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TOR story and gameplay mechanics do not mix
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Think about this: If my biggest complaint is that I have to smash buttons and there is lag, then this game must be pretty awesome. And it is. If you don't like this game, you don't like video games. I'm not ignorant enough to believe that all players are going to fall head-over-heels in love with this game as soon as they first log in. In fact, I believe that I mentioned that this game feels very much like any other MMO. But I'm willing to bet that anyone who sticks out the first 16 levels will be totally wrapped up in the game.
Larry everett of massively says it all for me in his pre order now part of his weekly column i dont really have to add to it.
id love to highlight the biggie
if u dont like this game u dont like video games, And that he doesnt expect everyoen to love it at first but it they play to level 16 they will be totally engrossed in the game .l
ps id lvoe to point out another hte thread by a person who had never posted before really its getting old .
For me any SW based MMO will be insufficient until a Jedi can fight as spectacularly as in Jedi Knight 2, which was made like 10 years ago on Quake 2 engine and is pretty much still the most awesome Jedi feeling ever created in a game. Also it has to have a seamless space- planet landing transition with space battles. If a company can not do that (apparently one guy can, see Infinity), they have no business touching the IP, in my opinion, and I will fight it with all guns blazing, as I always do seeing lack of talent and greed mixing this way.
My Guild Wars 2 First Beta Weekend "reviewette" : http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/4944570/thread/349125#4944570
I can agree with some of the OP's points, especially about training. However, I disagree about the tagging, mostly. We've seen what happens in games where there's no 'ownership' of mobs (those games that still allow it). It's not pretty. And it seems the way GW2 is going to get away from that system is by making the whole world a public quest, where mobs have no owners at all. However they manage it, I don't doubt there will be some downsides or opportunities for grief there either. Name one other system that jerky people don't mess up. In my weekend play of the game, the respawning clickies and tagging were a very, very minor concern. More often than not I was aided by the stystem-- or rescued by other players when in over my head-- and I count on one hand how many times another player ninja rushed, spoiling my fun.
More to the point, however, is that I think the OP may have missed a neat opportunity when it comes to creating that epic us versus them feel from the movies. After reading the post, my initial thought is that the simplest way to institute that was to just group up with someone in the same area or doing the same quest. Then it immediately becomes the little group of troopers/smugglers against the bad guys that was first envisioned. The Heroics and World Bosses that seemed pretty prevalent, even at the early levels, create great opportunities to live out that particular brand of Star Wars fantasy as well. None of this is meant as a criticism, just my particular point-of-view.
If after his claims of being a long time tester since Closed amounts to his list below, and that's all he found to complain about after a few months, not too shabby for the game I'd say.
"TO MICHAEL!"
I found that while leveling I'd see someone fighting mobs that were grey to me, but I knew that if I didn't help them those mobs might kill him, return to their spots and kill me while I was killing MY mobs. Helping even though I didn't get any "loot" still benefitted me because I was making sure that I wasn't going to get jumped afterwards.
What did that usually consist of? One or two bomb shots as a Trooper, simply CCing one or two mobs as an Inquisitor, or outright killing something quick as a Jedi Warrior. Nothing big that didn't take me 5 seconds. Half the time you don't have to kill it; just weaken it so the other dude can finish it off.
It doesn't always have to be tangible loot one receives to have a self-interest served while playing. Sometimes it's just common sense and about survival.
"TO MICHAEL!"
I could go on, but I'm trying to focus my points to one thing instead of having a list. I don't need to mention later planets as they are all pretty much designed the same way so I'm keeping it familiar for everyone so the discussion can involve more people.
Everything in green I disagree with. You not helping the person dying will not effect you in any way. The mobs are spread out so your fighting does not involve the person next to you. If that person had died and brought the mobs to you and as long as you don't do any AOE, those mobs will return to their spawn points. Like I said before, the only return in helping another player is the satisfaction of helping a person and not npc, however hardly anyone will do that because players need an incentive to help others.
Every action you do in life, you do it because you get something in return. Even giving to charity, you gain a good feeling of having helped others that need help, which is why some people don't give because it's not enough. Same with grey mobs. There are going to be a lot (not all, and I base this on my experience with 'tag' systems) of people that will just overlook others that are engaged in mobs because they are focused on their own goals and quests.
Not true. I have helped out people i havnt known for no reason other then to be nice in mmos ive played. ive met others like this also
Not everyoen is a jerk in mmos. They do exist but i find that there are alot of peple willing to help if u just ask for it .
I have helped people otu and vice vera for no reason other then killing the mob quicker might get it so i could get the mob i needed faster, or just to be helpful cause they were dying and the mob was winning and i felt like helping them out.
I gained nothing from it so what. sometimes the only reward u n eed is a thank you for helping i know it goes a long way with me
I also know there are others like that also.
When you tag an item there is a timer bar that needs to fill before it dings. In some games if another player or multi-players tags the items during the timer bar is done by the first tagger then all will get credit. BW should have gone with this type of system, maybe it was an oversight by them.
~shrugs~
Velika: City of Wheels: Among the mortal races, the humans were the only one that never built cities or great empires; a curse laid upon them by their creator, Gidd, forced them to wander as nomads for twenty centuries...
I'm not saying 100% of people are not going to help others in need. I've descibed in the post above yours that people need incentives to help others. Feeling good about helping others is not good enough for a lot of people, if that were the case the world would be a happier place.
I'm saying that the way the system is, the story, feel, tone, of the game does not mesh with the gameplay mechanics. We all want to destroy the empire as republic and vice versa yet the mechanics make you play you vs everyone else as you progess your character.
Edit: Let me ask you a very simple question. When you think of the community of the internet as a whole, is the first thing that pops into your head is, "the internet is full of nice people." In my experience anonymity brings out the worst in people.
You just need to let go of SWTOR, don't waste your time writing. I for one agree with you, everything in this game is horribly dated mechanics, things that have annoyed me over and over in previous MMO's. They've put zero effort into thinking of something new and fresh, all they've done is waste insane amounts of cash on voice overs. And that's fine but the rest of the game is a straight up copy of WoW, it's truly disgusting.
Keep your eyes on the horizon and wait for TSW and GW2, let this POS rot away with the rest of the failures.
Actually it was the Quake 3 engine and I FREAKING LOVED THAT GAME, I usually just sat around in a server chilling talking to people or just dueling and thats all that matters. you haz light sabur I haz too lets duel!
The truth may be puzzling. It may take some work to grapple with. It may be counterintuitive. It may contradict deeply held prejudices. It may not be consonant with what we desperately want to be true. But our preferences do not determine what's true.
Carl Sagan-
I could write a long rebuttal post but what's the point. Everything that will be said has been said so I will keep it short and to the point.
The Devs always said what the game would be sorry there is no space combat like Tie-Fighter no Quake 3 combat engine and Bioware just delivered a very polished mmorpg version of their populare KOTOR series. Frankly that's what I have been waiting for a simple fun and engrossing MMORPG with a story that I can play casually. The game was built for players like myself and I am very much looking forward to it.
KOTOR made me quit SWG when I realized I had a second job playing SWG after I saw what being a Star Wars Hero could be like.
For me having an awesome fun time and escaping reality is what is most important while not being forced to grind to stay relevant. This game delivers on that for me so I for one will be playing for a long time!
If you think not aiding someone doesn't affect you, then we'll just have to disgree. From what I've played helping people were certainly beneficial in that if they died, it could make things very interesting for someone who passed on the chance. I call it the "Spiderman/Uncle Owen" scenario.
If Peter Parker stops the thug, he doesn't later kill Uncle Owen. But because he didn't think it would "benefit" him for whatever reason he didn't. This is classic MMO philosphy and just about every mmo I've played was one where as a healer, I'd run by and pop heals and buff players who were fighting. I got nothing from it right? Wrong. When you help others, it tends to have a trickle-down effect; even in cutthroat games like Darkfall this is understood by the newest of noobs.
The reason I started was because someone buffed ME as a noob when I first started mmos. That's how it works and why people play MMOs. You seem to be playing for loot only, which is the wrong reason to be playing a mmo. If you want loot there are a myriad of games you can play for that purpose where you don't have to compete with tagging. A MMO is about community, not capitalism. (Pay me or I don't help)
Sometimes in mmos, you'll be fighting a mob and dying for whatever reason (You weren't paying attention to health, your pots are on cooldown, a mob glitched, etc) and you'll be losing. You are one tick away from death and then someone runs by and heals or finishes the mob for you. That is a huge relief even if there is no real "death penalty" that someone HELPED you without looking for anything other than "Hey, thanks man. Very decent of you".
I hope you don't play ToR or at least on my server because if you will only help someone if you can get a shiny, you certainly aren't the type of person I would want in my community especially if I was on a PvP server.
"Meh, I'm not helping him. He's going to get the lion's share of the kill so pfff."
"TO MICHAEL!"
Try Call of Duty. As someone said earlier, I don't think MMOs are your type of game. TOR has brought some new stuff to the table, but they aren't about to build an entirely new kind of MMO that is going to be alien to everyone who is used to playing MMORPGs.
Argh
You have no idea what planets I've been to and what I've done. I can tell you to a certainty that Bioware placed every group of mob at a certain distance so you do not pull more than one group. You will not get aggro from someone dying from their group of mobs. It's all spread out, and if you had played any of the beta you would have noticed that since level 1. It continues throughout the game. It's Bioware's design to place groups of mobs with enough space apart.
Can anyone else who has played the beta discuss the mob placements? Do you think they are spread out? I sure do. The only mob that patrols is a "strong" mob, and adding that to my group of three mobs does not add any difficutly to taking them all down. I have never once had someone elses train effect me, it's done by design, because all the mobs are spread out.
I disagree with the title.
In short, SWTOR's story or context addition has the most impact on the quest based leveling experience.
Questing has been the main means of leveling themepark MMO's. SWTOR added VO, cinematic cutscenes and choices to them, thus adding more context to them for a larger immersion/enjoyment.
Questing while leveling is what you do anyway while in themepark MMO's.
VO/cutscene enhanced questing with choices > textbased questing where 'accept' or 'cancel' were the only choices you can make.
So nope, imo TOR story is a valuable and effective revamp of an MMO gameplay mechanic that's already in themepark MMO's, namely quest based leveling.
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."
I see you did not read my post. I never said VO is bad. I never said having a story is bad. I never said choices are bad. Read my post. The problem with TOR is they took 2005 MMO mechanics and put a story on top of it. What they should have done is create a story and build mechanics around that story.
No, I get exactly what you're saying, at least what you try to explain in your OP, I only disagree with it.
What you're advocating is that they first look at what the story was and then invent and design the gameplay mechanics around that story, while the approach that BW chose is reverse, check what gameplay mechanics to use as a foundation and add story/context where it was lacking or fell short in current MMO's. Which in my opinion is a better approach. Stories can change, when new stories are added, should the gameplay be changed as well purely because of it? Sounds odd to me. Story or added context can be an enhancement or enrichment of existing gameplay and that's the route they chose.
That's why I gave the example of quest revamp.
They made story present throughout the game but still subservient to the gameplay mechanics they chose, while according to you they should have made the story center and then design gameplay mechanics around it.
We just disagree with what the best approach is, I think it's the first while you think it's the latter.
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."
To be fair there is a pretty heated discussion about this going on in the dev community right now. If you read sites like gamasutra where professionals debate the issue, the consensus is that this practice needs to stop.
Building a game around gameplay-mechanics is great for a sandbox (see Minecraft) but horrible if you talk about narrative. The majority of game-designers today design separately narrative and gameplay mechanics which is unsatisfying as long as the narrative is pre-defined.
Of course sometimes you just do not need to worry about this in AAA development, people don't buy Red Dead Redemption for the awesome gunplay or excellent farm-sim but for the interactive movie experience the game provides.
But to push the envelope one must stop to think of narrative and gameplay as separate. Just like any movie is not separated into script and cinematography. The script formulates the cinematography.
Gameplay has to facilitate narrative, not just propell you through it.
I couldn't have said it better myself.
Narrative or storytelling has been pretty nonexistent in MMO's for a long time, and MMO's with little narrative have been doing great from the beginning of the MMO genre, which was foremostly due to the gameplay and features they offered. So that says something about the importance of gameplay. In fact, story or narrative have become so alien as a concept to MMO's that a couple of MMO companies have stated explicitly that they wanted to bring the story or RPG back into MMORPG.
The movie analogy is only partially correct, because the script is a lot more important to a movie than story/narrative is for an MMORPG. Also, movies are more rigid and less varied in the changes they can implement to tell a story than games are.
In short: quite some MMO's have been doing without story/narrative rather well, BW is putting a larger focus on story/narrative in an MMORPG, which is already a big step to try in MMORPG's as a lot of discussions in these forums show enough.
Developing a whole MMORPG with all the features and mechanics fitted purely around the story/narrative sounds like a completely unreasonable route to take, especially considering that story wasn't a required pillar at all so far for MMO success. To me it looks like BW is already taking a big risk with the tentative implementation and first steps they're making in their story infusion.
Developing a whole MMO and all its mechanics and features purely around a story/narrative sounds like borderline suicidal for a company to do, especially seeing how the MMO market has been so far.
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."
Telling a story is hardly a revolution in gaming. The problem some people are having with TOR is that story has taken presedence over Content and content is what players need to create their own story, not listen to VO. On top of that the game world looks dead, nothing moves it feels empty even with people playing in the same area. This isn't a story issue its a gameplay issue, in fact the way TOR is made makes it the last choice in a game that should be driven by story, themepark mmorpgs traditionally dont pay attention to lore and have to opporate like Diku mud chatrooms, because thats what they were based on, so people wont be bored to death. I think TOR has removed some of the traditional themepark player elements that make the endless, endless gear grind bearable. They really should have focused more on a living environment, the TOR environment is just dead, I am sorry we can debate the ins and outs of TOR all you want, but this isn't debateable, I have seen games made in the late 90s that have a more active environment to play in.
Story = Content
I know this is an alien concept for a lot of modern gamers that seem to suffer form chronic ADHD, but for many people it's true. Granted, I will be the first to admit that in many cases the game world in SWTOR needs some livening up, but to claim that story isn't content just does not compute...
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"Searchers after horror haunt strange, far places..." ~ H.P.Lovecraft, "From Beyond"
Member Since March 2004