In one of the more impressive April Fools' jokes, ArenaNet built a full 8-bit inspired 3D world for your Guild Wars 2 avatar to reminisce in. Super Adventure Box was a nod back to classic platformers, creating a series of jumping puzzles through a lo-fi pixelated land of colourful animals and rainbow spewing clouds. In this video, ArenaNet's Josh Foreman explains the inspiration for the update.
In essence: crazier jumping puzzles - the inexplicably popular agility tests, that somehow provide a satisfying challenge, despite the MMO genre typically using a control scheme entirely unsuited to precision movement. "Our developers created Super Adventure Box out of a desire to see how creative we could be with jumping puzzles and a dream to pay homage to video games of the classic era."
After the Mad King's Clock Tower puzzle from GW2's Halloween 2012 event, the team wanted to outdo themselves with something even more outlandish. A retro trip to the ghost of gaming past provided the excuse to take another leap of faith.
Super Adventure Box wasn't just retro in its looks. ArenaNet also created an authentically 8-bit soundtrack to accompany it. You can hear the 80s console homage at their SoundCloud page , and read about its creation here .
Super Adventure Box will be available in Guild Wars 2 until the end of the month.
