Guild Wars 2 to get raids and go free-to-play (sort of)

But not really.

Ever since the announcement of the Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns expansion fans have been on the fence about how the game was priced, but it seems like ArenaNet is making some changes. IGN spilled the beans about Saturday's PAX Prime announcement from the developers…

According to IGN's now deleted tweet and article, Guild Wars 2 is getting raids, and the core game is going to be available for free. Currently, the game doesn't require subscriptions – but does require an upfront payment for the game.

gw2-getting-raids-ign-twitter

Now, this might not be what you think it is, the free-to-play aspect of the game mentioned in IGN's tweet, might be referencing trial accounts.

According to data mining free-to-play players will be met with a number of limitations, so don't think that the game's  community will be ruined by too many gold spammers:

  • Only one or two character slots
  • Limit of level 15
  • Seems like a limit on how high a "rank" you can get (specific to trial or possibly PvP related)
  • Only able to send mail to friends.
  • Can't send items or gold through mail
  • Can't speak in map chat
  • Can't access Team Arenas
  • Can't access main WvW maps (EB and Borderlands)
  • Can't sell items on TP

It's unfortunate when leaks make their way around the web, but just because you might know some details on it now doesn't mean you shouldn't tune in to their Saturday announcement.

[Reddit]