If you know a Guild Wars 2 fanatic who has a tendency to tinker with low-level code, kiss that person goodbye for a while. Arenanet is taking a leap beyond the standard player-generated MMO game events to let players actually create tools and apps using data from the game server. That includes mobile apps for iOS and Android.
“We have a team working on exposing some of the code to the player base,” said Arenanet content designer Mike Zadorojny, speaking to MMO game site PC GamesN. “We have APIs the players can tie into. The fans are already working on a Google Maps for Tyria that lets you zoom in and see what’s going on at the individual map level.”
According to the game’s official Wiki, the API allows access to server data that goes well beyond maps and matches. There are ways to access and document world events including those that are still active or about to take place. If the event’s completed, there’s a way to see if it was a success or failure. There’s also data for mapping and documenting what’s been discovered by players in the games, things such as hidden items and recipes for crafting.
Zadorojny has hinted that the effort takes some burden off of Arenanet, letting them see what players can do with the reams of data on hand while their team focuses on real game updates. The developer has been quickening updates from initially once a month to twice monthly content drops. Zadorojny said it’s part of Arenanet’s strategy to make Guild Wars 2 a living MMO world.
“Now we’re seriously looking at how the world changes based on player interaction. That’s why we’ve been moving towards this more frequent build structure,” said Zadorojny. “We’ve got four teams building content that will be coming out every two weeks, because we want to create a true living world that reacts to what the players are doing as much as possible. That’s kind of been the holy grail for MMOs. If you can have enough engaging content, you keep the player excited and challenged. They’re always going to have something new every time they log in. That’s really the impetus behind what we’re doing.”
