From what I have experienced so far, the main issue I had was the UI customisation. I hate side quickbars, I like 4 or 5 at the bottom and I like them rather small. I had to put side bars on to fit my skills, ally skills and quick items/buffs on and all of a sudden it's so crowded I can't see my character properly. The chat window is overlapping everything and I can only make it thinner not shorter which renders my massive monitor practically useless. The UI is oversized and bubbly, that only leaves me a box the size of my hand in the middle in which to actually experience the game world.
Even just the added fuction of resizing windows or the UI scale as a whole would bring it lightyears ahead.
Secondly, the character customisation. Although I was not completely dismayed by this I was slightly miffed that although there were a lot of options, most of them were so pig ugly or strange looking that I have trouble imagining that anyone would use them. I don't understand why companies spend so much time making different facial textures and haircuts and even helmet and clothing to some degree, when most is so bad looking I actually feel cruel to my character to think of using it. They could accomplish so much more with less useless presets and a couple of colour wheels.
The questing is too easy! everything is laid out for me!
The quest nodes are too confusing I can't find where to turn em in!
I wish they hadn't even added in space combat!
The space combat they added in sucks horribly!
I wish you could do a lot of features you could never do on any theme park game and I had unrealistic expectations and now I'm super disapointed and I blame Bioware.
Pretty much nailed it Mike. MIght have changed a few of those around in what I believe should be ordered of importance. (character creation and UI I think should be the highest on the list seeing as how you deal with those for the majority of your playtime, and even in the best case scenario, space combat is only a fraction of your total gameplay).
But I digress. Good work. Carry on.
Weird, I like the UI, only wish we could move the windows around.
That is what i mean, there really isn't much in the way of customization. I dislike the windows where they are... I also dislike the size of some windows, and after playing for as long as I have, I'm sick of the tutorial window being there, and the bars on the sides when I'd prefer extra bars on the bottom, or running the length of the screen instead of being masked by overlayed windows.
I think theres a lot of room for improvement with the UI, and as its what you deal with the most, I find the ability to change it a high priority.
A good point was made earlier about what exactly any of you would do with free roaming space flight.
So you're just gonna fly around in the vastness of space? Checking out cool looking planets? That gets really old really fast, just ask Eve.
I would rather them never spend another second on space combat and focus more on story.
Also this was an old beta build (this past weekend) circa Sept. Luckily many of the smaller issues have been fixed and there was a dev quote about opening up the UI API "very soon" after launch.
Currently Playing: GW2 Retired: Shadowbane, DAoC, WoW, FFXI, Eve Online, SWToR
I have played the weekend beta and I am realy disappointed by the character editor. There is theoreticaly enough choice, but the races share hair, heads, scars etc. which reduces the amount of good looking combinations, because in my opinion not all of them fit for all races. I mean for example most of the hair styles for the male Sith pureblood...
24/7 persistent world realm vs realm conflict is so minimal as to be insignifigant(yes I've heard words...NOT ACTIONS and gameplay that shows Bioware considers it important(rather I interpret the lack of this content in the same way as the child like instanced pvp...."lets stick some of this pvp stuff in the game to keep some criticism off our backs"....is how I interprt this critical deficiency
So I'm waiting for DOMINUS or GUILD WARS 2 or ARCHAGE etc
I have played the weekend beta and I am realy disappointed by the character editor. There is theoreticaly enough choice, but the races share hair, heads, scars etc. which reduces the amount of good looking combinations, because in my opinion not all of them fit for all races. I mean for example most of the hair styles for the male Sith pureblood...
Ha! I was SO tempted to get the thorniest looking pureblood and give him Beiber hair! ;P
I am a fanboi according ot most of u and even ive said the choices in character creation suck Especially body types. This was a sure thing on this list.
The ui not being able to be resized sucks a bit also. Although im so used to having my entier bottom of screen covered in action bars in wow it dont bother me as much since its all at the bottom of my screen if that ws at the top or middle it would drive me nuts.
i cant comment on space havent tried it yet. The sidequest issue hasnt popped up yet as im only a 15 on dromund kaas. I do the questss anyways just to see where the lead so not a big deal to me
I never said tor was perfect just that tor is the mos tfun i have ever had in an mmo .
I hear alot of complaints about textures i dont have any issue there but others have suprised that didnt make list.
Itemization i dont worry about at low levels. I only start tto worry at max level and thats because they put gates on there content at end game so i have to farm gear.
I havent made my guy anything to use by crafting or even treid ah i think that may change the options a bit as they stated crafting gives u the most variety as u level and really in beta the ah and craftign for yourself is where ud find that.
The only not so great thing about SWTOR for me is the fact that I can't preorder anymore. Fortunatly for me I'm not a game critic so I don't notice/am not bothered by small things like those on the list.
Oh, and about that space combat thing... Am I the only one that got the 'false impression' it will be a minigame just for fun when BW announced it? I saw many people complaining like they have expected EVE or something...
There are alot of abilities that are the same but have different names for differnt classes, so much like character creation, characters also have a similar look and feel
bosses are on timers and anyone can engage with them. This will be a huge problem at release with dumb ass kids griefing and killing them so others cant get the update
quest rewards are inferior to the gear you are already wearing for that level (majority of them are, every now and then you get an upgrade, but its noticeable at the lower levels.
the voice overs for quests are great at first, but really got old after a few hours.
pvp warzones have 10's with 19's in them, which sucked when wow was like that and still does. hopefully they go with the 10-14, 15-19, 20-24 ect.. system wow went to.
I have my fair share of issues with SW:ToR as much as anyone, but I still can't understand why someone would go into a BioWare game expecting great, balanced pvp?
ToR is a single player RPG in a mmo space. I expect questing and storylines to be great. I expect crafting and pvp to be the equivelant of mini-games at release.
Pvp for me exceeded my expectations, it was fun and a good time killer. Of course though it's nothing compared to DAoC or WAR - but then again why should it be?
Btw the pvp warzones has every level in it, not jsut a level range. When you enter you get the 'bloster' buff which brings your stats inline with everyone else. On my level 18 Smuggler this weekend I was consistantly in the top 5 in damage and kills, even against a few level 25+.
Currently Playing: GW2 Retired: Shadowbane, DAoC, WoW, FFXI, Eve Online, SWToR
Why on earth would I worry about character customization when I'm going to be staring at the back of my freaking characters head from day 1?
So what if I can change the cheekbones or nose length or whatever, I'm not going to see it on a constant basis, if at all, I know some players enjoy messing around with thier characters look, but for me I just press "Random Body/Look" and hope for the best, if I end up with a Danny Devito look then so be it.
Sidequests! until I read this I didn't realise that some ppl thought of them as a nuisance, I've been so engrossed in the game that it never occured to me that there where even such things as sidequests, guess I'm that immersed in the game that this one has just gone completely over my head.
I'l agree with you on the UI, but then again once I've gotten used to it I'm not one that likes to use mods to change it, it throws my gameplay out of whack, so I'm happy with whats on offer, it isn't as bad as alot of other games and I find it still very useful.
Well as far as space combat goes, I hated Elite, I hated EVE and I've disliked every space simulator thats ever been produced, If I wanted to fly spaceships around and shoot other spaceships I would have tried harder at EVE, even the minigame is too much space combat for me, I've gome to SWTOR to be an evil sith lord who wants to crush the rebel scum under my boots, and I'd prefer to do it on the ground thankyou very much.
U realize classes are mirrors. Sith warrior , jedi knight, are mirrors although they have some diffrent acting and animatied abilites, Counselor, inquisitor mirrors , inquistior gets lighnight counselor gets telekenetic abilities, So they look and feel iffrent,
Ia , smuggler are mirrors. Again they have alot of same style abilites but also some that are unique.
Troooper and bh are mirrors and agina some same some unique abilities. That said we knew this for what 1 yr or more
I like the list, it would be real similar to my own.
The part that bothers me most is the customization, I really like to get in-depth with it when possible. The other thing that really bothered me but I could get past it was the UI. I really am used to the old standard chatbox on bottom left, I moved it there and it was fine till I grouped with anyone, haha. So I actually ended up with my chatbox sorta mid-left side of screen, it worked I guess. But being able to fully modify the UI will be nice if they put that in. Also being able to change the color scheme. The actua l design/look of the UI though I loved
Why on earth would I worry about character customization when I'm going to be staring at the back of my freaking characters head from day 1?
In SWTOR you see your char a lot more then in other MMOs. Did you play it? Its like mass effect you will see him/her all the time when you answer dialogs, which is almost during every quest.
I'm a bit of a long term Star Wars fanboi. (I even stuck up for Jar Jar for years) So there is nothing in that list that really screams at me to not get this game. It seems from the stuff I've read that the game won't be the masterpiece that I was originally hoping for, but it still looks like a pretty amazing game. Overall, it seems the good outweighs the bad, but I won't know for sure until I dive in and see if it can hook me.
UI - is just working fine and i hate to be forced to play the UI game instead of THE GAME game. Im am perfectly fine with a good functional non customizable UI.
Avatar appearance - avaerage good,
"Torquemada... do not implore him for compassion. Torquemada... do not beg him for forgiveness. Torquemada... do not ask him for mercy. Let's face it, you can't Torquemada anything!"
Why on earth would I worry about character customization when I'm going to be staring at the back of my freaking characters head from day 1?
In SWTOR you see your char a lot more then in other MMOs. Did you play it? Its like mass effect you will see him/her all the time when you answer dialogs, which is almost during every quest.
I agree completely. It would be different if it were RIFT, where you do see the back of your characters head for 99% of your journey, but here you're avatar is constantly used in cut scenes and it would have been nice if they had added a bit more feature to the face.
Seriously though, yeah, some 2+ heroic's can be soloed if you work at it, but to suggest that none of 'em do, you'd be fairly seriously mistaken, unless of course you significantly overlevel them.
UI - is just working fine and i hate to be forced to play the UI game instead of THE GAME game.
Unbelievably naive statement. Nobody has ever forced you to install a UI to play a game, unless you gave in and installed it.
I've had this discussion in so many threads about standard UIs vs custom UIs. Custom UIs bring so much to the game they don't have any problem overshadowing the perceived negatives. The UIs that everyone is fine with today wouldn't be at this state without player-developers creating custom UIs.
Everyone wants bread but doesn't want to allow the doubh to rise before baking it.
Like your list, but have to swap it around some for me.
5. Side Quests
Pretty self explanatory here. This would probably make most people's list of any MMO.
4. Space Combat
This quite honestly feels like I'm playing Black Prophecy. With the controls and similar stuff, but atleast in Black Prophecy I can mod my ship out.
The reason I drop this down so far compared to OP's list is. Why I would've liked this to be more exciting or in-depth. Not once did I ever say I was going to buy this game cause of space combat. Nor will it be the reason to make me not buy it.
3. Itemization
Moved this up for one good reason. If you can craft mods, enhancements, stimulants, blasters, knives or even lawn darts. If you have very limited availability to stick all these shiny's somewhere then what is the point? Agree with OP, needs to happen a little sooner.
2. UI
Why the overall look of the UI is far from hideous, the sheer lack of customizing it is atrocious. UI is a major factor in all games. So I think this needs attention sooner then later.
Biggest thing with me is, you can only have two windows open at a time. Very inconvenient when it comes to crafting. Trying to compare what you can craft, to what you have equipped.
1. Character Creation
Simply put in today's times, and in this game! Who doesn't want to look badass? Not saying all choices are horrible, but your choices are so limited.
I simply moved this to one over the OP's space combat for the reason above and this.
This game has never been marketed like EVE, or for that matter a "space simulation" But, I will say had this been called Star Wars: Ships of the old Republic, I would be highly, highly disappointed!
Overall my pro's far out weigh my con's. So see you all on the 20th!
Comments
From what I have experienced so far, the main issue I had was the UI customisation. I hate side quickbars, I like 4 or 5 at the bottom and I like them rather small. I had to put side bars on to fit my skills, ally skills and quick items/buffs on and all of a sudden it's so crowded I can't see my character properly. The chat window is overlapping everything and I can only make it thinner not shorter which renders my massive monitor practically useless. The UI is oversized and bubbly, that only leaves me a box the size of my hand in the middle in which to actually experience the game world.
Even just the added fuction of resizing windows or the UI scale as a whole would bring it lightyears ahead.
Secondly, the character customisation. Although I was not completely dismayed by this I was slightly miffed that although there were a lot of options, most of them were so pig ugly or strange looking that I have trouble imagining that anyone would use them. I don't understand why companies spend so much time making different facial textures and haircuts and even helmet and clothing to some degree, when most is so bad looking I actually feel cruel to my character to think of using it. They could accomplish so much more with less useless presets and a couple of colour wheels.
People always find something to complain about.
The questing is too easy! everything is laid out for me!
The quest nodes are too confusing I can't find where to turn em in!
I wish they hadn't even added in space combat!
The space combat they added in sucks horribly!
I wish you could do a lot of features you could never do on any theme park game and I had unrealistic expectations and now I'm super disapointed and I blame Bioware.
(this is examples of what I see)
That is what i mean, there really isn't much in the way of customization. I dislike the windows where they are... I also dislike the size of some windows, and after playing for as long as I have, I'm sick of the tutorial window being there, and the bars on the sides when I'd prefer extra bars on the bottom, or running the length of the screen instead of being masked by overlayed windows.
I think theres a lot of room for improvement with the UI, and as its what you deal with the most, I find the ability to change it a high priority.
A good point was made earlier about what exactly any of you would do with free roaming space flight.
So you're just gonna fly around in the vastness of space? Checking out cool looking planets? That gets really old really fast, just ask Eve.
I would rather them never spend another second on space combat and focus more on story.
Also this was an old beta build (this past weekend) circa Sept. Luckily many of the smaller issues have been fixed and there was a dev quote about opening up the UI API "very soon" after launch.
Currently Playing: GW2
Retired: Shadowbane, DAoC, WoW, FFXI, Eve Online, SWToR
The Aphelion MMO Blog - GW2 Initial Impressions
May be true, but it's the best MMORPG to come out in years, and I've played all the major ones.
I have played the weekend beta and I am realy disappointed by the character editor. There is theoreticaly enough choice, but the races share hair, heads, scars etc. which reduces the amount of good looking combinations, because in my opinion not all of them fit for all races. I mean for example most of the hair styles for the male Sith pureblood...
FOR ME
The deal breaker (no I'm not buying the game)
24/7 persistent world realm vs realm conflict is so minimal as to be insignifigant(yes I've heard words...NOT ACTIONS and gameplay that shows Bioware considers it important(rather I interpret the lack of this content in the same way as the child like instanced pvp...."lets stick some of this pvp stuff in the game to keep some criticism off our backs"....is how I interprt this critical deficiency
So I'm waiting for DOMINUS or GUILD WARS 2 or ARCHAGE etc
Ha! I was SO tempted to get the thorniest looking pureblood and give him Beiber hair! ;P
I am a fanboi according ot most of u and even ive said the choices in character creation suck Especially body types. This was a sure thing on this list.
The ui not being able to be resized sucks a bit also. Although im so used to having my entier bottom of screen covered in action bars in wow it dont bother me as much since its all at the bottom of my screen if that ws at the top or middle it would drive me nuts.
i cant comment on space havent tried it yet. The sidequest issue hasnt popped up yet as im only a 15 on dromund kaas. I do the questss anyways just to see where the lead so not a big deal to me
I never said tor was perfect just that tor is the mos tfun i have ever had in an mmo .
I hear alot of complaints about textures i dont have any issue there but others have suprised that didnt make list.
Itemization i dont worry about at low levels. I only start tto worry at max level and thats because they put gates on there content at end game so i have to farm gear.
I havent made my guy anything to use by crafting or even treid ah i think that may change the options a bit as they stated crafting gives u the most variety as u level and really in beta the ah and craftign for yourself is where ud find that.
The only not so great thing about SWTOR for me is the fact that I can't preorder anymore. Fortunatly for me I'm not a game critic so I don't notice/am not bothered by small things like those on the list.
Oh, and about that space combat thing... Am I the only one that got the 'false impression' it will be a minigame just for fun when BW announced it? I saw many people complaining like they have expected EVE or something...
Some of the things i did not like:
There are alot of abilities that are the same but have different names for differnt classes, so much like character creation, characters also have a similar look and feel
bosses are on timers and anyone can engage with them. This will be a huge problem at release with dumb ass kids griefing and killing them so others cant get the update
quest rewards are inferior to the gear you are already wearing for that level (majority of them are, every now and then you get an upgrade, but its noticeable at the lower levels.
the voice overs for quests are great at first, but really got old after a few hours.
pvp warzones have 10's with 19's in them, which sucked when wow was like that and still does. hopefully they go with the 10-14, 15-19, 20-24 ect.. system wow went to.
I have my fair share of issues with SW:ToR as much as anyone, but I still can't understand why someone would go into a BioWare game expecting great, balanced pvp?
ToR is a single player RPG in a mmo space. I expect questing and storylines to be great. I expect crafting and pvp to be the equivelant of mini-games at release.
Pvp for me exceeded my expectations, it was fun and a good time killer. Of course though it's nothing compared to DAoC or WAR - but then again why should it be?
Btw the pvp warzones has every level in it, not jsut a level range. When you enter you get the 'bloster' buff which brings your stats inline with everyone else. On my level 18 Smuggler this weekend I was consistantly in the top 5 in damage and kills, even against a few level 25+.
Currently Playing: GW2
Retired: Shadowbane, DAoC, WoW, FFXI, Eve Online, SWToR
The Aphelion MMO Blog - GW2 Initial Impressions
Yeah, this list is well put together. Character creation and UI (especially target of target) need improvement. I still find the game to be fun thou.
Why on earth would I worry about character customization when I'm going to be staring at the back of my freaking characters head from day 1?
So what if I can change the cheekbones or nose length or whatever, I'm not going to see it on a constant basis, if at all, I know some players enjoy messing around with thier characters look, but for me I just press "Random Body/Look" and hope for the best, if I end up with a Danny Devito look then so be it.
Sidequests! until I read this I didn't realise that some ppl thought of them as a nuisance, I've been so engrossed in the game that it never occured to me that there where even such things as sidequests, guess I'm that immersed in the game that this one has just gone completely over my head.
I'l agree with you on the UI, but then again once I've gotten used to it I'm not one that likes to use mods to change it, it throws my gameplay out of whack, so I'm happy with whats on offer, it isn't as bad as alot of other games and I find it still very useful.
Well as far as space combat goes, I hated Elite, I hated EVE and I've disliked every space simulator thats ever been produced, If I wanted to fly spaceships around and shoot other spaceships I would have tried harder at EVE, even the minigame is too much space combat for me, I've gome to SWTOR to be an evil sith lord who wants to crush the rebel scum under my boots, and I'd prefer to do it on the ground thankyou very much.
U realize classes are mirrors. Sith warrior , jedi knight, are mirrors although they have some diffrent acting and animatied abilites, Counselor, inquisitor mirrors , inquistior gets lighnight counselor gets telekenetic abilities, So they look and feel iffrent,
Ia , smuggler are mirrors. Again they have alot of same style abilites but also some that are unique.
Troooper and bh are mirrors and agina some same some unique abilities. That said we knew this for what 1 yr or more
i dont understand the problem?
Im beginning to think that the MMO industry is becomining a scam
I like the list, it would be real similar to my own.
The part that bothers me most is the customization, I really like to get in-depth with it when possible. The other thing that really bothered me but I could get past it was the UI. I really am used to the old standard chatbox on bottom left, I moved it there and it was fine till I grouped with anyone, haha. So I actually ended up with my chatbox sorta mid-left side of screen, it worked I guess. But being able to fully modify the UI will be nice if they put that in. Also being able to change the color scheme. The actua l design/look of the UI though I loved
In SWTOR you see your char a lot more then in other MMOs. Did you play it? Its like mass effect you will see him/her all the time when you answer dialogs, which is almost during every quest.
It's not really a scam, but it is the best way to stop piracy. Someone may eventually make an emu, but that is years away.
I'm a bit of a long term Star Wars fanboi. (I even stuck up for Jar Jar for years) So there is nothing in that list that really screams at me to not get this game. It seems from the stuff I've read that the game won't be the masterpiece that I was originally hoping for, but it still looks like a pretty amazing game. Overall, it seems the good outweighs the bad, but I won't know for sure until I dive in and see if it can hook me.
UI - is just working fine and i hate to be forced to play the UI game instead of THE GAME game.
Im am perfectly fine with a good functional non customizable UI.
Avatar appearance - avaerage good,
"Torquemada... do not implore him for compassion. Torquemada... do not beg him for forgiveness. Torquemada... do not ask him for mercy. Let's face it, you can't Torquemada anything!"
MWO Music Video - What does the Mech say: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FF6HYNqCDLI
Johnny Cash - The Man Comes Around: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0x2iwK0BKM
I agree completely. It would be different if it were RIFT, where you do see the back of your characters head for 99% of your journey, but here you're avatar is constantly used in cut scenes and it would have been nice if they had added a bit more feature to the face.
Don't mean to be a grammar nazi, but....
Unbelievably naive statement. Nobody has ever forced you to install a UI to play a game, unless you gave in and installed it.
I've had this discussion in so many threads about standard UIs vs custom UIs. Custom UIs bring so much to the game they don't have any problem overshadowing the perceived negatives. The UIs that everyone is fine with today wouldn't be at this state without player-developers creating custom UIs.
Everyone wants bread but doesn't want to allow the doubh to rise before baking it.
Like your list, but have to swap it around some for me.
5. Side Quests
Pretty self explanatory here. This would probably make most people's list of any MMO.
4. Space Combat
This quite honestly feels like I'm playing Black Prophecy. With the controls and similar stuff, but atleast in Black Prophecy I can mod my ship out.
The reason I drop this down so far compared to OP's list is. Why I would've liked this to be more exciting or in-depth. Not once did I ever say I was going to buy this game cause of space combat. Nor will it be the reason to make me not buy it.
3. Itemization
Moved this up for one good reason. If you can craft mods, enhancements, stimulants, blasters, knives or even lawn darts. If you have very limited availability to stick all these shiny's somewhere then what is the point? Agree with OP, needs to happen a little sooner.
2. UI
Why the overall look of the UI is far from hideous, the sheer lack of customizing it is atrocious. UI is a major factor in all games. So I think this needs attention sooner then later.
Biggest thing with me is, you can only have two windows open at a time. Very inconvenient when it comes to crafting. Trying to compare what you can craft, to what you have equipped.
1. Character Creation
Simply put in today's times, and in this game! Who doesn't want to look badass? Not saying all choices are horrible, but your choices are so limited.
I simply moved this to one over the OP's space combat for the reason above and this.
This game has never been marketed like EVE, or for that matter a "space simulation" But, I will say had this been called Star Wars: Ships of the old Republic, I would be highly, highly disappointed!
Overall my pro's far out weigh my con's. So see you all on the 20th!