We’ve partnered up with players to showcase their creative Guild Wars 2-inspired content on the official Guild Wars 2 Twitch channel. Read on for this week’s scheduled programming, and don’t forget to check out the Guild Wars 2 category on Twitch for more great streams!

The Guild Wars 2 Art Show (by KoboldArt)(English)
Noon Pacific Time (UTC-7)
KoboldArt is burning up the canvas on this week’s show!

ArenaNet Livestream: Let’s Play Guild Wars 2 World vs World (English)
9:30 a.m. Pacific Time (UTC-7)
Join the World vs. World development team in the Mists for their weekly stream. This week they’ll be playing on EU servers.

If you need help converting times into your own time zone, you can use this tool. Thanks for watching!

Rubi and Clayton are crossing over into the Mad Realm! Join them tomorrow for Halloween fun, and keep an eye out for the character Rubi Djinn on EU servers.

The livestream will air on October 22 at noon Pacific Time (UTC-8) on the official Twitch, YouTube, and Facebook channels.

Let’s get spooky! Our annual Halloween festival, Shadow of the Mad King, is now live. Check out the release highlights and update notes for all the details.

First, check your in-game mail for a letter from Magister Tassi containing an Invitation to the Mad Realm. Use this item to travel back and forth between Tyria and Mad King’s Labyrinth.

Lion’s Arch is Tyria’s Halloween celebration headquarters. Asura gate portals to Lion’s Arch are available in major cities and can be used by any player who has the Guild Wars 2: Path of Fire™ expansion or is at least level 35.

Players without access to Lion’s Arch can travel to the Mad Realm from the Village of Shaemoor in Queensdale, the Village of Smokestead in the Plains of Ashford, Snowlord’s Gate in the Wayfarer Foothills, the Village of Astorea in Caledon Forest, and Soren Draa in Metrica Province. These locations are outside each starting city’s main gate. Run to the candy corn icon on your map and speak to a Lunatic Boatmaster guarding a haunted door, and they’ll whisk you away to your choice of eerie activities.

Haunted doors will also appear in Kessex Hills and Gendarran Fields throughout the event. Interact with the doors to trick-or-treat!

During Halloween, King Oswald Thorn’s capricious spirit can manifest in Tyria—and Tyria’s citizens can cross into Thorn’s Mad Realm.

The city of Lion’s Arch is transformed with scary decorations and a gloomy autumn glow! Every two hours, Mad King Thorn will gather his “subjects” (anyone within shouting distance) to play a game. Perform the emotes he commands you to—but only if he calls out, “Your Mad King says.” If you do well, you’ll receive keys to unlock the Mad King’s Chest.

The Grand Piazza also features seasonal vendors and doors to Shadow of the Mad King activities.

Mad King’s Labyrinth
Battle hordes of Halloween creatures, race your mounts, and trick-or-treat at haunted doors through the twists and turns of a macabre maze. It’s a great way to gain experience for your characters and Trick-or-Treat Bags full of goodies, especially if you team up with other players to explore. Stay on your toes, though—powerful enemies like the Grand High Viscount of Candy Corn, legendary Skeletal Lich, and Labyrinthine Horror will make nougat of the unwary.

Mad King’s Clock Tower
Hop to the top of a vicious timed jumping puzzle before the deadly miasma below makes its way to you.

Ascent to Madness
Face Mad King Thorn himself! This dungeon encounter is intended for players of all skill levels and can be entered from Lion’s Arch.

Mad King’s Raceway
Take your mounts out for a spin in time trials and races against other players. Springer, jackal, and roller beetle rentals are available if you need a steed.

Minigames
Speak to a Lunatic Boatmaster to participate in Reaper’s Rumble or Lunatic Inquisition.

Shadow of the Mad King activities award Trick-or-Treat Bags containing a vast selection of Halloween goods. The primary currency is candy corn, which can be traded to special vendors for minis, armor skins, recipes, and more.

Many unique rewards are obtained by completing achievements. You’ll find information on the Shadow of the Mad King achievements and their rewards in your Hero panel under the Daily and Festivals categories.

Have fun and remember to trick-or-treat safely!

We’ve partnered up with players to showcase their creative Guild Wars 2-inspired content on the official Guild Wars 2 Twitch channel. Read on for this week’s scheduled programming, and don’t forget to check out the Guild Wars 2 category on Twitch for more great streams!

The Guild Wars 2 Art Show (by Fiaoradd)(English)
Noon Pacific Time (UTC-7)
Watch Fiaoradd create art on this week’s show!

ArenaNet Livestream: Let’s Play Guild Wars 2 World vs World (English)
3:00 p.m. Pacific Time (UTC-7)
Join the World vs. World development team in the Mists for their weekly stream. This week they’ll be playing on NA servers.

If you need help converting times into your own time zone, you can use this tool. Thanks for watching!

From October 15 to November 5 King Oswald Thorn’s cruel laughter will fill the air as Halloween returns to Tyria! Play wicked games, tackle the Mad King’s Clock Tower, go trick-or-treating in the labyrinth, venture into the cornfield for Reaper’s Rumble, and more.

In the summer of 2000, Pat, Jeff, Brett, Brandon, Gaile, Josh and I worked out of the living room of my apartment. We dreamed of mixing role-playing and strategy, of delivering a constant stream of new content into an online world, and of doing it with a friendlier business model than we’d seen before. That first summer we didn’t have much but we had a great team, and built the beginnings of what became Guild Wars and ArenaNet.

We couldn’t have known then the extent of the journey we were embarking on or all the wonderful and talented people who would join us along the way. For the past two decades we’ve gotten to work with brilliant developers and advisors, we’ve enjoyed an amazing relationship with the Guild Wars community, and were able to pursue the games of our dreams.
I’ve appreciated every moment of it. But the time has come for me to take a step back. Next week I’ll join some of my friends in forming a new studio. We’ll go back to the beginning and make small games again.

I’ll always love ArenaNet and Guild Wars. Now I’ll get to experience Living World releases as a player rather than as a developer.

Two years ago, when I transitioned away from the Guild Wars 2 game director role to focus on new product development, I asked Mike Zadorojny to take on that role. Now as he takes on a larger leadership role, I am confident that ArenaNet and Guild Wars 2 are in good hands. Z is a true champion of the Guild Wars franchise and of this studio’s values; he is the best person to continue carrying the torch at the company.

I want to thank the Guild Wars community for supporting us all these years. Some of my happiest times have been hanging out with you at launch days, anniversary parties, championship matches, trade shows and other gatherings. It’s great to see so many of the same faces year after year. My goal in making games is always to entertain people, so nothing makes me happier than to think we made a game that could entertain people for years.

A moment I’ll always remember is standing in front of you at PAX 2015 to announce that we’d make the base game free-to-play. It was the right thing to do for the game, but how would existing players react? You’re giving away what I paid for? Will the game be overrun by noobs? But that wasn’t your reaction at all. You formed welcoming committees to meet players as they came out of the tutorial zones and take them under your wings. It’s a lasting memory of how supportive you’ve always been toward this studio.

I want to thank TJ Kim and NCSOFT for standing behind ArenaNet and giving us the space to try new things. We first met NCSOFT in 2002, at a time when many companies didn’t “get” online-only games, but NCSOFT was so in tune with what we were trying to accomplish that we couldn’t even finish our pitch before they started making the pitch for us. TJ always loved Guild Wars, and played the game as much as many of you. When we talked, we’d talk games. I’ve worked for companies that were all about quarterly earnings, and I’ve always appreciated that NCSOFT is about making the best games.

And I want to thank the team at ArenaNet. It’s been an honor to work beside you all these years. You’re a team of artisans, sweating the details, putting your personal touches on everything this studio ships, even through seven retail releases and 80 episodes. You make games because you love the games. And you’re crazy, too, in all the right ways, daring yourselves to do things like “E3 For Everyone” for Guild Wars 1 or launching new content every two weeks through the first year of Guild Wars 2. We’ve had amazing adventures together. It’s been the journey of a lifetime, and I’ll always carry your passion with me.

Mo

To the Guild Wars community,

I’ve been working at ArenaNet since January 2006. I started in this company as a contract QA tester, and I’ve had the amazing opportunity to work with Mike O’Brien on developing both of the worlds of Tyria since the Factions product release for the original Guild Wars. We’ve always strived to make positive player interaction one of the core tenets of our games, and it has been a true joy to see the Guild Wars community come together in the virtual worlds we’ve helped to create. Knowing so many people found joy in what we do has been an incredibly rewarding and enjoyable experience. Mike led the studio for so many years, and so much of the amazing culture in this building stems from his leadership along with the other founders during the early days of ArenaNet, which strived to be a creative space where art came to life and the studio innovated and created games that were detailed, wondrous spaces for everyone to enjoy.

I took over the role of Game Director on Guild Wars 2 right after we launched Path of Fire. Assuming that role made me appreciate how passionate and amazing this community is, reminding me each day how important our work is. Since then we’ve aimed at making huge strides to the quality and cadence of content we’ve been adding to the game every year. I love the fans, I love this team and we’re all very excited for you to play the upcoming chapters of The Icebrood Saga. We’ve got some really fun content on the way.

I want to personally wish Mike the very best in whatever is next for him. Though he is leaving the studio, his presence and legacy will always be a part of the team, and I am going to make sure I do everything I can to keep the torch he passed me burning brightly into the future, both for the Guild Wars franchise and ArenaNet itself. I am looking forward to continuing this journey with all of you.

Mike Zadorojny

We’ve partnered up with players to showcase their creative Guild Wars 2-inspired content on the official Guild Wars 2 Twitch channel. Read on for this week’s scheduled programming, and don’t forget to check out the Guild Wars 2 category on Twitch for more great streams!

The Guild Wars 2 Art Show (by Fiaoradd)(English)
Noon Pacific Time (UTC-7)
Watch Fiaoradd create art on this week’s show!

ArenaNet Livestream: Let’s Play Guild Wars 2 World vs World (English)
3:30 p.m. Pacific Time (UTC-7)
Join the World vs. World development team in the Mists for their weekly stream. This week they’ll be playing on EU servers.

If you need help converting times into your own time zone, you can use this tool. Thanks for watching!

If you can’t get enough roller beetle racing, ArenaNet partner Battle Efficiency is hosting a competition! Sign up to participate in qualifying races throughout Tyria for a chance to win gems. Make it to the final round, and legendary prizes await the victors!

Qualifying races will be held on October 5, 6, 12, and 13 at 11:00 a.m. Pacific Time (UTC-7). Head over to Battle Efficiency’s site for all the details.

What’s a race without spectators? Beetle enthusiasts can watch all the action on these Twitch channels:

English

• https://www.twitch.tv/roy__
• https://www.twitch.tv/keyba_

Spanish

• https://www.twitch.tv/ebattletv