ArenaNet has announced a major shift in its live service Guild Wars 2 operation today, ditching separate payments for Living World seasonal add-ons and packaging the narrative storylines alongside the MMO’s expansions instead.

Up until today these Living World releases, which act as narrative links between the major beats of the overall tale of Guild Wars 2, have been sold separately from major content expansions. Now, players who buy an expansion like Heart of Thorns will get a Living World season free of charge.

The problem with how this used to work was it meant players who just bought expansions would miss information about what key characters were up to, and major developments would be left largely unexplained. With this new DLC model, you’ll be able to get the full picture without forking out extra cash.

Those who own the base game get season one of Living World, while those who buy the game’s first expansion Heart of Thorns receive Living World season two. Seasons three and four are packaged alongside the Path of Fire expansion, while the final Living World season comes with End of Dragons. Any missing episodes from these Living World seasons are automatically added to accounts who own the aforementioned expansions.

For those who have bought any Living World DLC after 12th September, gems (premium in-game currency) will be added as a recompense to your account. This includes those who bought Guild Wars 2 bundles including the appropriate expansions.

“Our goal with these changes is to make jumping into Guild Wars 2 as seamless as possible,” reads the Guild Wars 2 blog post announcing this change. “By increasing the value of our expansions and simplifying the purchasing options, we are making it easier than ever for new and returning players to dive into the vast, evolving world of Tyria.”

This change comes at an interesting time for ArenaNet and Guild Wars 2. With Guild Wars 3 announced, the team has trickled out early information ahead of a beta release in autumn 2027. As for Guild Wars 2, it’s to be reinvigorated, with older parts of the game refreshed and a Hall of Monuments system allowing players to unlock rewards for Guild Wars 3 by completing certain tasks in Guild Wars 2.

At the same time, the original Guild Wars has been rebooted with Guild Wars Reforged. Ported to mobile and given love through recent updates, the full suite of Guild Wars games is undergoing something of a renaissance. This change to the DLC model appears to be streamlining the process of getting into the series for newcomers tempted to embark on a big MMO and a pretty good one at that.