Which would you rather have, a city full of pre-programmed NPCs designed to make it look like it was populated when only YOU are there or a city filled with players such as yourself, creating a community of real people to mingle and interact with?
What you describe as lacking is true of any city in the world. What brings it to life is people... not cardboard cut-outs placed randomly about. If it appears *dead* with just NPCs... that's a good thing... because NPCs aren't real people. You say Stormwind is a vibrant city? Take all the players out of it and reevaluate that statement. Do you interact with NPCs short of vendors/AH? That sort of interaction is akin to using an ATM machine. The city will come alive when it is filled with players... or so you will hope.
I think people are playing MMORPGs like single-player games too much. What made MMORPGs great was the people who played them... the community. There is no community in MMORPGs these days. You spend your time sitting in queues alt-tabbed out doing something else while you wait for it to pop. You don't need friends to do anything except maybe a dungeon or raid. Everything else can be done completely alone. Why not just create a game that auto-populates bots for you so that it's really only you in the game and everything else is faked. Is that what you are looking for? You can still progress a character et al without ever dealing with a real person. Tons of RPG games do that every day. And yet, people still yearn for the human interaction... which is why MMORPGs still have one thread of life in them... the HOPE that someone out there might actually say something to you other than a pre-programmed script.
SW:TOR will either succeed or fail at the greatest challenge of all... creating a community. Without it, it will lose playerbase like no tomorrow. With it, it will thrive for years to come. Trust me, no amount of content will make up for the lack of community. Rift proves that every time it throws out a new content patch. People would rather stand around in a city doing nothing filled with real people than play a game in which the city is barren of real people. If some dead MMORPG all of a sudden had 10,000 people playing every day, it would quickly gain the interest of the MMORPG community... because players really do chase after the other players. They want real interactions with real people. It's why players return like homing pidgeons back to the game they think has all the players in it. It's when they see it's just as empty as the one they left that they seek out something else. So if you are a game developer, you can make a small mint on sales (not subscriptions) merely by feeding them new games to try out. Until one figures out how to recreate community, they will always just be a way station until the next game comes out.
Max level'd bounty hunters in a few of the beta builds with the hope that the devs would take the constructive critisicsm for its worth (i know TONS of testers felt the same).
Without using spoilers its a little hard but the low quality production for npcs standing around doing the same crap 24/7 was annoying...specially when at one time some Imperial Admiral gets attacked and YOU have to save him while at the same time theres a good 10 troopers just standing around talking to each other with the same looped animation...this is where that $150mil went?
Did BW allow us to actually interact with chairs and benches now? that was terrible that you vcouldnt even sit in a chair unless you positioned yourself jsut right and used /sit command..
I uninstalled before that last build because of the lack of interest BW had with their shortcomings so not sure if things have changed but my personal spaceship felt like a indy ripoff of Mass Effect 2..it served no purpose other than a bank..since you could do the brainless crafting/missions anywhere, doing it on the ship was pointless...i HATED 'you cannot interact with this object at this time' for the ships communicatior/holo terminal...i mean really? i cannot check in with my crew anytime i want? "sorry i am busy with my looping animation and my code only allows me to talk to you at specific points in the game" - not good for companions.
Combat for me was fluid and great...just the mobs i was fighting were umm lame? all the way to max it was groups of 3 or maybe 4 with 1 harder guy sometimes just in packs standing around...nearly every type of attackable mob all the way was like this....i felt like if i could zoom in really well i would see little spawn points on the ground.
Did the "EPIC SPACE COMBAT" (their advertising) become epic yet? or even mediocre? would be an improvement.
Have fun if you love the game..thats the whole point afterall
...have even more fun with your offshore accounts and your new villa in the Caymens with part of that $150mil EA flunkies
good luck with your affiliation work MMORPG.com..i know you have to pay the bills and these companies are where the moneys at but one day it will bite you in the face
All three of your points I totally agree with and more. The worlds are dead, stagnate, souless places. Even in WoW the cities are more alive. Even the world of Azeroth has more life going on than what we saw in this game. Sad. MOBs are the one thing that really just annoyed me the most. They just stand around and wait for you to run up and start the whack-the-mole game on them. ::sigh:: Then when they do engage you the combat was predictable and a sheer yawn fest for me. Playing a game of Space Invaders takes more challenge.
You can't really judge how the community will take shape in beta so saying the worlds are dead is a bit silly, i do however agree with you on the mobs, they are way to static and not interesting at all to fight.
there is phasing or sharding or something technical like that, means you will only have a max of 100 people in your instance,. i think that's the reason they seem dead.
if there are 401 players, you might be the lucky one who has a instance for hisself.
Max level'd bounty hunters in a few of the beta builds with the hope that the devs would take the constructive critisicsm for its worth (i know TONS of testers felt the same).
Without using spoilers its a little hard but the low quality production for npcs standing around doing the same crap 24/7 was annoying...specially when at one time some Imperial Admiral gets attacked and YOU have to save him while at the same time theres a good 10 troopers just standing around talking to each other with the same looped animation...this is where that $150mil went?
Did BW allow us to actually interact with chairs and benches now? that was terrible that you vcouldnt even sit in a chair unless you positioned yourself jsut right and used /sit command..
I think you are ignoring the relaities of designing for a multiple player environment with this statement. SW:TOR isn't a single player game like Skyrim so it can't have the same level of NPC interactions that a single player game can. When you create a MMO you can't assume when someone is going to come into a area with NPC's so if you want all the player base to interact with them even as observers you have to loop the content and that severly limites what you can do. For content you want more interaction with you need to instance it. Personally I think Bioware has done a much better job finding a middle ground than any other MMO I have played recently.
Compare TOR to a game like Skyrim and the world does seem a bit lifeless. Compare TOR to any other MMO out there and it seems miles away better.
All three of your points I totally agree with and more. The worlds are dead, stagnate, souless places. Even in WoW the cities are more alive. Even the world of Azeroth has more life going on than what we saw in this game. Sad. MOBs are the one thing that really just annoyed me the most. They just stand around and wait for you to run up and start the whack-the-mole game on them. ::sigh:: Then when they do engage you the combat was predictable and a sheer yawn fest for me. Playing a game of Space Invaders takes more challenge.
You can't really judge how the community will take shape in beta so saying the worlds are dead is a bit silly, i do however agree with you on the mobs, they are way to static and not interesting at all to fight.
there is phasing or sharding or something technical like that, means you will only have a max of 100 people in your instance,. i think that's the reason they seem dead.
if there are 401 players, you might be the lucky one who has a instance for hisself.
All the more reason for the mobs and NPCs to bring life to a game. Not really a good idea to depend on players for that anyhow, but so many MMOs do.
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.
Which would you rather have, a city full of pre-programmed NPCs designed to make it look like it was populated when only YOU are there or a city filled with players such as yourself, creating a community of real people to mingle and interact with?
Max level'd bounty hunters in a few of the beta builds with the hope that the devs would take the constructive critisicsm for its worth (i know TONS of testers felt the same).
Without using spoilers its a little hard but the low quality production for npcs standing around doing the same crap 24/7 was annoying...specially when at one time some Imperial Admiral gets attacked and YOU have to save him while at the same time theres a good 10 troopers just standing around talking to each other with the same looped animation...this is where that $150mil went?
Did BW allow us to actually interact with chairs and benches now? that was terrible that you vcouldnt even sit in a chair unless you positioned yourself jsut right and used /sit command..
Compare TOR to any other MMO out there and it seems miles away better.
What exactly are we comparing it too in terms of liveleness?
I'll take guards shooting at Justicars in a stand off over one or two orcs walking around org.
Mobs being static? Once again compared to what? Mobs will actually walk away and take cover from you, and to me that is less static than ANY mmo I have played.
First of all, in regards to it being a dead, souless, world: That's simply not true. While I would definitely prefer the npcs weren't static (welcome to most themepark games), there is simply no way someone with an open mind would play this game and thing, "Gosh, it feels so dead and lifeless." It's just the opposite, in fact. There is actual ACTION happening in the background of this game. You hear things going on, you see things going on. The starter zones look like there is a war happening. You hear explosions in many places. You see spaceships flying through the air in both cities and out in the world. I felt the cities in this game actually FELT like cities. They were massive. Now, they weren't laid out so you an explore every part of them (you couldn't go to every tower in the city and poke around), but BioWare did a great job of giving the illusion of the cities being huge. And what you could explore covered more territory than any other MMO i've seen. I'm so sick of other MMOs that have cities that are nothing more than a big town (Wow) or even worse, a single building, Rift. Bravo to Bioware here.
Second, as for the point made about the mobs and their AI, that must have been an old build. Trust me, the mobs were tuned up in this game and many of them given special abiities that made them more difficult. They don't just stand there until you stroll up to them, although there are some that are still stationary. They don't behave any better or worse than other MMOs of its kind, except they are much, much tougher now. I died quite a bit in my first 15 levels on my Bounty Hunter last weekend, much more than I expected, and regular mobs can put a hurt on you if you aren't paying attention. In fact, they actually tuned the mobs up MORE since the build I tested. To the point that a lot of testers are finding it a bit too difficult. Do some of the mobs still stand around? Sure. And that's going to happen in themepark games. Strange that SWTOR would be called out on it by some people on this thread who have professed love for WoW, which has the most static mobs of all.
Do some of the mobs still stand around? Sure. And that's going to happen in themepark games. Strange that SWTOR would be called out on it by some people on this thread who have professed love for WoW, which has the most static mobs of all.
I think people were hoping that the game would improve upon previous games in this regard. But you are right in that most mmos are the same in this aspect. In fact, the only mmo that I can think of that was different with enemy AI was Tabula Rasa.
First of all, in regards to it being a dead, souless, world: That's simply not true. While I would definitely prefer the npcs weren't static (welcome to most themepark games), there is simply no way someone with an open mind would play this game and thing, "Gosh, it feels so dead and lifeless." It's just the opposite, in fact. There is actual ACTION happening in the background of this game. You hear things going on, you see things going on. The starter zones look like there is a war happening. You hear explosions in many places. You see spaceships flying through the air in both cities and out in the world. I felt the cities in this game actually FELT like cities. They were massive. Now, they weren't laid out so you an explore every part of them (you couldn't go to every tower in the city and poke around), but BioWare did a great job of giving the illusion of the cities being huge. And what you could explore covered more territory than any other MMO i've seen. I'm so sick of other MMOs that have cities that are nothing more than a big town (Wow) or even worse, a single building, Rift. Bravo to Bioware here.
Second, as for the point made about the mobs and their AI, that must have been an old build. Trust me, the mobs were tuned up in this game and many of them given special abiities that made them more difficult. They don't just stand there until you stroll up to them, although there are some that are still stationary. They don't behave any better or worse than other MMOs of its kind, except they are much, much tougher now. I died quite a bit in my first 15 levels on my Bounty Hunter last weekend, much more than I expected, and regular mobs can put a hurt on you if you aren't paying attention. In fact, they actually tuned the mobs up MORE since the build I tested. To the point that a lot of testers are finding it a bit too difficult. Do some of the mobs still stand around? Sure. And that's going to happen in themepark games. Strange that SWTOR would be called out on it by some people on this thread who have professed love for WoW, which has the most static mobs of all.
Oh course it is being called out. It should be better than WoW. It is 2011. Shouldn't we as players expect more from these game designers? Are they just to lazy to add things like roaming MOB's? Are they to lazy to actually have a MOB you know do more than just stand and get whaacked on? Most of the encounters I had in this game, with the exception of a few the MOB's stood in one place and allowed me to whack on them. Yes there were a couple that wouldrun for cover, but all you had to do was follow them to where they took cover and then - play whack-the-mole with them. Seriously...it is 2011 and we're still getting games like this made? I was really hoping the guys at Bioware would do more with the NPC's and MOB's combat AI - boy was I wrong. They touted that they were going to make the worlds seem alive unlike anything we've ever seen before. If that is their idea of bringing worlds to life...give me a game like WoW any day of the week. It makes SW:ToR seem dead.
Seems this is another kleenex-MMO. Great. Feeling really disappointed, as all my fears are confirmed.
You shouldn't feel disappointed but happy. Think of all the time and attention you've wasted in the past year to a game that wasn't your type of game anyway and that wouldn't provide you the gaming fun you need.
Now that you know for certain that it isn't something for you, you don't have to waste a single minute or shred of attention to it anymore, you can simply forget about the game, ignore it and instead devote your time and attention to a game or games that do have the potential to be fun for you.
When you look at it pragmatically, this would have to be a great relief for you, having all your doubts removed now you can fully move on to other things.
Also, Elikal, I can't help but notice how much you compare SWTOR to Skyrim. I believe such a comparison would best be left unused since both games are vastly different in their design philosophies, their technical capabilities, their business models, and their target audiences. It just seems like you have unrealistic expectations in regards to what TOR sells itself off as. Simply put, don't let Skyrim, a single-player sandbox-style game, influence the way you view SWTOR and other MMO's in general since they will never be the same. It just isn't a valid and credible analogy.
I find it a bit difficult to believe the mobs just stand there and wait to be hit. These people are the ones that did Mass Effect I and 2 and recall so many times the mobs would cleverly move from cover to cover to get to you or hide when you try to hit them and then come out and shoot. I think I will find out for myself rather than just believe everything written.
First of all, in regards to it being a dead, souless, world: That's simply not true. While I would definitely prefer the npcs weren't static (welcome to most themepark games), there is simply no way someone with an open mind would play this game and thing, "Gosh, it feels so dead and lifeless." It's just the opposite, in fact. There is actual ACTION happening in the background of this game. You hear things going on, you see things going on. The starter zones look like there is a war happening. You hear explosions in many places. You see spaceships flying through the air in both cities and out in the world. I felt the cities in this game actually FELT like cities. They were massive. Now, they weren't laid out so you an explore every part of them (you couldn't go to every tower in the city and poke around), but BioWare did a great job of giving the illusion of the cities being huge. And what you could explore covered more territory than any other MMO i've seen. I'm so sick of other MMOs that have cities that are nothing more than a big town (Wow) or even worse, a single building, Rift. Bravo to Bioware here.
Second, as for the point made about the mobs and their AI, that must have been an old build. Trust me, the mobs were tuned up in this game and many of them given special abiities that made them more difficult. They don't just stand there until you stroll up to them, although there are some that are still stationary. They don't behave any better or worse than other MMOs of its kind, except they are much, much tougher now. I died quite a bit in my first 15 levels on my Bounty Hunter last weekend, much more than I expected, and regular mobs can put a hurt on you if you aren't paying attention. In fact, they actually tuned the mobs up MORE since the build I tested. To the point that a lot of testers are finding it a bit too difficult. Do some of the mobs still stand around? Sure. And that's going to happen in themepark games. Strange that SWTOR would be called out on it by some people on this thread who have professed love for WoW, which has the most static mobs of all.
Oh course it is being called out. It should be better than WoW. It is 2011. Shouldn'r we as players expect more from these game designers? Are they just to lazy to add things like roaming MOB's? Are they to lazy to actually have a MOB you know do more than just stand and get whaacked on? Most of the encounters I had in this game, with the exception of a few the MOB's stood in one place and allowed me to whack on them. Yes there were a couple that wouldrun for cover, but all you had to do was follow them to where they took cover and then - play whack-the-mole with them. Seriously...it is 2011 and we're still getting games like this made? I was really hoping the guys at Bioware would do more with the NPC's and MOB's combat AI - boy was I wrong. They touted that they were going to make the worlds seem alive unlike anything we've ever seen before. If that is their idea of bringing worlds to life...give me a game like WoW any day of the week. It makes SW:ToR seem dead.
First of all, there are roaming mobs in this game. I'm not sure what build you played, but I was ambushed more than a few times by patrols after a 3 pull. My guess is that will get more prevalent in the later planets which are much more open. As for the mob AI, I'm not sure which build you played, but they were tuned up quite a bit in the last build. Many of the stronger ones given unique abilities that you have to deal with. And I noticed quite a bit of humanoid mobs not just blindly rushing at you when you fired on them, instead many times I saw them duck for cover before attacking. So, the mob AI may not be your cup of tea, but it is currently better than what we see from WoW. Then again, maybe the Pandas will be much smarter.
I'm not sure what you are looking for in terms of an "alive" world, but the worlds seemed plenty alive to me. Look, I get that you're a WoW fangirl and are anxiously awaiting the Panda expansion. I get that. Good on you. And I also get that you have predicted this game to be dead after 6 months or so (believe that was your timeframe). So once again, lets revisit this conversation in 6 months time, shall we?
Oh course it is being called out. It should be better than WoW. It is 2011. Shouldn't we as players expect more from these game designers? Are they just to lazy to add things like roaming MOB's? Are they to lazy to actually have a MOB you know do more than just stand and get whaacked on? Most of the encounters I had in this game, with the exception of a few the MOB's stood in one place and allowed me to whack on them. Yes there were a couple that wouldrun for cover, but all you had to do was follow them to where they took cover and then - play whack-the-mole with them. Seriously...it is 2011 and we're still getting games like this made? I was really hoping the guys at Bioware would do more with the NPC's and MOB's combat AI - boy was I wrong. They touted that they were going to make the worlds seem alive unlike anything we've ever seen before. If that is their idea of bringing worlds to life...give me a game like WoW any day of the week. It makes SW:ToR seem dead.
I'm sorry, but you can't make these assumptions without having a vast knowledge on game development. It just isn't fair to gaming companies to assume that they should always evolve and always push the limit graphically. You need to understand that games like SWTOR are designed to accomodate an enormous amount of people at once and that they are designed to accomodate people with lower-end computers. Taking the game to the massively multiplayer realms has its benefits but also has its sacrifices.
I find it a bit difficult to believe the mobs just stand there and wait to be hit. These people are the ones that did Mass Effect I and 2 and recall so many times the mobs would cleverly move from cover to cover to get to you or hide when you try to hit them and then come out and shoot. I think I will find out for myself rather than just believe everything written.
Depends on who helped on this game, the Mass Effect team or the Dragon Age team.
Also, Elikal, I can't help but notice how much you compare SWTOR to Skyrim. I believe such a comparison would best be left unused since both games are vastly different in their design philosophies, their technical capabilities, their business models, and their target audiences. It just seems like you have unrealistic expectations in regards to what TOR sells itself off as. Simply put, don't let Skyrim, a single-player sandbox-style game, influence the way you view SWTOR and other MMO's in general since they will never be the same. It just isn't a valid and credible analogy.
As long as players continue to kowtow to game designers that do not push the limits of what these games could do, we'll continue to get the same thing over and over again. If there is one thing Skyrim tells us, you can take something and make it better. I've played many SCRPG's in the past and nothing even comes close to Skyrim. Why can't these big gaming companies do the same for MMORPG's. Some of us players are not actually asking for to much really, just make the worlds seem alive and give us more to do other than just play whack-the-mole. SW:ToR is all about whack-the-mole. There is no skill you get in the classes that have anything to do other than combat related skills. Nothing. It is all about combat. The saddest thing of all they built their game around this combat and the combat is lackluster garbage. Tab target and mash a couple of keys. We have that all ready in games like Aion, Warhammer, Rift and WoW...why must we do that all over again? Because the developers of this particular game played it safe and decided to go the WoW route. That is a real shame and I for one will not spend one red cent on a game like that.
(3) While I was very well entertained... I never really had the feeling to be in a MMO.
There are also some minor points, like the not so cool clothing/armor, which just looks a few tads too cartoony and could need some serious texture. Cloth does have a fabric, you know. Unless you wear a plastic bag. And in SWTOR clothing and armour just look like plastic. Even metal doesn't much look like metal, and the same issue I have with most textures. They look... plasticy. I'd REALLY wish they had gone for a BIT more rough/mature/realistic texture design. From a distance it looks good, but closer, those textures are just mostly artificial and sterile to me.
still have a hard time to belief I am going to stay in SWTOR longer than, say, half a year. I sure will play 2-3 class stories through.
Oh, another thing I came to realize was this: I felt SWTOR playing was "exhausting" me,
You've brought up serveral points of issue I share as well. I've played 3 beta weekends so far (soon to be 4). I'll just add my counters and additions to your main points:
1. Sadly npc's have a stark contrast between open world and cut scene activity. I'd like to see more open world liveliness too. There needs to be more walking, talking and back ground voices (even if it makes little sense. More droids and npc ground vehicles too or even creatures. There is some rare npc's chatting that you can listen into (like in a cantina) and their conversation is usually rather funny or reflects the local story. You have to be very close to hear this however. On the plus side, this stuff is typically fluff and could be easily added later and we could hope they limited it until graphics are optimized (lates beta patch was all about this btw with more advances features being added). I suggest everyone pop into the beta suggestion board if or when you have access and give feedback on this.
2. The world does indeed start out linear. On the plus side, it feels nowhere near as linear as Rift does. Where you head is largely determined by what quests you have. That being said, even the starter planet is a decent enough size and although valleyed more than later worlds, it has limited phased areas (just enough to offer secluded quests points) and is largely a seemless place. It is worth exploring however because you can find datacrons and boss mobs that must be approached in groups. In some respects the maps are more an mmo open world model offering more dungeon type areas than Wow with open world boss encounters and elite level open world mobs (elites in Swtor are FAR tougher than Wow elites ... think vanilla wow when elites were impossible solo when you had your crappy gear ... then balance it around having a companion. Latest patch in beta also upped their difficulty). Later worlds are indeed HUGE but I ponder if they are worth going back to later when you outlevel them. This is the greatest draw back to leveled games.
3. With difficulty levels being increased with latest patches (not so much at lower level mind you) I can see the need to group increasing. This is something Bioware seems to be stressing lately. Your main story will be soloable most of the time with only plot point climax areas having need for grouping. The direction BW is taking is one where solo difficulty is based upon you+companion. This makes some angry as they feel week without a companion but I prefer this as it gives room for having a rl friend join and things aren't such a cake walk. All this being said, I can't see the game being one much beyond requiring many more than your own guild and a few friends to play up until you reach larger operations and operation level world bosses and open world pvp.
- Sadly things do look plastic. I guess you simply get used to it. Itemization is ongoing. What we saw over the last few guilds included a ton of placeholders. I am sure many did not know this. The latest patch (yes it was a big one) added a ton more itemization including high level stuff. On top of this textures and more advanced vid settings were introsuced. Lets hope this softens the issue some but until super high texture packs and high dx settings are included we may have to live with toons looking less impressive than terrain.
- I fully expect many players will hit a point where they think content isn't enough for their liking. Story players will have several play throughs but will become stale due to shared leveling paths. Raiders will powerlevel like they always do thinking end game is all that counts (in a story based game lol) and complain two raids aren't enough for them. Pvp'rs will complain about the initial imbalances plaguing all launches, too few warfronts, not enough meaningful open world pvp and it's flaws despite the game having more than Wow even has today. Swtor's copy and paste mmo mechanics will bore many and not grab their attention. It's lack of initial sandbox elements and social mechanics and city feel will offend many. Truth is the game is trying to grasp at so many mmo elements at once without the benefit of 2-3 expansions that it may may manage to alienate more by trying to attract more. In the end it is a game worth trying, worth playing but one many players may have to choose to revisit after content fills many gaps.
- Exhaustion: I too fealt this but I am not sure how much is simply my inability to play games for a long time or how much is due to the game itself. There certainly is an element of overwhelming. When you can plot your own course you tend to keep an objective in mind and you stick with it. With quest based games you juggle so many objectives that you can become overwhelmed by them, especially when story is trust upon it. This is why this game works great when it comes to your personal story arc but doing all side quests and world stories at once can make you cry and shake your head. It's too bad Swtor couldn't find a balance with this. One thing I can't stand is heading off to kill 54 mobs only to find out you missed a quest that wants to send you back there to kill those mobs all over again. Now I also see failings with public quests systems (like War and GW2 ... the latter simply being one I also see many people ignoring the story for and only grind to reach the objective not matter where they are) but I would love to simply see a message like, "You have met the objective of a local resident! Please visit X town. This resident would like to speak to you!". This would help greatly in questing and allow you to simply wander off and do things without map plot chasing.
First of all, in regards to it being a dead, souless, world: That's simply not true. While I would definitely prefer the npcs weren't static (welcome to most themepark games), there is simply no way someone with an open mind would play this game and thing, "Gosh, it feels so dead and lifeless." It's just the opposite, in fact. There is actual ACTION happening in the background of this game. You hear things going on, you see things going on. The starter zones look like there is a war happening. You hear explosions in many places. You see spaceships flying through the air in both cities and out in the world. I felt the cities in this game actually FELT like cities. They were massive. Now, they weren't laid out so you an explore every part of them (you couldn't go to every tower in the city and poke around), but BioWare did a great job of giving the illusion of the cities being huge. And what you could explore covered more territory than any other MMO i've seen. I'm so sick of other MMOs that have cities that are nothing more than a big town (Wow) or even worse, a single building, Rift. Bravo to Bioware here.
Second, as for the point made about the mobs and their AI, that must have been an old build. Trust me, the mobs were tuned up in this game and many of them given special abiities that made them more difficult. They don't just stand there until you stroll up to them, although there are some that are still stationary. They don't behave any better or worse than other MMOs of its kind, except they are much, much tougher now. I died quite a bit in my first 15 levels on my Bounty Hunter last weekend, much more than I expected, and regular mobs can put a hurt on you if you aren't paying attention. In fact, they actually tuned the mobs up MORE since the build I tested. To the point that a lot of testers are finding it a bit too difficult. Do some of the mobs still stand around? Sure. And that's going to happen in themepark games. Strange that SWTOR would be called out on it by some people on this thread who have professed love for WoW, which has the most static mobs of all.
Oh course it is being called out. It should be better than WoW. It is 2011. Shouldn'r we as players expect more from these game designers? Are they just to lazy to add things like roaming MOB's? Are they to lazy to actually have a MOB you know do more than just stand and get whaacked on? Most of the encounters I had in this game, with the exception of a few the MOB's stood in one place and allowed me to whack on them. Yes there were a couple that wouldrun for cover, but all you had to do was follow them to where they took cover and then - play whack-the-mole with them. Seriously...it is 2011 and we're still getting games like this made? I was really hoping the guys at Bioware would do more with the NPC's and MOB's combat AI - boy was I wrong. They touted that they were going to make the worlds seem alive unlike anything we've ever seen before. If that is their idea of bringing worlds to life...give me a game like WoW any day of the week. It makes SW:ToR seem dead.
First of all, there are roaming mobs in this game. I'm not sure what build you played, but I was ambushed more than a few times by patrols after a 3 pull. My guess is that will get more prevalent in the later planets which are much more open. As for the mob AI, I'm not sure which build you played, but they were tuned up quite a bit in the last build. Many of the stronger ones given unique abilities that you have to deal with. And I noticed quite a bit of humanoid mobs not just blindly rushing at you when you fired on them, instead many times I saw them duck for cover before attacking. So, the mob AI may not be your cup of tea, but it is currently better than what we see from WoW. Then again, maybe the Pandas will be much smarter.
I'm not sure what you are looking for in terms of an "alive" world, but the worlds seemed plenty alive to me. Look, I get that you're a WoW fangirl and are anxiously awaiting the Panda expansion. I get that. Good on you. And I also get that you have predicted this game to be dead after 6 months or so (believe that was your timeframe). So once again, lets revisit this conversation in 6 months time, shall we?
As long as players continue to kowtow to game designers that do not push the limits of what these games could do, we'll continue to get the same thing over and over again. If there is one thing Skyrim tells us, you can take something and make it better. I've played many SCRPG's in the past and nothing even comes close to Skyrim. Why can't these big gaming companies do the same for MMORPG's. Some of us players are not actually asking for to much really, just make the worlds seem alive and give us more to do other than just play whack-the-mole. SW:ToR is all about whack-the-mole. There is no skill you get in the classes that have anything to do other than combat related skills. Nothing. It is all about combat. The saddest thing of all they built their game around this combat and the combat is lackluster garbage. Tab target and mash a couple of keys. We have that all ready in games like Aion, Warhammer, Rift and WoW...why must we do that all over again? Because the developers of this particular game played it safe and decided to go the WoW route. That is a real shame and I for one will not spend one red cent on a game like that.
LOL, but you'll spend it on Pandas. Anyway, the good thing is that no one is asking you to spend a red penny on this game. There will be enough people who will to make this an extremely successful game.
What exactly are we comparing it too in terms of liveleness?
I'll take guards shooting at Justicars in a stand off over one or two orcs walking around org.
Mobs being static? Once again compared to what? Mobs will actually walk away and take cover from you, and to me that is less static than ANY mmo I have played.
City of Heroes felt alive to me with npcs walk around and talking.
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what
it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience
because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in
the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you
playing an MMORPG?"
Thanks for the write up,Im now more sure of my decision when I canceled my pre order..
Im a bit surprised to hear that the game sounds so lifeless.The mobs just standing there waiting for you to attack? I mean thats shades of Asheron's Call,shades of 1999,which is a time where you could get away with something like that.Today that is nothing but a major glaring flaw in my book..
Also, Elikal, I can't help but notice how much you compare SWTOR to Skyrim. I believe such a comparison would best be left unused since both games are vastly different in their design philosophies, their technical capabilities, their business models, and their target audiences. It just seems like you have unrealistic expectations in regards to what TOR sells itself off as. Simply put, don't let Skyrim, a single-player sandbox-style game, influence the way you view SWTOR and other MMO's in general since they will never be the same. It just isn't a valid and credible analogy.
As long as players continue to kowtow to game designers that do not push the limits of what these games could do, we'll continue to get the same thing over and over again. If there is one thing Skyrim tells us, you can take something and make it better. I've played many SCRPG's in the past and nothing even comes close to Skyrim. Why can't these big gaming companies do the same for MMORPG's. Some of us players are not actually asking for to much really, just make the worlds seem alive and give us more to do other than just play whack-the-mole. SW:ToR is all about whack-the-mole. There is no skill you get in the classes that have anything to do other than combat related skills. Nothing. It is all about combat. The saddest thing of all they built their game around this combat and the combat is lackluster garbage. Tab target and mash a couple of keys. We have that all ready in games like Aion, Warhammer, Rift and WoW...why must we do that all over again? Because the developers of this particular game played it safe and decided to go the WoW route. That is a real shame and I for one will not spend one red cent on a game like that.
Skyrim is a fantastic game that I have spent more time in then most games in the past, but it is a wonderful SINGLE player game, it could never work in an MMO setting. Skyrims world feels so alive because it feels like it is living and breathing when you are not around, NPCs do things, move around, caravans come and go, bandits kill people and when they die, they are gone forever.
When you add in thousands of people, all playing within the same gaming space, you have to make sacrafices to the type of game play you can present to your audience. NPCS can never die without respawning in an MMO, vendors cant go to their locked houses at night and not sell you anything till morning in an MMO because you cant speed up time. Do you really want hundreds of players having to spend time waiting just to get to an NPC because they went to sleep? World changing decisions do not work when thousands of people are also presented with the same choices, and you cannot have 1 person making decisions for an entire player base.
There are so many variables presented when you convert a game to an online space, that a lot of sacrafices have to be made. Sure while playing Skyrim I keep wishing that it was an MMO, but if it was it would lose a lot of what makes Skyrim, Skyrim, simply because you HAVE to change things when you add in hundreds of other players.
If you do not like SWTOR for what it is, thats fine, not everyone is going to enjoy it and others will love it. Personally I have found more life in SWTOR than I have in other games as I roam around. A band of Mandalorians kneeling down over the carcas of a recently slain kill, ranged mobs that stun me then roll behind cover to take shots at me as I get close, speeders and transport vehicles moving over the skies of major cities. Sure there could be more wandering NPCS but again this is an MMO, one that is targetting people on lower end PCS, and for every NPC you add, you add a small amount of requirements to it as well, and this is such an easy addition that Im not about to write off an entire game because of it.
Also, Elikal, I can't help but notice how much you compare SWTOR to Skyrim. I believe such a comparison would best be left unused since both games are vastly different in their design philosophies, their technical capabilities, their business models, and their target audiences. It just seems like you have unrealistic expectations in regards to what TOR sells itself off as. Simply put, don't let Skyrim, a single-player sandbox-style game, influence the way you view SWTOR and other MMO's in general since they will never be the same. It just isn't a valid and credible analogy.
As long as players continue to kowtow to game designers that do not push the limits of what these games could do, we'll continue to get the same thing over and over again. If there is one thing Skyrim tells us, you can take something and make it better. I've played many SCRPG's in the past and nothing even comes close to Skyrim. Why can't these big gaming companies do the same for MMORPG's. Some of us players are not actually asking for to much really, just make the worlds seem alive and give us more to do other than just play whack-the-mole. SW:ToR is all about whack-the-mole. There is no skill you get in the classes that have anything to do other than combat related skills. Nothing. It is all about combat. The saddest thing of all they built their game around this combat and the combat is lackluster garbage. Tab target and mash a couple of keys. We have that all ready in games like Aion, Warhammer, Rift and WoW...why must we do that all over again? Because the developers of this particular game played it safe and decided to go the WoW route. That is a real shame and I for one will not spend one red cent on a game like that.
Again, you are being unrealistic. TOR does not sell itself off as a revolutionary game on every aspect. When you create a product, you have to evaluate the risks of certain decisions. TOR is a multi-million dollar project. You can't take risks like that just for the sake of innovation when you have this much money on the line. You may say that TOR is "playing it safe", but in reality BioWare is just being logical. What if they tried to revolutionize a certain aspect of MMORPG gameplay and for some reason people didn't like it? All that money, all those hours of work go to waste. It's too much of a wild gamble, and one that BioWare and most companies are not willing to take, especially when they KNOW there is still a very large and powerful market for the type of product they chose to make.
Comments
Which would you rather have, a city full of pre-programmed NPCs designed to make it look like it was populated when only YOU are there or a city filled with players such as yourself, creating a community of real people to mingle and interact with?
What you describe as lacking is true of any city in the world. What brings it to life is people... not cardboard cut-outs placed randomly about. If it appears *dead* with just NPCs... that's a good thing... because NPCs aren't real people. You say Stormwind is a vibrant city? Take all the players out of it and reevaluate that statement. Do you interact with NPCs short of vendors/AH? That sort of interaction is akin to using an ATM machine. The city will come alive when it is filled with players... or so you will hope.
I think people are playing MMORPGs like single-player games too much. What made MMORPGs great was the people who played them... the community. There is no community in MMORPGs these days. You spend your time sitting in queues alt-tabbed out doing something else while you wait for it to pop. You don't need friends to do anything except maybe a dungeon or raid. Everything else can be done completely alone. Why not just create a game that auto-populates bots for you so that it's really only you in the game and everything else is faked. Is that what you are looking for? You can still progress a character et al without ever dealing with a real person. Tons of RPG games do that every day. And yet, people still yearn for the human interaction... which is why MMORPGs still have one thread of life in them... the HOPE that someone out there might actually say something to you other than a pre-programmed script.
SW:TOR will either succeed or fail at the greatest challenge of all... creating a community. Without it, it will lose playerbase like no tomorrow. With it, it will thrive for years to come. Trust me, no amount of content will make up for the lack of community. Rift proves that every time it throws out a new content patch. People would rather stand around in a city doing nothing filled with real people than play a game in which the city is barren of real people. If some dead MMORPG all of a sudden had 10,000 people playing every day, it would quickly gain the interest of the MMORPG community... because players really do chase after the other players. They want real interactions with real people. It's why players return like homing pidgeons back to the game they think has all the players in it. It's when they see it's just as empty as the one they left that they seek out something else. So if you are a game developer, you can make a small mint on sales (not subscriptions) merely by feeding them new games to try out. Until one figures out how to recreate community, they will always just be a way station until the next game comes out.
Max level'd bounty hunters in a few of the beta builds with the hope that the devs would take the constructive critisicsm for its worth (i know TONS of testers felt the same).
Without using spoilers its a little hard but the low quality production for npcs standing around doing the same crap 24/7 was annoying...specially when at one time some Imperial Admiral gets attacked and YOU have to save him while at the same time theres a good 10 troopers just standing around talking to each other with the same looped animation...this is where that $150mil went?
Did BW allow us to actually interact with chairs and benches now? that was terrible that you vcouldnt even sit in a chair unless you positioned yourself jsut right and used /sit command..
I uninstalled before that last build because of the lack of interest BW had with their shortcomings so not sure if things have changed but my personal spaceship felt like a indy ripoff of Mass Effect 2..it served no purpose other than a bank..since you could do the brainless crafting/missions anywhere, doing it on the ship was pointless...i HATED 'you cannot interact with this object at this time' for the ships communicatior/holo terminal...i mean really? i cannot check in with my crew anytime i want? "sorry i am busy with my looping animation and my code only allows me to talk to you at specific points in the game" - not good for companions.
Combat for me was fluid and great...just the mobs i was fighting were umm lame? all the way to max it was groups of 3 or maybe 4 with 1 harder guy sometimes just in packs standing around...nearly every type of attackable mob all the way was like this....i felt like if i could zoom in really well i would see little spawn points on the ground.
Did the "EPIC SPACE COMBAT" (their advertising) become epic yet? or even mediocre? would be an improvement.
Have fun if you love the game..thats the whole point afterall
...have even more fun with your offshore accounts and your new villa in the Caymens with part of that $150mil EA flunkies
good luck with your affiliation work MMORPG.com..i know you have to pay the bills and these companies are where the moneys at but one day it will bite you in the face
there is phasing or sharding or something technical like that, means you will only have a max of 100 people in your instance,. i think that's the reason they seem dead.
if there are 401 players, you might be the lucky one who has a instance for hisself.
I think you are ignoring the relaities of designing for a multiple player environment with this statement. SW:TOR isn't a single player game like Skyrim so it can't have the same level of NPC interactions that a single player game can. When you create a MMO you can't assume when someone is going to come into a area with NPC's so if you want all the player base to interact with them even as observers you have to loop the content and that severly limites what you can do. For content you want more interaction with you need to instance it. Personally I think Bioware has done a much better job finding a middle ground than any other MMO I have played recently.
Compare TOR to a game like Skyrim and the world does seem a bit lifeless. Compare TOR to any other MMO out there and it seems miles away better.
All the more reason for the mobs and NPCs to bring life to a game. Not really a good idea to depend on players for that anyhow, but so many MMOs do.
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.
Why can't you have both?
Not even. Not in this case.
What exactly are we comparing it too in terms of liveleness?
I'll take guards shooting at Justicars in a stand off over one or two orcs walking around org.
Mobs being static? Once again compared to what? Mobs will actually walk away and take cover from you, and to me that is less static than ANY mmo I have played.
First of all, in regards to it being a dead, souless, world: That's simply not true. While I would definitely prefer the npcs weren't static (welcome to most themepark games), there is simply no way someone with an open mind would play this game and thing, "Gosh, it feels so dead and lifeless." It's just the opposite, in fact. There is actual ACTION happening in the background of this game. You hear things going on, you see things going on. The starter zones look like there is a war happening. You hear explosions in many places. You see spaceships flying through the air in both cities and out in the world. I felt the cities in this game actually FELT like cities. They were massive. Now, they weren't laid out so you an explore every part of them (you couldn't go to every tower in the city and poke around), but BioWare did a great job of giving the illusion of the cities being huge. And what you could explore covered more territory than any other MMO i've seen. I'm so sick of other MMOs that have cities that are nothing more than a big town (Wow) or even worse, a single building, Rift. Bravo to Bioware here.
Second, as for the point made about the mobs and their AI, that must have been an old build. Trust me, the mobs were tuned up in this game and many of them given special abiities that made them more difficult. They don't just stand there until you stroll up to them, although there are some that are still stationary. They don't behave any better or worse than other MMOs of its kind, except they are much, much tougher now. I died quite a bit in my first 15 levels on my Bounty Hunter last weekend, much more than I expected, and regular mobs can put a hurt on you if you aren't paying attention. In fact, they actually tuned the mobs up MORE since the build I tested. To the point that a lot of testers are finding it a bit too difficult. Do some of the mobs still stand around? Sure. And that's going to happen in themepark games. Strange that SWTOR would be called out on it by some people on this thread who have professed love for WoW, which has the most static mobs of all.
I think people were hoping that the game would improve upon previous games in this regard. But you are right in that most mmos are the same in this aspect. In fact, the only mmo that I can think of that was different with enemy AI was Tabula Rasa.
Oh course it is being called out. It should be better than WoW. It is 2011. Shouldn't we as players expect more from these game designers? Are they just to lazy to add things like roaming MOB's? Are they to lazy to actually have a MOB you know do more than just stand and get whaacked on? Most of the encounters I had in this game, with the exception of a few the MOB's stood in one place and allowed me to whack on them. Yes there were a couple that wouldrun for cover, but all you had to do was follow them to where they took cover and then - play whack-the-mole with them. Seriously...it is 2011 and we're still getting games like this made? I was really hoping the guys at Bioware would do more with the NPC's and MOB's combat AI - boy was I wrong. They touted that they were going to make the worlds seem alive unlike anything we've ever seen before. If that is their idea of bringing worlds to life...give me a game like WoW any day of the week. It makes SW:ToR seem dead.
We long time forum watchers can only pray lol
There Is Always Hope!
Also, Elikal, I can't help but notice how much you compare SWTOR to Skyrim. I believe such a comparison would best be left unused since both games are vastly different in their design philosophies, their technical capabilities, their business models, and their target audiences. It just seems like you have unrealistic expectations in regards to what TOR sells itself off as. Simply put, don't let Skyrim, a single-player sandbox-style game, influence the way you view SWTOR and other MMO's in general since they will never be the same. It just isn't a valid and credible analogy.
I find it a bit difficult to believe the mobs just stand there and wait to be hit. These people are the ones that did Mass Effect I and 2 and recall so many times the mobs would cleverly move from cover to cover to get to you or hide when you try to hit them and then come out and shoot. I think I will find out for myself rather than just believe everything written.
First of all, there are roaming mobs in this game. I'm not sure what build you played, but I was ambushed more than a few times by patrols after a 3 pull. My guess is that will get more prevalent in the later planets which are much more open. As for the mob AI, I'm not sure which build you played, but they were tuned up quite a bit in the last build. Many of the stronger ones given unique abilities that you have to deal with. And I noticed quite a bit of humanoid mobs not just blindly rushing at you when you fired on them, instead many times I saw them duck for cover before attacking. So, the mob AI may not be your cup of tea, but it is currently better than what we see from WoW. Then again, maybe the Pandas will be much smarter.
I'm not sure what you are looking for in terms of an "alive" world, but the worlds seemed plenty alive to me. Look, I get that you're a WoW fangirl and are anxiously awaiting the Panda expansion. I get that. Good on you. And I also get that you have predicted this game to be dead after 6 months or so (believe that was your timeframe). So once again, lets revisit this conversation in 6 months time, shall we?
I'm sorry, but you can't make these assumptions without having a vast knowledge on game development. It just isn't fair to gaming companies to assume that they should always evolve and always push the limit graphically. You need to understand that games like SWTOR are designed to accomodate an enormous amount of people at once and that they are designed to accomodate people with lower-end computers. Taking the game to the massively multiplayer realms has its benefits but also has its sacrifices.
Depends on who helped on this game, the Mass Effect team or the Dragon Age team.
As long as players continue to kowtow to game designers that do not push the limits of what these games could do, we'll continue to get the same thing over and over again. If there is one thing Skyrim tells us, you can take something and make it better. I've played many SCRPG's in the past and nothing even comes close to Skyrim. Why can't these big gaming companies do the same for MMORPG's. Some of us players are not actually asking for to much really, just make the worlds seem alive and give us more to do other than just play whack-the-mole. SW:ToR is all about whack-the-mole. There is no skill you get in the classes that have anything to do other than combat related skills. Nothing. It is all about combat. The saddest thing of all they built their game around this combat and the combat is lackluster garbage. Tab target and mash a couple of keys. We have that all ready in games like Aion, Warhammer, Rift and WoW...why must we do that all over again? Because the developers of this particular game played it safe and decided to go the WoW route. That is a real shame and I for one will not spend one red cent on a game like that.
You've brought up serveral points of issue I share as well. I've played 3 beta weekends so far (soon to be 4). I'll just add my counters and additions to your main points:
1. Sadly npc's have a stark contrast between open world and cut scene activity. I'd like to see more open world liveliness too. There needs to be more walking, talking and back ground voices (even if it makes little sense. More droids and npc ground vehicles too or even creatures. There is some rare npc's chatting that you can listen into (like in a cantina) and their conversation is usually rather funny or reflects the local story. You have to be very close to hear this however. On the plus side, this stuff is typically fluff and could be easily added later and we could hope they limited it until graphics are optimized (lates beta patch was all about this btw with more advances features being added). I suggest everyone pop into the beta suggestion board if or when you have access and give feedback on this.
2. The world does indeed start out linear. On the plus side, it feels nowhere near as linear as Rift does. Where you head is largely determined by what quests you have. That being said, even the starter planet is a decent enough size and although valleyed more than later worlds, it has limited phased areas (just enough to offer secluded quests points) and is largely a seemless place. It is worth exploring however because you can find datacrons and boss mobs that must be approached in groups. In some respects the maps are more an mmo open world model offering more dungeon type areas than Wow with open world boss encounters and elite level open world mobs (elites in Swtor are FAR tougher than Wow elites ... think vanilla wow when elites were impossible solo when you had your crappy gear ... then balance it around having a companion. Latest patch in beta also upped their difficulty). Later worlds are indeed HUGE but I ponder if they are worth going back to later when you outlevel them. This is the greatest draw back to leveled games.
3. With difficulty levels being increased with latest patches (not so much at lower level mind you) I can see the need to group increasing. This is something Bioware seems to be stressing lately. Your main story will be soloable most of the time with only plot point climax areas having need for grouping. The direction BW is taking is one where solo difficulty is based upon you+companion. This makes some angry as they feel week without a companion but I prefer this as it gives room for having a rl friend join and things aren't such a cake walk. All this being said, I can't see the game being one much beyond requiring many more than your own guild and a few friends to play up until you reach larger operations and operation level world bosses and open world pvp.
- Sadly things do look plastic. I guess you simply get used to it. Itemization is ongoing. What we saw over the last few guilds included a ton of placeholders. I am sure many did not know this. The latest patch (yes it was a big one) added a ton more itemization including high level stuff. On top of this textures and more advanced vid settings were introsuced. Lets hope this softens the issue some but until super high texture packs and high dx settings are included we may have to live with toons looking less impressive than terrain.
- I fully expect many players will hit a point where they think content isn't enough for their liking. Story players will have several play throughs but will become stale due to shared leveling paths. Raiders will powerlevel like they always do thinking end game is all that counts (in a story based game lol) and complain two raids aren't enough for them. Pvp'rs will complain about the initial imbalances plaguing all launches, too few warfronts, not enough meaningful open world pvp and it's flaws despite the game having more than Wow even has today. Swtor's copy and paste mmo mechanics will bore many and not grab their attention. It's lack of initial sandbox elements and social mechanics and city feel will offend many. Truth is the game is trying to grasp at so many mmo elements at once without the benefit of 2-3 expansions that it may may manage to alienate more by trying to attract more. In the end it is a game worth trying, worth playing but one many players may have to choose to revisit after content fills many gaps.
- Exhaustion: I too fealt this but I am not sure how much is simply my inability to play games for a long time or how much is due to the game itself. There certainly is an element of overwhelming. When you can plot your own course you tend to keep an objective in mind and you stick with it. With quest based games you juggle so many objectives that you can become overwhelmed by them, especially when story is trust upon it. This is why this game works great when it comes to your personal story arc but doing all side quests and world stories at once can make you cry and shake your head. It's too bad Swtor couldn't find a balance with this. One thing I can't stand is heading off to kill 54 mobs only to find out you missed a quest that wants to send you back there to kill those mobs all over again. Now I also see failings with public quests systems (like War and GW2 ... the latter simply being one I also see many people ignoring the story for and only grind to reach the objective not matter where they are) but I would love to simply see a message like, "You have met the objective of a local resident! Please visit X town. This resident would like to speak to you!". This would help greatly in questing and allow you to simply wander off and do things without map plot chasing.
You stay sassy!
Actually it was a year.
LOL, but you'll spend it on Pandas. Anyway, the good thing is that no one is asking you to spend a red penny on this game. There will be enough people who will to make this an extremely successful game.
City of Heroes felt alive to me with npcs walk around and talking.
Epic Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1
https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
Thanks for the write up,Im now more sure of my decision when I canceled my pre order..
Im a bit surprised to hear that the game sounds so lifeless.The mobs just standing there waiting for you to attack? I mean thats shades of Asheron's Call,shades of 1999,which is a time where you could get away with something like that.Today that is nothing but a major glaring flaw in my book..
Skyrim is a fantastic game that I have spent more time in then most games in the past, but it is a wonderful SINGLE player game, it could never work in an MMO setting. Skyrims world feels so alive because it feels like it is living and breathing when you are not around, NPCs do things, move around, caravans come and go, bandits kill people and when they die, they are gone forever.
When you add in thousands of people, all playing within the same gaming space, you have to make sacrafices to the type of game play you can present to your audience. NPCS can never die without respawning in an MMO, vendors cant go to their locked houses at night and not sell you anything till morning in an MMO because you cant speed up time. Do you really want hundreds of players having to spend time waiting just to get to an NPC because they went to sleep? World changing decisions do not work when thousands of people are also presented with the same choices, and you cannot have 1 person making decisions for an entire player base.
There are so many variables presented when you convert a game to an online space, that a lot of sacrafices have to be made. Sure while playing Skyrim I keep wishing that it was an MMO, but if it was it would lose a lot of what makes Skyrim, Skyrim, simply because you HAVE to change things when you add in hundreds of other players.
If you do not like SWTOR for what it is, thats fine, not everyone is going to enjoy it and others will love it. Personally I have found more life in SWTOR than I have in other games as I roam around. A band of Mandalorians kneeling down over the carcas of a recently slain kill, ranged mobs that stun me then roll behind cover to take shots at me as I get close, speeders and transport vehicles moving over the skies of major cities. Sure there could be more wandering NPCS but again this is an MMO, one that is targetting people on lower end PCS, and for every NPC you add, you add a small amount of requirements to it as well, and this is such an easy addition that Im not about to write off an entire game because of it.
My Guild Wars 2 Vids
Again, you are being unrealistic. TOR does not sell itself off as a revolutionary game on every aspect. When you create a product, you have to evaluate the risks of certain decisions. TOR is a multi-million dollar project. You can't take risks like that just for the sake of innovation when you have this much money on the line. You may say that TOR is "playing it safe", but in reality BioWare is just being logical. What if they tried to revolutionize a certain aspect of MMORPG gameplay and for some reason people didn't like it? All that money, all those hours of work go to waste. It's too much of a wild gamble, and one that BioWare and most companies are not willing to take, especially when they KNOW there is still a very large and powerful market for the type of product they chose to make.