Guild Wars 2

First let me congratulate the writing team on intelligent storytelling across the board, from ambient conversations to books in Durmand Priory to random townsfolk. I admire their courage in exploring some serious, difficult questions of human condition (or Asura, Charr, Norn, Sylvari condition as the case may be). And there are plenty of clever puns. Running around the maps I was often amused, rarely bored, and never felt any insult to my cognitive abilities, something I can hardly say for most MMOs. Here are two of my favorite story moments.

With the general good impression out of the way, it is time to tackle a pet peeve: Overly positive NPCs bordering on self-delusion.

The love of her life dumped her. Did she rage? Did she weep in silence? Did she sing “You’ve been a fallen angel / Ripped out of the sky / But as your wings grew strong enough / You left me behind to die” (song)? No, no, no. She exclaimed, “If we work together, we can achieve anything!” I’d be real worried if that were my daughter’s first reaction being dumped.

Sometimes a bad ending is the only logical conclusion to a story. I’d rather have fun revelling in misery as a tragic hero, than be told to count the failure as a win, knowing very well I didn’t.

I think the point behind Dawkurra not being phased from being declined is the fact that she’s a skritt and the Exalted are gold.

Skritt aren’t too intelligent – especially when alone – and what thought processes they have are overriden by shinies.

Also, something easy to overlook with that particular skritt: on the roofs of the skritt structures in AB there is a generically named skritt cowering on the roofs. Talking to him explains the following: the skritt is afraid of heights, but ran up top by Dawkurra’s suggestion when the mordrem attacked; now that the mordrem are gone, the skritt is too scared to climb down. Worse, however, is that said skritt was Dawkurra’s boyfriend – was, because she dumped him for the Exalted shininess. Not the Exalted. The shininess of the Exalted structures.

In other words, while the Exalted turned Dawkurra’s advances down, Dawkurra’s unphased because she’s stupid and the shine of the Exalted and their structures have overridden her sensibilities.

You do find her running around Tahir screaming “THIS IS THE BEST THING EVER.” “SOOOOOOOOO SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” and variants out the crazy end, I’m assuming this is after you rescue the one Exalted. (I’ve not done a lot of the events in Auric basin, but I did catch the scene where the Exalted sage refused the skritt’s advances/professions of love :P)

I always found her cute and silly, a bit of a break from the darkness of Heart of Thorns. That and the guild initiative pair that wander Tahir talking about random things, from Revenants wandering around the jungle, to whether the one guy needs more swords, to “You think we’ll meet Braham? That’d be awesome!”