Here's a link to the googledoc listing who has expressed an interest thus far! Add yourself and post in here if you're willing and able to saddle up with us.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AgXPgFSj9DsddFRsd2dRZDFPVmo2RkRwX0xyeElFU2c

Hello, I like the video games and I guess that if you are on this virtual website, you probably like them too! If so, that's mega cool of you and I think if you want to play this new fangled Guild Wars 2 then you are even cooler than that.

What I want to do is play with you guys and gals (I'm on that ever-growing beta roster list, which you can find over here) and then create some video and/or audio recording our thoughts and deepest feelings, whether we do this live whilst playing the game or after the fact I'm not sure of yet (we could do both, if you're really keen). I'm essentially wanting to do this as I'm very much looking forward to this game and want to talk to you cool cats about it. I don't get to have much real-time interaction with people talking about the heights and depths of what I consider to be the greatest entertainment medium so far created by human hands. And I want to damnit, you can't stop me!

I will be a complete newbie to GW2, although I did play something like a dozen hours of GW1 many years ago, I basically count as a newborn in the grand scheme of things. As to my previous experience with the genre, it doesn't quite stretch back to MUD1 but I have played some MMO games before, namely Ultima Online, Anarchy Online, EverQuest, Star Trek Online, Phantasy Star Online and World of Warcraft. So I do consider myself able to use a mouse and keyboard to some degree. My point here is that I'm not looking for someone to experience the game with/talk about it who isn't able to accept and deal with a player who is not as good as them. That is not to say that I wouldn't LOVE to work with and learn from a better player than myself, but they'll need to be able to not throw a shit fit when I fuck up/don't play the best at all times/not know everything about the entire Guild Wars series.

Ideally we would have a mix of a few different skill levels and personality types to bring some different points of view to the table, but whatevs, I'm cool if you're cool. So, let me know if you want to join forces, here is a sample of my voice for your consideration:

My voice is terrible (at least to my ears) but I might be interested in such a thing. Not much GW experience but plenty of WoW time to give me knowledge into what might make this a better MMO over previous ones.

Sounds like fun! I'm definitely up for it. I will post more when I get home.

@wemibelec90: @selfconfessedcynic: Thanks for your replies guys, I hope we can work something out between us. Just to let y'all know, I am UK-based and therefore a few hours ahead of your time zones (assuming you are both in The New Land), I am able to play at some crazy hours of the night anyway. Let me know where you are and what time you are, if you can.

I'll probably take part in any mumble chat in game, so if you're just gonna record that I'll join in, but I don't like my voice enough to go out of my way to record it.

@Fattony12000: Well, tony, if you check out the beta roster you'll have a general idea of what times I can be on for the weekend itself, and they are indeed a bit random looking, as I'm 10 hours in front of even you (In Australia here, rather than the US).

I'll be available for post-dubbing if you want to do a comments video or a QA video, and if you can align your timings with what I've put on the roster, then I'll be more than happy to do a live chat with you. I can even create a group on our mumble server if you want to use that for the conversation. How do you plan to get the audio working? recording everything on your end?

I can probably make a copy of my own, but will need some direction as to what you're looking for (for example, I could make an audacity recording of my end of the conversation, or adobe audition for that matter). Do you want us to post process our audio files or do you want to put them together first and process them that way? (probably the latter, I'd say).

In general, it would be great to hear how you've done this in the past and what you think the right method would be for this.

I hope to see you on - as for my voice, well, it's passable. I don't think anyone has complained about it : )

This sounds like a really cool idea, best of luck with it! I'd love to join you but I probably shouldn't put myself down as I have exams soon and don't even know if I can play much this weekend... Plus, while I have played a hundred odd hours of Guild Wars, I'm very unversed in MMO's otherwise and am coming to GW2 purely cause the first game was awesome. I'll pop in to the GB Mumble when I'm on though!

A quick note to all my fellow beta bombers, you can nab the client and start downloading right now if you like!

http://cloudfront.guildwars2.com/pVRS48PNCNhr0nlwfSIGf2jVkt4AhkjAVCp0IUp3ptvHlENECYbMWlJ49hwCn1J/Gw2.zip

@selfconfessedcynic: Thanks for your reply and enthusiasm for the idea, I'll work out what's going to be the best way to do this for those who want to participate, soon. I imagine it would be best to have everyone record their own audio as a backup, but I'll record everyone at my end via mumble/skype/vent of course. I've had some experience in video and audio editing (nothing professional), but I've never done what anyone would call a podcast. The kind of thing I'd be looking for on the podcast would be:

1. A quick run through of people's experience with the Guild Wars series in general/race and class choices for the beta/how much time put into the game so far.

2. Each person to talk about the specifics of how they started their game, just the opening 60 minutes or so. If we were playing together in a party (or even in multiple, separate parties), we could give our group impressions of the character creation/starting areas/voice acting/cut-scenes/graphics/stuff that's especially good or hyper shit.

3. General chat interspersed with questions/arguments posed to different people. For example, a newbie like me could ask a more pro player about a particular issue I found with the game, or what would be a better way to solve a quest.

4. As to one of the reasons why I'd like to do this...since I love video games more than anyone else on the planet, I figured it would be a good time to at least give something like this a go before I die. I've been wanting to talk with fellow gamers about games for around 13 years now, and you gotta start somewhere!

@Fattony12000: Cheers for the linkski! And again, hope your podcast-esque thing goes well!

Dude, where in the sweet tits is this client saving all this shit it's downloading? It better not be on my C:// drive, I want the game and everything with it on my storage drive... Any idea how to change it?

I'm totally down for this. I planned on doing something similar on my personal gaming blog (shameless self-promoting link) with at least 1 friend of mine, and I think it would be great to do it for the GB community as well.

@Chavtheworld: Thanks very much for your support! It's going straight into the 'Gw2' folder, right next to the .exe file. It's that file called Gw2.dat, notice how it keeps getting larger and larger? I would imagine you just close the client and move it to wherever you want it to be.

@shinboy630: I'll add you to the list. That's right I'm making a list now. A hot sexy list. And plans...mmm...

@Fattony12000: Ahhhh sweet, that's good then cause the installer is already on my E drive :D

@Fattony12000 said:

I don't get to have much real-time interaction with people talking about the heights and depths of what I consider to be the greatest entertainment medium so far created by human hands. And I want to damnit, you can't stop me!

I'm in the same boat duder. I would love to talk to someone while playing in this beta weekend :D Count me in.

A slight issue, though: Are you guys all in American time zones? I'm in EU, so that could cause some issues with timing and so on? :(

I'd be way into this if I still had a working mic.

I would also be into this idea. I plan to hopefully do lots of live streaming as well, so if we're playing and talking at the same time at all, people could go there to check it out live! Definitely add me to the list though. I have no real life friends that are interested in the game, and thus, no one to discuss my experiences with. Well, I am on a podcast, but they didn't seem too thrilled last time I went on about WoW, so I imagine a GW2 information explosion probably wouldn't go over so well either.

Also, thanks for the link!

@Chronologist: I'm in the UK, I'm going to be making a googledoc to list who can do what, and when and where. I'll PM it everyone interested and link it in my OP when it's done. Expect to see that tomorrow (Wednesday).

@Dark_Lord_Spam: Your input will still be valued through the medium of text, I am also heavily inclined to make use of my fairly hefty PC to record lots of video too, if you'll be playing with us anyway then please share what you got to give! Also, microphones are pretty cheap /winkyface

@Dourin: Sounds good to me, see my above message to Chrono.

@Fattony12000: Ok Cool. Looking forward to the weekend :D

@Fattony12000:

I am in the United States but my playtimes usually stretch on into the night. Odds are, I would be on at times that would easily allow me to play with people in Europe. As I said earlier, my voice would only hurt the ears of everyone who listens to me but I'd be willing to talk about my experiences if someone wanted me to. Otherwise, I could add some form of text to the discussion.

I guess I'd be up for this, but I'll need to find a working mic first. I've spent at least 2000 hours in GW1, but that by all means doesn't make me an expert at GW2 or GW1 lore. I'll naturally know the major events and major characters from the original, but I was never invested in the lore. I can elaborate on the professions moving to GW2 and their previous roles in GW1, but it's been at least 4 years since I actively played GW1.

This BWE I plan to spend the time deciding on the profession and race for my future main. I'm on EDT.

I'm down with this, and living in Norway, my timezone is skewed nothing more than an hour.

I recalculated when I'll be available on the first day of the beta. How does a mumble chat discussing the topics you have in mind at any time for the first 11 hours of the beta sound? : D

So we can do that character creation discussion as we make them or just afterwards if you wish.

So here's me and @Tarkhein having a short chat about this BWE to test our end of things. We recorded on the mics we currently own, using Skype for Tarkhein's side of things and me using a personal recording for mine then superimposing the audio streams.

It was originally intended to be posted on Tarkhein's youtube channel which is why he intros then I promptly take over : P

I wouldn't mind hearing feedback about audio quality, etc - and yes, I know half of one of my email addresses is visible, that is why I've kept the video unlisted.

I uploaded it in 720p, but I guess that is still processing atm (not that it really matters - it's just the login screen + music, but uno, could be useful to know for later).