Guild Wars 2

My specs are:
CPU: core 2 duo 3.0Ghz
GPU: geforce 9600 gt
2GB of ram

I hear this game is CPU intensive. So i don’t want to go spend 500 dollars on a nice video card and RAM and then not see much of an improvement..

Any advice would be helpful

To be honest.

You need A good CPU over good GPU. Which in Your case it mean You need to build full new spec On other socet then 775 ( which core 2 duo is ).

So basically what You want to do is:

Get medicore/low graphic card like HD7770 or GTX650ti
get cheap ram dual channel 8gb ddr3
And spend some good cash on Mobo& CPU.

In that case:

AMD FX 8350 ( still not 100% recomended ) but really cheap. Am3+ motherborads

or
Intel 1155 socet
i3-3240
i5-2500k/2550k/3570k
i7-2600k/2700k/3770k

And get good colling. OC CPU.

And it should be fine.

i3/fx 8350 CPU will allow You to be happy with nice FPS in PVE and SPvP but not In massive WvWvW.
while i5/i7 oc’d to 4-4.5ghz will give you nice fps in WvW with awesome fps in PVE and SPvP.

the graphica cards 650ti & hd7770 will allow You to be happy with medium/high settings.

You can slo try to snatch used or reselled GTX 470/480/560/560ti/570.
or HD 6870/6950/6970

A better GPU won’t increase your FPS much or at all. It will however let you use higher graphic settings so the game will look better.

4GB+ of ram will probably help you more with your current spec.

(See Part 2.2 for more)

Bassicaly ….what those 2 geezers above me said :P
If u got $500 to spend ..save another $200 and u can build a very nice machine that can play GW2 nicely.