Utopia, time and mist oddities, and our current story,

Now that we have Kralk devouring reality and creating time rifts, I wonder how likely it is that we'll have some strange beings from the mists popping out.

Perhaps beings like Virrastra and the Sun boss from the fractal. Maybe even some concepts from the scrapped Utopia Guild Wars 1 expansion. If you look at some of the concept art for it you can tell that it was meant to be an Aztec/Mayan themed, or at least partially themed expansion. Not that this means anything, but we had the gecko springer skin, the legendary scepter, and the new Siren's Reef assets that all have kind of that similar ancient civilization theme. Siren's Reef fits the Aztec theme a little less, but I still get the feeling that wherever this story is headed we'll be seeing a lot more of these assets.

We also had the Timekeeper Outfit which has always been curious to me, and if I'm not mistaken came before we found out Kralk was capable of creating time rifts everywhere. But it gives me a major Chronomancer vibe, even though the Utopia concept art is a little bit more cyborg.

A lot of the other outfits people have been claiming to be very Canthan-themed, and I only played Guild Wars 1 for the first time last year and am not fancy enough to know which outfits were originally in there, it seems possible that some of these outfits could fit into the Utopia theme as well. (Ancient civilizations and such.)

The most logical resolution is still Aurene and it wouldn't make sense to jump into a different world in the Mists while Kralk is alive, the idea of having an expansion in a foreign world in the mists could still be enticing. Or at least a living season. The difficult part of that is that I'm pretty sure they said they weren't able to do entire zones in the mists or something, but it's just a thought.

Would also be an interesting way to introduce a new race into the game as well as new elite specs.

As much as I would love to see Cantha, and want Aurene to resolve our current dilemma, it would be neat to see some of this concept art come into the game at some point.

And tying back to the beginning, could Virrastra and that sun boss be beings from these civilizations?Could this potentially also be where humans originated from?Or, if not humans, then perhaps the Forgotten?Perhaps where Samarog and some of the demonic entities in Bastion are from?

https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Guild_Wars_Utopia - Link to the description of the canceled/"readapted" expansion.https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Category:Utopia_world_concept_art - World concept art.https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Category:Utopia_character_concept_art - Character concept art.

As much as I would love to see Cantha, and want Aurene to resolve our current dilemma, it would be neat to see some of this concept art come into the game at some point.

I don't think ArenaNet intends to return to the Utopia plot. For two reasons. First is that in the Episode 4 AFC, Linsey Murdock stated that they're keeping open world maps to the world map itself, so we won't have open world zones in The Mists, etc. Incidentally, this also crosses Cantha off the list of possible locations unless a) they change their mind and create a new world map (ala GW1), or b) expand the map so large that we have to scroll past one or two monitor's worth of pure water to go from Cantha to Elona/Tyria.

Secondly, the concept art always led me to believe that Menzies was to play a major player, and it's been heavily implied he's now dead. Even if they change the plot a lot, Utopia was to be exploring the family of the Six Gods, and it seems to me they've gone a different route with godhood since then. On top of that, there would be too heavily a similarity with asuran architecture and the Utopian architecture, unless they completely revise the thematic style of Utopia.

IMO, Utopia as it was planned will never show up. We might visit the location, but the style will no doubt change drastically. If we were to visit the plot by now, it'd likely be as a GW1 expansion (and that's downright even more unlikely).

Aztec theme already existis in the game(old temples in the tropical jungle) = Verdant Brink.

@ugrakarma.9416 said:Aztec theme already existis in the game(old temples in the tropical jungle) = Verdant Brink.

The elonian architecture?

@"cptaylor.2670" said:We also had the Timekeeper Outfit which has always been curious to me, and if I'm not mistaken came before we found out Kralk was capable of creating time rifts everywhere. But it gives me a major Chronomancer vibe, even though the Utopia concept art is a little bit more cyborg.

Don't think there was anything concrete in game suggests it was created by Kralk on purpose, more probably a side effect of Kralk rampaging in the mist and opening rifts everywhere to chase after Aurene

also, it's most likely Kralk only obtained after absorbing part of left over Balthazar's magic since he never demonstrated such ability, and Balthazar being a mist walker

@Konig Des Todes.2086 said:I don't think ArenaNet intends to return to the Utopia plot. For two reasons. First is that in the Episode 4 AFC, Linsey Murdock stated that they're keeping open world maps to the world map itself, so we won't have open world zones in The Mists, etc. Incidentally, this also crosses Cantha off the list of possible locations unless a) they change their mind and create a new world map (ala GW1), or b) expand the map so large that we have to scroll past one or two monitor's worth of pure water to go from Cantha to Elona/Tyria.

I thought about this and came to the conclusuion that they can actually pull this off.The simple tool of scrolling would allow us to zoom out, marvel at a full map of Tyria and zoom back into cantha.The map is fine, the interface just needs to be updated to make it work. Then again, interfaces are not set in stone, if Anet want's to go all out the could project the map onto a globe, so that Tyria the planet can be observed from space. The 3D map might need a skybox, for which I suggest an expanded version of Twilight's space, giving the legendary greatsword a connection with the world itself.