A Journey Through Star Wars: The Old Republic

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A Journey Through Star Wars: The Old Republic

Two weeks ago, after completing my first Star Wars: The Old Republic column, I was a bit anxious about its next instalment. But just like that and out of the blue, they released the game on Steam.

Read the full story here

Scot

One of the three best story MMOs we have, along with Lotro and FFXIV, you can't knock that. Is it just me or do we have less adbots now?:

"The Shroud Of The Dark Side Has Fallen. Begun, The Adbot War Has!”

Amathe

Good article. Brings back memories.

Jaguaratron1

Shame SWTORS microtransactions are one of the stingiest around, want to do more than a coupe of warzones you got to pay, want to be able to wear a better class of items which you got as a drop? Got to pay.

Its also mind numbingly easy, your companion can solo 99.99% of the game, I wish they would do a classic server which was how it was at launch.

Blippedyblop

Scot said:

One of the three best story MMOs we have, along with Lotro and FFXIV, you can't knock that.

Is it just me or do we have less adbots now?:





"The Shroud Of The Dark Side Has Fallen. Begun, The Adbot War Has!”

Elder Scrolls Online amongst them.

DEXA88

I would call it a journey down the gutter nomather how much they pay for advertisment they should have made some reforms a long time ago. Star Wars is supposed to be about a war going on but there are no massive scale battles just a story you go thru. The battlegrounds are locked at 10 per week and once you go thru the story there is nothing to do.

cameltosis

A well written article, and good to see that the game is getting an injection of new players, that's usually good for the people who already like the game.

I have a few issues.

First, SWTOR is not an MMORPG. It has a player cap of 75 (or, it did when i played it anyway). Thats less than Fortnite and PUBG, neither of which is massively multiplayer. This is one of the reasons I quit the game, I could feel the difference when playing. There were just never any other people around, even if my particular instance had hit the cap of 75 people. It really manifested itself in a shit community: you cannot form social bonds with other people if you don't see other people! I remember running guild events, trying to spark some PvP out in the world. Had maybe 30 of us from the guild, all flagged, running round imp hubs. Often, when we loaded into a new planet, we would be put in an instance by ourselves because existing instances couldn't fit us in! Then, the enemy could never find us because we were in different instances. Absolute joke.


Second, more of a pet peeve: "the fact that SW:TOR, even after so many years, remains the top dog in the field of MMORPG storylines". I'm not saying I disagree with you, but to me this is the equivalent of saying I have the best smelling farts. It may be true, but it still stinks like shit. Storys and games have just never worked well together, even less so in a multiplayer game. I found 99% of SWTOR's stories to be generic and boring. The only stories that were marginally engaging were, like you say, the class stories. But they were a tiny fraction of the game.


Third, MMO populations don't often follow a bell curve. The first generation (pre-wow) followed a vague bell curve, with the peak at the first xpac. The second generation (wow-swtor) generally followed a decreasing curve (peak at launch with rapid decline, slowly steading out over time), but just some short-term positive upticks for xpacs. The third generation (post-swtor, the action combat years) I don't really have much of a clue about as studios stopped releasing numbers.

For SWTOR itself, it sold 2.1m pre-orders, but peaked at 1.7m player month one, dropping to 1.3m month two, then dropping below 500k by month four. 500k was their break-even point, thus prompting the shift to F2P. Theyve never gone over 500k monthly active users since, so definitely not a bell curve for the game.

The only MMO that has actually followed a bell curve for population is WoW itself.


(I know this last point is really pedantic but can't help myself! I spent quite a while studying statistics in school and normal distribution - bell curves - was a big part of it, so I can get a little frustrated when i see it used incorrectly).

Mendel

I'm back playing SW:TOR on Steam.  It does nothing well, as far as game mechanics go, but it does have some bright points and annoyances.  The stories are pretty good, but as @Cameltosis said above, games and stories rarely go together well, especially in MMORPGs.  This game is far too dependent on voice-acting and animated cut-scenes to hold my interest for long, but it is a pretty good diversion from my daily life.

Sovrath

cameltosis said:

Second, more of a pet peeve: "the fact that SW:TOR, even after so many years, remains the top dog in the field of MMORPG storylines". I'm not saying I disagree with you, but to me this is the equivalent of saying I have the best smelling farts. It may be true, but it still stinks like shit. Storys and games have just never worked well together, even less so in a multiplayer game. I found 99% of SWTOR's stories to be generic and boring. The only stories that were marginally engaging were, like you say, the class stories. But they were a tiny fraction of the game.

That's where I disagree with you.

Without story to a game they are just arcade games to me. Fun for short bits but really dull for the long haul. Or they could be puzzle games and that works as well. But again, just for short bits.

For mmorpg's, sure, they can have less story if they actually capitalize on creating "a world." 

Cambruin

MMORPGs have storylines at their core. They're the massive version of a roleplaying game. You play a role within a persistent world, a world both rich in lore and in design. If you say lore, told and experienced mainly through storylines, has no place in MMORPGs, then I think you have a misconception of MMORPGs as a whole.

If you're only in it for the combat and character evolution, you may as well be playing Diablo or Path of Exile. What sets MMORPGs aside from the action combat games ìs the whole lore/questing/storyline within a credible world.
That's how I feel at least.

HazenXIII

Been playing SWTOR since closed beta and a subscriber since launch up until 2 months ago because it's the only (official) Star Wars MMO we have. I hate to say it, but it's a possible Top-20 MMO that SHOULD have been the #1 MMO because of the IP and companies associated with it. Witnessing years and years of bad decision after bad decision by the various dev teams is mind boggling to me. I had decent amounts of fun since 2011, but, like the sequel trilogy, this game could have been sooooo much more. I honestly wish the game would just die, so a new Star Wars MMO can be built from scratch eventually...

Bakgrind

HazenXIII said:

Been playing SWTOR since closed beta and a subscriber since launch up until 2 months ago because it's the only (official) Star Wars MMO we have. I hate to say it, but it's a possible Top-20 MMO that SHOULD have been the #1 MMO because of the IP and companies associated with it. Witnessing years and years of bad decision after bad decision by the various dev teams is mind boggling to me. I had decent amounts of fun since 2011, but, like the sequel trilogy, this game could have been sooooo much more. I honestly wish the game would just die, so a new Star Wars MMO can be built from scratch eventually...

SWTOR's flaws have been numerous, but I think the main reason that it wasn't popular as it should be is because it is based on the KOTOR series. While KOTOR was a very big hit for Bioware it isn't or may not have been all that well known to a lot of Star Wars movie fans. Personally I think they should had based the game at the time of the CLone Wars because there would be more stories,factions and player classes to it than just the Jedi and Sith.

[Deleted User]

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etlar

Nice group game with good story, not so much an mmorpg imho

I mean, i took a Journey in starwars 2 days ago, but that was SWG: legends

record pop: 1902
normally around 1000ísh on in the eu primetime

and in swg i just met more ppl in those 2 days, who actively engaged me in conversation for various reasons. one wanted me to come to Lok with him and his weird wookie friend who kept saying strange and uncomfortable sounds.

yet i had more player interaction in a 18 year olds MMORPG over 2 days, than i had prolly ever had in SWTOR.
sad.

Gruug

I loved SWTOR when it first launched. Even played in the beta. Loved the story driven quests and much of the combat system. When it came, I hated the space portion of the game. It was a passable arcade experience at best. I played maybe five different characters and classes just for the story though. It was great. But like all things, it changed. My first issues with the game was when it went "free-to-play". Not because I was hoping to deny anyone from playing but because I felt I had paid my way to that point and now others were going to take advantage of what I paid for. It soured my experience from then on. I stayed around for maybe three months but the magic was gone. There was no more story. There was just the grind in a game I was paying to play while others were enjoying it for free.

Emeraq

I enjoy this game for what it does well, and that is the story. I leave the PvP (never been my thing) and "raid" content alone. I also don't worry too much about the gear grind as my companions do a fine job of keeping me alive, most of the time. Crafting is a bore, and given that I don't touch the content that gives high end crafting materials, and money cap is limited, I find this also limits crafting.. so I say why bother.

My suggestion is to at least play through the storylines, expansions, and let it sit until new content comes out.

Nanfoodle

Im back playing SWToR as well. I played everything republic so I am on Empire side. With the new legacy bank, I was able to transfer all my credits and tradable items to my new char. So its fun doing new worlds and story I dont know. So having a blast and I love trinity class systems. 

cheyane

I too loved the stories very much. I enjoyed Agent the most. I played  a light Sith Warrior and dark Jedi knight. I had so many characters I lost track at some point. Played beta and launch.