I'd hate to say, because I've been solely posting on this board, but SWTOR has already lost its spark with me.

Seems to play just like a lot of MMOs, with the added bonus of buggy abilities and mechanics, a shitty UI, and poorly implemented PvP. Class quests and voice-acted quests are still just that: quests. I've done them for years and they all just scream repitition. I'm glad it isn't a "mash 2 buttons, collect pixels" like wow, but having to do a whole CC/control companions/cycle cooldowns strategy for. Every. Single. Mob pack you come across?

I really don't want this to be a debate thread, and I don't mean to get people flared up who do in fact love this game, but I'm looking to see if anyone else has gotten this feeling, or already had the feeling and didn't even bother to pre-order.

Maybe it's time I quit MMOs :(

No I'm not sorry you are :(

@Ulain: I haven't played TOR, how's the endgame anyway? Raiding and stuff I mean. That's what kept me playing WoW for a long time at least, though I finally quit summer 2010.

Yeah, a bit. I usually just quit for a day or so and then come back. Only level 45, though, so maybe once you hit cap and the drive to level is gone, playing isn't as fun.

Sounds like you have just become tired of MMOs in general.

... Yes.

I think I'm going to post some more of my thoughts on it soon.

Just find yourself something else to do for a while, like not playing the game for a few days or helping out noobs with flashpoints, start up a nice little business through the market or try rolling a pvp server. Just don't keep on doing what you find boring cause that will of course make you not like the game.

Dude it has been known for a long time that this game plays like a traditional MMO.

Nah, I still got lots of plans that keep me awake at night (as in playing the game). Got to get to lvl50 with my Inquisitor and play some endgame, as well as gear all my companions. Lvl my Bounty Hunter too. Eventually I wanna do a Smuggler and Jedi Knight playthrough. Still got lots to do in the 80 odd days of gametime I got left. That's when I'll revise next. There are so many upcoming high impact games like Diablo 3 and Guild Wars 2, I doubt I'll extend right away. I'll be back for more eventually though. SW:TOR's formula is intoxicating.

take a break, you don't need to force your way through this game like you would wow. theres a story enjoy that and when the mechanics become tiresome step away for a day or two.

Because of my 5 years of playing WoW I didn't play beyond the beta, I think I'm filled up with MMOs for a while...until Guild Wars 2 is out!

I learned one thing.
 
This game should be enjoyed slowly like a Mass Effect game, any attempts to rush will just get on your nerves.
I went kinda fast (or rather, played a lot) and only then I noticed the 'Land on a planet, get the lowdown, get your story quest, get your major planet story quest, get random sidequests, complete a trillion bonus quests, do some hc's, finish up, repeat on the next planet.
 
It shows if you play too much and too fast.
Its how I burned out on most games, too much of it basically breaks the barrier and you keep looking for that fix, which is getting harder to find.
 
What I did?
I stashed my level 50 and began a new one, this time taking my time.
So far it's working wonders and I'm enjoying it in doses.

MMOs are definitely a genre for a certain type. They are designed to keep you paying the monthly fees.

I'm level 40 and haven't gotten anywhere close to enough TOR in me. I am actually ignoring shiny new copies of GoW3, UC3, AC:R, and LoZ that I received over the holidays because ALL I WANT TO DO IS PLAY MORE TOR.

Then again, based on your criticisms, it sounds like we're playing two different games. Outside of occasional lag, all of my abilities work exactly as they are supposed to. I have 20 abilities that I use regularly during combat and, as a tank, have to keep my eyes on the life-bars of my teammates, the positioning of my opponents, and the location in which I'm fighting, and the UI has yet to let me down. The only impactful bugs I have encountered were two geometry traps where my character got stuck, but I was able to finagle my way out in both situations within a minute or two. Also the only time I need to pay careful attention to my cooldowns/companion is when I'm trying to solo Heroic content. Even when I accidentally attack a group without my companion present, I can get through without using anything on a significant cooldown and typically have around 50% health remaining.

It sucks that you're not having fun with TOR, but I'm prepared to keep on having enough fun for both of us.

I am really enjoying it a ton! I've been doing lots of interesting quests. Just hit level 17. I love selling archaeology supplies. I enjoy the PVP. It's been a great amount of fun.

I wouldn't say I'm bored but I definitely get where you're coming from when you're saying that you've "lost the spark".

I was more excited to play SWTOR than any other MMO I've played since WoW, and I was really loving it for the first few days. But I'm already starting to suffer the classic "MMO Fatigue" signs and winding down the amount of time that I'm playing.

In some way I think that because I've played so many MMO's by now (Ultima Online, Anarchy Online, Asheron's Call 1+2, City of Heroes, Lineage 2, World of Warcraft and Rift, just to name the ones off the top of my head) I'm now so used to the "classic" MMO experience that it will take something truly fresh and original to get me excited about a MMO game again.

I was hoping that the story of SWTOR would be that thing for me, but after a couple of weeks of playing it's pretty clear that the storytelling suffers pretty significantly from being squeezed into a MMO and that's a problem that BioWare simply has not managed to solve.

Shit just got real with my imperial agent, and I'm looking forward to starting another class. I can see my time with the game ending in a few months, certainly, but for now I'm still enjoying it.

My Story is keeping me engaged and I'm having fun with my classes rotations. Been avoiding some of the Heroics and Flashpoints purely until I find a good guild because PUGS haven't gone well yet, but I'm far from getting bored with it.

I've been playing with my brother and we are enjoying it. Lot's of pauses since he has to stop and take care for his 4 month old son but I don't mind. We've been playing about 2 or 3 days a week and so far have only made it to level 19. If I was on my own I'd probably be much higher up. But maybe my slow pace and the fact that it's his first time playing an MMO are making it fine for me so far. I've played city of heroes for 4 years and some WoW. I was burned out on MMO's but so far this doesn't feel too much like one at the moment. I also find the stories interesting for my bounty hunter.

was thinking of getting it, but across the quick look and GB talk of it i came to the conclusion that this was indeed still an MMO despite its story hook.

and i no longer want that.

sounds like the difference between you and i is that you pulled the trigger on the purchase.

Nope, story is keeping me happy with the game. And last night just went through a Heroic 4 with a random dude, so it was just me and him plus our companions, felt pretty great.

After the initial rush of playing a new MMO for an entire weekend I slowed down to normal hours. I still find it very enjoyable. Next to City of Heroes, my favourite MMO, this could very well be my 2nd favourite mmo game. I already put more time into it than Aion and maybe even Warhammer and that's just after a few weeks. Lovin the story of my Bounty Hunter and the fact that I could very well be playing the game the same amount of time with 7 other classes? Sign me up.

Still loving it, still want to play it all the time, still think about it when I can't play, and still thinking about stuff to do in the future in it. I'm taking my time as I feel there is zero rush to get to level cap. There is so much to do. I'm loving the crew skill system and working on it with two toons. I really like the flashpoints and have been doing each one at least 3-4 times each. I got my main to 31 and the first alt to 22. I got plans for two other alts and just need to find the time to play them. I look forward to new space missions and upgrading my ship as well. I could go on and on.

Only played WoW for about 3 weeks when it was expansion free, didn't enjoy it. Loving the hell out of TOR but playing in smallish chunks about 3 hours every 2 days.

I felt exactly this at around lvl 38 and stopped. Same tactics, same enemies, different look and different location, no amount of voice acted fetch quests would change the gameplay of kill x + collect/disable/enable y + Bonus kill z.

You think about gameplay loops in game design terms, and the gameplay loop for swtor (disregarding pvp) is only about 10 seconds (the amount of time an interaction with enemies takes place as bounty hunter in my case) and just repeats for hours and hours and days.

Death from above, tracer missile, tracer missile, unload, tracer missile, tracer missile, rail shot, repeat.

@TaliciaDragonsong: You're not wrong. Just hit 41, landed on Belsavis. I think the point that you land on a new location is a great stopping point. Putting the game down for a day, taking a break. Really enjoying it, certainly not bored, but playing this game for 15 hours straight doesn't work. The combat is challenging, the decisions can be thought-provoking. This isn't a passive MMO experience driven by the sole desire to level up as efficiently as possible.

No. Every time I play something else awesome happens.

No, I was not surprised that this MMO plays like an MMO.

If it hadn't, I would probably be more perplexed.

A bit. It doesn't help that it runs really bad on my crappy laptop, weirdly enough it doesn't seem to matter that much if I am playing on the lowest of low settings or on medium settings. I have been playing around with the settings a lot but my fps dip into the low 10's quite a bit. In the beginning the shinyness of a new game made me able to overlook it for a while, but it is getting harder and harder.

@Fenris82 said:

I wouldn't say I'm bored but I definitely get where you're coming from when you're saying that you've "lost the spark".

I was more excited to play SWTOR than any other MMO I've played since WoW, and I was really loving it for the first few days. But I'm already starting to suffer the classic "MMO Fatigue" signs and winding down the amount of time that I'm playing.

In some way I think that because I've played so many MMO's by now (Ultima Online, Anarchy Online, Asheron's Call 1+2, City of Heroes, Lineage 2, World of Warcraft and Rift, just to name the ones off the top of my head) I'm now so used to the "classic" MMO experience that it will take something truly fresh and original to get me excited about a MMO game again.

I was hoping that the story of SWTOR would be that thing for me, but after a couple of weeks of playing it's pretty clear that the storytelling suffers pretty significantly from being squeezed into a MMO and that's a problem that BioWare simply has not managed to solve.

Pretty much this. I wasn't expecting swtor to reinvent the wheel, and having taken a break from wow for a good 4-5 months now, I thought I'd be "withdrawn" enough to get back into an MMO. Such doesn't seem to be the case; the class missions don't immerse me enough when I still have to do several of the MMO duties to level: Grind out random filler quests, do mindless PvP (with unbalanced level 50s, ugh) or do "dungeons", excuse me, flashpoints.

I'll admit I haven't got to 50 on any of my toons. But I don't really plan to just to see if the game becomes good. I enjoy the journey, not the destination (why the hell am I playing MMOs, you ask). I've done it on EverQuest, on WoW, I see nothing new for star wars in that regard. I do think I'm going to have to be a single-player for at least a while.

I appreciate the suggestions of taking a break from it or slowing down, but after 11, 12 years of MMOs, it's just programmed into me now to spot an MMO when I see it.

I haven't tried Mass Effect 1 yet O.o

Love tearing people new assholes as a Marauder in PvP (Arenas were the worst thing to ever happen to PvP)

Cleared normal mode EV and looking forward to starting hard in a couple weeks.

Rolled an Agent alt and the storyline is RIDIC and loving it.

As someone to whom responsiveness and ease of use is of utmost importance in an MMO, none of ToR's issues have bothered me to the point of not wanting to play.

I'll come back to you once I've played through every class storyline. This is a BioWare game through and through, and fuck the rest of the world for thinking that's becoming a bad thing. BioWare for life.

- Darth Tila Tequila, The Harbinger, <Shadow Cell>

I'm pacing myself. I have plenty of characters in the 10-15 range, and one level 20 jedi character. I'm feeling that the game doesn't offer too much in terms of actual fun gameplay. I'm into multiplayer and so far 90% of this game has been singleplayer for me. I'm not pro subscription based singleplayer games.

Apparently there's lack of Republic players on some servers, and in order to do Heroics and Flashpoints players make Imperial characters. That's usually not a good sign this early on.

Feeling like a moron for gifting this around to people for Christmas.

Maybe its because this is my first MMO ever, but I have yet to find myself bored. I did feel a little bleh about the game one night, but I took a break and came back and was enjoying myself again.

WoW always bored me cuz it felt shallow, But this one actually has a story to keep me interested...

Plus being a Star wars and Bioware fan helps...

Side note: Anyone else notice how almost every MMO other than this one envolves Wizards and dragons and such?

Can anyone comment on the quest variety? Any actual innovations there, story aside?

Mind you, I have only played in beta, but I felt the quests were rather uninspired for a newly released MMO.

When I look at it reductively, it all came down to Kill X of Y, Loot X number of <insert object>, Go to X to click on <insert object>, or go to Z and talk to dude X. I never had the feeling I actually accomplished something, I had little fun, and felt like I got the same quest time after time, only slightly reworded, and delivered with super serious voiceacting.

It took WoW multiple expansions and almost 5 years to finally add some really cool quest-related setpiece moments, grow a sense of humor, and create a ton of quests that are straight-up a lot of fun to complete. I'm talking about being a tail-gunner on a plane with Harrison Jones on a mad quest to find treasure, stomping mobs sitting on the shoulders of a 200 foot frost giant, being attacked by a colossal squid while in a submarine, rolling over hundreds of gnomes with a giant flaming katamari ball, throwing bear cubs on trampolines, rolling with B-company in Redridge, jousting quests on Pterodactyls, CSI murder investigation with Lieutenant Horatio Lane, etcetera.

These things were often story-driven quest chains which took you through an entire zone, which were a ton of fun even without a lot of voiceacting.

Does TOR have anything like this in general questing? I'm just looking for a little variety in mechanics, and a Star Wars story alone isn't enough to keep me playing long-term.

I think I'm coming to the end of my time with SWTOR, I know it's an MMO but I really was hoping for more then kill quests, on Taris my kill count of Rakhghouls must have been way over 500. The class quests are nice and yeah the story does drive it, but when those class quests are buried within 15 boring quests, over and over again it really does start to grate. I think after my free time I won't be re subbing

I'm a level 48 Jedi Shadow - I've found the story much more interesting post-Taris. Still a ton of MMO busy-work quests, but not half as bad as games like WoW were.

The real test is going to be what happens when I hit 50 in the next few days. Kind of want to roll an Imperial Agent to see the story, but at the same time, I'm not keen on grinding out the quests again to get it to 50. Sure all of the story progression quests will be different, but I'm gonna go out on a limb and say a lot of the bog-standard fetch quests you encounter in between story bits are identical.

At any rate, even if I don't, I've gotten almost 100 hours of solid entertainment so far. The game isn't perfect, and still trots out a lot of the familiar (and tired) old MMO tropes, but that doesn't make it any worse than any other MMO out there, including Warcraft. Having fully voiced characters, and companions to roll with, and unique story bits, have proven enough of a carrot on a stick to retain my interest for now.

I learned one thing.  This game should be enjoyed slowly like a Mass Effect game, any attempts to rush will just get on your nerves.

@Vexxan said:

Because of my 5 years of playing WoW I didn't play beyond the beta, I think I'm filled up with MMOs for a while...until Guild Wars 2 is out!

^ This.

Genius move on Bioware's part, bringing a game that feels 6 years old at release to a tired genre full of people who are sick of the same old same old.

Hopefully there are enough teenagers who never played an MMO out there to keep the tasteless joke that is TOR afloat.

Unfortunately, I decided to stop just yesterday. Among others, I played a 31 imperial sorcerer and was really enjoying the story. In contrast to the Republic's side, it was fun to have every npc fear you and address you as 'my lord'. I didn't realize you didn't have to complete every quest and became way over leveled. I got pretty worn out by all the dialogue, I should have focused more on the class quests which is one of the most entertaining parts.

Ton of hours put in, I feel fine moving on from the purchase. As an advice, check your subscription before it renews. About 14 days left for me, time sure flew.

Oh and the GB kessler guild is awesome. Tons of 'interesting stories' by good friends of GB in the guild lol.

Alright, I gotta ask out of curiosity: if kill and fetch-quests are dull. What kind of quests do you want?

It puzzles me because pretty much every RPG (Single player and MMO) Ive played in the last 20 years have been a giant kill or fetch quest and contained several side-quests that are pretty much only kill/fetch quests.

I played the beta, but it felt so much like WoW, and I got really bored once I hit the mid 20s, but Guild Wars 2 on the other hand... looks amazing.

I reached level 50 and feel like I've tapped the game out.   The daily quests on Ilum and Belsavis are tedious and boring (though very rewarding).  The one level 50 flashpoint I ran (Directive 7) had broken boss encounters which dropped green loot for classes that weren't in the party.  It took me forever to find a group for The False Emperor, but then I couldn't zone in because of a bug.  From what I understand though, normal level 50 flashpoints drop 116 level loot, which is worse than the gear you get from running daily quests.  My only real option for advancing my character is to run hard mode flashpoints and operations.

I got to lvl 24 Scoundrel and haven't played in 4 days. I don't know when I'll go back, but I've been wanting to do BF3 and Skyrim more than this atm.

I got to lvl 23 as a Smuggler after participating in a couple weekend betas and having an ok time. I just flat-out didn't care about playing anymore after a couple days of playing. I had my pre-order canceled before I got charged. I might be tired of that style of mmo combat after 5+ years of wow but the story really didn't catch me as it did on the imperial side.

It's like BC WoW questwise and that's why it's so old. Hell, Cata is way fresher and more modern. The conversation and story is great, sure, but the combat is horrible, enviromental design isn't great and the game in general isn't very polished if you ask me. I got bored after a good 50 hours split over two characters.