but the co-founders of BioWare certainly made out well in the deal.
Look at it this way... EA buys up all the competition. Then who cares if their games suck? EA just passes the blame ot the aquired company.
I don't think anyone buys that though .
Really guys! It wasn't us, it was Bioware! It's not like we rebranded 6 of our crappy studios as "Bioware" and then mysteriously Bioware games started to suck.
I thought Bioware started going downhill during the later stages of DA:O's development. To me there was a noticeable shift from "Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Here's what we're thinking..." to "Trust us, you don't want that. Our way makes for a better game. If you don't stop complaining we're going to shut you up." Woo and Gaider were particularly guilty of this IMO, and they were part of the "old guard" at Bioware, so to me it wasn't just an EA thing. Thankfully DA:O was far enough along that it retained some of the "old Bioware" in it, but to me subsequent efforts have been marred by the shift in attitude.
With respect to TOR specifically, I think the things that Bioware has typically been regarded as good at were done fairly well in the game, and all the rest was sort of the bare minimum of what would be needed to be a functional MMO. That's not something that suprised me. It's the overwhelming feeling that they don't want me around ruining their game because I'd like to see features that I found fun in other MMOs added to TOR ... because, you know, they know better than me what I want in my games.
No change for me. Everything other than SWTOR has been great, which I put down to LA
Will have to see after ME3, but is not getting off to a great start as EA have pulled all Mass Effect 3 games from the GAME group. The GAME group were the only ones stocking the Collectors edition in the UK, and now have switched retailers in 1 day, resulting in people thinking they had their copies secured, and now lost, like myself, as all retailers became out of stock within 6 hours.
Doing this at this stage, being close to release, is just stupid.
I hope Bioware can go solo again and extract themselves from EA. I am definately not buying any more EA games after this. This is the final straw
EAs business ethics show they do not care for their customers.
Cmon you gotta be fair......a number of publishers have pulled their stuff from Game. The company is flat out on hard times, and you have to be able to pay for your inventory.
I realize it sucks for the gamers, but this is on Game(been reading about it on Joystiq.com)
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
My interest in Bioware as a great game making company started with KOTOR and vastly improved with Mass Effect 1. When I tried Dragon Age 1 I found the story telling bland and down right boring at times. Mass Effect 2 butchered the Mass Effect series in my opinion. You spent way too much time hunting down uninteresting companions only to find out later they wouldn't be in the 3rd one. Horrible! The 3rd Mass Effect, I don't even need to say anything other than EA (AKA SOE 2.0).
I was really sceptical of the idea of TOR when I first heard it was being developed; but, the more I read about it, the more interested I became; up until I was invited into beat for several months. Actually I lost interest in the game after 2 months of playing in Beta. I saw the way the developers were handling the massive amount of problems with the game and it raised a huge number of red flags for me. After being a part of the MMO community for well over a decade, you know what traits to look for in a game that will succeed and Bioware was not giving me any confidence at all, especially when they got busted lying numerous times to the community. This company has grown to be just another shady hand of an already corrupt business that's grown too big for it's own good.
I probably won't be buying anymore Bioware/EA products anymore. I began my boycott of SOE long ago; so, I know I have the dicipline to not cave in and buy cheap entertainment. I'd rather waste my money on gardening supplies or women.
I dont know if I would say they suck at MMOs, but they arent rocket scientists either when it comes to them. Had they grabbed some extra depth from EQ in how to make worlds seem alive, then a ton of the complaints wouldnt of been there. Thinking they could make a great PVE game, and balance it with PVP is just self defeating IMO. Cater to one or the other, cause you will never keep both groups content.
I wish they had stayed in the single player arena. MP on ME3 is a direct influence of EA IMO, and not something I purchase BW games for.
That said, I still play TOR here n there.....as a single player game, which is all I am interested in playing these days.
ME3 flat out was a blast to play thru. About half way thru my second play thru currently. I read it takes about 15 play thrus of MP to max out readiness which is something I will have to do eventually. Think I have 45 of 52 acheivements currently. I would imagine the Insanity play thru will be the toughest of the 3 games.
Overall I still like Bioware, and they are still my favorite game producer. That said, if for some reason the folks all quit, and started a new company free of EA, I sure wouldnt be complaining.
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
My interest in Bioware as a great game making company started with KOTOR and vastly improved with Mass Effect 1. When I tried Dragon Age 1 I found the story telling bland and down right boring at times. Mass Effect 2 butchered the Mass Effect series in my opinion. You spent way too much time hunting down uninteresting companions only to find out later they wouldn't be in the 3rd one. Horrible! The 3rd Mass Effect, I don't even need to say anything other than EA (AKA SOE 2.0).
I was really sceptical of the idea of TOR when I first heard it was being developed; but, the more I read about it, the more interested I became; up until I was invited into beat for several months. Actually I lost interest in the game after 2 months of playing in Beta. I saw the way the developers were handling the massive amount of problems with the game and it raised a huge number of red flags for me. After being a part of the MMO community for well over a decade, you know what traits to look for in a game that will succeed and Bioware was not giving me any confidence at all, especially when they got busted lying numerous times to the community. This company has grown to be just another shady hand of an already corrupt business that's grown too big for it's own good.
I probably won't be buying anymore Bioware/EA products anymore. I began my boycott of SOE long ago; so, I know I have the dicipline to not cave in and buy cheap entertainment. I'd rather waste my money on gardening supplies or women.
SO you are growing some Gonza weed to share with your mini Hareem?
I suggest you add this idea on the main boards. I still enjoy gaming these days, but damn if I didnt, I would be asking you for pointers.
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
After DA2, SWTOR, and ME3. Bioware has lowered their product each step of the way. They were my favorite company, now you wont ever see me buy another game from them again.
same as always. everyone messes up so i don't see why so many haters!!! then again we'll see the same thing happen when GW2 and Tera is released. Haters will hate, fanboys will defend and I'll enjoy watching both sides go at it
Hmmm.... NWN OC was lame. NWN :SoU was lame. Jade Empire was good, but short. ME1 wasn't good as a wall-shooter, crappy in mechanics but at least had some role-play. ME2 was 'resource gathering in space, plus Space Junior High School Counselor, plus a big bang at the end which was the only thing that saved it as far as I'm concerned. KOTOR was okay, lame romances and too much area-running-padding was a negative that destroyed what would have been an "A" title. Same with DA:O.
So, since BG & BGII, I've only truly liked ONE of their games -- NWN:HotU -- to play through multiple times for the sake of enjoyment. With another five being ok, but flawed for certain tedious features that have become more-and-more prevalent over time. And were, as games, ultimately over-rated because of the bandwagon effect BioWare games enjoy.
Then comes: DA2, SWTOR and now there's a huge back-lash on ME3. Even many people I thought were lifer-BioDrones have dropped their stripes and are now disconsolate due to 'BioWare's fall.'
See, this is the OTHER SIDE of the bandwagon effect. You can cruise on your reputation for a long time. Just keep mailing it in with gimmicks and shallow plots, but lots of 'special effects' and hype.... Sure, you'll get by for quite some time. But every time you do, you lose some of your audience.
Do it enough times in a row and the trickle becomes an avalanche. And you reap the storm of contempt that you sow when you substitute BS for quality game play.
After DA2, SWTOR, and ME3. Bioware has lowered their product each step of the way. They were my favorite company, now you wont ever see me buy another game from them again.
Bargain bin. I've been buying their games bargain bin. I got ME1 for $3 on Amazon digital super-sale a few weeks ago. Another $15 for ME2 six months ago.
(Yes, I played them out of order, I saw my daughter play ME1 and she was pretty much revolted and didn't finish it. If a friend hadn't talked her into ME2, neither of us would have touched the franchise.)
After DA2, SWTOR, and ME3. Bioware has lowered their product each step of the way. They were my favorite company, now you wont ever see me buy another game from them again.
Bargain bin. I've been buying their games bargain bin. I got ME1 for $3 on Amazon digital super-sale a few weeks ago. Another $15 for ME2 six months ago.
(Yes, I played them out of order, I saw my daughter play ME1 and she was pretty much revolted and didn't finish it. If a friend hadn't talked her into ME2, neither of us would have touched the franchise.)
So you bitch about BW products, and yet you are still spending money on them.
The price paid is irrelevent.....the fact you keep going back says everything. If I dont like a title, I sure as hell wont spend my time running them down. Worse, I wont keep supporting their products.
Simply shaking my head at you.
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
My first experience with Bioware was KOTOR. I also played Dragon Age 1 & 2, and Mass Effect. I thought DA 1 and ME1 were some decent games, but DA2 was when my opinion of Bioware changed for the worse. I chalked it up to a one time creation of a bad game, but ME2 was dumbed down, albeit still fun.
With SWTOR, I don't think the Bioware we knew when KOTOR released is still around. It seems they're more interested in maximizing profits than creating unique and great games. Making a fully voiced MMORPG with light/dark/neutral alignment choices is cutting edge, which is no different than what they did with KOTOR, but with KOTOR I didn't feel like I was getting milked for money. Same can be said with the downloadable content for their other games. I remember when you paid for a game and you got the full game (ie. everything developed for that game) with the box. Now the games are much shorter, has less depth, and you have downloadable content available on day 1, which means it could have been included in the box.
I haven't beat ME2 yet, and I'm not sure I ever will, which means ME3 will likely never be played by me. I'll also probably not ever buy a Bioware product again. I'm just sick of more of the same from game developers. I want developers to push the boundaries of the genre's they make games for. Add new features to their new games, not take features away. Add more content with new games, not less and then let you buy additional content.
What's funny is that I just started playing LoL a couple weeks ago and I've had more fun playing that game on a daily basis than I have any other game in a long time. Weird, especially when you play through the same 3 maps all the time.
There is no bioware anymore. Sad fact of life, but true nonetheless. Its now Electronic Arts. For better or in this case, for worse, EA calls the shots. It was evident in the pre-christmas release of a game that easily could have used another 6 months of polish.
Its evident in the push for DLC in their single player games now. Quarterly reporting is now the driver of everything that happends.
Actually Iam a big or maybe was a fan of Bioware games, this was the reason I did try out Swtor.
At the end Swtor was just a mediocre mmorpg and overhyped.
But it comes even worse, Mass Effect 3 is another fail and this leads really to rethink about Bioware/EA and future releases. Btw Mass Effect 3 got 3.2/10 on Metacritic.com with 1600 reviews, often from players who were big fans of ME1 and ME2. Without talking much about the redicioulos DLC method.
First releasing Dragon Age 2 which was a let down, swtor and now ME3....their quality goes down the drain.
I have been fan of Bioware since their first games and really loved DA:O and I was extremely disappointed with DA2, ME3 was great except for the ending but I can give their artistic freedom.
SWTOR as a single-player experience was the best mmo leveling experience, but the pvp which I was waiting for was just a big flop and that the story just ends with no interaction from your companions at all after you hit 50.
This is Bioware's first attempt at an MMO game, on the pve aspect they've done a good job, on the pvp side... not so great, bad idea to hire a dev team that nearly destroyed Warhammer online's pvp. If they plan on making a Mass Effect MMO game, they should take notes with what's happening with SWTOR and learn from them, I know SOE doesn't do this because they refuse to learn anything and repeat their stupidity over and over (or probably thinks people are dumb).
I like Star Wars, I like sci-fi games, and the fact that there's so few sci-fi MMO's... the choice is silm and I want to like this game but after getting 2 level 50's, my patience is running thin. Well, Planetside 2 is on the horizon although I'm on the fence about it due to it being developed and hosted by SOE which are responsible for compromising my account (and CC) last spring.
id like to point out they are fixing pvp, Open world pvp is still broken on illum but they are working on that and in 1.2 update making it so warzones will be the go to pvp
say what u will about ea and bioware and most of u do but u cant fault there handling of bugs, They work hard to squash them as fast as they can and they make changes to adress player concerns like end game crafting
for all tors pvp faults warzones are actually fun, i dont have any hitch issues in them , and while pvp isnt perfect, its fun at least in warzones and after 1.2 alot of the concerns with how long it takes to get to battle master or wahtever top rank is are being adressed
Bioware for all the hate on this thread made a very fun engaging game for me at least and for at least a million others, who still play.
Bioware RAPED the Star Wars franchise into oblivion. Their game is a complete failure.
I would not go that far but for an MMOG it is certainly a dissapointment. As a single player RPG I would say it is alright, even good, but problem is that it is not a single player RPG.
What made it really bad for me is the condascending remarks they made about SWG and how they dont want to have players playing a moisture farmer, like that is all SWG was about. Say what you want about SWG but as an MMOG it was vastly, vastly superior to SW:TOR.
Space combat, how they handled Jedi's (not everyone could be a Jedi from the get go) was simply so much better than this space on rails tripe and everyone, and their uncle and their dog, can be a Jedi. More over the lifeless world of SW:TOR cant hold a candle to SWGs rich and open ended world. Contrary to what mmorpg.com thinks, voice acting alone does not make a rich and vibrant world.
I could give a rat's ass about Bioware. What i'm more concerned with is the SW IP that i love. I can understand the difference between TOR's and SWG timeline. SWG had really no jedi and the old republic had many, cool, not a problem. Where i think Bioware screwed up is trying to shoebox the very huge and deep SW galaxy, instead of opening it up and letting it breath like SWG did.
If Bioware would have followed the SWG pre-cu model instead of the WOW one and added in their story/ VO and cutscenes for your character's personal story only, i really believe they would have had a solid mmorpg.
The biggest gripe i see is that, people are tired of the same old stuff they have been doing since WOW came out. The gear grind and dungeon crawling thing has gotten old and honestly, no one can do it better than WOW, so why copy it. Add in all the other standard systems that they left out and are going back and putting in because of the bitching that's going on and you can see that Bioware took the wrong approach from the get go.
Really after KOTOR 2 they went down a path and through merging with EA it just became a rehash with no creativitiy. A manufacturing line of a successful formula with no passion.
Comments
I don't think anyone buys that though
.
Really guys! It wasn't us, it was Bioware! It's not like we rebranded 6 of our crappy studios as "Bioware" and then mysteriously Bioware games started to suck.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
as a single player dev ... .rocks
as an MMO dev .................sucks
I thought Bioware started going downhill during the later stages of DA:O's development. To me there was a noticeable shift from "Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Here's what we're thinking..." to "Trust us, you don't want that. Our way makes for a better game. If you don't stop complaining we're going to shut you up." Woo and Gaider were particularly guilty of this IMO, and they were part of the "old guard" at Bioware, so to me it wasn't just an EA thing. Thankfully DA:O was far enough along that it retained some of the "old Bioware" in it, but to me subsequent efforts have been marred by the shift in attitude.
With respect to TOR specifically, I think the things that Bioware has typically been regarded as good at were done fairly well in the game, and all the rest was sort of the bare minimum of what would be needed to be a functional MMO. That's not something that suprised me. It's the overwhelming feeling that they don't want me around ruining their game because I'd like to see features that I found fun in other MMOs added to TOR ... because, you know, they know better than me what I want in my games.
Cmon you gotta be fair......a number of publishers have pulled their stuff from Game. The company is flat out on hard times, and you have to be able to pay for your inventory.
I realize it sucks for the gamers, but this is on Game(been reading about it on Joystiq.com)
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
My interest in Bioware as a great game making company started with KOTOR and vastly improved with Mass Effect 1. When I tried Dragon Age 1 I found the story telling bland and down right boring at times. Mass Effect 2 butchered the Mass Effect series in my opinion. You spent way too much time hunting down uninteresting companions only to find out later they wouldn't be in the 3rd one. Horrible! The 3rd Mass Effect, I don't even need to say anything other than EA (AKA SOE 2.0).
I was really sceptical of the idea of TOR when I first heard it was being developed; but, the more I read about it, the more interested I became; up until I was invited into beat for several months. Actually I lost interest in the game after 2 months of playing in Beta. I saw the way the developers were handling the massive amount of problems with the game and it raised a huge number of red flags for me. After being a part of the MMO community for well over a decade, you know what traits to look for in a game that will succeed and Bioware was not giving me any confidence at all, especially when they got busted lying numerous times to the community. This company has grown to be just another shady hand of an already corrupt business that's grown too big for it's own good.
I probably won't be buying anymore Bioware/EA products anymore. I began my boycott of SOE long ago; so, I know I have the dicipline to not cave in and buy cheap entertainment. I'd rather waste my money on gardening supplies or women.
I dont know if I would say they suck at MMOs, but they arent rocket scientists either when it comes to them. Had they grabbed some extra depth from EQ in how to make worlds seem alive, then a ton of the complaints wouldnt of been there. Thinking they could make a great PVE game, and balance it with PVP is just self defeating IMO. Cater to one or the other, cause you will never keep both groups content.
I wish they had stayed in the single player arena. MP on ME3 is a direct influence of EA IMO, and not something I purchase BW games for.
That said, I still play TOR here n there.....as a single player game, which is all I am interested in playing these days.
ME3 flat out was a blast to play thru. About half way thru my second play thru currently. I read it takes about 15 play thrus of MP to max out readiness which is something I will have to do eventually. Think I have 45 of 52 acheivements currently. I would imagine the Insanity play thru will be the toughest of the 3 games.
Overall I still like Bioware, and they are still my favorite game producer. That said, if for some reason the folks all quit, and started a new company free of EA, I sure wouldnt be complaining.
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
SO you are growing some Gonza weed to share with your mini Hareem?
I suggest you add this idea on the main boards. I still enjoy gaming these days, but damn if I didnt, I would be asking you for pointers.
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
You should see it now after ME3... There are a LOT of ticked off fans...
There is no Bioware anymore, but only EA. SWTOR does nothing to change this.
After DA2, SWTOR, and ME3. Bioware has lowered their product each step of the way. They were my favorite company, now you wont ever see me buy another game from them again.
I vote "No, not really"
My view of BioWare hasn't been that great for years. Not since BG2.
Hmmm.... NWN OC was lame. NWN :SoU was lame. Jade Empire was good, but short. ME1 wasn't good as a wall-shooter, crappy in mechanics but at least had some role-play. ME2 was 'resource gathering in space, plus Space Junior High School Counselor, plus a big bang at the end which was the only thing that saved it as far as I'm concerned. KOTOR was okay, lame romances and too much area-running-padding was a negative that destroyed what would have been an "A" title. Same with DA:O.
So, since BG & BGII, I've only truly liked ONE of their games -- NWN:HotU -- to play through multiple times for the sake of enjoyment. With another five being ok, but flawed for certain tedious features that have become more-and-more prevalent over time. And were, as games, ultimately over-rated because of the bandwagon effect BioWare games enjoy.
Then comes: DA2, SWTOR and now there's a huge back-lash on ME3. Even many people I thought were lifer-BioDrones have dropped their stripes and are now disconsolate due to 'BioWare's fall.'
See, this is the OTHER SIDE of the bandwagon effect. You can cruise on your reputation for a long time. Just keep mailing it in with gimmicks and shallow plots, but lots of 'special effects' and hype.... Sure, you'll get by for quite some time. But every time you do, you lose some of your audience.
Do it enough times in a row and the trickle becomes an avalanche. And you reap the storm of contempt that you sow when you substitute BS for quality game play.
Bargain bin. I've been buying their games bargain bin. I got ME1 for $3 on Amazon digital super-sale a few weeks ago. Another $15 for ME2 six months ago.
(Yes, I played them out of order, I saw my daughter play ME1 and she was pretty much revolted and didn't finish it. If a friend hadn't talked her into ME2, neither of us would have touched the franchise.)
So you bitch about BW products, and yet you are still spending money on them.
The price paid is irrelevent.....the fact you keep going back says everything. If I dont like a title, I sure as hell wont spend my time running them down. Worse, I wont keep supporting their products.
Simply shaking my head at you.
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
At this point I'm done with them. Sorry to say that IMO KOTOR was their only good game!
Basicaly, they fit into the EA mold very well; like the Madden franchise, what have they upgraded in 10 years?
My first experience with Bioware was KOTOR. I also played Dragon Age 1 & 2, and Mass Effect. I thought DA 1 and ME1 were some decent games, but DA2 was when my opinion of Bioware changed for the worse. I chalked it up to a one time creation of a bad game, but ME2 was dumbed down, albeit still fun.
With SWTOR, I don't think the Bioware we knew when KOTOR released is still around. It seems they're more interested in maximizing profits than creating unique and great games. Making a fully voiced MMORPG with light/dark/neutral alignment choices is cutting edge, which is no different than what they did with KOTOR, but with KOTOR I didn't feel like I was getting milked for money. Same can be said with the downloadable content for their other games. I remember when you paid for a game and you got the full game (ie. everything developed for that game) with the box. Now the games are much shorter, has less depth, and you have downloadable content available on day 1, which means it could have been included in the box.
I haven't beat ME2 yet, and I'm not sure I ever will, which means ME3 will likely never be played by me. I'll also probably not ever buy a Bioware product again. I'm just sick of more of the same from game developers. I want developers to push the boundaries of the genre's they make games for. Add new features to their new games, not take features away. Add more content with new games, not less and then let you buy additional content.
What's funny is that I just started playing LoL a couple weeks ago and I've had more fun playing that game on a daily basis than I have any other game in a long time. Weird, especially when you play through the same 3 maps all the time.
There is no bioware anymore. Sad fact of life, but true nonetheless. Its now Electronic Arts. For better or in this case, for worse, EA calls the shots. It was evident in the pre-christmas release of a game that easily could have used another 6 months of polish.
Its evident in the push for DLC in their single player games now. Quarterly reporting is now the driver of everything that happends.
Kind Regards
Actually Iam a big or maybe was a fan of Bioware games, this was the reason I did try out Swtor.
At the end Swtor was just a mediocre mmorpg and overhyped.
But it comes even worse, Mass Effect 3 is another fail and this leads really to rethink about Bioware/EA and future releases. Btw Mass Effect 3 got 3.2/10 on Metacritic.com with 1600 reviews, often from players who were big fans of ME1 and ME2. Without talking much about the redicioulos DLC method.
First releasing Dragon Age 2 which was a let down, swtor and now ME3....their quality goes down the drain.
After they failed me with SWTOR and now they're doing day 1 DLC on ME3...
I won't support them until €A/Bioware changes people on head positions and starts thinking about the quality again.
"Happiness is not a destination. It is a method of life."
-------------------------------
I have been fan of Bioware since their first games and really loved DA:O and I was extremely disappointed with DA2, ME3 was great except for the ending but I can give their artistic freedom.
SWTOR as a single-player experience was the best mmo leveling experience, but the pvp which I was waiting for was just a big flop and that the story just ends with no interaction from your companions at all after you hit 50.
So yes I am disappointed with Bioware.
This is Bioware's first attempt at an MMO game, on the pve aspect they've done a good job, on the pvp side... not so great, bad idea to hire a dev team that nearly destroyed Warhammer online's pvp. If they plan on making a Mass Effect MMO game, they should take notes with what's happening with SWTOR and learn from them, I know SOE doesn't do this because they refuse to learn anything and repeat their stupidity over and over (or probably thinks people are dumb).
I like Star Wars, I like sci-fi games, and the fact that there's so few sci-fi MMO's... the choice is silm and I want to like this game but after getting 2 level 50's, my patience is running thin. Well, Planetside 2 is on the horizon although I'm on the fence about it due to it being developed and hosted by SOE which are responsible for compromising my account (and CC) last spring.
id like to point out they are fixing pvp, Open world pvp is still broken on illum but they are working on that and in 1.2 update making it so warzones will be the go to pvp
say what u will about ea and bioware and most of u do but u cant fault there handling of bugs, They work hard to squash them as fast as they can and they make changes to adress player concerns like end game crafting
for all tors pvp faults warzones are actually fun, i dont have any hitch issues in them , and while pvp isnt perfect, its fun at least in warzones and after 1.2 alot of the concerns with how long it takes to get to battle master or wahtever top rank is are being adressed
Bioware for all the hate on this thread made a very fun engaging game for me at least and for at least a million others, who still play.
After Dragon Age II I knew they had changed for the worse. It is a tragedy really.
I could give a rat's ass about Bioware. What i'm more concerned with is the SW IP that i love. I can understand the difference between TOR's and SWG timeline. SWG had really no jedi and the old republic had many, cool, not a problem. Where i think Bioware screwed up is trying to shoebox the very huge and deep SW galaxy, instead of opening it up and letting it breath like SWG did.
If Bioware would have followed the SWG pre-cu model instead of the WOW one and added in their story/ VO and cutscenes for your character's personal story only, i really believe they would have had a solid mmorpg.
The biggest gripe i see is that, people are tired of the same old stuff they have been doing since WOW came out. The gear grind and dungeon crawling thing has gotten old and honestly, no one can do it better than WOW, so why copy it. Add in all the other standard systems that they left out and are going back and putting in because of the bitching that's going on and you can see that Bioware took the wrong approach from the get go.
Really after KOTOR 2 they went down a path and through merging with EA it just became a rehash with no creativitiy. A manufacturing line of a successful formula with no passion.