Guild Wars 2

I just noticed GW2 is having a trial weekend. I haven’t played this game for months, but I haven’t uninstalled it yet either. So let me ask, what is there for new players to do?

Leveling and the plot arc? I have one character of each race, from level 20 to 28, and all their storylines were terrible. Don’t like the writing, the voicework, the ‘cutscenes’, or the awful level balancing. Levelling solo was painfully slow. Finding useful equipment was a chore — by design, I think, since they want players to buy equipment with real money on the auction.

Exploring the zones? I played long enough for the wave of hardcore players to pass me by, leaving the newbie zones and the secondary zones empty. Exploring by myself was dangerous with little reward, and even if I could handle that it’s not what I want in a social game.

Dungeons? The first real dungeon was level 35, which I never reached. I heard that something lower level appeared after I left. Do you need a team, or can a solo player jump into one?

PvP? Meh. If I want a PvP game with incremental character customization and fixed skills (can we at least rebind weapon skills, now?), there are MOBA games for that. I never liked the GW2 PvP.

For players without friends in the game, GW2 was un-fun…and the opportunities for making new friends was minimal. Has any of that changed at all?