ArenaNet and Guild Wars 2 have recently been hit by a rather large amount of layoffs, around a hundred people in total. As you might imagine, this caused quite a bit of chaos within ArenaNet, as well as put the future of Guild Wars 2 into question.
In order to address these concerns and showcase what exactly they're working on, the Guild Wars 2 developers have now announced their plans for the future. The details are obviously lacking as ArenaNet doesn't want to commit to anything specific just yet, but thankfully it does appear that Guild Wars 2 will continue chugging along quite nicely.
"Content teams will have more flexibility to decide what makes sense for a given release—for example, we could focus on expanding the boundaries and content of an existing map if that would provide a better experience than creating a new one," reads the official update. "Ultimately, this will mean a relatively steady release of new content that will allow us to continue telling the story of Tyria in exciting new ways."
"We’re currently adding more polish to the final encounter in the next raid, which continues the story of Qadim and will get its own release after Episode 6. We’re utilizing one of the new team’s efforts to build some additional small-scale open world content so all of our players will have something to celebrate with the release of the raid."
The Warclaw mount is the latest major addition
When it comes to long-term goals, ArenaNet is currently working on a build template system, the option to salvage sigils and runes, as well as a significant overhaul of the cooking profession. There will also be improvements to the World vs World mode, including more interesting rewards and new PvP festivals, though the developers are currently unable to give any specific details.
"We’ve mentioned in the past how important world restructuring is to our WvW initiatives, and that hasn’t changed," continues the update. "While the Programming Team is focused on this initiative, the team is also focusing on smaller updates that can temporarily change the game mode, like the No Downed State Week we’ve done in the past."
"It’s our hope that through posts like this we can help clarify for you what our priorities and goals are for the game. And while this isn’t everything we have planned for the game, it at least gives you better insight into its development. The team is passionate about not only supporting Guild Wars 2, but continuing to grow it alongside all of you."
Where exactly this leaves the much-anticipated third expansion, I'm afraid ArenaNet hasn't specified. However, given this update and their plans for the future, it seems we're going to have to wait for quite a while before the expansion arrives, if it even ends up being a thing. Personally, I do hope they end up finding the time and resources to make a brand new expansion because both Path of Fire and Heart of Thorns were thoroughly enjoyable!
Whatever the case may be, I'll make sure to let you know once ArenaNet releases more details. Until then, make sure to unlock the new Warclaw mount!