Today, the dailies in Guild Wars 2 included Ascalon Slayer and Puzzle Jumper, so I grabbed an alt I’ve been levelling and headed over to do some completion in Diessa Plateau. It’s not my first time doing the skill challenge, vista, and jumping puzzle associated with The Breached Wall, but it is my first time doing it in a while. If I’m honest, it’s been weeks since I did any jumping puzzle without invoking mesmer shenanigans and months since I’ve done the one in the south of the Diessa Plateau. I’m a bit out of practice at jumping puzzles, but I think I’m a fairly average jumper and Wall Breach Blitz is a fairly average jumping puzzle.
It’s impossible for me to play through this puzzle and not get a little nostalgic. This is the Breach. This is where the Foefire hit and the humans of Ascalon all died at the hands of Charr legions and their own sorcerer-king. At the same time I was death-leveling my Guild Wars: Prophecies character in that wall, I was speaking with friends about the reported verticality of Guild Wars 2. I remember having conversations about whether we would all just fall off of stuff all the time next to that wall in the original game and now I get to fall off on it in the modern world. Jumping puzzles in general make me nostalgic because the first time I ever saw someone jump in Guild Wars was at the ArenaNet offices from the very top of The Grove, but Wall Breach Blitz especially gives me feelings because I do remember Ascalon before the wall collapsed and you could scramble up it.
Despite my strong love of this jumping puzzle for its lore and back story I think mechanically it could be better. I believe that there shouldn’t be enemies on a jumping puzzle and there are ghosts crawling all over the broken Great Northern Wall. My reason for saying this is that jumping puzzles are stressful enough without worrying about the ghosts respawning and crippling you on your run-up. I don’t mind tough enemies and I don’t mind tough jumps, but I don’t think they belong together because they feel like a distraction from each other. The whole time I’m fighting I just want to not kite the enemy off the edge and the whole time I’m jumping I’m unduly stressed by the possibility I’m going to be killed by an enemy. Both have a place in games, but they are not easy bedfellows.
The other thing that irks me about Wall Breach Blitz as a jumping puzzle is that the last two jumps are the hardest. I like to be challenged when I’m playing games, but I feel that after five minutes of effort I’ve earned a break. When the super exciting rewards are one jump away, I get extremely excited and slightly spastic. The tough jumps can be in the middle or even close to the end of a puzzle, but if I can see the prize you should just let me have it. I completed this Ascalonian puzzle more than once because I fell on the last jump.
I have a few gripes, but overall I think Wall Breach Blitz is a good jumping puzzle. At the end you get an achievement, vista, treasure chest, and skill so it feels rewarding. None of it is too hard so it is a fun way to introduce people to the world of jumping puzzles. If you know someone who still loves Guild Wars then show them Wall Breach Blitz as it has the nostalgia value plus the modern rewards. Have fun and happy jumping.
