First Guild Wars World Championship Announced

[Tami]

NCsoft and ArenaNet announce first Guild Wars World Championship

Competition kicks off in October; Finals set for Taiwan in February 2006

BELLEVUE, Wash., September 29, 2005/... Players of the hugely successful Guild Wars? online computer game will soon get a chance to battle for supremacy in the upcoming Guild Wars World Championship. The competition, sponsored by NCsoft? and Guild Wars developer ArenaNet?, will kick off this weekend, and will come to an exciting conclusion with teams from America, Europe and Korea competing in the Guild Wars World Championship Finals during the week of the Taipei Game Show, which takes place February 16 ? 20, 2006 in Taipei, Taiwan.

The inaugural season will begin Saturday, October 1, 2005, as ArenaNet resets the Guild Wars ladder at midnight Pacific Daylight Time (7 AM GMT). The ladder season will last three months, and will lead to playoffs among top-ranked guilds in three regions: America, Europe and Korea. Two eight-player teams from each region will then qualify to compete in Taipei for the Guild Wars world champion title in February 2006. Teams from Taiwan and Japan will also compete in exhibition matches with the world finalists.

"Players have been clamoring for a tournament ever since we launched Guild Wars in April," said ArenaNet Co-founder Jeff Strain. "This sort of global competition has been in our plans from the start, and since the emphasis in Guild Wars is on player skill, the game is perfectly suited for tournament play."

"We are pleased that the inaugural championship playoffs will take place in Taiwan where we'll be able to celebrate the launch of Guild Wars, which will take place just a few weeks prior to the finals," said ArenaNet Business Director Tommy Park.

The announcement comes on the heels of last week's news that Guild Wars surpassed more than one million units sold in North America and Europe. And earlier this month ArenaNet released their Sorrow's Furnace Update, a free expansion of Guild Wars content that offered two new explorable regions, new quests, new monsters, new items and more.