I have no worries about a negative preview, nor positive one. This one meh, I mean I just can't take the "it's like WOW" criticism seriously anymore. All this is, is tunnel vision.
All negativity is focused on popular buzzwords, the trinity, the instance, the phase, the raid, the grind... etc...
There's nothing informative in this sort of feeback, no offer of a better idea. It's just flat out tunnel vision, all anyone can see is WOW, I played wow for like a week tops, that's it since it's been released, I played tops in AOC maybe two months, never even hit 80. 78 to be exact.
LOTRO a week, why? Because there are plenty of other options, you don't have to play every game that releases in this genre, as a result burning yourself out on all of them. This is where the tunnel vision comes from, you've forced yourself through an MMO one to many times, now you can't play them.
The second I have second thoughts about logging in I don't, most of the time never again. The game and I didn't connect, most cases aesthetically, so it felt boring. That's why I almost hit end-game in AOC it wasn't boring until then. Basically the story was over and I wasn't interested in much else. Never had much to complain about with the game either.
Don't play games you don't like, just because it has one thing you do. That way you're not burning yourself out on those few aspects you like. Play full products that you like.
The few full packages I've liked were UO, DAOC and SWG, everything else I wouldn't allow myself to push through simply just to push through..I played those as long as I could and that's it. SWG being the longest from 03-05.
Buzzwords are a buzzkill for all games. people tend to focus more on the positives or negatives of games just off of the propaganda in either direction and don't typically try to sift trough it all to see things for what they are. As it is more easy to lable, bumper sticker or slogan something that it is to put real thought into the reality of the situation. Thus emergers the mentality seen on this form for both sides of the games discusses; a lack of objectivity and an attachment to overtly meaningless idiologies like "WoW Clone".
We go trough life with many yet there is a time we must walk our path alone.
Notice how they say its a "genre-changing" MMO. Those are bold claims when you are basically just changing the way story is presented in an MMO (which is actually like an RPG). For that matter I would also say Rift is "genre-changing", this is one of the things I have problems with. Don't sell it as a "next step" in mmo's if its really probably not (my opinion). Although I know this is more of a marketing gimmick than anything else.
I believe their 'Story' will change the MMO genre. At least the themepark MMOs. The reason is simply that static and neverchanging worlds are no longer enough. For 10 years or so we have completed 'epic' missions that obviously should have changed how the zones should look like. TOR wil paint a new picture of this system. A picture, I hope, others will eventually pick up and develop further.
Wait, wait, wait...SWTOR is doing a dynamic world too? I didn't know of that. Any source for this? I'd love to read up on it.
Yeah me too.. any links?
I have read of different quests and things that have consequences. I know in the Tatooine walkthrough, if you save the sith that is dying in the cave, he will later emerge as a jedi informant or something. I am not sure if theb world physically changes, but I am sure that the choices you make and who you let live or die have consequences.
This is what is meant by "changing" the world. For me its not the same thing at all. It changes your PERSONAL story, and don't get me wrong this is new for MMO's but its not "epic" or "groundbreaking" for me since its the exact same thing we see on all recent Bioware games and many RPG's (branching storylines) just that it's now in an MMO....if it somehow affected the MMO part then I would call it "epic"
Just inspiring thoughtful discussion. It is true I have a distaste for Bioware, EA, some of the managerial staff, WoW clones, and uninspired, unoriginal and uninovative design in games.
There is a lot going for this title that just makes me cringe, but I am not trying to troll. Notice I left this topic alone. I just posted and moved on. I posted none of my thoughts or opinions but simply relayed what I saw on Digg because I thought it was newsworthy. Yes the Creutz quotes were the top news item on Digg yesterday for a little bit so I guess others thought it was newsworthy as well.
The Massively quotes I particularly liked though because as much as they liked the game or wanted to like it they couldn't help but admit it was more of the same, nothing new, and yet another clone in not so few words. If you are reading this post or massively the chances are you have played the same game for a great deal of time already and this is not the best of news. For some this may be perfect news. WoW in the Star Wars Universe sweet. For me though, who has loved MMO's since EQ and Ultima Online and was never even entertained by WoW or any of its clones for more than a month or two this is just getting sad and a bit pathetic. Especially coming from a Game Development/Design standpoint. This genre has been plagued by a constant lack of design, originality, or innovation for going on 8 to 9 years now.
You do realize that anaylist had his "facts" mixed up don't you? Bioware never promised anything but more of the same, with story tacked on. The entire premise of his complaint is flawed.
I have to disagree, when you say something like this:
"During a presentation before my hands-on time with The Old Republic, BioWare stuck to its company line about how this will be a “genre-changing” MMO, but for the first time in my experience, they broke down what they mean"
That specific gameplay formula will never have the same level of success it had the fist time around. People want something different, whether they know it now or not. Now THERE's a sweeping generalization for you! lol
Sure, you never get back that initial bliss when you first started playing MMO's and literally everything was new and exciting.
But then again, it's also not the case that the vast majority of MMO gamers have developed a burnout or antipathy towards themepark gameplay. People want something different, but they also want the same, things that fall within their comfort zone, and the extent of 'something different' varies from one person to the next. For some it's already different enough when it's another MMO that has a different world setting, visuals, and leveling experience.
After all, if people really needed something different quickly and all the time, then why would the majority have been playing the same themepark styled MMO's for all those years, and still play it, one themepark MMO or another? Or other examples, why would procedural law firm or cop tv shows still be majorly popular to the majority of people even after years, no decades, of them with not that much change to their format?
When you look at people in general, you'll see that they want something different and varied but also or even more they want things to stay roughly the same as long as it stays within their comfort zone. Only the mix of wanting something different and wanting things to stay the same is different from one person to another.
Anyway
/offtopic
Well said! I couldn't have put it and better and really is not off topic when people are complaining that "WOW clone". You can't re-invent the wheel but you can change how it works. True innovation only comes around every so often.
I have to disagree, when you say something like this:
"During a presentation before my hands-on time with The Old Republic, BioWare stuck to its company line about how this will be a “genre-changing” MMO, but for the first time in my experience, they broke down what they mean"
I know its all marketing BS though.
Well, questing fills like your first 200-250 hours of gameplay, and after that it's 200 hours for each of the alternative characters you create. That's a huge amount of time and influences your whole leveling experience. If you revamp that gameplay aspect into a more immersive experience, and polish dungeons up as well into more story related, and this proves to be hugely liked, then I'd say that the time of bland textbased questing might slowly be coming to an end.
Originally posted by Lathander81
Well said! I couldn't have put it and better and really is not off topic when people are complaining that "WOW clone". You can't re-invent the wheel but you can change how it works. True innovation only comes around every so often.
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums: Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
I have to disagree, when you say something like this:
"During a presentation before my hands-on time with The Old Republic, BioWare stuck to its company line about how this will be a “genre-changing” MMO, but for the first time in my experience, they broke down what they mean"
I know its all marketing BS though.
Well, questing fills like your first 200-250 hours of gameplay, and after that it's 200 hours for each of the alternative characters you create. That's a huge amount of time and influences your whole leveling experience. If you revamp that gameplay aspect into a more immersive experience, and polish dungeons up as well into more story related, and this proves to be hugely liked, then I'd say that the time of bland textbased questing might slowly be coming to an end.
Originally posted by Lathander81
Well said! I couldn't have put it and better and really is not off topic when people are complaining that "WOW clone". You can't re-invent the wheel but you can change how it works. True innovation only comes around every so often.
Thanks
Im sure you guys are coming up with these numbers from sources straight from Bioware, can you point me toward that? Cause I havent been able to find one but Ive seen people talking about 200+ hours of gameplay,btw Im assuming its all story related not extra curricular activities. Cause to be honest 200+ hours of pure quest and story seems almost unrealistic...and 200 more for each other character of unique quests?!
Honestly, my expectations for this game are pretty low; much lower than they are for GW2.
When I played Bioware's DragonAge series, I discovered I became attached to the companions. I loved the way they interacted with one another. They each had their own personalities and idiosyncrasies that made them seem almost 3D. I likened it to playing a novel instead of reading it. I didn't care about combat or my character's advancement after awhile.
This is the expectation I am taking into TOR and I think anyone expecting new mechanics from this game will be disappointed.
If you want to play inside someone's novel, TOR is for you. If you want to work with new mechanics try something like GW2.
I have to disagree, when you say something like this:
"During a presentation before my hands-on time with The Old Republic, BioWare stuck to its company line about how this will be a “genre-changing” MMO, but for the first time in my experience, they broke down what they mean"
I know its all marketing BS though.
Well, questing fills like your first 200-250 hours of gameplay, and after that it's 200 hours for each of the alternative characters you create. That's a huge amount of time and influences your whole leveling experience. If you revamp that gameplay aspect into a more immersive experience, and polish dungeons up as well into more story related, and this proves to be hugely liked, then I'd say that the time of bland textbased questing might slowly be coming to an end.
Originally posted by Lathander81
Well said! I couldn't have put it and better and really is not off topic when people are complaining that "WOW clone". You can't re-invent the wheel but you can change how it works. True innovation only comes around every so often.
Thanks
Im sure you guys are coming up with these numbers from sources straight from Bioware, can you point me toward that? Cause I havent been able to find one but Ive seen people talking about 200+ hours of gameplay,btw Im assuming its all story related not extra curricular activities. Cause to be honest 200+ hours of pure quest and story seems almost unrealistic...and 200 more for each other character of unique quests?!
They're explanation of this is they account for all things when counting time played dialogue, walking/running and combat.
As for the reply earlier, about genre-changing... This is what they mean...
"According to the developer, there are four major tenants of the role-playing game experience: exploration, progression, combat, and story. As BioWare tells it, MMOs have already mastered the first three, but they’ve always put story on the backburner.
In other words, BioWare will not be significantly changing the core style of MMO gameplay that has been refined and popularized with titles like EverQuest and World of Warcraft.".
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
To all the negative people bashing TOR in this thread and of course the OP:
The game isn't in closed beta yet, don't judge.
You probably haven't played the game yet, don't judge.
Sure you're entitled to your opinion, but that doesn't mean you have to publicly trash TOR, don't judge.
OP: You linked a review from one website where sure the majority of people had luke warm feelings about the game. Even though they said they weren't impressed, they are still going to buy the game. If you don't like the aspect of TOR or are against it, then guess what?! Don't play it and take your negative trolling somewhere else. While you're being negative, TOR received E3's most anticipated MMO of 2011 AND for every negative, luke warm review, there's 10 positive ones, so again, take your trolling someplace else.
While I am skeptical and have my doubts, I'm still getting this game. Not only is it awesome that Bioware is getting into the MMO genre, it's a Star Wars MMO! SWG sucked and TOR seems to be miles and miles ahead of anything SWG did. I'm super excited for TOR, I can't wait and I just hope it blows expectations out of the water!
To all the posivite people hyping TOR :
The game isnt in the closed beta yet, dont judge
U probably didnt play the game as well, dont judge
I just felt like I should do some justice to these completely useless arguments
The problem with people like you is that you are uninformed and the main point of my reply eludes you. Like someone else told you (which is something I was aware of) is that the game has been in testing for quite some time now. Both in Bioware's building and weekend testing (mostly) with beta participants.
Now, to the point about you missing the main point of the reply. I said I had my doubts and hope the game to be a good one. The link the OP posted were the opinions of only a few people who played TOR at E3, which were negative opinions. That's fine, people are entitled to their opinions. The problem that I was addressing was that he was using those reviews to reinforce his biased opinion and that it was the be all end all attitude towards the game. While anyone who has tried the game is entitled to their opinion, it's way too soon to pass judgement on something that most people have only seen videos and screenshots.
You said to be don't judge and I haven't. If you bothered to comprehend what I said, it was that I was skeptical about how good it will be, but that I was extremely excited for it's release because I'm a Star Wars fan as well as an MMO fan.
I have to disagree, when you say something like this:
"During a presentation before my hands-on time with The Old Republic, BioWare stuck to its company line about how this will be a “genre-changing” MMO, but for the first time in my experience, they broke down what they mean"
I know its all marketing BS though.
Well, questing fills like your first 200-250 hours of gameplay, and after that it's 200 hours for each of the alternative characters you create. That's a huge amount of time and influences your whole leveling experience. If you revamp that gameplay aspect into a more immersive experience, and polish dungeons up as well into more story related, and this proves to be hugely liked, then I'd say that the time of bland textbased questing might slowly be coming to an end.
Originally posted by Lathander81
Well said! I couldn't have put it and better and really is not off topic when people are complaining that "WOW clone". You can't re-invent the wheel but you can change how it works. True innovation only comes around every so often.
Thanks
Im sure you guys are coming up with these numbers from sources straight from Bioware, can you point me toward that? Cause I havent been able to find one but Ive seen people talking about 200+ hours of gameplay,btw Im assuming its all story related not extra curricular activities. Cause to be honest 200+ hours of pure quest and story seems almost unrealistic...and 200 more for each other character of unique quests?!
the 200 hours came from some interview last year but since then have tried not to give a time amount because they know people will do everything to to try and prove it wrong. here was they latest dev quote regarding this though:
So I was listening to all those interviews from the fan site summit, and there was something the lead writer said that I wanted to clarify.
He was talking about how each class (8) has 3 chapters each. And in his example of the bounty hunter, he said the "great hunt" (chap 1) was 2 times as long as all the story in KOTOR.
Making several assumptions, can we presume that:
8 classes * 3 chapters each * 2x length of KOTOR = 48 times more story then KOTOR?
I think it's reasonably safe to assume that the chapters for each class are fairly close in length to other classes. The only thing I don't know is if Chapter 1 is roughly the same length as Chapter 2 and Chapter 3.
Or, I could have taken it out of context and what he meant was that chapter 1 for all the classes was two times as long as Kotor. Which would mean roughly 6 times more story.
What say you?
Hey Folks,
Glad to clarify. Please bear with me, though, as it can be hard when we're talking about story and story length. So let's start with a few rules for how we tend to talk about it at Bioware:
First: the whole critical path of the game is the length. The walking, the combat, the travel on your ship, world quests, everything you'd have to do to come out the other end the right level. When we say the story of Chapter 1 is X long we do not mean if you somehow took all the conversations and ran them together. Sneaking through the Death Star and shooting stormtroopers was just as much of Luke's story as talking about going and saving the princess. So all the content you're expected to do goes in there. What doesn't go in? Warzones, crafting, socializing, auction house, space game, etc (yes, you could skip world quests and do Warzone or space game quests or Heroics for XP instead but swaps like that tend to more or less even out). Anything not required to level up is outside the estimate.
Second: Your mileage may vary. When we talk about the length of the game at all, we keep it vague for the important reason that people burn through content at different rates. The numbers we're using today are based on best case estimates from hundreds of people playing through Chapter 1. Some people were faster, some people were much, much, much slower as they apparently not just stopped to smell the flowers but had their CCs pick some, studied them, made adrenals out of them and then decided to sit by the roadside and consider what they'd done.
Third: This may change somewhat before ship. Difficulty has been going up in the mid and late leveling game to create real, RPG-style combat challenges. This makes the game longer. Death penalties have been going down. This makes the game shorter. But we have a general idea where we want it to end up and I think it's safe now to make some broad statements.
Okay, with all that out of the way, let me clarify. I was speaking of the a single average first time playthrough of a single class's Chapter 1 being more than twice the length of a single average first time playthrough of the entirety of the original Knights of the Old Republic. Chapter 2 and 3 are each somewhat shorter than Chapter 1 (which are extended by the Origin and Capitol worlds experience) but still pretty darn big.
If we are talking about playthroughs of all the classes we're well into four digit hours but even one class is in the plural hundreds. Anything more specific is going to get me into trouble and honestly will just make me look silly when one guild makes it their all encompassing mission to beat the leveling game in a single marathon session then Photoshop their completion time onto a shocked looking picture of my face and spread it all over the interwebs.
I have to disagree, when you say something like this:
"During a presentation before my hands-on time with The Old Republic, BioWare stuck to its company line about how this will be a “genre-changing” MMO, but for the first time in my experience, they broke down what they mean"
I know its all marketing BS though.
Well, questing fills like your first 200-250 hours of gameplay, and after that it's 200 hours for each of the alternative characters you create. That's a huge amount of time and influences your whole leveling experience. If you revamp that gameplay aspect into a more immersive experience, and polish dungeons up as well into more story related, and this proves to be hugely liked, then I'd say that the time of bland textbased questing might slowly be coming to an end.
Originally posted by Lathander81
Well said! I couldn't have put it and better and really is not off topic when people are complaining that "WOW clone". You can't re-invent the wheel but you can change how it works. True innovation only comes around every so often.
Thanks
Im sure you guys are coming up with these numbers from sources straight from Bioware, can you point me toward that? Cause I havent been able to find one but Ive seen people talking about 200+ hours of gameplay,btw Im assuming its all story related not extra curricular activities. Cause to be honest 200+ hours of pure quest and story seems almost unrealistic...and 200 more for each other character of unique quests?!
Near the end..start at about 1:15 it's quiet so you may have to turn the sound up.
The 200 hour is everything that goes into doing the personal story. Assuming that you start right away and don't stop till you hit the end.
They said just concentrating on the personal story though will make you start to fall behind in levels and make it gradually harder (enemies level faster then you) and thus you may need to divert off a bit to let your levels catch up.
Help me Bioware, you're my only hope.
Is ToR going to be good? Dude it's Bioware making a freaking star wars game, all signs point to awesome. -G4tv MMo report.
Bioware devs talking about combat and how great, heroic its going to be. Sadly E3 didnt show any of this. Especially the live stream they did.
This is one reason why many were underimpressed with this years E3 showing of SWTOR. The Deves themselves in many vid posts have hyped this game. As the youtube vid I linked shows. But from this video is also from a game demo they built to show off the game, not the game itself. This doesnt mean the game wont be a commercial success, but the devs need to slow down on the hype if they cant deliver
Never trust when Bioware hype anything, Dragon Age II is an good example, they hyped DA2 to the skies but in the end the game sucked, was shallow and emty.
TOR will be a snack MMO you eat it fast because you enjoy it but after a short while you feel sick and stop eating.
Bioware devs talking about combat and how great, heroic its going to be. Sadly E3 didnt show any of this. Especially the live stream they did.
This is one reason why many were underimpressed with this years E3 showing of SWTOR. The Deves themselves in many vid posts have hyped this game. As the youtube vid I linked shows. But from this video is also from a game demo they built to show off the game, not the game itself. This doesnt mean the game wont be a commercial success, but the devs need to slow down on the hype if they cant deliver
Never trust when Bioware hype anything, Dragon Age II is an good example, they hyped DA2 to the skies but in the end the game sucked, was shallow and emty.
TOR will be a snack MMO you eat it fast because you enjoy it but after a short while you feel sick and stop eating.
Nothing personal, but your credibility is like zero. This is what you wrote about Vanguard:
"
Originally posted by elocke
Vanguard. It truly needs a relaunch to bring in a nice population to enjoy the game to its fullest. It's now at the point it should have been at launch.
Vanguard is really a great game to ad not many people are forgiving when it comes to retry a game.
This is what you wrote about LOTRO:
Yes LOTRO's combat is somewhat slower comparing to other MMOs, and it's even slower playing as a Guardian.
Still a really great game, try to get to atleast lvl 30-35 to taste some early 3 man instances and play with your toon.
Or skirmishes to learn how to play in a group and learn your class.
Most people like me who loved for a short time LOTRO will love SWTOR because it takes both of those games and adds so much more in just about every department. I can understand a SWG or Darkfall disgruntled vet posting something like this, but if you liked either of those two previous games, there is absolutely zero reason to say the complete opposite in some generic way about SWTOR. I know this because just about every guild member from my previous large guild on both Vanguard and LOTRO are watering at the mouth to get at this game.
Bioware devs talking about combat and how great, heroic its going to be. Sadly E3 didnt show any of this. Especially the live stream they did.
This is one reason why many were underimpressed with this years E3 showing of SWTOR. The Deves themselves in many vid posts have hyped this game. As the youtube vid I linked shows. But from this video is also from a game demo they built to show off the game, not the game itself. This doesnt mean the game wont be a commercial success, but the devs need to slow down on the hype if they cant deliver
Never trust when Bioware hype anything, Dragon Age II is an good example, they hyped DA2 to the skies but in the end the game sucked, was shallow and emty.
TOR will be a snack MMO you eat it fast because you enjoy it but after a short while you feel sick and stop eating.
Nothing personal, but your credibility is like zero. This is what you wrote about Vanguard:
"
Originally posted by elocke
Vanguard. It truly needs a relaunch to bring in a nice population to enjoy the game to its fullest. It's now at the point it should have been at launch.
Vanguard is really a great game to ad not many people are forgiving when it comes to retry a game.
This is what you wrote about LOTRO:
Yes LOTRO's combat is somewhat slower comparing to other MMOs, and it's even slower playing as a Guardian.
Still a really great game, try to get to atleast lvl 30-35 to taste some early 3 man instances and play with your toon.
Or skirmishes to learn how to play in a group and learn your class.
Most people like me who loved for a short time LOTRO will love SWTOR because it takes both of those games and adds so much more in just about every department. I can understand a SWG or Darkfall disgruntled vet posting something like this, but if you liked either of those two previous games, there is absolutely zero reason to say the complete opposite in some generic way about SWTOR. I know this because just about every guild member from my previous large guild on both Vanguard and LOTRO are watering at the mouth to get at this game.
Wow. Talk about your chickens coming home to roost.
Sounds like E3 did more harm than good for them. Sad because people expect better from a popular developer.
Well, if you wasted $60 on DA2, you'd know that Bioware isn't that god everyone thinks they are.
ME3 will probably be Bioware's last best title.
lol.
I just want to say on the UI thing. Changing the UI/Mods are just the thing to do. Sure, we may not see mods at release day, but eventually there will be I bet.
Guess what, WoWs UI is gone and becomes Xperl or something else you might use. It's now a great UI. It just makes calling any UI that can be modded a "WoW clone UI" even more silly.
“Despite promises from EA/Bioware that the title represents a major step forward in MMO design, what we saw was essentially a World of Warcraft clone with Star Wars character skins and the Bioware RPG nice/nasty dialogue tree mechanism bolted on for non-player character conversations.”
This is humerous. He takes a major step forward in MMO design(and it is a major step), defines it, and then dismisses it all in the same sentence.
It also reinforces my very strong belief that MMO industry "analysts" are less informed than the game's they analyze than the average MMO player.
I don't get what you're saying there. How does he "takes a major step foward...", "defines it" and "dismisses it all.." To me he's saying that despite what Bioware says the game is a major step foward, he thinks that it is not...
I think he meant that it was defined by the "dialogue tree mechanism". Whether you like the system or not, you do have to admit it is a HUGE step forward in allowing the players to define there story in an MMO. Espeically since these decisions affect the game later on. Dismissing that is kind of a head sratcher for me as well. It makes me wonder what this guy WOULD be impressed with if shaping the game, an MMO, with your own choices isn't on his list.
Ya, I see what he meant now. I misread his comment. One thing about the topic though, Ive seen a couple of people already talk alot about this shaping the game or world and so on. I probably missed something, but how exactly does a player shape the game or world in SWTOR? I thought story was more directed at your own personal story and it would affect YOUR story later on but not the world or game.
Well, an old example I can give goes back to the Jedi starter world. One of the quests involves finding out that a pair of Jedi have fallen in love and you are given the choice of turning them in OR helping them hide the fact (which nets you a nice little bonus item). Then there is the Sith story in which you have to convince a ships captain to attack another ship or kill him and take over yourself (with differences in the next quest based on your choice). Lastly, the most recent example I have seen was where as a Jedi you have the chance to finish off a Sith Master OR let him live. If he lives, you end up meeting him later as a reformed Sith turned Jedi.
I am sure there are other examples out there, these are just what I got off the top of my head.
Ya but those affect your personal story, they don't affect the game or the world around. Right?
We don't know yet, they have only given out some very tantalizing hints so far as to how far this will extend. Still, how many MMO's give you even that much? None that I can think of, which is understandable (IMHO) because the coding has got to be immense for an MMO.
So for one people should not be saying it affects the game or the world since its not true at least that we know of. Secondly, this sounds similar to Personal Story in GW2 although it seams like in SWTOR it might not be in your own sort of instanced location but I don't have the details on this for SWTOR. This sounds like it will make for a great RPG story but it wont really affect the MMO part of the game.
Dude, what is it exactly that you want?? This isnt some sandbox EVE ONLINE mmo where you get to strip down an asteroid belt and no one else can do it after you. The decisions you make will affect YOU and YOUR game and YOUR story. Isnt that enough?? It will also affect the experience of those that are with you in your group for example. And we still dont know about operations that will have 20+ people in it. If theres storytelling and personal choices to be made there as well, it IS a major step forward for MMO genre.
“Despite promises from EA/Bioware that the title represents a major step forward in MMO design, what we saw was essentially a World of Warcraft clone with Star Wars character skins and the Bioware RPG nice/nasty dialogue tree mechanism bolted on for non-player character conversations.”
This is humerous. He takes a major step forward in MMO design(and it is a major step), defines it, and then dismisses it all in the same sentence.
It also reinforces my very strong belief that MMO industry "analysts" are less informed than the game's they analyze than the average MMO player.
I don't get what you're saying there. How does he "takes a major step foward...", "defines it" and "dismisses it all.." To me he's saying that despite what Bioware says the game is a major step foward, he thinks that it is not...
I think he meant that it was defined by the "dialogue tree mechanism". Whether you like the system or not, you do have to admit it is a HUGE step forward in allowing the players to define there story in an MMO. Espeically since these decisions affect the game later on. Dismissing that is kind of a head sratcher for me as well. It makes me wonder what this guy WOULD be impressed with if shaping the game, an MMO, with your own choices isn't on his list.
Ya, I see what he meant now. I misread his comment. One thing about the topic though, Ive seen a couple of people already talk alot about this shaping the game or world and so on. I probably missed something, but how exactly does a player shape the game or world in SWTOR? I thought story was more directed at your own personal story and it would affect YOUR story later on but not the world or game.
Well, an old example I can give goes back to the Jedi starter world. One of the quests involves finding out that a pair of Jedi have fallen in love and you are given the choice of turning them in OR helping them hide the fact (which nets you a nice little bonus item). Then there is the Sith story in which you have to convince a ships captain to attack another ship or kill him and take over yourself (with differences in the next quest based on your choice). Lastly, the most recent example I have seen was where as a Jedi you have the chance to finish off a Sith Master OR let him live. If he lives, you end up meeting him later as a reformed Sith turned Jedi.
I am sure there are other examples out there, these are just what I got off the top of my head.
Ya but those affect your personal story, they don't affect the game or the world around. Right?
We don't know yet, they have only given out some very tantalizing hints so far as to how far this will extend. Still, how many MMO's give you even that much? None that I can think of, which is understandable (IMHO) because the coding has got to be immense for an MMO.
So for one people should not be saying it affects the game or the world since its not true at least that we know of. Secondly, this sounds similar to Personal Story in GW2 although it seams like in SWTOR it might not be in your own sort of instanced location but I don't have the details on this for SWTOR. This sounds like it will make for a great RPG story but it wont really affect the MMO part of the game.
Dude, what is it exactly that you want?? This isnt some sandbox EVE ONLINE mmo where you get to strip down an asteroid belt and no one else can do it after you. The decisions you make will affect YOU and YOUR game and YOUR story. Isnt that enough?? It will also affect the experience of those that are with you in your group for example. And we still dont know about operations that will have 20+ people in it. If theres storytelling and personal choices to be made there as well, it IS a major step forward for MMO genre.
well they have said there wont be group dialogue in operations because having 16+ people try to vote on something doesn't work to well
Jeez, there was a 6 hour waiting line at E3 so how many people decided to spend one day of E3 to see SWTOR and miss all the other games that was being shown?
This game had the largest line (longer than Wii-U) at the convention with most people wanting to play more of it afterwards.
Gdemami - Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
“Despite promises from EA/Bioware that the title represents a major step forward in MMO design, what we saw was essentially a World of Warcraft clone with Star Wars character skins and the Bioware RPG nice/nasty dialogue tree mechanism bolted on for non-player character conversations.”
This is humerous. He takes a major step forward in MMO design(and it is a major step), defines it, and then dismisses it all in the same sentence.
It also reinforces my very strong belief that MMO industry "analysts" are less informed than the game's they analyze than the average MMO player.
I don't get what you're saying there. How does he "takes a major step foward...", "defines it" and "dismisses it all.." To me he's saying that despite what Bioware says the game is a major step foward, he thinks that it is not...
I think he meant that it was defined by the "dialogue tree mechanism". Whether you like the system or not, you do have to admit it is a HUGE step forward in allowing the players to define there story in an MMO. Espeically since these decisions affect the game later on. Dismissing that is kind of a head sratcher for me as well. It makes me wonder what this guy WOULD be impressed with if shaping the game, an MMO, with your own choices isn't on his list.
Ya, I see what he meant now. I misread his comment. One thing about the topic though, Ive seen a couple of people already talk alot about this shaping the game or world and so on. I probably missed something, but how exactly does a player shape the game or world in SWTOR? I thought story was more directed at your own personal story and it would affect YOUR story later on but not the world or game.
Well, an old example I can give goes back to the Jedi starter world. One of the quests involves finding out that a pair of Jedi have fallen in love and you are given the choice of turning them in OR helping them hide the fact (which nets you a nice little bonus item). Then there is the Sith story in which you have to convince a ships captain to attack another ship or kill him and take over yourself (with differences in the next quest based on your choice). Lastly, the most recent example I have seen was where as a Jedi you have the chance to finish off a Sith Master OR let him live. If he lives, you end up meeting him later as a reformed Sith turned Jedi.
I am sure there are other examples out there, these are just what I got off the top of my head.
Ya but those affect your personal story, they don't affect the game or the world around. Right?
We don't know yet, they have only given out some very tantalizing hints so far as to how far this will extend. Still, how many MMO's give you even that much? None that I can think of, which is understandable (IMHO) because the coding has got to be immense for an MMO.
So for one people should not be saying it affects the game or the world since its not true at least that we know of. Secondly, this sounds similar to Personal Story in GW2 although it seams like in SWTOR it might not be in your own sort of instanced location but I don't have the details on this for SWTOR. This sounds like it will make for a great RPG story but it wont really affect the MMO part of the game.
Dude, what is it exactly that you want?? This isnt some sandbox EVE ONLINE mmo where you get to strip down an asteroid belt and no one else can do it after you. The decisions you make will affect YOU and YOUR game and YOUR story. Isnt that enough?? It will also affect the experience of those that are with you in your group for example. And we still dont know about operations that will have 20+ people in it. If theres storytelling and personal choices to be made there as well, it IS a major step forward for MMO genre.
well they have said there wont be group dialogue in operations because having 16+ people try to vote on something doesn't work to well
Alright, operations are there for something else. But it still stands for 4 people flashpoints.
“Despite promises from EA/Bioware that the title represents a major step forward in MMO design, what we saw was essentially a World of Warcraft clone with Star Wars character skins and the Bioware RPG nice/nasty dialogue tree mechanism bolted on for non-player character conversations.”
This is humerous. He takes a major step forward in MMO design(and it is a major step), defines it, and then dismisses it all in the same sentence.
Oh it's a step alright....but the question is "a step foward or a step backwards". I guess we will all find out when the game launches this year. Until then.....theorycraft ppl.
It's a step forward. I don't see there being any argument against it. It's ridiculous to believe that adding a heavy story element to a game genre that suffers from repetitive action and lack of direction would somehow be a step back.
I have yet to play a game, whether it be an FPS, RTS, MMO, RPG, Adventure, etc. that did not benefit tremendously from a solid storyline presented in a professional manner.
Actually there is a very valid argument against it, community building. There are hands-on previews that specifically state that grouping is awkward and/or does not really promote grouping with other classes unless it's a spot where absolutely neccessary(flashpoints). Having your own personal branching storyline insures that YOUR story is what you are doing because everyone wants progression. It takes a lot of patiences and a good-heart to spend your time playing a game to advance someone elses progression at the cost of your own. It is a sacrafice that most will not make and that deeply impacts community. As much as people hate WoW you still had a good chance to have the same quests as others and group up. With personal storyline the further you get the less likely it is.
I should state that if you do story in a way that promotes grouping/community then yes that is indeed a step forward. But the way that Bioware is currently handling it is not. It will feel like a single player/co-op leveling experience and that isn't so great in a MMORPG where the entire point is community and socializing.
The hatred people have for TOR is pretty funny. I guess hating TOR is the "cool" thing to do because it's the big name on the block or something.
Am I a TOR fanboy? No. Am I excited to try the game? Of course. Do I think it's going to be the best thing ever? Of course not. I've been burned on too many MMO releases that I was excited for and turned out to be poor. But I'd prefer to judge the game for myself rather than watching a short clip or reading something some guy on a web site says before forming an opinion on how good the game is.
Actually there is a very valid argument against it, community building. There are hands-on previews that specifically state that grouping is awkward and/or does not really promote grouping with other classes unless it's a spot where absolutely neccessary(flashpoints).
For every handson preview that states that grouping is awkward (which is iirc only 1, 2) there are 9, 10 that state that grouping is fun. It seems to me that you focus only on the few bad comments because that suits your antipathy towards SWTOR better.
Having your own personal branching storyline insures that YOUR story is what you are doing because everyone wants progression. It takes a lot of patiences and a good-heart to spend your time playing a game to advance someone elses progression at the cost of your own. It is a sacrafice that most will not make and that deeply impacts community. As much as people hate WoW you still had a good chance to have the same quests as others and group up. With personal storyline the further you get the less likely it is.
Complete nonsense, and to me it shows an utter lack of understanding how questing in SWTOR works. Case of having heard the bells but having no idea where the belltower is.
I should state that if you do story in a way that promotes grouping/community then yes that is indeed a step forward. But the way that Bioware is currently handling it is not. It will feel like a single player/co-op leveling experience and that isn't so great in a MMORPG where the entire point is community and socializing.
On the contrary, the way how Bioware is implementing questing actually promotes and encourages grouping. I suggest you read up on the available information and come back when you have a detailed (and preferrably more objective) knowledge of how questing works in SWTOR.
Claiming that how questing works now in MMO's is better than how SWTOR will do it is so insanely ludicrous that it's hard to take seriously, nor the persons who firmly believe that.
Originally posted by Vhaln
Originally posted by c4_Garuda
The decisions you make will affect YOU and YOUR game and YOUR story. Isnt that enough??
Not in an MMO, no. Not at all.
It improves the questing gameplay in an MMO.
It's better than the textbased questing where you can't make any decision in the questlines except accept and do them, and that's it.
NB: after reading the continuous protestations of some people towards SWTOR's story questing, I've come to the conclusion that most of those people actually don't give a damn about quests or quest leveling in MMO's. That's why you never hear them make any remarks about the state of affairs with textbased questing now or what they'd prefer more, the current textbased questing or VO cinematic questing where decisions have influence. Because to them quests or questing is trivial and has no entertainment value anyway, so any improvement or upgrade of the questing aspect in MMO's is a worthless investment: why should they care about improvement in the questing department if they want other features, like sandbox features, far and far more?
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums: Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
They could have done the "Live Walk Through" better, but overall I liked what I saw at E3. Maybe because I have not hyped myself up so much that nothing this game, or any other one for that matter, ever did could please me.
@MMO.Maverick. Based on his previous borderline posts, I think your wasting your breath replying to that second person.
"If half of what you tell me is a lie, how can I believe any of it?"
Comments
Buzzwords are a buzzkill for all games. people tend to focus more on the positives or negatives of games just off of the propaganda in either direction and don't typically try to sift trough it all to see things for what they are. As it is more easy to lable, bumper sticker or slogan something that it is to put real thought into the reality of the situation. Thus emergers the mentality seen on this form for both sides of the games discusses; a lack of objectivity and an attachment to overtly meaningless idiologies like "WoW Clone".
We go trough life with many yet there is a time we must walk our path alone.
This is what is meant by "changing" the world. For me its not the same thing at all. It changes your PERSONAL story, and don't get me wrong this is new for MMO's but its not "epic" or "groundbreaking" for me since its the exact same thing we see on all recent Bioware games and many RPG's (branching storylines) just that it's now in an MMO....if it somehow affected the MMO part then I would call it "epic"
I have to disagree, when you say something like this:
"During a presentation before my hands-on time with The Old Republic, BioWare stuck to its company line about how this will be a “genre-changing” MMO, but for the first time in my experience, they broke down what they mean"
I know its all marketing BS though.
Well said! I couldn't have put it and better and really is not off topic when people are complaining that "WOW clone". You can't re-invent the wheel but you can change how it works. True innovation only comes around every so often.
Well, questing fills like your first 200-250 hours of gameplay, and after that it's 200 hours for each of the alternative characters you create. That's a huge amount of time and influences your whole leveling experience. If you revamp that gameplay aspect into a more immersive experience, and polish dungeons up as well into more story related, and this proves to be hugely liked, then I'd say that the time of bland textbased questing might slowly be coming to an end.
Thanks
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
Im sure you guys are coming up with these numbers from sources straight from Bioware, can you point me toward that? Cause I havent been able to find one but Ive seen people talking about 200+ hours of gameplay,btw Im assuming its all story related not extra curricular activities. Cause to be honest 200+ hours of pure quest and story seems almost unrealistic...and 200 more for each other character of unique quests?!
Honestly, my expectations for this game are pretty low; much lower than they are for GW2.
When I played Bioware's DragonAge series, I discovered I became attached to the companions. I loved the way they interacted with one another. They each had their own personalities and idiosyncrasies that made them seem almost 3D. I likened it to playing a novel instead of reading it. I didn't care about combat or my character's advancement after awhile.
This is the expectation I am taking into TOR and I think anyone expecting new mechanics from this game will be disappointed.
If you want to play inside someone's novel, TOR is for you. If you want to work with new mechanics try something like GW2.
They're explanation of this is they account for all things when counting time played dialogue, walking/running and combat.
As for the reply earlier, about genre-changing... This is what they mean...
"According to the developer, there are four major tenants of the role-playing game experience: exploration, progression, combat, and story. As BioWare tells it, MMOs have already mastered the first three, but they’ve always put story on the backburner.
In other words, BioWare will not be significantly changing the core style of MMO gameplay that has been refined and popularized with titles like EverQuest and World of Warcraft.".
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
The problem with people like you is that you are uninformed and the main point of my reply eludes you. Like someone else told you (which is something I was aware of) is that the game has been in testing for quite some time now. Both in Bioware's building and weekend testing (mostly) with beta participants.
Now, to the point about you missing the main point of the reply. I said I had my doubts and hope the game to be a good one. The link the OP posted were the opinions of only a few people who played TOR at E3, which were negative opinions. That's fine, people are entitled to their opinions. The problem that I was addressing was that he was using those reviews to reinforce his biased opinion and that it was the be all end all attitude towards the game. While anyone who has tried the game is entitled to their opinion, it's way too soon to pass judgement on something that most people have only seen videos and screenshots.
You said to be don't judge and I haven't. If you bothered to comprehend what I said, it was that I was skeptical about how good it will be, but that I was extremely excited for it's release because I'm a Star Wars fan as well as an MMO fan.
the 200 hours came from some interview last year but since then have tried not to give a time amount because they know people will do everything to to try and prove it wrong. here was they latest dev quote regarding this though:
http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=6297786#post6297786
DanielErickson
Joined: Oct 2008
05.04.2011 , 01:34 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by nezitx
So I was listening to all those interviews from the fan site summit, and there was something the lead writer said that I wanted to clarify.
He was talking about how each class (8) has 3 chapters each. And in his example of the bounty hunter, he said the "great hunt" (chap 1) was 2 times as long as all the story in KOTOR.
Making several assumptions, can we presume that:
8 classes * 3 chapters each * 2x length of KOTOR = 48 times more story then KOTOR?
I think it's reasonably safe to assume that the chapters for each class are fairly close in length to other classes. The only thing I don't know is if Chapter 1 is roughly the same length as Chapter 2 and Chapter 3.
Or, I could have taken it out of context and what he meant was that chapter 1 for all the classes was two times as long as Kotor. Which would mean roughly 6 times more story.
What say you?
Hey Folks,
Glad to clarify. Please bear with me, though, as it can be hard when we're talking about story and story length. So let's start with a few rules for how we tend to talk about it at Bioware:
First: the whole critical path of the game is the length. The walking, the combat, the travel on your ship, world quests, everything you'd have to do to come out the other end the right level. When we say the story of Chapter 1 is X long we do not mean if you somehow took all the conversations and ran them together. Sneaking through the Death Star and shooting stormtroopers was just as much of Luke's story as talking about going and saving the princess. So all the content you're expected to do goes in there. What doesn't go in? Warzones, crafting, socializing, auction house, space game, etc (yes, you could skip world quests and do Warzone or space game quests or Heroics for XP instead but swaps like that tend to more or less even out). Anything not required to level up is outside the estimate.
Second: Your mileage may vary. When we talk about the length of the game at all, we keep it vague for the important reason that people burn through content at different rates. The numbers we're using today are based on best case estimates from hundreds of people playing through Chapter 1. Some people were faster, some people were much, much, much slower as they apparently not just stopped to smell the flowers but had their CCs pick some, studied them, made adrenals out of them and then decided to sit by the roadside and consider what they'd done.
Third: This may change somewhat before ship. Difficulty has been going up in the mid and late leveling game to create real, RPG-style combat challenges. This makes the game longer. Death penalties have been going down. This makes the game shorter. But we have a general idea where we want it to end up and I think it's safe now to make some broad statements.
Okay, with all that out of the way, let me clarify. I was speaking of the a single average first time playthrough of a single class's Chapter 1 being more than twice the length of a single average first time playthrough of the entirety of the original Knights of the Old Republic. Chapter 2 and 3 are each somewhat shorter than Chapter 1 (which are extended by the Origin and Capitol worlds experience) but still pretty darn big.
If we are talking about playthroughs of all the classes we're well into four digit hours but even one class is in the plural hundreds. Anything more specific is going to get me into trouble and honestly will just make me look silly when one guild makes it their all encompassing mission to beat the leveling game in a single marathon session then Photoshop their completion time onto a shocked looking picture of my face and spread it all over the interwebs.
Hope that helps!
Daniel Erickson
Lead Writer
Star Wars, The Old Republic
Regarding numbers of hours
http://uk.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/star-wars-the-old-republic/video/6212670/crosshairs-interview-bioware-austin-on-star-wars-the-old-republic
Near the end..start at about 1:15 it's quiet so you may have to turn the sound up.
The 200 hour is everything that goes into doing the personal story. Assuming that you start right away and don't stop till you hit the end.
They said just concentrating on the personal story though will make you start to fall behind in levels and make it gradually harder (enemies level faster then you) and thus you may need to divert off a bit to let your levels catch up.
Help me Bioware, you're my only hope.
Is ToR going to be good? Dude it's Bioware making a freaking star wars game, all signs point to awesome. -G4tv MMo report.
Never trust when Bioware hype anything, Dragon Age II is an good example, they hyped DA2 to the skies but in the end the game sucked, was shallow and emty.
TOR will be a snack MMO you eat it fast because you enjoy it but after a short while you feel sick and stop eating.
If it's not broken, you are not innovating.
Nothing personal, but your credibility is like zero. This is what you wrote about Vanguard:
"
Vanguard is really a great game to ad not many people are forgiving when it comes to retry a game.
This is what you wrote about LOTRO:
Yes LOTRO's combat is somewhat slower comparing to other MMOs, and it's even slower playing as a Guardian.
Still a really great game, try to get to atleast lvl 30-35 to taste some early 3 man instances and play with your toon.
Or skirmishes to learn how to play in a group and learn your class.
Most people like me who loved for a short time LOTRO will love SWTOR because it takes both of those games and adds so much more in just about every department. I can understand a SWG or Darkfall disgruntled vet posting something like this, but if you liked either of those two previous games, there is absolutely zero reason to say the complete opposite in some generic way about SWTOR. I know this because just about every guild member from my previous large guild on both Vanguard and LOTRO are watering at the mouth to get at this game.
There Is Always Hope!
Wow. Talk about your chickens coming home to roost.
Currently Playing: World of Warcraft
Well, if you wasted $60 on DA2, you'd know that Bioware isn't that god everyone thinks they are.
ME3 will probably be Bioware's last best title.
lol.
I just want to say on the UI thing. Changing the UI/Mods are just the thing to do. Sure, we may not see mods at release day, but eventually there will be I bet.
Guess what, WoWs UI is gone and becomes Xperl or something else you might use. It's now a great UI. It just makes calling any UI that can be modded a "WoW clone UI" even more silly.
Dude, what is it exactly that you want?? This isnt some sandbox EVE ONLINE mmo where you get to strip down an asteroid belt and no one else can do it after you. The decisions you make will affect YOU and YOUR game and YOUR story. Isnt that enough?? It will also affect the experience of those that are with you in your group for example. And we still dont know about operations that will have 20+ people in it. If theres storytelling and personal choices to be made there as well, it IS a major step forward for MMO genre.
"To be a rock and not to roll..."
well they have said there wont be group dialogue in operations because having 16+ people try to vote on something doesn't work to well
'Underwhelming'. Is that article serious?
Jeez, there was a 6 hour waiting line at E3 so how many people decided to spend one day of E3 to see SWTOR and miss all the other games that was being shown?
This game had the largest line (longer than Wii-U) at the convention with most people wanting to play more of it afterwards.
Gdemami -
Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.
Alright, operations are there for something else. But it still stands for 4 people flashpoints.
"To be a rock and not to roll..."
Actually there is a very valid argument against it, community building. There are hands-on previews that specifically state that grouping is awkward and/or does not really promote grouping with other classes unless it's a spot where absolutely neccessary(flashpoints). Having your own personal branching storyline insures that YOUR story is what you are doing because everyone wants progression. It takes a lot of patiences and a good-heart to spend your time playing a game to advance someone elses progression at the cost of your own. It is a sacrafice that most will not make and that deeply impacts community. As much as people hate WoW you still had a good chance to have the same quests as others and group up. With personal storyline the further you get the less likely it is.
I should state that if you do story in a way that promotes grouping/community then yes that is indeed a step forward. But the way that Bioware is currently handling it is not. It will feel like a single player/co-op leveling experience and that isn't so great in a MMORPG where the entire point is community and socializing.
The hatred people have for TOR is pretty funny. I guess hating TOR is the "cool" thing to do because it's the big name on the block or something.
Am I a TOR fanboy? No. Am I excited to try the game? Of course. Do I think it's going to be the best thing ever? Of course not. I've been burned on too many MMO releases that I was excited for and turned out to be poor. But I'd prefer to judge the game for myself rather than watching a short clip or reading something some guy on a web site says before forming an opinion on how good the game is.
Not in an MMO, no. Not at all.
When I want a single-player story, I'll play a single-player game. When I play an MMO, I want a massively multiplayer world.
On the contrary, the way how Bioware is implementing questing actually promotes and encourages grouping. I suggest you read up on the available information and come back when you have a detailed (and preferrably more objective) knowledge of how questing works in SWTOR.
Claiming that how questing works now in MMO's is better than how SWTOR will do it is so insanely ludicrous that it's hard to take seriously, nor the persons who firmly believe that.
It improves the questing gameplay in an MMO.
It's better than the textbased questing where you can't make any decision in the questlines except accept and do them, and that's it.
NB: after reading the continuous protestations of some people towards SWTOR's story questing, I've come to the conclusion that most of those people actually don't give a damn about quests or quest leveling in MMO's. That's why you never hear them make any remarks about the state of affairs with textbased questing now or what they'd prefer more, the current textbased questing or VO cinematic questing where decisions have influence. Because to them quests or questing is trivial and has no entertainment value anyway, so any improvement or upgrade of the questing aspect in MMO's is a worthless investment: why should they care about improvement in the questing department if they want other features, like sandbox features, far and far more?
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
They could have done the "Live Walk Through" better, but overall I liked what I saw at E3. Maybe because I have not hyped myself up so much that nothing this game, or any other one for that matter, ever did could please me.
@MMO.Maverick. Based on his previous borderline posts, I think your wasting your breath replying to that second person.
"If half of what you tell me is a lie, how can I believe any of it?"