The good, the bad, and the ugly on Guild Wars.
User Rating: 9.7 | Guild Wars (Special Edition) PC
The Good: 1) Graphics - Whether or not you like the game Guild Wars has one thing that everyone should agree on and that is how beautiful the art work is. The artists have outdone themselves with their work especially the vibrant colors and large (looking) environments. The backgrounds are very well done making you think the world is quite large even though you are confined to an obvious space (no falling off cliffs and what not). 2) Game play - The game is easy to play and pick up but as gamespot's review indicates mastering the game is another story. Controlling your movement couldn't be easier as you can use your mouse to move, keys to move, and even set an automove key. Targeting is easy as point and click or set hot keys to target. You get the ability to pre-set equipment load outs as well which is an outstanding feature. PvP is difficult to pick up for PvP newbies and vets will need about 10 hours to become competitive but then it's "on" from there. 3) PvP - If you are like me then you have no had a good PvP experience in an MMORPG since the early days of Ultima Online before their dev team changed for the 100000th time and eliminated the days of tank mage and replaced it with dex monkey point and click warfare. Guild Wars brings back the art of skillful combat in an MMORPG. The battles can be quick or long depending on the players skill levels. The matches can be made up of absolutely bizarre class combinations or ideal load outs that cover all their needs. With the variety of classes and the addition of sub classes gaining experience in battle is a MUST to become a great PvP'er in Guild Wars. And it's group combat think DAoC meets UO who had a slight affair with Dungeon Siege... 4) Performance - This game loads very well and plays well. You will not need a hard-core gaming box to play this game though you will need at least a 2ghz p4 or comparable processor with an FX quality graphics card and a gig of ram probably possibly 512 might do it. The game runs fast and smooth no big load issues. In areas where there are 30+ people all moving around I noticed a very negligible drop in performance nothing significant. 5) The little things - They did a good job at figuring out what were some of the pet peeves of other RPG's and MMORPG's and put them to rest in Guild Wars. If you visit a city you can now travel to it by clicking it on your map. No more having to run fro place to place that you have already been to. I hated having to travel through 10 minutes of n00b areas just to deliver something to an NPC. You can only travel to cities you have been to before not to new ones. Pre-set load outs always a plus! Here's my bow, here's my sword and shield, here's my two handed F U axe, and all I have to do is click a button and they are unloaded and loaded. 6) Value - Unmatched in it's value due to the fact it has something for both fans of RPG's and fans of PvP combined with no monthly fee. The Bad: 1) Pathing - The pathing in the game is poor. I've attacked things that seem to run around invisible square objects before getting to me, mind you it's on a flat surface so it really looks bizarre. The Ugly: 1) NPC AI - NPC's often forget you need to do something before you can continue a quest with them and instead give you dialog to a part of the quest you should not be able to get. NPC A tells you to take item A to NPC B. Well, talk to NPC A before you deliver to NPC B and you get the dialog for the next phase of the quest that you shouldn't get. This happens more often than I would think since BETA is over. Also, NPC's often don't talk to you at all which is rude! lol This is not a big problem but it is a let down when you see a random farmer or townsfolk walking around and when you get to them they do not respond to your attempts to communicate. Guild Wars is simply fun and has something for everyone and free from a monthly fee which shows to me that my suspicions that the MMORPG's really make a buck off their monthly fee more so than they should. 
