Thank you Guild Wars and Community[edit]
- Hey Guys.
I recently found out about the death of a GW player and wiki's user and it made me surprisingly sad. It also made me strongly melancholy and nostalgic for the good old days when GW was new and exciting and I was part of the massive growing online community of players and wiki users. I doubt many, if even any, people will ever read this with the Guild Wars community ever diminishing but I just wanted to leave some record of my feelings about Guild Wars and it's Wiki and their players and users. The whole experience was a massive part of my life and I miss it and you dearly.
My name is Crohán and when I first encountered Guild Wars, I was about 22 and living in England. I started playing on my brothers account just after release. I was blown away! I loved the total immersion, it was so satisfying my imagination and lust for fantasy and an escape from the mundane and stress of my life. I got my own account after the release of Factions and never looked back. It was about this time that I really got into the Guild Wars wiki in a big way but didn't actually create a user page for some time. Shortly after the release of Nightfall, I met a girl one day when stood about chatting in Kamadan. Over the next few months we became good friend and both got Eye of the North at the same time and began completing that together. On the 29th of February 2008, she came up from London and we met up in person for the first time and began seeing each other. Within a few days of meeting her, I met her beautiful daughter. A few months down the line, we were living together and expecting our first child together. On the 3rd of January 2009, we had a baby girl. Now we were a family of four and had to start looking for some new accommodation. We decided to move to my home town in Ireland and made the move that April.
On the 21st of October 2010, we had our second child together, another girl. All this time, me and my fiancé were still playing Guild Wars most days and I was spending hours a week on the wiki. We were members of the massive Guild Wars community and it felt like we were part of something big and exciting but that was all about to change. With Guild Wars 2 in production and the news that there would be no more campaigns or expansions for Guild Wars, people began to drift away. By the time just before the release of Guild Wars 2, the community has diminished so much and that vas very sad. On the 25th of August 2012 (my birthday), Guild Wars 2 head start went live and we were there. I thought it would be like the start of something beautiful again, like what I imagined it was like when guild wars was released and that I'd be there to witness it from the beginning. In truth, it just wasn't the same as Guild Wars and there was no going back to the Guild Wars I loved. Every time I logged in, I was just astounded by the emptiness of it and it left me with the same empty feeling deep in my chest. It was like we had abandoned it and left it full of ghosts and memories and now that we wanted it back, it was too late. Try as me might, we just couldn't get that old Guild Wars experience back and that broke our hearts. So, we just went back to Guild Wars 2 in the hope that we could find something to fill the hole.
On the 11th of April 2013, we had yet another girl. We continued to play Guild Wars 2 most days and although it was fun in its own way, it just wasn't the same. We would log back in to Guild Wars from time to time, see if we could find any old friends or reignite that old flame but it always left us feeling sad. I would occasionally find myself browsing pages and pages of the Guild Wars wiki, looking for old familiar faces but they were nearly all gone.
It is now the end of August 2014 and we have just found out that the missus is expecting again. This will bring our family to a grand total of 7; me, the missus, the four girls and the expected baby.
It is now March 2015 and we have just had another girl, bringing our family to a grand total of 7; me, the missus and our five girls. All of this, we owe to Guild Wars for bringing us together, for giving us the world of Tyria in which we met.
So, if you're reading this,[edit]
although we have never met and although we almost certainly don't know each other, I want to say "Thankyou!".
If you have ever played Guild Wars, then Thankyou for being a part of such a special game, experience and part of my life.
If you're a wiki user, then Thankyou for keeping the wiki alive by reading, editing and contributing to it.
If you're reading this and you had some part in making or running of the game, then Thankyou from the very bottom of my heart for playing some part in bringing me and my partner together.
If you just ended up here by following links and have never played Guild Wars or used the wiki, then Thankyou for taking the time to read this and help keep the memory of the whole experience alive.
No matter the reason's why you read this, by reading it, you have became part of my whole Guild Wars experience and for that, Thankyou. I know this will sound weird but I love you all too, like distant members of my family I have never met. You see, we all have something in common, we all experienced, in some way, large or small; the Guild Wars Experience.
- Thankyou,
- The friend you never met,
- Cro...
P.S.
If you ever want to contact me about anything Guild Wars, please feel free. You can leave a comment on my talk page and I will be emailed letting me know you have. You can also contact me through my GW2 user space as I use that more often (and again, I will get an email letting me know you have posted). If it is some years since I wrote this and I don't use any of the user spaces, don't worry, I will always leave it so if you comment on my talk page, I will get an email letting me know. No matter how much time passes and irrelevant of if the game even still exists, contact me anyway. Guild Wars will always be such a massive part in my life because it was where I met me partner. For a time it was like my favourite holiday destination or my second home, my home away from home. No amount of time will make me forget it and I will always try make time to reply to anyone that's gone to the effort of contacting me about it.
 Titan Crow 00:15, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
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