Dear ArenaNet, dear players,
first of all: I’m no native speaker, so please excuse some minor mistakes. But I really think that posting on the international/English forums will increase the chance of being read.
The issue I want to discuss is the lore-based storyparts that aren’t implemented into the game. With the Queen’s Jubily patch there were so many questions that stuck into my head. I am aware that most of them (maybe) will be answered in the near future, but some of them were already deepened by the shortstory on the main website. „What Scarlet Saw“ was a very nice text I enjoyed reading. But what if I had missed it? The background story regarding Scarlet’s character is one major aspect of the current events. Players who don’t visit the main page won’t get all those things and start acknowledging her as a cheap copy of „Joker“ (? Batman) – which she is not!
Today, I wanted to show this shortstory to some of my guildmates, because they were discussing Scarlet’s background. But when I looked at the Website, I couldn’t find it anymore. Two more news appeared and sent the wonderfully written text to page no. 2. I found it easily, but what surprised me more was the fact that I also found some text about the Charr-delegation, one short story about Ellen Kiel and one about Evon Gnashblade.
I had missed them and therefore a whole part of new Guild Wars 2 lore.
I don’t think that things like that should happen.
Instead I’d like to suggest something.
You remember the Hall of Monuments? Not the ruins we can now travel to. The old one. Big. Pompous. What about something like this:
Implement some new instanced area, for example at the priory’s spot in Lornar’s Pass (they are known for their historic knowledge). But actually it could be elsewhere – it doesn’t really matter, maybe Lionsarch? Anyway: this instanced area is designed as some big room. Fine and valuable pillars of marble and gold reacht towards the very top of the hall where it leads into a ligh flooded copola. In the very middle of the room, there is a fountain (e.g.) and the light from the top flows into every corner of the room. Ancient runes float through the air and a misterious atmosphere is generated.
Ok, enough … the actual thing is: This hall would be some kind of „Living World Research and Preservation center“. Backgrounds and histories would be memorized on stone steles or maybe in virtual diaries (? Asuran technology). All those short stories could be accessed in this area and (maybe) some Guild Wars 1 lore as well? Maybe the Flameseeker Prophecy concentrated on one stele? Some kind of library.
I know that some of those stories mention things that are described from a omniscient narrator perspective. But mentioning that this area also functions as some kind of research center might explain this fact (see „Fractals of the mist“).
I don’t think it would be much too complicated to do something like this. Especially because all of those shortstories only posted on the main Guild Wars 2 website will be forgotten soon. I for my part didn’t event know that they existed. And people who will join the game in one or two months won’t know either. We should preserve those masterpieces and make the game more independent from out-game-content, respectively try to fuse those two parts.
Or at least (I emphasize: at least) implement some section on the main page (equivalent to the “Releases”-button) especially for the storyparts. Otherwise they will vanish on the (very) back pages of the news feed.
That’s all I’d like to say. I hope that my intentions shine through and that my text was readable for you native people.
Regards,
Latrotoxin
