The Best MMO I've played to date. Huge explorable map and plenty of variety
The Good:
The first thing you'll notice upon purchasing and installing Guild Wars 2, there are no requests for your payment details as this is a non subscription MMO. ArenaNet really clearly took a lot of time to make this title as accessible as possible, and even with a £40-£50 pricetag (depending on where you get your copy) it is without a doubt, worth every single penny.
The race and profession selection screens are simple to use, informative, and intuitive. They offer plenty of variety and there are no race/profession restrictions.
Once starting the game as one of your five races, you will find a nice linear path to get new players started in the form of your personal story, and it is exactly that... your story. The questions you answered in character creation make changes to your personal legend which is great as it promotes multiple character creation, as well as cooperation with others working on slightly different mission lines to you.
The fast travel system is great and works directly from your map. The world has 507 waypoints to explore, which upon discovering you can then fast travel to for a small fee (detemined by your character level from what I can gather) and the dynamic quest system will sometimes cause waypoints to become contested, requiring solo players and sometimes groups to work together to make the location available for travel.
The Crafting system is incredibly detailed, requiring you to make the individual components for your crafting needs. Unlike many MMO's, when you want to train a new skill by getting rid of one you already heave, you don't lose your progress in that trade skill. The only penalty is a small fee, however it means that a single character can feasibly learn all trade skills with a single character. On the note of crafting, many items can be discovered by combining different components (up to four total) into a discovery tab. Storage for your crafting mats is also taken care of, allowing you to store up to 250 of each crafting ingredient into a shared collection bank, preventing the clutter overflowing your bags. The collectibles can be deposited from any location.
The Combat is fluid. Skills are attached to your weapons, meaning that your weapon preference actually makes a difference to your play style, and unlike many games in the genre whereby you stand in one place and cast your spells, in Guild Wars 2 there is a far more active element with the inclusion of a simple evade bar that sits inconspicuously above your health meter. You get 2 'dodges' with a full bar which refills over time.
PvP and WvW (Player Vs Player and World Vs World). I'm unable to comment too much on this aspect of Guild Wars 2 as I am more of a PvE (Player Vs Environment) gamer. I have however dabbled in the WvW and it is incredibly robust. There are so many different objectives to complete, and unlike some other games (read WoW), when entering the PvP and WvW you are immediately scaled to Lvl 80 (the current level cap) and attired in level appropriate PvP gear, making PvP and WvW all about skill and teamwork as supposed to who has the best gear.
The Not so Good:
There is no matchmaking system for the dungeons. This seems like a targeted gripe, but I assure you it isn't. The dungeons themselves are challenging and fun to play. If you are a new player and haven't found yourself a guild of competent players yet it will be difficult to get a group to play. This isn't as terrible as it sounds, although it can be irksome at times.
The lack of a matchmaking system is the only reason I don't give Guild Wars 2 a 10/10. For your money however, I struggle to recommend a more robust, fun, and polished game to add to your collection.