Guild Wars 2

Cantha and Elona ASAP pls:-)

Polismassa.6740:

Say that Cantha was reintroduced in an expansion, and one or two new races/professions were introduced, what might they be. I don’t remember of any particularly stand-out races in Cantha aside from the Tengu, and they already have an area cordoned off for use as a main city on mainland tyria so i’m not sure how that would work.

That said, I think that several people hit the nail on the head, the three environments that really stood out were Kaineng city, which could be stunningly reimagined and redesigned with the new engine. As well as the Echovald forest and the Jade sea, which practically need no redesign. heck, most of the textures and objects they already have from the jade maw fractal, and some of the monsters from both are present in GW2. I’m also thinking of how incredible it could be to do jumping puzzles in Kaineng city, as well as what kind of dungeons and world bosses could be added. Obviously many will want the return of The Deep and Urgoz’s Warren, but really the possibilities are endless.

The Tengu would almost have to be the new race if there was one. Thinking back, I’m not coming up with any other races that existed in the area to adapt unless you consider a “monster” race from the existing GW2 content (dredge/skritt/hylek etc). New classes would be difficult as well as “thief” pretty much rules out assassin. Ritualist would make sense (yes there’s overlap with ranger, but that was true between Prophesies and Factions as well). Right now there’s a lack of heavy armor classes, but presumably a return to Elona expansion would come first and add a class based on the Dervish to fill that void.

Josh Foreman.8250:

Cantha was my favorite GW1 region to work on. And I worked on every GW release. I know a lot of the dev team loved it and would love to revisit it. I kinda agree with critickitten about the negative aspect of tight corridors. Most of that came from hitting technological limits while trying to keep the epic quality of the concept art. I think we could do some really amazing things with those themes in our new engine. Certainly nothing is ruled out. I certainly encourage anyone to express your desire for a Cantha region in GW2 in a positive and friendly way. It could be years away, but it’s worth asking for.

After listening to the pod cast and what you just stated here it seems you guys have run into this issue before. For instance before factions was released you guy’s had to remove the panda pet from Guild Wars 1, because of problems with the marketing in China. Nevertheless that was rectified latter since the entire server base end up getting shut down at a latter date.

Now this seems a bit more extreme version of that based on the aesthetic architecture depicted by combination of Asian cultures. Heck I thought we were picky about the voice acting in factions and when titles first appeared. However the look of factions was never a huge issue with the fans (except those who did not care for the slums of Kaineng city), I still adore the Jade Sea it had something that was a signature of Arena Net artistic mastery.

It would be distressing if this is the case though, because Cantha had actually some interesting dynamics that were never fully fleshed out. I know I have ranted before about Factions being the weakest campaign of the GW franchise, but I have always complimented on its unique aesthetic appeal. Also the lead into Factions event was pretty neat; where we got to have some of its prominent citizen’s end up showing up in North Kryta Province.

Josh Foreman.8250:

Cantha was my favorite GW1 region to work on. And I worked on every GW release. I know a lot of the dev team loved it and would love to revisit it. I kinda agree with critickitten about the negative aspect of tight corridors. Most of that came from hitting technological limits while trying to keep the epic quality of the concept art. I think we could do some really amazing things with those themes in our new engine. Certainly nothing is ruled out. I certainly encourage anyone to express your desire for a Cantha region in GW2 in a positive and friendly way. It could be years away, but it’s worth asking for.

Factions was my favorite Guild Wars expansion, mainly due to the Asian-themed content and the absolutely gorgeous landscape.

I don’t understand what is wrong with Asian themes? The history, culture, and art of the Far East is arguably older, richer, and deeper than that of anywhere else on Earth. Why avoid it?

Please include Cantha in future content!

Syeria.4812:

Polismassa.6740:

Say that Cantha was reintroduced in an expansion, and one or two new races/professions were introduced, what might they be. I don’t remember of any particularly stand-out races in Cantha aside from the Tengu, and they already have an area cordoned off for use as a main city on mainland tyria so i’m not sure how that would work.

That said, I think that several people hit the nail on the head, the three environments that really stood out were Kaineng city, which could be stunningly reimagined and redesigned with the new engine. As well as the Echovald forest and the Jade sea, which practically need no redesign. heck, most of the textures and objects they already have from the jade maw fractal, and some of the monsters from both are present in GW2. I’m also thinking of how incredible it could be to do jumping puzzles in Kaineng city, as well as what kind of dungeons and world bosses could be added. Obviously many will want the return of The Deep and Urgoz’s Warren, but really the possibilities are endless.

The Tengu would almost have to be the new race if there was one. Thinking back, I’m not coming up with any other races that existed in the area to adapt unless you consider a “monster” race from the existing GW2 content (dredge/skritt/hylek etc). New classes would be difficult as well as “thief” pretty much rules out assassin. Ritualist would make sense (yes there’s overlap with ranger, but that was true between Prophesies and Factions as well).

There were also Nagas, who were supposed to be ancient race as well. Tengu, of course, but i think that by background they have all left Cantha already (or at least everyone thinks so), and there was a strong dredge presence in Echovald. Don’t remember other major races that would qualify (yetis were way too primitive for that). As for classes, Ritualists would be definitely a good option – they were already a balanced class even in GW1, with access to healing, utility, damage and support, though i’d say they would be closer to engineers than rangers.
You could give them class-specific spirit mechanics, and summonable weapons and utility ashes for that unique look.

What is bad however is that, apparently, according to the fluff both the Jade Sea and Echovald have returned to their natural state by now. Those were really cool environments, and i’d be very sad to see them gone.

Josh Foreman.8250:

Cantha was my favorite GW1 region to work on. And I worked on every GW release. I know a lot of the dev team loved it and would love to revisit it. I kinda agree with critickitten about the negative aspect of tight corridors. Most of that came from hitting technological limits while trying to keep the epic quality of the concept art. I think we could do some really amazing things with those themes in our new engine. Certainly nothing is ruled out. I certainly encourage anyone to express your desire for a Cantha region in GW2 in a positive and friendly way. It could be years away, but it’s worth asking for.

Alright, I’ll say my 2 cents on the matter…

In GW1, I hated Cantha. Overall, it was my least favorite game. Voice acting aside, I hated it because the entirity felt too kitten depressing with half of the continent – the entirety of Kaineng City for all we saw and knew – was basically slums. The only part of Kaineng City not slums or full of sewage was Raisu Palace, which held no incentive to go, and by the time we visit was already wrecked thanks to Shiro Tagachi.

On the other hand, I also hated the gameplay design – it was “pure numbers to make difficult” (Winds of Change even furthered this…), which makes sense from a lore standpoint – Kaineng City is an overpopulated place, and the best way to show this would be to have hundreds of foes in small areas, rather than hundreds of allies in small areas.

This said, I loved the appeal of the Jade Sea and Echovald Forest, though I didn’t like mobs there either, and I loved the lore of the entire continent (more so than I loved the lore of Elona, sans the part revolving around Abaddon’s and the Realm of Torment’s lore – particularly the canon-questionable Arachnia). Furthermore, where we go in Kaineng also makes sense seeing how we’re battling a plague, which contract first and foremost in low-health areas. Namely, slums and sewers.

So long as explorable Kaineng City is less than 90% slums/sewers, I think I’d enjoy returning there. And I would absolutely love for the lore on human origin to be explained further and that currently makes the most sense to do in Cantha, seeing how all given indications put humanity’s first placement on the world in Orr, but yet the timeline tells us they were in Cantha hundreds of years earlier than they were on continental Tyria (and that, to both locations, they sailed rather than walked through a god-made portal).

The lore potential for Cantha is far larger than Elona, so being a lore lover I’d love to go there sooner. But if and only if the aesthetics are less depressing and the gameplay design for foes doesn’t revert to GW Factions’ designs.

On the flip side – I can’t see Cantha being visited without a revoking in one form or another of “all non-humans got kicked out” – a continent full of humans and wildlife just makes for a bland(er) game expansion. And I can easily see naga, dredge, and possibly wardens all surviving either way.

The only aspect of Cantha I liked was the Kurzick and Echovald Forest. I would beg on bended knee for the Kurzick, I loved them so much, to me they were so stylish, moody, grim and gothic. I loved that….so atmospheric.

However, Elona I would like to see…I really enjoyed exploring that continent.

I’d prefer the return of Elona, Crytal desert, Ring of Fire and other tyrian regions, over Cantha.
But well any expansion with new regions would be awesome

Hey, China and Korea just be friends ok so we can have you represented in our game!

The Luxons and Kurzicks were hybridised, Greek/Indo-Asian and Kabuki/Germanic respectively. They were about as East Asian as the Kodan. Heck, it could be argued that the Kuzicks were less so, so where all this fuss about ‘avoid Asia’ actually comes from… -shakes head-

Still, as someone with a long-time fascination with the ancient Middle East, I’d much prefer to head to Elona first. Give me Persia and Egypt and the awesome Palawa Joko.

Either that or Janthir.

Illiander.8049:

Josh Foreman.8250:

Cantha was my favorite GW1 region to work on. And I worked on every GW release. I know a lot of the dev team loved it and would love to revisit it. I kinda agree with critickitten about the negative aspect of tight corridors. Most of that came from hitting technological limits while trying to keep the epic quality of the concept art. I think we could do some really amazing things with those themes in our new engine. Certainly nothing is ruled out. I certainly encourage anyone to express your desire for a Cantha region in GW2 in a positive and friendly way. It could be years away, but it’s worth asking for.

Here’s the thing, when I saw what the GW2 engine was capable of, Kangang City was the first thing I thought of and went “That would be awesome” Fighting over rooftops, dropping down into the streets, fighting through the buildings…

If you start thinking swashbuckler movies you’ll see where I’m coming from.

Yeah, and even if ultimately Cantha is a lost cause, I hope that the same concept can nevertheless be incorporated into GW2.

Maybe the dominion of winds? The Tengu has shown their architectural prowess by erecting a wall a few times the magnitude of the great wall in ascalon, and if ALL Tengus are supposed to cram in that small island now they’d likely have the population density to require some fairly vertical living spaces. They also totally have reasons to outdo kaineng city in urban development ever since being kicked out.

All this points to a majestic, vertical, sprawling city that is, for all intents and purposes, Kaineng 2.0, right between Lion’s Arch and The Grove.

Cantha was an interesting place. The mission mechanics were a lot of fun, The elite dungeons were cool, and the art design of the jade sea and petrified gothic-forest was neat, but let’s be real here.

The faction/alliance system was a pointless mess that served no practical purpose aside from alienating and annoying players for no good reason while not rewarding alliances who owned cities.

The majority of quests required an obscene amount of fetching and running stupidly long distances despite the established use of map-travel in the first campaign.

The entire plotline and all of the voice acting for that campaign was god awful compared to that found in nightfall/prophecies/EOTN. In fact, the Winds of Change arc done by the beyond team years later was a much better story, with no voiceovers or cinematics. Factions was hands down the weakest and most contrived plot in the entirety of the lore. But it’s lore now, we’re past it, and it does make for interesting backstory.

If we’re to revisit Cantha again, there’s definately room for improvement.

Josh Foreman.8250:

Cantha was my favorite GW1 region to work on. And I worked on every GW release. I know a lot of the dev team loved it and would love to revisit it. I kinda agree with critickitten about the negative aspect of tight corridors. Most of that came from hitting technological limits while trying to keep the epic quality of the concept art. I think we could do some really amazing things with those themes in our new engine. Certainly nothing is ruled out. I certainly encourage anyone to express your desire for a Cantha region in GW2 in a positive and friendly way. It could be years away, but it’s worth asking for.

I can certainly understand, given your background, why you’d love the Cantha region.

But unless you can find a way to either improve the “slums” of Kaineng City such that they’re no longer a system of narrow corridors (i.e. blowing up the entire city and rebuilding it from scratch), I have to be honest: Cantha is not the right place for GW2 to go.

GW2 is such a massive, open, beautiful world that a city like Kaineng (which admittedly is meant to be slummy and ugly, representing the horrid conditions its people must live in) would be such a downstep from the sweeping, beautiful sights of the cities in Tyria. One of the first things that struck me with amazement was the cities, how large and absolutely beautiful they were. Kaineng, sorry to say, is probably one of the ugliest cities aesthetically that I’ve seen in any game I’ve played, not only in terms of appearances, but also in design and structure. Its narrow walkways, unclear world map that made navigation even more difficult, and very “same-y” wall textures made every part of the city look the same. It would need a total redesign to even compare with the sheer beauty, scale, and grandeur of Divinity’s Reach or The Grove.

There’s also the camera issue. The camera in GW2 is so frustrating that it gets hung up on objects and stuck in walls even within the large, open world that you’ve created. Even now after previous fixes, it’s still pretty poor even compared to GW1’s camera. So it would be an absolute nightmare trying to navigate in the narrow corridors of Kaineng with GW2’s camera. Which, again, makes me emphasize that the city would have to be totally redesigned to make it work for this game.

So basically I’m saying this: if you want to go back to Cantha as a designer, don’t let my distaste for Factions stop you. However, if you’re going to do it, you will need to completely rebuild it from the ground up, because it had major technical and design flaws that would make it a severe step down from what you’ve built in GW2.

Cantha is my home. :< I miss it.

I feel like a couple people didn’t read what Josh Foreman said about the whole narrow corridors and new engine thing, and that seems to be the primary complaint which I can understand as well….It’s important to keep in mind that this would be Cantha 250 years in the future from where we left it in the first place, that’s a long time…For all we know Kaineng City got destroyed by something and they had to build a new city elsewhere, or on top of the old one, it’s been 250 years even a “new” city that was built 2 centuries or more ago would be old now and had many numerous generations come and go since.

Also, in 250 years the isolation could have actually served as a positive thing for the country and they could keep Kaineng alive but there could be dramatically reduced poverty and slums, there could be a “new” Emperor or Empress on the throne that has done a lot of work in livening up major portions of the city, and thus reducing a lot of the “depressing, and dark” feeling of those former slum areas since it has been two and a half centuries since it’s known darkest period in the history of Cantha. They could be reluctant to re-open trade and end their isolationist era but need to because there’s something major going on, there is literally many ways that Cantha could be introduced in GW2, it doesn’t have to be depressing at all as there were so many parts of Cantha that were bright and vibrant locations even in the City..

Frankly, with beautée made ??by the devs before release of the game .. I would prefer that Korea and China still leave us things as they were.
Chasm better in full of the promontory is ugly … Sad … And nothing changes.

They could at least gradually reseal and measurement to a new neighborhood.

Genre Quartier des Arts District or merchant Asura, Charr, Norn … Sylvari.

Or a large garden / vegetable garden. With fountains, and a relaxation area with a small inn-style Home for other races who come to visit.

But look, it was a magnificent creation:

Josh Foreman.8250:

Cantha was my favorite GW1 region to work on. And I worked on every GW release. I know a lot of the dev team loved it and would love to revisit it. I kinda agree with critickitten about the negative aspect of tight corridors. Most of that came from hitting technological limits while trying to keep the epic quality of the concept art. I think we could do some really amazing things with those themes in our new engine. Certainly nothing is ruled out. I certainly encourage anyone to express your desire for a Cantha region in GW2 in a positive and friendly way. It could be years away, but it’s worth asking for.

I feel many gw1 players such as myself want to return to places such as cantha and other locations in the original gw. My reason? I’m curious to know what has happened over the course of 250 years. What has changed in places like cantha and elona? Heck, I even want to see the crystal desert, which was my favorite location in gw1.

As of now, despite gw2 being a sequel it really doesn’t feel like the original. Connections between the two games are too far in between. Occasionally one sees something that makes you go “ah hah I remember seeing that in gw1”. But as I said, its quite rare.

Do not negate gw1 past, but at the sametime gw2 should also move forward and explore stuff gw1 could not.

scizwig.5492:

I just heard news that Cantha might not ever be making its way back into GW2 as an unnamed artist for Anet has said: "NCsoft was firm in its decision to stay away from “Asian” themes and keep it “universal.” ArenaNet had to make adjustments quickly. A small number of you may recall that the human story was originally split by Canthans/Elonians/Ascalonians instead of the current Streets/Commoner/Noble paths. Divinity’s Reach originally had sections dedicated to the three cultures as well (Ossan Quarters & Rurikton are the current “versions” perhaps?) ArenaNet obeyed NCsoft’s suggestion and halted all Canthan productions, including the once-existing Canthan sector of Divinity’s Reach…. Because of time restrictions, they had to erase the Canthan sector of DR quickly. The current result is “The Great Collapse.” It’s an inside joke now, she says. The “Collapse” symbolizes what was once an idea that didn’t make it all the way. She further states that ArenaNet had to come up with some new lore to cover up the lack of Canthan content — hence the Emperor’s decree (read lore on Wiki). That’s all I have."

Regardless if this true or not, it is ridiculous. The game world is made universal because it has more than one type/race of human. In GW1 I saw it like this:
Kryta= Greece, Ascalon =European, Istan and Kourna= African, Vabbi and Orr= Arabic and lastly Cantha represented Asia, mostly China/Japan/Korea. That universal diversity is what made Guild Wars such a compelling game. By trying to represent most cultures, you created something universal. I think it is a huge mistake that NCsoft think that universal should mean some sort of one ‘common race’, that because of sexual mingling has come about. That being the only way for it to come about… It is unbelievable to think that entire continent can be erased from a game for the sake of PR.

Cantha and Factions had some of the very best concepts about it in terms of map design and cultural lore. From The training Island to the main land the entire game was beautiful, and the giant city, felt like a giant city. I have actually gotten myself lost in it many times. In fact for quite a lot of people I know, Factions is what got them playing GW in the first place… I know that doesn’t count for much but still.

But what I am most annoyed about, is that you guys (anet) have always been ‘we talk to our player-base’ If this about Cantha is true, then surely this is something we need to talk about. As this is no small thing, it is an entire section of lore and some of your best work going down the drain for no real good reason. Even if this is a thing set in stone, I think it is unfair that the player-base’s opinions go left unheard. It could even be possible that if NCsoft realise how much we love that part of the game, they might change their minds. After the whole Mass effect thing, I think anything is possible with enough voices.

Anyway I just thought I should say something and hopefully people agree and that we can rescue Cathan from the ideas bin.

Well I hope it’s wrong, I would like that area of the world to be unlocked. It would be silly since that area is part of Tyria.

Josh Foreman.8250:

Cantha was my favorite GW1 region to work on. And I worked on every GW release. I know a lot of the dev team loved it and would love to revisit it. I kinda agree with critickitten about the negative aspect of tight corridors. Most of that came from hitting technological limits while trying to keep the epic quality of the concept art. I think we could do some really amazing things with those themes in our new engine. Certainly nothing is ruled out. I certainly encourage anyone to express your desire for a Cantha region in GW2 in a positive and friendly way. It could be years away, but it’s worth asking for.

I would like to have Cantha and Elona back considering they are part of Tyria and already in the lore. I like those areas.

Figthing in Kaineng in this game would be epic with all those building.

AND IMAGINE THE JUMPING PUZZLES!! Now that would be epic stuff!

And I really want to see how is the Jade Sea now that it started to be liquid again (some serious opportunities to promote underwater combat) and to compare past and present of the region like we do with the current game.

I loved Cantha and I would love to see it returning. Plus, if the Tengu are going to be a playable race as all signs are there, sooner or later they will have to visit good ol Cantha.

Cantha just has to come back. It just has too. I would do anything at this point right now to go there. I might even push someone off a cliff if it got me the expansion with cantha tomarrow.

Cantha was the most UNIQUE place in tyria to me. It introduced a sprawling metropolis that was litterly hundreds of years before it’s time. Yes, even I had trouble in Keining city. It was a nightmare. But you have to admit. WHERE ELSE did you feel that claustorphopic, confusing, and downright dangerousness. The city was slums, and it was dreary, and its atmosphere suited it so well.

Everyone can complain that tight corridors left them in tears. But I actually am off the opposite belief. The city was tight, cramped, and dreadful. In the best way possible. I mean, who where beleives slums are filled with rock gardens and giant mansions? It’s the slums! People stay close together, its safer in numbers. Even in awfull conditions, the slums were filled with evil men and woman, afflcited, kappa. It was dangerous. The only place that was not dangerous was a few “Heavily civiliced” area, and I want keining back.

Yes I want to have some pretty lands too. That island off the coast of the city is where I belive the “Rich Ministry” live. So that can be pretty to your hearts content. But the city was litterly enourmous(SPRAWLING NEARLY THE ENTIRE COAST). It was so perfect. Everywhere in gw2 feels open, and huge. No where do you feel that tight, compressed, rat-instinct. Seriosly, in Keining i felt like a rat-Running from predators. If I got backed into a corner, it was one hell of a fight. I think the greatest part of that, is that it worked with the slums. Anet unitentionaly attributed this filth, slum, depression, and danger to this survival instict. Even in those conditions, the slum-humans lived and found happyness where they could. They worked tirelessly, for meanial money(if any). It was a masterpiece.

Also the jade sea and Eschovald Forest are probably still recovering. They may be heavily recovered. Also we have to remeber the Petrification and Jade-if-fication had been around for a long time. Nuclear radiation doesnt disapear in a even 50 years. It takes a very very long time, and this is a life’s curse. But still, both were amazing and want to return. I WANT MY AMBER ARMOR BACK!

Shing Jea was also very pretty, with Mountains and vallies, seas, and farmland. Everything, it was just SOOOO precious. But I have this feeling that is arguably the most changed. It was protected under canthan law from canthans. But the Naga may not have been so happy with being pushed out.

Also as for a reason the Isolation barrier to go down. As everyone in tyria found out. THERE is no way for just one race to beat the dragons. I bet Bubbles is lieing deeper in the jade sea. Which by the way, Cantha as we saw it was only the kittenula, there was a bigger body further south. So if bubbles was destroying the country side-I think id take any help i can get. PRide or no pride. Canthan’s as a people have shown that they know what they can and can not handle, and will accept whatever help when they need it.

I dunno what to believe.

Anet said from the start they didn’t want to expand to Cantha and Elona again because it spread the player base out too much.

So they made a huge persistent world in Tyria spreading everyone out too much and then stuck everybody in the same dungeon. Oh well.

On the other hand Anet also spoke of “my story” and “we don’t make grindy games”. From my point of view, neither of these are true.

The reason I bring that up is simple. They said from the start that they would never go back to Cantha or Elona in GW2, so it might still happen.

Josh Foreman.8250:

Cantha was my favorite GW1 region to work on. And I worked on every GW release. I know a lot of the dev team loved it and would love to revisit it. I kinda agree with critickitten about the negative aspect of tight corridors. Most of that came from hitting technological limits while trying to keep the epic quality of the concept art. I think we could do some really amazing things with those themes in our new engine. Certainly nothing is ruled out. I certainly encourage anyone to express your desire for a Cantha region in GW2 in a positive and friendly way. It could be years away, but it’s worth asking for.

Cantha: worth waiting for.

I didnt like the asian style areas of GW1.

Gehenna.3625:

I dunno what to believe.

Anet said from the start they didn’t want to expand to Cantha and Elona again because it spread the player base out too much.

They said from the start that they would never go back to Cantha or Elona in GW2, so it might still happen.

I don’t remember this being said at all. Not saying it wasn’t, but can you present a source?

I didn’t like Cantha much in the beginning but it grew on me. I’m sure we’ll get it back, maybe around GW2 launkittenorea/Asia

Honestly, as a setting I preferred Elona to Cantha. I enjoyed the assassin class very much, but the theme of that area just never really seemed to tie together very well with the Prophecies content. If it wasn’t for the Mhenlo connection I wouldn’t have felt a link at all. I’m not saying Cantha was bad; I actually enjoyed it very much. But, in many ways it felt like it could just as easily have been its own separate game with no ties to Tyria. I didn’t really get the same strong fantasy-vibe from it that I did with Prophecies.

I would really prefer development time be spent fleshing out the remainder of the continent Tyria. Crystal Desert, Maguuma Jungle, etc.

Can you guys just imagine revive cantha with this new engine, places, themes, music… Will be amazing just Amazing!!

Gw2 has to have Cantha and Elona

This is Tyria… Tyria without those places will never be a complete gw2.

Waiting for Cantha like GW2 Launch

I’d love to see Cantha remade, but to be honest, I’d rather see an entirely new continent first.

Please please PLEASE bring back Cantha!
Factions was the first Guild Wars game int he series I got my hands on, and it solidified my love for your games! If it hadn’t been for that lovely nation to the far south, I would have never thought about heading towards the northern regions introduced in Prophesies and later on in Night Fall, and the Eye of the North expansion! I
know that you guys want the game to be appealing in Eastern markets (I do too!), and that because of South Korea and China’s relationship, having both their architecture styles in the game would be a bad move. Still, there has to be some way to get to Cantha! Maybe use other Asian styles for structures? Maybe just don’t show Kaineng, but at least let us see the Jade Sea and Echovald Forrest! The architecture styles of the Luxons and Kurzicks don’t reflect either South Korea’s or China’s! At least give us that for now! Please don’t let such an amazing region in your world go unseen!

For me, Cantha was the most incredible place in all of GW1. Aside from my first character in the beginning of Prophecies and the Paragon and Dervish that had to be made in Elona, all of my characters were Canthan. There is a certain wonder and power to that land with the sprawl of Kaineng to the stone forest and the jade sea that the other lands of GW1 just didn’t capture for me quite as well. My fondest memories of GW1 were in Cantha, and I would hate to see it go.

“I’d love to see Cantha remade, but to be honest, I’d rather see an entirely new continent first.”

That won’t happen, unfortunately, because we have a globe of the planet Tyria and we can see all of the continents on there. So unless another sunken Orr-like-continent suddenly rises we won’t be seeing anything new.

Josh Foreman.8250:

Cantha was my favorite GW1 region to work on. And I worked on every GW release. I know a lot of the dev team loved it and would love to revisit it. I kinda agree with critickitten about the negative aspect of tight corridors. Most of that came from hitting technological limits while trying to keep the epic quality of the concept art. I think we could do some really amazing things with those themes in our new engine. Certainly nothing is ruled out. I certainly encourage anyone to express your desire for a Cantha region in GW2 in a positive and friendly way. It could be years away, but it’s worth asking for.

Oh, Josh, it makes me SO SAD to think of waiting years before we can go back to Cantha! Thank you for all the great work you and others did on the world of Factions, and thanks for your encouragement to us to keep hoping and asking!

Factions was my first Guild Wars game and the reason I feel in love with the world of Tyria. I still have such a deep emotional attachment to the story and the world…call me sentimental but it would be heartbreaking if such a beautiful project was never returned to in GW2. For the sake of all of the talented people who made Cantha a region we love so much, and the players who still get homesick for Shing Jea, Kaineng Center, House zu Heltzer and Cavalon…I sincerely hope Anet will not leave Cantha behind!

I will keep asking until we see it again!

A petition was requested to save Cantha (and Elona):
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/gw2expansions/

Lets do this!

ShadowGryphon, hooray for your petition! I just signed. We can do this!

Just have to quote frostflare whose entire post expresses so well what I also feel:

frostflare.6390:

Cantha just has to come back. It just has too. I would do anything at this point right now to go there. I might even push someone off a cliff if it got me the expansion with cantha tomarrow.

Cantha was the most UNIQUE place in tyria to me. It introduced a sprawling metropolis that was litterly hundreds of years before it’s time. Yes, even I had trouble in Keining city. It was a nightmare. But you have to admit. WHERE ELSE did you feel that claustorphopic, confusing, and downright dangerousness. The city was slums, and it was dreary, and its atmosphere suited it so well.

This right here. No, Kaineng City was not always pretty or cozy. It was awe-inspiring. It was real. It immersed you in an incomparable way. When you consider the fact that it was inspired by the real Kowloon Walled City in Hong Kong, you realize that it had to be squalid, terrifying, amazing, dangerous, in order to ring true, and that’s why its awesome. This also was a major part of the emotional appeal to me. You really felt and believed the people’s suffering and it made you feel more heroic by helping and proceeding through the story. You knew what you were fighting for. The series of small victories in the face of insurmountable societal obstacles, corruption and hardship made the game very realistic and meaningful to me. The sense of never-ending conflict makes for an amazing game and deep story.

Also, Kaineng City was just one region in the diverse map of Cantha…just IMAGINE Echovald on a Guild Wars 2 scale! Cathedrals and giant trees! Imagine underwater combat in the unfrozen Jade Sea! Imagine how beautiful pastoral Shing Jea would be or how awesome and luxurious the wealthy, beautiful districts of the city would look. If Shing Jea was not at the bottom of the sea, that is (please, please, please! Let Master’s Togo legacy survive!)

Also, from a lore perspective, the effort to overcome the xenophobia of Cantha would add a lot to the GW2 story, which focuses on all races learning to unite. If getting the lesser races of Tyria to join up against the dragons was a challenge, just imagine convincing a whole continent of isolationists that they have to give up prejudice in order to survive. Good story material there.

Yes, I would do anything to get Cantha back! Most especially pay for the expansion! Those making corporate decisions also need to know that people not only care about Cantha, we will make it profitable by financially supporting Anet, too!

Yes please, sir. The sooner the better, loved Cantha, my favorite region. Yea, corridor aspect wasn’t my favorite, but overall art style, Jade Sea… Loved it.

scizwig.5492:

I just heard news that Cantha might not ever be making its way back into GW2 as an unnamed artist for Anet has said: "NCsoft was firm in its decision to stay away from “Asian” themes and keep it “universal.” ArenaNet had to make adjustments quickly. A small number of you may recall that the human story was originally split by Canthans/Elonians/Ascalonians instead of the current Streets/Commoner/Noble paths. Divinity’s Reach originally had sections dedicated to the three cultures as well (Ossan Quarters & Rurikton are the current “versions” perhaps?) ArenaNet obeyed NCsoft’s suggestion and halted all Canthan productions, including the once-existing Canthan sector of Divinity’s Reach…. Because of time restrictions, they had to erase the Canthan sector of DR quickly.

>

Neb.4170:

But why on earth would NCSoft, a Korean company, want to get rid of Asian elements?

Pure target audience strategy. They saw how westerners rejected Asian elements during Mists of Pandaria development, so they took it as a business rule and wanted to surf on the rejection. That is speculation of course, but it is so obvious …

Seriously, a publisher forcing a game studio to remove so much already done work … just for the sake of securizing potential rejections… it speaks volumes.

Maybe …. Let’s all start a Kickstarter to fund the independancy of ArenaNet ? …….
(seriously, I would give loads of money for that)

ShadowGryphon.6257:

A petition was requested to save Cantha (and Elona):
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/gw2expansions/

Lets do this!

Yay! I was thinking about starting one but you already did, so thanks! I’m curious how many people will actually sign a petition.

I’m glad to see so many people agree that Cantha is an absolute must for the game, and feel as strongly (in a positive way) as I do about it. Seeing the community come together about something that has always been an integral and deep part of the GW lore & Mythos must be pretty fantastic for the developers to see, especially devs like Josh so I hope the discussion continues to move forward!

I would love to see the Jade sea finally back to being water, and thinking about the types of monsters both on land and in the water is pretty exciting. The dynamic events, and everything would definitely be very exciting to see, especially if we had a big event where we took ships from Lions Arch or even from a newly liberated section in Orr now that there is progress being made and there are somewhat less undead swarming everything, the first scene arriving at Cantha would be so amazing…Lol so many of us have made our toons Canthan from the first and now second game, to be able to go ‘home’ is something that I’m pretty sure would be received very positively by most of the community! 250 years is a long time, so many things could have changed by now for the better. I agree with a couple posters above that said that the moments where we’re back in familiar places from GW1 are the most gratifying experiences, after all that is what a true sequel does in my opinion. I’m definitely open and looking forward to new places that weren’t in GW1 but my heart is in the places that were, so being able to return and take part there in a “living” world that Anet has been creating, to see the changes and progress, or lack there of are the most gratifying experiences.

PS: I hope Josh and other devs continue to take part in the conversation

Miss cantha and elona as well, as a former gw1 player they both bring back a lot of good memories. The already established lore would also be good to keep.

Lol No Cantha? ANet has lost it.

Cantha as xpac or stop playing, simple as that.

Josh Foreman.8250:

kineticdamage.6279:

Pure target audience strategy. They saw how westerners rejected Asian elements during Mists of Pandaria development, so they took it as a business rule and wanted to surf on the rejection. That is speculation of course, but it is so obvious …

That’s not what happened. This went down long before anyone even know MOP was coming. It was simply a cultural consideration.

Hmmm, gonna throw it out there, the fact that there was even an option to exclude Cantha because of its Asian themes, is prejudice.

The fact that expansions are traditionally so different and foreign from the base game is precisely why they are so successful, they give the player something fresh and new.

Tell me Josh, I’m wondering whether there are any plans in the future to honor GW1 at all?

Y’wanna know the real reason we’re not returning to Cantha? Nagas

Halfway through development they decided to make Nagas the main aquatic slaving race. Then they realized that sounded too much like other fantasy stereotypes, so they replaced it with something they’d established in Eye of the North: Krait.

Except the Krait in GW2 only share one thing in common with their GW1 incarnation – they both look like snake people. Except, y’know, metamorphosis and looking completely different and all that jazz, but whatever, the decision was made, Krait now look like Naga.

Oh wait, weren’t Naga in Cantha? Uh oh. What’re we gonna do when we go there? Let’s dodge the issue and just never return to Cantha. Al Qaeda bombed it, the end, moving on to Elona..

Fyi this is a sarcastic post, but in all seriousness we better return to Cantha, compared to Prophecies it was a breath of fresh air. You can’t just disregard all the potential that was had there – potential remnants of the Kurzick/Luxons after they were absorbed into the empire, what happened to the Monastery on Shing Jea Island, did Mhenlo & Cynn have children, ‘cause Logan Thackeray is kind of a crappy successor to GW1’s lineage, given Gwen wasn’t a major character until EotN, unless you consider raining fireballs of doom in the beta a major character, etcetera! You can’t just toss all that aside, the shepherds of the Canthan people that you saw, the celestial beings, it all ties in to a greater power that may reside alongside or above the six! So much potential lore, you can’t just sweep it under the rug and dust your hands off of it.

hey guys let’s leave out anything asian but keep all the christian holidays!

LOGIC!

Josh Foreman.8250:

kineticdamage.6279:

Pure target audience strategy. They saw how westerners rejected Asian elements during Mists of Pandaria development, so they took it as a business rule and wanted to surf on the rejection. That is speculation of course, but it is so obvious …

That’s not what happened. This went down long before anyone even know MOP was coming. It was simply a cultural consideration.

Someone should explain the reasoning behind it. Otherwise there will be rampant speculation and chaos will ensue. o.O

vespers.1759:

hey guys let’s leave out anything asian but keep all the christian holidays!

LOGIC!

You obviously aren’t aware that cultures celebrated the changing of seasons and other astrological occurences long before our modern day religions. Everything changes with history but the celebrations remained.

… I’m going to lol if I get infracted for this.

Josh Foreman.8250:

Cantha was my favorite GW1 region to work on. And I worked on every GW release. I know a lot of the dev team loved it and would love to revisit it. I kinda agree with critickitten about the negative aspect of tight corridors. Most of that came from hitting technological limits while trying to keep the epic quality of the concept art. I think we could do some really amazing things with those themes in our new engine. Certainly nothing is ruled out. I certainly encourage anyone to express your desire for a Cantha region in GW2 in a positive and friendly way. It could be years away, but it’s worth asking for.

Hows about this:

In Gw1 I first visited the Canthan (aka Factions) campaign roughlt 6 months after it’s release. At first I hated it, downright avoided it, in fact I didn’t revisit it until after the Elonian (aka Nightfall) campaign came out. When I did revisit it, however, what I found completely turned my view of the campaign upside down. Not only did I totally fall in love with the new lore and storyline characters, the scenery was majestic, the enemies diverse and engaging. When I ventured into the depths of the Deep (Luxon Dungeon) and Urgoz’s warren (Kurzick Dungeon) I learned a whole new depth of teamwork that I had not previously encountered. It continued to be my favorite campaign from then on (up until then I was a die-hard Prophecies campaign-er). And to this day I think back on it fondly, even occasionally logging back in to GW1 to play around in the continent and immerse myself in it. When I heard GW2 was releasing I was soooo excited about having the possibility of having a chance to explore the future Canthan continent. When we recieved soe lore about it, I was even more excited: " Cantha became isolationist under Emperor Usoku’s rule, cutting ties with the northern nations. Prior to Usoku’s rule, Cantha was growing xenophobic through the influence of the Ministry of Purity, though because of the isolation, it isn’t yet known to what extent the Ministry of Purity’s influence grew in political and social terms" HOLY CRAP let me in there to see what’s going on!!! That was my first thought lol. To hear it might not make it into this game is beyond shattering to me. In fact it downright slaps me in the face. I supported the GW team and by-proxy NC Soft for these many years and was certain that the things i loved so much in GW1 would return in GW2 (albeit in it’s future context of course ;-) ) I really don’t think the development team would erase an entire (and massively important) chunk of content out of the game so it makes me think it comes down to a cost thing which most likely lies with the publisher/funders. I would implore those making this decision to rethink this. Even if right now, it’s not a financially viable thing to do, that’s ok, in fact, it’s MORE than ok. I can’t even begin to imagine the amount of resources that was put into this game in it’s current state and it will take a little while to recoup that investment. Makes perfect sense. Just please PLEASE do not exclude future content like the Canthan continent for the sake of savingf a few bucks. I can promise you, it will only have negative effects. If you have to delay it for a year, 2, heck even 3, whatever it takes, then do so. Strengthening a foundation is always more important anyway before you decide to add more to a building. I hope at some point my words will be seen by someone with the power to make this happen and they take them to heart. Many of us have invested years of our lives into your product, and plan to invest many more. We just ask you continue to provide us with a means to immerse ourselves in this world you have helped create. I apologize for the excessively long post, but I feel my thoughts needed thoroughly expressing on this issue because it is a very important one.

I would definitely be interested in seeing how Cantha and the other human cultures adapted and changed over the past 200 years.

Katz.5143:

Josh Foreman.8250:

kineticdamage.6279:

Pure target audience strategy. They saw how westerners rejected Asian elements during Mists of Pandaria development, so they took it as a business rule and wanted to surf on the rejection. That is speculation of course, but it is so obvious …

That’s not what happened. This went down long before anyone even know MOP was coming. It was simply a cultural consideration.

Someone should explain the reasoning behind it. Otherwise there will be rampant speculation and chaos will ensue. o.O

so a typical day on these forums?

I really do hope that Cantha will be included in a future expansion. I always felt that Factions was the most beautiful (visually) of the three campaigns, and I’d love to revisit Kaineng City, the Echovald Forest and the Jade Sea and see how it’s changed in 250 years. I got SUCH a thrill re-visiting old GW1 locations like Fort Koga and Aurora Glade in Brisban Wildlands.

Josh Foreman.8250:

kineticdamage.6279:

Pure target audience strategy. They saw how westerners rejected Asian elements during Mists of Pandaria development, so they took it as a business rule and wanted to surf on the rejection. That is speculation of course, but it is so obvious …

That’s not what happened. This went down long before anyone even know MOP was coming. It was simply a cultural consideration.

If it is just a cultural consideration it definitely can be rectified. I’m Chinese myself and I know where they are coming from. A universal “Asian” theme was never a cultural issue because it doesn’t actually exist in the real world. It’s fabricated fantasy just like everything else, but with a slight different flavor is all. Plenty of Asian MMOs have those kind of themes. Ragnarok Online was considered a major success in Korea and I think it still exists to this day, the game must have lasted at least a decade. The entire game was modeled after real world cultures, including Asian influences, even East Asian influences. They never actually put hard references to any specific cultures however, which is what you can be dinged for.

Chinese names like Mei Ling and Japanese names like Akihiko is not acceptable because you can actually tell they are Chinese or Japanese. When you put them together it doesn’t make sense. How do they even communicate (and why would they speak with each other anyways)? Why are these names clearly sound like they’re from different languages and have completely different naming rules and conventions? Let’s not even talk about the disproportionately fewer Korean names, because all of these names are problematic.

Then there’s the issue of the “dragon empire” that dominates the other two close proximity vassal states like it’s feudal time all over again. What’s more, the two vassals hated each other forever! Just like it’s in the real world too! Not everyone likes this part of the real world’s history. I’m sure it’s interesting to outsiders, but if you think in the shoes of the actual people who have to deal with this, especially in the shoes of Korea and Japan, who is still facing this very same issue to this day, it suddenly doesn’t sound all that fantastic, really. (And what do you mean Cantha swept the kurzicks and luxons up in one fell swoop anyways? You think the idea that China sweeping up Korea and Japan in one fell swoop will fly at all? Think of the political implications! There is no way this can stay, no matter how you twist it.)

Moving on to the Ministry of Purification, which I can also pinpoint on to real historical events. They are too long ago for me to personally experience, but my parents experienced it. It has also caused them to migrate out of China over and over (yes, this is legit). Again something that people would rather not see in entertainment. It almost feels like those propaganda movies the Chinese government churn out of the assembly lines.

So it seems like I too have a lot of reasons to hate Cantha, but I do still enjoy it for what it offered. The art style touched the tip of the iceberg that is Asian art, and Kaineng city is still a city that is a big change of scenery compared to every other fantasy-themed cities. Fortunately, if NCsoft has not banned the Kodan sanctuaries and Kodan naming conventions, it means they they are actually open to having Asian influences in the game. Cantha can be saved, ironically, by Ministry of Purification. Simply have them burn all records and re-invent history from scratch. Cantha will only be recognized as a nation that only exists in fantasy, and has none of the aforementioned hic ups. It happens to have a very large overpopulated city that is a structural model of New Delhi, while its aesthetics take inspiration from classical East Asia (or else where, or invent your own mix, at least for this part of the game you cannot go wrong). There was never a Dragon Empire. There was never any sort of split. It appears that everything is as harmonious as can be. The plight of the poor versus the wealth and the issues with a bureaucratic, corrupt government exists, but corruption is legitimate anyway, and is treated the same way as in South/South-East Asia. This is workable, and should not step on anyone’s toes, and still retain all the intriguing aspects of Old Cantha for Tyrians to enjoy.