Old Republic, New Interview

Awesome interview!

@Napalm said:

@Ghostiet said:

@Napalm said:

@Ghostiet said:

@wh1terav3n said:

That's an impressive beard.

Yeah, but Tom French kills it when it comes to impressive beards and hairstyles.

Fuck you! I will not allow you to undercut the awesome beard of Daniel Erickson!

Tom French begs to fucking differ.

Nope.

You're fucking blind. You're a special case.

I cannot believe this. You wrote "Nope." with a straight face. You believe this shit.

PEOPLE, THIS MAN IS INSANE

Huh, didn't know about choices evolving depending on alignment.

I bet Jeff wont call him an asshole. heh

Nice job Jeff making the discrete dime bag hand-off !! Pusha #1.

Just thought I'd point out it's very obvious they recorded the podcast much earlier than Tuesday. This interview most likely happened before the podcast as well since they make very similar comments but here they have to actually think about them while in the podcast they're already ready with them.

Sage Merrill laughs at Daniel Erikson and Tom French's puny beards.

I love how he imitates the players.

Jeff is wearing pants.

What is this world coming to?!?

I think Ryan is getting fatter, I hope he stays healthy

Great interview. I appreciate, in an extreme capacity, that you raised questions about things you yourselves were disappointed with or had some kind of curiosity about. You guys are often too nice, it seems, when you interview developers. Most professional reviewers are, and I can understand wanting to keep it friendly, but I prefer to hear it when you're issues with something get questioned so the developer can give you their reason for why something is the way it is. It feels more fresh and is something I wish more professionally done gaming interviews would have. Tough questions don't have to be unprofessional or mean spirited and sometimes it feels sites are afraid to ask them to people in the know in fear of seeming mean.

That is just my perception.

More reasons I like Giantbomb. Don't be afraid to ask the difficult questions. It makes these interviews so much more interesting.

Really enjoyed this.

would like to know any news on an Australian release date?

Seriously, why does Jeff even play this game when he admittedly hates Star Wars?

I'm from Modesto too.

Thanks for not being afraid to politely ask the questions about the issues you had with the game!

@GunsAreDrawn: cause it's his job?

Loving the agent so far. Too bad there aren't quests you can complete without even fighting. You are supposed to be an infiltration expert but somehow it always comes down to "kill these dudes to be accepted into our order". Why can't I just charm my way into the secret order like a real agent? I guess it's too much to ask for an MMO with those kinds of quests. Most single player RPG's don't even have the option to not fight except maybe in a couple of minor side quests.

Also the companions don't seem to talk nearly as much as in Dragon Age and such. You just see the 15 or -1 pop up on screen instead of actually hearing for example Morrigan tell you how folish you are for running errands in Dragon Age. Maybe the companions have more to say later on, after all you are supposed to be able to romance them, but I've played two classes through 2-3 planets and neither those companions feel like more than tanks yet. It certainly isn't like the companions in DA or even KotOR or ME.

The story is amazing by MMO standards, but so far doesn't live up to KotOR, DA or ME. They could have cut half the side quests and focused more on the character story. I have to do so many side quests to level that I can forget what was going on in the main story. I still love the game, but kind of get the feeling the MMO side of it hurts the game more than it helps it. That's not to say it is inferior to Bioware's single player games in every way. In my first hours I had as many awesome dark side choices as I had during the entire game in KotOR 1 or 2. I just hope that if they make an expansion they focus on the main character story even if it means less content. Most side quests are not that interesting, especially when you've done them several times as you do since every class has them. But I guess it's still better than even Dragon Age as the only story difference there between classes is the origin story. Even with all the generic quests each class has more unique content than any single player game I know, in most games a different class don't even affect the story at all.

I've already spent as much time with the game as I did with the entire story in say ME or KotOR and I feel like I've barely scratched the surface so I can't complain about not getting my money's worth. And since it's an MMO there will (hopefully) always be more content coming. How is €13/$15 a month not a great deal for that compared to €50/$60 for a regular 6-18 hour single player video game.

That man is hiding more of his beard underneath that cap. I KNOW IT.

Maaan...I don't wanna get into an MMO but the more I hear about this game, the more I wanna try it out. And yeah that's including the podcast. It's pretty clear MMO's are not the guys bag but Ryan seems to dig it an Jeff has put 30 hours into it despite not being big on the genre anymore or the source material. 
Great interview.

@GunsAreDrawn:Ooh, ooh, I know this one!

...Because it's fun.

@OzGamer: they said there aiming for march 1st

Hah, that Steam jab at the end made this whole interview worth it.

I'm thinking of trying out TOR, even though I'm not an MMO fan... I'm so intrigued by a huge RPG with 8 different potential stories...

We shall see haha. Thanks for the interview, GB guys - these couch interviews with industry-types are great.

This guy seems full of crap, he obviously doesnt know much about star wars if he thinks there has never been an alien main character.

As much as I love games like Mass Effect & KOTOR I think the whole light/dark, renegade/paragon with distinct meters and rewards for going either way, kind of devalues the concept of choice. I know this was touched on in the interview with Jeff describing him going against his best judgement for better gear, but the thought of going through hundreds of hours worth of cutscenes only to choose the first or third option seems kind of depressing to me. Is there any reward for being neutral?

Very informative, and it sort of addresses some of the issues they've been bringing up.

I have no idea what Daniel Erickson is talking about at 13:25. Since when were RPG's games you play with a ton of friends while eating pizza and drinking beer?

@Godlyawesomeguy: I'm not quite sure either but I think maybe he was talking about tabletop rpg games like D&D.

@Godlyawesomeguy: I think he's refering to D&D

EDIT: ops didnt read bune's comment sorry!

@Godlyawesomeguy: Tabletops. The RPGs. So yeah, those.

@Wiseblood said:

Sage Merrill laughs at Daniel Erikson and Tom French's puny beards.

I bet this guy gets SUPER high,

@Eeptog said:

This guy seems full of crap, he obviously doesnt know much about star wars if he thinks there has never been an alien main character.

He didn't say that. He said there's never been a case where the primary main character was not human/humanoid. Supporting main characters have frequently been crazy alien characters, but there's always the Luke Skywalker-esque kind of character.

Although frankly the prequels didn't have ANY main protagonists and everybody was like a freaky stupid alien that couldn't be related to, human or no. Star Wars outside of the original theatrical movies sucks real bad.

@OriginalGman said:

What the fuck are you doing, guys? This one interview has single-handedly changed my view of this massive free-time black hole. I played WoW for 5 fucking years, I can't do that again. Why did this interview have to be so goddamn interesting?

Okay. So it's not just me.

I was sort of mystified by this interview. I think I enjoyed it more than the Nolan North one.

@Grissefar said:

He keeps dodging the instance issue. How come WoW can do it no problems? Is it really worth it just do it will go smooth once a year when there's an event?

He's a writer. He writes stories.

He is not in PR/community management.

He is not a networking engineer.

Which instancing issue are we talking about? If it's the empty cities business, I ask: why are the capital cities empty? Simple, people are fucking leveling up. It's the same reason why the auction house is empty. People are busy getting through content.

Also, Blizzard bans accounts for large social gatherings. They see it as a hostile effort to crash servers. I've also seen WoW zones be split due to heavy populations with instancing (Orgrimmar 1, Orgrimmar 2).

@Krenor:

Same here, I love Ryan and he needs to stay fit, more Kinect QLs!!!!

I was shocked to see negative points being raised in an interview so publicly, when sites normally just post standard interviews.

His points were very interesting and reminded me that some people don't seem to realise games are designed. They don't just happen. Even if they are derivative of other titles on the market.

A+ journalism here, prying yet professional. Great job guys!!

I began my Sith Inquisitor with the bestes of intentions. Then I met Khem Val. I am killing the weak and innocent and guilty alike - with a passion and frevor I didn't believe in me.

Khem Val corrupted my soul! Damn you monster. Or better... Who do you want to eat for Dinner - Khem Darling?

@MormonWarrior said:

@Eeptog said:

This guy seems full of crap, he obviously doesnt know much about star wars if he thinks there has never been an alien main character.

He didn't say that. He said there's never been a case where the primary main character was not human/humanoid.

Exactly. Twileks and similar races are humanoid. Hell, roadian's and transdoshans are pretty humanoid depsite the reptileness. What he's talking about is, say, in Mass effect the main character being hanar. Traditionally if it doesn't have arms, legs and a head it isn't in a main role.

@AlisterCat

@MormonWarrior

He heavily implied that anything without a human face isnt relatable which is an insane thing to say. Hence why there arent Rodians or Trandoshans.

Is feeling alienated not a human experience?

Also i would absolutely love to play as a Hanar, but thats just me.

@Eeptog said:

@AlisterCat

@MormonWarrior

He heavily implied that anything without a human face isnt relatable which is an insane thing to say. Hence why there arent Rodians or Trandoshans.

Is feeling alienated not a human experience?

Also i would absolutely love to play as a Hanar, but thats just me.

In the TV world marketers would tell you that anything outside of your race and class isn't relatable, let alone whether you are human or not.

Most of their (GB crew) complaints seem to be about the MMO part of the game. I've been playing it like a singleplayer game - gameplay is very similar to KotOR (abilities on hotbar etc.), story is great, VO is great and really, even the MMOish quests (kill X number of mobs), you have those in SP games as well.

Every now and then I have to switch to MMO mode by grouping with people to do Flashpoints/heroic quests - but it seems to be very optional and since I'm not a PUG person, I tend to do that very little (only when I'm lagging behind in levels in relation to Class quest).

It all depends on your perspective. I haven't enjoyed MMORPGs after EverQuest and still - I'm loving this.

Is Jeff trying to pass off drugs in the beginning

@Godlyawesomeguy:

Since dungeons and dragons? Never played it, but I assume he's talking about tabletop RPGs.

So glad I went with the Imperial agent.

Very informative! I know I'd enjoy playing a character to cap, I'm just not sure if it's worth it to me if there's nothing to do at 50. I'm waiting to see what kind of content they have for lv50s.

Well, I'm sold. Causality/Consistency.. exactly what I feel most games I play are missing.

This pretty much convinced me to try the game out. I love a good story, and the agent's definitely sounds like one

I'm not going to lie: this interview did a much better job of selling me on The Old Republic than pretty much any of the marketing for that game. That being said, if I do play it, it will be when its cheap.

When Jeff asked the closest to a hard hitting question he had his body language was full of nervousness. I know it's hard to show the same abrasively to a person as you do on a podcast away from them so it's understandable.

I'm not a fan of the game, but the storylines are genuinely pretty awesome. I'm still on the fence if I can power through the gameplay just to enjoy the storylines.