And now that I`ve seen the game for myself I have to say that it meets all my expectations:  
A polished yet unremarkable MMO experience that`s been done to death and I have no interest in repeating. 
 
- Graphics wise the game looks ok, it is not striking, but it`s perfectly fine.  

- I love the music and sound design in general. 
 
- A lot of fanboys out there have been pushing really hard the "this doesnt have the average MMO quest structure" line, but it does. Fetch 20 of these, kill 15 of that, find this boss, etc.
 
- Combat  is exactly what you would expect from a WoW clone, which confirms what I`ve feared for a long time. Bioware was not looking to innovate, but to improve (in extremely subtle ways) on an old formula that in my opinion needs to remain in the past. Although there is some degree of satisfaction to be had hurling junk at enemies, cutting them down with your lightsaber or shooting them down, the mechanics of "press 1, press 2, right click, stare at cooldowns, repeat" simply doesnt cut it anymore. 
 
- No gamepad support. I know many would jump at my throat for adding this to the list, but I think that if you are going to make me perform repetitive mindless tasks for countless hours you should at least provide a way for me to do so from a comfortable position. I am aware of the existence of xpadder, but there is a big difference between building an interface from the ground up to work with a controller and using software to trick the game into letting me play the way I want to. 
 
- Last but not least, something that bothers me more than I expected it would, can be express in the following way: 
"I have good news and bad news, good news is everyone gets to be a Jedi. Bad news is everyone gets to be a Jedi" 
I understand that nobody wants to shoot a crappy laser gun when they could destroy their enemies with the wave of a hand, but I kept thinking to myself that there was a time when being a Jedi was badass and cool and that time has past. 
 
All of the above is of course my personal opinion. GLHB!

And now that I`ve seen the game for myself I have to say that it meets all my expectations:  
A polished yet unremarkable MMO experience that`s been done to death and I have no interest in repeating. 
 
- Graphics wise the game looks ok, it is not striking, but it`s perfectly fine.  

- I love the music and sound design in general. 
 
- A lot of fanboys out there have been pushing really hard the "this doesnt have the average MMO quest structure" line, but it does. Fetch 20 of these, kill 15 of that, find this boss, etc.
 
- Combat  is exactly what you would expect from a WoW clone, which confirms what I`ve feared for a long time. Bioware was not looking to innovate, but to improve (in extremely subtle ways) on an old formula that in my opinion needs to remain in the past. Although there is some degree of satisfaction to be had hurling junk at enemies, cutting them down with your lightsaber or shooting them down, the mechanics of "press 1, press 2, right click, stare at cooldowns, repeat" simply doesnt cut it anymore. 
 
- No gamepad support. I know many would jump at my throat for adding this to the list, but I think that if you are going to make me perform repetitive mindless tasks for countless hours you should at least provide a way for me to do so from a comfortable position. I am aware of the existence of xpadder, but there is a big difference between building an interface from the ground up to work with a controller and using software to trick the game into letting me play the way I want to. 
 
- Last but not least, something that bothers me more than I expected it would, can be express in the following way: 
"I have good news and bad news, good news is everyone gets to be a Jedi. Bad news is everyone gets to be a Jedi" 
I understand that nobody wants to shoot a crappy laser gun when they could destroy their enemies with the wave of a hand, but I kept thinking to myself that there was a time when being a Jedi was badass and cool and that time has past. 
 
All of the above is of course my personal opinion. GLHB!

To be honest, this style of MMO has set expectations from its consumer base. It's a genre with well-defined qualities, like modern military FPS', sports games, and driving sims. There's nothing wrong with ticking off the boxes and making subtle improvements, because the really left wing stuff is still out there to play and is still being made. EVE online is still going pretty strong, and that game is utterly unlike WoW in virtually every way.

That's the way I look at this game, and having played it, I can say it does a good job at being an MMO game and an even better job at telling a story while doing so. Still, I'm inclined to agree with you on one point... too many Jedi, thematically this just doesn't quite feel like the Star Wars I want to be a part of.

Game would be a lot better if it was a Singleplayer game. I find myself wanting everyone else to go away, tbh! Sure, I'm not playing with friends yet and thats really the only time where I'll think "oh i'm glad this is an MMO.." otherwise i'll be running about trying to find enemies to tag and kill before the 10 other people do so. The graphics aren't that good, i expected a little better tbh. I'd seen some screenshots and they looked alright, maybe it's the lack of AA (though I tried to force it through gfx card) in the beta.. but ugh everything looks like its 3 years out of date. I don't mind the style, but some of the textures should be a bit better on a high texture quality setting. I have no doubt that it won't last very long, and certainly won't sustain a playerbase for more than a year. I think WAR has probably been the best MMO yet bar WoW, and so far SWTOR isn't really making me believe I should change that view. Some things are alright, I quite like the character interaction. It's quite cool, and the creation of characters seemed not bad. If this was a SP game, I think I'd buy it. Since its an MMO there is a certain amount of commitment that you need to be in for. If I decide "meh" I'm not hugely digging this "I'll come back to it later" then that means that I'll need to pay another £9 for the month. I made a mistake with DC Universe online and this reeks of that with a bit more polish.

I´ve been invited to the next beta test starting tomorrow , so I´ll see how it fares with me , but to be honest I havent played mmos , much less WoW , except Final Fantasy XI , so perhaps all the things that you find not all that interesting may seem wonderful to me and perhaps that is the people Bioware are going for ... as for the too many Jedi thing , that the most stupid reason for not liking a game ... too many Jedi really? Jedi Order means more than 2 you know , this is the thing I find the most annoying to complain for all those "fans" of Star Wars.

I'll give it a shot if it has a free trial.

After playing about 40 minutes I spotted just about every gripe I have with modern MMOs. They didn't even try to hide the fact they copy pasted nearly every mechanic from previous MMOs. Pretty disheartening, you think Bioware would break the standard stale market. I didn't even feel like I was playing a Star Wars game minus the sound design.

As I figured they spent the majority of their time on that portion. As a side effect everything else suffers. I guess I'll try it out for another hour or two, but I doubt it will change my mind.

One thing, small detail may it be, when a laser is coming your direction, don't even bother moving because they are homing lasers...

Couldn't agree more.

This will initially be a big hit with easily impressed kids who have little to no experience with MMOs, but it's unlikely enough of them will stay interested in it for long enough to make it a longterm success.

One day publishers will learn to stop putting millions of dollars into developing stale, bland, unoriginal cookie-cutter MMOs, hoping for huge profits.

Today is obviously not anywhere near that day.

You guys do realize you are complaining about not liking the game because it is an mmo that plays like an mmo right? Long story short, if you don't like mmo's you are not going to like the mmo named SW:ToR.

I enjoyed my beta experience a few months ago, but then I never got into WoW.

@Karkarov said:

You guys do realize you are complaining about not liking the game because it is an mmo that plays like an mmo right? Long story short, if you don't like mmo's you are not going to like the mmo named SW:ToR.

Define what an MMO should play like? (rhetorical) Is there some MMO cook book out there handed out to every game developer prior to game development? Saying that one game should look and play exactly like one another is an absurd comment to make. More specifically about a very successful company such as Bioware. If you don't like MMOs you will likely have a better chance of enjoying this game. If you do like/love MMOs you are likely to be more critical of the game, seeing how you know what the market has come to these days, first hand.

I'll echo the sentiments that it makes me wish it was a single player experience. I like the graphics/art style, I've enjoyed what I've played of the story and the voice acting is pretty good (I went republic trooper because he has the same VA as Varric from DA2). I don't even mind the combat that much...it's just I've never really enjoyed MMOs, so I'm left wishing that it was Knights of the Old Republic 3.

agreed. and i picked bounty hunger as to not be another dude with a lightsaber.... BORING AS HELL.

So far I'm enjoying it.
Not loving it, but enjoying it.
This should be fun to 50 once.

I'll only get it if I can play a Gungan.

I like the general MMO formula and I love the Star Wars universe so being able to play a part in my favourite universe with mechanics that I do not find offensive is a win-win for me.

so you wrote this to say you were a skeptic and still are a skeptic and played it for a couple hours to confirm it is an MMO and therefore is what you set out to prove it was.

Got it. You have every right to nay say, but I will respectfully disagree =)

@Patman99 said:

I like the general MMO formula and I love the Star Wars universe so being able to play a part in my favourite universe with mechanics that I do not find offensive is a win-win for me.

This is fundamentally how I feel about it as well.

@Karkarov said:

You guys do realize you are complaining about not liking the game because it is an mmo that plays like an mmo right? Long story short, if you don't like mmo's you are not going to like the mmo named SW:ToR.

@Giantstalker said:

To be honest, this style of MMO has set expectations from its consumer base. It's a genre with well-defined qualities, like modern military FPS', sports games, and driving sims. There's nothing wrong with ticking off the boxes and making subtle improvements, because the really left wing stuff is still out there to play and is still being made. EVE online is still going pretty strong, and that game is utterly unlike WoW in virtually every way.

That's the way I look at this game, and having played it, I can say it does a good job at being an MMO game and an even better job at telling a story while doing so. Still, I'm inclined to agree with you on one point... too many Jedi, thematically this just doesn't quite feel like the Star Wars I want to be a part of.

This is exactly the problem and why The Old Republic isn't going to do nearly as well as Bioware and EA hopes.

They weren't looking for just another MMO formula game, hell they weren't even selling it as that. They want the next big thing to have people pay 15 bucks a month for.

Mainstream success is what they were looking for, and just another MMO isn't going to do it. The MMO crowd isn't viable for this big of a game.

I doubt even WoW diehards are going to switch over since they're so invested in Azaroth instead of Star Wars.

so you wrote this to say you were a skeptic and still are a skeptic and played it for a couple hours to confirm it is an MMO and therefore is what you set out to prove it was.

Got it. You have every right to nay say, but I will respectfully disagree =)

@Patman99 said:

I like the general MMO formula and I love the Star Wars universe so being able to play a part in my favourite universe with mechanics that I do not find offensive is a win-win for me.

This is fundamentally how I feel about it as well.

@Doctorchimp said:

I doubt even WoW diehards are going to switch over since they're so invested in Azaroth instead of Star Wars.

^ this is the biggest thing that will hurt this MMO. When someone looks at the time they have put in WoW and that they have a community that are play with. Dropping that and moving to start it again is a hard sell. Regardless whether the game is "better" or not.

Personally I've enjoyed what I have got to play. It is my first MMO and I love bioware games so i'm very much biased. (i've also been playing it solo). But I can understand why people are not enjoying it. Due to it being so similar to other MMO's that they have already played for X amount of hours.

I don't understand the people complaining that blasters home in and lightsabers aren't a 1-hit kill when huge world-breaking swords and demon-forged rifles in WoW do the exact same things and the same can be said for pretty much every game with combat ever.

It's a game.

Furthermore, EA never set out to do anything other than make money, as do all businesses, and even though this wont beat or cripple or damage wow in any significant way, or set the world ablaze, they'll make a profit and will have accomplished their goals in the safest, most uninteresting and uninspired way they possibly could.

And who can blame them? People like money.

Letting everyone be a Jedi is the worst possible design decision you could make for this game.

I completely agree. It's an average MMO, if you still enjoy games like WoW, it's perfectly fine.. but it feels very dated and lazy.

I don't think it's designed very well and it only very loosely adheres to the Star Wars universe, which is maybe just me being nit-picky, but so much of it feels off and un-Star Wars like. Things like having the Jedi Temple on Coruscant destroyed is obviously just an excuse for them to design their own version of it elsewhere. I think they would have been better off making a Mass Effect MMO, or a completely new sci-fi universe. But that wouldn't make as much money, would it?

I won't act like they're the only company trying to make money, but it very much feels like a game that was designed by the investors. It's a shameless, unexciting, cash grab.

I had fun, but i'm just in the prologue. Yes, all quests are kill/fetch with a story attached some really trivial and some connected to your character class. Combat was standard. I liked using cover though. Seems like a solid MMO but it isn't a revolution that's for sure. I sometimes found the weirdest parts were the other players and how detached my game is from theirs. We're all running around dressing the same doing the same quests, running past each other, but there's hardly any incentive to interact in the early stages.. I teamed with a guy for some tougher quests and the we disbanded the group and thats my multiplayer experience in this MMO so far, very thin.

• About the quests--sure, they're the same in concept, but having that Mass Effect style set up for almost all the quests really helps make me feel like I'm always doing something relevant since there is story to them. I didn't feel like I was just grinding up levels like I do in other MMOs during my beta access (got to almost level 11, maybe it starts to lose it's novelty eventually.)
• Don't agree that it needs gamepad support. (Just not enough buttons to use your spells after like level 10 at the latest)
• Combat was definitely MMO combat. Whether that's good or not is up to each individual to decide.
• And I guess I'm one of the people that likes Star Wars mainly because Jedis are fucking awesome. I might not even consider playing this if it wasn't for Jedi's being awesome, so if I couldn't play as one... that would blow. I understand where you come from though.
• Did enjoy the music.
• Graphics are better than average MMO graphics in my opinion, but still nothing special.

So yeah, I found it to be fun, but not without its flaws. I'll probably pick it up sometime and play through it as a single player RPG. That's how I was enjoying the beta.

Average mmo? I get the feeling most of you don't realize that would require it to be a barely playable snorefest piece of shit. Which it isn't.

As far as sales go this game will easily be the best selling opening week of any mmo in history.

Nothing to separate it from other mmo's you say? Uh... fully voiced? The story is actually about your character? Alignment choices? (you did know light dark choices effect your end game gear options, personal story, companions, abilities, and even potentially your character appearance right?) New PVP arena games that are more than capture the flag or control point xyz? The entire companion character and crafting system being completely different from any other mmo (save a few I doubt any of you have ever heard of)? This doesn't even get into the entire concept of the soft trinity, advanced class options, raids, end game pvp, branching paths through small team dungeons, or the million other things they are trying to tailor to their game and improve on.

Anyone who has followed this game at all knew it was not out to reinvent the wheel. Hell give me enough time I could find you interviews given by SW:ToR's game makers who flat out say they were not looking to redefine mmo's but instead improve upon them. Unrealistic expectations from people who more than likely don't even play mmo's and have not followed the game isn't Bioware's fault.

Lastly.... not star wars??? Ridiculous. It looks like KotOR, sounds like KotOR, and has been written by the same people who wrote KotOR. I think it is pretty clear what that adds up to. You don't like alot of people being jedi? Get over it. If you couldn't play as one then they may as well had not bothered making the game in the first place and anyone with common sense knows that. Also for a cheap cash in attempt it sure cost alot of money. Like.... more than any video game ever made.

I can´t wait to try out the beta tomorrow and come to the exact same conclusions.

So I actually went through my Skyrim quest list and figured out that I had 10 separate quests that were "go to cave, get my hat, bring hat back, get money". I also have a bunch of misc quests that are "go to bandit tower, kill bandit boss". I also have a quest that is about collecting 4 random items and bringing them back. In 42 hours there have been about three conversations/cutscenes that I felt were written and performed well. There is one path through all of the quests, 90% of the time they don't even give you a dialogue choice.

And yet Old Republic gets blasted for having the exact same quests, with better writing and performance. I don't get it.

I'll say this, in 2-3 hours with Old Republic, I wasn't doing the quests so I could level up and get a new pair of boots. I didn't even know about the rewards until the quest finished. I did them because I wanted to see what would happen next in the story. I wanted to see who the 'Black Death' killing innocent Evocii really was, and then during the cutscene I was given three pretty interesting choices of how to proceed. After that happened, the rewards were a bonus. In Mass Effect I completed all the loyalty missions and side missions just because I wanted to see everything in that game... in World of Warcraft I skip entire quest lines because I've levelled past them. That's an important distinction. Playing through my starting zone, I was tracking down every quest and seeing them through because I wanted the completeness of the story, whereas every other MMO out there the quests are just there to make it seem less grindy.

Average mmo? I get the feeling most of you don't realize that would require it to be a barely playable snorefest piece of shit. Which it isn't.

As far as sales go this game will easily be the best selling opening week of any mmo in history.

Nothing to separate it from other mmo's you say? Uh... fully voiced? The story is actually about your character? Alignment choices? (you did know light dark choices effect your end game gear options, personal story, companions, abilities, and even potentially your character appearance right?) New PVP arena games that are more than capture the flag or control point xyz? The entire companion character and crafting system being completely different from any other mmo (save a few I doubt any of you have ever heard of)? This doesn't even get into the entire concept of the soft trinity, advanced class options, raids, end game pvp, branching paths through small team dungeons, or the million other things they are trying to tailor to their game and improve on.

Anyone who has followed this game at all knew it was not out to reinvent the wheel. Hell give me enough time I could find you interviews given by SW:ToR's game makers who flat out say they were not looking to redefine mmo's but instead improve upon them. Unrealistic expectations from people who more than likely don't even play mmo's and have not followed the game isn't Bioware's fault.

Lastly.... not star wars??? Ridiculous. It looks like KotOR, sounds like KotOR, and has been written by the same people who wrote KotOR. I think it is pretty clear what that adds up to. You don't like alot of people being jedi? Get over it. If you couldn't play as one then they may as well had not bothered making the game in the first place and anyone with common sense knows that. Also for a cheap cash in attempt it sure cost alot of money. Like.... more than any video game ever made.

So I actually went through my Skyrim quest list and figured out that I had 10 separate quests that were "go to cave, get my hat, bring hat back, get money". I also have a bunch of misc quests that are "go to bandit tower, kill bandit boss". I also have a quest that is about collecting 4 random items and bringing them back. In 42 hours there have been about three conversations/cutscenes that I felt were written and performed well. There is one path through all of the quests, 90% of the time they don't even give you a dialogue choice.

And yet Old Republic gets blasted for having the exact same quests, with better writing and performance. I don't get it.

I'll say this, in 2-3 hours with Old Republic, I wasn't doing the quests so I could level up and get a new pair of boots. I didn't even know about the rewards until the quest finished. I did them because I wanted to see what would happen next in the story. I wanted to see who the 'Black Death' killing innocent Evocii really was, and then during the cutscene I was given three pretty interesting choices of how to proceed. After that happened, the rewards were a bonus. In Mass Effect I completed all the loyalty missions and side missions just because I wanted to see everything in that game... in World of Warcraft I skip entire quest lines because I've levelled past them. That's an important distinction. Playing through my starting zone, I was tracking down every quest and seeing them through because I wanted the completeness of the story, whereas every other MMO out there the quests are just there to make it seem less grindy.

@Karkarov: Yes, the presentation is nice, but nothing about the core gameplay changes what you'd expect from a typical MMO. Other MMO's these days also have big stories, a focus on your character, etc. Fair enough, maybe they weren't setting out to make anything significantly new, but that's not a very good excuse for dated gameplay that's a snore to play.

As for it not feeling like Star Wars, that complaint is more about the Knights of the Old Republic universe in general, but Bioware set a lot of the standards there and it's still a valid complaint. Padawans not using lightsabers is stupid, moving the Jedi counsel, technology being completely stagnant for thousands of years, etc. There are too many gaping holes in the lore, and as a Star Wars fan, it bugs me.

I expect the game to do very well, but it's going to feel even more dated and redundant by next year, and with even Blizzard set to release a new MMO.. it's going to be left in the dust quite quickly. It's a solid enough game, but it's not 2004 any more.

I played WoW from vanilla to just before Firelands got released and the quests I enjoyed the most from that game was to Take a dump outside some hut in Wotlk (you ate some apples or sth). I doubt I read a single quest text and quite frankly I didnt give a shit, I played the game for the social aspect while having enjoyment from butchering mob and player alike.

I tried Riften. I still dont got a god damned clue why there were tentacles from the sky all over. Got some vague memory of gods or something. Alright wow-clone in every aspect.

SWTOR combat is kind of similar to wow. That isnt a bad thing necessarily. Its fluent and itll get a bit more fun when you utilize it fully. The big difference is that I care about the story (no, Im no Star Wars-freak. Ive seen the three first movies and thats it.). I care about the quests. Its presented in a great way. Hell, I dont even notice quests are retrival quests (but then again, cant you include pretty much anything into that category?) as the retrival is secondary. The reward is the story. As someone wrote, the writing is better than Skyrim and the side quests are way less obvious (Damn Jarl, you got alot of bounties and the Jarl of Winterhold sure got alot of ancient helmets scattered over Skyrim!).

@White_Silhouette said:

@Doctorchimp said:

I doubt even WoW diehards are going to switch over since they're so invested in Azaroth instead of Star Wars.

^ this is the biggest thing that will hurt this MMO. When someone looks at the time they have put in WoW and that they have a community that are play with. Dropping that and moving to start it again is a hard sell. Regardless whether the game is "better" or not.

Personally I've enjoyed what I have got to play. It is my first MMO and I love bioware games so i'm very much biased. (i've also been playing it solo). But I can understand why people are not enjoying it. Due to it being so similar to other MMO's that they have already played for X amount of hours.

Most everybody I've been playing WoW with have around a YEARs worth of playtime, many substantially more. The genre is in dire need of a revolution, at least from where I am sitting. The WoW template MMO has literally been done to death. Personally, I have big hopes for Guild Wars 2. Their subtle, but meaningful changes to worldbuilding and questdesign and combat mechanics might just do the trick. From what limited experience I have with SW:TOR, the storytelling angle just isn't enough to excite, when the core gameplay is what it is. But that's just me, I've done way too much of this core gameplay template MMO already. Many have not and maybe aren't as tired of this tried and true formula. It simply puts me to sleep.

I'm still skeptical of their ability to support this game from an infrastructure point of view. This weekend's beta test has been going on since Friday morning and there is now an almost 60-page thread on the support forums of people, myself included, whose accounts have yet to be flagged for beta access with nary a word from BioWare's support or tech team. Sure it's a beta, but this is as good a sign as any for things to come from the game's account services at launch.

@Seppli said:

@White_Silhouette said:

@Doctorchimp said:

I doubt even WoW diehards are going to switch over since they're so invested in Azaroth instead of Star Wars.

^ this is the biggest thing that will hurt this MMO. When someone looks at the time they have put in WoW and that they have a community that are play with. Dropping that and moving to start it again is a hard sell. Regardless whether the game is "better" or not.

Personally I've enjoyed what I have got to play. It is my first MMO and I love bioware games so i'm very much biased. (i've also been playing it solo). But I can understand why people are not enjoying it. Due to it being so similar to other MMO's that they have already played for X amount of hours.

Most everybody I've been playing WoW with have around a YEARs worth of playtime, many substantially more. The genre is in dire need of a revolution, at least from where I am sitting. The WoW template MMO has literally been done to death. Personally, I have big hopes for Guild Wars 2. Their subtle, but meaningful changes to worldbuilding and questdesign and combat mechanics might just do the trick. From what limited experience I have with SW:TOR, the storytelling angle just isn't enough to excite, when the core gameplay is what it is. But that's just me, I've done way too much of this core gameplay template MMO already. Many have not and maybe aren't as tired of this tried and true formula. It simply puts me to sleep.

I have multiple level 85s in WoW, played Everquest 1 and 2 a lot, and played pretty much every MMO to come out in the past few years and I still love the way this type of MMO plays. Usually when an MMO tries to change that it fails horribly, and usually those are the MMOs I'm skeptical about, not the ones that I already know I like.

Even though this game tempts me, I'm probably end up not going to play it. MMO's have a weird effect on me ; they don't entertain me at all. MMO's are usually so mundane that you only get entertained when you reach your goal, which is probably to have the best character possible. The road to get there, for me, isn't entertaining. It's a long, mundane chore that transforms entertainment into any other dayly activity. Oddly enough, I've come to that realisation after three years of WoW. From 2004 to 2007.

A lot of it is incredibly boring to me and the whole story angle isn't exciting enough.

No purchase!

Well, it has the same boring MMO-gameplay that all MMOs seem to have nowadays, go to area, speak to all NPCs with symbols above their head, go to monster-area, attack monster by spamming 1, 2, 3, 4, 5... wait for someone to group you for heroic questline, return to first area to talk to NPCs again, move to new area, repeat.

Sure ToR has alot of dialogue that makes all the questing seem more interesting, but the only thing I feel when playing it other than pleasant surprise (for some reason the game actually is more enjoyable than WoW/AoC/WHO), is that the game should have been an epic singleplayer experience.

Dont care much for the art-design and so what if everyone can play Jedis, in the old republic those were pretty common. Not that I played a jedi, I went Smuggler.

@Rattle618 said:

No gamepad support. I know many would jump at my throat for adding this to the list, but I think that if you are going to make me perform repetitive mindless tasks for countless hours you should at least provide a way for me to do so from a comfortable position. I am aware of the existence of xpadder, but there is a big difference between building an interface from the ground up to work with a controller and using software to trick the game into letting me play the way I want to.

I'm completely with you on gamepad support. I don't play any MMOs so I don't know if this is the norm or not, but holding the mouse buttons + scrolling to move the camera is weird. I wish I could use an Xbox controller and play KoTOR-style or just click in a direction Diablo-style with the mouse.

Im gonna play through this in one month single player style or with a buddy. Then I'll probably cancel, cant see this as good enough to play long term.

@JoeyIA said:

@Rattle618 said:

No gamepad support. I know many would jump at my throat for adding this to the list, but I think that if you are going to make me perform repetitive mindless tasks for countless hours you should at least provide a way for me to do so from a comfortable position. I am aware of the existence of xpadder, but there is a big difference between building an interface from the ground up to work with a controller and using software to trick the game into letting me play the way I want to.

I'm completely with you on gamepad support. I don't play any MMOs so I don't know if this is the norm or not, but holding the mouse buttons + scrolling to move the camera is weird. I wish I could use an Xbox controller and play KoTOR-style or just click in a direction Diablo-style with the mouse.

With so many abilities it would be a bit of a nightmare to have an elegant solution.

Sounds like Bioware should have spent less time making voice overs, and more time actually innovating.

@Mikemcn said:

Sounds like Bioware should have spent less time making voice overs, and more time actually innovating.

Nope. The game is perfect for people who still like to play this style of MMOs. (Which I would go on a limb and say is the majority of the MMO community.) The story stuff is a pretty massive innovation to the genre by the way, it's a ton better then just pressing accept on a wall of text. I actually cared about the quests and what I was doing my entire way to level 35.

You spend millions and millions and millions and your designers come up with fetch quests. Great job.

@Burglarize: Talking about Skyrim?

I just avoided a gang fight by threatening to eat them.

@Brodehouse said:

@Burglarize: Talking about Skyrim?

I just avoided a gang fight by threatening to eat them.

Haha, I remember that part. They got scared and ran away because I said I would kill them and eat them.

@Brodehouse: Who's to say Bioware didn't make the best DAMN "collect 10 things" game ever? I just think it's funny that that's the general concept for a lot of gameplay.

@CL60 said:

@Mikemcn said:

Sounds like Bioware should have spent less time making voice overs, and more time actually innovating.

Nope. The game is perfect for people who still like to play this style of MMOs. (Which I would go on a limb and say is the majority of the MMO community.) The story stuff is a pretty massive innovation to the genre by the way, it's a ton better then just pressing accept on a wall of text. I actually cared about the quests and what I was doing my entire way to level 35.

I don't agree with this at all. A lot of people may still find this type of gameplay fine, but that's simply because they refuse to look at anything else and are unwilling to accept what's wrong with it. Personally, my biggest problem is the holy trinity. Even if you want to defend the quest structure and grind, I don't see how you can think that's still a good way to design and balance classes.

The dialogue does help to keep things going, if you look at something like Lord of the Rings, it's very hard to get anywhere in the game because it's so dull and you never really feel like a hero (at least not until the higher levels) so giving your character a story and personality does help a lot, but I wouldn't exactly consider it to be innovation, it's just basic progression (which a good portion of WoW players are still against) and it's certainly not the MMO doing this, so it's not really a strong point in its favour.

Played for about 12hours this weekend, seems solid. Will probably play a sith warrior to the end of the main story but I doubt I'll pay for an extra month after that. I have no desire to do any endgame content or pvp.

I think it is a fun game, but nothing new.