[AsheMan]

So the release date is December 20, 2011, just in time for the Christmas season. I'll be buying it or ask for it as a present. Unfortunately, I always visit family over the holidays and won't be able to spend that time diving into SWTOR.

In general, SWTOR seems like it's going to be a fairly standard MMO in terms of combat, quests, and gear. The graphics are better than most other MMOs. The full voice acting is superior when compared to any other MMO. The dialogue wheel is interesting, but I'm unsure if your choices really effect the game.

I haven't seen much regarding space combat, but it sounds like it will be fairly linear like a Starfox mission (if any of you played that game).

Each side only has four classes, and I think they went the route of Warhammer Online and the opposing faction's classes somewhat mirror each other to try and keep a balance in PVP. Hopefully it's done better than what Warhammer offered.

My biggest worry about SWTOR is that it will be so similar to other MMOs, that I'll devour the content within a month or two and get bored of the game. We'll see.

I'm expecting massive initial sales, possibly record breaking, and then followed by a steady decline as people max out and quit. Hopefully I'm wrong. I'd love nothing more than an MMO to reinvigorate my feelings towards the genre. It's been way too long since I've played an MMO that felt like it could be my home for a substantial amount of time.

[Fozzik]

If anyone would be interested in contributing to the site... by keeping up on the SW:TOR news and posting it to our news page, let me know.

[tdewey10]

Originally Posted by AsheMan

My biggest worry about SWTOR is that it will be so similar to other MMOs, that I'll devour the content within a month or two and get bored of the game. We'll see.

Yep. In the end the SW fans will be the ones that remain - there just doesn't seem to be a ton of 'game' there for folks who like exploring. Fortunately for Bioware/LA there are a lot SW fans.

I'll buy it and play it - but I don't see it lasting more than two months on my comp (time to maxlevel).

[mmorpeegee]

I'm not even planning on trying it, but I'll be interested to hear what you guys say about it.

[mmorpeegee]

Hmm I might have to change my tune... I have heard some really good things about this. I basically had about 0 to 1% interest in this game but after talking to some guy earlier who is in beta, it got me pretty excited. He said that it is very story driven and all the quests are full voiced... He said it gives such a great feel like you are playing a gigantic RPG rather than a bunch of 'skip the txt' MMO quests. And he said there are dark and light choices that affect the game.

But most importantly of all (to me at least), he said the combat is great. He said there is no autoattack and that it's really interactive and fun.

I guess I shouldn't have ignored it after all. Although it's much nicer hearing breaking news that a new MMO is awesome, rather than following one closely for years and then finding out it's a piece of crap :P

[perfect]

Originally Posted by mmorpeegee

...He said it gives such a great feel like you are playing a gigantic RPG rather than a bunch of 'skip the txt' MMO quests. And he said there are dark and light choices that affect the game....

This is about it's only saving grace. Would have been a much better single player game.

[AsheMan]

Originally Posted by perfect

This is about it's only saving grace. Would have been a much better single player game.

But single player games rarely charge monthly subscriptions.

[Fozzik]

Originally Posted by AsheMan

But single player games rarely charge monthly subscriptions.

That's probably the thing that most concerns me about the game. It really seems like BioWare just made a good single-player game, then added in a shoddy copy of their wow formula interpretation so they could keep people around and grinding and charge them a monthly fee.

The fact that they seem to often use the single-player RPG elements to "fix" (read: band-aids) issues with the MMORPG elements makes me think they went about this all the wrong way from the outset.

"We just copied the same crappy crafting right over in a simplified, extra-grindy form...but don't worry! You can have your companions do it for you!"

That sort of thing just seems like lazy or idiotic design. My sense is that the same old stale WoW-formula MMORPG lumps and warts are going to poke through before too long, and players are going to find it drags down the RPG experience to the point where it's not worth the subscription fee for more than a month or two.

Real social play seems even more repressed than is typical for a WoW-formula MMO in this design...this too will lead to less retention. The players who stick around long-term will probably do so for the same reason that most pre-ordered the game... It's Star Wars. Some people will take a lot of BS in order to be part of a beloved franchise. Personally, people making crappy products out of franchises I like just makes me want to give them my money even less. Transformers is one of my favorite franchises of all time...and I didn't see the most recent movie at all (and don't plan to).

[mmorpeegee]

That is silly because their monthly fee isn't even going to make them much money if people don't stick around. Even though I had a lot of fun in Rift, I only played for one month... So it wasn't even a subscription, I just bought the game and got a month included and that's it. So they didn't make very much money off me, or my friends. AoC was the same, so was WoW in fact. I think with Vanguard I probably paid for about 3 months so that at least achieved something, but not much.

So they may as well just make a single player game because they aren't going to make any more money off me unless they can keep me playing for many months. The only one to do that so far has been EQ and that was about 10 years ago.

[akinggold]

Hello,the new world.

[perfect]

So strange. They want you uninstall the Beta client so that you can install the Live client when you get it.

Every Beta I've done has patched the Beta Client to the Live Client upon launch. Why are they being obtuse?

[AsheMan]

Originally Posted by perfect

So strange. They want you uninstall the Beta client so that you can install the Live client when you get it.

Every Beta I've done has patched the Beta Client to the Live Client upon launch. Why are they being obtuse?

The beta made us download the 30gb file several times during the various stages of testing. It doesn't surprise me that they want us to do it again.

[perfect]

Originally Posted by AsheMan

The beta made us download the 30gb file several times during the various stages of testing. It doesn't surprise me that they want us to do it again.

That makes sense as they move from test subject to test subject.

It makes no sense not to patch the Beta to a Live version. Also also wik, that means everyone who has a Digital Download will be clogging the tubes trying to download it for the Headstart.

[AsheMan]

There was an update on the SWTOR forums and it said if you played in the beta AFTER Nov. 25th then you can keep the client and just update to the new one. If you're like me and only played in previous betas then you need to uninstall and get the new client.

[perfect]

Originally Posted by AsheMan

There was an update on the SWTOR forums and it said if you played in the beta AFTER Nov. 25th then you can keep the client and just update to the new one. If you're like me and only played in previous betas then you need to uninstall and get the new client.

Thanks, AsheMan.

[perfect]

So, here we are a week away from Head Start and no information about when Head Start will...start? I'd like to know if I'm in the five, four, three, two, or one day HS wave so that I can plan my sic...vacation time appropriately.

[dabble]

I'm really excited to play now. Downloaded it last night, but... I have to wait until the 25th I'm actually excited about Christmas Day for the first time in years. Want to bring back some Christmas magic? Try doing this one year.

[mmorpeegee]

How are you guys liking this so far? I've seen a few really positive reviews!

[Fozzik]

I've been playing since launch, both solo and duo'ing with my wife. I know the game considerably better now than I did during my short time in beta, but I would say my opinion hasn't changed (check out my blog for my long beta review). It's a decent single-player RPG with a badly implemented WoW clone attached.

It's an enjoyable experience as a solo player, and probably worth the price of the box and a few months' sub price to work your way through a few of the class story lines. The worlds, sounds, and graphics are well done overall, and quite immersive with many little touches that really make it Star Wars.

The negative elements are many... The amount of bugs continues to surprise me, considering the budget, manpower, and safe-route design, but I haven't run into any game-breaking issues. I'm also somewhat shocked at many of the elements that were borrowed from WoW's formula years ago...without the improvements that Blizzard has made in those in-between years.

Zone design and quest hubs are very poorly laid out, forcing a TON of running back and forth, and sometimes causing one to completely miss some quests until it's too late, even in starting areas. The zones start to get really large as you move up to the higher level worlds...so the amount of travel (even using the "fast" taxi routes) gets to be quite annoying. There's literally no way to play without going back and forth constantly.

There appears to be no phasing at all...so even the biggest world-altering changes you supposedly make in your story are gone after a quick respawn or stepping out of each mini-instance. I absolutely hate spending hours liberating a factory, culminating in a big climax against a boss...and then having to fight my way back out against the same trash I supposedly whiped out. Oh yeah, I guess I can just port back to base and pretend. =/

Skills are a pain, because you're forced to run back to a trainer every single level to train each new ability and each new rank of your old abilities. Gear is very complicated with mods and augments, even from an early level, and there are a ton of stats to try and figure out without much clear indication of what they do or why. Just to give a bit of an idea...you can get gear as rewards from quests, you can get commendation points to get gear and mods, you can get grouping points to get gear and mods, you can get light side or dark side points to get gear and mods, plus you can get gear from companions crafting. I'm probably leaving something out (PvP points for gear and mods?). But after all that, you still have decide whether it's better to take the upgrade when a new piece of gear arrives, or stick with what you have and augment it. Also needing to outfit your companions means an even greater level of complexity and things to keep track of, and the UI is pretty poor in this department - not intuitive - and sometimes makes things worse.

Combat and class mechanics are in general very mediocre, and sometimes bad. They chose to go the route of the global cooldown, and then they also chose to go with tons of skills with longer cooldowns. At level 25 I have more than thirty abilities on bars cluttering my screen. This is made worse by the fact that basically all mobs are linked in groups of 3, 4, or 5, and special or elite mobs are EVERYWHERE.

I find myself forced in most fights to basically hit every skill, regardless of order...and if a fight lasts too long you're in big trouble... mashing your basic attack and waiting for cooldowns. I very often find the combat to be less responsive than other games...I sometimes find myself mashing buttons two or three times before a skill activates (likely due to individual or global cooldowns, plus stuns and other things that make it even more awkward).

So encounters tend to last long enough where you run out of buttons to push...and most classes have a pretty limited amount of AoE. Instead of any kind of tactics (other than a few basic combinations of certain skills which play off of each other), combat is a jerky, halting experience where you are watching your UI much more than I would like and where combat is often decided by whether you remember to hit ALL of your buttons (in no particular order). Maybe that's some folks' cup of tea...but not mine.

Duo'ing (or grouping outside of the designated instances / areas) is just a flat out pain in the ass. It would take too many words to explain...but it's a mish-mosh of tons of barriers. Basically, you'll need to play the same class and stay right at the same point in the story if you want to play together, and you are still forced to split up and solo on a very regular basis. If you step out of the story track and just go kill some mobs or do the daily group quests....you will likely outlevel your current point in the story and have to deal with trivial content to catch things up.

[mmorpeegee]

Thanks for all the info! Sounds like one to miss from my POV. Although I think my Star Wars fanatic friends should probably give it a shot. I probably would do as well if I had nothing else to play, but VG is serving me well for now, and hopefully GW2 soon!