Guild Wars 2 beta begins in March

The open beta for Guild Wars 2 will begin in March, according to ArenaNet.

Writing on the official Guild Wars 2 blog, ArenaNet president Mike O’Brien explained the team is in the process of moving forward in the testing process.

“We recently finished our first closed beta test, and we’re now ready to hold progressively larger events.”

Users hoping to get into public beta should expect the invitation process to begin next month.

“In February we’ll invite select press to participate in beta testing, and in March and April we’ll aggressively ramp up the size of our beta test events so that many of you will have a chance to participate.”

He added that the MMO is confirmed to launch later this year.

This news follows last week’s statement from Guild Wars 2 writer Angel Leigh McCoy, who announced the team was outlining plans for its beta and said the game was “coming along smashingly“.

There is no official release date announced for Guild Wars 2.

Guild Wars 2 is setting out to be one of the biggest MMO releases of this year, and alongside the likes of TOR and even The Secret World, it will be interesting to see whether WoW’s subscriber-base continues to branch out to new titles.