[PC] Star Wars: Old Republic

[Diivox]

I gave this beta weekend a real thorough shot because most of my friends thought I was crazy for not jizzing all over myself after playing. I steeled myself to survive the newbie zones (which are AWFUL) and give the game a real chance.

Starting with the bad: Let me make no mistake, this is still the standard 3rd gen MMORPG that we've all played before. get quests, go to quest dot, collect x amount of pig ballsacks, return to quest giver. Antiquated ideas like armor repair, grey items (seriously, why the fuck do you make me loot something that has no value? just give me credits. there is no gameplay enhancement by filling my inventory in the middle of doing something cool.), travel time and death penalties still survive. Theres alot TOR does that doesn't make alot of sense unless it's explained as: "this is what everyone expects out of an MMORPG".

The Good: The story, at least Sith side. Republic was really very bland. Sith options are amazing, and I knew I was in for a treat when I first rolled a Sith Warrior and then came back as a Human inquisitor. one is treated as royalty and destined for greater things, while the other was treated like a dogshit slave with no expectations of survival. I could see class differentiations, but even by race? damn nice touch. Voice acting is phenomenal top to bottom. I guess this doubles as a bad though, because I sure as fuck don't want to be on mumble/ventrilo while playing this. PvP arenas are well designed, and were really the clincher for me ; I had a fucking blast playing Huttball and in chaining pvp arenas. I leveled faster through pvp, meaning I could skip alot of mundane quests if I wanted to.

The ugly: framerates, and some quests are really very broken. This game runs like shit on my rig, and I'm a guy who can pull Skyrim, buggy as it is, on high settings. My Jedi Consular literally could not progress forward. Don't feed me that "it's just beta" bullshit. the game comes out in 3 weeks. this is not a beta, it's a release candidate, and is very likely the version that will be printed to DVD (have fun with the 0 day patch, it will be huge). and a 30 gig install? really? fuck you.

Final Verdict:

plan on buying the game. If you are an MMORPG vet with some serious time invested in a game like WOW, or rift, or LOTRO, or whatever, nothing here will knock you on your ass. But if you like Star Wars and you enjoy a quality bioware story, theres enough to warrant your 50 bucks. I have a strong group of friends ready to play with me so I'll live with the bullshit because ultimately, lightsabers make anything cool. I've played way shittier games (The Matrix Online, Star Wars Galaxies, LOTRO, DDO) just because they've had good Intellectual Properties, and this one I had some moments where I was genuinely entertained and impressed with the tender loving care put into it.

 

[nesper]

what do you mean your consular could not progress forward?

 

[ThomasTomasz]

I gave this beta weekend a real thorough shot because most of my friends thought I was crazy for not jizzing all over myself after playing. I steeled myself to survive the newbie zones (which are AWFUL) and give the game a real chance.

Starting with the bad: Let me make no mistake, this is still the standard 3rd gen MMORPG that we've all played before. get quests, go to quest dot, collect x amount of pig ballsacks, return to quest giver. Antiquated ideas like armor repair, grey items (seriously, why the fuck do you make me loot something that has no value? just give me credits. there is no gameplay enhancement by filling my inventory in the middle of doing something cool.), travel time and death penalties still survive. Theres alot TOR does that doesn't make alot of sense unless it's explained as: "this is what everyone expects out of an MMORPG".

The Good: The story, at least Sith side. Republic was really very bland. Sith options are amazing, and I knew I was in for a treat when I first rolled a Sith Warrior and then came back as a Human inquisitor. one is treated as royalty and destined for greater things, while the other was treated like a dogshit slave with no expectations of survival. I could see class differentiations, but even by race? damn nice touch. Voice acting is phenomenal top to bottom. I guess this doubles as a bad though, because I sure as fuck don't want to be on mumble/ventrilo while playing this. PvP arenas are well designed, and were really the clincher for me ; I had a fucking blast playing Huttball and in chaining pvp arenas. I leveled faster through pvp, meaning I could skip alot of mundane quests if I wanted to.

The ugly: framerates, and some quests are really very broken. This game runs like shit on my rig, and I'm a guy who can pull Skyrim, buggy as it is, on high settings. My Jedi Consular literally could not progress forward. Don't feed me that "it's just beta" bullshit. the game comes out in 3 weeks. this is not a beta, it's a release candidate, and is very likely the version that will be printed to DVD (have fun with the 0 day patch, it will be huge). and a 30 gig install? really? fuck you.

Final Verdict:

plan on buying the game. If you are an MMORPG vet with some serious time invested in a game like WOW, or rift, or LOTRO, or whatever, nothing here will knock you on your ass. But if you like Star Wars and you enjoy a quality bioware story, theres enough to warrant your 50 bucks. I have a strong group of friends ready to play with me so I'll live with the bullshit because ultimately, lightsabers make anything cool. I've played way shittier games (The Matrix Online, Star Wars Galaxies, LOTRO, DDO) just because they've had good Intellectual Properties, and this one I had some moments where I was genuinely entertained and impressed with the tender loving care put into it.

Sounds good, and I'll be joining you. This is my first MMO experience- I just bought a computer so I'll be able to handle it, but really, I am a huge Star Wars fan so I'll have a good time with the story regardless. I especially can't wait to play the Sith side- as you said, there is going to be a lot of class difference which I like. I also want to see if they explain further how the emperor has lived for 1,000 years (they explained some in the novel Revan.)

Still, I kinda wish they had made a KOTOR 3 to finish up the Revan/Exile story, and not just a novel (though I would argue that the story isn't necessarily finished.)

 

[nesper]

Sounds good, and I'll be joining you. This is my first MMO experience- I just bought a computer so I'll be able to handle it, but really, I am a huge Star Wars fan so I'll have a good time with the story regardless. I especially can't wait to play the Sith side- as you said, there is going to be a lot of class difference which I like. I also want to see if they explain further how the emperor has lived for 1,000 years (they explained some in the novel Revan.)

Still, I kinda wish they had made a KOTOR 3 to finish up the Revan/Exile story, and not just a novel (though I would argue that the story isn't necessarily finished.)

it's not, its tied up in the game.

 

[ThomasTomasz]

it's not, its tied up in the game.

Are you referring to the Revan/Exile story?

 

The Exile and Revan confronted the Emperor with another Sith Lord, who betrayed them. The Exile was killed, Revan was captured and placed in stasis and has a telepathic link with the Emperor, and the Sith was turned into an agent for the Emperor, but is still looking to overthrow him. I'm sure that Scourge (the one who betrayed Revan) will be in the game, but I am not sure if they wrap up Revans story or not.

 

[Diivox]

what do you mean your consular could not progress forward?

theres alot of parts of the game that are personal instances for the purpose of storyline. they are red shields over the door if you dont belong there, green if you can go in. usually, when you go it goes to a cutscene and your story progresses. i talked to some ancient jedi guy and he disappeared in a puff of smoke... and it just stuck there. i reset the quest 4 times repeating the earlier steps before i submitted a GM ticket and logged out of the character. never did get a response, but i dont think they had CSR's working over the weekend, it was just a stress test.

 

[KNUBB]

I played the beta this past weekend. It is borderline unplayable on my computer :crying:
I need to upgrade before I purchase this.

 

[nesper]

theres alot of parts of the game that are personal instances for the purpose of storyline. they are red shields over the door if you dont belong there, green if you can go in. usually, when you go it goes to a cutscene and your story progresses. i talked to some ancient jedi guy and he disappeared in a puff of smoke... and it just stuck there. i reset the quest 4 times repeating the earlier steps before i submitted a GM ticket and logged out of the character. never did get a response, but i dont think they had CSR's working over the weekend, it was just a stress test.

yah that sucks. few months back got stuck on a balmorra class quest for imperial agent, reset that 4 or 5 times was about to give up then it worked.


revan and the exile story will be continued in the game. scourge was showed in one of the dev walkthroughs i think but could be wrong.

 

[Bigpapa42]

I played the beta this past weekend. It is borderline unplayable on my computer :crying:
I need to upgrade before I purchase this.

I took a look at the minimum requirements and they aren't that heavy. Upgrading to a level of playability shouldn't be that expensive.

 

[KNUBB]

I took a look at the minimum requirements and they aren't that heavy. Upgrading to a level of playability shouldn't be that expensive.

Yeah my computer is right at the minimum. It was barely playable. Don't want to play it like that.

 

[Bigpapa42]

Yeah my computer is right at the minimum. It was barely playable. Don't want to play it like that.

Yeah, it can get frustrating when the game is just barely playable. That's actually a big part of the reason I ended up building a PC not quite a year ago. I went overkill. But for a pretty solid gaming system, you can probably put something pretty solid together for $300-$400, depending on what components you can reuse and whether or not you need a new OS. I was looking to put a system together for a buddy in that price range and it would've killed this game.

 

[KNUBB]

Yeah, it can get frustrating when the game is just barely playable. That's actually a big part of the reason I ended up building a PC not quite a year ago. I went overkill. But for a pretty solid gaming system, you can probably put something pretty solid together for $300-$400, depending on what components you can reuse and whether or not you need a new OS. I was looking to put a system together for a buddy in that price range and it would've killed this game.

Yeah I have been planning on building something. The parts I had lined up would cost me about $500

 

[Bigpapa42]

Yeah I have been planning on building something. The parts I had lined up would cost me about $500

If you're thinking of building soon, its probably not a bad time. Places like Newegg should have decent Christmas sales. The AMD Zambezi processors should drop the prices of the previous-gen AMD CPUs a bit more, plus it looks like memory is still pretty cheap.

I'm thinking a lot of folks are gonna end up upgrading their systems for this game.

 

[KNUBB]

If you're thinking of building soon, its probably not a bad time. Places like Newegg should have decent Christmas sales. The AMD Zambezi processors should drop the prices of the previous-gen AMD CPUs a bit more, plus it looks like memory is still pretty cheap.

I'm thinking a lot of folks are gonna end up upgrading their systems for this game.

I don't think I'll be able to do it soon. It would probably be after the new year

 

[Maynard]

i started playing this tonight. played for about 3 hours and loved every minute of it. Still adjusting to using a m/kb though. I chose a Sith Inquisitor. The abilities are pretty dam cool.

 

[Maynard]

took some screen shots.

Sith Temple

 

Juke box

 

my dude....the last pic in this section is me using seethe. Which is what Darth Maul used while he was waiting in between the doors when fighting Obi Wan and Qai Jin. its a still shot so you cant see this mystic coloring radiating from him while he paces back and forth

 

my dude with the bartender

 

random pic in a taxi

 

 

[Nukleopatra]

This game fucking blows - 80% of their shitty community are Warcraft cast offs.

Blizzard is the one company EA doesn't stand a chance at beating. Enjoy your flawed, piece of shit game, that'll be F2P within a year, because the subs are already dropping like flies.

 

[BrntO4Life]

This game fucking blows - 80% of their shitty community are Warcraft cast offs.

Blizzard is the one company EA doesn't stand a chance at beating. Enjoy your flawed, piece of shit game, that'll be F2P within a year, because the subs are already dropping like flies.

Another analyst claims that over two million units of SWTOR have been sold since launch with an expectation that 75% to 90% of players will stay on as paid subscribers following the first free month.

:yao:

 

[ThomasTomasz]

This game fucking blows - 80% of their shitty community are Warcraft cast offs.

Blizzard is the one company EA doesn't stand a chance at beating. Enjoy your flawed, piece of shit game, that'll be F2P within a year, because the subs are already dropping like flies.

:troll:

 

[Maynard]

i wont be one of those people renewing. I can barely muster up the interest to play thru the 30 days i got for free. the more you play the more u realize that the game is full of tedious missions and dull gameplay. i am not a huge fan of the long drawn out bioware story dialog....i can deal with it, but its not a selling point. So for me its alot of get mission...run for 10 minutes to the area, kill bad guys, run back to mission giver.

killing bad guys isnt even fun. u just kind of stand there and watch your guy perform various animations as u select the move he will perform...its not all that appealing.

the game looks cool and has a quality amount of production value, but the gameplay and quests are not worth paying for on a monthly basis. I am glad i only paid $30 for the game and not $60.....but i regret spending the $30