Star Wars: The Old Republic Will Actually Ship This Year

@familyphotoshoot: @familyphotoshoot said:

This game is doomed.

I find your lack of faith disturbing

I'm optimistic about this game. Or rather, I really want to see it do well, for both BioWare's and my KOTOR sequel expectatsions' sakes. 

Would be cool to see the GB crew doing a video series on SWTOR, especially playing as a party, but judging from their Bombcast comments I don't think they'll like it very much.
 
Finally, I hope this sudden announcement for the holiday season doesn't compromise the launch quality of the game. Maybe they're trying to avoid too much competition with Diablo 3. I wouldn't mind buying it at the end of their fiscal year if that extra time meant a smoother release, because MMOs always launch with problems.

@Xeirus said:

@Meowshi said:

Fuck off.

Real mature "kid". People these days, with no common sense. Talk like this to someone in person and see how well that goes, "kid".

Like I said, I'm done with you. If you want to have a conversation with someone, don't start it off with accusing them of trolling. Once again, kindly fuck off.

While I reckon this will easily be the best MMO since vanilla WoW, I think they teased the game far too early, and its unlikely I'll ever invest in a subscription model again.

I have high hopes for this MMO. Ignoring endgame content, I want to believe that each character class has a leveling experience that mimics its own entire KOTOR game. I'll gladly spend the enormous $150 CE asking price if I'm getting hundreds of hours of top-notch BioWare quality gameplay.

That said, I'm crossing my fingers I get a beta invite. $150 is obviously a huge amount of money to spend on a game, and BioWare wouldn't be the first studio to make a crap MMO. The previews they've had of the game don't do them favors.

@Meowshi said:

Fuck off.

Real mature "kid". People these days, with no common sense. Talk like this to someone in person and see how well that goes, "kid".

Oh man, I love that quoted picture. Jeff you hilarious bastard XD

Man, it really pisses me off when people say this game is going to be bad, first off it is a matter of opinion, sooo if you don't like MMO's then don't talk about the game and screw off. Second, this game is being made by Bioware, if you expect anything below a polished and fun game then you are crazy, plus its been in development for almost 6 years, if it is not polished then i have lost all faith in humanity. There is no need to hate on this game just to hate, and for the crazy people that think it will go F2P, if you want the most fully fleshed out, premium and polished experience then you gotta pay for it bub.

Man, it really pisses me off when people say this game is going to be bad, first off it is a matter of opinion, sooo if you don't like MMO's then don't talk about the game and screw off. Second, this game is being made by Bioware, if you expect anything below a polished and fun game then you are crazy, plus its been in development for almost 6 years, if it is not polished then i have lost all faith in humanity. There is no need to hate on this game just to hate, and for the crazy people that think it will go F2P, if you want the most fully fleshed out, premium and polished experience then you gotta pay for it bub.

UTINI !

@MB said:

@Robosaur said:

Does anyone else think that it will start the day of or after Galaxies shuts down?

The first paragraph of the article says the launch of SW:TOR is five days after Galaxies shuts down...

Pretty sure he was referring to the early access.

this will keep me busy until D3

@Drazat said:

This needs to be F2P

There are plenty of F2P MMOs out. This game is aiming for WoW's marketshare.

If it does go F2P, then I'll predict it will just be shut down shortly afterwards. It's too expensive for that.

@Xeirus said:

@Meowshi said:

@Xeirus said:

@CL60 said:

@blueduck said:

@CL60 said:

@blueduck said:

@Meowshi said:

@Benny said:

Too bad for them that they started making this when WOW was at its peak, only to have interest in WOW begin to wane since cataclysm was released.

Quality aside, when guild wars is released; the subscription based model will be completely irrelevant to new games post-WOW, if it isn't already.

With a monthly fee, a developer can churn out patch content at any rate they like and still get money regardless, whereas with guild wars, the onus is on arenanet to get high-quality content out as fast as possible so people can pay them for it. In my opinion, a much better model.

Interest in WoW is dying because the game has been out for years, not because people are tired of the style of gameplay. They just want that style in a shiny new wrapper. What the mass market wants is basically WoW in a brand new setting. That's essentially what this game is offering.

You're insane if you don't think it will be successful.

GW2 is innovative and will most likely be a more engaging game, but it won't sell anywhere near as much as The Old Republic. Quality does not equal sales.

Is that why Rift did so well? It was Wow in a shiny new rapper.

Uhh, Rift is doing well.

Yeah for its budget its doing well but if you took the amount they spent to make TOR it wouldn't be looking so hot right now.

EA has stated they need 500k subs to do good enough, Rift was Trions first game, and it sold around 1.2 million and has a very solid playerbase and is growing. A bioware starwars game with the knights of the old republic name will do just fine..most of the MMO playerbase wants MMOs that play similarly to WoW.

"good enough" won't be enough, I hope the game is great I really do because I want to play it and enjoy it. But from the video they showed (I know, I know, it's not much) this game looks awful. It'll do very well at launch but I promise it will drop off or go f2p after a year. But who knows, to each hsi own.

The game looks like an MMO. People who are disappointed in it are either people who aren't fans of MMOs in general or people who expected something that differed from your standard MMO. Either way, your problem is with the genre, not the game, and it's you're own fault for building up expectations based on nothing. From day one the developers of this game have been honest about what it is.

"We are not re-innovating combat."

"Our game is all about gear."

"We respect the trinity system."

Only way you could have been confused is if you weren't listening.

People still think that a game needs to do WoW numbers to be successful? EA has already said they only need a million subscribers to break even. Even SWG managed to sell a million copies, and it was a steaming pile of shit. If you people want to ignore Bioware's name recognition, Star War's franchise appeal, and the massive amount of hype these games have; then be my guest. Just don't pretend like your predictions of dumb are based on any sort of logic.

I"m basing my opinion on the trailers they have shown, literally everything from this game that's been posted is pure recycled copy/paste battles from every MMO out there.

I think you need to calm down, you act as is you work for the damn company. It's an opinion, I have mine, you have... whatever yours is, I can't tell, just seems like you're trolling.

Fuck off. If you lack the mental capacity to handle a discussion with someone who disagrees with you, then you shouldn't be a part of this discussion. I'm not interested in having a discussion with some halfwit who is going to accuse me of trolling. Grow up, kid.

@wompa421 said:

@Meowshi said:

@wompa421 said:

I still don't know about this game if it wasn't an MMO I would definitely buy it but since it is one I'm going to wait till giant bomb does some coverage and a review on it to see if its worth me sinking a lot of time into it. The only MMO I've played was City of Villains and I played the shit out of it I did play WOW for a week and got bored hopefully this game is worth it because there are a lot of games coming out late in the year that I'm interested in.

That is an incredibly silly decision. Giant Bomb is not the place you go for MMO coverage or reviews. None of the main four even like MMOs, and they've already stated they have no interest in the game several times. If you're relying on this site to determine whether or not to buy an MMO, you might as well use it to determine which JRPGs and EA sports titles you want as well.

oh i didn't know everyone there said they had no interest in it i guess i'll have to go with gamerevolution.com and game informer and other places for the review.

Yeah, certain genres of games aren't well-represented on the site; mainly because there's only four guys!

Totally read that headline as "Star Wars: The Old Republic Wii ships this year". Blew my mind for about three seconds.

@ucankurbaga said:

@GreenOcelot: Don't worry it will go f2p in 6 months.

I don't see it going fully F2P but i do believe at some point they will have a F2P option running along side the subs like what is happening with Star trek online, DC universe etc why they are not launching that way from the start i don't know it would be better for them in the long run if they did.

@GreenOcelot: Don't worry it will go f2p in 6 months.

That last part has me genuinely excited.

just wish MMO's were cheaper, i'm a poor scummy student god dammit!

tons of people waiting in the queue for TRO at Eurogamer this weekend

Looking forward to this title but trying as hard as i can to not get too excited as a lot of the testers are saying that this is basically WOW with lazer swords and WOW isn't a game i really enjoyed. I enjoyed Galaxies for the first few years of it coming out so trying as much as possible to remain positive, Bioware do tell some great stories so i hope this is the case here too.

This needs to be F2P

@Robosaur said:

Does anyone else think that it will start the day of or after Galaxies shuts down?

The first paragraph of the article says the launch of SW:TOR is five days after Galaxies shuts down...

Does anyone else think that it will start the day of or after Galaxies shuts down?

No Christmas vaycay for any Bioware employees then!

@IndieFinch: That's a overblown myth. Server costs are no-where near that expensive, and they are making millions in profit from retail sales alone, not to mention the sales of the expansions every odd year. The profit margins of WoW are astronomical.

I'm surprised this is coming out before next year, but aside from being Star Wars, this game just isn't getting me excited for it. It seems like WoWm but I wish it the best.

@lockload: that was pretty cool of them, but man. I have done EVERYTHING they've asked of me with no beta invite. I pre-ordered the collector's edition, I've attended every PAX presentation they've made, I even read an issue of the comic book! What do I get? A testing weekend that was short on both sides because of technical issues! JUST LET ME IN ALREADY BIOWARE.

If you have to wait for January to do a series on the game, I'd be glad to wait. Having a slightly more mature community and a few server stability patches might even help.

@Meowshi said:

@Xeirus said:

@CL60 said:

@blueduck said:

@CL60 said:

@blueduck said:

@Meowshi said:

@Benny said:

Too bad for them that they started making this when WOW was at its peak, only to have interest in WOW begin to wane since cataclysm was released.

Quality aside, when guild wars is released; the subscription based model will be completely irrelevant to new games post-WOW, if it isn't already.

With a monthly fee, a developer can churn out patch content at any rate they like and still get money regardless, whereas with guild wars, the onus is on arenanet to get high-quality content out as fast as possible so people can pay them for it. In my opinion, a much better model.

Interest in WoW is dying because the game has been out for years, not because people are tired of the style of gameplay. They just want that style in a shiny new wrapper. What the mass market wants is basically WoW in a brand new setting. That's essentially what this game is offering.

You're insane if you don't think it will be successful.

GW2 is innovative and will most likely be a more engaging game, but it won't sell anywhere near as much as The Old Republic. Quality does not equal sales.

Is that why Rift did so well? It was Wow in a shiny new rapper.

Uhh, Rift is doing well.

Yeah for its budget its doing well but if you took the amount they spent to make TOR it wouldn't be looking so hot right now.

EA has stated they need 500k subs to do good enough, Rift was Trions first game, and it sold around 1.2 million and has a very solid playerbase and is growing. A bioware starwars game with the knights of the old republic name will do just fine..most of the MMO playerbase wants MMOs that play similarly to WoW.

"good enough" won't be enough, I hope the game is great I really do because I want to play it and enjoy it. But from the video they showed (I know, I know, it's not much) this game looks awful. It'll do very well at launch but I promise it will drop off or go f2p after a year. But who knows, to each hsi own.

The game looks like an MMO. People who are disappointed in it are either people who aren't fans of MMOs in general or people who expected something that differed from your standard MMO. Either way, your problem is with the genre, not the game, and it's you're own fault for building up expectations based on nothing. From day one the developers of this game have been honest about what it is.

"We are not re-innovating combat."

"Our game is all about gear."

"We respect the trinity system."

Only way you could have been confused is if you weren't listening.

People still think that a game needs to do WoW numbers to be successful? EA has already said they only need a million subscribers to break even. Even SWG managed to sell a million copies, and it was a steaming pile of shit. If you people want to ignore Bioware's name recognition, Star War's franchise appeal, and the massive amount of hype these games have; then be my guest. Just don't pretend like your predictions of dumb are based on any sort of logic.

I"m basing my opinion on the trailers they have shown, literally everything from this game that's been posted is pure recycled copy/paste battles from every MMO out there.

I think you need to calm down, you act as is you work for the damn company. It's an opinion, I have mine, you have... whatever yours is, I can't tell, just seems like you're trolling.

After reading that EA Louse blog earlier this year I'm wondering if this game is even worth bothering with.

Meh. I decided to wait for Guild Wars 2. That's got me excited. Plus, I have a friend who was in the SWTOR beta, and he came away unimpressed. I may do a trial to see if its worth my time and money. That, and my preorder money was switched to a PS Vita once I heard about what the game's like.

I really like the dialog in the game,is a shame...because from what I've seen,that's pretty much it.

which is not enough.

@Funkydupe said:

@CitizenJP said:

My life is over lol. I want to cry with joy.

Your new life begins in a galaxy far, far away...

LOL YES! ( 7 ^_^)7

I'll believe it when I see it.

I think the game will do fine in terms of sales and player base. I'll be interested in trying it out once they start a free trial sometime down the line.

Can't say that im too interested, but can't wait for the video.

seems like they where pressured by investors to announce a permanent release date cant wait for the finished product though

@Meowshi said:

@wompa421 said:

I still don't know about this game if it wasn't an MMO I would definitely buy it but since it is one I'm going to wait till giant bomb does some coverage and a review on it to see if its worth me sinking a lot of time into it. The only MMO I've played was City of Villains and I played the shit out of it I did play WOW for a week and got bored hopefully this game is worth it because there are a lot of games coming out late in the year that I'm interested in.

That is an incredibly silly decision. Giant Bomb is not the place you go for MMO coverage or reviews. None of the main four even like MMOs, and they've already stated they have no interest in the game several times. If you're relying on this site to determine whether or not to buy an MMO, you might as well use it to determine which JRPGs and EA sports titles you want as well.

oh i didn't know everyone there said they had no interest in it i guess i'll have to go with gamerevolution.com and game informer and other places for the review.

Kinda makes up for the delay to Diablo III (as i was hoping late 2011) so I'm now looking forward to Jeff and Co playing this for a QL as well (hoping its not sub only!).

@CitizenJP said:

My life is over lol. I want to cry with joy.

Your new life begins in a galaxy far, far away...

@Edwardryu said:

actually, I don't understand MMO why I have to pay even more after buying. subscription? my ass. once you paid for it, you don't need to pay more if it is not DLC. that's why I never play this kind of bullshit including WOW, possibly Diablo 3 or whatever. what a stupid people are! they don't even realize that they pay even more and more. one time you buy. that's all. don't want to waste my damn money for nothing.

It is because it costs a lot of money to run the servers. Running the persistent world and supporting that many player iterations over such a long period of time costs a lot of money. Plus you need 24/7 staff on hand to take care of customer service because people have in game problems at all hours. On top of that they push out constant updates. With WoW for an example, you spend the $50 to get the original content. Then each month they patch in more quests, items, raids..etc. Purely from the amount of time you can spend in the game, it is cheaper to play a game like WoW then to purchase new titles. I played WoW for 6 years with over 275 days of /played across 3 characters. Throughout that time I didn't purchase 360/PS3 games, just played WoW. The game essentially never ends, where as many $60 games end within 7 or 8 hours and are done for good.

@Redbullet685 said:

Meh. I don't like MMO's.

thanks for the info.

Not even Star Wars can make me endure the repetition of MMORPG gameplay.

It seems like a lot of people are planning to play this as a single player type experience and it has me wondering how Bioware plans to keep people playing after they have completed all the stories.

@zymbo said:

@BeepBeepBoop said:

People sure like to complain a lot.

Well I preordered about a week ago, and I'm excited. I'm not expecting the second coming of MMOs, I'm expecting a story driven MMO with companions in space, so I doubt I will be disappointed.

I played WoW for quite a while and enjoyed it so if the combat is similar, I'm cool with that. Plus I don't have time for WoW endgame anymore so the idea of just rerolling and having a whole new story is pretty exciting for me.

All in all I'm just excited to make a smuggler and shoot first, with a wookie by my side.

Pretty much my thoughts too. Not looking for anything revolutionary here. Just want a decent story and a lot of single player/small group action.

Exactly. 8 different BioWare stories set in the Star Wars universe, each with their own group of companions. Of course I'll buy that!

My life is over lol. I want to cry with joy.

@BeepBeepBoop said:

People sure like to complain a lot.

Well I preordered about a week ago, and I'm excited. I'm not expecting the second coming of MMOs, I'm expecting a story driven MMO with companions in space, so I doubt I will be disappointed.

I played WoW for quite a while and enjoyed it so if the combat is similar, I'm cool with that. Plus I don't have time for WoW endgame anymore so the idea of just rerolling and having a whole new story is pretty exciting for me.

All in all I'm just excited to make a smuggler and shoot first, with a wookie by my side.

Pretty much my thoughts too. Not looking for anything revolutionary here. Just want a decent story and a lot of single player/small group action.

@smikey said:

Actually why don't you just put up videos of you playing STO? Let people see what the recent changes in the game are actually like.

This.

Looking forward to this. Be a nice Christmas treat.