Guild Wars 2 Beta for Mac OS X out now!

     For those Apple Guild Wars fans that have been locked out of the game since it is only for the PC. Good news, the beta is now up for OS X for those that have purchased the game. According to the post all you need is an active account and you can hop right in. Here are the minimum and recommended specifications to run it.

Digital sales for Guild Wars 2 is now available (again)

     The digital edition was previously brought down in a statement from Arena Net to preserve the experience of the current playerbase. However, in today's news, it seems that the company is now quite confident in expanding the population once again. Digital sales for Guild Wars 2 is now back on sale at their official website. This is true for both the regular and digital deluxe edition and are priced at $59.99 and $79.99 respectively. So if you still have any friends that missed this the first time around, it's time to remind them to get out their credit cards before this goes down again.

     Arena Net has also released the official launch trailer for the game entitled Our Time Is Now. Check out  the video and links after the break.

State of the Game Update for September 7

     There are some significant changes incoming as found in the recent state of the game update released by Arena Net. The company now shows which areas they are targeting next and it seems that some of the main issues since the launch will be addressed tonight. Check past the break as we see what we can expect in tonight's update.

Self-Help Site for Guild Wars 2 is up; Account Password Reset also Available

     Following the release of the technical support forums, the development team has recently opened the self-help section in their website. Here everyone would find a list of questions, answers and guides that tackle common problems regarding accessing the game. The site also includes a section for general announcements. Here are some highlights to the announcement for today:

• The Trading Post is currently down for maintenance
• Guild invites may only be received intermittently. Additionally, some players who were in guilds have been kicked and cannot be reinvited. We're investigating. 

     While problems regarding the trading post is nothing new at this point, people being kicked from guilds is a particularly new issue. Let's hope this gets resolved over the next few days.

     In other somewhat related news, everyone can now reset their password by following a link in the self-help site. This feature was previously disabled to prevent hackers from obtaining login information from leaked email addresses for various Guild Wars 2 fansites.

Source: Guild Wars 2 Support Site

Dolyak Escort Rewards in WvW Halted for Review

     Dolyak escorts are events in World vs. World where you walk along a dolyak carrying supplies to a pre-determined destination, such as a fort or tower, for delivery. Normally, you get rewarded with experience, coin and what not once you have successfully escorted the Dolyak to its destination, fending off any invaders that come your way. However, in practice, invaders don't usually get to some of the dolyaks since the paths are nested within rows of defensive lines. This can be a strategic choice as you want to keep your supply lines safe, but this translates to escort quests being more of a formality and area for easy rewards. Seems that Arena Net may think that this is the case too.

Arena Net opens up the Technical Support section of the Official Forums

     The team at Arena Net has been pulling punches left and right in terms of rolling out updates and fixes for the past days following the launch. This time around, they have brought up the Technical Support section of the official forums. The team brought down the whole forums right after the beta tests ended and this is the first time to see it again in some form. The team has mentioned that they will be opening up other sections on the forum once everything has settled. Also, the Arena Net Community Team Lead Regina Buenaobra has an interview over at Massively that address some of the issues and updates that the team has been tackling on for the past couple of days. There are still some issues with the game, but the constant updates and relatively quick turnarounds by the team suggests good times for the game's future.

Source: Guild Wars 2 Forums, Massively

Trading post is available, for real and probably for good this time

     It seems that yesterday's update was actually true. After checking it for myself, the trading post is now available and based on how it is performing, it seems that it is pretty much here to stay. The trading post has been sporadically available for testing purposes but was, for the most part, unavailable since the launch. Aside from the availability, it looks like Arena Net has found a way to optimize the trading post since the interface is now very responsive. This is a lot different from how it was in the beta as well as the testing done over the last week. So what are you waiting for, it's time to bring out all that stuff you've been farming and finally get some coin for it.

State of the Game Update for September 3, 2012

     The Arena Net team has been providing a daily status update about several issues that are cropping up for players via the Guild Wars 2 wiki site. Today's update had some information about the trading post and some bug fixes. Jump past the break for the updates.

Players Banned due to abuse of Karma Weapons Exploit

     A number of players were banned from Guild Wars 2 due to the abuse of an exploit found via a Karma Weapons vendor. The exploit involved obtaining high level weapons for a fraction of the intended karma cost. These weapons are then salvaged or tossed into the forge get high level materials or better quality gear. Based on feedback from the community, it seems that the people banned were those that really abused the system e.g. buying 1000+ copies of the weapon as opposed to those that bought just one or two. Though it may be best to just delete all items and weapons associated with this just to be on the safe side.

Arena Net posts State of the Game Update on Reddit

     Arena Net has released a state of the game update on Reddit highlighting several aspects of the game.The topics they touched on revolved around account security and some game systems that have not yet reached its ideal state due to the large influx of players following the launch. Here is a quick summary of some of the topics they covered.

Trading Post is NOT Available!

Update 1: It seems that due to problems with the trading post when it went up yesterday. Arena Net has brought it down again for maintenance. We'll keep you posted on developments.

Update 2: Arena Net released a State of the Game Update that covers the trading post. See: Arena Net posts State of the Game Update on Reddit

     The Black Lion Trading Company a.k.a the Trading Post is now up and running. People can now buy and sell items using the trading post interface. The trading post was previously down for maintenance since the start of the early access last August 25 and no updates were given. It's well and good now since it is now accessible to all players. Note though that upon testing it a couple of hours ago, there are still some issues such as the buying and selling tab not refreshing, or the my transactions tab not showing the goods you have up for sale. Nevertheless, with a little patience, you will be able to get through. Let's hope to see some improvements in the near future.

The interface is accessible via the lion icon on the upper right of your screen or by pressing the default key "O"

Chilling with the Servers Down

     I have officially started playing Guild Wars 2 and managed to get my character to level 10 before servers went down around 2 hours ago. So far, my beta impressions are still spot on since I actually played the human area during the beta. There were somethings that were expected such as random lag spikes and flooding of people but overall, the launch was pretty okay considering and I was able to log a good amount of play before everything went down.

Guild Wars Account Linking Now Available!

     I just noticed that you can now link your original Guild Wars account via a link in your account page. If you have not yet linked your account when you bought the game, you can now do so by visiting your account page then click on Link Accounts. If you have filled up your Hall of Monuments, you'll get a load of rewards for Guild Wars 2. This also grants access to character name reservation for your older characters in the original.

The Guild Wars 2 Online Manual Now Available!

     It looks like Arena Net is starting to wet our appetites for everything Guild Wars 2. With just around a day left until the game's launch, the devs at Arena Net released an online manual for our viewing pleasure. The manual focuses on basic concepts that we need to know once we start our journey across Tyria. They explicitly said that this should pretty much cover our first hour within the game but even if it doesn't, it's still something to do while waiting for the game to launch.