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I played this game when it first came out. It was rubbish.
noncley
Member UncommonPosts: 718
But, two or three days ago, I tried it again and have never been so impressed at a game's turn-around.
On launch, it was a horrible, fly-by-numbers, rat-run with no chances or choices to make. The acting was appalling and the writing was the worst kind of cheaply-commissioned fan-fic (for example, all female Siths were referred to as 'Lord' and 'Master' not because, in the words of the then chief writer, DEaniel Ercison, now thankfully fired, it was 'modern and progressive' but because EA wouldn't have to pay twice for a voice actor to refer to a player Sith as 'My lord' or 'My lady).
However, someone in charge obviously realised that they were going to lose the hundreds of millions of dollars they'd invested in the game if they didn't invest in cleaning it up and making it richer - yet not changing it so much as would change the nature of the game itself.
While it is still, in many respects, a smallish themepark, they have enriched the experience of going through it by increasing XP gain so you you're not trapped in a space the size of an elevator killing the same things over and over again; they have allowed the player to customise their own experience through strongholds; they have dramatically increased the quality of the writing and the situational story telling; the game has options in that while you do have to do the main storyline quests, you can pick and choose which other quests you do to gain the XP necessary for levelling; they have made decoration, customisation and detail a large feature of the game and, for me anyway, this has paid off in much broader experience.
I can understand that many people are put off by the cash shop but I , speaking personally, found it not too intrusive.
I have to say, that the game is now a pleasurable experience and worth playing. I just wish that whoever made executive decisions to revamp and re-invest in SWTOR had been the same guiding genius behind its forerunner, SWG.
On launch, it was a horrible, fly-by-numbers, rat-run with no chances or choices to make. The acting was appalling and the writing was the worst kind of cheaply-commissioned fan-fic (for example, all female Siths were referred to as 'Lord' and 'Master' not because, in the words of the then chief writer, DEaniel Ercison, now thankfully fired, it was 'modern and progressive' but because EA wouldn't have to pay twice for a voice actor to refer to a player Sith as 'My lord' or 'My lady).
However, someone in charge obviously realised that they were going to lose the hundreds of millions of dollars they'd invested in the game if they didn't invest in cleaning it up and making it richer - yet not changing it so much as would change the nature of the game itself.
While it is still, in many respects, a smallish themepark, they have enriched the experience of going through it by increasing XP gain so you you're not trapped in a space the size of an elevator killing the same things over and over again; they have allowed the player to customise their own experience through strongholds; they have dramatically increased the quality of the writing and the situational story telling; the game has options in that while you do have to do the main storyline quests, you can pick and choose which other quests you do to gain the XP necessary for levelling; they have made decoration, customisation and detail a large feature of the game and, for me anyway, this has paid off in much broader experience.
I can understand that many people are put off by the cash shop but I , speaking personally, found it not too intrusive.
I have to say, that the game is now a pleasurable experience and worth playing. I just wish that whoever made executive decisions to revamp and re-invest in SWTOR had been the same guiding genius behind its forerunner, SWG.
Comments
The game was ok when it came out. Not more, not less. A juicy WoW clone in a star wars gown, but with tons of bugs, performance issues and so on. It has evolved since then in a lot of good ways but the endgame seems the same to me as it is in almost any themepark mmo.
They tweaked a lot of things that look promising at first and it is a nice leveling experience if you like leveling, questing and the storytelling. The new storyline though feels like a real singleplayer game. Most of it you even have to do completely alone.
I did tend to come back from time to time to check on new talenttrees and stuff but always lost interest after a couple of weeks. Its just not enough really new stuff. Maybe at some point theyll throw out a bunch of new instances, raids, craftingsystem and so on like other games normally do as an addon and by that time it might actually feel new and rewarding again like in the beginning.
On the whole I found it to be a pleasant shooter type game. Something different from the normal sword and shield games I play.
Got tired of all the side quests real fast, but since the game now supports just playing the main quest line I found it enjoyable. Had a Rep. Solider and liked the story.
Got off the starter planet, did the Hutt one, but then for some reason it would crash when I tried to go onto Tat or Alderaan, the next set of planet's. So it just became unplayable. Didn't care to look into it (maybe like LotRO regions those planets require a purchase?) so I just unloaded it. No great loss in my book.
A nice enough game, but like STO with it's increased XP gain, you have to think there's something just not right if they want you to burn past the lower level stuff to get to max in a much shorter time.
SWG (pre-cu) - AoC (pre-f2p) - PotBS (pre-boarder) - DDO - LotRO (pre-f2p) - STO (pre-f2p) - GnH (beta tester) - SWTOR - Neverwinter
So long as you recognise you are going into a themepark - those idiots tried to sell it as an open world game on launch - then you will be pleased to find it is a rich, interesting and visually dazzling themepark, unlike many of its competitors.
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It was an "OK" game but a "rubbish / disappointing / poor / sub-par" mmo - that certainly didn't hack it as a subscription mmo. Hence they added f2p - although I agree with Nanfoodle it never really dropped the sub. (Although if anyone hasn't tried it and feels the need you can do the "trial" and decide whether you like it or not.)
As for F2P. A trial would be even better, even if it is a shorter duration. They have too many stupid restrictions in place.
Wa min God! Se æx on min heafod is!
I tried to like this game, I really did. Bought the collectors edition for both me and my wife. We played for three months and decided it was trash. Then I came back for the hutt cartel expansion and that pure crap.
Then I came back for the starfighter expansion and that part was fun, but the rest of the game was still trash and now no one plays starfighter anymore. Log in for a game and have to wait an hour for one to launch, so scrap that part if you liked it.
They added housing and then made it the most grindy housing I've ever seen in my life. You buy a house, but then you have to pay to literally unlock doors in the house, each door costing millions if you buy a nice house. Then furnishing it with stuff is going to cost you five times that much.
Then I came back for Shadows of Revan and that was, admittedly, the only fun content in the game. I actually enjoyed that expansion. Although, after about the fourth toon I was utterly done with it too.
Then I came back for about two months after KOTFE and the trash has been taken to the dumpster, picked up by the garbage truck and hauled off to the landfill. Any redeeming qualities this game had left were murdered by KOTFE.
I don't play MMOs for the Story, if I want a rich Story narrative, then I play Single Player games with no Subscription, no Cash Shop and with the whole game that focuses on me.
I play MMOs to play with other people not to lose myself in the rich storyline that alienates me from the multiplayer aspect of it and the other players.
I also find cinematic rather annoying in MMOs and SWTOR has plenty, so deffo not the game for me, but I am sure it's not a bad game if you like a Solo friendly MMO and you are a fan of interactive Movies.
New Game Verdict: Do not touch SWTOR with electrified bargepole.
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EA/BioWare, in my opinion, start off the discussion with "We need to add another gear treadmill and item grind to the game to keep players subscribed, any ideas?"
"Yeah, boss, I have an idea. We could add housing to the game that players have to buy, then we only give them one room in the house with their purchase and make them buy all of the other rooms. The best houses will have doors that cost millions to unlock and no way to preview the room first. Screw it, we'll even make the hallways locked behind a money wall too! That way they think they're getting a room, but it's just a hall to the room! Then we'll add all the decorations that they'll actually want to all of the raids that way, they'll have to grind for gear and for decorations at the same time! We'll make our raids pull double duty for those that don't even need gear anymore! Brilliant!"
If someone had told me in 1999 that I would absolutely hate BioWare and what they've become in 15 years, I would have laughed at their face. It's depressing really.
No, I liked it at first - having hated it four or five years ago - because of the beautifully rendered landscapes (not that you could actually enter them), because of the new ability that allowed you to customise the costumes of your toons and their companions, because of the idea of the housing and because of the XP acceleration scheme that allowed you to whizz through the repetitive and grinding aspects of the game just by concentrating on the character-story missions. Oh, and because I was playing Sith Assassin which allowed you to stealth past the 'group of mobs every ten yards'-trash which would otherwise have driven you mad.
When you get to KotFE, almost all of these features are actually removed or else somehow ruined (for example because the 'bottle zones' of the KotFE missions are so small, the Devs have made it so that 'stealth' doesn't work any more, and all mobs can see you, because if you didn't, you would be able to sail through each zone in two minutes and then wonder why you were paying £10 a month in subscription. As it is, stealth characters now find themselves fighting every twenty seconds and it takes twenty minutes to get through one boring, mind-numbing zone only to get to another in which exactly the same thing happens.
TL:DR - Thanks, but I'm not an idiot sheep.
As others have said though basically an OK single player game (there are better, there are also worse) and they have added OK extra content (some better, some worse).
As an mmo though it has been lacking.
Sad really that (imo) SW BF - a game with no pretension of being an mmo - fulfills the role better.