Guild Wars 2 as a Competitive PvP Game

Player vs. Player (PvP) was a pretty big deal in the first Guild Wars. I'll be the first to admit that I went into the game with high expectations for its PvP duels and arenas. The game's called Guild Wars, for chrissakes. What else could I have expected?

The game certainly lived up to at least some of my expectations but it wasn't the be-all, end-all for PvP it could have been. Notably, Guild Wars had a constantly changing skill set that developers had to design to adapt to the shifting styles that players attached themselves to, in terms of class and group builds.

Note: In case you haven't played the first game, Guild Wars used a system very much like Magic: The Gathering's decks, in the form of swappable skill cards. As certain builds became popular, so too did their counters.

Yet despite the popularity of PvP, much of the game's development was centered around its cooperative, and story-based content. Players, at least early on, had to trudge through the main story campaign to unlock skills to use in PvP. It was a way to get players to experience the larger world of Guild Wars, while at once serving as an obstacle to any player solely interested in PvP.

A recent report on MMORPG.com suggests that NCSoft will allow players to create their own PvP servers in Guild Wars 2, with rules of their own to determine the flow of play instead of adhering to a single official ruleset. These player-hosted servers servers will be available in addition to ArenaNet servers.

Without the forced 'official' oversight of ArenaNet, enterprising players will be able to host their own tournaments either locally at LAN parties—potentially giving rise to the return of the LAN parties of the late 90's and early 00's—and allow local sponsorships to drive the community, in the same way all competitive fighting game communities handle their own leagues, both local and international.

The news should come as a surprise to players given that Guild Wars 2, like its predecessor, has been touted as an MMORPG.

It will be interesting to see if Guild Wars 2 can inject new life into the competitive gaming scene. The competitive gaming scene is far from dead, but it wouldn't hurt to see a fresh new venue for competitive gaming.