Guild Wars: Reforged

Nostalgia runs through many Reforged-era reviews: players who started in 2005 logging into twenty-year-old characters, or starting fresh accounts so they can play the whole thing again. Many add that the game holds up on its own terms, and some first-timers agree: "It's weird feeling nostalgia for a game i never played." The pushback is that nostalgia carries the praise for people who were not there. One new player wrote "I think nostalgia is doing a lot of the heavy lifting for this game." That divide mostly runs between veterans and newcomers who bounce off the dated design.

The skill system gets the most specific praise. Players describe it as deck building: hundreds of skills, a primary and a swappable secondary profession, and only eight slots, so every loadout is a choice. "Pick this up if you want to use your brain to make a class, rather than just getting skills fed to you," one reviewer wrote, and a newcomer added that "Only having 8 moves available makes build-crafting a lot of fun." Free respecs in any outpost and capturing elite skills from bosses come up often. The counterpoint comes mostly from players who prefer vertical progression and gear upgrades, who find the horizontal system thin, and from veterans who say the meta has settled on a few builds (Mesmer-heavy hero teams come up repeatedly).

A large group plays it as a single-player or small co-op RPG. Henchmen fill a party from the start, and customizable heroes (early in Nightfall, later in Prophecies and Factions) let you set every companion's build and gear. "401 hours, never once used chat, best single player MMO of our time." Some reviewers call the companions the best party AI they have seen; a smaller group says weak henchmen are why the harder missions feel impossible solo. Several reviewers advise new players to start in Nightfall to get heroes sooner.

Controller support is the most praised part of the Reforged update itself, and Steam Deck owners write the most enthusiastic of those reviews: "Runs AMAZING on the Steam Deck," and "They did a phenomenal job adding controller support." Players mention good battery life, playing on the couch and in bed, and Linux and handheld PCs running it without tweaks. A smaller set of reviews disagrees sharply: no button remapping or inverted axis, a virtual cursor that takes over whenever a window is open, awkward hero commands and targeting, and on-screen keyboard workarounds for chat. "Controller support is meh. They only added a joystick cursor to navigate the UI instead of adding things like radial menus and other modifiers." One veteran with thousands of hours wrote "I believe the Steam Deck Verified badge was given in haste."

Value comes up often: three full campaigns in one purchase, no monthly fee, and years of content. "$20 for all 3 main campaigns is a steal," one player wrote, and another praised "No subscription, no boring endless questing and text walls, no dailies that incentivize you to make unhealthy habits." Existing owners got Reforged as a free update, which several singled out ("Massive respect for putting this out as a free update for people who own the original versions"). The caveats are that Eye of the North and the bonus missions are sold separately, and a few reviewers think twenty dollars is too much for a twenty-year-old game.

Players describe outposts packed with people again after years of empty districts ("Ascalon City in pre-searing was 10 deep last night") and guilds recruiting new players. The community gets warm words, especially from newcomers who were given gold, gear and runs: "Everyone is helpful. Everyone responds when you ask a question." A minority found it the other way: veterans who only want to run you through missions, new players who could not find groups for normal play, and an elitist streak around criticism of the game.

Many reviewers are glad the game is getting attention again: new pre-Searing content and a dungeon, balance passes, and challenge modes (Hardcore and the Melandru's Accord ironman mode). "Excellent game, now getting updates again after many years." Some long-time players are more critical of the direction: new content locked to Reforged Mode, character slots needed for the new challenge modes, balance changes that broke established farming builds, and update quality, with one writing "Every update has some embarrassingly bad bug that needs an emergency patch a day or two later."

Jeremy Soule's soundtrack and the painterly art direction come up as reasons the game has aged well, with several new players surprised to learn the composer also scored The Elder Scrolls. "This game is proof that realistic graphics really aren't nearly as important as art direction," one first-timer wrote. A few note that zone music loops until it grates.