InkMind

Guild Wars 2 is an MMO-RPG (Massively-multiplayer-online Role Playing Game) where players follow a story with their own character as the protagonist while sharing a world with other players. Some parts of the story are instanced, which means that the player is separated from the shared world and follows the story alone, or together with scripted companions who are part of the story. Recently, ArenaNet released the continuation of the story, End of Dragons: What Lies Beneath. But what came before?

The history of Guild Wars 2:
In 2005 Guild Wars (1) was created, however that game was not as story focused as the second part is. The first game was a more instance based game, where the story is fragmented and only exists while the player is actively engaged in an instance. In 2010, the first and second Guild Wars books, Gosts of Ascalon and Edge of Destiny were released. These books tried to open the lore and highten the interest of fans in the story, with more or less success. After the success of Guild Wars (1), the publisher ArenaNet released Guild Wars 2 in 2012. The game released with improved game mechanics, and most importantly, they focused on storytelling much more, which — together with the first book’s release — sparked players’ interest in lore.

“[…]the game has been described by ArenaNet as having nontraditional elements as well, because “it doesn’t make you spend hours preparing to have fun rather than just having fun.”
— wiki.guildwars2.com

In 2013, following the success of the game and player interest in the lore, ArenaNet released the third book, Sea of Sorrows, together with an in-game scavenger hunt event.

But why is Guild Wars 2 really different?
The uniqueness of Guild Wars two mainly comes from this intense focus on the story, as well as the player being the protagonist of their own story, but not the only hero in the world. Whereas other similar games — such as World of Warcraft and most fantasy stories place the player and reader in the story as the sole hero. Guild Wars 2’s story is a “quest fantasy”. As W.A. Senior explained in
his essay ‘Quest fantasies’:

“The narrative begins as a single thread but often becomes polysemous, as individuals or small groups pursue minor quests within the overall framework. Quest fantasies conventionally start in a place of security and stability, and then a disruption from the outside world occurs. The protagonist, generally an average person with hidden abilities, receives a call to action and reluctantly embarks on the first adventure. Choice is crucial in quest fantasy, so protagonists face several cruxes where their choices determine the fate of many. After the hero and company pass the first test and receive rewards such as magic items, a respite, often characterized by feasting and music in a haven under the protection of a wisdom figure, occurs during which the members of the company receive aid and knowledge.”

The only difference that is prevalent in GW2 is that, as I mentioned earlier, the sole hero of the land is not the player or ‘reader’. There are multiple heroes and helpers that aid against the disruption caused by dragons. Speaking of dragons, the story has both fantasy and sciencefiction elements. The core literary fantasy elements I have identified are the following:

• a complete fantasy land (Tyria)
• dragons
• various forms of magic
• sentient non-human races
• science-fiction style technology, such as teleportation gates and lasers
• the ‘Afterlife is a physical place that players can visit and where they can converse with ghosts
• the ‘gods’ of the world are present and can be interacted with in the world

There are various small fantasy and science-fiction elements, as well as Lovecraftian-horror style elements, especially regarding enemy creatures, for example, humanoid or animal-like skeletons, and wormlike poison-spewing jungle flowers. It is also notable that humans are the alien race of Tyria and the natives are the asura, norn and charr, while the newest race is the sylvari — they are born from the ‘Pale Tree’ and they represent the fauna and flora of Tyria. There are also ancient, forgotten races that are extinct. In my opinion, the story of Guild Wars 2 is most comparable to N. K. Jemisin’s Fifth Season. Even though the story carries some high fantasy elements, it is not as complex as most high fantasy worlds such as what we see in Lord of the Rings.

What is the story about?
The main conflict and driving force in the story comes from 2 sources:

• inhabitants of Tyria trying to survive and defeat the elder dragons
• inhabitants starting racial wars with each other, fighting over territory and resources

The element of othering and racial problems are well represented in dialogue in the game when charr call the sylvari “lettuce” or “leaf” or when the asura are belittled by humans and norns due to their body size and large ears.

The playable, ‘readable’ story starts with the player creating their character and choosing elements that make up their background story. This element gives an interesting twist to the story that the traditional book format would not be able to allow. The first question determines a profession-dependent aesthetic aspect of your character. The second question determines the character’s initial personality, which affects how NPCs react to the character (typically as differences among dialogue choices). The final three questions determine the personal story of the character; questions relating to the character’s background, motivations, and experiences. These questions are determined by race. Players can choose to “Skip to End” at each of these steps, in which case the game will randomly answer the questions and take players to the last step. Skipping this element allows players to randomize their experience and makes the story similar to the traditional book story format, where the main character background and backstory is written by the author.

Interstingly, because the story of the game is mixed between the books and the games, parts of the lore that are present in the books happened before the events of the Guild Wars 2 game. However, the connection is there in the game and players are able to visit locations that are part of the lore. The developers made sure that the game world feels authentic to the lore and history, by adding events such as the previously mentioned scavenger hunt, where players follow the story of Cobiah Marriner, the hero of the books. At the end of the scavenger hunt, players end up at the statue of Cobiah.

“Now, Zhaitan’s undead servants dominate the sea, destroying port
after port and slaughtering anything in their path. In the midst of ruin, Cobiah wows to see Lion’s arch rebuilt. Amid the storm of the dragon’s rising, Cobiah must become a hero to his crew and an
admiral to the pirate fleet, and face ghosts of his past. Only then will he master the Sea of Sorrows and crush the armada of Orr.”
— Sea of Sorrows

Cobiah and his friends rebuilt the city after surviving Zhaitan’s attack. The rebuilt city of Lion’s Arch is currently a main player hub in the game.

The uniqueness of the story really comes from the interactivity element. That fact that readers turn into players change multiple aspects about the experience. Most notably, the reading time of the story expands. Reading all 3 Guild Wars books can be done in a few hours, they are not extensive texts. However, playing through the story, even if the player is only experiencing the story and focuses on completing it as fast as possible, typically takes more than 20 hours. The game also offers the element of choice as interactivity during the main story. These dialogue options given to the player are connected to the player’s original choice of personality traits at character creation. The game offers a variety of choices for the player that will slightly affect the story or the response of the character the player is talking to. Imagine this as being able to choose dialogue in a book and the book changing based on your choice in real time.

In conclusion, I would describe the Guild Wars 2 story as a mid-fantasy interactive story with elements of science fiction – which works similarly to choose-your-own-adventure books.

InkMind

– 2024, London