Guild Wars players uncover a sword hidden in the game for eight years

A blade that had remained hidden in the original Guild Wars for eight years was finally discovered by sleuthing fans earlier this week.

Silver Edge, a blade named after one of the game's more prolific Wiki contributors, would have likely remained undiscovered if not for a tease from former ArenaNet developer Matthew Moore. Last week, Moore responded to ex-Vlambeer developer JW Nijman's call for interesting easter eggs by sharing one of his own—along with a crumb of a clue to give players a long-overdue starting point.

The seeds of this secret were sown a little earlier, with an anonymous wiki poster claiming last August that they'd "heard from an ex-dev" about a riddle related to the Xunlai Archivist NPCs. More confirmed that they were indeed onto something, and with the first sign down, players immediately got to work trying to hunt down this secret. 

Much of their progress is logged on a Reddit thread—and while trying not to spoil the surprise too much, Moore does chip in now and again to try and point the MMO detectives in the right direction (no, frogs aren't involved). But even as he contacted fellow former devs to try and weigh in on the puzzle, there was a strong chance the item was flat-out broken after nearly a decade of updates.

"It's eight-years-old, unmonitored, unmaintained content", Moore admitted in a wiki post. "Will it work? Probably. But even if you can cobble together the proper steps to perform this magic trick, it also may not."

Thankfully, the easter egg still works—and was eventually discovered yesterday by redditor Evaziel. Activating several requirements (Fortune Of The Gods and Lucky Aura), Evaziel ate a cupcake (tasty!) in front of an NPC named Kilroy in Lake Drakkar, before using an ability named Light Of Deldrimor. That effect summons a Silver Vaettir who, when killed, drops the long-hidden blade. 

The sword itself isn't particularly special. It shares an appearance with blades that are far easier to obtain, and its stats aren't earth-shattering. But it stands as a trophy to the community's investigative prowess, and effectively immortalises one wiki contributor's name in the game.

All said, it took just under three days for the community to acquire the sword after discovering its existence. That's some remarkably fast sleuthing. But Moore admits that, "knowing what [he does] about puzzle design now", he could've made the puzzle a little better—or at least, not have left it lying in silence for nearly a decade.