GW2 Stress Test and Announcement

First and foremost you should all know by now that Guild Wars 2 will be released on August 28th! The best part of that news is that everyone who pre-purchased the game gets a 3-day head start, which means you can start playing it on the 25th and get a weekend in before everyone else does. Awesome! The wait is almost finally over!

I've also been super glad that during the 2 months we have left of waiting we're getting all these stress tests, and beta weekends, which are super fun and they've let me really figure out what to do under different playing circumstances. During the stress test yesterday I only had a few hours to play, and I had already completed a lot of the content I intended to so what was I to do for a couple hours?

First of all, I turned myself into a deer. I mean why not?

Then I played around on my warrior and killed some bandits with the help of Logan Thackeray. The thing I really enjoy about playing a warrior is that combat feels especially visceral. While I do definitely enjoy the combat system with Mesmers, there's always a soft spot in my heart for getting up close and personal with my foes. Smashing them in the face with large objects never gets old.

After that we all found out that there would be a repeat of the last BWE final event, in which Dragon Branded minions invaded the Plains of Ashford. During the last BWE I didn't get a chance to play in this little event so it was especially fun for me to experience for the first time. I definitely did my fair share of zerging waypoints and making sure that nothing survived our onslaught. 

Of course, eventually I got turned and had a party with my new friends. 

Now we only have some speculation left to do. The last BWE is July 20-22, so what do you think they'll let us play? I'm hoping the Sylvari and Asura are finally available. It would be awesome to finally see Rata Sum and The Grove in all their glory!

GW2 Gearing up for BWE2

Now that ArenaNet has posted what we'll be able to see and do in this coming Beta Weekend Event the question arises as to what will you ACTUALLY do?

With all this new content you could spend the entire weekend crafting, exploring and fighting bandits without even stepping foot into the new PvP content. Likewise, it's entirely possible for you to spend your entire time locked in brutal combat with the newly added sPvP tournament mode. Will your team be victorious, or will you be crushed by your foes? But perhaps, it fits your fancy to go look into the explorable Ascalon Catacombs and spend all your time vanquishing the newly formed ghosts of olde?

I know I for one haven't spent nearly enough time with sPvP and WvWvW content so I'm definitely going to make sure to at least do a tournament or two, and find out what this Dark Room they speak of has to offer. I do love tricks and traps. Also, I've finally gotten my rig set up for recording video (sorry no streaming yet) so I've definitely got some plans for a steady flow of content after the beta has run its course. Expect glorious screenshots and battle reports at the very least!

Which means if you've got any ideas on what you'd like to see feel free to let me know! My Mesmer would be more than happy to risk life and limb for you.

GW2 The BWE Downtime Game

As many of you have already read this morning ArenaNet announced that the next BWE will be from June 8th-11th and there's some interesting bits in there that should be of interest to you. Particularly all your characters will be kept.

I find this to be great news because after spending 30+ hrs building up a Mesmer over the course of the last BWE and Stress Test I would hate to have to do it all over again. Of course I totally would do it all over again, and probably take the opportunity to explore some different options starting out. Maybe go through the Charr story instead. I really fell in love with their starting area when I was exploring around and just having fun. Their dynamic events have a particular flavor to them that's really fun and unique. You're definitely not going to find little human kids running around commenting on how badass they are when you kill ghosts for them.

With that in mind, I can't wait to see what the Asura and Sylvari zones have to offer. I've been gripped by the Sylvari lore since they were first announced and was planning on making one even before they became even more awesome. I just hope we don't have to wait too long to get a chance to see what they have to offer. And all this waiting has really gotten me thinking what to do in all this GW2 downtime? I'm not going to pony up for Diablo 3 right now because, well frankly I don't have the money, but that's besides the point. I know that once GW2 launches I'm just going to shelve everything else anyway so I don't really think it's a great idea to go and buy a bunch of stuff potentially months before you stop playing it entirely.

So I've been picking up hobbies, like blogging, for example, and I've been watching SC2 streams over at TeamLiquid. As well as chugging through the Brutal campaign in SC2. Sometimes that campaign just feels like you're smashing your head into a brick wall. It's like a test in how much of a masochist you are. Honestly, I don't think it's really worth it, but it's something to keep me entertained in the meantime. I'm also going through and finishing up Playthrough #2 of Borderlands. I've built up a SMG Siren to the point that almost nothing poses much of a threat though, so it's really more to get some kind of FPS kick than anything else. There's a few Achievements I have left to get, but the Underdome is retarded and I don't really feel like spending 16hrs of arena grinding to get 4 more achievements.

Vanilla GuildWars has always had a special interest for me so I log back in there from time to time, but given that I've already gotten 40/50 in my HoM I've almost entirely retired my character to playing dollhouse with all the armor sets I've collected and screwing around in Random Arenas from time to time. And with the gargantuan time commitment I'd have to invest in order to get another 5 HoM points it's one of those things that I'm really not interested in anymore.

What have you been doing in this downtime? Are you still working on finishing up your HoM? Or is there something entirely different that's been keeping your attention? I hear a lot of people have been logging back into old favorites to pass the time.

GW2 Rumor to start your week

File this under 'unsubstantiated rumors' but I figure I'd bring it to your attention all the same.

Usually the first thing I do when I get up is check Google reader and get up to date on what's rumor milling around the internet and surprisingly the things have been relatively quiet these days. That was until I loaded up the GW2 beta client and it started downloading something.

See for yourself.

Noted, the download was pretty small. Somewhere in the realm of 35-40mb. And the content text from last week's Stress Test hadn't changed, but could this be a sign of an upcoming Beta Weekend Event? Possibly. We do know that during the first BWE the beta clients from earlier were updating as much as 2 days before the client was released to the public and we also know that ArenaNet has stated that they're aiming to have a BWE once a month. While last Monday's stress test was fun and all it wasn't a BWE, and factor in that there's only one weekend left in May, so if ArenaNet want's to keep up to their word it reasons to believe there's a good chance of a BWE this coming weekend.

Though, as I'd mentioned at the start, this is all just unsubstantiated guessing.

In the meantime you should go check out GW2Guru. There's an awesome post showing all the armor sets we know of. It's great eye candy.

UPDATE: There was a post on the GW2 Facebook a little bit ago regarding BWE and their frequency. I think this part gets to the point:

"We're going to adhere to a monthly schedule as much as feedback and development allow, so it may be a little more or a little less each time, depending on how things progress. For now, we will have more information on upcoming Beta Weekend Events and stress tests as soon as we're able, and we thank each of you for being an important part of the creation of Guild Wars 2. ~RB2"

So while it's possible that there might be a BWE this coming weekend, I'm definitely not going to get my hopes up.