ladislavbayer4271: I don’t think HoT and PoF should be free, why? The game doesn’t have any sub fees, it’s buy once, play forever. Also, these two expansions are constantly on sale, going for about 20 bucks for both in a bundle, that’s nothing.

user-kb3co6mj6e: Lol us old school gw2 players played the main game and heart of thorns with no mounts

Nyce-Gaming: GW2 is a great mmo. Never understood why it never became more popular or a household name

PoohbearZa: I like your honest take on the game so no hate from me.

Questing does feel kinda similar as you go, but I wouldn’t call it copy-paste. There’s enough variety to keep it interesting.

When I played the base game, there were no mounts because there weren’t any expansions yet, so everyone was on foot. Mounts aren’t locked behind an expansion — they were just added in the third one. The base game was never designed with mounts in mind, so it can seem that way now.

The game doesn’t really hold your hand, and the devs know that. They’re slowly improving it, but keep in mind it’s a small team — they don’t have a WoW or FFXIV-sized budget or dev crew.

Also, expecting a game with no sub fee to give away all expansions for free is kinda crazy. WoW and FFXIV both charge monthly and have cash shops. GW2 has one too, but honestly it’s pretty fair.

And the expansion bundle is always on sale — I checked, and the first three are $49 for the set right now.

Big tip: the worst mistake new players make is using a boost right away. Just play the game — the journey is the content, and it really rewards exploring and taking your time.

amandagray825: The complaint that you have to pay for expansions blows my mind. There’s not a sub. If you aren’t enjoying it, don’t play it. If you are, why not support the studio?

alimansour2323: The best part of GW2 is how you’re never rushed to do content, lets me play while being an adult with a job

Perisemiotics: maybe next time try not to skip the whole game but actually play it... good luck

dellenrules: I noticed you were playing an Elementalist.

That is a hard class for first time users and make a lot of them quit the game.

I always recommended a more hybrid melee oriented class like the Necromancer, Guardian, or Mesmer.

The base game is an expansive world with many things to do.

There is so much content in the game that there is not a single person in the history of this game who has done it all… and that is just the base game.

One thing that I felt aided in your enjoyment was the class change.

This game can also be extremely challenging. At launch, it was one of the hardest MMO games out there.

Now the game has been severely NERFED making it easier for newcomers. Some people claim it’s due to a power creep, but that is NOT true.

When previously engines use to gang up on you 20 to 1 and kill you with 2 hits, yet now their numbers are 5 to 1 with their damage reduced by 75 percent, that is not an example of power creep. That is ANET nerfing the difficulty.

I do miss the enjoyment of those difficulties.

yvindBy: No subfee is what got me into GW1 in 2005. But the game was very good, so I followed into GW2 when that released in 2012.

Guild Wars 2 is one of the very few MMO's where ALL content is relevant. You get good to great rewards from wherever you go or whatever you do. The first 2 expansions is just as relevant as the latest expansion.

You can see people in all maps at most times: Game feel very alive. The dynamic events made me think of all games with Quest hubs/NPC's as old 1990-design.

The horizontal progression is something many struggle to adjust to, after they have got their mindset into vertical progression, after played many other MMOs with vertical progression. I still have insane amounts of content in GW2 with horizontal progression.

GW2 does not give you many directions where to go: It is pretty open. If you need arrows where to go: You will struggle with the freedom in GW2.

The "endgame" in GW2 is what you want it to be: Without even be close to list all options: You can do most things between exploring the huuuuge world, being social, help new players, collect some of the insane amount of skins, achivement point hunting, do meta events and world bosses in open world, do Fractals (high end quick ish dungeons), do raids... Or even solo the high end content without gear if you are ultra hardcore.

R00m1o6C: The core game is Guild Wars 2's natural player filter. So many didn't make it to the end and went back to WoW, FF14, etc. ... whether that's good or bad is up to each individual.

normalmighty: I don't think giving away the expansions for free wpuld make sense, given that unlike the games you were comparing this too, there is no sub fee. At some point they have to receive some amounts of income to keep the lights on and pay for ongoing development.

I do understand the feeling - it looks like a lot if you consider buying all the expansions at once - but it adds up to way less after less than a year of playing the game when you remember there is no sub.

TFalconwing: One thing I will note is that GW2 doesn't have a sub fee, unlike other MMOs like FFXIV and WOW. This is one of the main reasons why the expansions still have a box price. You'll likely still pay less overall on GW2 than you would on another MMO simply because of this one difference, but it does mean the up front cost is larger. It shouldn't come as a surprise that mounts, an expansion feature, is an incentive to buy the expansion. ANet doesn't want everyone to be F2P after all.

I do also want to highlight that a lot of mechanics and features are explained on the level up screens, but it is a lot of information and they are not accessible later. I understand not catching all of it. Thanks for giving my favorite MMO a fair shake.

thomastgnome6526: Thank you for almost proving my point... Ever since GW2 started giving a free trial of the mount I've been saying that taking it away is likely to cause some new F2P players to quit the game. I am of the opinion that allowing F2P to have the Raptor, but not allowing them to earn the Masteries for it would be far more beneficial. That said, if you weren't a content creator, would you have given up on the game at that point?

Tindra-111: So i have nothing to complain about when it comes to how you feel about the game, it is your feelings and those are ofc valid for you. There is a but though which was your claims about expansions. Why should the expacs not cost money? There are no monthly fee or vip or any sort of monthly cost. All expansions are valid and played everyday by players because GW2 do not raise levels and make expacs of the past invalid. But most of all, due to those things above where you pay for the expac and then own it forever and can play it when ever you want and it will still be valid you get the worth of your money back if you actually keep on playing the game. I for example have over 20k hours in the game, which is nothing to brag about but consider how little money that is in the end for expansions i paid for and that i still play today, it would be silly to complain about that i had to pay for them when there is nothing else you pay.

And if you do not pay for the expansions who are valid and full of players still then where would Arena Net get money so they can keep on making content?

boxonothing4087: "more of the same" applies to every MMO out there.

You blaming the game for things that applies to the others too.

As for "doing a bad job at explaining", that's not what it does. It expects you do to your job and doesn't constantly hold your hand.

pherocks2634: No matter what mmo you play you cant revieuw it based on a few hours.

You need to dive deep into its mechanics and what it offers.

Its like playing Eve Online for 7 days en say wel, i took a few gates and thats it.

Each mmo has its strentght and weakness.

But to rate a mmo based on a few baby steps is a crime.

matthewcarey5842: RuneScape has the best quests of any game by far.

graqon_4400: dead game wars 2

nd6886: Thought this game died in 2017.

henrythegreatamerican8136: GW2 is a game that's fun to return to once a year, but after a a few weeks of playing it the repetition kicks in and I quit again until next year.

And let's not forget, at its core it is still a themepark game where players don't really have any serious control over what happens in the world.

I'm 100% done with themepark games.

KostMalen: Rare fully honest review.

Domain_Korekt: Good reviews would welcome if you'd go into a little bit more detail in a followup video maybe on mechanics etc.

Static-EN-: full honesty, i respect you for that. I play a lot of games that have this silly industry standard "It gets better!" sign hammered on them. But glad it worked out!

ReapTheWhirlwind: I've been playing GW2 since open beta and the core game truly hasn't changed much.

Oct 31 2025

Buy GW2 Gold