SWTOR

[palmer_eldritch]

I'm playing a stormtrooper who never takes off his helmet. Romance? What is this thing called romance?

[tazelbain]

A platonic romance with a fellow trooper no need to remove your armor.

[Simond]

Light-side Sith Inquisitor with a Puritan view: "It was this sort of filth that lost us the last war!" 

[Outlawedprod]

Apperently one can get paid for trolling. It's called being an analyst:
Analyst calls SWTOR a “highly derivative” clone of WoW and likely to miss 2011

“We got hands-on time with the game, and were largely unimpressed,” stated Creutz. “Despite promises from EA/Bioware that the title represents a major step forward in MMO design, what we saw was essentially a World of Warcraft clone with Star Wars character skins and the BioWare RPG nice/nasty dialogue tree mechanism bolted on for non-player character conversations.

Sounds like he summarized the 200 pages of this thread for investors! =p

The questions isn't did they deliver what they talked.  The question is will the people buy it.  Judging by Rift's success swtor will have massive sales.  No whether they can retain them past 3 months or whenever Diablo hits ...

[luckton]

Wait, so they were playing the same Tatooine demo that they showed at E3?  The same one stripped of everything but what was essential to whatever they needed to do for the area?  And, based off of dev commentary to fansites at E3, stripped of a lot of the polish they claim is in the internal builds?

 

[Rendakor]

I'm playing a stormtrooper who never takes off his helmet. Romance? What is this thing called romance?

Tonite, you pukes will sleep with your blasters. You will give your blaster a girl's name, because this is the only pussy you people are going to get!

[eldaec]

Apperently one can get paid for trolling. It's called being an analyst:
Analyst calls SWTOR a “highly derivative” clone of WoW and likely to miss 2011

“We got hands-on time with the game, and were largely unimpressed,” stated Creutz. “Despite promises from EA/Bioware that the title represents a major step forward in MMO design, what we saw was essentially a World of Warcraft clone with Star Wars character skins and the BioWare RPG nice/nasty dialogue tree mechanism bolted on for non-player character conversations.

This seems like a reasonable analysis based on what everyone has said.

Combat seems well presented but as shallow as WoW.

They appear to try to compensate with sheer volume of story.

/shrug

[WindupAtheist]

Wait, so they were playing the same Tatooine demo that they showed at E3?  The same one stripped of everything but what was essential to whatever they needed to do for the area?  And, based off of dev commentary to fansites at E3, stripped of a lot of the polish they claim is in the internal builds?

 

Gee maybe they shouldn't have fucking displayed it in public in such condition then.

"Silly analyst taking note of public demonstrations! Haven't they read the dev posts promising miraclepatch bla bla bla..."

 

[Soln]

The one thing that struck me with that 45min Tatooine demo was "What a helluva lot of travel...."

so 

[Amaron]

Combat seems well presented but as shallow as WoW.

I don't think WoW combat is all that great but calling it shallow isn't correct at all.   It's fairly complicated and has a very high skill cap.    The amount of twitch they've managed to work into something with a GCD is rather impressive in fact.  For those of us who would like to see something more action oriented (with like aiming) it's not going to do us any good to be deluded about what WoW combat really is. 

[eldaec]

I don't think anyone was expecting aiming.

[Draegan]

Side note:  I'd love to see an MMOG with challenging 5 man content progression much like 10-20 man raiding progression.  That would be pretty awesome.

Isn't WoW getting DESTROYED for having heroic 5 mans being too difficult?

Yeah but to be fair to Draegan those aren't progression content, those are (or should have been) farm content.

Shouldn't that distinction been by player, not by content?  I don't see why for some people heroic 5mans couldn't be their "Progression" content, or at least some rough equivalent.   I dunno, I guess instead of talking in isolation about raiding we'd need to spend some time laying out all the possible "stuff" to do at end game and what rewars you would get for what, but I honestly think that would be worth having a separate thread for if we really wanted to try and hash it out.

Progression content has many levels.  Kind of like Rift has it.  There are a set of Tier 1 5 man dungeons.  Then there are a set of Tier 2 5 man dungeons.  Then another tier and so on.  That's progression.  WOW just has a set of "hard mode" dungeons.

Each tier should get progressively harder requiring gear and stuff from previous tiers.

[Sjofn]

WoW is flirting with tiers for the five man stuff, actually, I just don't think they're capable of putting out enough for anyone to actually notice. It currently goes regular dungeons -> heroics of those dungeons -> the revamped Zul'Whatever heroics.

[Ingmar]

They explicitly don't want you to have to play catchup if you come along later, too, so I wouldn't expect a progression model for 5s exactly.

[Paelos]

People would be more forgiving of a progression for 5s though when you have access to a matching system than they are for raids.

[sam, an eggplant]

Analysts basically make educated guesses. They support these reports as best they can, but ultimately, they're guessing just like the rest of us. The main difference is that nobody bases their investments upon you thinking SWTOR looks like a WoW clone. It's not a bad gig, if you can get it.

[eldaec]

Each tier should get progressively harder requiring gear and stuff from previous tiers.

Heh, Mark Jacobs has some ward gear to sell you....

[Paelos]

I need to start making guesses about how much games will suck, make up a few charts, and toss my CPA cert behind it. I could be a fancy analyst.

[Montague]

Analysts basically make educated guesses. They support these reports as best they can, but ultimately, they're guessing just like the rest of us. The main difference is that nobody bases their investments upon you thinking SWTOR looks like a WoW clone. It's not a bad gig, if you can get it.

That and the guy must be a real nobody. Any analyst with any sort of clout would go to Austin and see development firsthand instead of at E3.

[Draegan]

Where they show the same demos?  When I went to Trion's Studios in San Fran to check out Rift, they had the same shit they were showing the press at all big shows.

[Malakili]

I need to start making guesses about how much games will suck, make up a few charts, and toss my CPA cert behind it. I could be a fancy analyst.

Is that what we do here? Minus the CPA cert at least.

[Merusk]

I need to start making guesses about how much games will suck, make up a few charts, and toss my CPA cert behind it. I could be a fancy analyst.

Is that what we do here? Minus the CPA cert at least.

Yes, but we're neither visible, marketing ourselves or collecting money for it.

[Paelos]

My point was to do what I'm already doing while leveraging the alphabet soup behind my name to make money off being a giant nay-saying douche.

Btw, I think this game will be successful from a normal MMO standpoint, but probably fail horribly in the "recovery of investment" area.

[Murgos]

Origin not required to play:

While Origin will be the exclusive digital retailer for Star Wars: The Old Republic (in other words, if you want to buy it online and download it, you’ll do so through Origin) that does not mean that Origin is required for you to access or play The Old Republic.

Origin is a digital storefront, and the desktop application is there to give you quick access to Origin exclusives and deals.

However, you won’t need to launch the Origin application to run The Old Republic, nor will you patch the game via Origin. Once the game is on your hard disk, you’ll be connecting to our servers to patch and launch the game, and Origin does not have to be running to do that.

To answer another question - boxed versions of the game will include the client on DVD(s)

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=6823172#edit6823172

[luckton]

Origin not required to play:

While Origin will be the exclusive digital retailer for Star Wars: The Old Republic (in other words, if you want to buy it online and download it, you’ll do so through Origin) that does not mean that Origin is required for you to access or play The Old Republic.

Origin is a digital storefront, and the desktop application is there to give you quick access to Origin exclusives and deals.

However, you won’t need to launch the Origin application to run The Old Republic, nor will you patch the game via Origin. Once the game is on your hard disk, you’ll be connecting to our servers to patch and launch the game, and Origin does not have to be running to do that.

To answer another question - boxed versions of the game will include the client on DVD(s)

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=6823172#edit6823172

Good.  Now we just have to wait for the pre-order bullshit EA will pull out of their ass for TOR 

Let's start a guess-game for the exclusives..

GameStop: Exclusive yoda-race companion

Best Buy: Some kind of trinket that increases your primary stat by 50.

Origin: Light-saber that you can change the color of to whatever you want.

[Malakili]

Origin not required to play:

While Origin will be the exclusive digital retailer for Star Wars: The Old Republic (in other words, if you want to buy it online and download it, you’ll do so through Origin) that does not mean that Origin is required for you to access or play The Old Republic.

Origin is a digital storefront, and the desktop application is there to give you quick access to Origin exclusives and deals.

However, you won’t need to launch the Origin application to run The Old Republic, nor will you patch the game via Origin. Once the game is on your hard disk, you’ll be connecting to our servers to patch and launch the game, and Origin does not have to be running to do that.

To answer another question - boxed versions of the game will include the client on DVD(s)

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=6823172#edit6823172

Good.  Now we just have to wait for the pre-order bullshit EA will pull out of their ass for TOR 

Let's start a guess-game for the exclusives..

GameStop: Exclusive yoda-race companion

Best Buy: Some kind of trinket that increases your primary stat by 50.

Origin: Light-saber that you can change the color of to whatever you want.

Access to special headstart and/or special princess Leia hairdo for female characters.

[tmp]

Origin: Light-saber that you can change the color of to whatever you want.

Why put more effort than necessary.

Origin: exclusive access to the red and purple lightsaber crystals.

[luckton]

Origin: Light-saber that you can change the color of to whatever you want.

Why put more effort than necessary.

Origin: exclusive access to the red and purple lightsaber crystals.

That would be how EA 'would' do it.  I just say any color due to how the TOR boards always have at least 2-5 threads running about how if they can't customize their lightsaber the way they want, they'd write Lucas a very angry letter. 

[Malakili]

Origin: Light-saber that you can change the color of to whatever you want.

Why put more effort than necessary.

Origin: exclusive access to the red and purple lightsaber crystals.

That would be how EA 'would' do it.  I just say any color due to how the TOR boards always have at least 2-5 threads running about how if they can't customize their lightsaber the way they want, they'd write Lucas a very angry letter. 

I went over there to confirm this claim and found this gem:
http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=342508

am a hero, and supposidly master of my domain by the time I'm level 50... but someone is going to tell me what color lightsaber I am going to use? I'm a Darth, I want a green lightsaber...

 

[luckton]

I went over there to confirm this claim and found this gem:
http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=342508

am a hero, and supposidly master of my domain by the time I'm level 50... but someone is going to tell me what color lightsaber I am going to use? I'm a Darth, I want a green lightsaber...

 

I only wish I could make this shit up.   

[tmp]

That thing has 46 pages and counting. Bet the guy who said on the first page it's not prada handbags feels really stupid now.

[sam, an eggplant]

Here's some schadenfreude for ya. Feast upon my tears, and be satiated.

So I just got an email from Bioware, subject "STAR WARS: The Old Republic Testing Opportunity". I SQUEEEEEEE like a 13 year old girl the captain of the varsity team just invited to homecoming, and click the link, nipples fully erect. It sends me to fill out a 10 page long survey, which I diligently spend 15 minutes or so doing, then at the end posts a screen saying the following:

"Survey Completed: Thank you!

We’re sorry, but you do not qualify for this particular test. This does not exclude you from future tests however, and if future tests occur you may be contacted to participate. Thanks for your time and may the force be with you!"

Clearly whoever is running the beta program has succumbed to the dark side of the force. Have you ever heard of such a sadistic cocktease?

[Lucas]

What the f....? For real, man  

In other news, TOR Community Manager Stephen Reid said that european invitations may go out pretty soon (even though the scale of the test will be kept somewhat smaller than the U.S. one, which is going to get bigger within the next month).

[SnakeCharmer]

Harsh.

[sam, an eggplant]

http://twitter.com/#!/Rockjaw/status/81131085781671936

QQ