Guild Wars 2 finally starts to come to life

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-02-23-mesmer-and-assassin-in-guild-wars-2

They seem to make a lot of assumptions in here - they say that it's been said that Mesmers are not returning, and that all of the returning professions have been announced...but none of what's actually said by the GW2 designers in the articles reflect that, nor is it supported by anything else that's been said by the game. The closest you get is Jon Peters saying that fans of the Mesmer play-style will be happy and that that's all they've said. And as Mesmers have been directly mentioned in the novels...yeah.

Haha- go read it again. They've made a small but significant edit on the quiet...

Haha, those sneaky bastards.

http://ie.pc.ign.com/articles/115/1153403p1.html

Wasn't supposed to be announced until next week but GameTrailers leaked stuff early yesterday.

So, here's the Assassin-equivalent...

Thief is a pretty lame name for the profession, Rogue would have been the most suitable for a mix of Assassin and Swashbuckler. Dual pistols are going to get alot of use though for the cool factor.

Thief has a classical feel about it, describes one of the classes' main mechanics (i.e. stealing things) and fits the theme. Perfectly good name.

As to whether this stealing thing is a good idea or not... we shall see.

I think that profession is going to be fun. Dual-wielding is always awesome.

And it sounds like it's less "stealing and keeping" and more "stealing and immediately using in some way", which is neat. I like the example of stealing a shield and throwing it back at them for a bit of extra damage.

(This stuff was all actually released the day before I posted it here...but I was too busy with the Embark Beach update in GW1 😛)

Seems ma bit poncy to me; it also has gameplay issues about how random the effect is. Still, we'll see.

http://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/professions/thief/

Woohoo, officially announced.

And when you steal stuff, you don't literally steal something, it seems, but it generates an environmental weapon based on what you're fighting and stuff like that.

Not going to lie, I have to play this profession.

There a bunch of new stuff coming out as a result of the new show demo; links here are pics of the Kryta map (with some clear shout-outs to the original) and Norn character creation.

Hopefully there will be some comprehensive vids of stuff again too.

http://augustbandri.com/images/PAX%20East/gw059revised.jpg

http://augustbandri.com/images/PAX%20East/gw058revised.jpg

http://augustbandri.com/images/PAX%20East/gw002.jpg

...kind of amused there, I know the person who's Norn that is, he's ****ing annoying as hell on the GWG forums.

I like the painted look of the maps. And hah, the Ascalon Settlement is still there!

I've been watching a lot of vids but visual quality has been poor and the sound in one currently hot set of Necromancer vids is so bad it could damage your speakers.

This vid is not bad- quality is good though you are stuck with the ambient sound.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=of3P9WouogU&feature=feedu_more

Shows off The Vigil Keep, and has some good quality close ups of the skill bar, inventory screen, distributing stat points etc.

(They have now cut down to four stats from the six they had back in August; it seems quite a few mechanics of this game are still in flux)

Spoony- following on from his since-justified demolition of FFXIV when he compared the XIV and GW2 demos last August- continues his good impressions of the game at PAX East. Also includes decent quality versions of the Thief vids.

http://spoonyexperiment.com/2011/03/19/pax-east-2011-guild-wars-2/#disqus_thread

You know what I really want?

They need to reveal the sylvari redesign already. They did a redesign on the race last year and as far as everyone can tell, that's been complete since like...October or November. But they're still being so quiet about it.

I'm not so sure it is as complete as rumoured; I think the art re-design was done then but not necessarily its implementation into the game.

"ArenaNet has confirmed that the sylvari have undergone a redesign, completed in October. No further information has been released about the extent of this redesign."

So...yeah.

It's precisely that 'confirmation' that I am referring to.

I am sure they are nearly ready now, though, as the race weeks have started.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KR2Esy83MQ0

😂

Haha, yes. The April Fool's stuff for this year was brilliant.

http://www.tentonhammer.com/gw2/features/editorials/why-you-should-care

Nothing really new but still worth reading, I think.