Let's Review — Visions of Eternity: The Only Way | Guild Wars 2

 

The second quarterly patch for Guild Wars 2's Visions of Eternity expansion has released, titled The Only Way. Under the new format started with VoE, the first quarterly patch was focused on improvements to core systems with very little in the way of new content, making this the first major content release since the expac launched. After a six-month wait, does it live up to the hype, and has it benefited from the extra development time? I think it has, but let's dive into why.

This article has been adapted to a YouTube video. Check it out if you'd prefer a video format!

Story

VoE had a promising start in the story department, and I'm happy to say that The Only Way does a great job of following it up. This is a great sign, since the cracks in the SotO and JaWi stories were already showing by the time their first patches came around. VoE has rocketed its way up to one of my favorite stories the game has to offer, and I'm incredibly excited to see its finale.

I'm generally quite forgiving of GW2's story—I think the launch portion of SotO was great, for example, whereas the majority of players seem to think the entirety of that expansion was trash. Even being the world's biggest story apologist, I can admit that much of the game's narrative is pretty weak. 

My biggest criticism of the story, however, is one that actually applies more to the older expansions than it does to the newer ones. I can see the vision behind what both SotO and JaWi were going for and how they're held back by poor pacing & production decisions and generally being rushed—really, seeing just how close they were to being great is even more frustrating than looking at the ways in which they're bad. I can appreciate that IBS Champions did the best it could with an impossible situation. On the other hand, the primary flaw of GW2's stories is present more in its older content than in its newer releases, despite the former not facing the same struggles as the latter—not as badly, at least.

But, enough beating around the bush. The biggest issue with GW2's story, at least in my eyes, is that it lacks thematic depth. Consider Heart of Thorns. What is that expansion about, narratively? I don't mean the plot, e.g "It's about killing the elder dragon, Mordremoth." What is that expansion's message? What themes does it explore with the characters and the trials they go through? It seems to me, at least, that it doesn't really have one. At the very least, whatever themes it does try to tackle are not explored enough to be immediately memorable.

Now, that isn't inherently all too bad. While a novel absolutely cannot stand on its own without strong themes, the story of a videogame is a bit of a different matter. The primary purpose of the story in a game like GW2 is to ferry the player through interesting situations and give them tasks to complete, problems to solve, and interactive setpieces to enjoy; any deeper meaning is appreciated, but optional. 

In this sense, the stories of HoT, PoF, EoD, and the living worlds between them are entirely functional for their purpose as game stories, but there's a palpable sense of something missing. In the moment, they have no shortage of emotional moments, character beats, and fun twists that can be very compelling, but when you zoom out, you realize those have very little connective tissue, at least thematically. When analyzed that way, they can feel less like stories and more like series of events, because that's sort of what they are.

Again, this isn't inherently a bad thing. Modern writing, particularly in webnovel spaces, now contains a lot of stories that function similarly, with less focus on themes and more on spectacle and individual moments. As I already said, while this makes for a less potent and memorable overall experience, those individual moments can still work really well on their own. I should also note that, despite all my criticism in this section, I'm actually a huge fan of GW2's overall story. I recognize that what I've pointed out here is a critical flaw, but I remain engaged in spite of that flaw because the game succeeded in getting me invested in its world, characters, and lore. Simply caring about the people who are involved and the events that are happening allows the story to function well even without deeper themes at work—though I believe the fact that you need to already care about the universe to get maximum enjoyment from the story explains why so much of the community seems to generally dislike it.

This brings us to why I appreciate the more recent stories so much. The Icebrood Saga is my favorite of the game's stories by far, and even considering the trainwreck that is Champions, I still think it is the best story narratively. This is because it elevates itself above a mere series of interesting events by tying them all together with very clear themes. While I'd be left scratching my head if you asked me what the main theme of HoT or PoF was, I could answer in an instant for IBS—its thesis is "Fascism can corrupt anyone, and it benefits nobody in the long run." This idea is explored both through Bangar, the literal fascist dictator and parody of a real-world tyrant, and Jormag, a fantasy analog for the tempting power of corruption. I could describe further, but you get the point; IBS has a theme, and all of its elements actively contribute to exploring that theme.

This now, finally, brings us out of that cascading series of tangents and back to VoE and why I like it so much: it has clear themes, and it's actually committing to them. To be precise, it seems to be a counterargument to the 'great man' theory, or the idea that history is defined primarily by the actions of notable individuals who are gifted and superior. Vloxx believes that only great individuals like himself and the Commander can guide the world in the right direction, and that organizations like the Astral Ward or Tyrian Alliance are holding the world at large back. He idolizes and respects the Commander, believing they are a perfect hero who will eventually understand his goal; despite that, the story shows us how the Commander, and other powerful figures like Isgarren, are still flawed, imperfect, and most of all, human. Furthermore, it makes a clear case for how powerful individuals like those two cannot carry the world on their shoulders alone and are only as strong as they are thanks to the support of countless worthy allies.

Characters

As with the plot itself, I think the utilization of the cast in VoE is a marked improvement over recent expansions. Using JaWi as an example, since it's the most recent, something it was sorely lacking was any sort of character arcs. Hanging out with Caithe and Malice was fun, but neither of them really grew or changed during our adventure, and they ended up tapping out before it was even over. Similarly, while we got some interesting character beats with Livia, Isgarren, and Anise, none of those really made for a full arc. Aside from Waiting Sorrow confronting the wizards and her past, the only real overarching character growth was from Poky, who got to experience both the fun and dangers of a real adventure for the first time, overcome his over-eager naivete, and prove himself a worthy and competent member of the team.

Contrasting that with VoE, our entire main cast has something interesting going on during their journey in Castora, and The Only Way did a really great job at showing those off, especially with the conversations in that first instance with the vines and after the final instance. Let's go over everyone.

Canach is most certainly the star of the show. His arc touches on the severe shift his character has taken from EoD onward, becoming more of a suave businessman and playboy rather than dedicating himself to hero work. I personally enjoy that side of his character a lot as well, but it's really interesting seeing him admit that a part of him doesn't feel complete with just a life of pleasure. He hearkens back to his debut as a well-meaning terrorist in LW1 and is the character who best understands Vloxx and his motivations, and he makes it clear he wants to make up for lost time and do a bit more good in the world.

Isgarren also has a major arc in VoE. The first half of that arc—him trying to remain secretive and solve everything on his own, only to have his secrets revealed anyways and be forced to rely on us—already started in the launch chapters, and it continues here with him being put completely out of commission by Sidony's curse. The same idea of him having to rely on others is expanded on further here, and we see some personal growth on his front, starting to act a bit more humble and accommodating. It's clear he's growing out of the more selfish and stubborn version of himself that Vloxx so maligns, and I'm looking forward to an eventual confrontation between the two.

Rytlock's role in this story is a bit less clear, but we're getting to see him in a different light than usual. He's been acting particularly antsy, and it seems he's feeling a bit useless while surrounded by powerful individuals like Isgarren. He joined the expedition out of a desperate desire to get out of politics and back into the action, but he's taking things incredibly seriously and seems to be particularly hard on himself and his contributions to the developments in Castora. I hope the final patch will give him a moment to prove to himself why he's here with us.

Sayida is the member of the main group with the least going on at the moment. In the first patch, she was the one with the most dubious opinion of Vloxx, and we got some fun banter between her and Canach regarding whether or not villains could truly be trusted or redeemed, during which she forgot both she and Canach were examples of exactly that. With Vloxx's actions veering much more clearly towards "evil", there wasn't as much opportunity for such conversations this time around. She seems to be settling into her new role as a proper politician, but it remains to be seen if she'll have a major role to play in the plot's climax. Even if she doesn't, it's been nice to spend some time with a more minor member of the cast, and I appreciate her presence and the way she bounces off the rest of the group.

Even more than our heroes, I think the villains had an exceptional showing in this patch. Vloxx's quest for ascension continued, and he managed to get exactly what he wanted. The knowledge he received seems to have corrupted his goal. His aim has shifted from merely removing obstacles like Isgarren or the Tyrian Alliance to something much grander and more dangerous, altering the "code of creation" itself. I'm looking forward to seeing whether he succumbs to the power he's obtained or manages to stick to his values in the end.

While Vloxx continued to develop in more or less the direction I expected, Kuda completely blew my expectations out of the water. I initially expected things to play out in a much more formulaic fashion—Sebb got taken down in the first act, so Kuda would be taken down in the second as we build up to the confrontation with Vloxx. The twist we got instead is much, much more interesting. She is incredibly effective and intimidating as the leader of the Inquest, and I can't wait to see whether she continues to stack up as a serious threat or if her arrogance gets the better of her. Her lackeys, the Omega Team, are also pretty decent minor villains. I enjoyed reading their diaries, and they serve their purpose as this act's boss encounter well. Speaking of,

Gameplay

This patch did a great job at solving my biggest criticism of the launch story's gameplay, which was the implementation of the open-world collections. The previous collections ground the story to a complete halt and were frustrating to figure out with how vague their hints were and how well-hidden some of the items were. Those problems are completely absent this time around.

This batch if story had one collection, and it was tied into the story itself quite well—we needed to scavenge materials so Canach could craft a bomb and get us into the ascension ritual. The hints this time around were very clear for most of the items, and the rest were very close either to other collection items or to various waypoints. I finished the collection very quickly and easily while exploring the map; I have no complaints on how it was implemented.

The actual story instances this time around have been met with pretty mixed reception. They focused a lot less on combat and a lot more on simple puzzles, with some of them—namely the bomb-crafting process and the trials of Divitium Nava—dragging on quite a lot. I didn't mind the former so much as a change of pace, but I think the latter is a bit more egregious due to just how many puzzles we have to complete in that instance. Most of them are fine, but there are a couple, mainly the pipe puzzle, that just feel like huge time-wasters. The worst part of the pipe puzzle in particular is that there's actually an alternate solution that's pretty easy to figure out and would cut the time it takes to complete in half, but the game doesn't let you utilize that superior solution, instead forcing you to slowly place and repair every single pipe. It's a drag.

The couple of combat encounters we do get this patch are... fine. This is the only chunk of VoE that won't get an associated strike, and it shows. We get two different fights against the Omega Team, and these aren't bad, but the trio just use a bunch of attacks already associated with generic champion inquest enemies. Facing the three of them at the same time is novel and challenging, but I'd definitely have preferred an actual unique encounter. Back when SotO was releasing, I was flabbergasted by the decision to release only two strikes instead of the obviously superior three, and I'm just as confused that they've committed to the same mistake here in VoE. I hope the pattern of two-encounter expansions ends here, that's for sure.

Eternity's Garden

As always, the real meat of any GW2 update is in the open-world content. That's where the game shines most, and it's where it expects the majority of players to spend most of their time. How does this map stack up compared to the two stellar maps that preceded it? Pretty dang well, I think.

The variety and design of events in this map is really good. Everything's spread out well, and while there are a few repeating events across the map—as well as some that share the same mechanics, just used slightly differently—they're spaced far enough apart from each other, and with enough unique stuff inbetween, that none of them end up feeling stale. The quality of champion enemies remains high, and I appreciate that we're still getting unique new enemy types this deep into the expansion.

The kitshark adventure is fun. I personally think they have an adorable design, so I'm glad to see more of them. It's pretty easy to get gold on, but it's satisfying to play, so it gets a pass.

The two jumping puzzles are good, though I'm much more a fan of Artificer's Rise than Munchin' Moths. I don't mind the new checkpoint system used on the Castora JPs—lots of players suck at platforming, so it's nice for them without hurting me much—but I do feel like they make things just a liiittle too easy, especially with how frequently they're placed. Seriously, some of these JPs have, like, two jumps between some of the checkpoints. I appreciate that Artificer's Rise spaces them out much better, and the gliding and tower climbing bits are fun and unique.

EG adopts the same format as Starlit Weald for its meta-events—it has one big, main meta on a global timer and a smaller, dynamic meta-event located somewhere else. We'll get to Shackles of the Ancients in its own section in just a second, but I'd like to discuss the Temple of Abnegation first. It's a simple, but very effective event chain in how it's designed. It focuses on the mechanic of filling up three altars seen in a few other events across the map, with the unique twists of damaging miasma filling the area and the boss shifting between alignments that require you to interact with each of the altars. The initial events do a great job of teaching you the mechanics, and the boss is pretty fun and unique. Great stuff all around.

Shackles of the Ancients

Now, let's get to the map's main dish—its primary meta-event, Shackles of the Ancients. This event is one of those that's tied directly into the story progression, though the game does a worse job at informing you of this than past maps have. It tasks you with first halting an Inquest invasion of the forge, then repairing a bunch of pipes, and finally taking on the All-Seer, a powerful Seer relic with a mind of its own who's responsible for controlling the Seneschals and maintaining the curse that hangs over Castora.

From a thematic/narrative standpoint, this meta is a little weird, though I only realized so once I sat down to start writing this section. The Inquest bit at the beginning is completely disconnected from everything else that happens, which is entirely focused on the All-Seer and preparations to confront it. It almost feels like the team wanted Kuda to have some presence in the map meta (similar to Sebb back in Secret of the Weald), but couldn't think of a way to actually incorporate her into the All-Seer stuff and just tacked her invasion of the forge on instead.

That said, that's honestly a really small nitpick. It's a bit weird if you think about it too hard, but everything that happens still makes sense—and, let's be honest, people don't run metas for their storylines. I don't think so, anyway. If you do, leave a comment down below and give me free engagement.

The main focus of metas is the gameplay, and I think Shackles of the Ancients is pretty good in that department. Compared to Secrets of the Weald and Hammerhart Rumble, which were basically just composed of big boss encounters, this meta is designed more like a boss rush, moving you swiftly between encounters with a bunch of different champion enemies. Impressively, all the bosses used throughout have unique movesets. It's all pretty simple stuff, just universal mechanics like AoE fields and such, but the variety is really appreciated and contributes to giving the meta a really good flow. Just running around and killing, like, twelve unique bosses in a row feels good.

Almost every part of the meta has you splitting into three groups (except the crabs halfway through, which have you split into two instead; I'm sure that won't be a huge headache for anyone trying to do optimized runs of the meta), usually fighting three different bosses. First you take on the Inquest champions in the forge, and then you move on to the only non-combat section of the meta, where you must use your skimmer to repair underwater pipes and use its water jets to kill—I mean seal—leaks.

This pipe section, just like the story's pipe section, drags on a bit too long in my opinion. Compared to the breakneck pace of the rest of the meta, jumping between a bunch of different bosses in rapid succession, this part brings things to a screeching halt for several minutes of gameplay that isn't really super engaging. It would benefit a lot form the pipes getting repaired with fewer deliveries and the leaks dying to fewer water jet shots.

After the pipes, it's time to fight the two crabs back in the forge again. Then you teleport to the north of the map to face the All-Seer (in)directly. You'll first face its three avatars. The avatars have a unique and very fun set of attacks, though the three of them are identical to each other, and they have a unique Triple Trouble-esque mechanic in that they get buffed if there isn't a group fighting the other avatars. 

After killing the avatars, you CC the freretories, kill three champs in the middle, and jump back out to fight the avatars again, this time with a slightly altered moveset compared to before. The new attack they gain here spawns a ton of spinning blades along the ground, similar to Jessica in the Hammerhart meta. This mechanic is my only big gripe with the fight; unlike Jessica, the avatars' blades have zero AoE indicator around them, making them quite difficult to make out at times.

After killing the avatars and CCing again, your final task is to kill three champion versions of generic transcended animals before breaking the chains. This might seem at first like an anticlimactic ending, and I've seen some complaints in that regard, but I actually think that effect is intentional here, and pulled off extremely well. There's dialogue from Isgarren between the phases commenting on how the All-Seer is getting increasingly desperate the more of its minions we take out, and that's displayed perfectly by the enemies we face. By the time it summons those generic animals, it's scraping the bottom of the barrel for anything at its disposal to try and stop us. Viewing it that way, dismantling the All-Seer's defenses piece-by-piece until it's forced to throw a jellyfish at me is very satisfying. It helps that these champs also have unique movesets, so they're fun to fight, too.

Throughout the fight, there are a couple of universal mechanics in play. The All-Seer will laser you if you try to use non-skimmer mounts, which I think is neat. I appreciate that you get a bit of time before he shoots, so you can still risk using your other mounts for short bursts; that allows you to use the warclaw for a bit of CC, for example. Besides that, the main mechanic you'll see is Simon Says. Sometimes you'll get frozen in place and have to solve the minigame to unfreeze yourself. I think this is a pretty interesting mechanic, actually, and it's executed much better here than the almost identical mechanic in the Aquatic fractal's Jellyfish Beast fight, where pressing the wrong buttons will rapidly kill you; that's very annoying, since you'll usually be doing a damage rotation and could instantly kill yourself by pressing a ton of buttons the second you get Simon Says'd, so I'm glad the All-Seer is kinder on that front. I do wish you had a little more time to react between when the indicators appear and when you get frozen, though; as it stands, sometimes you get downed by other attacks while frozen and there's just nothing you can do about it.

There's a pretty neat mechanic where you get tethered to another player. You'll both be empowered if you stand near each other, but take damage if you split up. This is a fun idea, but I feel like it's a little too complex in its nature for a world boss and would be much more at home in a raid. It also shows up way too infrequently, not to mention how annoying it can be to get tethered to someone who refuses to stand in melee range of the boss. The other mechanic that appears in the center is the rising boulders from Gwyllian's fight. I honestly didn't even notice these until my, like, sixth time doing the meta. Both these and the tether feel very underutilized.

My final critique isn't entirely the game's fault, but I've also found players' inability to split up well very frustrating with this meta. Lots of metas have mechanics where you must kill multiple bosses at the same time, but this one doesn't, so you often end up with most of a squad following the tag and killing each of the bosses one at a time. This is most painful for the pipes event near the beginning. Please, people, pay attention and split up for Kormir's sake.

My critique here came off as a bit of a mixed bag, but that's mostly because I'm a pedantic motherfucker and like to get into the nitty-gritty. Overall, I'm a pretty big fan of this meta. I really wish it had better rewards, and for that reason alone I don't expect I'll do it super often after I finish all the other achievements in the map, but it's a good time nonetheless. Good job, ANet!

Conclusion

Overall, I think The Only Way is a very strong showing. Its biggest flaw, in my opinion, is that it lacks any instanced content whatsoever—with the fractal, convergence, and second strike all coming in the final patch, this one had absolutely nothing to offer to players who primarily care about those gamemodes. The fact that the convergence wasn't included here is particularly confusing to me, since I can only assume it will feature Kela, Gwyllian, and maybe the All-Seer's avatar(s); why delay it when those are all already present?

Ultimately, that's more a problem of strange decision-making for the expansion overall rather than a problem specifically borne of this patch itself. The content we did get here is incredible. Eternity's Garden brings VoE to a perfect three-for-three when it comes to stellar new maps, Shackles of the Ancients is a great meta, and the direction the story is taking is very promising. I love how much focus was put on the character arcs of our companions here, I love that Kuda got to be fun and intimidating instead of just another stepping stone to Vloxx, and I'm incredibly curious to see how things end.

Commenting a bit more on the story side of things, I think dividing the story into a cleaner three-act approach, along with the extra time the team took to develop VoE compared to the previous two expansions, have done wonders for its pacing. At this point in SotO's story, in the 'The Realm of Dreams' release, it felt like we were meandering—new major characters were still being introduced, and subsequently killed off just as fast. I distinctly remember wondering how they could possibly fit everything else that still needed to happen into a single patch. JaWi fared a bit better with 'Repentance', which felt much more solid in a vacuum, but with how rushed parts of the following 'Absolution' patch's story felt, it made the decision to slow things down in Mistburned Barrens seem a pretty poor one in retrospect.

VoE has managed to avoid any such issues, and that makes me confident that it will stick the landing—which is an important improvement, as I'd argue its ending was the most disappointing aspect of JaWi's story. I always try to be optimistic in these reviews, to look for the best way things could play out going forward, and that's clear in my reviews of some of these past patches, even if my predictions were unfortunately not entirely correct. Even if I chose to look past them in favor of what could be accomplished with perfect execution, clear signs were present of the foundational issues that plagued SotO and JaWi. 

Those signs simply aren't present at all here in VoE, and that has me more optimistic than ever. I truly think this is where the team have managed to perfect the production and formula for these shorter expacs. Now we just have to hope that the final patch sticks the landing; for the first time in a while, I can say I think it will without even a shred of wishful thinking.