IGNPC: Last question. What are some of the lessons that ArenaNet has learned over the past four years? What assumptions did you get right? What did you get wrong?

Mike O'Brien: We were right to make an online RPG in the tradition of Magic: the Gathering instead of Dungeons & Dragons. We founded this company because we wanted to bring players innovative new experiences, and I think Guild Wars Gold has done that. But since Guild Wars was really the first game of its kind, we made some mistakes and learned a lot along the way, and we can apply those lessons to Guild Wars 2.

For example, we were right to build the game around character skills, but we were wrong to let the number of skills grow to Magic: the Gathering-like proportions. It's unnecessary, and it's too much to absorb in a real-time setting. With Guild Wars 2 we can accomplish more with fewer skills.

We were right to believe strongly in the potential of instancing. Our use of instancing allows us to tell compelling stories, and to enable players to really impact the world in a way that's just not possible in most persistent-world games. But there are benefits of persistent worlds too, like the ability to casually make friends as you encounter people in the world, and there's no reason why Guild Wars 2 can't have the best of both worlds.

Overall, I think we were very right to take risks with both game design and business model. In a genre full of very similar games with similar business models, Guild Wars Gold stands apart from the crowd. That's something we're proud of and that we'll continue to do.

IGNPC: Thank you for your time!