SWTOR

[Lucas]

Hey look, an in-topic message! :P

November Press Event round-up:

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=95439

The best collection of info is over at Darth Hater:

http://darthhater.com/2009/12/03/december-3rd-information-extravaganza/

A more in-depth look to the Inquisitor and Consular classes (along with specific description of some skills), companions ; also, we get more details on the progression of the Smuggler class: at a certain point, we'll be able to choose if we want to become Gunslingers (Dual pistols, long range, smooth talker/persuasion) or Scoundrels (short range, stealth, medicine).

[Triforcer]

EDIT:  Oops, wrong thread.

[Khaldun]

Actually, I still like the derail as a topic. Me and my 200+ action figures feel the same way. They're all over my bookshelves, basically. But as folks observed, this is a debate that rages across most collecting communities: do you buy for the value of something, as an investor, or because of a love of the object or thing you collect, to use it in some fashion. Wine collecting, for example, is all about this issue: there are people who buy wine because they want to buy a bottle cheaply today that will be worth far more in ten years; others buy it to drink it sooner or later. I think the first category of collector is nuts, personally, but there are people who make pretty good money that way, and they have to know the collectibles as well as the second category of collector (what's good, what's not; what's valued, what's valueless, etc.)

[Ratman_tf]

MxO!

Never opened. 

[Lantyssa]

All characters are fully voiced, and dialogue choices are made similarly to Mass Effect in that you choose the gist of what you want your character to say and the line delivered is something more intricate than what was shown in the dialogue wheel.

Unfounded fears over having to redo thousands of hours of voice-overs because the text doesn't exactly match averted.

(You're welcome to tell me how right I was, now.  Or I can say 'I told you so!'  Either works for me.)

[Morat20]

All characters are fully voiced, and dialogue choices are made similarly to Mass Effect in that you choose the gist of what you want your character to say and the line delivered is something more intricate than what was shown in the dialogue wheel.

Unfounded fears over having to redo thousands of hours of voice-overs because the text doesn't exactly match averted.

(You're welcome to tell me how right I was, now.  Or I can say 'I told you so!'  Either works for me.)

I HATED that. ME: "Let's see, let's pick something noncommital like 'That's interesting'. Shepard, sarcastic: "That's INTERESTING. How about I shoot you until you're not so goddamn boring?". Me: WTF?

[Fordel]

ME had all it's choices set up by their position. Like the 'evil' response was always bottom left or whatever.

[Ingmar]

Yeah bottom right was usually Jack Bauer mode, with a side of self-interested greed.

[Malakili]

ME had all it's choices set up by their position. Like the 'evil' response was always bottom left or whatever.

Shit, Why don't we just set it up this way, just give us the same wheel every time, and let the character speak whatever the hell you want.

Edit, fuck it the formatting makes it look all shitty, here were my options:

"Paladin" good
Good, but greedy.
Indifferent
Jackass
Evil, but doesn't alienate good NPCs
Kitten Killing Evil

[Daeven]

OOO!

Good
Mercantile
Nihilistic
Sadistic
Psychotic Sociopath


I like this new conversation wheel. I'd always choose the last one.
NPC: "Would you like to buy new armor?'
Shepard: "YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRGH! KILL THE BANNANA HOPLITE MACHINES!!!"
Party "wtf?"

Even better if they include nonsensical Dragon Age facial distortion software (patent pending).

[Venkman]

ME had all it's choices set up by their position. Like the 'evil' response was always bottom left or whatever.

Shit, Why don't we just set it up this way, just give us the same wheel every time, and let the character speak whatever the hell you want.

Edit, fuck it the formatting makes it look all shitty, here were my options:

"Paladin" good
Good, but greedy.
Indifferent
Jackass
Evil, but doesn't alienate good NPCs
Kitten Killing Evil

Heh funny, I just commented about this in the DA:O topic in PC/Console last night. In the context of those always being the option no matter how many levels you've trended towards Good or Jerk.

[Khaldun]

Other options I'd like on a conversation wheel in an RPG:

Cynical but basically good-hearted underneath
Passive-aggressive
Can I have sex with you?
I'm here to help but I'm not your fucking fedex man
I sound friendly but I secretly hate you all
I'm just doing this until I get a better job offer

[Xurtan]

Other options I'd like on a conversation wheel in an RPG:

Cynical but basically good-hearted underneath
Passive-aggressive
Can I have sex with you?
I'm here to help but I'm not your fucking fedex man
I sound friendly but I secretly hate you all
I'm just doing this until I get a better job offer

This one. My evil aligned companions never seem to understand the concept of appearing to be nice to get information. (I'm looking at you, Morrigan..) Honestly, you would think they had never heard of playing nice to get someone to trust you before you stab them in the back. I'm so tired of the cliche Psychotic-Puppy-Kicking-Evil. What ever happened to the proper intelligent villains? 

[NowhereMan]

I demand a chaotic neutral option that gives one from a set of random responses regardless of what's going on, ranging from, "I pledge myself to your cause," to, "Die for your crimes against my gods and/or significant others!" with a bit of, "That's great but have you ever stopped to think about how adorable kittens are?" thrown in as well.

[Outlawedprod]

The best collection of info is over at Darth Hater:
http://darthhater.com/2009/12/03/december-3rd-information-extravaganza/
more details on the progression of the Smuggler class: at a certain point, we'll be able to choose if we want to become Gunslingers (Dual pistols, long range, smooth talker/persuasion) or Scoundrels (short range, stealth, medicine).

That interview on there o_O.  Of course when I was thinking smugglers and black market goods I instantly thought healing too !!

[Mattemeo]

I demand a chaotic neutral option that gives one from a set of random responses regardless of what's going on, ranging from, "I pledge myself to your cause," to, "Die for your crimes against my gods and/or significant others!" with a bit of, "That's great but have you ever stopped to think about how adorable kittens are?" thrown in as well.

You'll have to wait till the next patch for a red and black skintight fruitsuit with matching pouches to go with that.

[Lantyssa]

I hate the "Chaotic Neutral is crazy" belief.  Stupid second edition.  No one ever gets it right.

[eldaec]

Vampire Bloodlines just called to say hi to the last dozen posts, and to tell every rpg conversation tree for the last 5 years to go fuck itself in the ass.

[UnSub]

Other options I'd like on a conversation wheel in an RPG:

Cynical but basically good-hearted underneath
Passive-aggressive
Can I have sex with you?
I'm here to help but I'm not your fucking fedex man
I sound friendly but I secretly hate you all
I'm just doing this until I get a better job offer

In Excel Saga's parody of Japanese dating games, the dialogue choices for all conversations amounted to:

 - Be nice
 - Kill her
 - Stick it in

which got particularly hilarious when talking to family members.

[Daeven]

Vampire Bloodlines just called to say hi to the last dozen posts, and to tell every rpg conversation tree for the last 5 years to go fuck itself in the ass.

I concur.
Wha?
Oh baby!
WHARBLEGARBL!!!!!!

[Kageru]

Then we can go to the next logical step and just set an "automatic choice". Set your character to always pick the same category, remove the boring gameplay between these intricately voiced cutscenes, and then you can just watch it like the movie it so wants to be.

[Crumbs]

Has there been any indication that there is a "massive" component to this game?  As in, whether you play with thousands of people, or parallel to them. 

From the FAQ: 

Can I play alone?

While there are some tasks that cannot be completed without the cooperation of others, the majority of the game can be accomplished by playing alone.

How is this an MMO?

[Malakili]

How is this an MMO?

Thats what we've asking pretty much every page of this thread.  The answer seems to be, "Bioware is going to see if people are willing to pay a monthly fee for a co-op KOTOR game"

[Crumbs]

How is this an MMO?

Thats what we've asking pretty much every page of this thread.  The answer seems to be, "Bioware is going to see if people are willing to pay a monthly fee for a co-op KOTOR game"

Yea I myself have asked the same question in here.  It's just that, as time goes on, it seems more and more insane that this is gonna actually happen.   I'm still clinging to the hope that MMO-like features will be announced.   

[Ratman_tf]

Then we can go to the next logical step and just set an "automatic choice". Set your character to always pick the same category, remove the boring gameplay between these intricately voiced cutscenes, and then you can just watch it like the movie it so wants to be.

They could put minigames into dialogue scenes! Imagine playing a round of Tetris in order to unlock the "Why didn't I just play Tetris?" dialogue option.

[Velorath]

How is this an MMO?

Guess it depends on how you want to play it.  Sounds like if you want to group with people, go ahead and group.  If you'd rather play solo you can use your companion characters to help.  Pretty much seems like how most of us play MMO's these days except most MMO's tend to have a lot of the best content (dungeons) gated off for groups, often leveling past it before I get a chance to get a group together for it.

I had some good group experiences with F13'ers in AOC when a bunch of resubbed at the same time and made new characters, but that's been a pretty rare experience for me in MMO's.  It was just fortuitous that a number of us were leveling at the same pace.  Even then we had to fill out the group with random people of varying quality.  If SWTOR ends up being a good game, I'll be more than happy to group up with other Bat Country members whenever they're on, but I'll really like it if I'm not cockblocked from all the good content just because I'm working odd hours one week, or if we can't put a group together for whatever reason.

If that makes it something other than an MMO, so be it.

[Malakili]

It's just that, as time goes on, it seems more and more insane that this is gonna actually happen.   I'm still clinging to the hope that MMO-like features will be announced.   

I guess it depends on how much you want.  I bet you'll end up seeing an auction house, some shared social zones, and so forth.  I'm expecting guild wars/hellgate sort of a thing.  

[Venkman]

Has there been any indication that there is a "massive" component to this game?  As in, whether you play with thousands of people, or parallel to them. 

From the FAQ: 

Can I play alone?

While there are some tasks that cannot be completed without the cooperation of others, the majority of the game can be accomplished by playing alone.

How is this an MMO?

As mentioned, been discussed. But there's a lot of questions about what it takes to be an MMO, and have since people debated whether Diablo 2 qualified (I thought it was a borderline, whereas I think GW definitely is due to the shared spaces). SWTOR feels more like an RPG with an MMO business model than a game like WoW or Aion where you can largely solo as you level up, but you're doing so alongside other players doing the same in the same shared space.

What I haven't been interestedin looking up yet (so maybe someone knows?) is how instantiated  SWTOR is. Is it like WoW or CoX where you level up in shared spaces but then have the "real" fun in instances? Is it GW where it's mostly instantiated adventures and shared spaces are for socializing and commerce?

[Malakili]

I'd like to think that part of an MMO has to be lots of shared space.  Obviously its not something that there is any clear definition for, and people will argue about it until the cows come home...BUT, I think one important thing is that there should be contact with other players EVEN WHEN YOU DIDN'T INTEND TO.   This doesn't mean PvP with people or something, but it does mean running into people you didn't know would be there.  I think Guild Wars is borderline in this regard, but might qualify, and something like EVE would be a really good example.

To me, the "ideal" MMO would have lots of player impact, even when players didn't do stuff together.  People sometimes get into a huff about this and think its a group/solo argument, but it really isn't, its a shared persistent world argument, ideally with resources that people are competing over (even if the competition isn't traditional combat oriented PvP, for instance, I often describe the economy in EVE, even in "carebear" empire space as "PvP" for people that don't like combat PvP.)  Obviously for me to suggest that a game has to be like EVE to be an MMO is silly however, because there are few games like that, and not may more who even try for it (and arguably not even a very big player base that wants it to begin with).  Things like WoW can be defined as an MMO under this definition, but it obvious tries to mitigate any player interaction that isn't desired by both players (except maybe on PvP servers).

Anyway... it seems like SWTOR is taking it to the next level and seeing if taking away almost all of the unwanted player interaction, aside from maybe seeing people in a town/city is going to yield a success.  Much to my dismay, I think that there is a good chance it will.

[Malakili]

After thinking about this for a couple more minutes, I had a better idea.

Ask yourself "If this game came out before the MMO genre was coined would we have defined a new genre for this game?"   

[Crumbs]

After thinking about this for a couple more minutes, I had a better idea.

Ask yourself "If this game came out before the MMO genre was coined would we have defined a new genre for this game?"   

Was MMO coined at the time of Phantasy Star Online? (2000) Because there was a game that you could play alone, even offline.  Come to think of it, the original KOTOR and now SWTOR look sorta like PSO. 

[Lantyssa]

It's premature to say it will have an MMO business model since we don't know what the model will be and the only leak years before release places it more like Guild War's payment structure.

We can speculate about how different models will be received, for a game we still know nothing about, but assuming what it is going to be is extremely premature.

[Merusk]

Was MMO coined at the time of Phantasy Star Online? (2000)

 

Yes, long before that, sometime around UO in 1997 at least.  Multiplayer Online game was used before that for things like NWN, Gemstone and M59, I believe.

[Venkman]

To me, the "ideal" MMO would have lots of player impact, even when players didn't do stuff together. 

Eve. I've said before that I feel like Eve is just about the only remaining actual "MMO" if you go by the letter of some vague law about players all sharing the same space, same risk, and same ability to impact the world even if their specific input is different.

Now compare that to the diku derivatives from EQ1 on forward, against the trending away from large scale interaction and impact beyond some minor influence on the server economy. Adventures, raids, story, PvP, all been compartmentalized into theme parks to protect playstyles from accidental interaction with competing playstyles. WoW is a prime example. That actually could be three different games for the amount of actual direct interaction the playstyles of leveling up, raiding, and Arenas have with each other (as far as I can tell. Could be wrong).

I've long felt that people don't actually want the end result of the theoretically perfect MMO. And that's either because:

• Fully living and breathing virtual worlds are so complicated to develop they end up being fun because of the new and creative ways to exploit the bugs until the game gets redesigned to be a normal "game"; or,
• The UI is so abstracted the player can't get that emotional connection between themself as a person and their representation in the game. They don't "feel" like a part of the world, they feel like they're watching it.

So since diku derivatives have been successful enough and virtual lifestyle experiments not nearly as much (when compared side by side), the resources go towards the former.

[UnSub]

Ask yourself "If this game came out before the MMO genre was coined would we have defined a new genre for this game?"   

A co-op RPG (COORPG) could have been a new genre once. Maybe. But again it runs into the problem that RPGs are meant to be all about the main character, set up to make the player feel like the hero of the narrative. You might be able to do this in a party setting, but again the issue is getting players to head in the same general direction, combined with pretty much every p'n'p RPG party experience I've had where one person wants to play a Lawful Good Paladin (or equivalent) and one person wants to play a Chaotic Evil Rogue (or equivalent). A GM can improvise. A computer game (probably) can't.

SWOR will have PvP and social spaces and guilds et al, but it will also be the themey-ist of theme parks.