They say you never get a second chance to make a first impression. But when it comes to MMOs, that is not always the case. Of course, when it comes to individual players that saying may be true. But to the general public, not always. Of course the obvious first impression is launch. But in more recent years. when a game goes F2P that becomes a second first impression. And if they do it right, it can completely change a game's rep. I think that TOR's F2P change has gone pretty good, but I dont know if I would call it fantastic like LOTRO, for example. But a 3rd chance to make a first impression can be expansions, and I think that for TOR this is the last big chance. Lets hope it goes right.
SSSP a boxed expansion you suggest , that would be great. Not sure if it would be just the SSSP though surely we need a new planet or two ? level cap increased to level 65 sounds pretty good too.I do think the SSSP will be rolled out in parts though , so it might end up as part of our sub fee and of course that you firstly bought the next expansion. You see back in the day only one person was working on the project and worse still only on his day off. We shall see but in the words of MGMT "Love those alien days", Great article btw.
Cheers,
BadOrb.
Thanks! I don't think a new planet and level cap bump would be necessary to justify a boxed expansion with the scope of features I mentioned in the article. If the overall scope of the project ends up being much smaller, sure. But if the expansion is purely space focused, you could have enough content there to easily justify an expansion without a whole lot of meat needed to be added to the ground game (see: SWG: Jump to Lightspeed).
Why not have both? Most MMOs today raise the level cap with expacs. I understand what you are saying. But, think about this. What about those who really could care less about the space combat side of the game? Would it be wise to ignore them?
Why not have both? Development costs money and time, that's why. You have to make choices. I'd rather have a fully featured space game expansion than one reduced in scope in order to tack on unrelated content. BioWare has added new Operations, Flashpoints and other ground content as part of their regular updates already and can continue to do so in between and after a potential space expansion. A level cap bump and significant ground content update could come in the form of a smaller scale digital expansion along the lines of Hutt Cartel. In fact, some people not caring about the space game is a major reason not to do a level cap bump in a space expansion. People would feel obligated to buy something they may not be interested in in order to remain competitive on the ground side of things.
This is just my opinion, of course. Your points are perfectly valid.
I guess I didn't really think of it that way. Good points.
I see , I get it , that makes sense. SSSP boxed ( if large enough , no level cap ) , you only need to buy it if you want it and doesn't impact the ground game at all. Then all the updates they do with our subb money as per. Then a small expac ( new planet )with a level cap increased to level 60. I'm sold , Only problem is have they enough staff and time is ticking , but I'm hopeful they will read this article and get some or all of these ideas into the game. One other small problem might be the updates to the SSSP , how would that work ? Just use subb money and cartel money to update it ?
Cheers,
BadOrb.
PSO 4 years , EQOA 4 months , PSU 7 years , SWTOR launch ongoing , PSO2 SEA launch ongoing , Destiny 360 launch ongoing. "SWG was not fun. Let it go buddy." quote from iiNoSkillzii 10/18/13 The original propoganda pixie dust villain :[]
all good ideas in the article, I have no faith in it happening though. Bioware has proved to be extremely arrogant in the last few years and unable to really admit when they screw things up. If they can't understand that the original space game was garbage that should never have been developed, they won't be able to make anything great.
Taking advantage of Bioware's strong points in storytelling has a flip side to. They need to acknowledge their weakness in system building in bring in people that really know what they are doing, and I doubt that's happened.
I agree with your reasoning for doing a box release also. The problem is the complete lack of faith people have in them after being burned before. They would really have to impress to get my money at this point, if they even can- not to say I'd turn it down a great product if they actually made one, it would just be hard to convince me it wasn't crap.
Originally posted by MikeB Originally posted by lizardbones Given the game and the IP, what can they really do with space besides combat? People are not going to be miners, and they aren't going to start corporations in space, and hanging out with other people in their space ships would just be weird. So off the rails space combat missions with objectives, and off the rails space pvp missions, with objectives. That sound about right?
I sort of maybe get your point about the game (everything must be heroic!), but not the IP. There were, in fact, space miners in Star Wars as well as characters who ran 'corporations in space'. All of this stuff already happened (with the exception of space corporations) in the SWG expansion Jump to Lightspeed, and hanging out with people in their ships certainly wasn't 'weird' there, either.
Walking around the multiple decks of a Luxury Yacht and being able to see space move past you through the windows as someone else piloted the ship was a pretty awesome experience that I would love to have again in SWTOR. It's not necessary to make the space game great, which is why I left it out of the article, but now that you've mentioned it, I would love to see that too.
Hanging around inside the ships would be cool. That would actually be something that would be cool without the new space project. I meant sitting in your ship while your friend sits in their ship, and both ships are hanging around in space. That would be weird.
What I don't think will happen is something like Eve. Crafting isn't a big enough part of the game to warrant a shift towards that kind of open ended game play.
That's not to say they can't do stuff with space that is different than the ground game. Maybe players aren't mining, but they can participate in mining missions. Smugglers can actually smuggle. Smugglers are definitely part of the good guys, but maybe smugglers and bounty hunters can work missions together for neutral corporations.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
I watched that video 8 times now, and that looked like space flight very much on the rails. I did not see anything in the video that suggested it was off the rail combat.
Just looks like a bunch of hype to try to get anyone at all to try/pay for this turd. Or to come back. (And to all the F2P boosters, any bets on whether this new content will be sub only?)
I mean really, how many really quit just because the space part of the game was a piece of garbage? A very few, perhaps.
As opposed to all of things wrong with the rest of the game, and how shallow it is? Everyone else.
So "fixing" the space game (if it is even fixed, whatever that means) is going to do what exactly?
Not going to help much and frankly, the sooner this thing dies, the sooner another SW MMO can be made by another company.
This almost made me reinstall, but now I'm hesitant. I just know they'll tack on some F2P restriction on this mode. It's strange, since I actually liked the on rails space combat, not that this isn't a welcome addition but I hope it is just that; an addition.
Gotta get my Star Fox fix from something...
Right! I reinstalled and looked at the cartel market and shook my head, One thing caught my eye. Charging for the ability to Hide/Show your helmet,ReallY!?! lol but guess ya cant complain to much when its F2P >.0
Originally posted by skeeter667 This is going to end up being a warzone not an expansion IMO
The more I'm thinking about it, the more I believe this might be true. I'm getting the feeling their going to push SWTOR into more MOBA-style content. I hope I'm wrong.
Originally posted by Jyiiga This is a feature that should have shipped with the game.
Awesome. But it didn't. So let's move on from here and talk about what they should do now that they're actually doing something on this front.
Honestly, I think that ship has sailed. It might bring a few people back but most of us that moved couldn't really be tempted back no matter how awesome whatever they claim to bring. At this point, I wouldn't go back to the game if it was entirely free to play. It just wasn't really *fun* so I don't think the addition of a real space game would save it. Junk the whole thing and start from scratch, maybe. Focus on the space game and make the avatar combat secondary... Then your crew skills, "true" exploration, fleet encounters, etc would have a better place to exist.
You just described Eve Online and their new space combat project. :-)
I watched that video 8 times now, and that looked like space flight very much on the rails. I did not see anything in the video that suggested it was off the rail combat.
It wont be on rails, and looks like it will be all about space PvP warzones or something like that, or at least it will have space warzones, but that all the info about the proyect so far and maybe one of the reason about why BW and EA are looking for temporary testers for a new PvP experience coming to swtor.
Regardless of what features it expands on or opens up, I think it's success will depend on whether it's added on or put behind the cash shop. A good concept might make me resub, but I will not fork out to try it out.
I have fond memories of the old tie fighter game. So doing something like this is really exciting.
I don't think space should be crowded everywhere you go. It makes sense for missions, but not for exploration. I also think if it is still just a minigame, that really isn't enough to base an expack on even if it is off rails.
The biggest problem for SWTOR going forward is that there F2P model blows. The best part of the game is the 1-50 experience, and you don't need to pay a cent for it. And because of the heavy handed way they approach F2P, I really don't feel like giving them my money. If they did like Rift does and provide value for subscribing instead of making it hell for non subscribers and saying "hey at least you aren't those guys", that would go a long way towards getting players behind them. Really until they address this, I have a hard time getting excited about any xpack they put out.
What about the video shown here suggests that it is not on rails? Looks just like all the other hype that was shown before the game launched and not much of that panned out either.
Is this supposed to attract more people to the game? There are far bigger issues than the tacked on space portion that came with launch.
open / free roam space is where its at. Unless they do that then the SSSP wont change a thing for good.
And now with news of WAR shutting down i am personally worried and dont feel like wasting money on Swtor. Who knows when EA will shut down this one too since population is pretty low on all servers now. THey are clearly not making enough money out of their farcical model.
They've been doing a large amount of advertising the last two weeks for TOR (kinda has me thinking something is coming up rather soon). Part of the LA/EA deal includes TOR, so I doubt we'll see TOR shutdown any time soon.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
What about the video shown here suggests that it is not on rails? Looks just like all the other hype that was shown before the game launched and not much of that panned out either.
Is this supposed to attract more people to the game? There are far bigger issues than the tacked on space portion that came with launch.
What a waste of a great IP.
Did you not notice the player doing a 180? Try that in TOR now.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Originally posted by t3hWheez Love the game, hate the engine.
Thats seems like a possible contradiction. Since the game is the engine. Thus, the engine and its limitations shape the game to be a certain limited experience in the open world, and even instances.
The good features of the game are great. Except as a whole it really is dragged down by the limited aspects which are presumably existent due to the bad engine optimization.
They basically designed their game with an engine which was more of a canvas or a skeleton of thier game. And instead of putting all thier work into a proper engine, they lazily and then hastily tried to make something that was used as a drawing broad tool as thier actual engine.
For example ESO devs mention this, and how they are using the same engine just for generating new ideas and content, but have thier own custom engine optimized for MMOs.
We need swtor to relaunch thier game on a new engine. And the best way to do this, is by making the new launch heavily based on single player aspect that has higher settings for extra detail, with a very optimized engine for the mmo aspect of the game.
This way players get what they want from BW and that is an actual single player game with the extra of a whole new mmo on the side. That is how they should have made thier game, and not mash up thier story in a mediocre MMO and thus also making the story mediocre at times to fit within the MMO context.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble
I wonder if it will be third person like in STO or first person cockpit view. Getting the UI right for that will be really important. The space combat in STO is fun, but I think the UI is a bit clunky. It can distract from focusing on the combat.
In STO's defence, starships don't have a cockpit, even the battle bridge has consoles beside the main viewer starship battles are slower and have more strategic aspect than the dogfights, so the external view is a straightforward decision I guess.
In TOR's case I think an approach like the earlier X-Wing series would be great. Just with present gfx of course, a few years ago we jumped into some play with X-Wing vs. Tie fighter just for the lolz, well... pretty outdated I must tell
Originally posted by Jyiiga This is a feature that should have shipped with the game.
Awesome. But it didn't. So let's move on from here and talk about what they should do now that they're actually doing something on this front.
[mod edit]
What nonesense. MikeB makes a valid point. There's no point, in this thread, to discuss coulda, shoulda, woulda. It's water under the bridge. More interested in what they're doing now that SSSP is coming.
I'd like to see a vastly more open space shooter. And let's not forget some real ship smuggling or blockade running.
Yes. Dream big. I can't imagine that the super efficient crack code warriors at Bioware will let you down. If you are a fan of this game then you should not be raising expectations. They release basic functionality. It's been demonstrated over and over.
You won't get smuggling, or hyperdrive repairs in space, or any of that happy shit.
Originally posted by Jyiiga This is a feature that should have shipped with the game.
Would be great if every game would ship with all inclusive without any bug. But never did and never will, to complex.
For the rest I do not think would play anyway space combat (i dislike a lot nearly forced space missions in STO). I like MMO's with avatars, if not would play EVE or alike. This can be seen only as added bonus. But with so many things do to I do not need anyway.
I just hope for some new expansion on horizont, this time with class story quests continuation.
And sorely missed is multi (or at least dual) spec. Only thing that I can not believe was not included at start. There should be no game with edngame without.
Agree completely with this article. However, I do not believe what we will get will be anywhere near that prestigious. I feel like a fundamental flaw with SWTOR was the whole "everything you do will be heroic" line and it lends itself to the biggest issue I have with the game, the lack of player choice. I can not be heroic when I want to be, I have to be heroic all the time. I am playing in a preset story and not making my own. This will feed directly into this space project and not allow it to be anything more than an instanced, queue up style space battleground that ends when one team "wins". Hope I am wrong.
Originally posted by ignore_me Yes. Dream big. I can't imagine that the super efficient crack code warriors at Bioware will let you down. If you are a fan of this game then you should not be raising expectations. They release basic functionality. It's been demonstrated over and over.You won't get smuggling, or hyperdrive repairs in space, or any of that happy shit.
Here's the thing. What are the odds that Bioware is going to do something truly different from what they've already done? Just because the setting is "space" instead of "world" doesn't mean they are going to deviate dramatically from what they've already done. How many times in the past has any developer, but Bioware in particular updated what they've done with something completely new and different?
So, yeah, it's probably going to be cool. Cooler than the base game anyway. It's probably not going to be the crazy rewrite of the game that a lot of people seem to think might happen.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
Comments
They say you never get a second chance to make a first impression. But when it comes to MMOs, that is not always the case. Of course, when it comes to individual players that saying may be true. But to the general public, not always. Of course the obvious first impression is launch. But in more recent years. when a game goes F2P that becomes a second first impression. And if they do it right, it can completely change a game's rep. I think that TOR's F2P change has gone pretty good, but I dont know if I would call it fantastic like LOTRO, for example. But a 3rd chance to make a first impression can be expansions, and I think that for TOR this is the last big chance. Lets hope it goes right.
I see , I get it , that makes sense. SSSP boxed ( if large enough , no level cap ) , you only need to buy it if you want it and doesn't impact the ground game at all. Then all the updates they do with our subb money as per. Then a small expac ( new planet )with a level cap increased to level 60. I'm sold , Only problem is have they enough staff and time is ticking , but I'm hopeful they will read this article and get some or all of these ideas into the game. One other small problem might be the updates to the SSSP , how would that work ? Just use subb money and cartel money to update it ?
Cheers,
BadOrb.
PSO 4 years , EQOA 4 months , PSU 7 years , SWTOR launch ongoing , PSO2 SEA launch ongoing , Destiny 360 launch ongoing.
"SWG was not fun. Let it go buddy." quote from iiNoSkillzii 10/18/13
The original propoganda pixie dust villain :[]
all good ideas in the article, I have no faith in it happening though. Bioware has proved to be extremely arrogant in the last few years and unable to really admit when they screw things up. If they can't understand that the original space game was garbage that should never have been developed, they won't be able to make anything great.
Taking advantage of Bioware's strong points in storytelling has a flip side to. They need to acknowledge their weakness in system building in bring in people that really know what they are doing, and I doubt that's happened.
I agree with your reasoning for doing a box release also. The problem is the complete lack of faith people have in them after being burned before. They would really have to impress to get my money at this point, if they even can- not to say I'd turn it down a great product if they actually made one, it would just be hard to convince me it wasn't crap.
Walking around the multiple decks of a Luxury Yacht and being able to see space move past you through the windows as someone else piloted the ship was a pretty awesome experience that I would love to have again in SWTOR. It's not necessary to make the space game great, which is why I left it out of the article, but now that you've mentioned it, I would love to see that too.
Hanging around inside the ships would be cool. That would actually be something that would be cool without the new space project. I meant sitting in your ship while your friend sits in their ship, and both ships are hanging around in space. That would be weird.
What I don't think will happen is something like Eve. Crafting isn't a big enough part of the game to warrant a shift towards that kind of open ended game play.
That's not to say they can't do stuff with space that is different than the ground game. Maybe players aren't mining, but they can participate in mining missions. Smugglers can actually smuggle. Smugglers are definitely part of the good guys, but maybe smugglers and bounty hunters can work missions together for neutral corporations.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.
I watched that video 8 times now, and that looked like space flight very much on the rails. I did not see anything in the video that suggested it was off the rail combat.
Just looks like a bunch of hype to try to get anyone at all to try/pay for this turd. Or to come back. (And to all the F2P boosters, any bets on whether this new content will be sub only?)
I mean really, how many really quit just because the space part of the game was a piece of garbage? A very few, perhaps.
As opposed to all of things wrong with the rest of the game, and how shallow it is? Everyone else.
So "fixing" the space game (if it is even fixed, whatever that means) is going to do what exactly?
Not going to help much and frankly, the sooner this thing dies, the sooner another SW MMO can be made by another company.
Right! I reinstalled and looked at the cartel market and shook my head, One thing caught my eye. Charging for the ability to Hide/Show your helmet,ReallY!?! lol but guess ya cant complain to much when its F2P >.0
The more I'm thinking about it, the more I believe this might be true. I'm getting the feeling their going to push SWTOR into more MOBA-style content. I hope I'm wrong.
You just described Eve Online and their new space combat project. :-)
This. http://www.swtor-spy.com/blog/1363/swtor-super-secret-space-project-part-2/
It wont be on rails, and looks like it will be all about space PvP warzones or something like that, or at least it will have space warzones, but that all the info about the proyect so far and maybe one of the reason about why BW and EA are looking for temporary testers for a new PvP experience coming to swtor.
ill wait and see cause yu can make an on rail shooter look of rail w the right sets of shots
n im pretty sure itll b hidden in th cash shop fer evry1
I have fond memories of the old tie fighter game. So doing something like this is really exciting.
I don't think space should be crowded everywhere you go. It makes sense for missions, but not for exploration. I also think if it is still just a minigame, that really isn't enough to base an expack on even if it is off rails.
The biggest problem for SWTOR going forward is that there F2P model blows. The best part of the game is the 1-50 experience, and you don't need to pay a cent for it. And because of the heavy handed way they approach F2P, I really don't feel like giving them my money. If they did like Rift does and provide value for subscribing instead of making it hell for non subscribers and saying "hey at least you aren't those guys", that would go a long way towards getting players behind them. Really until they address this, I have a hard time getting excited about any xpack they put out.
What about the video shown here suggests that it is not on rails? Looks just like all the other hype that was shown before the game launched and not much of that panned out either.
Is this supposed to attract more people to the game? There are far bigger issues than the tacked on space portion that came with launch.
What a waste of a great IP.
They've been doing a large amount of advertising the last two weeks for TOR (kinda has me thinking something is coming up rather soon). Part of the LA/EA deal includes TOR, so I doubt we'll see TOR shutdown any time soon.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Did you not notice the player doing a 180? Try that in TOR now.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Thats seems like a possible contradiction. Since the game is the engine. Thus, the engine and its limitations shape the game to be a certain limited experience in the open world, and even instances.
The good features of the game are great. Except as a whole it really is dragged down by the limited aspects which are presumably existent due to the bad engine optimization.
They basically designed their game with an engine which was more of a canvas or a skeleton of thier game. And instead of putting all thier work into a proper engine, they lazily and then hastily tried to make something that was used as a drawing broad tool as thier actual engine.
For example ESO devs mention this, and how they are using the same engine just for generating new ideas and content, but have thier own custom engine optimized for MMOs.
We need swtor to relaunch thier game on a new engine. And the best way to do this, is by making the new launch heavily based on single player aspect that has higher settings for extra detail, with a very optimized engine for the mmo aspect of the game.
This way players get what they want from BW and that is an actual single player game with the extra of a whole new mmo on the side. That is how they should have made thier game, and not mash up thier story in a mediocre MMO and thus also making the story mediocre at times to fit within the MMO context.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble
In STO's defence, starships don't have a cockpit, even the battle bridge has consoles beside the main viewer
starship battles are slower and have more strategic aspect than the dogfights, so the external view is a straightforward decision I guess.
In TOR's case I think an approach like the earlier X-Wing series would be great. Just with present gfx of course, a few years ago we jumped into some play with X-Wing vs. Tie fighter just for the lolz, well... pretty outdated I must tell
Yes. Dream big. I can't imagine that the super efficient crack code warriors at Bioware will let you down. If you are a fan of this game then you should not be raising expectations. They release basic functionality. It's been demonstrated over and over.
You won't get smuggling, or hyperdrive repairs in space, or any of that happy shit.
Survivor of the great MMORPG Famine of 2011
Would be great if every game would ship with all inclusive without any bug. But never did and never will, to complex.
For the rest I do not think would play anyway space combat (i dislike a lot nearly forced space missions in STO). I like MMO's with avatars, if not would play EVE or alike. This can be seen only as added bonus. But with so many things do to I do not need anyway.
I just hope for some new expansion on horizont, this time with class story quests continuation.
And sorely missed is multi (or at least dual) spec. Only thing that I can not believe was not included at start. There should be no game with edngame without.
Here's the thing. What are the odds that Bioware is going to do something truly different from what they've already done? Just because the setting is "space" instead of "world" doesn't mean they are going to deviate dramatically from what they've already done. How many times in the past has any developer, but Bioware in particular updated what they've done with something completely new and different?
So, yeah, it's probably going to be cool. Cooler than the base game anyway. It's probably not going to be the crazy rewrite of the game that a lot of people seem to think might happen.
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.