Guild Wars 2: End of Dragons

 PC
  • Publisher: NCSOFT
  • Release Date: Feb 28, 2022
User Score
7.5

Generally favorable reviews- based on 111 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 75 out of 111
  2. Mixed: 12 out of 111
  3. Negative: 24 out of 111

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  1. Shadamehr
    May 22, 2022
    6
    The downsides:
    *The game is showing signs of budget and dev cutbacks.
    *4 maps compared to the previous expansion's 5 *No sign of Living World 6 in sight, with the previous expansion Living World 4 dropped in just two months after the expansion's release (Sep 22nd 2017 - Nov 28th 2017). Instead we have repeat content for new players and those who have never played Living World 1. And    The downsides:
    *The game is showing signs of budget and dev cutbacks.
    *4 maps compared to the previous expansion's 5
    *No sign of Living World 6 in sight, with the previous expansion Living World 4 dropped in just two months after the expansion's release (Sep 22nd 2017 - Nov 28th 2017). Instead we have repeat content for new players and those who have never played Living World 1. And challenge modes for the 10 man strikes.
    *Almost all drops are geared towards making legendary weapons, if thats not your thing ...
    *The 2nd map which is meant to be a bustling, busy city (think Bladerunner) seems deserted and empty with cut and paste mobs and repeatable quests, nothing at all like the loading screens. Where are all the citizens ?
    *One of the downsides to Guild Wars 2 is that if you've never played vanilla Guild Wars there will be a lot of names and lore that are totally lost on you (some of them mind blowing). The expansion is based in Cantha, an area from vanilla Guild Wars, the amount of hype before release was similar to that when Blizzard announced Warlods of Draenor: We're returning to Burning Crusade get excited !!!
    *The game went through a 10 month new content drought along with a truncated ending to Living World 5 just so they could all work on the expansion (with the latter they pulled devs off it and ordered the story to end).
    *Once you've obtained the item needed for your turtle mount there's zero incentive to do the meta on the last map. The meta is tough (which as a non raider I don't mind at all), but can fail, you can waste a full 2 hours for no reward. They've added a very rare infusion drop to encourage players to get involved however I've been playing for 6 years and have played map meta events hundreds of times without once ever seeing an infusion drop, let alone transformation potions, or since the start of 2021 the infusion from Khan-Ur. We're talking about a 1 in 10,000 drop rate. Playing the meta for a chance of a very rare infusion would be soul destroying. They need to add more drops, mount skins, pets, skiff and rod skins, transformation potions etc. Or have the map wide meta start from the actual boss fight.
    *There should be more gear collections.

    *On the plus side, its ***new content*** with some challenging story instanced boss fights if you're going for achievements.
    *It was a fun, enjoyable play through though again seemed short compared to the previous expansion.
    *I added an extra point for the epilogue, very well done.
    *There is no endless gear grind treadmill where all your gear becomes obsolete once every 3 months when new content drops. Your gear stays current, always. Which also means all previous expansion and Living World maps are current, there's absolutely no need or urgent hurry to jump into the latest expansion, if you're into story I would really advise against doing this.
    *Fishing is fun once you get into it, and insane if you go for the Cod Swimming Among Mere Minnows achievement (a pun title based on a vanilla Guild Wars title).    … Expand
  2. MoofiaBossVal
    Nov 5, 2022
    5
    EoD brings the least amount of new content and features of any GW2 expansion thus far. No new SPvP or WvW maps. No new raids or fractals. No new transformative PvE features like gliding or mounts. You're pretty much getting a glorified living world story pack with new elite specializations, and that's it.

    There are only 4 new PvE maps. Seitung Province looks okay. New Kaineng is a    EoD brings the least amount of new content and features of any GW2 expansion thus far. No new SPvP or WvW maps. No new raids or fractals. No new transformative PvE features like gliding or mounts. You're pretty much getting a glorified living world story pack with new elite specializations, and that's it.

    There are only 4 new PvE maps. Seitung Province looks okay. New Kaineng is a little cool but the futuristic cyberpunk aesthetic doesn't fit the franchise. Echovald Forest looks like a prototype HoT map. Dragon's End looks overall meh, and centers around a poorly designed meta event, though it does have a cool boss fight at the end. The level design isn't on the same level as HoT's map design. There are no adventures (minigames) packed into these maps like in HoT, or even races like in PoF's maps. There is no incentive to keep playing these maps once you get the hero points and mastery points.

    The music is unmemorable. There are a couple of nice ambient tracks that play in Seitung and New Kaineng, but I struggle to recall the rest of the soundtrack.

    The new elite specializations are a mixed bag. Many of them are thematically cool, but a lot of them are just mechanically broken. It has been 8 months since release and the Untamed still hasn't been fixed yet. Another problem is that the new EoD elite specializations are overtuned and have powercrept older elite specializations (let alone just playing a vanilla class with no elite spec). The EoD elite specializations are also underwhelming visually. The Untamed for instance has no animation on its new teleport ability, Unnatural Traversal, and has no new animations when equipping an Aurene Legendary (unlike every other class). The new Thief spec, Specter, wields a scepter but reuses axe animations, which looks odd. And so on.

    There are a few other miscellaneous issues. EoD maps are capped at 60 players. EoD maps are constantly closing, causing all progress on an event chain to be lost and you lose all of your built up fishing or bloodlust or Dragon's End stacks when switching instances. The ascended weapons for EoD elite specializations are gated behind fishing up rare fish that have incredibly low droprates. Spending two hours fishing for a stingray for your Untamed hammer only to never get it is very demoralizing.

    The story is very bad. It is 11 hours long but there is only 2 hours of cool adventuring: the setpiece with the airship fleet at the beginning, and then the final battle at the end. The 9 hours in between is spent standing around listening to the pathetic melodrama of unlikeable, narcissistic characters. Much of the dialogue is horrendously awful and not even the voice actors can salvage it. There is also a lot of swearing all of the sudden, not just in the story but also in outdoor events in EoD maps. Don't play EoD with your window or door open. It is hard to believe that the same people who wrote the vanilla game or HoT or even season 4 wrote the story and dialogue for this expansion. Narratively, End of Dragons is an unsatisfying conclusion to the game's storyline.

    I overall enjoyed EoD, but only just. I would only recommend it if you are playing GW2 and one of the elite specializations appeals to you, or if you really like GW2 and have played through all of the content up to EoD and just want a little bit more GW2 to play.    … Expand
  3. vickykoi
    May 9, 2022
    5
    I've been playing since release. Taken many breaks in-between. I'll be honest, this expansion is pretty mediocre. The contrast is very high in the colors of the maps. I mean the maps are beautiful, but the colors are super bright. The story seemed great in theory with the Icebrood saga buildup. BUT then they brought back some enemies that were already resolved several years ago as the mainI've been playing since release. Taken many breaks in-between. I'll be honest, this expansion is pretty mediocre. The contrast is very high in the colors of the maps. I mean the maps are beautiful, but the colors are super bright. The story seemed great in theory with the Icebrood saga buildup. BUT then they brought back some enemies that were already resolved several years ago as the main antagonists of this expansion. "Ankka" was just thrown into the dialogue out of nowhere to be the main antagonist because "she's so empty inside and wants to kill the gods and all higher powers".

    The "selling" features of this expansion were some iffy elite specs, a boat, and fishing. And you could already use the stingray to ride over water. So honestly i feel like this was 6 months of free release maps labeled as an expansion. Not worth 30$, infact i might even ask for a refund and wait till it goes on sale.    … Expand
  4. dabran
    Mar 2, 2022
    5
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. I've been playing this game for a long time (since launch, basically), and my feelings about this expansion are mixed at best.

    Story writing improved, though still has this trademark New Era GW2 Writing - villains are stupid and pretty one-dimensional, with Ankka being positively someone's deviantArt OC who feels "hollow inside", and that's supposed to be taken seriously. Unfortunately, I'm not 12 anymore to find something like that compelling. Yet again they do dispose of a character with interesting potential shortly after their redemption/progression or high note that could be a turning point - this time, literally killing her off instantly. Would've been fine if they haven't done it several times with Demmi, Blish, etc. Dragonvoid is both basic and lazy in execution as a main threat - recolors of previously-encountered enemies, all in all. Still, it must be noted that character writing has improved tremendously, especially since such shining stars as Braham aren't nowhere to be seen. Yes, this fact alone would sell this DLC to somebody, I know. Stakes of the threat are so overblown I'm not sure we'll ever top them anymore, which just makes it seem like a checkbox thing by now. Overall, mixed opinion on it - usual Anet writing shortcoming are there, but I did find myself not hating characters this time, and we did get a lot of Canthan cast being actually relevant, which did not happen with Elona.

    Map design is a hit or miss, but mostly miss. Color palettes are bad, shader work is underpolished, you can clock a TON of overused assets (they made a bunch of window blocks and built a huge, inconvenient city out of them - you can't really unsee the repetition in designs once you catch it), and generally a look more in line with amateurish maps in Second Life. Trees glow in the dark in neon pink still, and I play with maxed everything, and yes, my drivers are up to date, and no, it's not a DX11 bug (by the way, maps are prone to those more than usual, because they're oversized for no real reason and game chugs chugs chugs trying to keep up). What's original - separate architecture and seldom attention to detail - is good, but I honestly find myself disappointed by how... cheap the big city feels. Like something you'd build in Minecraft with Worldedit on, if you're catching my drift, and wouldn't know when to either stop or add something else. Final map should be considered visual terrorism.

    New skins are pretty good, and include some casual clothing options for all armor classes, so art department isn't really slacking off - I fully expect to find out that this was the result of time constraints. Overall, let's just call visual design subjective - I tried to supply my points with some reason, but there's plenty of people who find overly loud colors everywhere appealing and enchanting.

    Gameplay - New strikes are okay, but not /great/. Distinct lack of rewards tied to them is felt right off the bat with just a new set of ascended weapons boasting unique skins. Nothing impressive. These strikes also could use a little bit more prelude with some running up to the boss, but nope - they just dump you into the middle of the arena and you walk into a circle to start the fight.

    Metas - no idea, map matchmaking was broken and seems to not be good still, which I found quite bumming for an expac launch and thus I'm noting it. From what I've seen, final meta involves some raid boss mechanics, and general open world crowd happily failed them repeatedly while not dealing enough DPS. Probably a scaling issue, but also a bit mean to throw raid mechs such as Largos bubbles at poor openworlders, but they probably need it.

    Elite specs (aka subclasses)

    This time around, these mostly suck. Most of them lack anything creative about them, are either overly simplistic or just shallow. They're obviously underdeveloped, judging by how not all trait interactions with core get explained in tooltips on multiple classes, how little have changed since last beta (and we had quite enough time to get them into something better), how they introduce little to none new character animations and reuse the rest heavily (new FX is there, but actual animations are very lacking), and most of player feedback regarding all of them got discarded as per usual. On top of that, balance team also did some strange balancing decisions to "make space for new elite specs", which includes heavy-handed bandaid nerfs to things that either weren't at all a problem, or were just... in the way?.. for new niches for those elite specs, which to me personally is quite tiring by now. I really want the balance team to do/try/perform better, yet it'd seem they're doing balancing decisions based on Reddit complaints, some mysterious private discords, and a roll of dice. They did promise a bigger balance update later on.

    Grain of salt as usual, but ultimately it's a good thing expac happened at all.    … Expand
  5. JonJonz
    Mar 9, 2022
    5
    Of all the expansions for this game, EOD is mediocre.

    The good to excellent: * A few really fun new class specializations like the Engineer Mechanist * Lots of Hero Points with only a few protected by Champions * If you complete the story you get a teleport scroll to the new zones so you don't have to do the story for all your characters The bad: * Previously to access    Of all the expansions for this game, EOD is mediocre.

    The good to excellent:

    * A few really fun new class specializations like the Engineer Mechanist

    * Lots of Hero Points with only a few protected by Champions

    * If you complete the story you get a teleport scroll to the new zones so you don't have to do the story for all your characters

    The bad:

    * Previously to access new expansion zones the player only had to complete 1 or 2 solo story missions. This expansion require completing the entire long story chain, we are talking 10s of hours to go through. Do you want to play a MMORPG or single player RPG?

    * It's not the old scrub friendly GW2, Open world metas are tuned like raids now. If you don't have a Raid capable toon, your screwed.

    * The turtle mount that was heavily marketed as a reason to buy the expansion requires completing the Raid level difficult final map meta.

    * The previous two issues have divided the comminity and turned it toxic, the try-hards vs the casuals. The game has flipped from starting out as casual friendly buy with game modes on the side for try hards, to putting try hard first and abandoning casuals.

    * The new zones are mediocre.

    So if you are a try hard pro and you love story missions its a definite buy. If your the average scrub, unless you really can't live without one of the new specializations, wait till it's on sale or just stick to what you have now. If your new to the game, it's still a good value if you are a try hard buy, if not pass and stick with the base game including POF and HOT expansions.    … Expand
  6. bisshmal
    Mar 2, 2022
    5
    After being a huge GW fanboy over the past 2 decades and recently delving into other MMOs my expectations were really high for GW2EOD and after my playthrough my thoughts are quite mixed.

    Story ArenaNet have done a good job at providing a decent storytelling experience with this expansion. One of the games biggest strengths in my opinion is the amount and quality of voice acting...    After being a huge GW fanboy over the past 2 decades and recently delving into other MMOs my expectations were really high for GW2EOD and after my playthrough my thoughts are quite mixed.

    Story
    ArenaNet have done a good job at providing a decent storytelling experience with this expansion. One of the games biggest strengths in my opinion is the amount and quality of voice acting... although you will hear many NPC's having the same voice of key main characters (which is quite off putting). The story in EoD was quite short but overall good, it did feel somewhat rushed towards the end however. It's nothing stellar or comparable to FFXIV's writing but somewhat enjoyable none the less.

    Gameplay
    At release open world gameplay felt empty and events felt were over scaled. Most fetch/collect quests required me to run back and forth 10 times, taking over 10+mins, not sure who thought that was a fun idea but 10 times for a solo player?!
    Story encounters were definitely improved from their past content. They're definitely going more for a cinematic experience which is a lot more enjoyable imo.
    The Meta event's seem fun however the game runs terrible when many players are in the same area (which is most meta events). I played the last maps Meta and there were so many people my frame rate dropped below 20 and the amount of visual noise from other players just made what was supposed to be a cinematic experience just a cluster *** of ability spam. This is nothing new to the expansion though since Guild Wars 2 Meta event's have always been plagued by this. I think it would be awesome to experience this content through 10-man instances. I'm just not a fan of most meta events because of the zergy gameplay by nature, playing through that content doesn't make my effort feel valuable at all.

    Fishing
    It's been over 9 years since Guild Wars 2 added any new form of gathering system and fishing is definitely a nice addition which takes inspiration from the fishing mini-game in Stardew valley. It's not the best MMO fishing experience but it's a lot more interactive than most other titles. My biggest gripe however are is that it is tied to the mastery system meaning you level up fishing by killing things/partaking in events. I haven't really dived into much fishing in GW2 because never felt the need to. I'm sure there are some achievements associated with but I completed the fishing mastery track with less than 15 mins of actual fishing time.

    Skiffs
    A nice addition however at launch there was no keybind option for this?! Because of this I rarely used the thing and instead always used the skimmer. The only time I really needed to use it was for story missions where you're are required to do a bit of Ubering (which was quite enjoyable along taking in the environment and the dialogue).

    Siege turtles
    I was expecting a story mission or something where you use siege turtles however no siege turtles were used in the entire story of the expansion. The closest I got was an event where I could order adolescent turtles to fire their cannons.

    Jadebots
    They add a nice new mechanic to level design where you can essentially fly around as a drone and get into places you wouldn't be able to. I had two major problems: There were many instances where my character would keep running while I take control of the Jadebot, making some tasks quite annoying having to switch back and make my character stop. And the other issue was inconsistent key binds. My descend button was to the same as Dodge key although on my Skyscale and swimming to descend it's CTRL. And the game doesn't give you an option to change it without effecting your characters dodge as well.

    Environments
    The new maps are some of the best looking maps in Guild Wars 2 to date. However it is definitely showing it's age with the small and fog heavy view distance. The amount of pop-in of objects in the distance has never been so prominent. I can't imagine how it beautiful the game would look with an extended view distance comparable to FFXIV which has recently announced graphical/engine improvements.

    Music
    The music in EoD was good. Wasn't a huge fan of the normal combat music though, however the boss themes were definitely epic sounding. I've been spoilt by Masayoshi Soken's music in FFXIV to which is the only MMO I've played where I've been in parties where ppl will tell you in chat to crank music volume to max.

    Overall End of Dragons was a nice expansion leaving me wanting a lot more considering it's small package. It will be interesting to see how Arenanet continues with it's live service updates and hopefully with a clear vision and engine improvements they've promised the future of GW2 will be bright.    … Expand
  7. OrangeJinjo
    Mar 3, 2022
    6
    It's alright.
    I'm coming at this from a pretty casual perspective; did fractals with some friends during path of fire but I never really did any pvp or any serious pve content. I'm mostly just a collector/explorer.
    I feel like with every pro I have, there's a bit of a con that goes with it. Visuals: The maps overall I'd say look pretty decent, with a couple exceptions. At the same    It's alright.
    I'm coming at this from a pretty casual perspective; did fractals with some friends during path of fire but I never really did any pvp or any serious pve content. I'm mostly just a collector/explorer.

    I feel like with every pro I have, there's a bit of a con that goes with it.

    Visuals:
    The maps overall I'd say look pretty decent, with a couple exceptions.
    At the same time, my frame rate was pretty bad in a lot of these zones. My computer is starting to show its age for sure, but I didn't have this problem at all until End of Dragons. I had to turn everything down to medium, and even still there are some parts where I drop down to 30-40 fps.
    And to be honest there are games that look way better that don't turn my fps to trash.
    The armor is kinda hit or miss as usual, it looks like an older mmo but I didn't really expect a huge overhaul or anything.
    The skill animations are kinda what kill it for me the most in this department, they're just really bland, even the new elite specs really don't stand out that much. The animations are just kind of floaty looking and don't have any nice spell effects to go with them.

    Gameplay:
    Not much has changed, I think the exploration is still a strong point of this game, but the actual combat feels kind of bland, that's more of a personal preference I guess.
    The new masteries they added are kind of sleeper tbh... Feels like the skiff is just a skimmer 2.0? and fishing is cool and all but not really a game changer, it's pretty standard stuff and doesn't add much to the game.
    Jade bots don't really add a whole lot, I guess it would be nice if I didn't have any mounts or anything. Otherwise they just give you tiny buffs/solve puzzles during the main story.

    Story:
    I don't want to put spoilers in here so I'll keep it pretty vague.
    Most of the new characters are likeable, but there's a couple that I feel were just kinda hamfisted in..
    I think we were supposed to feel sympathy for a specific character but they just came across as kind of hollow and honestly a bit of a piece of ****
    On the same token, one of the other new characters I actually kind of liked, but it didn't feel like they were given enough time to develop.
    I might be misremembering things but I could have sworn there were in game cut scenes in path of fire that showed our characters in the cut scenes, but in End of Dragons it's back to this thing where our character disappears while the npcs do all the important stuff (Not a huge deal but it is something I noticed for sure.)

    TLDR;
    If you liked GW2 before this, it's basically just a map pack, you'll get some enjoyment out of it.
    If you're like me and you come back every now and then to check it out, honestly you'll probably be a bit disappointed.
    It's weird because this expansion took so long to come out, yet it feels a bit rushed at the same time.    … Expand
  8. dr0nzer
    Mar 5, 2022
    5
    The problem I find with all guild war games is that you never really feel powerful, your character never really progresses or grow in stats and power level, so you're always the same from start to finish, even as you gain new armor, the games scaling system makes sure the enemy npcs keep pace, this just makes your toon feel weak and squishy all the time, with very easy and constant deaths.The problem I find with all guild war games is that you never really feel powerful, your character never really progresses or grow in stats and power level, so you're always the same from start to finish, even as you gain new armor, the games scaling system makes sure the enemy npcs keep pace, this just makes your toon feel weak and squishy all the time, with very easy and constant deaths.

    People say this game respects your time, thats a load of crap - it's absolutely grindy as hell with crazy amount of materials to farm to unlock/craft armor as well as the sheer amount of time you need to invest into unlocking the mounts.. which they advertise heavily in their PR/marketing material. Using the achievement system as a quest tracker is absurd and shows you how limited this game engine is.

    The title was probably great in 2002 but it's mechanics and game systems have not aged well to modern times. Die hard fans will disagree as with all cliques but to a new player.. I do not recommend it, this is a try before you buy.    … Expand
  9. Avenrise
    Jun 16, 2023
    7
    Revised score: Down to a 7 from 8/10. Reason: After a year playing the expansion the longevity of the content in EoD maps has slightly decreased for me. Still great but it's natural that when you play content so often it becomes a little more stale.

    To the negative reviews... everyone is entitled to an opinion but honestly ignore the 1-3's and take the 10's with a pinch of salt. This    Revised score: Down to a 7 from 8/10. Reason: After a year playing the expansion the longevity of the content in EoD maps has slightly decreased for me. Still great but it's natural that when you play content so often it becomes a little more stale.

    To the negative reviews... everyone is entitled to an opinion but honestly ignore the 1-3's and take the 10's with a pinch of salt. This expansion was the best selling to date by far, was the most well received content for the game in years and encouraged more people to start playing the game than since it went free to play in 2015. ANET announced that due to it's success they now have more devs working on the game so it's here to stay for a long time yet.

    I've played the game since launch and seen both the ups and downs of GW2. The latest expansion, End of Dragons, is a joy to experience - from the vibrant new maps to the shock of a Jadepunk world we have not seen anything like in GW2 up until now. The music is stunning, taking inspiration from traditional Korean music (Maclaine Diemer is a HIGHLY underappreciated composer outside of GW2) and the final battle meta event is honestly one of the most impressive scenes seen in any open world MMO.

    The lore of EoD is the best story content since Season 4... maybe even surpassing it. Ankka has become one of my fav characters in the franchise and while not entirely to my liking did well to wrap up the decade long Dragon arc we've had in GW2 and gave hints as to where we are heading next.

    Negatives to balance it out: The third map does seem a little barren, could have done with a few more events maybe and with the final map being a smaller meta map the events are few and far between outside of meta time. The Elite specs haven't all been slam dunks with many saying some feel rushed and bland and were very unbalanced at launch however as of me editing this review major balance updates are on their way to fix many of the issues. Finally I'd say that there are indications here and there that make you feel like the expansion was made under a bit of a time constraint... not rushed but just feels like it's missing the odd thing here and there.

    I'm a fan of the franchise so I am naturally biased, this review is based on me being a current player but honestly this expansion was and still is great fun and with it being GW2 you buy it and it's there for you to have fun in until the servers shut down. GW2 with all the expacs and Living World content is the best $100 you'll honestly spend on any game.    … Expand

Awards & Rankings

66
#66 Best PC Game of 2022
49
#49 Most Discussed PC Game of 2022

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
81

Generally favorable reviews - based on 12 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 11 out of 12
  2. Mixed: 1 out of 12
  3. Negative: 0 out of 12
  1. RPG Fan
    May 16, 2022
    80
    Unlike other Guild Wars 2 expansions, End of Dragons doesn’t have one big feature to hang its hat on. Instead, it offers several smaller features and the game’s most enjoyable campaign yet. Factor in beautiful new maps and challenging but engaging late-game bosses, and there’s plenty of content for Guild Wars 2 fans to come back to.
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  2. Meristation
    Apr 14, 2022
    75
    An expansion with lights and shadows but interesting for Guild Wars 2 players nonetheless. Too much time waiting for a content that looks hurried at some points.
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  3. PC Gamer
    Apr 4, 2022
    81
    A worthy send-off to Guild Wars 2's Elder Dragon saga, and a reason to be optimistic about the future of the game.
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