Guild Wars is a tricky topic in the world of massively multiplayer games. It doesn’t cost anything to play beyond the cost of the serial code which is always a plus. However some say that this system creates a lack of new content and innovation. I’m not so sure though considering that details for the fourth part in the story and a sequel have already been announced.

Clearly NCSoft have a good market model going with their series, especially with the interest in carrying on creating new material and features. The new expansion pack ‘Eye of the North’ is said to include “18 new multi-level dungeons, 40 new armour sets, 10 new Heroes and massive 150 new skills, out of which 50 belong only to PvE”. It’s also primarily aimed towards already high-level characters (hence the continuation of the original storyline). The game is set as an ‘expansion pack’; it will require you to own at least one of the original chapters in the series and will be released at a cheaper price because of this. It continues on the story of the Prophecies campaign and includes giant earthquakes, underground tunnels and gigantic amounts of Charr - sounds like a pretty average story for an RPG then! Although the new expansion won’t bring any new professions or functions to the series, what it will bring is a lot of new content and a higher level-cap than the original games.

‘Eye of the North’ seems to be a sort-of bridge towards NCSoft’s next game, ‘Guild Wars 2’, which does make a lot of sense really. The game is said to contain a much higher level cap so it should help the fact that you can often obtain full level with your character less than half way through the story (in the original campaigns). As well as the story being set hundreds of years after the first games, Guild Wars 2 will allow you to play as other races, something which annoyed many people about the first game. Sadly though it won’t let you bring across your characters from the first game but it will let you port your ‘achievements’ from the original. As you can tell, not much has been confirmed about the game yet. I am really excited to play both of these games by NCSoft. I love their ‘no-fees’ style of online gaming because it just is hassle free and lets you jump in freely whenever you feel like it.

‘Eye of the North’ sees release in the third quarter of 2007. Guild Wars 2 is said to be in public beta by next year with a full release sometime in 2009/10. (It sounds so far away!)

Source:
The Inquirer

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