GW1 graphics update - Did you know about this?

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2018-05-12-how-a-datacenter-blowing-up-led-to-a-massive-graphics-update-for-13-year-old-mmo-guild-wars

I know it's not GW2 but I thought people might like to know - GW1 has had a graphics update! Apparently it happened earlier this week, but I've only just heard about it now (and then completely by chance).

It's not a massive change, they haven't re-done the graphics but they have added a lot of new and improved options which do make the game look better, including and 'advanced' option which does things like increase the level of detail and draw distance and makes sure it's always using the highest quality models (so no more 2D fuzzy trees suddenly replaced with 3D ones as you get closer). Even I noticed a difference after activating the new settings, and I normally struggle to spot small increases in graphics.

Even though I don't play GW1 very often these days I was happy to see it got an update, and I'm amazed the people who did it were willing to devote their free time to it. I'm happy to see there's still so much love for the original, even so long after the sequel was released. :)

Hooray! I played yesterday and it downloaded an update (which almost never happens nowadays), but didn't know about this so didn't think to change the graphics options.

it's a nice change, useless but nice.

@"Danikat.8537" said:https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2018-05-12-how-a-datacenter-blowing-up-led-to-a-massive-graphics-update-for-13-year-old-mmo-guild-wars

I know it's not GW2 but I thought people might like to know - GW1 has had a graphics update! Apparently it happened earlier this week, but I've only just heard about it now (and then completely by chance).

It's not a massive change, they haven't re-done the graphics but they have added a lot of new and improved options which do make the game look better, including and 'advanced' option which does things like increase the level of detail and draw distance and makes sure it's always using the highest quality models (so no more 2D fuzzy trees suddenly replaced with 3D ones as you get closer). Even I noticed a difference after activating the new settings, and I normally struggle to spot small increases in graphics.

Even though I don't play GW1 very often these days I was happy to see it got an update, and I'm amazed the people who did it were willing to devote their free time to it. I'm happy to see there's still so much love for the original, even so long after the sequel was released. :)

They did this at the expense of blowing up their eu based data center for gw2 so... I don't think it's that good.

@AncientYs.8613 said:They did this at the expense of blowing up their eu based data center for gw2 so... I don't think it's that good.

And you know this how? What evidence do you have that a change to GW1 affected GW2? And why would it affect EU but not NA?

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

@AncientYs.8613 said:They did this at the expense of blowing up their eu based data center for gw2 so... I don't think it's that good.

Because of the link that OP posted says that their EU data center based in Frankfurt Germany blew up(more specifically their servers got fried) and these data centers were used to host gw2 servers for Europe. So it primarily affects EU not NA. And now Arena net uses aws (amazon servers) to host all gw2 servers even the ones in Europe where previously the data center in Frankfurt was hosting eu servers.

@AncientYs.8613 said:

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

@AncientYs.8613 said:They did this at the expense of blowing up their eu based data center for gw2 so... I don't think it's that good.

Ah, I see. Thanks.Unfortunately, I think you confused cause & effect: the blow up happened first, unrelated to GW1 graphics.

Our datacenter in Frankfurt blew up (almost literally - the UPS system created a big energy spike and fried some of our equipment [never mind the story about the nearby unexploded bomb from WW2)," Clarke-Willson explained.

"I moved the Guild Wars servers to the US and then started paying attention to this subreddit to see if anyone noticed, because for me (even over VPN to Europe and back), the game worked fine.

The blow up happened first, due a problem with their UPS (universal power supply). It was during the work around to solve that problem that SC-W et al adjusted GW1.

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

@AncientYs.8613 said:

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

@AncientYs.8613 said:They did this at the expense of blowing up their eu based data center for gw2 so... I don't think it's that good.

Our datacenter in Frankfurt blew up (almost literally - the UPS system created a big energy spike and fried some of our equipment [never mind the story about the nearby unexploded bomb from WW2)," Clarke-Willson explained.

"I moved the Guild Wars servers to the US and then started paying attention to this subreddit to see if anyone noticed, because for me (even over VPN to Europe and back), the game worked fine.

Oh okay now I understand. Thanks. I didn't know that the two issues weren't related to each other. Your explanation makes sense out of this matter.

Wasn't this a month ago already? WP posted a video about this on March 24.

@TheNecrosanct.4028 said:Wasn't this a month ago already? WP posted a video about this on March 24.

There was some sort of update back in March, but the one being talked about in the OP happened earlier this week.

So in 12 years we can expect GW2 graphics to be updated. Nice.

@"Kheldorn.5123" said:So in 12 years we can expect GW2 graphics to be updated. Nice.

Perhaps an engine optimized for modern systems? Maybe? I hope so.. But not in 12 years later! Lololol...

Most of these changes could always be forced directly via the driver. So it was probably almost no effort to implement this.

Also it is shameful that GW1 supports MSAA but GW2 doesnt.

@TheNecrosanct.4028 said:Wasn't this a month ago already? WP posted a video about this on March 24.

Back then one dev (Stephan) added a command line for GW1 called -lodfull.

On March 9th, Stephan and another dev (Bill) made an update which turned the same function into an option in the graphics settings, making the prior command line redundant. They also added updates to the chat, including filters, a few updates to the report feature, and expanded the friends/ignore list to double the original length.

They worked on this update on their own time, most of it being off company hours (so they weren't paid for that time).

According to the article they have some more small updates in mind for the future, although that will also be done in their own time so it's likely to be a long time coming. But it's still better than nothing IMO.