TheRetroArcade
Veteran
Posts: 10,081
Joined: Feb 2026
Joined: Feb 2026
Wall running, mantling, aerial attacks, multiplayer combos—it's a lot of new stuff.
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There are few things as exciting as the prospect of a new MMO. And when that new MMO is from ArenaNet, the studio that's been focused on Guild Wars for more than two decades, the excitement is even greater. Having seen Guild Wars 3 in action at Gamescom, and spoken to game director Colin Johanson and lead combat designer Kevin Stocker, my excitement has been justified.
Just as Guild Wars 2 was dramatically different from its predecessor, Guild Wars 3 is not a simple sequel. It's distinct from GW2, a very different kind of MMO, and one that even in the short space of time I spent watching it being played is full of novel ideas.
The first big change is in its setting. The clock has been turned back 1,000 years, and we're heading to Orr—a land that in GW2's era is a post-apocalyptic hellscape, but at this earlier point is a verdant wilderness teeming with spirits.
"The origins of the Guild Wars franchise originate out of Orr," says Johanson. "This is a time before the gods have left the world, very shortly after Grenth has usurped Dhuum and become the god of death. This is a time where the first guilds are starting to rise across the world, and before the very first Guild War takes place. And there is 21 years of Guild Wars history, and so much of it originates out of this timeline and this setting."
As someone who's been playing Guild Wars since I was still in university, a trip back in time to see what led up to all the events I've played through is an exciting prospect. So the choice in setting offers a lot to veterans, but ArenaNet also picked this era because it's a great starting point for new players. You don't need any foreknowledge, because nothing that happened in the previous games has come to pass in Guild Wars 3. We're all going in pretty fresh.
The focus of this first hands-off demo is movement and combat, and it doesn't disappoint. Stocker takes control of a Warrior as Johanson talks me through what's happening. The Warrior jumps off a cliff, and immediately brings out her glider—a familiar mode of transport for Guild Wars 2 players. But then something new happens. Stocker spots some creatures below, so he attacks them from above, seamlessly swapping from gliding to a drop attack. This is all part of the new momentum system, and it's awesome.
One of our big goals when we make a new game in the Guild Wars franchise is to set out and try new things.
"One of our big goals when we make a new game in the Guild Wars franchise is to set out and try new things, and to innovate and to push the genre forward," says Johanson. Early on, the team identified movement as one of the places where it could shake MMOs up, building on the work it did in Guild Wars 2 with gliding, jumping puzzles and mounts.
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"One of the things that you constantly see [in MMOs] is that there's this really stop-start nature to movement," he continues. "You're running, then you stop and then you jump, then you stop and then you glide. Everything feels very clunky."
ArenaNet wanted to evoke action games, where there's no stopping and starting, just seamless switching between different styles of movement. Thus momentum became a "core component" to Guild Wars 3. The result is that there's now mantling, wall running, gliding in all directions, and your speed actually matters. The faster you're moving, the more force you're building up. This is how it affects combat.
"It ended up being a really natural development to bring the two systems together," Stocker tells me. "As soon as we got to the point where you could wall run into this leap and slam sequence, it was a huge hit in the studio, and so we took a step back and went through all of the combat—we're we're goin...Read more: Full article on www.pcgamer.com
What do you think about this?
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.
There are few things as exciting as the prospect of a new MMO. And when that new MMO is from ArenaNet, the studio that's been focused on Guild Wars for more than two decades, the excitement is even greater. Having seen Guild Wars 3 in action at Gamescom, and spoken to game director Colin Johanson and lead combat designer Kevin Stocker, my excitement has been justified.
Just as Guild Wars 2 was dramatically different from its predecessor, Guild Wars 3 is not a simple sequel. It's distinct from GW2, a very different kind of MMO, and one that even in the short space of time I spent watching it being played is full of novel ideas.
The first big change is in its setting. The clock has been turned back 1,000 years, and we're heading to Orr—a land that in GW2's era is a post-apocalyptic hellscape, but at this earlier point is a verdant wilderness teeming with spirits.
"The origins of the Guild Wars franchise originate out of Orr," says Johanson. "This is a time before the gods have left the world, very shortly after Grenth has usurped Dhuum and become the god of death. This is a time where the first guilds are starting to rise across the world, and before the very first Guild War takes place. And there is 21 years of Guild Wars history, and so much of it originates out of this timeline and this setting."
As someone who's been playing Guild Wars since I was still in university, a trip back in time to see what led up to all the events I've played through is an exciting prospect. So the choice in setting offers a lot to veterans, but ArenaNet also picked this era because it's a great starting point for new players. You don't need any foreknowledge, because nothing that happened in the previous games has come to pass in Guild Wars 3. We're all going in pretty fresh.
The focus of this first hands-off demo is movement and combat, and it doesn't disappoint. Stocker takes control of a Warrior as Johanson talks me through what's happening. The Warrior jumps off a cliff, and immediately brings out her glider—a familiar mode of transport for Guild Wars 2 players. But then something new happens. Stocker spots some creatures below, so he attacks them from above, seamlessly swapping from gliding to a drop attack. This is all part of the new momentum system, and it's awesome.
One of our big goals when we make a new game in the Guild Wars franchise is to set out and try new things.
"One of our big goals when we make a new game in the Guild Wars franchise is to set out and try new things, and to innovate and to push the genre forward," says Johanson. Early on, the team identified movement as one of the places where it could shake MMOs up, building on the work it did in Guild Wars 2 with gliding, jumping puzzles and mounts.
Keep up to date with the most important stories and the best deals, as picked by the PC Gamer team.
"One of the things that you constantly see [in MMOs] is that there's this really stop-start nature to movement," he continues. "You're running, then you stop and then you jump, then you stop and then you glide. Everything feels very clunky."
ArenaNet wanted to evoke action games, where there's no stopping and starting, just seamless switching between different styles of movement. Thus momentum became a "core component" to Guild Wars 3. The result is that there's now mantling, wall running, gliding in all directions, and your speed actually matters. The faster you're moving, the more force you're building up. This is how it affects combat.
"It ended up being a really natural development to bring the two systems together," Stocker tells me. "As soon as we got to the point where you could wall run into this leap and slam sequence, it was a huge hit in the studio, and so we took a step back and went through all of the combat—we're we're goin...Read more: Full article on www.pcgamer.com
What do you think about this?