NC Soft today announced that more than 500,000 participated in the recent sneak peak weekend with more than 3 million hours of play logged. That's a hell of a lot of people. Guild Wars Factions will launch for real on the 28th of April with an RRP on £29.99.

More information at eu.guildwars.com

"We knew that by focusing on new ways to play and new things to do within the game, such as the 12x12 Alliance Battles, which were extremely popular with both PvP and roleplaying gamers, that fans would respond enthusiastically," says Jeff Strain, co-founder of ArenaNet. "This weekend reinforced that we are on the right track with Guild Wars Factions and are making a game that rises to the challenge to be innovative and ever-compelling for its fans."