If you look hard enough you'll always find a 'yeah,but this sucks' about anything you get in life. As long as you're focused in on find the bad part you'll always find it sooner. Why not just focus on enjoying the game until you don't enjoy it anymore? Then move on and not take it as a personsl affront against you by the developers.
"I used to think the worst thing in life was to be all alone. It's not. The worst thing in life is to end up with people who make you feel all alone." Robin Williams
Lord of the Rings Online: After about a month playing this after release, I discovered that there was almost no solo content past lvl 20ish. This made the switch hard, as I want the option in an MMO to solo at will. I know that LOTRO has since rectified this issue.
Not sure if this has been mentioned but.. did you even play this game? It was almost all solo content, except for certain areas every so-many levels that were group based. And entirely optional. What happened was the soloers whined even more and the only group content during levelling became solo areas too. It's like Bioware making these Flashpoints, people complaining that they're too hard, then giving everyone +20 to everything during Flashpoints so they can go through it solo.
That was the time I left, when group based content started to become solo content with buffs.
Yes, they forgot to add lightsabers to the force users, insted they use carrots in different colours, it woks fine though. But it feels strange to kill a jedi with my sniper rifle, while he is running towards me with a green carrot as his weapon!
MMO players are going to race through this games content in less than a month. People playing the last 3 day open beta were hitting the high teens and low 20's on more than one character! By the end of the 1st month, your average MMO player is going to have at least one level 50 and maybe two. By the end of the 2nd month - if they keep playing - they will have done everything there is to do in the game. Most will grow tired of grinding the same raids and same areas looking for HC's and they'll be on these forums complaining and looking for a new "baby raptor Jesus MMO" to call the "WoW" killer.
Welcome to all MMOs. Powergamers gonna powergame. No reason a company should cater to them if they are going to space-bar through quest dialogue in order to get to endgame faster. And, btw...with two raids, 3 versions of every flashpoint, and a lot of variety in PvP as well as world bosses, people may get to endgame quickly, but they aren't going to burn through that much endgame content by the time more is pumped out by Bioware.
You mention, what, 5 MMO's? Dude there are hundreds out there, no really! And a ton of them are free! Come back when you are at least in double figures. But, tbh, if you still don't like any of them, then truly, MMO's just aint for you!
The main flaw about this game is that its a total waste of the Star Wars IP.
They have gone "yup people like wow because its simple, so we will copy that but make it more simple.. hah we are onto a winner here star wars + simple theme park MMO"
Now im not saying its buggy and plays like shit it does have some nice things..
*Awesome cutscenes
*Interesting story for the first 15 lvls
*Lightsabers
*Companions actually work qutie well
But saying that it really should have been a single palyer RPG with some co-op bits as it does not play like an MMORPG as there is no real need to team up..
Combat is boring and animations are not all that good.
Graphics are below par for a 2011 game with such a big budget.
Silly high price of £40 here in the UK, thats £10 more than standard PC games plus you have to pay monthly for it.
At the end of the day im 30 and have left simple games like this behind me a long time ago, I dont want everything given to me on a plate there is no fun in that.. but im sure the younger generation will love this especially the young teens who are really into starwars..
This game is not for me and I really think its a tragic waste of the Star Wars IP.. but and thats a big but... I think there will be lots of people who really love it..
Endgame is issue? sorry i do not understand. For a newly released game SWTOR has plenty of content. Now if SWTOR would have release with no end game content or broken content like WAR and AOC i would worry about it.
How many servers SWTOR will launch with on release?
ShredderSE - Umm how many do they need? Maybe 6. US, EU, Asian, France, German and Russian. Subs will be so low there is no need for more Snoocky-How many servers? The first 3 months a lot...after that 2 i guess, one for PVE and 1 for PVP...
Thorbrand - SWTOR doesn't have longevity at all. Might be one of the shortest lived MMOs.
Endgame is issue? sorry i do not understand. For a newly released game SWTOR has plenty of content. Now if SWTOR would have release with no end game content or broken content like WAR and AOC i would worry about it.
Millions of people will get to endgame too fast and then get bored of it.. unless of course Bioware are shit hot on releasing new content.. will have to wait and see i guess
Endgame is issue? sorry i do not understand. For a newly released game SWTOR has plenty of content. Now if SWTOR would have release with no end game content or broken content like WAR and AOC i would worry about it.
Millions of people will get to endgame too fast and then get bored of it.. unless of course Bioware are shit hot on releasing new content.. will have to wait and see i guess
Ahh ok;) well there is never enough content in any MMO for hardcore / power gamers. For those who can spend 10 hours a day playing games are never the target audience when companies churn out content updates. I read an article some time back regarding percentage of players who actually ever raided or did any of the end game content in WOW and results were shockingly low.
Casual players do not consume content that fast that is why i am not worried about the end game. Leveling alone in SWTOR is quite slow. people get wrong impressions during first 10 or so level but once you hit 30 it really slows down.
How many servers SWTOR will launch with on release?
ShredderSE - Umm how many do they need? Maybe 6. US, EU, Asian, France, German and Russian. Subs will be so low there is no need for more Snoocky-How many servers? The first 3 months a lot...after that 2 i guess, one for PVE and 1 for PVP...
Thorbrand - SWTOR doesn't have longevity at all. Might be one of the shortest lived MMOs.
Well, I think SWTOR's major flaw will be that it's too similar to other themepark games. This is only a flaw if you're already burnt out on WoW or something similar. The storytelling aspect in SWTOR will make playing through a few times pretty fun, but after that, will players really want to complete flashpoints, operations, and organized PvP in yet another game if they've been doing those activities for several years already?
I'm not saying I think this is a flaw for me personally, but I'm grasping for straws here to answer the OP's question.
Well, I think SWTOR's major flaw will be that it's too similar to other themepark games. This is only a flaw if you're already burnt out on WoW or something similar.
When all is said and done, this is pretty much the correct answer to most issues people with have with TOR.
My one major gripe with the game, as of now, is that aside from the first two planets, every class from either side has to take the same route to level cap. There are no overlapping of planets during the leveling process, and I think this is something that BW is going to have to add in later.
I like this. This is in the spirit of the thread, and it is certainly a possible flaw. It is fixable, but will they be able to correct this before people hit max level and go back and play alts and find they need new leveling content?
While this may be an issue, it is less of an issue for SWTOR than most MMO releases. Simply because the class quests are different, so playing different classes as an alt will offer a different leveling experience. As for the side quests that will be the same for all classes, you can instead play more warfronts or flashpoints instead of doing them. But it wouldn't hurt Bioware to create 4 different leveling path's per faction, so that each time you create a new class, you can have a completely fresh play through. However, despite being an altaholic, I'd prefer to see my characters story progress past the max level rather than have more options during the leveling experience. It's like my character is starring in its own book and further releases of class content would be like having a sequel to what released at launch.
That sentence that I highlighted tells me that you would have a difficult time accepting a game, unless it's WoW v2.0
Good luck finding what you are looking for, irregardless.
That sentence I highlighted tells me that you are judging me based on the fact that I liked WoW
Kidding, but seriously, WoW was great, no doubt, and why wouldn't we want future themeparks to have all the polish and standard features of it?
One game's features hardly make a "standard".
if it is the highest grossing, best selling, most widely played game of ALL TIME..... yeah, it kinda does. that is pretty much what creates standards....
I'll be sure to demand McDonald's special sauce next time I eat at Tomo Sushi, then.
Again....the features of ONE game do not make a "standard". A standard is a widely accepted and applied principle...such as hit points.
Your analogy fails quite a bit. McDonalds and Tomo Sushi aren't even remotely same kind of restaurants. It's like you were comparing WoW with Battlefield.
If you were to get that special sauce you should go to Burger King to demand it.
When we look at the themepark MMOs created past 6 years, they all accomodate WoWish style (let's not talk about how WoW copied stuff and all). SW:TOR itself is a testimony about the standard status of WoW.
But you don't have to take my word for it. Greg says so:
QUOTE: "Thursday during the keynote panel at the DICE Summit in Las Vegas, BioWare's Greg Zeschuk admitted that Blizzard's World of Warcraft has established MMOG standards in which BioWare will follow with Star Wars: The Old Republic."
PWNED?
But to OP: Majority of the people will burn the content in the game fast and it will probably go down to where other MMOs have gone lately. Besides watching videoclips the game doesn't have much to do. Once they're seen or become repetitive only MMO-playing Star Wars fans (probably mostly the same folk that stuck with SWG because of the SW part) stay and pay.
The major flaw of any mmorpg is that it's a mmorpg.
Most people simply don't seek lifetime commitment with their games. Hell, most people don't seek it with their spouses! The was majority of people simply will not play the game for a year because it's unthinkable for them to play a game for a year. They have lives.
My one major gripe with the game, as of now, is that aside from the first two planets, every class from either side has to take the same route to level cap. There are no overlapping of planets during the leveling process, and I think this is something that BW is going to have to add in later.
I like this. This is in the spirit of the thread, and it is certainly a possible flaw. It is fixable, but will they be able to correct this before people hit max level and go back and play alts and find they need new leveling content?
Hoth and Quesh share the exact same level range, just to give a small example of diverging leveling paths.
The problem is that people are judging SWTOR based on the first little bit of the game, since few people other than long term beta testers have seen anything else.
People seem to think that because they played through 15 levels of the game and read some reviews and interviews, that they KNOW everything that SWTOR has to offer.
Time will rectify this issue.
To answer the OP....no, I don't see any glaring flaws in SWTOR. The game is not perfect, and has it's faults, but nothing that outweighs it's merits.
I thought this was true. I only played up to level 20 in beta. But even here on mmorpg, they had an interview about the BH story. And it said that the choices you make will send you to different planets for chapter two. So that does sound like alternate paths to me.
Did you ever take the same class through to chapter two and end up on different planets based on choice? Or did you here others talk about the story taking them to different planets?
The problem is that unless we know for a fact this is true. No one will know becaue you can only make one choice. And you will end up playing a different class as an alt and not know that you had a different planets to go to if you made a different choice. I guess walkthroughs and databases will list level ranges on planets for each faction. So we will at least know that we could quest on another planet even if our story doesn't take us there. Just pop into your ship and go there.
While a class quest might send you to a different planet, the level range of that planet does not change. So if you say choose to go to Nar Shadda instead of Balmorra you're going to be fighting lvl 20-24 mobs instead of the lvl 16-20 mobs on Balmorra. Unless you do a lot of extra warzones, space missions, or the heroic quests you'll still have to level from Dromund Kaas -> Balmorra -> Nar Shadda, unless of course you like dying a lot. So you might have 3-4 quests that are different but the overall progression is still the same since the majority of your quests are shared planet quests.
Just to reiterate, just because a class quest gives you a planet choice does not mean that your leveling path changes. I've been to 50 and 43 on a SI and the leveling path was exactly the same even when I picked all the opposite choices. For the Sith it goes: Hutta/Korriban->Dromund Kaas->Balmorra->Nar Shadda->Tatooine->Alderaan->Taris->Quesh->Hoth->Belsavis->Voss->Correllia->Illum
The republic is almost exactly the same(iirc) except obviously their starter planets/capital planet and taris and Balmorra are switched.
Just to reiterate, some of those planets you listed are the exact same level range.
We're not talking about Act 1 planets here, which atm are rather linear, with the exception that you also have the option of returning to planets you have been to for higher level bonus quests.
For example....one I've already used in fact....both Hoth and Quesh offer lvl 35+ quests.....the mobs are the same levels, the quests are the same levels.
While leveling on Taris (31+35-ish) you might decide to go back to Nar Shaddaa for the bonus quests (31-34). Entirely optional. At level 40, you could also, if you chose, go back to Alderaan for the bonus quests there, should you feel like fighting antmen until you're ready to scream.
Once again, this information will be public knowledge in a month or two, so I'll just let time take it from here.
considering every MMO you just listed was too "bland" for you..... i think your time in MMOs has come to an end.
you have simply grown out of them. move on. if you havent found one that you liked after 4-5 MMOs.... perhaps they just arent for you any more.
What exactly were you reading? He only called two of the mmo's on this list "bland", and he gave counter examples of the good points. His example of AOC was spot on, it was nowhere near completion. You can say that mmo's are never compete, but AOC didn't even manage the features they promised for release. It even said DX10 ready on the retail box, when in fact the release was not ready to add support to DX10 yet. People felt pretty ripped off.
Rift? I can't with certainty speak for that because I wasn't interested in it, but from what I have heard and the research I had done while it was making it's way up to release, and what people had to say about it months after release, I am inclined to agree with OP about rift.
Yes it is a content grind themepark thus when the content is grinded there is probably a pretty shallow end game. They can't keep ahead of the players with this kind of content generation. Still they can address these issues with the first expansion, but they probably won't and will continue to mold the game in the shadow of WoW.
I'm going to be playing SW:TOR, and probably enjoy it greatly. But if it has to suffer from at least one major flaw, it will be the same flaw that causes people to leave any themepark mmo.
Yes it is a content grind themepark thus when the content is grinded there is probably a pretty shallow end game. They can't keep ahead of the players with this kind of content generation. Still they can address these issues with the first expansion, but they probably won't and will continue to mold the game in the shadow of WoW.
Still it should be fun for a couple months right?
if a MMO has end game people complain and when there is none people still complain. Gaming companies can just never win.
How many servers SWTOR will launch with on release?
ShredderSE - Umm how many do they need? Maybe 6. US, EU, Asian, France, German and Russian. Subs will be so low there is no need for more Snoocky-How many servers? The first 3 months a lot...after that 2 i guess, one for PVE and 1 for PVP...
Thorbrand - SWTOR doesn't have longevity at all. Might be one of the shortest lived MMOs.
Yes it is a content grind themepark thus when the content is grinded there is probably a pretty shallow end game. They can't keep ahead of the players with this kind of content generation. Still they can address these issues with the first expansion, but they probably won't and will continue to mold the game in the shadow of WoW.
Still it should be fun for a couple months right?
if a MMO has end game people complain and when there is none people still complain. Gaming companies can just never win.
Haha don't get me wrong. I like for there to be an end game, but with a theme park you kind of exhaust the entire world to arrive at a shallow end game that makes use of a tiny percent of the world along with instanced content. This type of game design appeals to millions obviously, but it just doesn't appeal to me. I will enjoy the ride as long as it is enjoyable for a gamer like me and then move along without making a deal about it.
Still if they want long term subs they will either:
a) Have to keep ahead of the curve with content to tack onto the end game, raise max level, and keep the linear gravy train rollnig, or
b) Add game systems similar to sandbox titles that enhance the game as a whole for all levels, add exploration, and add reasons for players to revisit past grinded areas to make use of the beautiful world their team crafted all while still adding content and story
I just don't see them applying option b, and in early interviews it appears they want to keep adding content and that will force them to tack it onto the end game because of their design philosophy. This style doesn't really appeal to me is all. Believe me though I will get my moneys worth.
Yes it is a content grind themepark thus when the content is grinded there is probably a pretty shallow end game. They can't keep ahead of the players with this kind of content generation. Still they can address these issues with the first expansion, but they probably won't and will continue to mold the game in the shadow of WoW.
Still it should be fun for a couple months right?
That might have been my concern before I played it, but now that I have, I think if they followed WoW a bit more closely, it'd actually be an improvement - Now that I've played TOR a bit, what I see them doing is mostly just adding more and more story content. Some fans will argue that if they add enough, that should be plenty, but I think those players are a bit of a niche. Certainly most TOR players like some story, but I think a lot of them will get sick of it - waayyy before they've seen all of it. Which obviously means that adding more won't help.
Reminds me of Rift, and how they kept adding more raid content. Players who felt Rift lacked endgame didn't like raid content that much, so no matter how much of it they add with every update, of course it'd never be enough. but Rift fans (and the devs) will still point to it and say it has tons of endgame.
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.
Long term it will do fine, but it will need more than just story, or more instances of pvp, or raids.
They will need space combat,
larger explorable worlds,
worlds that have more utility with housing,
guilds that play a larger role than a group that raids with more sand box elements for example,
mini games,
social activities,
player created content with mini games for example.
Improved character customization
Dynamic events, or unique dailies created by devs/mods
Weather system more evident and dynamic
Abilties that interact with environment more, for example with the weather. If its raining maybe force lighting has a larger aoe
Day/night cycle. They should really get on this, its a big deal imo, even if its hard to implement, its better to have the illusion of day and night, or darker or brighter times of the day.
Smart AI. IF there is going to be a huge number of NPC make them aggro easily. However make certain mob easy to kill but in large numbers while others harder in smaller numbers. The change in combat and style makes things interesting.
Make jump more useful. It looks like there is no need for a jump or crouch. Make that integrated with the environment and possibly with abilties. However that might be too demanding for an mmo by turning it into an FPS.
Swimming, and underwater content
Make vehicles interesting to be more than just transport and play a role in open world pvp. Possibly pvp abilties can slow down vehicles, or stop them. Same abilties can be avioded by driver, this can create for some rping and organized races. However this requires a more fps style combat with active blocking or something similar.
Add more proffessions like music. Make music very complicated and high quality and thus allowing people to actualyl create high quality music worthy of listening on you tube. Great for advertising. Myabe a musical companion can do this?
Localize servers, expand to other areas with more service in the area.
Regional release, with subs. I am not really in need of this since English is the only language I speak, but it helps with sales of a product by being exclusive to peoples area and language.
In UO you could write books and give them to other people. Whe should be able to do the same in swtor! We can write some fan fiction or sell online guides through AH for game money instead of real money.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble
Comments
If you look hard enough you'll always find a 'yeah,but this sucks' about anything you get in life. As long as you're focused in on find the bad part you'll always find it sooner. Why not just focus on enjoying the game until you don't enjoy it anymore? Then move on and not take it as a personsl affront against you by the developers.
Not sure if this has been mentioned but.. did you even play this game? It was almost all solo content, except for certain areas every so-many levels that were group based. And entirely optional. What happened was the soloers whined even more and the only group content during levelling became solo areas too. It's like Bioware making these Flashpoints, people complaining that they're too hard, then giving everyone +20 to everything during Flashpoints so they can go through it solo.
That was the time I left, when group based content started to become solo content with buffs.
Yes, they forgot to add lightsabers to the force users, insted they use carrots in different colours, it woks fine though. But it feels strange to kill a jedi with my sniper rifle, while he is running towards me with a green carrot as his weapon!
Welcome to all MMOs. Powergamers gonna powergame. No reason a company should cater to them if they are going to space-bar through quest dialogue in order to get to endgame faster. And, btw...with two raids, 3 versions of every flashpoint, and a lot of variety in PvP as well as world bosses, people may get to endgame quickly, but they aren't going to burn through that much endgame content by the time more is pumped out by Bioware.
You mention, what, 5 MMO's? Dude there are hundreds out there, no really! And a ton of them are free! Come back when you are at least in double figures. But, tbh, if you still don't like any of them, then truly, MMO's just aint for you!
Too many alts!!
I fear for 2 things:
1. Endgame/ contents.(Pve aswell as Pvp)
2. The time it takes to lvl a charater up.
The main flaw about this game is that its a total waste of the Star Wars IP.
They have gone "yup people like wow because its simple, so we will copy that but make it more simple.. hah we are onto a winner here star wars + simple theme park MMO"
Now im not saying its buggy and plays like shit it does have some nice things..
*Awesome cutscenes
*Interesting story for the first 15 lvls
*Lightsabers
*Companions actually work qutie well
But saying that it really should have been a single palyer RPG with some co-op bits as it does not play like an MMORPG as there is no real need to team up..
Combat is boring and animations are not all that good.
Graphics are below par for a 2011 game with such a big budget.
Silly high price of £40 here in the UK, thats £10 more than standard PC games plus you have to pay monthly for it.
At the end of the day im 30 and have left simple games like this behind me a long time ago, I dont want everything given to me on a plate there is no fun in that.. but im sure the younger generation will love this especially the young teens who are really into starwars..
This game is not for me and I really think its a tragic waste of the Star Wars IP.. but and thats a big but... I think there will be lots of people who really love it..
Yes Endgame is an issue..
You mean character lvling is too fast yeah ?
Endgame is issue? sorry i do not understand. For a newly released game SWTOR has plenty of content. Now if SWTOR would have release with no end game content or broken content like WAR and AOC i would worry about it.
How many servers SWTOR will launch with on release?
ShredderSE - Umm how many do they need? Maybe 6.
US, EU, Asian, France, German and Russian.
Subs will be so low there is no need for more
Snoocky-How many servers?
The first 3 months a lot...after that 2 i guess, one for PVE and 1 for PVP...
Thorbrand - SWTOR doesn't have longevity at all. Might be one of the shortest lived MMOs.
Millions of people will get to endgame too fast and then get bored of it.. unless of course Bioware are shit hot on releasing new content.. will have to wait and see i guess
Ahh ok;) well there is never enough content in any MMO for hardcore / power gamers. For those who can spend 10 hours a day playing games are never the target audience when companies churn out content updates. I read an article some time back regarding percentage of players who actually ever raided or did any of the end game content in WOW and results were shockingly low.
Casual players do not consume content that fast that is why i am not worried about the end game. Leveling alone in SWTOR is quite slow. people get wrong impressions during first 10 or so level but once you hit 30 it really slows down.
How many servers SWTOR will launch with on release?
ShredderSE - Umm how many do they need? Maybe 6.
US, EU, Asian, France, German and Russian.
Subs will be so low there is no need for more
Snoocky-How many servers?
The first 3 months a lot...after that 2 i guess, one for PVE and 1 for PVP...
Thorbrand - SWTOR doesn't have longevity at all. Might be one of the shortest lived MMOs.
Well, I think SWTOR's major flaw will be that it's too similar to other themepark games. This is only a flaw if you're already burnt out on WoW or something similar. The storytelling aspect in SWTOR will make playing through a few times pretty fun, but after that, will players really want to complete flashpoints, operations, and organized PvP in yet another game if they've been doing those activities for several years already?
I'm not saying I think this is a flaw for me personally, but I'm grasping for straws here to answer the OP's question.
When all is said and done, this is pretty much the correct answer to most issues people with have with TOR.
While this may be an issue, it is less of an issue for SWTOR than most MMO releases. Simply because the class quests are different, so playing different classes as an alt will offer a different leveling experience. As for the side quests that will be the same for all classes, you can instead play more warfronts or flashpoints instead of doing them. But it wouldn't hurt Bioware to create 4 different leveling path's per faction, so that each time you create a new class, you can have a completely fresh play through. However, despite being an altaholic, I'd prefer to see my characters story progress past the max level rather than have more options during the leveling experience. It's like my character is starring in its own book and further releases of class content would be like having a sequel to what released at launch.
Your analogy fails quite a bit. McDonalds and Tomo Sushi aren't even remotely same kind of restaurants. It's like you were comparing WoW with Battlefield.
If you were to get that special sauce you should go to Burger King to demand it.
When we look at the themepark MMOs created past 6 years, they all accomodate WoWish style (let's not talk about how WoW copied stuff and all). SW:TOR itself is a testimony about the standard status of WoW.
But you don't have to take my word for it. Greg says so:
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/World-of-Warcraft-SWTOR-Greg-Zeschuk-Mike-Morhaime-MMORPG,12174.html
QUOTE: "Thursday during the keynote panel at the DICE Summit in Las Vegas, BioWare's Greg Zeschuk admitted that Blizzard's World of Warcraft has established MMOG standards in which BioWare will follow with Star Wars: The Old Republic."
PWNED?
But to OP: Majority of the people will burn the content in the game fast and it will probably go down to where other MMOs have gone lately. Besides watching videoclips the game doesn't have much to do. Once they're seen or become repetitive only MMO-playing Star Wars fans (probably mostly the same folk that stuck with SWG because of the SW part) stay and pay.
The major flaw of any mmorpg is that it's a mmorpg.
Most people simply don't seek lifetime commitment with their games. Hell, most people don't seek it with their spouses! The was majority of people simply will not play the game for a year because it's unthinkable for them to play a game for a year. They have lives.
Just to reiterate, some of those planets you listed are the exact same level range.
We're not talking about Act 1 planets here, which atm are rather linear, with the exception that you also have the option of returning to planets you have been to for higher level bonus quests.
For example....one I've already used in fact....both Hoth and Quesh offer lvl 35+ quests.....the mobs are the same levels, the quests are the same levels.
While leveling on Taris (31+35-ish) you might decide to go back to Nar Shaddaa for the bonus quests (31-34). Entirely optional. At level 40, you could also, if you chose, go back to Alderaan for the bonus quests there, should you feel like fighting antmen until you're ready to scream.
Once again, this information will be public knowledge in a month or two, so I'll just let time take it from here.
I lolled, gorram Killicks (?sp). I hate them too.
Alderaan has improved now it has more taxis though. Back in the summer it was a real PITA to get around.
What exactly were you reading? He only called two of the mmo's on this list "bland", and he gave counter examples of the good points. His example of AOC was spot on, it was nowhere near completion. You can say that mmo's are never compete, but AOC didn't even manage the features they promised for release. It even said DX10 ready on the retail box, when in fact the release was not ready to add support to DX10 yet. People felt pretty ripped off.
Rift? I can't with certainty speak for that because I wasn't interested in it, but from what I have heard and the research I had done while it was making it's way up to release, and what people had to say about it months after release, I am inclined to agree with OP about rift.
Yes it is a content grind themepark thus when the content is grinded there is probably a pretty shallow end game. They can't keep ahead of the players with this kind of content generation. Still they can address these issues with the first expansion, but they probably won't and will continue to mold the game in the shadow of WoW.
Still it should be fun for a couple months right?
I'm going to be playing SW:TOR, and probably enjoy it greatly. But if it has to suffer from at least one major flaw, it will be the same flaw that causes people to leave any themepark mmo.
Being a themepark mmo.
if a MMO has end game people complain and when there is none people still complain. Gaming companies can just never win.
How many servers SWTOR will launch with on release?
ShredderSE - Umm how many do they need? Maybe 6.
US, EU, Asian, France, German and Russian.
Subs will be so low there is no need for more
Snoocky-How many servers?
The first 3 months a lot...after that 2 i guess, one for PVE and 1 for PVP...
Thorbrand - SWTOR doesn't have longevity at all. Might be one of the shortest lived MMOs.
Haha don't get me wrong. I like for there to be an end game, but with a theme park you kind of exhaust the entire world to arrive at a shallow end game that makes use of a tiny percent of the world along with instanced content. This type of game design appeals to millions obviously, but it just doesn't appeal to me. I will enjoy the ride as long as it is enjoyable for a gamer like me and then move along without making a deal about it.
Still if they want long term subs they will either:
a) Have to keep ahead of the curve with content to tack onto the end game, raise max level, and keep the linear gravy train rollnig, or
b) Add game systems similar to sandbox titles that enhance the game as a whole for all levels, add exploration, and add reasons for players to revisit past grinded areas to make use of the beautiful world their team crafted all while still adding content and story
I just don't see them applying option b, and in early interviews it appears they want to keep adding content and that will force them to tack it onto the end game because of their design philosophy. This style doesn't really appeal to me is all. Believe me though I will get my moneys worth.
That might have been my concern before I played it, but now that I have, I think if they followed WoW a bit more closely, it'd actually be an improvement - Now that I've played TOR a bit, what I see them doing is mostly just adding more and more story content. Some fans will argue that if they add enough, that should be plenty, but I think those players are a bit of a niche. Certainly most TOR players like some story, but I think a lot of them will get sick of it - waayyy before they've seen all of it. Which obviously means that adding more won't help.
Reminds me of Rift, and how they kept adding more raid content. Players who felt Rift lacked endgame didn't like raid content that much, so no matter how much of it they add with every update, of course it'd never be enough. but Rift fans (and the devs) will still point to it and say it has tons of endgame.
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.
Long term it will do fine, but it will need more than just story, or more instances of pvp, or raids.
They will need space combat,
larger explorable worlds,
worlds that have more utility with housing,
guilds that play a larger role than a group that raids with more sand box elements for example,
mini games,
social activities,
player created content with mini games for example.
Improved character customization
Dynamic events, or unique dailies created by devs/mods
Weather system more evident and dynamic
Abilties that interact with environment more, for example with the weather. If its raining maybe force lighting has a larger aoe
Day/night cycle. They should really get on this, its a big deal imo, even if its hard to implement, its better to have the illusion of day and night, or darker or brighter times of the day.
Smart AI. IF there is going to be a huge number of NPC make them aggro easily. However make certain mob easy to kill but in large numbers while others harder in smaller numbers. The change in combat and style makes things interesting.
Make jump more useful. It looks like there is no need for a jump or crouch. Make that integrated with the environment and possibly with abilties. However that might be too demanding for an mmo by turning it into an FPS.
Swimming, and underwater content
Make vehicles interesting to be more than just transport and play a role in open world pvp. Possibly pvp abilties can slow down vehicles, or stop them. Same abilties can be avioded by driver, this can create for some rping and organized races. However this requires a more fps style combat with active blocking or something similar.
Add more proffessions like music. Make music very complicated and high quality and thus allowing people to actualyl create high quality music worthy of listening on you tube. Great for advertising. Myabe a musical companion can do this?
Localize servers, expand to other areas with more service in the area.
Regional release, with subs. I am not really in need of this since English is the only language I speak, but it helps with sales of a product by being exclusive to peoples area and language.
In UO you could write books and give them to other people. Whe should be able to do the same in swtor! We can write some fan fiction or sell online guides through AH for game money instead of real money.
Write bad things that are done to you in sand, but write the good things that happen to you on a piece of marble