I'm gonna stick it out with Bioware and continue to be really interested, since I've really enjoyed their single-player games.
But its the unknown of whether they can meld their single-player expertise and story-telling with what should be depth and breadth of massively multiplayer content, dynamic and community-involved content in a persistnet world that has me wondering.
So they are blind they are not even watching GW2, lol BioWare will fall big time, they do not understand the mmorpg community, unless they are happy just making this game for there own fans, which is fine but don't keep telling us about other mmorpg.
"He added: "I don't think that [MMO creators] set out in the beginning to say: 'Hey, let's make this a grind. Let's not have any interesting content here.' A lot of the better ones more recently have interesting content for the first few levels, you know - and some of them for the first 20 levels, whatever. But it's still not the interesting content you'd expect in a single-player game."
So this guy is still thinking MMO's is the equivalent of a single player adventure game "on line".
Oh Boy, You don't play MMo's for 4 years for a predefined movie based story line...
--> Well it is his neck, not mine. I smell Age of Conan here.
Yes I do think succesful MMO's are being played for the excellent grind (meaning you keep playing the same content with different options and choices over and over and over again, because to this player it is fun and even conveniant (or he wouldn't be paying).
In fact millions of people want to look at matches for a thousand times.
How many of these people want to read the same book/movie for a hundred times?
I think Bioware is heading out into very deep waters indeed. Their great and deserved success with a sequence of story-rich single-player games has persuaded them that the same success can be easily duplicated in the massive multiple online market. They see only the similarities and not the vast and treacherous differences and, it seems to me, they have already made some fundamental strategic mistakes.
And the text files became even shorter and shorter over the years (because they are almost insignificant in on line play), while now you'll have to listen to them in minute long NPC voices.
Like I said in an earlier post: 90% of on line players don't even care to read 6 lines of text, now they'll need to listen to 6 minutes of NPC talk.
Great and immersive in solo games, "death" in on line games, because here the interaction with people count, not NPC talk.
Reading is found to be boring by many, there is no visual emotion. Given the choice would you rather read the script of a movie or watch it? I'd rather watch it. But you know, people are different. I wonder what the majority would say.
And the text files became even shorter and shorter over the years (because they are almost insignificant in on line play), while now you'll have to listen to them in minute long NPC voices.
Like I said in an earlier post: 90% of on line players don't even care to read 6 lines of text, now they'll need to listen to 6 minutes of NPC talk.
Great and immersive in solo games, "death" in on line games, because here the interaction with people count, not NPC talk.
Reading is found to be boring by many, there is no visual emotion. Given the choice would you rather read the script of a movie or watch it? I'd rather watch it. But you know, people are different. I wonder what the majority would say.
Those people just lack an imagination.
If they added that you can skip cutscenes they will be just as skipped as text quests just like people(not all) skipped the scenes in guild wars (hell people even asked you to skip it just before the end of a mission).
The way I see it this will be some kind of new type of mmo. I will aproach this game as a single player game which have many mmo elements which is fine by me. Imagine Mass Effect had some mmo elements, a beautiful single player experience which you could share with others. It did sold 2 million copies so the community would be big. I am not expecting the typical mmo we've been played but a rich story-lore wise game. I enjoyed other bioware game's because of that and I think I'll enjoy this too.
The way I see it this will be some kind of new type of mmo. I will aproach this game as a single player game which have many mmo elements which is fine by me. Imagine Mass Effect had some mmo elements, a beautiful single player experience which you could share with others. It did sold 2 million copies so the community would be big. I am not expecting the typical mmo we've been played but a rich story-lore wise game. I enjoyed other bioware game's because of that and I think I'll enjoy this too.
If bioware is going to make TOR more like a single player Rpg then I want them to give me on option to just buy the game box and play the game offline.
Im looking forward to the game but theres is no chance in hell that im going to pay monthly for a rpg co-op game when Borderlands does the same shit without a monthly fee.
And the text files became even shorter and shorter over the years (because they are almost insignificant in on line play), while now you'll have to listen to them in minute long NPC voices.
Like I said in an earlier post: 90% of on line players don't even care to read 6 lines of text, now they'll need to listen to 6 minutes of NPC talk.
Great and immersive in solo games, "death" in on line games, because here the interaction with people count, not NPC talk.
Reading is found to be boring by many, there is no visual emotion. Given the choice would you rather read the script of a movie or watch it? I'd rather watch it. But you know, people are different. I wonder what the majority would say.
Those people just lack an imagination.
If they added that you can skip cutscenes they will be just as skipped as text quests just like people(not all) skipped the scenes in guild wars.
Completely agree..
The vast majority of mmo players do not skip quest texts because they're text rather than flashy animation and VO. They skip the quest texts because they sense that this type of NPC-driven story is inherently alien to the medium. A mmo is always a persistent world, it is not a one-off thing. The interactions between you and other players always take precedence over anything any NPC can deliver. In WoW raids the true excitement does not come from the dev-written story behind the raid, it comes from two main staples of MMO - persistence (in WoW it is the gear you accumulate) and inter-player interaction (the need to act in coordination during a raid).
As for heroism... you cannot be a hero alone, at least not in mmos. When an NPC comes to you and tells you "you are a hero world savior", no matter how flashy and spectacular it is presented , it always comes out as somehow trite, irrelevant and simply "meh" compared to when another player simply pms you "you did good dps on that last boss" after a succesful raid.
In fact i even feel a little put down when being subjected to "you hero you" head-patting by an NPC. It's a bit embarassing, really, like being praised by your mother. Aw mom.. don't do that... I know you're doing this just because I'm your kid and you'll love me no matter what. Embarassing.
I'm not understanding how anyone can think this is a bad thing. I just don't *****get it.
We don't know that what they have planned will be bad or good at this point. We can only assume. And if you are assuming the best scenario and some are assuming the worst, how hard is that to undersatnd? At some point, content in an MMO has to be repeatable right, something you do again and again. Sure you'll move on eventually and there are many unqiue quests, but there are side questes, repeatable areas and just open play usually. Bioware could try something different; I don't know much about playing the game now so much as all their ideas, stories and voice acting. Hey, I know these games are completely different after the 100th time you have a character in left 4 dead 2 says something like that zombies wearing armor!, that things riding him, and the intro sccenes to a new area... the novelty wears off real fast. Hell some of STO boring quests had a page of text to them. I don't know what i want that read aloud to me each and every time.
I guess for me, after awhile, i just stop reading text boxes somtimes, especially if I sign on, my group is already up ahead and I just need to grab it and go. And what about sharing quests, that was the best thing about newer games, no longer do you have to send your friend an hour across the world to go get this quest you can't quite remember where you got it from, you can share it. Sometimes... it's not about story, it's not about great voice acting and or even much about the game at all. You've got an hour to play before you have to get to bed because of an early meeting and dang it you just want o join up with your friends and play with them. I don't want to spend most that time in a cutscene or listening to someone else talk.
Then again, the way they do it could be very well done, please most of us. It might be a perfect blend for all we know. Then again, I am not going to fault anyone for saying you know, this makes me worry a little.
parrotpholk-Because we all know the miracle patch fairy shows up the night before release and sprinkles magic dust on the server to make it allllll better.
And the text files became even shorter and shorter over the years (because they are almost insignificant in on line play), while now you'll have to listen to them in minute long NPC voices.
Like I said in an earlier post: 90% of on line players don't even care to read 6 lines of text, now they'll need to listen to 6 minutes of NPC talk.
Great and immersive in solo games, "death" in on line games, because here the interaction with people count, not NPC talk.
Reading is found to be boring by many, there is no visual emotion. Given the choice would you rather read the script of a movie or watch it? I'd rather watch it. But you know, people are different. I wonder what the majority would say.
Those people just lack an imagination.
If they added that you can skip cutscenes they will be just as skipped as text quests just like people(not all) skipped the scenes in guild wars.
Completely agree..
The vast majority of mmo players do not skip quest texts because they're text rather than flashy animation and VO. They skip the quest texts because they sense that this type of NPC-driven story is inherently alien to the medium. A mmo is always a persistent world, it is not a one-off thing. The interactions between you and other players always take precedence over anything any NPC can deliver. In WoW raids the true excitement does not come from the dev-written story behind the raid, it comes from two main staples of MMO - persistence (the gear you accumulate) and inter-player interaction.
As for heroism... you cannot be a hero alone, at least not in mmos. When an NPC comes to you and tells you "you are a hero world savior", no matter how flashy and spectacular it is presented , it always comes out as somehow trite, irrelevant and simply "meh" compared to when another player simply pms you "you did good dps on that last boss" after a succesful raid.
In fact i even feel a little put down when being subjected to "you hero you" head-patting by a NPC. It's a bit embarassing, really, like being praised by your mother. Aw mom.. don't do that... I know you're doing this just because I'm your kid and you'll love me no matter what. Embarassing.
This is the thing that worries me the most as i have a lot of younger kids on my vent.
I can already hear them now; "Arrgh, not another cutscene, stop talking to me and just give me my shit so i can go kill stuff".
A lot of these kids have been trained to only expect and like one thing, so it's going to be difficult to change that.
I personally don't care as i play my own way and don't let that nonsense affect me, but i can see the issue.
I would be fine with a five or ten minute video setup for a quest - IF each quest leveled you up, but when you have to do dozens or hundreds of quests to level - that is way too much.
Maybe BioWare will do something really clever and make quests longer but more rewarding, so we don't have to grind to level. I would applaud that.
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
So the key to an MMORPG is quest text? that's very interesting. Sorry, I'd like the option to decapitate the next quest giver that demands 20 (space) boars to be slain. I still pick the movie, voices are fun.
No: you write your own film and adventures... by playing an mmorpg freely in the content you are most interested in (be that crafting, fishing, raiding, PvP, ..)
No need to follow the prerecorded story telling of solo adventures.
I think its pretty well established that SWTOR isn't going to be a sandbox environment. Might as well pack up your bags and head to a different game.
It's about taking you by the nose and follow the path to the next video clip where you say "yes" " or "no" after which you will be "talking" to your companion NPC and will have a nice voice over AI talk with him and a new video will be uploaded for the next quest.
First 20 levels of AoC all over again. Too pessimistic ? Everything is ... pre recorded with voices and video clips.
I would say yes everything else on this planet is sandbox compared to this.
A wheel with six options, I think it's safe to say you're wrong.
I think we're going to find our choices boil down to 'Good', 'Bad' and 'Neutral' - or, if they're conversation choices, 'Polite', 'Rude' and 'Humorous'. It's not exactly Tolstoy,we'll be getting.
I think we're going to find our choices boil down to 'Good', 'Bad' and 'Neutral' - or, if they're conversation choices, 'Polite', 'Rude' and 'Humorous'. It's not exactly Tolstoy,we'll be getting.
Blasphemer! What about all the Pulitzer prizes BioWare's games have won?
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
Lets get one thing straight.. AoC failed shortly after launch because it had so many bugs it became dam near unplayable. u can argue anything else u want, but that is why the majority of people left. every mmo site talked at great lengths about the bug issues and how funcom fixed them b4 this new expansion. SWTOR devs have said repeatedly that u do not have to play the stories. it is a full world with full interaction with other players that u r free to roam at will. don't worry, u can still pretend u r "lothar, defender of the spoiled brats" during all ur free time instead of realizeing u really are just some scared insecure guy in cut up sweatpant shorts covered in cheetos yelling at your mom to leave you alone about doing something with your life. The idea that any game has to keep your simplistic mind occupied for years with mindless repeatable grinding while you tell bullshit stories to "friends" on ventrillo about how massively awesome you are, while u live vicariously through your paladin, is ridiculous and un-neccesarry. How about this, get some sort of life in the real world. pick another hobby to go with playing these games. make some real friends in the real world. look at porn, do something else other then play these games every waking moment of your day. i had 2 co-workers who took 4 days off of work when WoTLK came out. the reality is they paid dam near 1000 dollars between cost of game and lost wages so they could be among the first group to be bored with a long awaited add-on to keep WOW players coughing up 15 amonth. i am glad that devs are attempting to make a story driven game for the rest of us. the people who have jobs,friends,families, and other interests, that would LOVE a game that they can immerse into for an hour or two a night of quality entertainment before they go to bed. wether or not swtor is that game, i dont know, but u might as well get over it, because that is where gaming is going as a whole. watch E3, u will see
Bioware are putting me off their game before I have much to go on to judge it. Hmmmmm but it's Star Wars...
I think that's the attitude of most people. I'll wait a month to see how launch goes then I'll buy a box and sub for three months. Hey, it's Kotor III. How badly can they screw that up?
I'm not understanding how anyone can think this is a bad thing. I just don't *****get it.
We don't know that what they have planned will be bad or good at this point. We can only assume. And if you are assuming the best scenario and some are assuming the worst, how hard is that to undersatnd?
I guess I don't understand it because its stupid. The are releasing information a "x" and people are automatically assuming that "y" doesn't exist, regardless of the fact they've said "yes 'y' does exist".
It would be one thing if they came out and said... no, we are not going to have this, this, and this... we are focusing on that. But that hasn't been the case at all.
It would be like if a car commercial was on TV showing off a really nice interior, a slick design, some nice leather seats, etc... but they didn't show the engine... and then everyone freaked out because "zomg there isn't an engine, they didn't show it to me, the car will never work without an engine!! The designers are so stupid".
Meanwhile anyone with a lick of sense just rolls their eyes.
I can already hear them now; "Arrgh, not another cutscene, stop talking to me and just give me my shit so i can go kill stuff".
The cutscenes can be passed by as some of the interviews mentioned, you're not stuck to waiting them out.
A lot of these kids have been trained to only expect and like one thing, so it's going to be difficult to change that.
It'd be difficult to change that, not impossible and it doesn't mean their current expectations are the best MMO experiences they can enjoy, it's merely what they know now. As applies to a lot of other gamers as well, you only know if something different will work for you if others (successfully) show you those different ways.
What someone posted earlier, I agree that Bioware is heading into deep waters with their approach, we'll have to see whether it'll be drown, getting lost or finding new lands in the end.
I find it interesting that different companies have concluded observing the current MMO scene that something was lacking, and that a ANet, Funcom and Bioware (among others?) all thought that what needed improvement was the storytelling aspect to add immersion.
Seems to me that a number of the MMO development companies want to tell stories with their gameworld, and their MMO not be the equivalent of a Pac-Man, Mario Brothers or standard shooter where it's all about the gameplay with only a weak storyline tagged-on. When done well it could add to immersion in the MMO world, but it makes me wonder how they will solve the problems with story focus like repeatibility boredom after the first 2,3 times.
I don't mind it at all if companies want to try different things and walk different paths with their MMO, better than just another MMO clone with the same old WoW/LotrO/Aion/etc game mechanics. Thinking that how MMO's are today is all they can be qua gameplay styles is a dead-end road. So yay to a Funcom, ANet, Bioware and others if they want to reshape combat mechanics, reinvent questing/storytelling and/or get rid of classes and levels.
I expect some of those innovations to fail or be less successful than the makers expected. But some others of those innovations will be a right hit, other companies will see what works from the new gameplay styles and try to copy and enhance upon it, in the end only enrichening the MMO market, evolving it further.
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums: Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
I'm not understanding how anyone can think this is a bad thing. I just don't *****get it.
We don't know that what they have planned will be bad or good at this point. We can only assume. And if you are assuming the best scenario and some are assuming the worst, how hard is that to undersatnd?
I guess I don't understand it because its stupid. The are releasing information a "x" and people are automatically assuming that "y" doesn't exist, regardless of the fact they've said "yes 'y' does exist".
It would be one thing if they came out and said... no, we are not going to have this, this, and this... we are focusing on that. But that hasn't been the case at all.
It would be like if a car commercial was on TV showing off a really nice interior, a slick design, some nice leather seats, etc... but they didn't show the engine... and then everyone freaked out because "zomg there isn't an engine, they didn't show it to me, the car will never work without an engine!! The designers are so stupid".
the sad part is, most of the things the crybabies are up in arms about being absent from the game, the devs have actually said are in the game. there will be crafting, an auction house, free "sandbox" roaming. group raids. the devs have stated these things specifically.
Meanwhile anyone with a lick of sense just rolls their eyes.
I guess I don't understand it because its stupid. The are releasing information a "x" and people are automatically assuming that "y" doesn't exist, regardless of the fact they've said "yes 'y' does exist".
It would be one thing if they came out and said... no, we are not going to have this, this, and this... we are focusing on that. But that hasn't been the case at all.
It would be like if a car commercial was on TV showing off a really nice interior, a slick design, some nice leather seats, etc... but they didn't show the engine... and then everyone freaked out because "zomg there isn't an engine, they didn't show it to me, the car will never work without an engine!! The designers are so stupid".
Meanwhile anyone with a lick of sense just rolls their eyes.
Right... because information given out by companies in the MMO industry are always, 100% accurate. What they say is what we get on day one. Are you kidding? The last dozen or so relases of MMOGs didn't include any information that was incorrect, misleading or just outright lies? If you aren't a skeptical yet, be prepared to be burned. And if you believe all the commercials on TV, well that's just stupid (as you put it).
parrotpholk-Because we all know the miracle patch fairy shows up the night before release and sprinkles magic dust on the server to make it allllll better.
the reality is they paid dam near 1000 dollars between cost of game and lost wages so they could be among the first group to be bored with a long awaited add-on to keep WOW players coughing up 15 amonth.
250 dollar a day?! Dammit, I'm doing something wrong...
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums: Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
I'm not understanding how anyone can think this is a bad thing. I just don't *****get it.
We don't know that what they have planned will be bad or good at this point. We can only assume. And if you are assuming the best scenario and some are assuming the worst, how hard is that to undersatnd?
I guess I don't understand it because its stupid. The are releasing information a "x" and people are automatically assuming that "y" doesn't exist, regardless of the fact they've said "yes 'y' does exist".
It would be one thing if they came out and said... no, we are not going to have this, this, and this... we are focusing on that. But that hasn't been the case at all.
It would be like if a car commercial was on TV showing off a really nice interior, a slick design, some nice leather seats, etc... but they didn't show the engine... and then everyone freaked out because "zomg there isn't an engine, they didn't show it to me, the car will never work without an engine!! The designers are so stupid".
Meanwhile anyone with a lick of sense just rolls their eyes.
It's not that the car doesn't have an engine - it's whether that engine is a good engine; or whether it is underpowered, gets terrible mileage, and occasionally catches on fire.
We know the game will (probably) have PvP, crafting, and end game content; because BioWare said it would. Just like Cryptic said STO would have crafting and exploration. Which it does - it just happens to suck.
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
the reality is they paid dam near 1000 dollars between cost of game and lost wages so they could be among the first group to be bored with a long awaited add-on to keep WOW players coughing up 15 amonth.
250 dollar a day?! Dammit, I'm doing something wrong...
union electricians.. unfortunately we r getting our asses kicked right now with no work
Not sure if sharing this opinion would be out of point here, but ; my opinion is that no matter how much content you put into an mmo, it can and will eventually be completed, maybe smaller grps at first but eventually everyone would have completed however much content you put into it. The only thing that would break monotony at final/eventual endgame would be pvp, since each player reacts/responds differently to each other and different situations. I'm not sure how to break out of this system/cycle but this is what i've experienced. You can re-complete content aka farm bosses but it will be the same thing all over again as boss fights are always the same ie: bosses only have those few moves and react programmed to varying situation.
You never end and certainly don't hit the wall ever in a greedy game.
While a story driven MMO has "the end" and "wall" written all over it.
The extra problem is that with such a story driven MMO, you simply can't go over to an end game, because that would mean you go to the same sequences of video footage without another twist to the story.
To me it shows the man has absolutely no idea why people play MMo's for years on end.
Just out of curiousity what makes you think EVERYONE plays MMO's for the same reason you do? Yes for you, and probably several others its for greed. But Many people do play single player games and not for your greed reasons. Do you think they don't also play MMO's or that maybe people don't play MMO's for the sovial aspect instead of just the lone greed aspecvt?
Just beause your gameplay style is limited to only one aspect of gaming does not mean everyone or even a majority of people have the same limitation. SWTOR maybe not the game for you. but don't stick your head in the sand and believe that because its not the game for you that everyone or at least the majority share your views. You base your entire game play worth on weither you own the mighty uber item of the month XXX. Not everyones game play revolves around endless item grind. Diffferent people, Different cultures, different game play styles. There is room for all
Comments
Lol but it is quite likely to be true though:(
I think I actually spent way more time reading and theorycrafting about MMOs than playing them
So they are blind they are not even watching GW2, lol BioWare will fall big time, they do not understand the mmorpg community, unless they are happy just making this game for there own fans, which is fine but don't keep telling us about other mmorpg.
I think Bioware is heading out into very deep waters indeed. Their great and deserved success with a sequence of story-rich single-player games has persuaded them that the same success can be easily duplicated in the massive multiple online market. They see only the similarities and not the vast and treacherous differences and, it seems to me, they have already made some fundamental strategic mistakes.
Those people just lack an imagination.
If they added that you can skip cutscenes they will be just as skipped as text quests just like people(not all) skipped the scenes in guild wars (hell people even asked you to skip it just before the end of a mission).
Spoken dialog is still better imo though
The way I see it this will be some kind of new type of mmo. I will aproach this game as a single player game which have many mmo elements which is fine by me. Imagine Mass Effect had some mmo elements, a beautiful single player experience which you could share with others. It did sold 2 million copies so the community would be big. I am not expecting the typical mmo we've been played but a rich story-lore wise game. I enjoyed other bioware game's because of that and I think I'll enjoy this too.
Aye very important in a single player game
If bioware is going to make TOR more like a single player Rpg then I want them to give me on option to just buy the game box and play the game offline.
Im looking forward to the game but theres is no chance in hell that im going to pay monthly for a rpg co-op game when Borderlands does the same shit without a monthly fee.
Playing: Rift, LotRO
Waiting on: GW2, BP
Completely agree..
The vast majority of mmo players do not skip quest texts because they're text rather than flashy animation and VO. They skip the quest texts because they sense that this type of NPC-driven story is inherently alien to the medium. A mmo is always a persistent world, it is not a one-off thing. The interactions between you and other players always take precedence over anything any NPC can deliver. In WoW raids the true excitement does not come from the dev-written story behind the raid, it comes from two main staples of MMO - persistence (in WoW it is the gear you accumulate) and inter-player interaction (the need to act in coordination during a raid).
As for heroism... you cannot be a hero alone, at least not in mmos. When an NPC comes to you and tells you "you are a hero world savior", no matter how flashy and spectacular it is presented , it always comes out as somehow trite, irrelevant and simply "meh" compared to when another player simply pms you "you did good dps on that last boss" after a succesful raid.
In fact i even feel a little put down when being subjected to "you hero you" head-patting by an NPC. It's a bit embarassing, really, like being praised by your mother. Aw mom.. don't do that... I know you're doing this just because I'm your kid and you'll love me no matter what. Embarassing.
We don't know that what they have planned will be bad or good at this point. We can only assume. And if you are assuming the best scenario and some are assuming the worst, how hard is that to undersatnd? At some point, content in an MMO has to be repeatable right, something you do again and again. Sure you'll move on eventually and there are many unqiue quests, but there are side questes, repeatable areas and just open play usually. Bioware could try something different; I don't know much about playing the game now so much as all their ideas, stories and voice acting. Hey, I know these games are completely different after the 100th time you have a character in left 4 dead 2 says something like that zombies wearing armor!, that things riding him, and the intro sccenes to a new area... the novelty wears off real fast. Hell some of STO boring quests had a page of text to them. I don't know what i want that read aloud to me each and every time.
I guess for me, after awhile, i just stop reading text boxes somtimes, especially if I sign on, my group is already up ahead and I just need to grab it and go. And what about sharing quests, that was the best thing about newer games, no longer do you have to send your friend an hour across the world to go get this quest you can't quite remember where you got it from, you can share it. Sometimes... it's not about story, it's not about great voice acting and or even much about the game at all. You've got an hour to play before you have to get to bed because of an early meeting and dang it you just want o join up with your friends and play with them. I don't want to spend most that time in a cutscene or listening to someone else talk.
Then again, the way they do it could be very well done, please most of us. It might be a perfect blend for all we know. Then again, I am not going to fault anyone for saying you know, this makes me worry a little.
parrotpholk-Because we all know the miracle patch fairy shows up the night before release and sprinkles magic dust on the server to make it allllll better.
This is the thing that worries me the most as i have a lot of younger kids on my vent.
I can already hear them now; "Arrgh, not another cutscene, stop talking to me and just give me my shit so i can go kill stuff".
A lot of these kids have been trained to only expect and like one thing, so it's going to be difficult to change that.
I personally don't care as i play my own way and don't let that nonsense affect me, but i can see the issue.
I would be fine with a five or ten minute video setup for a quest - IF each quest leveled you up, but when you have to do dozens or hundreds of quests to level - that is way too much.
Maybe BioWare will do something really clever and make quests longer but more rewarding, so we don't have to grind to level. I would applaud that.
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
I think we're going to find our choices boil down to 'Good', 'Bad' and 'Neutral' - or, if they're conversation choices, 'Polite', 'Rude' and 'Humorous'. It's not exactly Tolstoy,we'll be getting.
Blasphemer! What about all the Pulitzer prizes BioWare's games have won?
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
Lets get one thing straight.. AoC failed shortly after launch because it had so many bugs it became dam near unplayable. u can argue anything else u want, but that is why the majority of people left. every mmo site talked at great lengths about the bug issues and how funcom fixed them b4 this new expansion. SWTOR devs have said repeatedly that u do not have to play the stories. it is a full world with full interaction with other players that u r free to roam at will. don't worry, u can still pretend u r "lothar, defender of the spoiled brats" during all ur free time instead of realizeing u really are just some scared insecure guy in cut up sweatpant shorts covered in cheetos yelling at your mom to leave you alone about doing something with your life. The idea that any game has to keep your simplistic mind occupied for years with mindless repeatable grinding while you tell bullshit stories to "friends" on ventrillo about how massively awesome you are, while u live vicariously through your paladin, is ridiculous and un-neccesarry. How about this, get some sort of life in the real world. pick another hobby to go with playing these games. make some real friends in the real world. look at porn, do something else other then play these games every waking moment of your day. i had 2 co-workers who took 4 days off of work when WoTLK came out. the reality is they paid dam near 1000 dollars between cost of game and lost wages so they could be among the first group to be bored with a long awaited add-on to keep WOW players coughing up 15 amonth. i am glad that devs are attempting to make a story driven game for the rest of us. the people who have jobs,friends,families, and other interests, that would LOVE a game that they can immerse into for an hour or two a night of quality entertainment before they go to bed. wether or not swtor is that game, i dont know, but u might as well get over it, because that is where gaming is going as a whole. watch E3, u will see
I think that's the attitude of most people. I'll wait a month to see how launch goes then I'll buy a box and sub for three months. Hey, it's Kotor III. How badly can they screw that up?
I guess I don't understand it because its stupid. The are releasing information a "x" and people are automatically assuming that "y" doesn't exist, regardless of the fact they've said "yes 'y' does exist".
It would be one thing if they came out and said... no, we are not going to have this, this, and this... we are focusing on that. But that hasn't been the case at all.
It would be like if a car commercial was on TV showing off a really nice interior, a slick design, some nice leather seats, etc... but they didn't show the engine... and then everyone freaked out because "zomg there isn't an engine, they didn't show it to me, the car will never work without an engine!! The designers are so stupid".
Meanwhile anyone with a lick of sense just rolls their eyes.
What someone posted earlier, I agree that Bioware is heading into deep waters with their approach, we'll have to see whether it'll be drown, getting lost or finding new lands in the end.
I find it interesting that different companies have concluded observing the current MMO scene that something was lacking, and that a ANet, Funcom and Bioware (among others?) all thought that what needed improvement was the storytelling aspect to add immersion.
Seems to me that a number of the MMO development companies want to tell stories with their gameworld, and their MMO not be the equivalent of a Pac-Man, Mario Brothers or standard shooter where it's all about the gameplay with only a weak storyline tagged-on. When done well it could add to immersion in the MMO world, but it makes me wonder how they will solve the problems with story focus like repeatibility boredom after the first 2,3 times.
I don't mind it at all if companies want to try different things and walk different paths with their MMO, better than just another MMO clone with the same old WoW/LotrO/Aion/etc game mechanics. Thinking that how MMO's are today is all they can be qua gameplay styles is a dead-end road. So yay to a Funcom, ANet, Bioware and others if they want to reshape combat mechanics, reinvent questing/storytelling and/or get rid of classes and levels.
I expect some of those innovations to fail or be less successful than the makers expected. But some others of those innovations will be a right hit, other companies will see what works from the new gameplay styles and try to copy and enhance upon it, in the end only enrichening the MMO market, evolving it further.
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
Right... because information given out by companies in the MMO industry are always, 100% accurate. What they say is what we get on day one. Are you kidding? The last dozen or so relases of MMOGs didn't include any information that was incorrect, misleading or just outright lies? If you aren't a skeptical yet, be prepared to be burned. And if you believe all the commercials on TV, well that's just stupid (as you put it).
parrotpholk-Because we all know the miracle patch fairy shows up the night before release and sprinkles magic dust on the server to make it allllll better.
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
It's not that the car doesn't have an engine - it's whether that engine is a good engine; or whether it is underpowered, gets terrible mileage, and occasionally catches on fire.
We know the game will (probably) have PvP, crafting, and end game content; because BioWare said it would. Just like Cryptic said STO would have crafting and exploration. Which it does - it just happens to suck.
"" Voice acting isn't an RPG element....it's just a production value." - grumpymel2
Not sure if sharing this opinion would be out of point here, but ; my opinion is that no matter how much content you put into an mmo, it can and will eventually be completed, maybe smaller grps at first but eventually everyone would have completed however much content you put into it. The only thing that would break monotony at final/eventual endgame would be pvp, since each player reacts/responds differently to each other and different situations. I'm not sure how to break out of this system/cycle but this is what i've experienced. You can re-complete content aka farm bosses but it will be the same thing all over again as boss fights are always the same ie: bosses only have those few moves and react programmed to varying situation.
<QQ moar plz. kkthxbai.>
Just out of curiousity what makes you think EVERYONE plays MMO's for the same reason you do? Yes for you, and probably several others its for greed. But Many people do play single player games and not for your greed reasons. Do you think they don't also play MMO's or that maybe people don't play MMO's for the sovial aspect instead of just the lone greed aspecvt?
Just beause your gameplay style is limited to only one aspect of gaming does not mean everyone or even a majority of people have the same limitation. SWTOR maybe not the game for you. but don't stick your head in the sand and believe that because its not the game for you that everyone or at least the majority share your views. You base your entire game play worth on weither you own the mighty uber item of the month XXX. Not everyones game play revolves around endless item grind. Diffferent people, Different cultures, different game play styles. There is room for all