I was not around for the original Mad King events on Guild Wars. From what I hear, they were massive and fun. With that said, so far the Guild Wars 2 version lives up to the lineage of the original event. It comes complete with a festive redesign of Lion’s Arch and plenty of mini-games and goodies in the gem store. There’s also an interesting scavenger hunt with a good story line involved. I went ahead and took the liberty of showing all the key areas in the hunt within a video. All in all, the event is well done– and free, so you can’t beat that.

Keep reading to watch the video!

ArenaNet announced yesterday that select retail stores will now be selling Gem Cards for Guild Wars 2. Players can purchase Gem Cards and use them in-game to receive Gems without having to utilize a credit card. Here’s the official announcement:

“You can purchase gems in-game from the Black Lion Trading Company, but starting this week you can also purchase Guild Wars 2 gems in real life at select retailers. These cards, which make a great gift, contain a serial code that can be redeemed in Guild Wars 2 for gems.

If gem cards aren’t in stock at your favorite retailer yet, be sure to ask if and when they’ll be arriving.

For redemption instructions and additional information about gems, visit the Guild Wars 2 Support page.”

Update 10/17: ArenaNet has released a list of retailers where Gem Cards can be purchased.

As we round the final bend toward Guild Wars 2′s launch, it’s impossible to not notice the rising storm of excitement, anticipation, and– well, there’s no sense in beating around the bush– hype. There, I said it. GW2 is carrying a lot of hype right now. MMO players are eager for something new, something shiny, and most importantly– something different. As most modern MMO fans know, hype can be a risky business, but GW2 has a lot of things going right for it so far. The combination of the game’s dynamic event system, dynamic leveling adjustment system, WvWvW feature, cooperative world system, and non-trinity combat system is a fairly innovative step in the industry, and a large reason for the hype.

Another innovative step is the move away from the classic subscription model. Most MMORPGs these days launch with a subscription model that may or may not prove the test of time, and if the game ends up slipping into a free-to-play model, many players feel frustrated with the model slip no matter their stance. Why? Because the developers will often veil the changes in flowery, positive PR lingo, change the way content patches are added to the game, and in general– change the game dramatically. Gamers prefer their games and development teams at face value– and that’s where Guild Wars 2 comes in.

For those of us who are diving headfirst into Guild Wars 2 from other MMOs that don’t feature microtransaction/cash shops, the idea of such a shop in GW2 may still taste a little bitter on our tongues. We’ve all heard the horror stories of games drifting to unwanted pay-to-win territories, and we’re all hoping that ArenaNet avoids going anywhere near that path. Will the company succeed? I sure hope so. They’re doing some excellent things with their cash shop. Still, my eyes remain sharp to the changes being made to it. As a result, I’ve been tracking the shop’s differences between beta weekends.

Every beta weekend event has seen some pretty large changes to the in-game gem/cash shop. Since BWE2, it now sports a new name: Black Lion Trading Company. For those interested in tracking the changes made along with me, here are the changes made between BWE2 and BWE3.

The Gem Store has seen a facelift of sorts since the first beta weekend event. This past weekend, we saw its new version, now known as the Black Lion Trading Company. A good amount of the items are the same, but there have been a couple significant changes. The store UI itself has been redone, for one thing. The new UI is easier to navigate, and the art is more in-tune with the rest of Guild Wars 2′s UI artistic elements. Most items have new graphics, and some have new names as well.

Among the added items is the rumored character slot expansion, some nifty glasses and sunglasses, a partial Trading Post summon item, a multiple-buff booster pack, and a “Box o’ Fun”. The Style tab, especially, is beginning to expand. Read on for more information!

I’m in the same boat as a lot of other people, since the bulk of my MMO experiences have been games that require a monthly subscription, I have virtually no experience buying items from a cash shop for use in my gaming. The Guild Wars 2 Gem Shop will be the first time that I’m actually planning on plunking down some cash to make my gaming experience better. I logged into the game and started browsing the available items, and I couldn’t help but feel a little underwhelmed by what was in there. Now I know that we’re still quite some time out from launch, so I figured what better time than the present to put out some ideas about some new items for the Gem Shop. For those of you who aren’t aware of the items for sale, my colleague Laura Hardgrave wrote an outstanding article titled Previewing the Gem Store. In that article she outlines all the items that currently exist in the Gem Store, and she also touches on the fact that there are no “Pay-to-Win” items in the Gem Shop as well. Keeping with the idea that the Gem Store shouldn’t contain these “Pay-to-Win” items, here are 5 things that I’d like to see on the Guild Wars 2 Gem Store.

Guild Wars 2′s Gem Store is one of the most debated topics for curious, prospective players. It’s easy to understand why. Many “free-to-play” MMORPGs offer similar shops, usually known as cash shops or microtransaction shops, and some of the items sold end up severely impacting the game for all types of players. The term often used for these games is “pay to win”, and it’s fairly accurate in most cases. The players with the most shop-bought items generally end up at the top of the food chain, which is unfair for everyone else. The notion of GW2 going this same route leaves a bad taste in many gamers’ mouths.

But will ArenaNet go that route? Many other games have made microtransaction shops that don’t contain items that have such a huge impact on gameplay, and merely contain novelty, vanity, cosmetic, and collectable items. And let’s face it, shops like this do well in popular games, because players love items that bring character to their characters. Character is good in MMOs. Unbalanced godly items are not.