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DJ Tasha's Blog
| Guild Wars goes viral |
With Guild Wars rapidly approaching its 5th Birthday on April 28th, the news this week has mostly been regarding the build up to the celebrations and events marking the significant date.
At the Games Developers Conference and Emerald City Comicon a couple of weeks ago, fans were being handed flyers with 2 different propaganda style designs. One of them had a White Mantle guy with the word "Obey" on it, while the other had a Shining Blade style sword with the word "Dismantle". For those not familiar with the Guild Wars franchise and lore, the White Mantle are a religious order which claim ruler-ship over Kryta, an area in the original Guild Wars campaign. They reject the 5 Gods worshipped by the rest of humanity in favour of those they call the Unseen Ones, also known as Mursaat. The Shining Blade are a rebellious organisation set on destroying the White Mantle and the Mursaat. The effect is a civil war which is the basis behind a portion of the original Guild Wars storyline and looks to be expanded on in the future.
Each flyer also had a 2d bar-code on it which pointed to a URL containing the picture of its respective flyers. The entire effort is a viral marketing tactic and has sparked a large thread on Guild Wars 2 Guru discussing the meaning behind each of the pictures and the comment of "March 16" which appears in the source code for the two web pages, along with the two phrases "Go, Discover Contentment. Truth is Obedience" and "Mantle has discovered plan. Writing is on Wall".
The two posters on the websites have also begun being "vandalised" by the two warring factions.
Last week's blog told you about the release of the 2 concept art videos from Arenanet's Artistic Director's lecture at the Games Developer Conference. Over the last week, we've seen the release of the final 2 videos complete with sound and 2.5d animation in places. At the end of the 3rd video there are some subliminal images relating to the White Mantle side of the viral campaign.
Yesterday Guild Wars also received a new update. Most of it was various bug fixes, but also contained the addition of new dialogue between Gwen, who is a central Guild Wars character, and Lieutenant Thackery. Now Thackery and Gwen were involved in a seasonal quest which sees Thackery presenting Gwen with a gift, attempting to break the ice between her. The new dialogue provides very strong hints towards the start of a relationship between the two characters, yet again signifying Guild Wars 1 changes to take place around the 5th anniversary and onwards to Guild Wars 2.
Tune in for my last set of every week for a round-up of Guild Wars and Guild Wars 2 information
Links
ArenaNet Official Youtube Channel (GDC videos)
Poster: White Mantle
Poster: Shining Blade
Guild Wars 2 Guru Discussion thread
Dialogue Updates
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Friday, 26 March - 23:30:58 |
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