Developer ArenaNet was on-site at this year's PAX Prime, with the exciting headline stating that the next expansion for Guild Wars 2, Heart of Thorns, will release in October of this year.
On top of that news regarding the base game have now emerged, as the game from now on will drop any kind of fee to be played. Upon launch in August of 2012 the developers opted to stay clear of the subscription model, in favour of a more traditional one-time price (same as with the original Guild Wars). That arrangement has ever since been in force, but now they are making to switch to a free-to-play-based system.
In other words, the base game of Guild Wars 2 is now entirely free, and according to the developers they are not doing this to fill the game with microtransactions. They simply want the game to stay alive, while persuading people to buy the upcoming expansion:
" If people are expecting we're going to go in and heavily monetize free players now, that's not what this is about. This is about making the base game available for everyone to try because we believe that when people love Guild Wars 2 they're going to buy Heart of Thorns. We're not changing the way people purchase cosmetic items or adding a bunch of new items in the store. Guild Wars 2 will remain the same game it always has been", ArenaNet writes in a statement.
So, if you've ever been keen on trying out the game, now's your time.