Guild Wars 2

Josh Foreman.8250:

Can’t wait for you to see what I’m working on now. You may never leave it.

I hope it’s as something as crazy as Mad King (or worst!) I had a love hate relationship with that one

I love all the JP where it’s about “finding the way” because doing (jumping) it isn’t problem at all for me … unfortunatelly when I find the way and complete it the Charm is gone :/

so I would like to see a “living JP” which is somehow shifting so it’s a lil bit different everytime I’m doing it

on the other hand I absolutelly hate both event JP because I’m playing small characters …
the JP itself was nice but doing it with other ppl was sooo anoying
I thought devs learned from halloween and when I saw christmass JP I was rly disapointed

I’ve not seen them all yet but I have some good memories of spending 2 hours figuring out the one in sparkfly fen with my guild :P

None of them. I didn’t realise I had bought a Nintendo JUMP PUZZLE 2 game, but apparently this is a platform game with bells on it.

The Clock Tower is my favorite. I got stuck at the point where you had to jump down, until I saw somebody jumping there and followed him. I got incredibly good at completing it.

From the open world I haven’t found all of them yet, but my favorites are Weyandt’s Revenge, Loreclaw Expanse, The Hidden Garden and Fawcett’s Bounty.

And even if it is not a JP, the labyrinth in Flame Temple Tombs in Diessa Plateau is a very good one.

Guild wars 2 should release an expansion contain purely of jumping puzzles. Honestly this is probably one of the game’s greatest saving grace.

It’ll be a hit i’m sure :P

Mad King’s Clock Tower as well. It took me quite some time to get the hang of it, but then I just couldn’t stop playing. I’d pay a handsome fee for a portal stone that brings me back.

Also loved Wall Breach Blitz because of the messages you could find underway. I remember being really curious what had happened.

Spekks’s Laboratory was a lot of fun too, with the disappearing platforms. I completed it rather quickly, but my friend really found it difficult so we spent a good 3 hours there before she managed it.

Ive found since making a sylvari that jumping puzzles are alot more fun than on my human, i havent done coddlers cover yet though i have tried it a few times and it has to be one of the more unique puzzle environments if only for the quaggans.

I missed out on trying the mad kings tower and the wintersday puzzles as i was busy exploring the world and didnt notice they existed till it was to kitten late

Im gonna go look for the hidden garden later though as it sounds like something i’d enjoy.

Sharkmaw Caverns
Scavenger’s Chasm because it reminds me of a 3D Zelda dungeon where you have to collect pieces to open chests/boss door lock.
Wall Breach Blitz because it was the first one I succeeded at in beta.

Will pay 10 dollars – maybe more – for another chance at mad king tower. It was a blast.

I have to choose?!? not happening….. i find the only one i hate is Griffinrook run as i’ve never managed to get the chest, always hit somewhere along the way. ><"

Also love the fact these are ingame biggest time killer / enjoyment when i’m bored and hell i’ve meet x amount of folks on my flist because of them. It is also something my fellow WoWguildies love in this game that play.

Found the norn puzzle in the beginning zone (Shaman’s Rookery I think) while exploring right after launch and had no clue what was going on. Spent a couple hours there until I finally finished it. What rush. Kudos to the devs for putting them in.

I like most of them. The mad king tower is one of the best. I also liked Griffonrook Run.. that one was tough, another one that took a long time to finish.

I just wish there were tangible rewards at the end. Getting low level greens after spending so much time finishing them is a bit of a let down. Still fun though.

Added note: Please add a first person camera soon. My main is a norn…

the one in metrica in the air is boss. so is the garden one. i also like the one in lornar’s. they are all pretty boss.

I got my puzzle completion in November, but I’ll try to get a top 5 in no particular order.

Conundrum Cubed – I still don’t know how I got to the end of this one, it’s just that Asura puzzles are awesome.
Mad King’s Clock Tower – Took me an incredibly long time, but there’s been no challenge like it.
Scavenger’s Chasm – Teamed up with a stranger to complete this one when it appeared, so it’s a good memory.
Obsidian Sanctum – I do this one practically every day.
Spekk’s Laboratory – Bit of a love-hate, as I died a few times, but at least I got revived.

of those ive done off the top of my head in no particular order

spekk’s lab
goemm’s lab (without cheating using shortcuts)
obsidian sanctum
clock tower

basically anything that is timed/ has environmental effects that add another dimension to it

My favorite jumping puzzle was the Scavenger’s Chasm.

It was atmospheric, unique. It’s design was thoughtful — the camera never gave me issues there (unlike in a puzzle just a short swim away), game’s slippery-slope mechanics weren’t an issue (yet again unlike in that one). The orbs were well hidden in creative places and the way the treasure room was built really made it seem like it was all worth doing.

The only sad part is that all it gives are blues and greens, which is a waste of 20 minutes (assuming you’re doing it the first time), yet even with that in mind — those 20 minutes were definitely the best part of the 800 hours I’ve spent in Guild Wars 2. It’s only funny that Griffonrook Run, an other jumping puzzle, made up the worst 3 hours of those 800.

I like diversity and a good challenge so I’ll go with Shamans Rookery at Wayfarer Foothills.

I loved the one in Straits of Devastation. It was cool the way it was presented as a glimpse into the past, with the painting at the top and everything.

The question is – are we going to see more jumping puzzles?
Also I would like to see the Clock tower permanently in the game!

@Josh Foreman – you know the guys from Crystal Dynamics should envy you. Even Tomb Raider can’t pull off the difficulties and brilliance in some of jp’s (ok they might will but still you’r doing an amazing job with this).

I have to say that I really enjoyed Skipping Stones in Cove
It’s pretty fun to do and the first time you think “ah, okay, I’ll just stand here in the geyser and wait for the stones to reappe… AAAHH! My hair is burning!!”
It’s also neat how it punishes you for not paying attention at the end and the forced perspective there lets you think the ridge is continuous (it’s not xD)

Josh Foreman.8250:

This next one I’m doing is so massive that I’m getting to do a bit of everything in it, so it’s been a super fun experience.

What if that super big JP already went online and we all are part of it? jumpception

Josh Foreman.8250:

FrizzFreston.5290:

Anyway, Scavenger’s Chasm is one of my favourites too. I have done it so many times now, I have started to time how fast I would go through it. (10 min atm)

It’s interesting how much love I’m seeing for that one on this thread. In general I’ve mostly heard negative feedback on it.

I have to say Scavenger’s Chasm is my favorite overall purely because it’s an actual puzzle. I also absolutely love the area with the running water, the water-worn holes, and just how beautiful it is overall inside. I’m a caver so maybe that has something to do with it, I prefer it for looks over the usually-preferred looks of Hidden Garden just because it’s so complex inside. It’s also impressive that nothing feels copy/pasted (in fact, very little in GW2 overall feels that way, which is very different than most massive games, especially cave systems). It’s also great that each JP is so different.

I want to say thanks for making these and the rest of the team for putting them in the game because it really does make the game more unique and I’m very glad that they’re a big enough success that you’re allowed to continue creating more!

FWIW Josh, the existence of jumping puzzles and hard-to-reach vistas is awesome, and is part of what sets GW2 apart for me – optional challenges that don’t revolve around some silly gimmick (e.g. “I’m on a horse and I have to press ‘X’ at the right time, 10 times over, once per day for 20 days, to get a special reward – I’m having so much fun I can barely contain myself from jumping out of my seat and never coming back to this game!”) or just fighting some bad guys.

I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve gotten to a hard-to-reach place in other games, only to be completely disappointed because there’s nothing there. I love exploring, but few games give you an incentive to do it, so hurrah to you and everyone else involved!

I suppose I can put the holiday ones down too as good ones, even though the Mad King’s clocktower made me rage over a stretch of 3 days, 3 hours each day (yes, it took me ~9 hrs to complete over the course of 3 days). It felt nice finally finishing though (as a human – bah to people who complained about Norn and Charr on the puzzle).

I liked the Winter Wonderland as well and completed it several times. Not as hectic as clocktower, but had its moments (screw you candy can platforms on the snowflake part!). Lol.

Josh Foreman.8250:

Victory.2879:

None of them. I didn’t realise I had bought a Nintendo JUMP PUZZLE 2 game, but apparently this is a platform game with bells on it.

Your just being silly. Jumping Puzzles are a peripheral activity that is only there for those who want to do them. The dev team has devoted probably less than 1% of their time to creating them. As I said above, there WERE a few slip-ups where vistas are too hard for those who hate jumping, but on the whole GW2 is not about jumping at all.

100% agree with Josh on this. Jumping puzzles are a fun OPTIONAL activity. If they don’t interest you, don’t do them. For a lot of us, they add an extra challenge.

As for me, I prefer the puzzles that are more linear in nature. I am not as much of a fan of those that require me to find keys or other things along the way. My favorite 2 jumping puzzles were the holiday one and the skipping stones one.

One suggestion… when you create timed puzzles, add multiple difficulty modes. At the easiest mode, a person would get the most time to complete the puzzle and receive the achievement at the end. At the higher difficulty, there would be better chest rewards but less time to complete the puzzle.

I don’t really like any of them although I’ve completed them all for achievement purposes.
My least disliked one is Loreclaw Expanse, but that’s probably just the BWE memories talking. I love the scenery in Griffonrook Run though.

I don’t know if it counts, but for me it’s Sector Zuhl. The first two times I completed it, I soloed the boss at the end, which took a hell of a long time. When I finally got him down, there was nothing, no chest, no new passage, nothing. I thought I did something wrong or missed a clue, but there was no clue to be had. To make matters worse, once you leave the boss room, he respawns, which led me to believe the reward for the jumping puzzle was to be able to farm the boss event in rapid succession. On my way back out(the small passage leading you to the dedge cave cloe to the zone portal) there was a rich vein of something I forgot, but it was placed inside the wall, so I couldn’t even get that. It was only a few weeks later when I joined up with another player to recheck the JP that I was told the chest at the end was bugged.

Josh Foreman.8250:

This next one I’m doing is so massive that I’m getting to do a bit of everything in it, so it’s been a super fun experience.

Really excited to see it! One question though, will it be in the Feb or March update? As a follow up, if it is in the Feb update, can you perhaps give us the number of JPs that we will see in Feb? Thanks

Josh Foreman.8250:

RandomHominid.3456:

I have to say Scavenger’s Chasm is my favorite overall purely because it’s an actual puzzle. I also absolutely love the area with the running water, the water-worn holes, and just how beautiful it is overall inside. I’m a caver so maybe that has something to do with it, I prefer it for looks over the usually-preferred looks of Hidden Garden just because it’s so complex inside. It’s also impressive that nothing feels copy/pasted (in fact, very little in GW2 overall feels that way, which is very different than most massive games, especially cave systems). It’s also great that each JP is so different.

I want to say thanks for making these and the rest of the team for putting them in the game because it really does make the game more unique and I’m very glad that they’re a big enough success that you’re allowed to continue creating more!

Wow, thanks for the great compliments. I do some spelunking myself, which lead me to try to recreate a claustrophibic feeling in one of the WORST JPs in the game: Troll’s End. Which was NOT that bad until the camera got changed just before we shipped! But then I incorporated that claustrophobia with exploration in Chasm. Also, I sculpted most of the cave props and tunnels in the game, so I’m glad to hear they don’t appear copy-pasty.

There is a part at Troll’s End that infuriates me so much. It’s on the part where you are on the planks, and you have to jump from the plank to a rock. But if you jump too early, you hit the ceiling which ruins the jump. And if you jump too late, well you just fall down. Was this intended or will there be a fix for this?

Also, are you responsible for the rewards for JP’s? I’m just curious if the loot table for an easy puzzle (like Urmaug) is the same as those which are harder and take much longer (if you can share that type of information)

Don’t think I have any favorite. Most are okay.

Question: Some seem to have shortcuts, are any of them intentional or are they all “glitches”?

Josh Foreman.8250:

Apolyon.6937:

And even if it is not a JP, the labyrinth in Flame Temple Tombs in Diessa Plateau is a very good one.

Uh… I made Diessa Plateau and I don’t know what you’re referring to. Is it new content?

It’s this mini-dungeon: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Flame_Temple_Tombs

Pretty sure it’s been in since beta, you do a meta-event to attack a firey place and open up a portal that ports you into the mini-dungeon and then there’s some underwater parts with torches and tunnels or something. And some ruins and stuff.

Lots of videos on youtube, like this one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SVZnP-QCTQ

Quote: Your just being silly. Jumping Puzzles are a peripheral activity that is only there for those who want to do them. The dev team has devoted probably less than 1% of their time to creating them. As I said above, there WERE a few slip-ups where vistas are too hard for those who hate jumping, but on the whole GW2 is not about jumping at all.

If they are OPTIONAL, then remove them from wvw as they have no part in it, block real wvw players from getting in and are the cause of a lot of friction between JP2 fans and wvw players.

Hell, take up my suggestion from months ago and take all the JP’s OUT of wvw and make it it’s own area with it’s own queue system and I’m sure the fanboys here would all love you for it (and the wvw community would love you for it too). Imagine a whole instance full of your favourite JP’s in a pvp area!

For something that less than 1% of devs time was spent on there certainly seems to be a lot more of them and even more being developed while it been X months and most if not all of the wvw issues still exist.

Maybe the JP team should work on wvw and the wvw team can play with designing JP’s, then we might see some results on wvw.

but on the whole GW2 is not about jumping at all.=== so then they didn’t appear in Xmas event as a major part of it, or most other added content doesn’t contain at least an element of either ‘jumping’ or a ‘puzzle’? Fractals has at least one where jumping is a major part of it- of the 3 I saw there was plenty of jumping and opportunities to fall to your death.

I’ll stop being ‘silly’ when you start being ‘sensible’ in your replies to a customer.

Victory.2879:

If they are OPTIONAL, then remove them from wvw as they have no part in it, block real wvw players from getting in and are the cause of a lot of friction between JP2 fans and wvw players.

Noooooo, we love the Murderpit!

Josh Foreman.8250:

Vol.5241:

Also, are you responsible for the rewards for JP’s? I’m just curious if the loot table for an easy puzzle (like Urmaug) is the same as those which are harder and take much longer (if you can share that type of information)

No, we map artists are teamed up with a scripter, and scripter has to keep all that economy balance stuff in mind. I know little about those issues.

Instead of having gear rewards they should put BoP unique visual skins in the JP chests. That would help return the game to it’s roots and save the issues of economy for other things.

I love the jumping puzzles, despite being really terrible at them. Several of the ones mentioned as being peoples’ favorites in this thread I simply cannot do – specifically Skipping Stones and Spekk’s Laboratory. Just don’t have the requisite eye/hand coordination. This is not a complaint! I have no problem with there being optional things in the game that I can’t achieve. And who know, maybe if I keep playing long enough I’ll improve enough to succeed.

Still have a great time with all the others, though. I have not done the Scavenger’s Chasm yet, but may tackle it this weekend. I believe it and Chaos Crystal Cavern are the only JP achievements I do not yet have, other than the aforementioned Skipping Stones and Spekk’s Lab ( And I’m currently pretending those don’t count. Because that’s how I roll. I maintain a 100% success rate at achievements cough inmymind cough by only choosing the ones I care to achieve. )

Griffonrook Run is where I bust out the portals. It requires playing ahead a little, but skipping most of the tricky bits makes it much easier.

After jumping down from the starting platform, it’s business as usual following the canyon wall until the first harpy nests – I dodge or use Veil to avoid the first harpy, drop Portal Exeunt and skip to the bottom of the long rise and staircase up to the crossing with the first chest on it. After that, the only tricky bit is jumping off that crossing and not getting killed by the griffon at the bottom of it. I generally save Decoy for that as a stunbreak and stealth rolled into one, dodge-roll past the advancing griffon, then continue on my merry way up to the final chest.

Still takes a bit of effort to get right but it’s nowhere near as bad as trying to outmanoeuvre all the griffons in the tight spots along the way.

Was going to add my favourite yesterday but I couldn’t log in at the time.

Branded Mine. It’s a pig, and I wish the nearest waypoint wasn’t so far, but it was a lot of fun trying to figure out the right path. And trial and error figuring out the safest angle to jump so my oversized charr has as much runway as it can get to land safely.

I am a colossal idiot for choosing to do every jumping puzzle in the game on a charr, but it seems to have worked.

Out of sheer curiosity, did you do the jumping puzzle in the Eternal Battlegrounds as well? Because the size of that is just magnificent. It’s the one and only jumping puzzle that I do regularly – Even if my chest hasn’t reset yet.

Are you considering doing something similar in the future? Either for WvW, or a PvE version – With automated traps, of course.

Also, I’m not a big fan of the timed jumping puzzles. I won’t say I’m terrible at the platforming stuff, but I’m far from the best at it. So getting a wee bit of extra time before getting blown to smithereens would be useful.

The problem with the jump puzzles in WvW is that they do a few things:
- They draw players who have no interest in WvW into WvW, which takes up queue slots from players who do want to contribute to WvW
- Their rewards provide a lot of siege and Badges of Honor, which makes them feel necessary for WvW players who have no interest in them
- They create a lot of animosity because players who prefer to do the JPs and not PvP cannot without being attacked by other players, due primarily to the willful griefing that the JP encourages (a lot of players love ruining the day of the players who do the JP but are not very good at PvP)

Josh Foreman.8250:

Victory.2879:

If they are OPTIONAL, then remove them from wvw as they have no part in it, block real wvw players from getting in and are the cause of a lot of friction between JP2 fans and wvw players.

I’m not super familiar with how the JP in WvW interacts with the rest of the map, so I can’t really speak to that. I am not an expert on all things GW2 or even JP. I’m speaking from my understanding of the subjects. I would be interested in hearing more about this dynamic though.

He is most likely one of the players who doesn’t want to have to have to PvP in any of the WvW jump puzzles. They feel they are forced to do the WvW JPs because of Badges of Honor for getting their legendary weapons made, and are mad that they are part of constructing legendaries to begin with. Thus, angry non-PvP players “forced” to do JPs in WvW and simply do not want to participate in PvP due to the badge rewards.

You have players who go into the JPs hoping not to get attacked and do /bow /wave and other emotes trying to signal that they don’t want to fight, and then you have players going in to JPs and attacking them for simply being there, or to seek out these players who don’t want to fight and ganking them.