Guild Wars: Eye of the North Previews

Three more previews of ArenaNet’s Guild Wars: Eye of the North expansion pack are now available, all of which are based on what was seen during a visit to the company’s headquarters in Washington. The first is at GameSpy:

Before we left to continue our opening adventure, we took a brief developer-led sojourn into the Hall of Monuments. This is a player-specific instance that the ArenaNet team views as both a thank you to their long-time fans and a bridge for players to eventually jump ship for Guild Wars 2. The hall contains five monument stations that display the game’s many, many collectible. Stations include a place to display collectable mini-pets, armor and weapons, heroic companions and titles. Once players make a new character in Guild Wars 2, they’ll be able to lay claim to some of these items. That led to a brief discussion about the nature of those bonuses and whether it might make things difficult for new players who wouldn’t have the advantages a Hall of Monuments would confer. According to Strain, the Hall of Monuments isn’t about power, it’s more about visual distinctiveness. In fact, given the design of the game which stresses player skill far more than gear stats, visual uniqueness has always been a major factor in motivating players. The Hall of Monuments won’t make a player tougher in Guild Wars 2 as much as make them just look good.

The second is at Games Radar:

EotN’s story expands on a storyline alluded to in Prophecies: The Great Dwarf, the patron god of all dwarves in the Guild Wars universe, opposes the Great Destroyer, an entity so fearsome, his name is forbidden to be spoken among the Dwarves. In Eye of the North, you meet and confront the Great Destroyer.

And the third is at Destructoid:

Our brief introduction to the expansion’s new storyline also acquainted us with GW:EN’s new races: the Norn, massive warriors from the Shiverpeak Mountains; the Asura of the Maguuma Jungle, and the Sylvari. These races are set to be playable in Guild Wars 2, and appear in Eye of the North as heroes and quest elements. You can build up reputation with these races by completing particular tasks, and a higher reputation will give you access to better weapon and armor sets and other bonuses. The Norn, for example, will grant you street cred if you can, y’know, beat them to a bloody pulp. They give you lots of opportunities to do this — namely, every time you talk to a new one. Being a culture that probably watches a lot of UFC and drinks their weight in protein shakes, the Norn won’t even deal with you until you’ve won their respect by conquering them in mortal combat.