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SWTOR lacks the little things....................
Paddyspub
Member Posts: 104
.......................from keeping players wanting to play for the long term.
The devs seem so ignorant and clueless on just the little things in even a themepark mmo (like wow) than make it fun and keep players wanted to play even if they got their chars geared or cleared most content atm.
Why is it so hard for EAware to come up with things like:
- having fun minigames like pazaak, swoop racing, etc
- being able to sit down in chairs
- rare mobs to hunt in the worlds
- free roaming space travel and battles with special worlds to discover
- being able to fully customize your ship inside and outside with neat gadgets to collect inside
- being able to unlock a cool non-humanoid race to play if you reach a certain condtition
- having a arena type feature in the game
This is just a small sample of what BW should do beside just moar dailies, ops, wzs, etc that ppl get tired of quicksly. Besides, what else is there to do besides either do wzs, ops, dailies. No wonder so many ppl left. Anyway my 2 cents.
Tbe Repopulation will be what SWTOR shouldve been.
Comments
currently playing: DDO, AOC, WoT, P101
Ahnog
Hokey religions are no replacement for a good blaster at your side.
No matter how cynical you become, its never enough to keep up - Lily Tomlin
Two things always bugged me day/nigh cycles were missing, as well as weather. Not to mention that all the NPC just stand there milling around with nothing to do other than to stand around a wait to be attacked.
I agree with all those. It seems to me the MMOs are getting more and more focused, trying to go tighter in their implementation of basic progression and combat models, and largely ignoring the "world" features.
The argument that some popular games of the past didn't have the "fluff" down pat on release is true (never mind that I don't consider them "fluff", doh!). It probably wasn't a requirement back then.
But the truth of the matter is, we don't know what's a requirement right now, in the post-WOW scene, to get players in for the long haul. Nowadays players tend to get bored quickly and move on. It's possible games need to go that extra mile on release now, just to hang on to their players.
The Star Wars fandom is almost as much about "the world" as the epic stories. So it seems if any IP MMO would take pains to build a detailed world with nifty little touches, it should be a Star Wars MMO. But what we have here is pure story and combat and little else.
I do enjoy what there is in there, but it was indeed a dire misstep, not going the extra mile with the feature set to capture that living breathing world" feel.
For me your post is the one that I agree with the most. I haven't heard anything from Bioware to address these items, only a focus on more content. When they make it feel a little more alive, I'll come back, but until then, for now, I'm more happy in GW2. Does anyone have info from Bioware about addressing the static feel of the world?
There Is Always Hope!
I doubt they'll be putting much effort into making a living breathing world. I think it would just be too costly. The players that already capped their characters wouldn't see much of it anyway. It's probably just too late for this kind of change, though one can always hope...
That's the primary issue with more modern themeparks.
It's extremely difficult to retain players long term with that model, and even more difficult for the players to stick to with it for longer than 6 months tops. I don't like Swtor generally (not that I think its awful), but even GW2 has this problem. When you build a themepark it's inevitable.
I think also, that mmo players would do well to get that through their heads, and lower their expectations of any kind of extreme long term playing when it comes to a themepark game. You can tell if a game is going to be themepark centric long before release. If so, don't go complaining when you start getting bored after 3-6 months. I'd say that's just to be expected.
WoW is one of those exceptions, but for me, it was the same. I tended to get bored after about 6 months when I played it. I generally played it in 3-6 month sessions before stopping for as long as a year or two. How people could play that game for 6 years or so, I never understood.
EvE I only played for 6 months before getting kind of burned out as well, but that is a game where I can at least understand fans who play it for many years at a time. They avoided the theme park model and I think it's been a very good thing for them. I really think more devs could do well to try that.
A sandbox centric mmo really does seem to keep players playing, and if the comments here on this site are anything to go by, its what players are freaking drooling for. So give mmo players what they want industry. Its good for you, and good for them.
I don't know if you'd call it "game making", but having a swoop racing system with intra- and inter-server leader boards, betting, and random track generation would make me resub today.
They could also incorporate the swoops into crafting. There is huge potential here that kotor fans have been crying for for years. I think it would bring back a lot of people.
http://f.cl.ly/items/3n15423i0G2i111y3c2b/computer.gif
I would just shrug off Ahnog's comments if you want to think outside the box. If someone want's to never leave the stigma of post-generation-WoW MMORPG's then just toss my comment aside, and dub me a hater.
It's all that stuff that fans wanted .. stuff posted on the official forum long before launch, that would have been "game making items [orange text above in quote]". WoW does it's magic with people who want fantasy. EA can't shoehorn WoW fans into a sci-fi / sci-fantasy game, because the target audience is extraordinarily different. Star Wars fans wanted to think outside the box.
Sure, people will play a game that's good, even if it isn't their genre of choice. SWTOR wasn't that good though, as a whole. The story was very entertaining, and the music was candy to the ears .. but the gameplay was lacking. Horrible game-engine, load screens from hell, instanced areas if the number got above a couple hundred, numerous bugs from an early launch that, imo, crippled the game at birth.
An area getting above a couple hundred players might sound like an awful lot, but not when you consider the biggest area, like Alderon, Tattoeine, or Hoth was about 40% the size of a WoW continent. 200 players is not very high, thus worlds feel dead (from lack of players, not even counting NPC lifelessness). And WoW was seemless, SWTOR used old technology from EQ1 (1999) for zones, then allowed each zone to be instanced so it could claim a technology marvel. I think not. SWTOR feels very small compared to the game it so vocally tried to crush, ie WoW.
Star Wars was built on innovation. And then came EA to follow, not lead .. and crush the hopes of fans everywhere ...
ps - don't write me off as a WoW fan, because Blizzard drove that game into the ground, post Cataclysm. It is a shell of the glory it once was, even if the architecture (like it's game engine) is still better than SWTOR. Which is a sad tale for another time
edit: spelling, grammar
Want a nice understanding of life? Try Spirit Science: "The Human History"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8NNHmV3QPw&feature=plcp
Recognize the voice? Yep sounds like Penny Arcade's Extra Credits.
Very well said.
MMOs have become so predictable that I'm no longer tempted to play them.
For a second there, I was thinking this was going to be a Pulp Fiction like thread.
What do they call a Quarter Pounder on Bocce?
Epic Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAigCvelkhQ&list=PLo9FRw1AkDuQLEz7Gvvaz3ideB2NpFtT1
https://archive.org/details/softwarelibrary_msdos?&sort=-downloads&page=1
Kyleran: "Now there's the real trick, learning to accept and enjoy a game for what it offers rather than pass on what might be a great playing experience because it lacks a few features you prefer."
John Henry Newman: "A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault."
FreddyNoNose: "A good game needs no defense; a bad game has no defense." "Easily digested content is just as easily forgotten."
LacedOpium: "So the question that begs to be asked is, if you are not interested in the game mechanics that define the MMORPG genre, then why are you playing an MMORPG?"
WoW in 2004 , no wait , EQ in 1998 , had the ability to sit in chairs , a day/night cycle , and rare mobs to hunt in the open world.
It's game breaking for a modern mmo world to feel so much not like a living breathing world.
SWTOR had multiple planets that added together still felt more stale than one single world EQ launched in 99.
Pathetic.
Yeah because 5 years in development and 1 year live just wasn't enough time to get things right I guess.
If you dont do stupid things while youre young, youll have nothing to smile about when youre old.
every single game that gets released will not hold huge players numbers for long.
comparing it to games that were released almost 10 years ago when there wasn't a lot of competition does you little justice.
don't get me wrong, a lot of the suggestions in the OP would be welcomed as i have seen those same exact suggestions being made a 100 times before.
but if the game had all that the game would likely still be in the same boat it is in today.
people bought into the hype and thought this was the game for them to play for years.
let me just say that nobody should ever have those kind of expectations for an mmo ever again unless someone makes a game that is just so far beyond anything else already out there that nothing else can compete (this includes sandbox games too).
until then, just forget about playing an mmo for years straight.
which mmo's do you feel have better replay ability? i actually think SWTOR has good replay ability given the fact that there is 8 unique class stories.
most mmo's have the same exact content leveling up if you re-roll.
the only thing keeping me playing this game is its replay ability.
Hmm EQ2 launched in 2004 as well and guess what... You can't sit in chairs in that game either. Oh, and by the way, I logged off SWTOR about an hour ago and I COULD AND DID SIT IN CHAIRS. Troll much?
If that is such a big deal, then I guess EQ2 would have failed years ago, oh wait, it didn't because it had a day/night cycle and weather too huh? If you play games based off being able to sit in a chair, day/night cycles, and hunting rare mobs then your standards are pretty low IMHO.
I bet you and those like you would complain if there were day/night cycles that there aren't different mobs running around at night.
Oh, and I guess world bosses don't exist in SWTOR either. Oh, wait, those can't be soloed so they don't count right?
Sandbox is were its at if you know how to do it, DFUW is the closest to a sandbox game worth playing once its done. The largest problem with sandbox is most of them have no direction and for new people or sheeps that like to be lead around they just wont like it.
WoW has done something very well which is give enough things to do in the game to keep interest even if you are not a raider.
EvE is a great game if you like that genera.
it lacks almost every major mmo feature? LOL
i am sorry, was that supposed to be a serious statement?
SWTOR lacks some minor features maybe, the quality and the way their content is implemented is questionable.
but, its hilarious that people say this is a direct wow clone with light sabers (which it is) yet it lacks all major mmo features somehow?
its posts like this that spread gross misinformation that make me laugh.
there wasn't any more to do in vanilla wow that there is currently in SWTOR.
other than the open pvp, i honestly cant think of anything else that you could do in vanilla wow that you cannot do in SWTOR.
IMO its the quality and the way it was implemented, not the amount of content.
not only that but wow was the best game in a time where there was very little competition.
wow made mmo gaming more main stream and brought a whole bunch of new players in.
that has a lot more to do with their success than the amount of content they had.
WoW is not "vanilla" for a very loooooooooong time now, afaik were 1 day apart from 2013, not 2006.
You dont make Ford T to compete in todays market and say "but but but when they started all they had was model T"
In fact, comparing something to WoW vanilla indicates failure in itself.