My PC Gaming Benchmarks

So I was digging through the closet today and found all my old Guild Wars disks. (I have the first 3 campaigns: Prophecies, Factions, and Nightfalls). I went ahead an installed them all again. I wasn’t too surprised that I could max out all of the games settings and still have over 60fps constantly. One thing that I was noticing though was a higher latency than I do with almost any other online game, not exactly sure why this is but I was kind of put off by it. The game sure hasn’t changed too much in the past few years, well I guess there wasn’t much to change the game was pretty good back then. More after the break.

There are a few problems that I have with the game even after all these years.

1: There is no jumping, this really limits what you can do in the game. I feel like I am always having to follow a pre-constructed path every where that I go.

2. Another problem that I have is that there isn’t a defined skill trainer. I still to this day don’t have a clue where the hell I’m supposed to go to gain new skills.

3. This is one thing that bugs the crap out of me, although I understand why they did it it still pisses me off. The penalty that you get when you die in combat. Since everything that you do is instanced just for you and your party having a health and energy loss every time you die really takes the solo ability out of the game

Now there are a lot of things that I do enjoy very much in this game.

1. The ability to “hire” out group members. Sure they aren’t nearly as good as a real person but they do allow you to just go out and solo some of the easier content. This is something that I wish other MMO games would incorporate. A lot of times I really don’t fell like waiting around for an hour to get a party together only to have to leave for work once its formed.

2.The environment is beautiful.

3. The game runs great even on older computers.

4. Free to play. Thank god there is finally a MMO that doesn’t charge a monthly fee. I understand why they do but it is nice to have a MMO that you can play whenever without having to reopen your account.

5. Great map, this is another thing that I wish other MMO games would do is kind of point you in the general direction of where to go on the quest that you are on.

I hear that there is a lot of great content and game play in the PvP aspects of the game. I’m just not too big into the PvP combat in most games. It just not very rewarding. Now the destructible environments in Age of Conan and Warhammer Online sounds almost exactly what I’m looking for.

All in all the game is still pretty solid and if you can pick it up on the cheap, I would go for it. They do have a new expansion pack out called “Eye of the North” although I still haven’t picked that up yet. Maybe that will be something to get with that tax stimulus check. Thank you George Dubya.

PROS: Beautiful graphics and smooth animations even on this dated engine. Being able to “hire” out group members. Free to play. Runs great on older computers. Great map.

CONS: Terrible death penalty, no jumping. Hard to find new skills.

Over all I give this game a 8/10