New Guild Wars 2 demo build brings changes to UI, character creation, and more

ArenaNet has had an exciting week -- the developer is in attendance at G-Star in Korea to show off the demo of Guild Wars 2. As with any game in development, GW2 is in a constant state of change as the team continues testing and improving. G-Star attendees were treated to the very latest build, and some of the ArenaNet developers put together some information about that build for those unable to attend the convention.

Eric Flannum, joined by Character Artist Team Lead Aaron Coberly and UI Artist Vicki Ebberts, ran down the changes in the newest ArenaNet blog entry. Character customization and creation got some improvements, and Aaron provides a detailed video to show them off. Vicki talked over the new "big beefy UI" as a response to feedback the team has received, and Eric wrapped up with some exciting details about changes to skill acquisition. Weapon skills will continue to be unlocked by using the weapon, but healing, utility, and elite skills will now be unlocked with skill points. "Skill points can be acquired by undertaking what we call a skill challenge. There are 200 skill challenges in the game, and they range from defeating tough opponents, to answering riddles, to drinking a particularly potent drink."

There are many more details -- and the promise of more to come tomorrow -- at the ArenaNet blog, so head there for the full blog entry!

Reader Comments (42)

Reading the last 2 articles about changes (this one and the engineer/pets one), I don't get the impression that the game will be released soon.

@Sephirah

As stated by Regina and a few others at ArenaNet: "we are still on track to release the last profession and closed beta before the end of 2011". Open beta will follow and based on the feedback from the tests that will determine the release date.

@Sephirah smart money is on a Fall / winter 2012 release for GW2, and some would say that's a bit optimistic. Think of it this way, you've got plenty of time to get to at least 30 points in the GW2 calculator. I'm just glad I got my Vabbi set before the HoM came out, back then rubies and sapphires were cheap(er) coming in at 3.5 to 4 plat each instead of the current going rate of 9+

@Sephirah Thats because you think of Arenanet as having one team. Arenanet has different teams working on different system, thats how they have always been. When a team finishes working on a system they just dont sit around playing with their fingers they keep working on it till its good. Which is kinda nice but extremely annoying as a fan waiting on that game.

@Arkanaloth

I feel that you're probably close to the ball park with that estimate but I hope you are wrong. That wait is gonna be killer, I'm just hoping for a spring q2 release at the latest.

@Sephirah
They're in a stage where they've started to put a lot of polish on character models and gameplay details. It may not be ready to go live within the next few months, but things are definitely starting to wind up.

@Arkanaloth

fall/winter 2012? you nuts? late spring at the latest. the game is ready for closed beta soon.

Loving the new changes. From what I saw in the article in regards to skill acquisition it sounds interesting and different from what most MMO's have done in the past (go to a trainer and buy the skill).

And personally, I don't mind these filler blogs of information since ArenaNet stated before G-Star that both the last profession and closed beta are on track for a later date in 2011.

Let's hope all goes smooth for GW2. They deserve it.

Man, I can't wait to play GW2 and SWTOR. Best of both worlds.

Nice to see male humans getting some decent-looking long hairstyles. The ones my warrior had to choose from in GW1 were.... not so good.

@Eamil That's why I always sent bald, haha.

@Grumms went*

Forcing me to hit hotkey #1 ten times before giving me a weapon skill on hotkey #2 to alternate with it isn't "teaching me" anything. I still really feel like ANet are "talking down" to their customers when they try to justify their new skill system with this type of rhetoric.

AND this still doesn't address the inherent imbalance between classes that have access to numerous different weapon sets and ones which use only a few.

I would prefer it greatly if they didn't treat their players like drooling idiots who need to be "taught" how to use their weapons. Please just give me access to the various skills associated with a weapon and allow me to experiment with them on my own, and make up my own mind as to which ones suit my particular playstyle or preferences.

There is so much to love about this developer and this game... I guess it's that extreme contrast between all the good and this one particularly bad choice that makes it stand out so much to me. I'm very much in the minority on this topic, but it is nevertheless the ONE really poor design choice that I've seen for GW2.

@ArcherAvatar

They're not designing this system around people like us who play and read about these games all day. It's meant to help those people that have never played this sort of game before who might pick Guild Wars 2 up; those new players that many hardcore gamers (and, no, if you read and post a blog dedicated to MMOs you're not longer "casual") love to pretend don't exist but then get upset when they're in their group and don't know what they're doing.

I can understand not liking the system, but acting like it's an insult to your intelligence just makes it seem like you're insecure about something.

@ArcherAvatar

Well, if you think of it as a choice between "having all skills unlocked at the start" or "unlocking the weapon skills one by one through using your weapon" then yeah, the "right choice" is obvious. But that's not what this was. It was a choice between "unlock weapon skills through use" or "learn new weapon skills from trainers."

I could be wrong but as far as I can remember I don't think they were EVER going to just give you all five weapon skills for a given weapon type from the start.

@Ehra

Exactly.
---
They're trying to get people that have never picked up any mmos or were just very casual in the more traditional titles, this will be a nice change of pace for those people.

@ArcherAvatar

it takes you like 5 mins to unlock the second skill, and then 5 mins to unlock the next one etc. Are you really so important that you can't spend 5 mins learning how to use a particular skill?

And the classes are not imbalanced because of weapon restrictions. Elementalists get only a few weapons but they have attunements. Warriors get a lot of weapons but no attunements. Engineers have toolkits/backpacks etc, Sounds pretty well balanced to me. Besides, the game isn't even out yet how could you possibly say that they are imbalanced?

@Eamil

Somehow I forgot to actually say what my point was, which was that the new weapon skill system might not be ideal for you or me, but it's still a much more interesting way of doing it than "hit level 3, go see trainer for new weapon skills." So from that perspective, I don't think it was a bad decision at all.

@ArcherAvatar
"AND this still doesn't address the inherent imbalance between classes that have access to numerous different weapon sets and ones which use only a few."

Every single class that lacks a large selection of weaponsets has unique gameplay mechanics to make up for it. Those mechanics are, in fact, the reason they have fewer weapon choices: it's about balance.

@ArcherAvatar

Overexaggerate much? I agree with you partially. I feel giving two skills to the player at the beginning would be a good choice BUT the speed at which you get the second skill is so fast that you won't even know you never had it. The only problem I guess is grinding to unlock all your weapon skills,and even then they achieve their intent and YOU DO learn what all the skills do AND how to use them.

| 1 | 2 | 3 | Most Recent | Next 20 Comments

New Guild Wars 2 demo build brings changes to UI, character creation, and more

Reader Comments (42)

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 11:04AM Sephirah said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 11:06AM nightsong89 said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 11:18AM Arkanaloth said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 11:47AM silver001 said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 12:34PM Seldra said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 12:59PM Irem said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 1:02PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 11:05AM nightsong89 said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 11:06AM Grumms said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 11:12AM Eamil said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 11:14AM Grumms said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 11:15AM Grumms said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 12:20PM ArcherAvatar said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 12:30PM Ehra said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 12:37PM Eamil said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 12:37PM Seldra said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 12:40PM wahahabuh said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 12:40PM Eamil said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 12:57PM Irem said

Posted: Nov 10th 2011 1:05PM Dirame said

Info

Description

MSRP

Release Date

Genre

Developer

Publisher

Rating

Breaking News

The Secret World launch delayed to July 3rd

Featured Stories

The Mog Log: The Legacy rewards and what they mean

The Tattered Notebook: The passing of Ribbitribbitt

The Firing Line: PlanetSide 2's Matt Higby on the MMOFPS revolution

Engadget

Joystiq

WoW

TUAW