GUILD WARS 3 is Real and I'm Finally Feeling Hyped

Guild Wars 2 is one of my favorite video games of all time. You’d think that I would be over the moon excited the moment that ArenaNet announced Guild Wars 3 at Summer Games Fest. The truth is, I wasn’t.

We got a short announcement teaser that was gorgeous, but I’ve been burned before so I rarely get hyped with just announcements. However, the team then spent the next few days doling out more information about Guild Wars 3 as well as their plans for Guild Wars 2 and Guild Wars Reforged.

This resulted in my hype growing exponentially and I’m finally feeling that rush of excitement and anticipation for this upcoming game in one of my favorite franchises.

Let’s talk about what we’ve learned. I’ll start by reviewing what we know about Guild Wars 3, and then go back to talk about the news for Guild Wars Reforged and Guild Wars 2. At Summer Games Fest, ArenaNet treated us with the following teaser.

That is gorgeous. I love the animation of the tapestry being embroidered and the voice over is all very dramatic. There’s some very important information in that teaser though. Now, it’s important to note that the only confirmed facts about Guild Wars 3 are as follows: the “joy of movement” is crucial to the game design, the open beta will launch in Fall 2027, the game is being designed for both PC and PS5.

It takes place in Orr approximately 1200 years before the events of Guild Wars Reforged and right after Grenth usurped Dhuum but before the first Guild War, it is an MMORPG, the teaser uses in-engine footage, the character will be able to move in a variety of ways (gliding, wall running, mounts, etc.) and players will be a Vaelwarden. As far as I’m aware, everything else is speculation, but typically with good merit behind it.

So, let’s get that speculation discussion started. In the teaser we see what appears to be a human, a kodan, a hairy asura, and maybe some other human-like species. Most of us are assuming these to be the playable species in Guild Wars 3 and it’s exciting.

I’ve wanted them to include kodan as a playable species in Guild Wars 2 for a few years now. The asura one is a bit more confusing since currently known lore suggests that the asura were likely underground at this point, so some think that this may actually be like a cousin species. I don’t think that’s the case given official art shows it with a golem very similar to the ones seen in Guild Wars Reforged.

Honestly, this is all very exciting. My main concern is that I’m worried that the actual gameplay won’t be what I want. Of course, only time will tell and I’m very excited to learn more.

Based on concept art shown and comments made by the team, there seems to be an emphasis on action-based gameplay. There’s something in the back of my mind that has me worried that it will be more of an ARPG like Diablo, but I admit that seems very unlikely.

As I mentioned, it was the additional information about Guild Wars 2 and Guild Wars Reforged that got me more excited about Guild Wars 3. I greatly appreciated and loved the confirmation that ArenaNet is planning on supporting all three Guild Wars titles over the next 10 years at least.

In discussions, they even pointed to EverQuest and EverQuest 2 as examples of how that can work. They even admitted that they made a mistake by all but discontinuing Guild Wars when Guild Wars 2 was released and they’re seeing so much life in the first game thanks to the release of Guild Wars Reforged.

Guild Wars Reforged is getting a mobile version later this year and it was confirmed that it is the only game in the series that will have a mobile version. However, it was also said that the partner development team at Two Weeks is working on new content for the game as well! T

hat is HUGE! We don’t know what that means. They’ve already done a couple of new dungeons, but the comments did sound like they were talking more about a new expansion. I still want to go back and revisit Guild Wars Reforged and I think I’m going to turn that into a summer project of mine, but the Guild Wars 2 news was my favorite.

I have played Guild Wars 2 almost since launch (personal circumstances prevented me from playing at launch). I love this game. I was genuinely worried about what might happen to it with the release of Guild Wars 3, and I’m genuinely more excited about what the team is planning to do to Guild Wars 2 between the final update of Visions of Eternity (the current ongoing expansion) and the launch of Guild Wars 3 than I would be about any new expansion news. They’re going to work on improving the game.

This is MASSIVE! They’ve decided to not share many plans or details, but the one that they did share was the Zhaitan fight. For those unfamiliar, the Zhaitan fight is the final boss fight in the core game’s story. Anyone can play through this point for free (and I highly recommend you do so).

Sadly, this fight is underwhelming and over the past few days, Colin Johanson (ArenaNet Studio Head) admitted that when Guild Wars 2 shipped, the fight was not what they wanted it to be and they were simply amazed that it wasn’t broken. After this fight gets updated, I am definitely going to play through the story with a new character and I’m excited to see the changes.

As I mentioned, they haven’t shared details really about what else is going to be addressed, but they are going to be doing this until the launch of Guild Wars 3 and they will be doing it in chunks chronologically. There will be two updates for the core game, and then each subsequent update will be for each of the expansions.

The idea is to bring older content in line with new standards and I love this. In fact, they are inviting players to head over to the official forums and share thoughts about what they want addressed. There are already some amazing ideas in there, but don’t be afraid to share your feedback.

Oh, it was also confirmed that after Guild Wars 3 is released, the team will continue to develop and release annual expansions for Guild Wars 2. Plus, they’re adding physics-based rendering and a new World vs World map.

Of course, it was also exciting to hear the team announce a new Hall of Monuments system that will connect Guild Wars 2 to Guild Wars 3. This was such a brilliant idea when Guild Wars 2 was releasing and I’m glad they’re giving us a new one.

They have confirmed that for now the plan does not include linking Guild Wars Reforged, but I’m okay with that personally (although I do agree the title God Walking Amongst Mere Mortals should probably carry over).

However, being able to show off and celebrate your achievements in the prior game in the new game is very nice from a player’s perspective. Also, this gives people incentive and excuses to go back and play the older games even after launch so they can get the cool titles and cosmetics.

It has felt weird having the excitement for Guild Wars 3 build gradually and mostly through information about how the first two games in the franchise are going to still be cared for. I believe that it is because while they cannot say much about Guild Wars 3 yet, hearing them be passionate about the first two games and how passionate they are in respecting players, it does a lot.

In case you missed all the news, I would recommend watching some of the videos below (beware the Twitch one has pretty rough audio) and/or videos from some of the great Guild Wars content creators such as Mukluk, Laranity, MightyTeapot, and many more. Some of those reaction videos also helped me process the news and different aspects, plus Laranity’s enthusiasm is contagious.