It is a sequel. By the very definition used to say it isn't, it is.
"Something that takes place after or as a result of an earlier event."
Everything that happens in GW2 is a result of GW1. Why are we even arguing about this? Stop trying to get cute with definitions >_>
Wow. Little upset are we? Who's arguing? Can we not have opinions on the forums? Last I checked, thats what they are for. If you want to believe its a sequel, go ahead. But dont go telling me what material I can or cant post based on my views. Yes, we can talk, debate, share opinions. And the best way to do that is in a civilized manner, rather than lash out. /end rant
there is a clear difference between opinion and falseness.
to say it is not a sequel goes against the very deffinition of the word.
i would link the definition, but you obviously have it.
i am not an avid follower of the game, but i know it is the same world, set centuries in the future, following the events of the first game. this in itself, is all it needs to be a sequel.
you see... we have words. words have meaning. meanings do not conviently change just because 'you' do not like how the word is being applied.
to be analytical, i could say that the game is a sequel by lore. even though, i should not have to do that, because at root, sequel means 'the continuation of a story in a work of art'.
so.... even if the ONLY thing in common with games was the lore, that is all it needs to be considered a 'sequel'.
the way in which many on this thread are using the word 'sequel' is SLANG. look that one up next.
It's a sequel. For those of you who disagree, go READ the lore. Much of what you find in GW2 is directly related, if not an evolution of what was going on in GW1. Is there a time jump? Yes, but it's the same world, you'll see the same areas from the first game (just updated from 100s of years). Many of the main characters in GW2 are descendants of characters from the first game. Even the enemies you fight are either directly taken from, or related to the ones you fought in the first game.
Remember the minions you fought in GW1? Nearly all of them are minions of the elder dragons. Whats the main 'endgame' boss of GW2? The elder dragon Zhaitan, the dragon of Orr, master of the undead. Remember the main villain from the original GW1? That's right, Vizier Khilbron the undead lich who is trying to obtain the Scepter of Orr.
Much of what happened in the original game leads up to what is happening in GW2 now. GW1 was the precursor to the elder dragon's awakening and wreacking havoc on the world. GW2 is the start of their awakening.
- It's absolutely a sequel in any definition you can choose to use.
That said, the gameplay is very much different from the first, but that has nothing to do with whether or not the game is a sequel.
** btw all of this info is easily available on the games' Wiki. It took about a minute to look up all that stuff. **
i honestly think they are confused by the meaning of the word.
gameplay has NOTHING to do with it being a sequel or not. this is what they fail to realize.
Having similarities doesn't make it a sequel. Final Fantasy has no sequels. There are 13 of them, but none of them are sequels. Final Fantasy 10-2 and Final Fantasy 13-2 are sequels to Final Fantasy 10 and Final Fantasy 13. But none of them are sequels to Final Fantasy 1.
What you are referring to is a "series." A series doesn't have to have continuity in any means. Many people refer to this as the bastardization of a great story. It is taking something that is successful (Terminator 3) and creating another movie in the series which has nothing at all to do with the other movies (Terminator Salvation).
With a series you can call the game anything you want. This could have been called World of Guildcraft or Elves Shooting Lasers. Guild Wars 2 is not Guild Wars and is not a sequel. It can have all the similarities it wants, all it means is ArenaNet is using the good name of Guild Wars to market their next game.
Next up Blizzard's secret project "Titan" to be renamed World of Warcraft 2.
Bad argument is bad. Final Fantasy X-2, for example, IS a sequel to FFX. It involves a continuation of story involving characters from the previous title.
From Gamespot: So the release of Final Fantasy X-2 is notable and novel not only because it's a sequel to a sequel (oddly enough), but also because it is, in fact, the first time Square has broken its custom and continued the storyline of an entry in its most hallowed RPG series. This venture into sequel territory isn't the only way FFX-2 diverges from the norm..
FromYoshinori Kitase, developer of FFX-2: Fan reaction was larger than we expected and we decided to continue the story of Yuna and surrounding characters in a sequel.
Now in regards to GW2, the game is using characters and events introduced in GW1 as a continuation of a story, including but not limited to the Thackery family and King Adelbern, as well as all of the races from the first game and their involvement in the events that shaped Tyria 200 years later. Time is not a factor in sequels, the story is sequential despite the time that has passed because it involves the same fantasy universe acting in a manner in accordance to the natural passing of time. If your definition is to be believed, then Star Wars Episode 4 would not be sequential with Episode 3, it would be an entirely different series. However, no one is going to agree with you that one is not a sequel/prequel to the rest.
If you actually read what I said I never claimed that Final Fantasy X-2 was a sequel to Final Fantasy X. What I said is that there is no sequel to Final Fantasy 1 (the first one) just 13-17 games in the series.
There are people who try to chronically setup all of the Final Fantasies to try and make them into one continuous storyline. As well there are people who try and put all of the various Link games in order to try and figure them out.
A big part of why I don't see Guild Wars 2 as a sequel (yet) is because end game isn't really there yet. You can have a sequel involving a new character but it has to revolve around the story of the former game. The fact that this is so far into the future negates that... in the same way that Final Fantasy 1 could potentially be 1000 years before Final Fantasy 2.
guild Wars 1 had better ui and it's customisation than gW2 so far.
really? what's the difference?
both seem very similar to me (clean, moving & resizing elements only?)
or do you mean that skill icons of an enemy aren't shown anymore? That might be a good thing or not, not sure what to think.
You can't move and resize all elements of GW2. GW2 lacks any k9ind of combat log too so far. In GW on a side were showing all the skills which hit you. it was a cool feature especially in pvp. And health bars of your character and people in your party were better. When you were poisoned it turned gree. when hexes it turned pink. When you had a deap wound condition you had a grey block on your health bar. And many other things. It made it very easy to see what is happening with you and party members. In GW2 trhere are loads of icons which are harder to read. They even lack the timer under them showing how long they will last.
GW2 has good ui but imo GW was simply better at showing information.
Nobody gives a damn about the GW1 as it is just a small page in the MMO history being lost somwhere in between the titans like Ultima and WoW (yes it has it's own community, but it is small - and I am sure the Arena Net knows by now that the number of players they can expect in GW2 based on the pre-sales is X times more than the GW1 community).
I really really hope that the devs won't even think about using the GW1 as a benchmark for GW2, since GW1 just plain sucks... I tried it a year ago or so as I was inspired by the reading about GW2 development and I am a fan of old game you know... butit was a disaster!!!... I am more likely to go back to playing Ultima online or... I don't know - tetris :-) rather than launching the GW1 again... it is heavily outdated and has no unique elements (well at least for me).
I really really hope that the devs won't even think about using the GW1 as a benchmark for GW2, since GW1 just plain sucks...
i personally enjoyed gw1 but most my friends did not
I also enjoyed GW1, but I do think it was time to bring the GW franchise into the 21st centry of mmo gaming; hence GW2! Look forward to seeing ya'll in the Mists!
Guild Wars 2 continues the LORE of Guild Wars 1, thus sequel. Even if it were an RTS (happy it isn't) and it continued the story, it would be a sequel.
If it were like EverquestNext, where they're doing a 'whole different alternate version of the world', then it's not really a true sequal in anything aside from sequential release, as it does not further the original story. It's a new begining, at that point.
Why do I write, create, fantasize, dream and daydream about other worlds? Because I hate what humanity does with this one.
Lol, what is up with all the animosity towards this being labeled a sequel? It's not a bad thing, but it is a sequel by definition.
It sounds to me like Anet is fixing everything that was wrong with GW1, which sounds great to me. There were a few key things in the game that turned me off from it, and with those gone, the game should be fun.
Lol, what is up with all the animosity towards this being labeled a sequel? It's not a bad thing, but it is a sequel by definition.
It sounds to me like Anet is fixing everything that was wrong with GW1, which sounds great to me. There were a few key things in the game that turned me off from it, and with those gone, the game should be fun.
Honeslty, I don't think anything was really 'wrong' with GW1. It was simply a different kind of game. A game that ArenaNet could build with their budget at the time and I'm almost certain they always hoped it would lead to enough revenue so that they could make the game they always intended to - which is Guild Wars 2.
Why do I write, create, fantasize, dream and daydream about other worlds? Because I hate what humanity does with this one.
Nobody gives a damn about the GW1 as it is just a small page in the MMO history being lost somwhere in between the titans like Ultima and WoW (yes it has it's own community, but it is small - and I am sure the Arena Net knows by now that the number of players they can expect in GW2 based on the pre-sales is X times more than the GW1 community).
I really really hope that the devs won't even think about using the GW1 as a benchmark for GW2, since GW1 just plain sucks... I tried it a year ago or so as I was inspired by the reading about GW2 development and I am a fan of old game you know... butit was a disaster!!!... I am more likely to go back to playing Ultima online or... I don't know - tetris :-) rather than launching the GW1 again... it is heavily outdated and has no unique elements (well at least for me).
All just your opinions... GW1 sold over 6 million copies till 2009. so saying it has a small community and it sucks and all this bashing is just.. pathetic... GW1 all by itself is unique
Just because GW1 isn't your cup of tea and you tried it for, probably 5 days tops, doesn't mean the game sucks...
"Happiness is not a destination. It is a method of life." -------------------------------
I really really hope that the devs won't even think about using the GW1 as a benchmark for GW2, since GW1 just plain sucks... I tried it a year ago or so as I was inspired by the reading about GW2 development and I am a fan of old game you know... butit was a disaster!!!... I am more likely to go back to playing Ultima online or... I don't know - tetris :-) rather than launching the GW1 again... it is heavily outdated and has no unique elements (well at least for me).
I think you played in presearing for 5 minutes before uninstalling. Just sayin', you didn't see the real game, or if you did, you tried to pigeonhole it into your "standard MMO expectations", and it didn't fit.
Btw, the community and game are still going strong after 7 years, 5 years after their last big expansion. I'd say that makes for a pretty succesful game, wouldn't you?
On-topic:
Every argument in this thread about it not being a sequel has been ludicrous. I very explicitly outlined how the design philosophies of GW1 and GW2 are consistent, even if the execution is different between the two. And there's the little fact that the story IS continuous; the final big boss of EotN is the first major minion of one of the dragons we fight in GW2. So...please stop the inanity? Please?
Nobody gives a damn about the GW1 as it is just a small page in the MMO history being lost somwhere in between the titans like Ultima and WoW (yes it has it's own community, but it is small - and I am sure the Arena Net knows by now that the number of players they can expect in GW2 based on the pre-sales is X times more than the GW1 community).
I really really hope that the devs won't even think about using the GW1 as a benchmark for GW2, since GW1 just plain sucks... I tried it a year ago or so as I was inspired by the reading about GW2 development and I am a fan of old game you know... butit was a disaster!!!... I am more likely to go back to playing Ultima online or... I don't know - tetris :-) rather than launching the GW1 again... it is heavily outdated and has no unique elements (well at least for me).
Opinions, everyone has them (just like a you know what).
GW1 was an amazing game. There was nothing wrong with it. And I don't think ArenaNet settled for GW1 because of their budget so that they can eventually create GW2.
GW1 was targetting people who liked action games and RPGs not the MMO crowd which love time sinks, gear grind and raids.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
GW1 was an amazing game. There was nothing wrong with it.
Agree with the first sentence, disagree with the second. I could post a litany of things that were wrong, or simply needed improvement. GW2 appears to be addressing most of the major ones - and most importantly, they identified what those problems were early on in development - which is a large part of the reason why I'm so psyched for it. I KNOW I like GW1, I've played it for probably way too long, so GW1 + fixed flaws + bigger, persistnet world + WvW = holy balls my perfect game.
Nobody gives a damn about the GW1 as it is just a small page in the MMO history being lost somwhere in between the titans like Ultima and WoW (yes it has it's own community, but it is small - and I am sure the Arena Net knows by now that the number of players they can expect in GW2 based on the pre-sales is X times more than the GW1 community).
I really really hope that the devs won't even think about using the GW1 as a benchmark for GW2, since GW1 just plain sucks... I tried it a year ago or so as I was inspired by the reading about GW2 development and I am a fan of old game you know... butit was a disaster!!!... I am more likely to go back to playing Ultima online or... I don't know - tetris :-) rather than launching the GW1 again... it is heavily outdated and has no unique elements (well at least for me).
I don't agree here.
GW1 had a "lackluster" (as far as sheer excitement / pizzazz) STARTER area, and to some degree the first portions of post-Searing Ascalon.
Then it picked up steam, and continued to do so to increasing level once you hit the Shiverpeaks, Kryta, and beyond. I started to play GW1 several months ago in prep for GW2 thinking it would be a simple case of "put up with blah" for the sake of GW2 prep. See, I had played the GW1 Trial twice before, but . . .
. . . had never gotten out of pre-Searing starter. /smackhead
HERO / HENCHMEN System - revolutionary / evolutionary:
I consider it "evolutionary" because it addresses some core game-play issues at a fundamental level other MMOs simply ignore and/or don't know how to deal with:
1) Ability to partake of game content and challenges on a limited play schedule (e.g. 4 hours a week adult with a job vs 80 hours a week unemployed chair-potato)
2) Ability to fill a party naturally to partake of game content and challenges, adjusting to live-player availability based on my schedule . . . not held hostage to everyone else's.
3) A natural mechanism mitigating lack of live-player availability in lower level zones. New players to a game don't feel anywhere near as much "left in the dust alone", while "everyone else" is running around cap and near-cap zones.
Con: Some gamers claim this "sucks" because it promotes "solo play".
The Hero/henchmen system works both ways. It's not an "anti-group" dynamic. I've frequently partied up with one to two other individuals for group challenges filling my party roster with players and Heros as needed/available.
Superb mechanism that basically acts like the oil in your car, allowing players to game without feeling jammed up.
More "hardcore" PvE content, in general.
The truth of the matter is you won't do very much at all "solo" in GW1, even just running from one place to another. GW1's mob profiles are setup to require GROUPS. Even trash mobs.
The group might be you and three to five henchmen, but it WILL be a group. It might be you and four other players, or you and one other player and two henchment, but it will be a group.
Mob profile, conduct, grouping conduct by patrolling mobs, and battle-conduct is far more (for you WoW players so you can relate) like what was seen in Magister's Terrace than the binary, predictable, simple aggro model found in many other MMOs. Mobs are very often found in packs, often with WIDE and quick patrol patterns, or ambush out of the ground. The aggro model is more complex with HEALERS and clothies often targetted first. Mobs are often linked even if distances between them fairly long. The result? You poke something, it, and all it's buddies, are heading to your group, and you can bet at least 1/2 those mobs have already targetted your healers and clothies, forget the "tank" and the Ranger.
Once I got into Kryta and beyond I've received MORE entertainment value for my dollar than I got in Rift, to my surprise. Storylining is superior. Continuity in the game overall and between expansions is superior. Artwork, particularly on gear models/armor is superior and highly diverse. Pet system(s) is very good. Quest chains are IMO superior, carefully tied and interwoven with overall world storyline progression. Good achievements system with not only tangible/functional benefits from achievements, but a good model for "fluff" display with carryover to GW2 in the Hall of Monuments.
GW1 faltered a bit in some areas:
Combat was at times clunky. Specifically:
Targetting was a blind 360 degree round robin of everything in mini-map range. Bad.
Characters would "lock on" actions refusing to recognize player movement controls for a second or two until an action was completed. So, you'd be firing at something, try to strafe sideways to get away from something, and your toon wouldn't move but keep firing for a second or three. Not great (but manageable once you adjusted your perceptions . . . but still not great).
Excessive landscape mazing often dissallowing you to jump down that little 10ft hill, instead having to go all the way around the S-curve road. Not great.
No in-game e-mail. Once you have it in an MMO, you expect it across the board.
No Auction House. Trade channel worked, so it's manageable. But, an AH would have been ncie.
The Instancing paradigm, as opposed to one, contiguous, World, being a pro or a con is up for debate in my mind. Generally speaking I would obviously preferr contiguous world. However, Instancing is fairly easy to adjust to as well as the flat-out necessary (and only) mechanic that can be used to allow a game to present more elaborate and differentiated progression content to a playerbase made up of more than one person. I'm interested in seeing how GW2's world/instance design and implementation is.
In the end I don't agree with your overall assessment of Guild Wars 1. After tasting of the "drek" we've seen shovelled out (repeatingly) by other offerings over the past few years, often the result of immature design/dev staffing and/or the swapping out of established dev teams to other projects . . . replaced with inexperienced teams . . . resulting in significant breaks in continuity / flavor / dynamics, Arenanet shows a lot of high-level quality and continuity in GW1 and it's expansions.
I'm hoping the experience will be the same in GW2.
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Comments
there is a clear difference between opinion and falseness.
to say it is not a sequel goes against the very deffinition of the word.
i would link the definition, but you obviously have it.
i am not an avid follower of the game, but i know it is the same world, set centuries in the future, following the events of the first game. this in itself, is all it needs to be a sequel.
you see... we have words. words have meaning. meanings do not conviently change just because 'you' do not like how the word is being applied.
to be analytical, i could say that the game is a sequel by lore. even though, i should not have to do that, because at root, sequel means 'the continuation of a story in a work of art'.
so.... even if the ONLY thing in common with games was the lore, that is all it needs to be considered a 'sequel'.
the way in which many on this thread are using the word 'sequel' is SLANG. look that one up next.
i honestly think they are confused by the meaning of the word.
gameplay has NOTHING to do with it being a sequel or not. this is what they fail to realize.
If you actually read what I said I never claimed that Final Fantasy X-2 was a sequel to Final Fantasy X. What I said is that there is no sequel to Final Fantasy 1 (the first one) just 13-17 games in the series.
There are people who try to chronically setup all of the Final Fantasies to try and make them into one continuous storyline. As well there are people who try and put all of the various Link games in order to try and figure them out.
A big part of why I don't see Guild Wars 2 as a sequel (yet) is because end game isn't really there yet. You can have a sequel involving a new character but it has to revolve around the story of the former game. The fact that this is so far into the future negates that... in the same way that Final Fantasy 1 could potentially be 1000 years before Final Fantasy 2.
Website: http://www.thegameguru.me / YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/users/thetroublmaker
You can't move and resize all elements of GW2. GW2 lacks any k9ind of combat log too so far. In GW on a side were showing all the skills which hit you. it was a cool feature especially in pvp. And health bars of your character and people in your party were better. When you were poisoned it turned gree. when hexes it turned pink. When you had a deap wound condition you had a grey block on your health bar. And many other things. It made it very easy to see what is happening with you and party members. In GW2 trhere are loads of icons which are harder to read. They even lack the timer under them showing how long they will last.
GW2 has good ui but imo GW was simply better at showing information.
Nobody gives a damn about the GW1 as it is just a small page in the MMO history being lost somwhere in between the titans like Ultima and WoW (yes it has it's own community, but it is small - and I am sure the Arena Net knows by now that the number of players they can expect in GW2 based on the pre-sales is X times more than the GW1 community).
I really really hope that the devs won't even think about using the GW1 as a benchmark for GW2, since GW1 just plain sucks... I tried it a year ago or so as I was inspired by the reading about GW2 development and I am a fan of old game you know... butit was a disaster!!!... I am more likely to go back to playing Ultima online or... I don't know - tetris :-) rather than launching the GW1 again... it is heavily outdated and has no unique elements (well at least for me).
i personally enjoyed gw1 but most my friends did not
EQ2 fan sites
I also enjoyed GW1, but I do think it was time to bring the GW franchise into the 21st centry of mmo gaming; hence GW2! Look forward to seeing ya'll in the Mists!
Guild Wars 2 continues the LORE of Guild Wars 1, thus sequel. Even if it were an RTS (happy it isn't) and it continued the story, it would be a sequel.
If it were like EverquestNext, where they're doing a 'whole different alternate version of the world', then it's not really a true sequal in anything aside from sequential release, as it does not further the original story. It's a new begining, at that point.
BOYCOTTING EA / ORIGIN going forward.
Lol, what is up with all the animosity towards this being labeled a sequel? It's not a bad thing, but it is a sequel by definition.
It sounds to me like Anet is fixing everything that was wrong with GW1, which sounds great to me. There were a few key things in the game that turned me off from it, and with those gone, the game should be fun.
Honeslty, I don't think anything was really 'wrong' with GW1. It was simply a different kind of game. A game that ArenaNet could build with their budget at the time and I'm almost certain they always hoped it would lead to enough revenue so that they could make the game they always intended to - which is Guild Wars 2.
BOYCOTTING EA / ORIGIN going forward.
All just your opinions... GW1 sold over 6 million copies till 2009. so saying it has a small community and it sucks and all this bashing is just.. pathetic... GW1 all by itself is unique
Just because GW1 isn't your cup of tea and you tried it for, probably 5 days tops, doesn't mean the game sucks...
"Happiness is not a destination. It is a method of life."
-------------------------------
I think you played in presearing for 5 minutes before uninstalling. Just sayin', you didn't see the real game, or if you did, you tried to pigeonhole it into your "standard MMO expectations", and it didn't fit.
Btw, the community and game are still going strong after 7 years, 5 years after their last big expansion. I'd say that makes for a pretty succesful game, wouldn't you?
On-topic:
Every argument in this thread about it not being a sequel has been ludicrous. I very explicitly outlined how the design philosophies of GW1 and GW2 are consistent, even if the execution is different between the two. And there's the little fact that the story IS continuous; the final big boss of EotN is the first major minion of one of the dragons we fight in GW2. So...please stop the inanity? Please?
Opinions, everyone has them (just like a you know what).
GW1 was an amazing game. There was nothing wrong with it. And I don't think ArenaNet settled for GW1 because of their budget so that they can eventually create GW2.
GW1 was targetting people who liked action games and RPGs not the MMO crowd which love time sinks, gear grind and raids.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
Agree with the first sentence, disagree with the second. I could post a litany of things that were wrong, or simply needed improvement. GW2 appears to be addressing most of the major ones - and most importantly, they identified what those problems were early on in development - which is a large part of the reason why I'm so psyched for it. I KNOW I like GW1, I've played it for probably way too long, so GW1 + fixed flaws + bigger, persistnet world + WvW = holy balls my perfect game.
I don't agree here.
GW1 had a "lackluster" (as far as sheer excitement / pizzazz) STARTER area, and to some degree the first portions of post-Searing Ascalon.
Then it picked up steam, and continued to do so to increasing level once you hit the Shiverpeaks, Kryta, and beyond. I started to play GW1 several months ago in prep for GW2 thinking it would be a simple case of "put up with blah" for the sake of GW2 prep. See, I had played the GW1 Trial twice before, but . . .
. . . had never gotten out of pre-Searing starter. /smackhead
HERO / HENCHMEN System - revolutionary / evolutionary:
I consider it "evolutionary" because it addresses some core game-play issues at a fundamental level other MMOs simply ignore and/or don't know how to deal with:
1) Ability to partake of game content and challenges on a limited play schedule (e.g. 4 hours a week adult with a job vs 80 hours a week unemployed chair-potato)
2) Ability to fill a party naturally to partake of game content and challenges, adjusting to live-player availability based on my schedule . . . not held hostage to everyone else's.
3) A natural mechanism mitigating lack of live-player availability in lower level zones. New players to a game don't feel anywhere near as much "left in the dust alone", while "everyone else" is running around cap and near-cap zones.
Con: Some gamers claim this "sucks" because it promotes "solo play".
The Hero/henchmen system works both ways. It's not an "anti-group" dynamic. I've frequently partied up with one to two other individuals for group challenges filling my party roster with players and Heros as needed/available.
Superb mechanism that basically acts like the oil in your car, allowing players to game without feeling jammed up.
More "hardcore" PvE content, in general.
The truth of the matter is you won't do very much at all "solo" in GW1, even just running from one place to another. GW1's mob profiles are setup to require GROUPS. Even trash mobs.
The group might be you and three to five henchmen, but it WILL be a group. It might be you and four other players, or you and one other player and two henchment, but it will be a group.
Mob profile, conduct, grouping conduct by patrolling mobs, and battle-conduct is far more (for you WoW players so you can relate) like what was seen in Magister's Terrace than the binary, predictable, simple aggro model found in many other MMOs. Mobs are very often found in packs, often with WIDE and quick patrol patterns, or ambush out of the ground. The aggro model is more complex with HEALERS and clothies often targetted first. Mobs are often linked even if distances between them fairly long. The result? You poke something, it, and all it's buddies, are heading to your group, and you can bet at least 1/2 those mobs have already targetted your healers and clothies, forget the "tank" and the Ranger.
Once I got into Kryta and beyond I've received MORE entertainment value for my dollar than I got in Rift, to my surprise. Storylining is superior. Continuity in the game overall and between expansions is superior. Artwork, particularly on gear models/armor is superior and highly diverse. Pet system(s) is very good. Quest chains are IMO superior, carefully tied and interwoven with overall world storyline progression. Good achievements system with not only tangible/functional benefits from achievements, but a good model for "fluff" display with carryover to GW2 in the Hall of Monuments.
GW1 faltered a bit in some areas:
Combat was at times clunky. Specifically:
Targetting was a blind 360 degree round robin of everything in mini-map range. Bad.
Characters would "lock on" actions refusing to recognize player movement controls for a second or two until an action was completed. So, you'd be firing at something, try to strafe sideways to get away from something, and your toon wouldn't move but keep firing for a second or three. Not great (but manageable once you adjusted your perceptions . . . but still not great).
Excessive landscape mazing often dissallowing you to jump down that little 10ft hill, instead having to go all the way around the S-curve road. Not great.
No in-game e-mail. Once you have it in an MMO, you expect it across the board.
No Auction House. Trade channel worked, so it's manageable. But, an AH would have been ncie.
The Instancing paradigm, as opposed to one, contiguous, World, being a pro or a con is up for debate in my mind. Generally speaking I would obviously preferr contiguous world. However, Instancing is fairly easy to adjust to as well as the flat-out necessary (and only) mechanic that can be used to allow a game to present more elaborate and differentiated progression content to a playerbase made up of more than one person. I'm interested in seeing how GW2's world/instance design and implementation is.
In the end I don't agree with your overall assessment of Guild Wars 1. After tasting of the "drek" we've seen shovelled out (repeatingly) by other offerings over the past few years, often the result of immature design/dev staffing and/or the swapping out of established dev teams to other projects . . . replaced with inexperienced teams . . . resulting in significant breaks in continuity / flavor / dynamics, Arenanet shows a lot of high-level quality and continuity in GW1 and it's expansions.
I'm hoping the experience will be the same in GW2.
Wherever you go, there you are.
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