Guild Wars 2: Heart of Thorns

 PC
  • Publisher: NCSOFT
  • Release Date: Oct 23, 2015
User Score
7.3

Mixed or average reviews- based on 981 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 670 out of 981
  2. Mixed: 72 out of 981
  3. Negative: 239 out of 981
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  1. Flimsa
    Nov 19, 2015
    0
    HoT is not worth the money. The expansion is focused around events that you as player have to repeat over and over in order to gain progress for your character. All events in all maps follow the same pattern, pre event leads to final boss event. HoT does not offer any options to gain character progress besides events. This make HoT linear with directed way to play the game. AdventuresHoT is not worth the money. The expansion is focused around events that you as player have to repeat over and over in order to gain progress for your character. All events in all maps follow the same pattern, pre event leads to final boss event. HoT does not offer any options to gain character progress besides events. This make HoT linear with directed way to play the game. Adventures turned out to be mini games that are unavailable most of the time. I guess that with challenging content developers are referring to players performance for pre event and final boss event to success.… Expand
  2. madmax21st
    Oct 27, 2015
    3
    Not worth $50 at all. Just a collection of Living Story contents that supposed to be free and got released all at the same time, became not free just so ANet can say it's an expansion.
  3. eval
    Nov 20, 2015
    3
    Heart of Thorns summed up in a sentence : "A torn in my side".

    Really a majority of content that was available prior to the expansion was either gutted, taken away or put behind a grind wall. You will spend countless hours in HoT grinding masteries to get the loot that should just be given out for your time anyways. Oh and the majority of the advertised content for the expansion that    Heart of Thorns summed up in a sentence : "A torn in my side".

    Really a majority of content that was available prior to the expansion was either gutted, taken away or put behind a grind wall. You will spend countless hours in HoT grinding masteries to get the loot that should just be given out for your time anyways. Oh and the majority of the advertised content for the expansion that we were lead on to believe it would be there release is still being added into the game and a lot of it we don't even know when, it will just be "soon".

    With that said I'll got over each mode briefly:

    PVP: Has an absolute imbalence right now. The new class reverant is just straight up overpowered and outright does every thing better than 2-3 classes. We all seen it coming with 400-500% buffs before launch. A few other classes got the same treatment. While others got straight up nerfs balancing them to the old bar. Also, without a doubt almost every single elite spec is straight up power creep compared to the base classes. There is almost no reason with exception of druid to not take your elite spec as it will bring more damage and utility. I honestly feel sorry for people that did not buy HoT and are playing base classes. On top of that we still don't have leagues. Ranked que is disabled and match making is still an absolute mess. Current balance is just kneejerk nerf into the ground what ever were complaining about today. I mean seriously, there could be nothing wrong with thief, someone will post thief is op on the fourms give no valid reasons and you could log in tomorrow to see nerfs no one asked for. PvP is really hard to enjoy right now.

    WvW: got a new borderlands map. Which is great except it was built as if you were supposed to be gliding everywhere and then they went oh that would be P2W so we wont include those. Generally on the new maps you'll spend countless hours walking around from place to place seeing no one as the maps are so vast. They also did nothing to sort out many of the issues of wvw. It's still a gold sink despite taking out upgrade costs, it still has night/workday time capping issues, it still has no meaningful rewards. If you play WvW it is solely for the enjoyment.

    PvE: HoT brough intresting new maps. The main issue with them is finding one that actually has people in it. A large majority of the time you will be waiting on these timed events and looking in the LFG tool to find other people. Most of the events go on for a long time! minimal 40mins-2 hours depending on the map. Classes are suffering here in being allowed into groups because of pvp kneejerk balance and a large majority of players refuse to play with certain classes. Lastly, anet have started to make changes that reward unskillful play and punish playing well. An example of this is the new adjustment to druid; which made building healing power to heal your allies less effective at healing than not taking any healing power.    … Expand
  4. Zulke
    Oct 26, 2015
    2
    You ask for end-game?You got it ! Grindfest and time sink awaits you! Gated traits/waypoints,paywall fractals and more.Dont forget mass crashes. Arenanet way, nothing more,nothing less.
    P.S From reddit with love
  5. digSerenity
    Oct 28, 2015
    0
    Not even a week before the nerf hammer hits and they cater to the people complaining about hard content after asking for it. Excellent job. Definitely better this way than to allow things to settle and for people to get used to playing with and against everything new.
  6. rezaiga
    Oct 27, 2015
    3
    This expansion isn't casual friendly so if you consider yourself to be one, better wait till they change things.

    The new world is so huge and amazingly beautiful but it stops there. 4th day after expansion and maps feels empty, it's a big problem because the difficulty in the new map is sooo much higher than old content and without other ppl around to help with events, it's almost    This expansion isn't casual friendly so if you consider yourself to be one, better wait till they change things.

    The new world is so huge and amazingly beautiful but it stops there. 4th day after expansion and maps feels empty, it's a big problem because the difficulty in the new map is sooo much higher than old content and without other ppl around to help with events, it's almost likely that you're gonna fail the event.

    Anet decision to upped difficulty with no downscale on events is like a middle finger to casual players.    … Expand
  7. rotondoman
    Oct 26, 2015
    1
    I honestly struggle to find anything positive to say about the new content. First of all I find it boring. Unimaginative. I find myself running through it hoping against hope that I can get finished with whatever mundane task I'm doing and move on to the next one and then the one after that just so I can be done with it. Which makes me think the replay value of HOT is near zero. I don'tI honestly struggle to find anything positive to say about the new content. First of all I find it boring. Unimaginative. I find myself running through it hoping against hope that I can get finished with whatever mundane task I'm doing and move on to the next one and then the one after that just so I can be done with it. Which makes me think the replay value of HOT is near zero. I don't see $50+ worth of new content. Maybe $25. For $50 I'd expect enough content to rival the original release.

    To be fair I'm in a couple of guilds and except for myself my pve centric guild loves it the new areas, the content, the masteries, and all the rest. Especially the hang gliding. My wvw guild hates everything about the new wvw map and changes to that aspect of the game.

    If I had to do it all over again I would not buy this expansion. At least not until it had been out for a while and I could see how things were going to play out.    … Expand
  8. Kurfu
    Oct 26, 2015
    0
    What used to be a huge *open* world that was fun and exciting to explore, has devolved into a game that keeps the players "on rails" via obnoxious terrain obstacles. If you enjoy running through canyons and over bridges, this is the game for you.
  9. bravoart
    Oct 28, 2015
    4
    As a player from the launch, this expansion is highly disappointing because as from the start, ArenaNet has decided to sell one thing, and deliver another.

    Any premise that the game has had of 'casual friendly' and 'no grinding' and so on, has been thrown out the window completely with the new expansion (if not a bit beforehand, honestly). There are multiple reviews here stating that    As a player from the launch, this expansion is highly disappointing because as from the start, ArenaNet has decided to sell one thing, and deliver another.

    Any premise that the game has had of 'casual friendly' and 'no grinding' and so on, has been thrown out the window completely with the new expansion (if not a bit beforehand, honestly).

    There are multiple reviews here stating that people are just lazy and want everything handed to them, but the reality is that if you were told that the game you paid $50 for, the majority of the content was locked behind doing the same events and waiting for the same events to respawn indefinitely with no ability to advance past it until you have done an arbitrary amount of grind, wouldn't you consider that unnecessary? This game has a rabid fanbase that believe that the developers can do no wrong and everyone should be aware of that.

    Gated content, forced group content that can not be soloed, bad rng, separation of reward effort, the list goes on and on of what is wrong with this expansion.

    As we've seen with ArenaNet multiple times before, they don't fix things without changing something else or knee-jerk nerfing whatever the playerbase moves to for counteracting the nerfs. The developers literally go out of their way to hobble progression again and again, yet people still defend it. Unbelievable.

    EDIT: Arenanet has made a concession with the amount of Hero Points needed for Elite specs and the gating of accessible hero points on the first new map. This is great and a solid step in the right direction, but that being said there is still a lot of issues pertaining to bait and switch and effort/reward that still need to be reviewed.

    Also be warned that community sites are actively guilting and insulting people with low review scores to change them to 10/10s. The game is not that great, but the communities about it are even worse.    … Expand
  10. KoalaMeatPie
    Oct 25, 2015
    4
    The following is my own personal experience with the Expansion soo far - I find the expansion to be just a mess of a chore.

    Everything from the level design, story progression, timed events and mastery system has been made to slow you down and hold you back. Let me start with the lesser annoyance, the level design. You can not go from one point to another directly, like in every    The following is my own personal experience with the Expansion soo far - I find the expansion to be just a mess of a chore.

    Everything from the level design, story progression, timed events and mastery system has been made to slow you down and hold you back.

    Let me start with the lesser annoyance, the level design. You can not go from one point to another directly, like in every other map of the game, you must wind and weave, and travel a maze of verticals, up and down, which without a glider is a huge pain because nearly everything are Elites or Vets which knock you down or cripple you. Why oh god, must everything cripple you?

    Story progression: Remember how they added a whole punch of level caps to the story missions in GW2 awhile ago? It's the same thing but with the mastery system. You must always be a level over next in masteries to continue with the "Very Urgent Chase", which is an issue because masteries take a long time to level up, how? Because

    Mastery progression places up huge walls which you need to go around and grind little rewarding events - which are interrupted in Auric basin, at least, by the Gates event - which are literally walls in front of walls. There is a 15 minute period where you can’t go into the city, walls are blocking the doors - then a 45? Minute event where you need to to coordinate with other players on the map to chisel down vines which are trying to get into the heart of the city. And you can forget trying to do this with 15 people.

    This, for the very least, interrupted our Guild hall claiming last night by ONE and a HALF hours because all Waypoints where contested, no way to teleport into the city, no Mesmer, no NOTHING, can’t run and glide because of the bubble at the heart, not even a Waypoint INSIDE the hole inside the heart of the city to act as a rallying waypoint. Those that were in, were stuck in, those that were out were SOL until the event failed or disappeared.

    Now, about the Hero points, it’s very nice and all that they say you get “ten points” each event, but the events are seriously over grindy. Whoever designed them, made it so you can not solo them like in the old world, you need half a raid to to get even one champ down. Their health and toughness is through the roof, not to mention all the conditions they throw at you. You can’t do any one of them with less than 4 people. Try finding 4 people, depending on your Time Zome and IRL commitments, it can be next to impossible.

    Add to that the constant crashes (I pressed Print Screen - I crashed, I was talking to an NPC, double clicked to talk to another - I crashed. I changed maps - I crashed, I FINALLY lvled to Mastery 3 - I crashed, I spawned my glidder - crashed) When you do find a populated event, the chances of you crashing are N times more, and when you log back in - over flow, if you’re lucky. If not, event over.

    TL;DR; : Everything about HoT is made to slow you down, hold you back and pad out the game and you should care.

    I want to raid. I LIKE being in a huge group and taking down challenges - the guild hall claiming was LOADS of fun. I've been doing the same Fractals for two years, it's FUN. "Lack of content" is not an issue - the quality is.

    They purposefully broke up the pace of the game to make it feel bigger. I don’t care about leveling, at all. They way they made it is just soo convoluted. I want to get my masteries up, have my druid healing skills, and raid with my guild.

    Lastly you want to know how to do a well paced story without holding you back and padding things out? Guild Wars 1 (Prophecies and Nightfalls). Somehow - they lost sight of how to do it properly.    … Expand
  11. Aerixa
    Oct 25, 2015
    3
    Incredibly tedious and not rewarding. You're grinding the same events, in massive, empty zones, to try to unlock the next tier of some odd skill to reach that spot on the map you need to be one step closer to that cool specialized class they showed. I've been playing since the game launched, and it's a complete 180 on the fun, solo, play at your own pace gameplay that this game started outIncredibly tedious and not rewarding. You're grinding the same events, in massive, empty zones, to try to unlock the next tier of some odd skill to reach that spot on the map you need to be one step closer to that cool specialized class they showed. I've been playing since the game launched, and it's a complete 180 on the fun, solo, play at your own pace gameplay that this game started out as. I'm going to shelve it for a bit, as it's just grinding to grind. I really wanted to love and support this, but I can't enjoy it in the current state.… Expand
  12. steve13
    Oct 26, 2015
    0
    Arena Net pulled a complete switch. So much for the play your way with no grind. The game is now nothing but a grind with gated content. They are even adding raids. This was clearly done as a time sink as there is not enough content to merit fifty dollars. Count me out. I am done with this game.
  13. Valkysas
    Oct 26, 2015
    0
    They took a awesome do what ever you want when you want to game and turned it into a Group only game
    with gating like you never seen be for 100% wast of money this expansion will be dead and soon the game if this is the direction they are going .. do you like to log in a game once or twice a week since that's the time all the other ppl log in and never be able to do any thing until then !    They took a awesome do what ever you want when you want to game and turned it into a Group only game
    with gating like you never seen be for 100% wast of money this expansion will be dead and soon the game if this is the direction they are going .. do you like to log in a game once or twice a week since that's the time all the other ppl log in and never be able to do any thing until then !
    ppl can't even find groups for the new HOT zone and it HAS to be done with one LOL    … Expand
  14. Thunderwitch
    Oct 25, 2015
    0
    Developers deceived everyone. They promised one thing and actually do the opposite. "in our game will never have to grind," but a more appropriate name for the game is now "Grind Wars 2: Heart of Grind". My score of 0, I expected more. It is no longer my favorite game. I'm from little friend guild. I paid 100$, but i cant see Guild Hall, becouse need 3 or more people in guild. All event isDevelopers deceived everyone. They promised one thing and actually do the opposite. "in our game will never have to grind," but a more appropriate name for the game is now "Grind Wars 2: Heart of Grind". My score of 0, I expected more. It is no longer my favorite game. I'm from little friend guild. I paid 100$, but i cant see Guild Hall, becouse need 3 or more people in guild. All event is unnecessarily complicated in new location, and on these very hard "group" events extremely small number of people… Expand
  15. Bragollac
    Oct 26, 2015
    1
    It's just a simple patch, not a massive add-on like blizzard do.

    They nerfed dungeons and fractals, so PvE Content simply ruined.

    Heart Of Thrones absolutely not interesting. Boring gameplay.
  16. ethanDS
    Oct 27, 2015
    1
    The community asked for an expansion when Anet were content with pushing living story.

    This is the result of living story becoming an expansion. It's lackluster, has little meaty content in it and is just paid fluff. I could easily see the majority of this content being living story given to us over the next year, instead due to the demand of an actual expansion, we have it now in a    The community asked for an expansion when Anet were content with pushing living story.

    This is the result of living story becoming an expansion. It's lackluster, has little meaty content in it and is just paid fluff. I could easily see the majority of this content being living story given to us over the next year, instead due to the demand of an actual expansion, we have it now in a chunk.

    I would ask anyone looking to purchase be wary, this is not your typical "massive scale expansion", very little to get excited about. I feel I've wasted money.    … Expand
  17. theGinch
    Oct 25, 2015
    0
    Everything is gated behind mastery points and other artificial buzzkills to disguise the very limited amount of content in this 'expansion'. Only the grim or truly desperate can muster the will to grind 400 hero points to actually play one of the elite specializations. For the rest of us the expansion is incredibly empty.

    Not sure if i have ever seen a bigger bait and switch than heart    Everything is gated behind mastery points and other artificial buzzkills to disguise the very limited amount of content in this 'expansion'. Only the grim or truly desperate can muster the will to grind 400 hero points to actually play one of the elite specializations. For the rest of us the expansion is incredibly empty.

    Not sure if i have ever seen a bigger bait and switch than heart of thorns.    … Expand
  18. zhyrn
    Oct 26, 2015
    0
    Anet nerfed every dungeon rewards (Core game) by 66% in order to force players to move in to the expansion content. You also won't receive the new Fractal Dailies rewards as the game will gently tell you that: "you need Heart of Thorns in order to unlock the full rewards".

    So basically they took content that was Vanilla and placed it under the expansion paywall. Before the expansion    Anet nerfed every dungeon rewards (Core game) by 66% in order to force players to move in to the expansion content. You also won't receive the new Fractal Dailies rewards as the game will gently tell you that: "you need Heart of Thorns in order to unlock the full rewards".

    So basically they took content that was Vanilla and placed it under the expansion paywall. Before the expansion was released I could play Fractals up until 50 and be fully rewarded doing so. Now, from Fractal Level 20+ my rewards are partially blocked and it feels like crap.

    Im not a F2Per, I paid for the core game ever since launch and I'm getting screwed over.

    This is not what a MMO expansion should be about. Company should encourage you to buy XPac by showing you new awesome things to get, not by nerfing the **** out of existing content or stright away locking.

    This is sounding more and more like those ****ty mobile games where people who pay get extra currency/bonus rewards over those who don't.

    I was waiting for a lower price to buy the expansion but now I'm genuinely pissed off and seeing all the grind and gate in the new expansion coupled with the former facts I've just mentioned, I wouldn't pay more than 10 bucks for this. Anet has lost a client here. A client who supported them for 10 years (back in GW1 LAUNCH!    … Expand
  19. Jason_Field
    Oct 27, 2015
    2
    No one is going to be more disappointed than myself. After having supported this developer for such a long time I think I'm finally at the point where I have to part ways. The maps are great, enemies look cool but locking the masteries behind such grindy time gates has really been a sour taste in my mouth.

    Had they not locked this content as well as the story behind this, I feel this    No one is going to be more disappointed than myself. After having supported this developer for such a long time I think I'm finally at the point where I have to part ways. The maps are great, enemies look cool but locking the masteries behind such grindy time gates has really been a sour taste in my mouth.

    Had they not locked this content as well as the story behind this, I feel this expansion wouldn't last long at all due to the lack of anything really meaningful.

    On the surface you'll find an intriguing game but you'll soon come to realise there is little substance.    … Expand
  20. AusJock
    Oct 26, 2015
    2
    Massive, massive disappointment with the HoT exapnsion... WvW is going to be gutted, the grind is outrageously bad and like nothing seen in any Guild Wars game previously.
    Casual players can expect to spend the next few months at-least just to get the elite specialization on a single character.
    There is an amazing amount of new content but every portion of it requires grinding in order    Massive, massive disappointment with the HoT exapnsion... WvW is going to be gutted, the grind is outrageously bad and like nothing seen in any Guild Wars game previously.
    Casual players can expect to spend the next few months at-least just to get the elite specialization on a single character.
    There is an amazing amount of new content but every portion of it requires grinding in order to learn masteries or gain Hero Points.

    If I could get a refund for my pre-purchase, I 100% would.    … Expand
  21. Vexia
    Oct 26, 2015
    0
    As someone who Pre-purchased the first game, played the beta, pre-purchased the second game and played that beta as well, I am so severely disappointed in Arenanet, the now "old" content is laggy as hell. While the new content is buggy as hell, I assume the pressure was on them to release it quickly but there are so many bugs in it, that players are getting 2-3 patches a day minimum, andAs someone who Pre-purchased the first game, played the beta, pre-purchased the second game and played that beta as well, I am so severely disappointed in Arenanet, the now "old" content is laggy as hell. While the new content is buggy as hell, I assume the pressure was on them to release it quickly but there are so many bugs in it, that players are getting 2-3 patches a day minimum, and those barely address the amount of bugs in the game, the lag, the same old issues they had before which never got fixed, and a complete disregard for real juicy content, the expansion is a pretty piece of fluff.

    My experience with the expansion, was to login, attempt to do the story, die in it, being unable to revive I had to exit because the pop up button for revival didn't show up, and upon re-entering the game, the story had vanished out of the game but remains in the log, being permanently unable to complete it. It's bugs like these that make you wonder why did I buy the expensive pre-purchase pack with all the gems, when after 5 days I still cannot complete any story, any new content, i'm still stuck in arena net limbo. waiting for the next patch and hoping that my fix will be in this one.

    Guild Halls were a major let down, a very weak monster fight in order to take control of the room, only 2 guild halls to choose from, mapped instances where your guild members are constantly shuffed from instance to instance as the game makes the rooms bigger or smaller, getting pop ups every 2-5 minutes telling you to switch maps. And we all know that Guild Halls are Arenanets way of fixing their very poorly designed market system which has a overflow of too many useless materials, and now all of a sudden these materials (examples carrots) are now needed by the thousands to use as a material to build your guild hall. Guild window looks messy, it's hard to find the things your looking for. THE LAG. IS NO JOKE.
    If you dare to open your guild window to look through your roster there is a huge amount of lag.

    GAME CRASHES CONSTANTLY, my files aren't broken, the game just decides to close it's self at random times. Which beats the black screen of doom that was happening a week ago.

    Fractals are fast, but are still just as boring as ever, but more appealing now, because you only need to be stuck with the same fools for 1 map rather than 4.

    The Elite specializations look cool, but that's about it, most feel slow and clunky and difficult to chain into a real attack.

    THERE WAS SO MUCH HYPE, and I was hyped for it, I even got my friends to play, and so far I've been nothing but disappointed, I knew I needed to keep my expectations low, so I wouldn't be disappointed if something wasn't as great as I'd expect it to be, but this is just ridiculous.    … Expand
  22. Andrx
    Oct 26, 2015
    1
    Everything was gated and now consist on an infinite grinding. No kidding, if you have alts you are going to be busy for the next year grinding the same thing over and over just so you can use the new skills that you bought with HOT.
  23. Joejones
    Oct 26, 2015
    0
    The Heart of Thrones expansion is a major let down. I sat and watched and waited before purchasing it, and then bought one for myself and a friend. Now I feel like I got ripped off. Arenanet went on and on about how he new specializations were no better or stronger than any other classes, but threw the hero points needed to open them behind gated content and are charging a ridiculous amtThe Heart of Thrones expansion is a major let down. I sat and watched and waited before purchasing it, and then bought one for myself and a friend. Now I feel like I got ripped off. Arenanet went on and on about how he new specializations were no better or stronger than any other classes, but threw the hero points needed to open them behind gated content and are charging a ridiculous amt of points to fully open these specs. You can't go grab them, you can't do most alone, and the main story line is bugged and still hasn't been fixed. Please don't waste your time or money on this product.… Expand
  24. Simbob
    Oct 26, 2015
    3
    The expansion in the current state is terrible. It basically wants you to eat soup with a fork, to gain access to the spoon. Everything is gated and grindy. It is a long way from the original GW2 philosophy of play your way.

    Anet have committed the cardinal sin in gaming of alienating their casual player. The casuals are the ones that keep a game ticking over, pay for the newest skin,    The expansion in the current state is terrible. It basically wants you to eat soup with a fork, to gain access to the spoon. Everything is gated and grindy. It is a long way from the original GW2 philosophy of play your way.

    Anet have committed the cardinal sin in gaming of alienating their casual player. The casuals are the ones that keep a game ticking over, pay for the newest skin, like to change their character design and pay for it. They have scrapped dungeons in favor for fractals, however, they do not give you any new fractals, so you are playing the same stuff over again.

    What have Anet been doing for the last 3 years? if this is their output of 3 years of work, they might as well call it a day now!    … Expand
  25. Cameirus
    Oct 25, 2015
    3
    HOTs has its good points, nice map design, gliding! and things like guild halls are all nice, however its crippled by the bizzare approach taken by Anet in putting excessive gating and grinds into the game, and locking key expansion features behind walls.

    The big selling point of the expansion is elite specialisations, which change how a class is played, these have been hyped and    HOTs has its good points, nice map design, gliding! and things like guild halls are all nice, however its crippled by the bizzare approach taken by Anet in putting excessive gating and grinds into the game, and locking key expansion features behind walls.

    The big selling point of the expansion is elite specialisations, which change how a class is played, these have been hyped and rightly so they are really fun. I know that from beta weekends. Not from the live game, as in the live game they are locked behind a stupidly high amount of hero points needed to unlock them. A normal trait line takes 65 points to unlock, an elite one takes 60 points just to start, and 400 to unlock, no thats not a typo. Its absurd.
    Yes hero challenges in the new zones grant 10 points, but these generally require groups and are locked behind another gate in requiring specific masteries to access....so that fails as well.

    All in all, very disappointing for Anet to take this path, so contrary to what GW2 was.    … Expand
  26. Fairchild
    Oct 25, 2015
    0
    horrible. they spent a year and half to make jumping puzzles and super tough trash mobs (that drop no loot). i suppose this makes sense...because there isn't any new loot in the expac. 2 new armor sets...original game launched with 30 or more. zero content and none on the horizon.
  27. XYLUM
    Oct 25, 2015
    3
    I give this a 3 out of 10 because, more then add to the existing Guildwars 2 game, they castrated it.

    The nerfed dungeons, they nerfed fractals and locked the loot in box that you have to BUY keys in order to open. They simply took Living Story Season 3 and added some mechanics, and a game update and hard gated the progression through insane amounts of grind, left out all of the    I give this a 3 out of 10 because, more then add to the existing Guildwars 2 game, they castrated it.

    The nerfed dungeons, they nerfed fractals and locked the loot in box that you have to BUY keys in order to open.

    They simply took Living Story Season 3 and added some mechanics, and a game update and hard gated the progression through insane amounts of grind, left out all of the major selling points the promised like raids, new legendaries and new squad system and charged us 50 bucks for it.

    I regret the purchase, and am hoping another polished MMO hits the market so I can give Arenanet back what they gave me with Heart of Thorns ...the middle finger.    … Expand
  28. TacticalLamp
    Oct 29, 2015
    2
    GW2 used to be a really fantastic game with an incredible variety of options and things to do.With the release of HoT that variety has shrunk to mindless killing of mobs and farming of events to gather experience to complete masteries. Other than exploring new zones, elite specialization, and other ridiculous amounts of farming ( because the expansion really botched the economy as aGW2 used to be a really fantastic game with an incredible variety of options and things to do.With the release of HoT that variety has shrunk to mindless killing of mobs and farming of events to gather experience to complete masteries. Other than exploring new zones, elite specialization, and other ridiculous amounts of farming ( because the expansion really botched the economy as a whole), the only thing to do at the moment is bash your face against your keyboard as you tag mobs to participate in events because often it is too difficult to farm mobs on your own as the new mechanics of random mobs disable your character into oblivion. When raids release there will be one more option for things to do fortunately, but with the way arenanet changed crafting and the economy, crafting the needed gear is MUCH more difficult than it was previously. Somewhere in the past several years developers have confused "difficult" for "time consuming" and it is a crime. Difficult content is wonderful. Time consuming content breeds resentment. Many things need to change as this game went from a really fantastic well rounded game to a grind gated, treadmill-like, tread up a giant mountain of broken dreams.… Expand
  29. videot76
    Oct 26, 2015
    0
    Complete disappointment. Anet's philosophy for GW2 was always "play the way you want" and "no grinding". This has been completely thrown out and stomped on as HoT offers NOTHING but grind, grind, and grind. 4 new maps you say? Even if they are bigger than the old ones, they feel extremely limited and you have to do the same handful of events over and over and over and over to be allowed toComplete disappointment. Anet's philosophy for GW2 was always "play the way you want" and "no grinding". This has been completely thrown out and stomped on as HoT offers NOTHING but grind, grind, and grind. 4 new maps you say? Even if they are bigger than the old ones, they feel extremely limited and you have to do the same handful of events over and over and over and over to be allowed to progress the story, which is astonishingly short and anticlimactic.
    The new specializations, one of the main selling points, requires you to grind everyting to the max to use.
    The new raids and legendaries, other selling points, aren't even included and will (maybe) be added at a later date.
    And what IS there is bugged beyond all reason. Remember the abortive pre-launch world invasion event and that it was so bugged that Anet didn't even ATTEMPT to fix it on account of being TOO broken? Well, that's the functionality you can expect from the entirety of Heart of Thorns. The final boss is a clusterf*** of broken, botched and outright missing mechanics, and that it passed testing proves that no actual person actually played it, but just checked "tested" on some form and went home for the day.
    I dare not even think of what the raids will be like - as late as a couple of weeks ago they were too broke to even be beta tested.

    Also, they not-so-sneakily force old players to buy the expansion by putting all rewards behind a mile-thick paywall. All Vanilla rewards have been nerfed through the floor to discourage people from playing old content, which will prove a mistake when the hype settles and people realize they are left with 4 minuscule new maps and a handful of endlessly repeating, slow, wearisome and plain unfunny events. Oh, and did I mention that one of those maps is the compulsory cliché gigantic insectoid hive? Because it totally is - but here's the twist: said insectoids play NO role in the story and seems to be shoehorned in simply to give some variety to the otherwise endless and monotonous jungle.

    I was going to give it a 1, but writing this I realize it doesn't merit even that. Without bugs it might even have been a solid 2, but releasing a full prize product with this many problems is simply not ok on any level. Even less okay is taking the core concept of the game and turning it completely in and out, transforming GW2 into a mindless grind for minuscule rewards and charging extra for the "privilege" of doing so.
    Thanks for freeing up more of my spare time, Anet - I definitely lost most of my interest in your products in one fell swoop!

    TL:DR Short, extremely buggy, grindy as hell and not much to show for it either. Comepletely and totally underwhelming in every single department - except the graphics, which are kinda nice. But they can be watched for free on Youtube.    … Expand
  30. bec
    Oct 26, 2015
    4
    The best part of the expansion is the new character specializations...they are an amazing way to fall in love with your character again. The new maps, well, they are difficult to navigate to say the least. Dead ends, enemies waiting to kill you (some in just 3 or 4 shots). Do the landscapes look beautiful? Absolutely. But we already knew that Anet could create a beautiful game. AThe best part of the expansion is the new character specializations...they are an amazing way to fall in love with your character again. The new maps, well, they are difficult to navigate to say the least. Dead ends, enemies waiting to kill you (some in just 3 or 4 shots). Do the landscapes look beautiful? Absolutely. But we already knew that Anet could create a beautiful game. A difficult to navigate map could just be skipped, I suppose, as could nearly impossible to complete group events which require mega zergs, it seems. The problem is the personal stories, many of which will require multiple deaths and retries from checkpoints...I don't understand how enemies you can't beat on your own are in personal stories...similar problem in original GW2 release, which Anet eventually nerfed (anyone remember Claw Island?). I have heard people raving about the expansion, I can see why. I have also heard people raging about it...and I get that too. For me, this expansion is interesting...it is everything, except fun. It's a lot of dodging, dying, retrying, grinding, etc. Also kind of divisive, older/more experienced players tend to rage at noobs for dying...but a lot of the enemies have new skills, even new AoE attacks, no one goes into the map the first time knowing what to do. For some, the gliders and mushrooms (once unlocked) are intuitive, for others less so...I am one of those people that has had to rely on a couple of helpful youtube videos already. Maybe one day this will be fun, but it's not now.… Expand
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Awards & Rankings

51
#51 Best PC Game of 2015
10
#10 Most Discussed PC Game of 2015
15
#15 Most Shared PC Game of 2015

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
81

Generally favorable reviews - based on 22 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 19 out of 22
  2. Mixed: 3 out of 22
  3. Negative: 0 out of 22
  1. CD-Action
    Jan 12, 2016
    85
    Heart of Thorns is so good I forgot the flaws that made me lose interest in the original game after my initial delight with it. [13/2015, p.64]
  2. Games Master UK
    Jan 3, 2016
    85
    Not the biggest expansion, but it enhances the best parts of an already magnificent MMO. [Christmas 2015, p.75]
  3. Edge Magazine
    Jan 3, 2016
    80
    In spite of the odd stumble, it's a wonderful journey. [Jan 2016, p.120]
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