW1 characters, I’ve completed all the campaigns in NM multiple times, done Legendary Defender of Ascalon, done survivor both the ‘traditional’ way (doing quests and missions) and by grinding, gotten cartographer on multiple characters etc. etc. Pretty much the only thing left that I want to do and haven’t is completing all the missions in Hard Mode and finishing my mini collection (which was never a realistic goal to begin with).

But I’d definitely recommend trying it at least. It is a very different game in a lot of ways. The levelling/questing structure is more traditional than GW2 but the skill system seems to be pretty unique to that game. It’s most commonly compared to Magic the Gathering and I’d agree it’s similar. You really need to think about your chocies and how everything will work together, but if you’re into making your own builds it will definitely appeal.

OP, short answer yes, awesome game!
Long answer, gw1 is rich in Lore, much more so than gw2. Although i haven’t payed gw1 form the time it launched, but got it some 4 years later, i imagine the lore evolved with the game, as i expect gw2 will too.

The game also has a rich and epic feel to their story lines in each campaign, great cinematics too and really nice graphics for such an older game.

You can do everything that is required to complete the game with your heroes. I did almost everything with them even in HM and including dungeons. It does take a little practice to micro manage them, usually u don’t have to but in some dungeons u do need to a bit. it’s no big deal really or even difficult to do. Because of Heroes, you should first start in nightfall to unlock them. It’s the only campaign that offers them to begin with but you do get others later in the other campaigns that you can do quests to unlock.

And a nice thing about heroes, all the skills available to you, are automatically available to your heroes too, so you can completely customise their builds, weaps and rune up their armor. And like some people have said above, heroes are better than some players and don’t disobey you or rage quite on you.

Ok so there’s no jump, but you can always do /jump and voila! its not the same but better than nothing lol. plus gw1 has the best dances absolutely the best and tons of great emotes. Hopefully, one day we’ll get them in gw2 as well, right now they’re very bland and sparse.

well if you do start playing come back and let us know what u think and how u like the game, gl and hf!

Sil.4560:

A game which has been out for years is more complete and complex than a game that is just approaching its first anniversary? Imagine that.

As someone who played both games at release, GW1 was miles ahead as it drew near it’s first year anniversary. But that’s beside the point.

I’d say give it a shot, I thoroughly enjoyed my first playthrough of PvE content, and a lot of it is very solo friendly, more so than this game. I personally have trouble jumping back in, mostly because the game feels so different than it did back when I played, and seeing HA deserted is heartbreaking to say the least. As you play, it’s important to remember that the game was designed as a PvP game with PvE drawing elements from it, which is the polar opposite of GW2.

As someone said earlier, someone in love with GW2 would probably not find much worth in GW1.

If you want a bigger persective on things. I went back and got GW1. Reminded me what I love about GW2, not that GW1 is bad but its not taking me out of 2. But its also fun to see the start. I remember findng Duke Barradin and literally going “Oh hey, thats the guy I killed as a ghost as a Charr!”

By all means, do it!!
Go play GW, i assure you it will be a unforgettable experience!!
Get the full pack with all the expansions! (especially Factions, you will just love Cantha!).
I bet after you “get in the game”, you will never want to came back to GW2!!

It’s still to this day a relatively in depth, decently challenging, and ultimately satisfying game. It’s much more of a traditional RPG with it’s combat, progression, and party management.

And if you get hooked, you have four campaigns to look forward to in addition to the hard mode variants, side quests, and dungeons. There’s a LOT of game in GW1.

This is largely if you’re mainly a PvE player, of course. PvP is definitely nowhere near where it used to be. It’s still worth checking out because there are few other games like it.

It still looks great, too, it’s aged very well and the art direction is still neato. It also probably has the best looking capes I’ve seen in an RPG.

I’ve been stuck on 45/50 for HoM for sometime and thinking of whether I should get the max for the ach’ pts. That’s what most will be doing. Has it’s own ‘mini Orr’ in FoW/UW which is classic GW1.

Why not? Give it a shot.
But there will be no jumping and you wont fall off the edges
Tons of skills combinations for you to figure out for pve or pvp.

In short…
Play GW1 like how you want it to be played. Nuff said
Trust me if Anet continue with GW1 expansions, not many would still be around here.
Thats how Bad-S GW1 is if you understand the mechanics of that game.
Jumping, Dodging are just meh compared to the complexity of that amazing game.

Man i miss my Prot Monk casting with Kungfu moves lol!