Players of the current Guild Wars campaigns and the expansion will be allowed to "port" achievements obtained in the original series into Guild Wars 2 via the Hall of Monuments location in the Eye of the North expansion which will also be present in Guild Wars 2. Player character names will be reserved from the original series for their owners' use in Guild Wars 2; however, the characters themselves will not be transferable from the original series.

As of 2008, the game is in alpha production. The following gameplay elements have been announced in press-releases, concept art, and interviews. The most easily visible change will be that avatars in Guild Wars 2 will be able to move in three dimensions. They will also be able to interact with the environment such as by breaking objects with weapons or setting objects on fire.

Guild Wars 2 will offer four new playable races in addition to the humans from Guild Wars 1: the Charr, sentient bipedal cat-like creatures originally introduced in the Prophecies campaign; the Norn, tall solitary humanoids who excel in armed combat introduced in the Eye of the North expansion; the Asura, short bipedal creatures with high intelligence and advanced mastery of magic also introduced in Eye of the North; and the Sylvari, hive-minded creatures born from a magical plant that share a common Dream of Dreams.

Guild Wars 2 will change a number of gameplay elements of the original series. Early interviews revealed that Guild Wars 2 will have a much higher maximum character level than 20, the maximum level of player characters in the original series. One of the major developer concerns is "to avoid forcing players into the grind-based gameplay that too often accompanies a high level cap." To accomplish this Guild Wars 2 to will give players "a strong sidekicking system, similar to that used in City of Heroes"; that is, high-level characters will be able to transfer their powers to lower-level friendly characters in the same party.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guild_Wars_2