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Has SWTOR proved why linear class story and voice acting cannot work in an MMO?
tixylix
Member UncommonPosts: 1,288
EQ2 hit the same problem years back when SOE found out that voice acting becomes mega expensive and way too slow to update content fast enough in an MMO. So they ditched the voice acting because not only do you have the problem of new content but updating old content as well. Now I don't know if much voice acting exists in that game at all but I didn't hear any trying the game again... which is a shame and I want classic EQ2 servers lol.
Now SWTOR is facing the same problem, it might have been ok if the subscriber base was as big as WoW's but it's declining fast. So they need to pour content out faster than ever to keep people interested in the game. Also with less and less income the first thing that has to be dropped is the voice acting, like I said it costs too much and takes too much time. It's not only gender based but class based too, that's a lot of voice acting to put in the game and I reckon it'll be dropped before too long. They'll probably choose to drop it for the side quests and only update class quests in expansions and keep the voice acting there. I already thought it was disapointing that after the first Flashpoint, the story and voice acting didn't really carry over to the other ones I tried.
On the whole I hate the way SWTOR handled the voice acting, it limited race choices and it kept taking you out of the game for cutscenes. These cutscenes weren't even good, they were static and just two characters facing each other the whole time. The other problem is there was barely any voice acting in the world (if you can call it that) it just felt so dead and lifeless as static npcs barely animated and nevere really moved to make it feel populated.
EQ2 handled it much better back in 2004, though the acting itself sucked lol. It was fully voiced for the NPCs and it kept you in the world, you ran past NPCs and they called you over and that's how you knew who had quests. It felt more immersive, there was no question marks above peoples heads and it made it feel more of an RPG that made you want to explore. You just walked over, clicked on them and got speach bubble options, your character didn't talk but theirs did to you, in real time in the game and not in a cutscene, you could also run away at any point.
That is a much better system and far more manageable for content creation. I just think SWTORs system which many people think is the strength of the game has ended up being it's weakness. I also think that how they've designed it where it's a linear game, worlds feel like linear zones instead of worlds and once you're gone through it once you don't wanna go through a second time because it's the exact same linear path again. It's just poor... it's more of a single player game than an MMO and everyone camps the fleet station and grinds battlegrounds and raids, you might as well not have the world lol.
Also why does story have to be linear? Why can't be have self contained quests with story dotted around in a non linear way in the game world. You could just have quests that are like 3 or 4 chained quests and then that's the case done like LA Noire missions. I would much prefer and sandbox SWG Pre CU like world where I could pick and choose where to do these quests.
Comments
The type of content that SWTOR needs to add does not need voice acting in it to make it work. The game needs more systems outside of questing/leveling/warzones in order for it to retain subscribers, not more of the same with people giving me 10 minute long cut scenes that tell me to go kill 10 Imperials in the longest way possible.
If they added things like housing, gambling, swoop racing, real space combat, customizing ships, better class progression, and meaningful crafting they would not have to add the addition of any real voice acting.
My Guild Wars 2 Vids
Yea this is pretty much my gripe.
The voice acting should have stayed with class stories, and the fact the entire game was too linear. Class story should have been optional, not the main focus of the game (imo). The biggest complaint i have, is the game was way to linear.
The story is its strongest aspect . 6 years ago i was amped about this game when i first starting to make comments about it in the SWG forums. Upon playing this steaming pile of failure i realized within 3 hours of beta that it should be boxed as a single player game . Of course i pre ordered , made it to 50 in a week or so and realized the game had nothing to offer me . The biggest things that get me is that you cant sit down in chairs and "WTF" ? And the economy was just awful . Theres nothing worth a damn to craft and resell , nothing to really loot and profit from.
The Old Republic is a lesson in what not to do in an MMORPG .
I really liked the class stories, but the rest of the game is just too linear. But the worst part of swtor imho is that you have absolutely nothing decent to do outside of questing. There's no "fluff stuff" for rp, crafting is pointless, no minigames, etc, to keep ppl entertained while waiting for more story.
Voice acting for the class quests only would probably give them more time to work on the stuff that's missing. Also if the quests weren't so linear making alts would not be so boring, by that i mean maybe different quests depending on your choices (choosing to kill the guy leads to quest A, allowing him to live leads to quest B, helping him against someone else leads to quest C).
I still believe swtor needed at least another year in the making, on the other hand it felt like they researched mmo's when they decided to make swtor but never bothered to check what was done in the years of the making (basically to see what was new, how it worked, could we adapt that into swtor, etc.)
I really hope the transition to f2p isn't a complete mess but this is EA were talking here.
If anything, it proved linear class story and voice acting *can* work in an MMO. Because, you know, most people stuck around till they completed their class stories.
The leaving, that came when those players hit the brick wall that is "the standard MMO endgame". That is: Raiding, heroic dungeons, PVP battlegrounds, large persistent PVP zone...
So, if anything in SWTOR didn't work, it was the standard MMO stuff. The story and voice acting worked as well as could be expected.
Next time, Bioware: When faced with the same two choices, go with your own stuff, not the WOW raiding/PVP instancing stuff.
I don't think so at all.
what it proved was that you need to sustain the story and give players more to do at cap.
There were people, myself included, who really enjoyed the game. But at cap then what?
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
The only thing SWToR proved is that it was not worth the money they put into the game's development.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Voice acting isn't a bad thing. In fact, (IMO) MMO's of the future will incorporate this more and more to help give personality to a game. Many high profile games coming out soon have voice-overs.
Voice-overs give a nice escape and sense of immersion to a game. The problem with SWTOR was many in this field though - specifically other fun parts of the game were simply left ignored, in a game crippled with an inferior game engine. While SWTOR had a grand story experience, to be the king of MMORPG's, the devs need to have a driving force to make players "want" to log on. Maybe it's for the social aspects, maybe for roleplaying, and maybe it's for a competitive nature. Any of these Maybe's will do, but SWTOR lacked them all. There is only so much you can do in a game engine that doesn't support the "massive" part of a MMO.
I could go on about how SWTOR tried to emulate the current watered-down version of WoW Cataclysm, but points were already made elsewhere. I don't play WoW anymore, and I don't plan to play again (Cataclysm was a huge letdown to it's history, Thanks Activision.). SWTOR didn't even emulate a good version of WoW (Vanilla, TBC), when it was popular and gaining subscribers. It rather copied the no-risk, no challenge gameplay of Cataclysm. The game just falls short in every category, except story.
Story alone can't hold a game afloat. It will be a helluva nice side feature though, once a developer gets the concepts of horizontal gameplay down.
Even with the cruddy engine, if EA were to implement a racing game, gambling, 3D space exploration .. this game would gain popularity fast. They had their chance and now it's blown. They took a chance on a WoW clone with story and lost. There is no money left to fund the very stuff that would attract new and former players.
Want a nice understanding of life? Try Spirit Science: "The Human History"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8NNHmV3QPw&feature=plcp
Recognize the voice? Yep sounds like Penny Arcade's Extra Credits.
I'm not promoting other games, but even though I have only minor interest in GW2, I did watch a segment on the voice overs they did. I was left with my mouth open when the video finished.
Essentially they do their voice acting in real time with the game, without cutscenes .. at least for the scripted events. So you hear stuff from the NPC's while you are free to move around and watch them from any angle you choose (as they do whatever they do with their own story). Or you can wander away while they are still talking. You can choose to follow them as they talk if you are interested in what they have to say / what they intend to do.
This was a major complaint I had with SWTOR (still below crappy engine and crappy customer service though). Players should not be removed from the game world during NPC interaction. Players speaking to NPC's should still be subjected to PVP, for instance. SWTOR just has too much instancing, phasing, and removal of players from the world during "story". How SWTOR was implemented ruined the sense of being in an MMO.
There is no dialog wheel in GW2 though. So every game has it's pluses and minuses. I sort of liked the dialog wheel, even if it only affected short-term results.
Edit: It should be noted though that GW2 does have it's share of bland forced no-interaction (removal of avatar from world) cutscenes. I was speaking to only highlights I've seen that were nice that were not avatar removals. I'd be more of a fan of in-game sequences, rather than uncontrollable video clips. I don't know how many in-game sequences exist in GW2, but I like what I saw.
Want a nice understanding of life? Try Spirit Science: "The Human History"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8NNHmV3QPw&feature=plcp
Recognize the voice? Yep sounds like Penny Arcade's Extra Credits.
Pretty much all dynamic events ("quests") in GW2 have those in-game sequences. The only part of that game with instanced cutscenes is your optional personal story. It's a bit like your class story in TOR.
In fact, GW2 will have voice acted racial stories, so if it's successful, I guess it will prove they can work in MMOs?
Indeed. I gave it a try this month and really felt to be playing a KTOR meets ME game instead of a real SW MMORPG
For that same reason I quited my sub and hope that some REAL MMO content will come soon. If not, then too bad and I'll be moving on for good...
Voice Acting is really good. it draws ppl into the game / quests. If you dont like it, there is a options you can close/skip scenes and can do quests like other mmos. "Click, Accept and Go!!!"
SWTOR proved how bad is Hero Engine and another WOW clone game is not an option for players anymore..
I'm with you on this matter.
It might be, because of the fact that I'm not native english speaker but also that I like to read books and imagine the situation from written text.
It might also be an age thing, because younger generations are Y-generation (Y for Youtube) and they want their information in visual form rather than written.
Anyway, now that I'm on my 2nd take in swtor (ye subbed for a month, because I had promised myself I will come back in the summer and check the game out) my spacebar rage is to the maximum and I won't do any quests other than class ones because I can't stand those poorly acted cutscenes.
I'll just rage out here the other thing that bugs me. Why do people say SWTOR has good stories? To me they're nothing but cheesy star wars rehash done bad.
I think it worked well for TOR and DCUO. And DCUO even was able to bring back some of the original VO actors for a recent DLC.
It can work.
I want a mmorpg where people have gone through misery, have gone through school stuff and actually have had sex even. -sagil
SWTOR proved that it definately does work. The problems with SWTOR are not the story or voice work, it's everything else. Confined areas, lackluster endgame, bad PvP. The story and voices are the best thing going for it. The level process has been improved in SWTOR, it is definately more fun doing the quests than in other MMOs. The problem they have is the lack of exploration available 'around' those quests.
I even wish GW2 took a more SWTOR story appraoch with the dynamic events to give them more meaning. Instead of.. 'flies are gathering around the streetlamps.. we must kill them all' or 'giant bog creature, must kill it'. I know the story and reasons are there in GW2 but damn are they hard to get without effort, especially if you join in with an event half way through.. you'll never know what the hell is going on or why.
Very good post on how VO can be PROPERLY implemented in an MMORPG.
VO is basically a tool, and like any tool, it can be used well or poorly. I really hate when games, especially MMORPGs, force you into constant cutscenes so they can subject you to their cinematic VO sequences. It's okay in moderation, but when it becomes frequent, it's a major pain.
On the other hand, as Karteli says, VO can be awesome when it is used to just enhance your normal gameplay experience. One of my favorite uses of VO in GW2 is simply when your character will scream out "My leg!" when they get crippled or something similar when you get another debuff or a buff. This isn't that much VO at all, but it's great because it gives you an immediate audio cue to tell you that you have been debuffed. It makes it so I can stay "in the game" more, and not be constantly eyeing the active effects area of the UI to see what buffs/debuffs I am under.
Another shining example of how VO can be used effectively is the game Bastion. In that game, there is a narrator that basically narrates what you are doing. If you kill a bunch of monsters, he will talk about it. If you find a new area, he will tell you about it. This is all while you are playing the game.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
I'd say the main problem is that SWTOR focuses too heavily on things that CANNOT be done well in an MMO. They just can't.
You either have to gut the game to the point where it isn't an MMO, or you gimp the story.
You cannot tell an effective story about your character, the hero, when the game world doesn't change to reflect anything you've done. Once you leave the instance, nothing has changed. What's more, to keep people subscribed you have to pad the quests with pointless busy work. Not to mention the combat won't be nearly as good as a singleplayer game.
Leave singleplayer games to singleplayer games.
You don't promote a lasting community that'll keep paying for your game by giving them solo instances and NPC companions.
Totally agree with this point...
I think also a more clearly defined way to get High-End PvE Armor through FP's, Ops, and Crafting is needed as well...They should look at the way LOTRO does this...It's very good IMHO, and keeps you grinding for the next great thing...And as you move up in End Game Armor so do the challenges...But different areas also offer great recipes for Crafters...I'm sure other MMO's do this as well...Which is why I was really shocked SWTOR's formula was so primative...