As the title said, the first open Guild Wars 2 beta was about a month ago, and after thinking about it some, here are my thoughts on it.

Professions

Easy place to start talking about. I was able to play at least a little bit with all the professions, but two I played with the most, which I'll talk about first.

Guardian

Going into the beta, definitely my top-pick for a profession. At the official release, I will probably be playing an Asura Guardian as my main character, but for the beta I was a Norn. I definitely like combination of both being a good support role, while also being very solo-able (although the class does learn toward group play). Being able to soak up a good amount of damage (something that is sparse among the GW2 classes) was nice due to my lower-level experience with this caliber of gaming.

With the guardian, I really liked the staff as a primary weapon, especially for its 1 ability (a conic spread in front of you). While not the best DPS, it was nice being the longest range AoE weapon for the Guardian, and also ideal for kiting. The hammer guardian I did not like as much as the hammer warrior, as with the greatsword. I did like the double mace though for a better DPS weapon set, and also just feeling really powerful while using it.

Thematically, I enjoyed the guardian as a paladin-type class. The major difference being that unlike Paladins from like Dungeons and Dragons, they weren't linked to a divine power source, and are more akin to wizardly arcane magic. Nonetheless, the glowing blue symbols and auras you throw down give the same general feeling. Your aegis looks very nice when charged as a spectral shield over your off-hand. One problem I found though was that when playing in the Norn areas, your symbols and zones were a bit difficult to see at times against the snow.

Necromancer

Not my first-choice caster coming in, but definitely came out. In previous games, I had not been a big fan of the summoner-type casters, largely due to annoying AI with them, or them being simply ineffective. With the necromancer, I found them much more organized and tactical in combat. I liked having a small army of undead minions around me, and they were very effective in taking out large numbers of adversaries at once. Unlike casters in most games, the necromancer was fairly tough - not as tough as some of the heavy armor classes, but could stand its own. The necromancer's death shroud I found very useful while waiting for my heal to recharge or whatever.

Like the guardian, I like the staff for its long-range abilities while my minions could be out fighting. Besides that I played with axes a bit, and then with the scepter/focus combo. I dunno - for me, the point of a caster isn't to be close up with fast attacks - it is the long-range AoE. Due to this, I stuck with the staff (I also did the same with my elementalist :) )

One complaint I have about the necromancer is that some of the stuff is really kinda disgusting - which I guess is kind of the point with it. It also felt kinda weird just walking through these villages/cities (I was playing a human), having these horrid undead abominations following me around, and all the NPCs just being chill about it. I know you can't really work around that as a game designer, but it just felt awkward.

Elementalist

It was the elementalist coming in that was my go-to caster. I dunno - it just didn't turn out too well for me. It was the first one I tried playing, and my frustration with it may be in part with me getting used to the controls. Of all the classes, it was the one would could take the least damage - which makes since as the wizard-type class. I didn't get too far with my wizard, as after I tried it out a bit, I focused on my necromancer as my caster to play on.

As the the above two, I played mostly with the staff (see a pattern?). The fire attunement was my favorite, with having the high DPS and AoE spells (plus the meteor shower is just fun). Switching attunements rather than weapon switching I found is very different. In other classes, I used the weapons switch for changing the range I was with the target, while with the elementalist it doesn't change your range, only effects change. For this, I got the lightning hammer as my first utility skill so I would have a close range weapon to counter-balance my staff.

Mesmer

Now getting into the classes I only played a little of. I really did not care for the mesmer, which might stem from my dislike of the sneaky, deceptive types. My first problem with the mesmer is (at least the norn one I was playing) the initial mask you get - it is very, very creepy. And then I guess I was treating my illusions as more minions like the necromancer, and they weren't (and shouldn't) fulfilling that role. The mesmer requires a play style very different than my own, and I don't think I'll be doing too much with this profession in the future.

Thief

Like the mesmer, I didn't care for general play style of the thief. In almost all games, I am more the direct and up-front sort of guy, not the stealthy, back-stabbing one. Nonetheless, I found the thief interesting to play, although I feel like I was running from more large battles for more time than I was actually fighting them. This is a class that definitely requires getting used to, and my low level of experience coupled with my limited time with this class made my use of it far less than efficient.

Warrior

I dunno if it was the warrior or the char when I was playing, but playing this character was just fun to play. Probably the most straightforward class to play, as you don't have too many special class abilities, besides hit things hard and, every so often, hit things really hard. Playing with a hammer was really fun with this, as you just feel powerful lugging that thing around. I wish I could have played more of this class, but you can only do so much in three days.

Ranger

In Dungeons and Dragons, I love rangers, although I rarely play with an animal companion, which is sort of the defining part of the GW2 ranger. Unlike the necromancer minions, I found that my animal was very weak, and kept dying all the time. I might have just not played enough with it to make it more effective, but I quickly got frustrated with it. I heard there were a bit overpowered in the previous beta, and might have been scaled back a bit too much.

Engineer

I did not play much with the engineer (not much past character creation), but in retrospect I really wish I had. I was in the mindset of 'This is a fantasy game and I'd prefer to stick to pure fantasy', which the engineer was a sore to that point of view. That being said, I think I'm going to be playing a lot more with the engineer in the future, as I found that a lot of his abilities are like that of Randus, my favorite character in the DnD podcast 'Critical Hit'. He is the semi-magic, semi-tech sort of guy, which really what the GW2 engineer is. Also, the engineer also has a bunch of weapons unaccessible to the other professions, which I want to try out.

Races/Starting Zones

Being there only 3 races available in this beta and 8 professions to try out, I got a good amount of experience in the starting zones of each race. I just can't wait until the Asura are available.

Human

In many games, humans end up being the ho-hum of the races - average stats across the board, fairly plain settlements, and the like. GW2 does a good job by making up for the plainness of humans in general by giving them one of the most awesome cities I've seen in a game. Divinity's Reach is amazing and must have taken ages to design. I probably spend a good hour just wandering around the city looking at everything.

Outside in the main starting zone, it feels fairly average for a human setting - a bunch of scattered farms and the like, which each one having its own quest lines and such. The dam under construction I enjoyed the look of, although I never got around to looking to see what was up on top. The bandit caves were fun, as I went in with my necromancer with a group of about 6 others where we cleared the area. Beyond the first set of farms and such, you go into the centaur raided area, which I felt was a much better change of pace, and the transition was nice as it wasn't so sudden.

Overall, I enjoyed what I saw of the human starting zone, although I did not get very much out of it.

Char

The char are probably my least favorite of the races, although they are fun to play (the cubs are also very cute ). Their starting zone, while it feels like a warzone, kinda isn't very enjoyable for me - feels too much like Texas. Their city, the Black Citadel, while interesting, wasn't very visually appealing to me. I also kept thinking 'Why did you make your streets out of giant gears...?'

The char starting area was also the most difficult of the three starting zones in this beta. In the others, it was a fairly low chance of failure for the events, but in the char zone, every other one was being failed. The steep learning curve hear turned me off the char a bit, although I came to like it a little bit later when I came back with my norn that I had leveled up a bit.

Norn

If I have one problem with the norn, it is that the men are HUGE, and you can't be too reasonably sized. But nonetheless, they ended up being my favorite of the races and starting zones. From a distance, the Shiverpeaks look almost exactly like the Cascades look like here in Washington, although they are viable a lot more often than here (any rain pretty much blocks them from view). Hoelbrek, the norn 'city', is very nicely done - I loved the giant ice sculptures and the lodges were amazing.

The starting areas themselves were in this valley down the sides of the Shiverpeaks, which then led back up into more snowy mountains. I really enjoyed the quests in this area, although my favorite was in one camp were you had a snowball fight with the children there. My main problem with the area is the number of monsters that chill you, which is probably one of the most annoying debuffs.

Other Stuffs

Character Creation

There is a point of too much customization. The character creator is nice, but who really cares about the exact angle of your nose? Your character for the most part will be small enough that it won't make too much of a difference. The armor dyeing system is turns out nice, although I am not quite sure about how unlocking more dyes will work out. I expect it will be a lot of trying over and over until you get the right one you want. But nonetheless, the creator is aesthetically appealing, easy to use, and does what it needs to do - what more can you ask?

WvWvW PvP

I didn't get too much experience with this, but from what I did do, it was... err... kinda boring. I really didn't see anyone from my side while I was playing, so I couldn't effectively do any keep invasion, so I ended up shepherding some dolyaks for a few hours and waiting around defending a tower. This is something meant to be done mostly in groups, but I was mostly solo for this beta.

That other type of PvP, the 5v5 one

Ok, here's the story. I've just started, and I'm checking through all my different GUIs and such. One of them in a PvP tab with teleport to PvP as an option. I click it and get into a game. I have no idea what I'm doing. My team ends up loosing. Yeah... I'll have to get into this a bit more another beta or until it releases.

Personal Story

I did a little bit of the personal story, but I preferred the open-world exploration. I did a bit on my human elementalist, but did not get too far with it. It is still fairly incomplete, with some of the chats and all, so I mostly left it alone. For the most part, it is your traditional quest system, just with a branching storyline.

Open-World Exploration Stuff

I really enjoyed this - it was easy to follow, and you can go pretty much wherever you want and a quest would be there. I know that these lower-level zones are probably those with the most content in them (for now), but it felt like a very full world. I also liked that you could easily go back into the other race's starting areas and go through their early quests, and still have it be an effective means of leveling. You do get down-leveled when you go into a lower level zone, but you still have some better equipment and more utility skills, which still gives you a bit of an edge.

Coming from Runescape, where quest zones are often completely dead, quests are very pointed and linear, and at any level there are only a few effective places to train, this is a nice change of pace.

Overall Feel/Art/Music/Performance (aka other)

Guild Wars 2 has a much more mature and developed feel compared to many other games I've played that are similar. It has a very defined stylization that works well with the overall mood of the game. The music is very high on my list for fantasy-style music - I can see myself purchasing a copy of the soundtrack once it is available.

Graphics wise, I didn't fiddle around with them, and it looked amazing still with only the default graphics settings. I have a mid-ranged computer (not a gaming computer by any standard), and it ran fine. I will have to see how well it works with Fraps and such, as I may want to make some videos in the future.

In short: I can't f'ing wait for this game to come out.

~DImos