ArenaNet



ArenaNet - located in Bellevue, Washington, USA - is the development studio that makes Guild Wars. Their mission is to "create a state-of-the-art, interactive game network and design premier multiplayer online games for dedicated game players."

ArenaNet is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Korean company NCsoft, publishers of other MMORPGs such as City of Heroes and Lineage 2.

Note: In colloquial chat, on forums and in this wiki, the name ArenaNet is often shortened to "ANet" or "A.Net".

History
ArenaNet was founded in 2000 by Mike O'Brien, Patrick Wyatt and Jeff Strain. All three of them came from Blizzard Entertainment and were previously involved in the development of multiplayer online games such as Warcraft, Diablo, StarCraft, World of Warcraft and the Battle.net gaming network.

The newly-formed business was originally called "Triforge", but was changed to "ArenaNet" shortly after.

ArenaNet was acquired by NCsoft in 2002.

Staff
Over the years, ArenaNet has grown to 100+ employees. Besides the three founders there are several other staff members "visible" to the community, for example Gaile Gray, Andrew Patrick, Emily Diehl, Regina Buenaobra and Isaiah Cartwright. A full list of the ArenaNet team can be found in the game credits.

NC West
On September 10 2008 NCsoft decided to unite ArenaNet with NC Interactive, NC Europe and NC Austin under the management of a new organization, NC West, based in Seattle by the end of 2008.

News and announcements
There are several outlets which ArenaNet uses to inform players about the game:


 * On their website: The Guildwars homepage offers news about the game. For convenient reading, all of those are copied here on the wiki at GuildWars.com News.


 * At the login screen: Short messages inform players about important updates while logging in. An archive of all login messages is at Login screen announcements.


 * In the game: ArenaNet representatives sometimes use the Frog or the Monastery Scribe to talk to players ingame about new developments. Unofficial transcripts of these sessions are stored at the Frog Talk.


 * On the wiki: Several ArenaNet employees use the wiki to release information to the players via the wiki:
 * The Community Managers maintain the Developer Updates page
 * Isaiah Cartwright sometimes releases information about new skills or skill balancing on various wiki pages.
 * Game updates are often directly reported onto the wiki before the website by Emily Diehl.
 * Other ArenaNet employees use wiki pages or their own talk pages to inform about various aspects of the game related to their field of specialisation.

Player feedback
ArenaNet uses the wiki to give users a possibility to get into contact with the developers regarding various issues:


 * Feedback:Main gives access to the bug report, skill feedback, and suggestion articles.
 * Regina Buenaobra is the American Community Coordinator for Guild Wars.
 * Martin Kerstein is the German Community Coordinator for Guild Wars.
 * Gaile Gray, Support Liaison, has a Support Issues sub-page off of her talk page as well as a Support FAQ page.
 * John Stumme is the Guild Wars Live Team Lead and therefore responsible of changes and additions for Guild Wars 1.
 * Note: Using the wiki is a great opportunity to relate comments and grievances to ANet, but please be aware that many players use this feature. Before posting, please check previous topics to see whether your concern already has been addressed and use this page to find out whether you are posting at the correct page, especially whether you are at the correct subpage. And always remember: A friendly question is twice as likely to be answered than an angry rant. Remember, the wiki is not a forum.