Guild Wars 2 Cinematic Trailer and Developer Blog

There’s certainly been no shortage of Guild Wars 2 content circulating the ‘net this week, and to top it off we have a new cinematic “Charr Land” trailer and developer blog to bring to your attention. Roll the trailer:

And then we head over to this new developer blog penned by ArenaNet’s William Fairfield for an inside look at dungeon design:

The dungeon we are spotlighting this week is the Ascalonian Catacombs. I was involved heavily in creature design and helping craft the explorable version of this dungeon. The enemies in this dungeon are primarily Ascalonian ghosts and a group of creatures known as gravelings. These menacing creatures feed on the essence of the ghosts and are twisted by that power. One of my favorite creatures among these is the graveling breeder; this foul beast will expel another graveling from inside itself onto some poor unfortunate adventurer. The Ascalonian ghosts are a throwback to Guild Wars, and many players will recognize the abilities being used against them: the all-too-familiar sting of a Crippling Shot, the burning singe of a Meteor Shower, or the brilliant shine of a Ray of Judgment.

Working on this dungeon taught me some good lessons about creature design. Designing the creatures of the dungeon to work in tandem with each other was one of our greater challenges. We didn’t want every creature to feel like it was just part of another mob, fighting next to another copy of itself. Instead, we worked hard to make the ghosts feel like they are working together, like they have synergy.