Welcome to the jungle!

Biomes are Guild Wars 2 Heart of Thorns new map features. They are said to have three elevations. The Canopy, the core or floor / ground level, and subterranean. We have seen some of this in Drytop and Silverwastes.  But is this totally new? To table top RPG’s we know this as Dragonchess, a game of chess that uses air, ground, and subterranean board pieces. Is it new to mmorpg’s? Maybe not (truthfully I have not played them all to know)? But will it be new on the scale of Guild Wars 2? YES! Will it be totally awesome? YES!

As a I played Guild Wars 2 BWE’s I enjoyed the jumping ability that guild wars did not have. But while just jumping around was fun, what was best of the jump? Yup, you guessed it, Hang time! The length of the fall….Weeeeeeeee. I recall map chat when I would proclaim AAAAAAAAIRBOOOOOOOOORNE! followed by a jump….some hang time…then SPLAT! Many in chat would wonder what I was yelling about, after explaining it often I would start groups of lemming leaps where we would all jump off cliffs, castle walls, mountains, or anything we could find. Heart of Thorns will prove to be very rewarding for the airborne trooper enjoying the hang time.  But I digress.

The Canopy

Looking up is not done in Guild Wars, and in Guild Wars 2 because of the additional ambiance of the environment I find myself looking up even more. Now in Guild War 2: Heart of Thorns with Canopy level play area’s I am guessing the views will be far more spectacular than ever before in Guild Wars.

With airship hulks, arboreal species, dragons flying (some of that could be seen in Guild Wars 2 also, in Arrah) and swooping down on players. The sky is literally the limit! We’ve seen in Guild Wars  some of the “arboreal species” living quarters, but were never able to get close to them much less enter them. I have a feeling with Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns we will not only be able to get up close and personal with the inhabitants, but actually enter their homes. The story lines that will undoubtedly come with Heart of Thorns has a at least four possibilities. There are the Heket, we might have even seen them in the PAX Announcement video. Obviously the Harpy, maybe they inhabit the jungle as well as Ascalon. Frogmen (Cousins of the heket), another possibility of what was in the PAX Announcement video. And lets not forget our favorite! Tengu 😀

 Ground Level

This is the area we are all used to. We spend endless ours walking / running / jumping around killing what ever comes our way. In Guild Wars they did have some pretty awesome views and landscape. I always liked Maguuma Jungle more because of the lush vegetation and a sense of being in a forest. Guild Wars 2 stepped it up a couple notches  with Metrica Province, Caladon Forest, and Kessex Hills (pre Toxic invasion). You could really get the sense of being in a forest or jungle.  In some areas you might have noticed the trees swaying to the wind as the rain hammered down on the leaves.

In Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns it looks like they have raised the bar a few more notches. With new features we will apparently literally cut / burn our way through the Maguuma Jungle.  Gone will be the days of just walking / running / jumping around the flat landscape. In the Jungle, now we will need to traverse winding paths, treacherous slopes, and even use the foliage to reach exclusive areas.

Subterranean

While not a new game feature, the method Guild Wars 2 and Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns uses to engulf the player down below the surface is quite unique. You really get the feeling of holding a torch in your hand as you pass from daylight into the depths of Tyria. As a table top rpg player I really enjoy this aspect. While you mostly encounter this affect at the beginning of jumping puzzles it can be found in a number of small caves found around Tyria.