Has the GW2 beta started for the weekend? If so, what do you think so far?

lag is unbearable lag spikes, framerate issues because the game is CPU bound and barely uses your GPU. i would have gladly waited another month for them to work out the kinks for this game and at least push out a playable beta so we could submit feedback about the core mechanics. it's gotten to the point where i don't want to play the game anymore and help the dev process, even when the game itself is bloody brilliant.princeofshapeir

Yeh the lag on both fronts, FPS and net, really hinders the gameplay. I have yet to try WvW (mostly because I don't know how to access it) but I think that will be an even bigger mess given how laggy the open world content has been up to this point.

Side note, loving the game especially the underwater content (from what little I have seen so far).

[QUOTE="princeofshapeir"]lag is unbearable lag spikes, framerate issues because the game is CPU bound and barely uses your GPU. i would have gladly waited another month for them to work out the kinks for this game and at least push out a playable beta so we could submit feedback about the core mechanics. it's gotten to the point where i don't want to play the game anymore and help the dev process, even when the game itself is bloody brilliant.Priapus101

Yeh the lag on both fronts, FPS and net, really hinders the gameplay. I have yet to try WvW (mostly because I don't know how to access it) but I think that will be an even bigger mess given how laggy the open world content has been up to this point.

Side note, loving the game especially the underwater content (from what little I have seen so far).

I'm getting about 15-20 fps with a x4 955, gtx 560ti and 8gb of ram. I sure hope they really clean it up for launch!!

I think the tutorial can better and I'm getting horrible performance issues. Well that's what betas are for but I really hope the final version is optimized.

I'm getting about 15-20 fps with a x4 955, gtx 560ti and 8gb of ram. I sure hope they really clean it up for launch!!

BSC14

Using an i7 930@3.4Ghz, a 5870, 6GB of RAM and the performance is awful. It's always between 15-30 FPS in larger areas and 30-40 in personal instanced areas. On top of that, switching all settings between the lowest and the highest doesn't change the framerate at all for me.

That said, I really like how the melee combat works in this game, but they need to optimise the performance.

Using an i7 930@3.4Ghz, a 5870, 6GB of RAM and the performance is awful. It's always between 15-30 FPS in larger areas and 30-40 in personal instanced areas. On top of that, switching all settings between the lowest and the highest doesn't change the framerate at all for me.

That said, I really like how the melee combat works in this game, but they need to optimise the performance.

scottahuch

Wierd I'm getting 55-60 fps even in places like lions arc / divinitys reach

I'm able to run medium-high with shadows disabled. Lag is annoying when there are 20ish people spamming flashy spells, but the game keeps at a nice FPS otherwise. The lag is something I expected since no MMO company, sans Trion, can seem to figure out how to launch a product without lag issues.

Onto the game itself. I pretty much got what I expected, a nice improvement on the usual systems in MMOs and a PvE system that benefits explorers like myself. The replayability sems there since I've went through the same area 3 times trying different classes and there has been a good amount of variation. Can't talk on PvP since I'm not touching that until I figure out my final class (prob Thief).

[QUOTE="BSC14"]

I'm getting about 15-20 fps with a x4 955, gtx 560ti and 8gb of ram. I sure hope they really clean it up for launch!!

WizardGlass

Well I don't believe they have a launch date so it could be 2 or 3 months off still.

[QUOTE="Elann2008"][QUOTE="WizardGlass"]honestly, i have been enjoying TERA more. GW2 is well made, and i like how dynamic the questing is..... but in terms of "fun", i find TERA to be better. it plays better, has better combat and better graphics. GW2 has better questing and better dynamic content, but just isnt as "fun" to play. Overall, so far, slightly disappointed with GW2. definitely not the MMO revolution it was cracked up to be. definitely worth playing though since there is no sub involved.WizardGlass

After reading your initial comment over, it isn't so bad as I initially thought, but I did not like how you brought TERA into the discussion when this is about Guild Wars. I think the better route that you should have taken was list the pros and cons about Guild Wars 2, and Guild Wars 2 only, and support them with facts, or at least your best judgement. Otherwise, you'll just look like a forum troll or someone who wants to make comparisons and come off one sided.

Kudos to you if you like TERA more. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that. I just didn't like how you came off comparing the two when you should have stuck to the topic, which is discuss Guild Wars 2. The other guy said that I was trying to shut you up. I honestly wasn't trying to shut you up. I really thought the NDA was still being enforced. I admitted my mistake and that is all concerning that comment.

I could sit here and make comparisons of Guild Wars 2 to World of Warcraft or The Secret World, or whichever relevant MMO is out there but that's just childish imho. There's enough of those types of threads to make a mountain of them. If you're really going to go that route, at least support your arguments with facts and I will more than likely take you seriously and perhaps debate about it. Otherwise, it's pointless bantering.

Whether you get TERA or GW2, or both, I hope you have fun. I'm not here to sway you one way or another, nor am I here to shut anyone up. That would be childish and silly.

Concerning BETA's and launches.. SWTOR had terrible performance for me during the last stress test weekend. I was getting around 30-40fps. Come early access and launch day, the game performed 60fps without a hitch. So, not all launches ended up bad as the beta.

No hard feelings. You don't seem like a bad person at all and if I came off as a jackass than I apologize. But as far as what I said above, I meant that.

I was a human street urchin and I must say I like the game, and I'm not getting too many FPS dips (unless I come out of water) and I have everything on high running a i5 2500k, 560ti, 4gigs DDR3 RAM. I like the there's different skills for different weapon combos, that's pretty neat.

To be honest, I liked the game more than I expected... ArcheAge (my most hyped mmo) will have a tough time competing with this.

I love how some enemies can down me in 3 hits. I love the movement, and the general gameplay. However, I do not like the heart quests. They are pretty bad. I didnt have any oFPS issues whatsoever, but then again, my PC could run Saints Row 2 without any issues, so take this with a grain of salt.

I was able to run the game completely maxed out without any lag, except during WvW when more than a hundred people attempt to spam AoE simultaneously. I had plenty of latency-spikes and DCs, but I don't mind those for now, since this is a stress test. In terms of my gaming experience outside performance:

Combat: Feels very sluggish, and the fact that I was pressing only a few buttons made the ordeal rather repetitive. I'm aware that dodging is an important part of combat, but with Oceanic latency like mine I don't see it happening successfully very frequently. In fact I don't think something this latency-sensitive has a place in MMO at all. The customisation from different weapon combinations adds variety, but having to change weapons in order to make combat feel less repetitive doesn't appeal to me well.

Graphics:I shall forgive how half the male characters look like women. The game's visuals in general feels sufficient for a MMO - there was nothing that's terribly ugly, but also nothing that's extremely impressive. Average graphics, but that's what MMOs should have. Any lower would disappoint me, any higher would concern me - the prettier a MMO is, the fewer the people will be able to play. What bothered me most though are the special effects in the game. They are too messy. Even when 10 people are attacking a single enemy my entire screen usually tend to turn into an effect-fest. I didn't lag from it, though I imagine many people will, but I was unable to even see where my character was standing and whether he was in range of the enemy. I certainly would have no chance of avoiding any hostile mechanics. Take such an amount of special effects into larger crowds, i.e. WvW, simply turned disasterous for me, both in terms of lag and clarity of the battlefield. Too messy.

Questing: The dynamic event was a nice idea on paper. In effect however the only difference I felt was that it merely removed the process of "picking up quest". It's also extremely easy to miss out dynamic events in crowded areas. As for quests and skill challenges. Sure, there may not be any quest hubs, but ultimately after talking to the scouts an area is essentially still a theme park. It's not about exploration, it's about reaching those hearts and skill challenges present on the world map. What's so different about it compared to the traditional picking up quest and heading to quest objectives? Most of the quests are also heavily text-based, after being spoiled by SWTOR's VO I simply fail to find the questing component attractive.

WvW: My first impression of WvW wasn't great. The entire scenario feels very slow. Indeed for some players who may only get to play a few hours of games each day they may not even manage to destroy a fortress gate within their schedules. The fights also feels like a battle of numbers rather a battle of skills. Whichever side has more people and more AoE spammers seem to easily have the upper hand in any fight. It reminds me both of vanilla AV and BF3. Impressive ideas, but I didn't find it fun.

Conclusion: I can't say that Guild Wars 2 will be a bad game, but now I have serious doubts about whether I will enjoy it at all. I shall be trying to cancel my pre-purchase. Dealing directly with NCSoft will no doubt be annoying. The experience the beta has provided me didn't justify my blind trust in the game's quality. I shall take my money elsewhere, and if post-launch the game proves to be greater than what I experienced, then I shall consider it again. The old saying comes: "if something isn't broken, don't fix it". Guild Wars 2 certainly tried to innovate in some areas, but whether those innovations brought improvements is rather doubtful in my mind.

I should also mention the game is pretty hard :|

i, like many others, have not been able to log in. the communication with the players is very poor at this point. the login screen does not even have an announcement section like d3 or even guild wars 1. i'm not impressed.Kh1ndjal

What server you looking to join?

Try this... add the following to the GW2 shortcut or make one on the desktop if you didn't have one before.

For North American Servers: -authsrv 64.25.38.54

For European Servers: -authsrv 206.127.159.107

Note: This is not a guaranteed fix. If this does not work for you, you should remove the added text.

That worked for me btw.

I should also mention the game is pretty hard :|

GD1551

It's the same as every other MMO I played.

First thing the game gets you to do when you login is boring kill and fetch quests so I ditched PVE because that bores me. You can do battlegrounds like any other MMO or the "world PVP" which is just a big Battleground like Ilum but with keeps from DAOC or WAR. There is no open world PVP which sucks, PVE and PVP are split so that sucks.....

The graphics look too Asian to me, they look quite dated too and to get round it they just put bloom and blur everywhere. I don't like the look of the character design either, they look rather Asian as well and I'm just not a fan of that style.

There are instances and loading screens into zones everywhere and you'll teleport to every location as there is no seamless world. There are no mounts too which I can see killing the "world PVP" because it takes too long to travel on those big maps.

I found the classes boring, I couldn't find one I liked as none really stand out to feel different. When I used to play WoW in 2005 I instantly found the classes to be unique and I loved what the Priest did as no other class could play the roll of being such a dedicated healer and then a mage like DPS roll with Shadow. In Guild Wars 2 they've taken the variety out of the classes by trying to get rid of the trinity and giving every class the same ability to do everything.

I just don't like it myself, wish people who do to have fun but I'll carry on waiting for a new MMO. Next one is Planetside 2 I think, I hate SOE for ruining all their games pretty much but it's Planetside 2 so I'll have to play it.

i, like many others, have not been able to log in. the communication with the players is very poor at this point. the login screen does not even have an announcement section like d3 or even guild wars 1. i'm not impressed.Kh1ndjal

Try placing your folder containing GW2 in the desktop and start it from there.

It worked for me.

[QUOTE="Kh1ndjal"]i, like many others, have not been able to log in. the communication with the players is very poor at this point. the login screen does not even have an announcement section like d3 or even guild wars 1. i'm not impressed.Maroxad

Try placing your folder containing GW2 in the desktop and start it from there.

It worked for me.

I managed to play yesterday 2 hours before the official beta launch and it run as smooth as silk on my PC, then as time drew closer to officialcounter it lagged. Same this morning most I guess many where still in bed and it run great then times passed it became laggy again. A lot of the problems people are getting is due to server over population.

As for the game, I have it maxed out and it is beautiful. I have played Norn Warrior for about 7 hours in total and am level 8 and it is the best MMO experience I have had since the first day of WoW all those years ago. It feels new and exciting and extremely well laidout. You can tell the game is a labour of love for the dev team. The amount of detail in the world is breathtaking and the grand vistas are beautifully.

The game play mechanic takes a while to get used it's not a stand there and spam one skill, you need to move about and really think what you are doing, lucky for me I have a Razer Naga mouse and have all the skills attached to that so I am getting used to the combat faster than my friends.

Overall when they sort the server lag issues this game is going to be amazing and is going to be my future MMO and time sink!

I am level 10 atm, and here are my impressions

Combat: The 2 weapon system is brilliant and I like how each weapon has its own set of skills. Underwater combat worked better than I thought and some enemies acted differently from others. The game is also way HARDER than most themeparks that come out these days, some quests are a real pain. Especially those group events.

Exploration: Unlike Azeroth, Tyria doesnt feel empty, no matter where I go I always stumble upon something new, hidden events, heart tasks, andd such. It is not uncommon for me to take the offbeaten path, just to see what lies there.

Questing: Although they make the whole experience a lot more unpredictable, the dynamic events themselves are hit and miss. The heart tasks and skill point tasks are around the same quality of your typical mmo. Except they are more loose. I love getting rewarded skill points. The main story apperantly branches quite a bit, and I was given a choice between saving my friend or a group of people.

Atmosphere:This isn't SWTOR, the world feels alive. In town you hear people having conversations and whatnot.

Customization:The skill limit makes character customization more interesting and the traits are nifty. I didnt spend much time with the character customization, but I dont care, I found an afro. I proceeded with dying my armor pink.

Atmosphere:This isn't SWTOR, the world feels alive. In town you hear people having conversations and whatnot.

Maroxad

The outdoor maps on SWTOR feel alive to me. But lets face it, most the worlds are made of steel and so ya know...steel does not feel alive. :)

I found the classes boring, I couldn't find one I liked as none really stand out to feel different. When I used to play WoW in 2005 I instantly found the classes to be unique and I loved what the Priest did as no other class could play the roll of being such a dedicated healer and then a mage like DPS roll with Shadow. In Guild Wars 2 they've taken the variety out of the classes by trying to get rid of the trinity and giving every class the same ability to do everything.

Tixylixx

Oh, it's not like I often said this could easily become a problem for the game. A Blizzard rep once said that classes in World of Warcraft will never be perfectly balanced, nor are they intended to, since that would require complete and utter conformity for each and every one of them.

On a separate note, I've been watching the Guild Wars 2 beta video here on Gamespot and, yeah, the graphics look even worse than I remember. I don't think I'd care as much if the game wasn't hyped up to be "the best-looking MMO yet" but, with that in mind, I have to say I'm less than impressed.

So the only way to get a shot at this beta is to pre-order the game from their website? £50 is a steep sum for a PC game.

[QUOTE="GD1551"]

I should also mention the game is pretty hard :|

Elann2008

I think it's a bit too much of the cheap side but that's just me.

So the only way to get a shot at this beta is to pre-order the game from their website? £50 is a steep sum for a PC game.

-Unreal-

They've cancelled pre-purchasing for now. It'll be up again in the future.

And the reason for the poor performance is because the game is CPU bound - they are trying to fix it, but as of right now, enjoy your low GPU utilization.

[QUOTE="-Unreal-"]

So the only way to get a shot at this beta is to pre-order the game from their website? £50 is a steep sum for a PC game.

The_Capitalist

They've cancelled pre-purchasing for now. It'll be up again in the future.

And the reason for the poor performance is because the game is CPU bound - they are trying to fix it, but as of right now, enjoy your low GPU utilization.

The highest settings pumps my 570 up to 70C, whereas my 2500k is resting at 48 - 56C per core. :(

Overall, I can't say I'm too impressed with the game as of yet, but I've only played a Human engineer and Charr ranger up to level five each. I suppose I'll see what happens at the release of the game.

[QUOTE="The_Capitalist"]

[QUOTE="-Unreal-"]

So the only way to get a shot at this beta is to pre-order the game from their website? £50 is a steep sum for a PC game.

Sheppard212

They've cancelled pre-purchasing for now. It'll be up again in the future.

And the reason for the poor performance is because the game is CPU bound - they are trying to fix it, but as of right now, enjoy your low GPU utilization.

The highest settings pumps my 570 up to 70C, whereas my 2500k is resting at 48 - 56C per core. :(

Overall, I can't say I'm too impressed with the game as of yet, but I've only played a Human engineer and Charr ranger up to level five each. I suppose I'll see what happens at the release of the game.

Guess my four-year old Xeon isn't quite up to the task. My GPU utilization is around 20% to 30% when I play the game.

i can't even log in into the account management or even the official forums anymore. does anyone else have this issue? this beta is appalling.Kh1ndjal

It's a beta, cut them some slack. Though many of us did pay for it...

[QUOTE="Kh1ndjal"]i can't even log in into the account management or even the official forums anymore. does anyone else have this issue? this beta is appalling.The_Capitalist

It's a beta, cut them some slack. Though many of us did pay for it...

[QUOTE="The_Capitalist"]

[QUOTE="-Unreal-"]

So the only way to get a shot at this beta is to pre-order the game from their website? £50 is a steep sum for a PC game.

Sheppard212

They've cancelled pre-purchasing for now. It'll be up again in the future.

And the reason for the poor performance is because the game is CPU bound - they are trying to fix it, but as of right now, enjoy your low GPU utilization.

The highest settings pumps my 570 up to 70C, whereas my 2500k is resting at 48 - 56C per core. :(

Overall, I can't say I'm too impressed with the game as of yet, but I've only played a Human engineer and Charr ranger up to level five each. I suppose I'll see what happens at the release of the game.

[QUOTE="Sheppard212"]

[QUOTE="The_Capitalist"]

They've cancelled pre-purchasing for now. It'll be up again in the future.

And the reason for the poor performance is because the game is CPU bound - they are trying to fix it, but as of right now, enjoy your low GPU utilization.

Nokivaris

The highest settings pumps my 570 up to 70C, whereas my 2500k is resting at 48 - 56C per core. :(

Overall, I can't say I'm too impressed with the game as of yet, but I've only played a Human engineer and Charr ranger up to level five each. I suppose I'll see what happens at the release of the game.

True, the fun doesnt really begin until you get some proper skills and can actually play the game to its fullest.

[QUOTE="Nokivaris"][QUOTE="Sheppard212"]

The highest settings pumps my 570 up to 70C, whereas my 2500k is resting at 48 - 56C per core. :(

Overall, I can't say I'm too impressed with the game as of yet, but I've only played a Human engineer and Charr ranger up to level five each. I suppose I'll see what happens at the release of the game.

Maroxad

True, the fun doesnt really begin until you get some proper skills and can actually play the game to its fullest.

Can't connect. :(

Yeah, it's down now. Has been down for the last two hours or so for me.

[QUOTE="Maroxad"]

[QUOTE="Nokivaris"] it gets better when you get your utility skills at higher lvl imo adds a lot more adaptability and customizationBrunoBRS

True, the fun doesnt really begin until you get some proper skills and can actually play the game to its fullest.

This game makes Swtor look fantastic. GW2 at least in its current form is pretty bad imo. Combat is completely unbalanced in favor of ranged professions. Questing is nothing but hub hoping which is exactly what they said the game wouldn't be. PvP is broken as most matches end up being 2 vs 2 instead of 5 vs 5. Takes forever to kill anyone and once you do you have to get up close to them and "finish them off" which I don't understand the need for. Overall the game just isn't very fun. I got a thief to 12 and a ranger to 8, so I'm only scratching the surface so things could change alot at higher levels. But the first 10 levels or so make me not even care.

Edit - Also forgot to mention the performance is really poor. I have a i5 750 @ 4ghz a gtx 580 and a ssd and the game runs at sub 30 FPS even on the loswest settings. This is with the game only using like 10% of my GPU. Again it's only beta, but man am I disappointed.

This game makes Swtor look fantastic. GW2 at least in its current form is pretty bad imo. Combat is completely unbalanced in favor of ranged professions. Questing is nothing but hub hoping which is exactly what they said the game wouldn't be. PvP is broken as most matches end up being 2 vs 2 instead of 5 vs 5. Takes forever to kill anyone and once you do you have to get up close to them and "finish them off" which I don't understand the need for. Overall the game just isn't very fun. I got a thief to 12 and a ranger to 8, so I'm only scratching the surface so things could change alot at higher levels. But the first 10 levels or so make me not even care.

Edit - Also forgot to mention the performance is really poor. I have a i5 750 @ 4ghz a gtx 580 and a ssd and the game runs at sub 30 FPS even on the loswest settings. This is with the game only using like 10% of my GPU. Again it's only beta, but man am I disappointed.

FPSfan1985

Theyve said the game is cpu bound. And how is pvp broken?

[QUOTE="FPSfan1985"]

This game makes Swtor look fantastic. GW2 at least in its current form is pretty bad imo. Combat is completely unbalanced in favor of ranged professions. Questing is nothing but hub hoping which is exactly what they said the game wouldn't be. PvP is broken as most matches end up being 2 vs 2 instead of 5 vs 5. Takes forever to kill anyone and once you do you have to get up close to them and "finish them off" which I don't understand the need for. Overall the game just isn't very fun. I got a thief to 12 and a ranger to 8, so I'm only scratching the surface so things could change alot at higher levels. But the first 10 levels or so make me not even care.

Edit - Also forgot to mention the performance is really poor. I have a i5 750 @ 4ghz a gtx 580 and a ssd and the game runs at sub 30 FPS even on the loswest settings. This is with the game only using like 10% of my GPU. Again it's only beta, but man am I disappointed.

Cloud567kar

Theyve said the game is cpu bound. And how is pvp broken?