Guild Wars Factions Preview - PC

Guild Wars is currently one of the most played MMORPG, second only to the super popular World of Warcraft. Released sometime in April 2005, Guild Wars gained a player base of over a million players world over, in a space of five months since its release. The game boasted a whole slew of features that made it a distinct product in itself, when compared to the over populated MMO scene.

NCsoft, the Korean based publisher of Guild Wars (and other notable MMORPGs like Lineage, Lineage II, City of Heroes and City of Villains) did not just create a completely new game, they also devised an unheard of business model for a commercial MMOG – a model which did not require subscription fees. Customers just had to purchase a copy of Guild Wars and keep playing for as long as they wanted to, without paying any sort of fees. Another key aspect that makes Guild Wars stand out is that players are rewarded for their skill as opposed to the time spent online. In other MMORPGs, one has to go through the usual level up grind, which is terribly tedious and gets quite boring.

Keeping up to its promise of releasing frequent expansions, NCsoft has announced Guild Wars: Factions, a stand-alone expansion slated for release in the second quarter of 2006. This expansion will include new professions, skills, regions, items, monsters, quests and options for PvP play, cooperative play and guilds.

The game takes place on the continent of Cantha, in the world of Tyria. There are three nations that dwell in Cantha – the nation of Cantha, Kurzick and Luxon. Cantha is a nation of merchants and traders governed by an emperor. History has it that 200 years ago, the emperor of that time was slain by his bodyguard Shiro Tagatchi. When brought to justice, his death wail petrified the forest and turned the sea to jade. Now his ghost has returned and trouble ensues.

The Kurzicks on the other hand are a very religious and conservative people that dwell in the petrified forest. The Luxons are wild nomads who traverse the jade sea on magical walking machines. The Kurzick-Luxon conflict is at the core of this expansion. The new gameplay experience that Factions brings to the series is territorial conquest. Existing guilds will be required to join one of the two factions. Guilds under a common faction will be able to join together and form alliances. Alliances will have a common chat channel and players will be able to visit other guild halls.

Players can take part in battles between factions and alliance missions by controlling cities and towns, which in turn will trigger special events and reveal exclusive areas. Missions in the game seem more like the stuff strategy games are made of. One example is an alliance mission in which teams cannot fight each other but have to hold resource points and cut off the other team’s supply lines. The new battles will be focused more around strategy rather than just mindless killing off opponents.

This expansion also brings with it two new professions – the Assassin and the Ritualist. The Assassin has access to teleportation, dual-wielding and stealth skills. The Ritualist is a spirit summoner who calls on spirits to attack, buff and heal players. Another new feature is the Observer Mode where players can view the proceedings of a battle without participating in it. Battle Isles is a new PvP continent providing players with further more new areas and quests.

Guild Wars: Factions is a stand-alone single edition expansion. Players are not required to buy Guild Wars to enjoy this. Players that have both can go back and forth and have complete access to items, skills and features of both games. With Factions, developers ArenaNet reiterate the fact that this MMORPG rewards player skill and strategy rather than equipment and time spent in the game. ArenaNet promises a balanced game even with two editions, all the new features, items and classes.

NCsoft have plans to release at least two expansion packs every year for Guild Wars. Looking at the amount of features packed into this first expansion coupled with the fact that one has to only pay for the game and not worry at all about subscription fees makes Guild Wars a very hot MMORPG for the coming years. This looks like one of the many that will actually stay. It doesn’t look like it will dethrone World of Warcraft anytime soon as both are distinctly different games. Guild Wars has its focus on tightly knit team playing with tactics as a key element as opposed to traditional MMORPGs.