Guild Wars: Eye of the North

The Good
Graphically some improvements have been made to the engine and for an engine that is over 2 years old, Guild Wars still looks pretty impressive for an online RPG – the water and fire effects are especially impressive.

The gameplay is pretty much similar to existing Guild Wars chapters except the quests are now repeatable and you have access to more multi-level dungeons. The Hall of Monuments is an interesting gimmick that actually encourages the player to spend a copious number of hours playing the game to farm the reputation points, money and titles required to deck it out, since any achievements gained here are apparently ported as benefits into Guild Wars 2 when that comes out.

Eye of the North contains the best music I’ve heard Jeremy Soule compose yet. The soundtrack will be a treat to Prophecies fans as several pieces incorporate the original theme into them. Also the music changes depending on situation featuring combat music when you’re in over your head and menacing horns whenever you come across a boss.

Voice acting quality is pretty much the same as before although it’s interesting to note that Maurice LaMarche (Pinky and the Brain, Futurama, etc.) voices some lines for Vekk, one of the Heroes available to the player.

Very little bugs were introduced at release and thanks to the streaming updates, serious issues were quickly resolved in the first couple of weeks. The game interface hasn’t changed that much from Nightfall and is therefore still very good.

The Bad
The GW:EN storyline is pretty standard by Computer RPG standards. A re-awakened evil threatens to destroy the world as we know it and it’s up to you and your band of heroes to vanquish them, etc. This would be alright if it weren't for the fact that some characters and events in the game may confuse the player if they haven’t played Prophecies before (since this expansion pack really seems aimed towards them).

GW:EN is definitely challenging and some of the story-based quests are interesting, however the repetitive grinding for reputation does become somewhat annoying at times. All quests and dungeons are repeatable and there’ll always be more things to fill up your Hall of Monuments with but the real question is whether you will have the patience to do so?

The Bottom Line
Guild Wars: Eye of the North will be a welcome addition to veteran players of the series, especially ones who enjoyed or exclusively played Prophecies. Several multi-level dungeons, repeatable quests and 10 extra Heroes will keep players entertained until Guild Wars 2 comes out, if they have the patience to grind reputation and money to fully deck out their Halls of Monuments!