Pre-release thread discussion

[Paelos]

Thoughts? Did the Beta make you more or less likely to play?

[koro]

I had some tempered enthusiasm with no expectations beyond "it's a diku" and "it's going to be very WoW-like" going into the beta, and the first build I was in got me surprisingly excited for what was to come. Since then I've gotten less and less enthusiastic about the state the game will be in come release. The stories I enjoyed, the questing I enjoyed, the combat I'm okay with. The game just seems to lack any real "soul", I hate the UI, and there seem to be too many Ghostcrawlers at the helm to make me anything but worried about the long-term health of the game.

If it's still trucking along really well in 4-6 months, I'll give it a go.

[jakonovski]

I didn't even try to get into the beta because they always make me less likely to play the real game (killed Rift for me). The whole thing seems a bit underwhelming from all the Youtube videos, but a Star Wars Christmas is still a powerful enough Force that I'll buy it. Assuming their servers can handle the launch.

[luckton]

I for one am looking forward to our new Jedi/Sith overlords.  I look forward to getting into the story, exploring the world and having a good time in a sci-fi setting, the latter being one of the most attractive features in this market of "just how many different ways can we draw an elf?".

That said, this game could still go the way of WAR; all hype pre-release and abysmal follow-up post.  I like to think that a game house like BW would be able to overcome the pitfalls that Mythic fell into, esp. considering this is a PvE-centric game, but only time can truly tell.  I do feel that if they stay committed to having voice work and cinematics done for everything even post-release, that alone helps justify a monthly sub of $15 (which I still find surprising even at this point...I'm shocked that EA wouldn't inflate the price to $20+ because of the all the voice acting and server logistics involved with this whole thing).

I do hope they get right to tackling performance issues and really optimizing the client post-release, as they'll have an entire smorgasbord of computer profiles to collect data from and get things ironed out.  Along with that, I hope the first couple patches don't take the Rift approach by just catering to the content burners and adding only end-game stuff.  Flesh out the leveling experience some more, add more fluff to space combat stuffs and work on the creature comforts.

[Modern Angel]

I went from thinking it's awful, awful dogshit to liking it to being pretty neutral. There are times I have fun with it but there's never been OH GOD I MUST PLAY stuff going on. I get that with strategy games, for chrissake.

But I'm leaning buy, because I think it'll be fun for a couple months with a duo, but I've got some serious reservations about its long-term viability as a primary game for tons of people. Note that this doesn't mean disaster; it's going to chew through wallets worldwide. But I just don't see it being the long-term behemoth that some folks think. I really think the novelty of the voice acting and cutscenes is going to wear thin a lot more quickly than people think. If it had novel mechanics, or even MODERN mechanics in MMO terms, it wouldn't be such a big deal but there's some awfully thin gruel in that department.

[Falconeer]

I'm disappointed. The stories are good and engaging to me, but that only tells you that I like Bioware (other) games. The diku part is bland, generic, ugly and boring. I am not canceling the preorder cause I want to follow a few stories to the end, but I'll try to make it into the first month so not to pay the monthly fee.

As I said, I can't see anything that justifies paying a subscription for a single player game with a lousy WoW clone glued in to provide below-par coop.

SWTOR is a huge wasted opportunity. Damn.

[eldaec]

But I just don't see it being the long-term behemoth that some folks think.

Without even playing beta this has been my suspicion. Star Wars will sell a lot of boxes, but it sets an upper limit as well as a lower limit. It's a barrier for a lot of the sorts of non-traditional gamer who got sucked into wow.

Having pre-CoX/EQ2 design just affirms that.

Still looking forward to it as Kotor 3 through 10. It can't possibly be less enjoyable than kotor 2. But long term this is no EVE.

[Sky]

Love it, beta weekends confirmed it.

[Rasix]

Beta just confirmed I knew what I'd be getting. 

I dislike some of their decisions (most that follow the established MMO formula), but like the Bioware touches quite a bit.  I'll stay for the story, and put up with the rest.  I may even end up liking the rest, who knows; I did not put a lot of time into the beta.

I'm not super hyped or anything, but I think I'll have fun.  I may be over the whole MMO thing for a while.  WoW's last xpac broke me a bit.

[Merusk]

I'm not down on it like the folks seem to be. It's pretty much exactly what I expected it would be, with a few hiccups in terms of UI, bad animations and insufficient explanation of what some things are and do. 

I didn't get the love for Rift some people had either, though.  It just appeals to different segments, I suppose.  I always read quest text in WoW and was a sucker for even LOLORE crap. This scratches that itch very nicely and the ONLY reason I've skipped stuff is because I only have a few more hours to get through things and I wanted to get to 10 on more than one character.

The combat needs some work - I think.  I can't tell for certain because some of it is OMGSTRESS lag and some is my ancient PC chugging really hard to load things.  As I said in the other thread, it just doesn't feel as responsive as WoW always has.  It's much snappier than LOTR ever felt but there's still some feeling of action lag.   Perhaps some of you can tell me if you're feeling the same or if it's just a latency problem.

The abilities themselves feel a little sparse, but I think part of that is I'm comparing it to games that have been out a lot longer.  Yeah, Rift had a lot more abilities per class but that was because you could role-swap so easily.  Each class only used a few of them, but in SWTOR it *seems* like you're going to have a use for each button you're given.  It could just be that I've only gotten to 11/12 so I haven't run into the "omg once in a while' abilities.

[DraconianOne]

I'm in two minds about it but I honestly think that I can't make a proper judgement on this until I've played at live with a character I'm going to keep in a class I want to play. But I was surprised at how much I quite enjoyed playing Consular even if the story itself has yet to grab me.  Ironically, it's the story mechanics that have pissed me off most of all - I don't mind the dialogue in class stories but having several dialogue trees to navigate on a quest I've done before makes me miss not having a text box I can just click to accept and close.

On the other hand, I'm easily amused (especially by Star Wars games) and reckon I'll enjoy it for a month or two. I can totally justify spending a sub on this as well because it fits within my beer-to-fun conversion ratio.

[Sobelius]

The companion character touches are new for an MMO -- persistent "relationship" with an NPC in-game, plus I really like the whole "go and craft/scavenge/sell" for me while I go shoot things. Nothing makes my eyes bleed worse than sitting at a crafting station watching a progress bar and this fixes that. Plus reverse engineering for getting mats back PLUS chance for new recipe. Works for me.

My friends and I grouped up for Esseles last night and enjoyed it. The social points thing is interesting, plus LOLing at choices my friends make when they win the cut scene roll.

Negative points, though, to BW for boss loot implementation. RIFT's "everyone gets a shiny" plus a 30 minute trade window, is miles better.

I feel like BW's noobness in the MMO space shows, but by no means is the game a disaster.

[Thrawn]

My opinion of it is mostly exactly what I expected, I probably wouldn't be pre-ordering if I didn't have a group of friends that wanted to play it together.

[kildorn]

It's a diku. Beta made me look forward to it far more, though. Mechanically, it's pretty much WoW vanilla. Style points out the ass, however.

I've liked the stories quite a bit so far. And I didn't think I'd care much about the voice acting, but I actually spent a decent amount of time deciding on characters based on their stories and how much I felt the voice fit the character's theme.

I don't know that I'll enjoy raiding at all. Single group healing wasn't bad, but wasn't that interesting at pre-30 levels either. I need to take one last look at the UI options to see if I can fix up the group UI for healing. Didn't like that by default the player names didn't seem to fall down F2-F4 that I could tell (looked like it went UP instead?), and I didn't like that my health/resource isn't listed with the other health bars.

[MuffinMan]

I don't think I would even be thinking about it if it wasn't for Bat Country. Which is quite silly since everyone will disappear within a month of release.

[luckton]

Which is quite silly since everyone will disappear within a month of release.

The optimist would say "Or they'll swell in force within a month of release because of it's awesomeness and realization that GW2 is still months off 

[kildorn]

For some reason I get a laugh out of your companion. They seem like slave labor. "Ooh, a resource node! YOU THERE, SCAN AND LOOT THAT"

[Rokal]

The combat needs some work - I think.  I can't tell for certain because some of it is OMGSTRESS lag and some is my ancient PC chugging really hard to load things.  As I said in the other thread, it just doesn't feel as responsive as WoW always has.  It's much snappier than LOTR ever felt but there's still some feeling of action lag.   Perhaps some of you can tell me if you're feeling the same or if it's just a latency problem.

The first couple hours of the last beta weekend, the combat felt pretty sluggish. Not that bad, not not as responsive as I wanted. Later in the night I tried the same class again and the combat felt completely fine. I'd say it feels maybe slightly less responsive than WoW, but I wouldn't be surprised if you were experiencing server lag.

[Paelos]

I played for 2 hours and liked it. The story is cool, the combat doesn't bother me like some seem to think, and the interface isn't horrific. I fully expect it to be updated anyway within a couple months.

I'm pleased with my preorder and plan on playing it for a while.

[Mosesandstick]

The early experience is better than ever, but now I'm very certain that Bioware is unable to produce high quality content quick enough.

[MuffinMan]

The optimist would say "Or they'll swell in force within a month of release because of it's awesomeness and realization that GW2 is still months off  

That's not optimism if you think BC will stick around. That's just rampant naivety.

[Dark_MadMax]

Man I thought I wasnt getting this for sure. But beta weekend changed my mind.  Story is actually quite good . I played IA to 10  and Sith Assasin to 18. I liked IA line better , but SA is not bad either. Yes it wow clone in everything but quests, which actually form single player quality storyline (with a few MMOish flavor quests)

Yes it probably will be for play-trough-once forget it. But imho its worth  playing just for this. And it actually looks like there is 2 major storylines for each faction. So make it play 4 times till level 20 , play twice till level 50.

[luckton]

The early experience is better than ever, but now I'm very certain that Bioware is unable to produce high quality content quick enough.

I'm going to flash my fan-boy card briefly and say that if a rag-tag team like Trion can put out more content in 6-months than what WoW could in two years, I think it's highly possible/probable that BW could do the same.  Hell, at the rate things are going with this thread and the general consensus around the net from this weekend, they're gonna have to.

[Lantyssa]

I feel like BW's noobness in the MMO space shows, but by no means is the game a disaster.

More like the MMO industry vets guiding the project show their stripes, but I agree with your points.

[Dark_MadMax]

The early experience is better than ever, but now I'm very certain that Bioware is unable to produce high quality content quick enough.

I'm going to flash my fan-boy card briefly and say that if a rag-tag team like Trion can put out more content in 6-months than what WoW could in two years, I think it's highly possible/probable that BW could do the same.  Hell, at the rate things are going with this thread and the general consensus around the net from this weekend, they're gonna have to.
[/quote]

I am pretty damn sure BW wouldnt be able produce squat for content. Because its all voice acted ,highly scripted etc. Once everyone finishes their line their will be staring at subpar WOW  with lightsabers. But before that it would be great ride

[Mosesandstick]

People have been clamoring for more "good" content for months, especially flashpoints. I got to experience the 2nd flashpoint, and it was far too similar to a standard group dungeon.

[murdoc]

Love it, beta weekends confirmed it.

Feel exactly the same way.

[Reg]

I'm quite happy with the game so far. It's pretty much exactly what I expected it to be.

[Evildrider]

I'm all in for SWTOR.  I went into this weekend not wanting to play too much and ended up catassing the last two days.   

[Azuredream]

I'm all in for SWTOR.  I went into this weekend not wanting to play too much and ended up catassing the last two days.   

I experienced a similar phenomenon.

[Sjofn]

 


No one is surprised, though, are they?

[TripleDES]

I guess I would get it for the story, but it became really tiresome. The main story mission makes you often enough run across the whole map, coincidentally letting you run into tons of mob groups, and then all the way back (quick travel has 30 min downtime). Most of them are the same encounter over and over. That is stretching my will to play pretty thin.

And I guess what's grating me, too, is that I've spent several hours into this, done god knows how many missions, and I still can't travel anywhere I want (i.e. Tatooine). Either that, or I'm fucking stupid and didn't find the appropriate shuttles.

[VainEldritch]

At the risk of being neither useful nor for that matter cynical, I love it. Frankly SWTOR is my MMORPG Nirvana. I've been thrilled by the game play, loved the SI and JC stories, revelled in them. Never have I been so engaged by, or felt so involved in any game - never like this.

Servers are down so I'm off for pizza... happy to have this to come back to.

 

[koro]

I actually feel bad that I'm not digging the game as much as I was a month or two ago. Most of my friends are all over it.

[Paelos]

I'm kind of amazed that the reactions are THIS different.