NnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnLEEEEEEEEROOOOOOOOY JENKINS!

Pretty awesome first real look at space combat, from PAX:

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You guys saw the awesome trailer before the whole 'elitists suck ass' tangent started, right?

Looks pretty sweet. I played EVE online for about 4 months (3 or 4 years ago), and the space game reminds me of that. I always thought it would be cool if a game could take EVE and WoW and combine them... looks like that is what has happened!

Gameplay videos are starting to show up from pax.

Not sure what's going on in the first one. Smuggler healing I think.

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Longer video, about 15 minutes.

<iframe title="YouTube video player" width="640" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/2Qk6O8Qzd0Y" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Official developer walkthrough of Taral V.

This looks ****ing amazing...

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This week's update, a Jedi Knight progression video:

<iframe title="YouTube video player" width="640" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/WlCPQ0AFrLs" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

They've outdone themselves with their April Fool's update (remember the sarlaac last year?):

http://www.swtor.com/news/news-article/20110401

When is this damn game coming out?

If I had to guess, I'd say September. If it was coming sooner than that, I think we'd know, and I don't believe they'll want to hold off for a holiday release, especially not with ME3 hitting sometime in that time frame. I think (hope) they're going to announce open beta at E3.

The reaction to PAX has been pretty overwhelmingly positive, as is everything I've heard out of beta (no direct sources there, though).

So, there was an event in London last evening where various people from the official swtor forums got to play the game for about an hour each, and the response is overwhelmingly positive. This is notable in part because a few of the people posting these glowing reviews have been blasting bioware on the forums for months/years over certain design decisions. And, as it turns out, they love the game. Whodathunkit...

Write-ups are here: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=292974

Consensus from some of the people there is an August/September release.

I can honestly say that I am glad I have managed to remain almost entirely free of mmorpgs. I know I would get hooked, especially on one that looks as immersive as what SWTOR appears to be. Hell, I was bored playing EVE for 3-4 months, but I couldn't stop playing the ****er... and there you don't even get a person/humanoid to look at, just a ****ing spaceship... though they can be pretty epic as you go up in skills.

What I am trying to say is, I really hope I can avoid this game when it finally comes out. I want to continue to have a life :(

Then I would probably stop reading this thread. Because I have a feeling it's going to get crazy when a few of us finally get our hands on it. It's looking like it's going to be an incredible game.

And I'm totally with you on how time-consuming they are. I've wasted a lot of time in a number of MMOs I really didn't like all that much, whether it was EQ or WoW or SWG or even LotRO now (haven't played in weeks, probably done). If what people are saying about TOR is true, that it's basically an online BioWare game and about as good a Star Wars experience as any game has ever had, it's going to end me.

So scared for this game...its going to own me. hehhe

Big update on Advanced Classes today:If you follow the link there are some cool images as well as a bit I didn't copy about how they use their testing metrics. And obviously, all these AC's are subject to change...

I cannot wait for this game!!!!

Thought you guys might be interested in this. It's a write-up of an upcoming PC Gamer article on the game, which includes the very first details of PvP that I've seen anywhere:Link to the forum thread is here

FML

Was that a "**** my life" or a "for the mother****ing loss"?

**** my soon to be nonexistent life.

I hear that, brother. This game's going to be like WoW was at it's worst for me I think. The real world will feel virtual and the game will be life.

Just watched this. I REALLY want to like this game, but so far . . . I just don't.

I'll buy it and try it out for sure, but it's going to have to show me something more than this, because that looked pretty much like the same things I've seen in WoW, TBH.

I can't really speak to WoW since I haven't played it for 5 years. I will say that 15 minutes of a flashpoint walkthrough is probably not indicative of every aspect of gameplay, and for sure doesn't emphasize what they're pushing as the game's major asset, that being story.

But...I haven't played it, so I can't say for sure.

I guess the big question is, what is SWTOR going to bring to the MMORPG world that other games haven't.

Outside of being based on Star Wars, lots of in-game voice/character acting, is it really going to do more?

i am guessing, there will be questing/grinding, crafting of some sort, PVP and...

It is going to be interesting to see. There is a ton of hype around this game. It wont meet all expectations, but I suspect it will be a pretty decent game.

All of those are confirmed. They (supposedly) have fewer fed-ex and "kill x whatevers" kind of quests, and most of them are optional side-quests that pop up automatically when you're doing class and world quests. The crafting system is a little unusual in that it's your companions that do the crafting, and they can do it while you're doing other things (or not online). Different companions have different strengths, and there are also treasure-hunting and political quests they can do in addition to crafting. They haven't officially released very much information on PvP, basically what I've posted on here in the last week.

The wild card, the 'and...' you mention is the story. They're designing the game differently from other MMOs in that leveling, under their design, is something to be savored rather than sped through so you can get to the end game. They want 0-49 to be just as important to the player as 50, basically. They don't want TOR to be yet another game where you burn your way as quickly as possible to the cap so you can start the real game.

And I'd imagine some traditional MMO players will have difficulties with that. They're (we're...) conditioned to think about leveling as an annoyance to grind through so we can get to raiding. So cinematic sequences and storylines could be a barrier to those folks. Me, personally, that's what has me the most excited about the game.

That's not to say that there won't be end-game. They just haven't released any information on it yet.

At this point, I would say there's probably a lot more that we don't know about the game than we think.

So what happens at end game? Anything?

They've talked about PvP, raiding and there've been whispers of some kind of legacy system (rumor is that it would allow you to play additional classes on some races) but they haven't talked in any detail about the endgame yet.

That's just the way they're handling PR: they are very tightlipped about releasing any information about any aspect of the game until it's set in stone. My assumption is that they will have the same kind of endgame options that people are used to, but with maybe a little more emphasis on alts (since story is such a big aspect of the game).

But I honestly don't know for sure...

MMO's are done, its been there done that. THey keep making them easier and easier to do.

I lost all faith in MMO's.

It is definitely going to be interesting to see.
There is a ton of hype around this game and I wonder if that is going to impact what people are expecting. Stay tuned.

As of now, I am planning on buying SWTOR and Guild Wars 2. Between those two, Rift and LoTRo, I should be good on MMO's for awhile. :)

And we still dont have a release date yet for SWTOR right?
Best guesses? My guess is late fall.

Looks very cool. But some of that action seems very very dependent on your companion characters. It's starting to look like they're really forcing the teamwork aspect and it's going to be the only way to get through some points. I guess that's OK as long as it's done correctly. I just hate relying on others that I may or may not know, to get through a level...

I'm more interested in end game, because that's where the bulk of your time is spent. Not sure this game has it.

Just a minor point, but when you use the words "companion characters" in TOR, people will think you're talking about traditional Bioware NPCs that travel with you, and not the PCs that group with you. I know that's not what you meant, I just want to avoid confusion...

The stock answer to being wary about needing to group is "it's an MMO". On the flip side, it's going to be extremely solo friendly, but there are going to be things that, if you want to do them, require groups. Apparently your entire class story arc (which is 200+ hours long) can be soloed, but the world quest arcs will involve flashpoints. Now, so far at least, group size for those flashpoints in TOR is smaller, 4 rather than the traditional 6. And the way beta is currently set up (I'm told...), you can comprise that group of 4 with any combination of PCs and companion characters. For instance, you can do it with 4 PCs, or with 3 PCs and 1 companion character, or 2/2. Although that's in testing and subject to change, not official.
They haven't announced anything, but that doesn't mean it isn't there. Developers have stated repeatedly that the game will have endgame, they just aren't ready to announce it. And judging by the way they've handled everything else to date, I don't see any reason to question that.

But...

TOR is not being designed to just be an empty 50 (60/70/85...) levels to burn through so you can get to raiding. It's being designed to be a full, deep game all the way through. So they are going to have more focus, more depth, and so on, during the journey to the level cap than these games traditionally do. Which, as I think I said yesterday, is probably going to frustrate some of the more hardcore mindset players who just want to burn through everything in two days so they can raid and get their world firsts.

Now, the impression I get is that you *can* burn through the game if you want, but you'll be skipping much of the best stuff if you do. You can apparently level through PvP as well, although I'm not entirely sure how that works. (I really, really need to get into beta)

My guess at what's going to happen to a certain segment of the playerbase is that they're going to skip all the story and then complain that TOR isn't any different than any other MMO, when, of course, they've chosen to bypass the very thing that does make it different...

Anyway, endgame will be important. Because MMOs are about retention, and giving players things to do is what keeps them paying the monthly fee. You know that. I know that. And I'm assuming that if you and I can figure out, the people working on the game know it, too.

Although they may have different ideas about it than either of us do. Who knows.

Nothing yet. I'm still guessing September or October. I can't imagine it would be any sooner than that.

I'm kind of hoping for November, strange as that sounds. I have a lot of work from August to October, and this game is probably going to kill whatever month I get it in. I could see me playing 12-18 hours a day if I'm not working.

Which is a bad, bad thing.

Then whats the point of an MMO? its just a single player game if your not dependent on others.

I so miss the days, when you needed a tank, healers, Crowd control/slower and dps. Its just all one big ass zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz now days.

You can still interact with other people without having to be dependent on them.

Nobody wants to spend hundreds of hours grinding, bro, I do it every day at work. I'm not sure what your gripe with the new MMOs is? Just because something takes a very long time to do, doesn't mean it's hard - only time consuming. The age of grinding is over and it's for the better.

Last time I was in lotro, you still needed tanks, healers, CC and dps to raid. Maybe they missed the memo.

Hell, even TOR has tanks, healers and dps, as hard as they've tried to avoid the normal trinity system (I left out CC, because every class has some kind).

I don't mind that. I like that idea. I just hope there's a payoff for going through the game by having a fully developed end-game. I don't want to level 18 alts. I want one guy and I want something to do with him after the lvl 50 grind is over (if you can even call it a grind).

I just hope they have good ones.

This is only a guess, but I don't think they're going to make it where alts are the end game. I do think they want to make multiple playthroughs more of an emphasis than other games have, to experience multiple storylines - that's the background of the rumored legacy system I would say - but they've mentioned raiding too many times not to have it, and PvP is clearly in now.

Although as a veteran MMO player (I'm making the assumption that you played WoW from the start like I did), I'd say you might agree that the odds are still pretty good that the full end game system may not even be in at launch. It never has been for any other game I've ever played. It wasn't even close to fully implemented with WoW, nor with SWG or LotRO (the major ones I've played).

Although they might surprise us, since it's been in developement for so long.

There are supposedly 3 embargoes for major events in the last few weeks, and they supposedly all end Friday (edit: Check that, officially ONE embargo is ending this week). Some of the fan sites that attended TOR's Fan Site Summit in Austin are teasing some kind of major reveal soon, but I know not what. Not buying too much into it, don't want to end up disappointed, but Friday may be a big day.

Massive update on Darth Hater from the Fan Site Summit. Tons and tons of information. I'll post some highlights later on, got to get to work now.

Here's a list of the general stuff I found most interesting:

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That would ****ign totally blow. If you had the ability to do dungeons and beat bosses solo, you may as well just ****ing avoid the montly fee and buy console games.

I Understand games now are pussiefied and loot is basically handed to you, but for me that shit is zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. I guess thats why i dont play them anymore.

Maybe one day a company will try something oldschoolish with a new school twist. If that happens, i may give it a shot.

I obviously haven't played them all, but I can't think of any major MMO where loot is handed to you or where you can do dungeons and beat bosses solo. Raid sizes have gotten smaller (most games are 12-24 now, instead of 40+), but that's it. And smaller does not necessarily equal easier, or easy. It still takes a lot to get the best stuff, especially when it's new content.

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EA earnings conference call today reaffirmed 2011 ship date for TOR. Still no release date, and there was mention of an outside shot at a January 2012 release, but they're assuming calendar year 2011. They mentioned they're holding the release date because they don't want to tip the competition.

There was this in a document:Q2 FY12 is July-September (this year...) and Q4 is October-December.

I bet we have to wait until 2012. :deevee:

That sucks. :banghead:

I'm still thinking september/october.

Just did some forum surfing and they reiterated that they intend to launch in the 2nd half of this year, so I don't think we have anything to worry about.

Interesting comment about testing from the call yesterday:

Thinking about EAs strategy to keep the release date close to the vest might be a smart one. It's really frustrating, on one hand, but I've noticed over the years that WoW has a habit of releasing major updates right around the times that other games launch. If you can keep the date cloudy, you might be able to avoid that.

PvP embargo has been lifted, there's some interesting stuff floating around now. I'm not somebody who's generally interested in PvP (although my initial WoW server was Illidan, go figure...) but I like what I'm reading.

PvP impressions article from Darth Hater:
(more at the link)

Another good article with specific information: http://darthhater.com/2011/05/05/fan...ation-learned/

(Includes bits on Resolve, Valor, PvP gear, Badges and so on)

Also an interview with one of the devs dealing with PvP.

Dude, don't take this the wrong way, but you've got such a boner for this game, I don't think they could do ANYTHING wrong at this point, in your eyes.

That's okay, though. I sincerely hope you enjoy the game (and I hope I do, as well... it would be nice to break away from WoW).

I'm about the most critical person you're ever likely to meet. If they do something I don't like, trust me, you'll know it.

At this point, they haven't...

I think the thing you have to realize is that the game, the way they're designing it, is so far attuned perfectly to both my personality and what I'm looking for in a game. Although I have pretty extensive raid experience ranging from Molten Core and Blackwing Lair in vanilla WoW to all but the latest raids in LotRO (which I can't even get myself to log into right now...) I've always preferred solo or small group play. I would say that probably 85% (or more) of my total time in MMOs has been spent alone, whether it was EverQuest or WoW or SWG or Tabula Rasa or LotRO. And I don't particularly enjoy end game; I'm much more likely to roll an alt than I am to raid nightly (although, again, I have done that). Frankly, raiding feels too much like work for me, and I just don't like that. Anytime a game starts to feel like a job, I lose interest. And, well, let's just say I have some clear antisocial behavior patterns. I've been playing these games for 12 years, been in a number of guilds, but never really felt like I was actually a part of any of them. So to find a game that's going to offer me at least 1600 hours of soloable, story-based play right out of the box is about as perfect a thing as I can imagine in an MMO.

That's really the main selling point for me. The story. If I'm getting an MMO with the kind of storytelling I experienced in KotOR, Jade Empire, the ME series and the DA series, that's all I really need. The rest of the stuff is ancillary. PvP? Take it or leave it. Raiding? Don't really care. The flashpoints I like because I do have a small core of dedicated friends coming into the game with me that I'll be able to do them with. Because I do not, ever, under any circumstances, PUG. Now, that said, that doesn't mean that I don't pay attention to that stuff. Because if it's good, well, that gives me that much more to do. And I am excited about what I'm reading with, for instance, PvP. Because I do like a system where different classes strengths will be utilized and it isn't all just about burst dps. I do like the idea of being able to PvP with my little group of friends. And if the raids - assuming there are raids - are as story based/intense as the flashpoints, I'll enjoy doing those, too. To a point at least.

Now, that's just me, and I know that. I understand that other people want different things from their MMOs, and I do respect that, but this game...it's almost like they're designing it with me in mind. Every announcement so far, with one exception (space combat) has been exactly in line with how I would design a game. And that's a little exciting.

If you don't like my enthusiasm, well, sorry, I guess. :shrug:

Interviewee is a non-native english speaker, so he's at times a bit tough to make out. Most of the visuals are from older videos, as well.

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Yeah, I've got a feeling that Keg isn't going to be quiet on anything that he doesn't like.

Keep the info/opinions coming, Keg. This is the thread I come to for almost all of my SWTOR news. :thumb:

Some potentially big news hinted at in this week's Friday Update, a pretty interesting Developer's Blog on the ingame Codex system. If you look at the image I'm about to attach, you'll see a tab on the UI labeled...Raid Lockouts.

Raids have been rumored all along, obviously, but this is the first official indication that they're in....

Looks cool.

Very high hopes for this game.
The only question I keep asking myself is:

"How am I going to play RIFT, SWTOR and Guild Wars 2 all the time?"

LOL

Its a good problem to have. :)

An MMO without end-game raiding would fail as an MMO, so I never had any doubts about that.

The problem for me is more along the lines of "how am I going to play TOR, Skyrim, Arkham City and Mass Effect 3 at the same time".

I was actually thrilled ME3 was pushed to 2012.

Yeah, me either.

Usually when they slip something like this into an unrelated update, it means there's a reveal coming. Maybe E3?

Meant to quote this earlier from the dev blog and forgot...Good lord.

Any word yet on whether there'll be a framework in place for UI add-ons? In WoW, I'm an add-on junky.

I don't think they've said, but I get the impression that add ons will not be part of the game. But don't quote me on that.

I was also an add-on junky in my WoW days, but I've found somewhat to my surprise that I like the experience in LotRO more, without them.

I'll be cool with that as long as the stock UI is halfway decent. The original WoW stock UI left a lot to be desired.

It certainly did.

That's the big thing: what kind of bells and whistles are in the game. There are some things I wish I could do in LotRO that I can't, but a lot of the stuff that I thought necessary in WoW really wasn't.

I also hate the idea of needing to have certain mods in order to do stuff. It's enough, in my mind, to have to deal with gear and (game) experience, I never really did like the idea of a guild or raid leader saying people needed to have mods x, y, or z in order to raid. That was part of the reason I eventually left the game for good in 2006.

But that's obviously a personal taste thing...

Have an update on add-ons. Officially, the final word is "no add-ons at launch". Maybe after launch, maybe not after launch, but for sure none when the game first goes live.

Thanks for the info. My guess is that if they don't have them at launch, they probably won't ever have them. They will have bigger fish to fry in the first year or so than to provide an add-on framework. I'm pretty sure WoW had add-on support from launch.

And I'll be cool with no add-ons, as long as the UI is decent.

Did they really? Seems like addons got huge at about the 2 year mark, but that doesn't mean they were not supported from the get-go.

I don't remember whether they had them at launch or not (although I'm pretty sure they did) but they were definitely a much bigger thing the second time I played the game, a year or 18 months after launch. At that point it had started to reach the 'mandatory mods to raid' point as I recall.

(At least I think so, this was years and years ago...)

Interesting developer post about the length of the class stories in the game:Not anything we didn't know already but still...holy crap.

<iframe width="640" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/DjdYjxmGF54" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Oh my.

Giggity giggity giggity giggity...

I may have missed it already, but does anybody know if it will be setup similar to KotOR, in that your force powers are somewhat restricted by your class? Such that a Jedi won't be able to wield lightning as well as a Sith because it's a "dark" power?

I would assume that is the case. It sucks though, cause force lightning is soooo much fun....

As far as I know, there's no lightning for Consulars or Knights, although there are things the Jedi can do that (as far as I know) the Sith cannot, as far as projecting objects and so on.

That said, I think the Consular is the only class that hasn't gotten a reveal trailer like this one, so the information is really a bit limited for now.

I should probably do a post with all the reveal videos in it.

That would be awesome, keg.

Yes please.

Bounty Hunter

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Imperial Agent

<iframe width="640" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/o9McdR_rXkY" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Jedi Knight

<iframe width="640" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/AfZwWECtTlI" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Republic Trooper

<iframe width="640" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/KY9NhfBBgXE" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Sith Inquisitor

<iframe width="640" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/DjdYjxmGF54" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Sith Warrior

<iframe width="640" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/VFYhMEZDIpg" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Smuggler

<iframe width="640" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/_vd4ahypXWA" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Great! Sith Inquisitor is the ****ing Warlock from WoW except they can also stealth. I'm betting that class is going to get nerfed to shit a few months after the game is released.

Consulars can also stealth. Although it's an advanced class choice for both (I think).

When they go for that advanced class, however, both inquisitors and consulars become melee focused rather than casting (for lack of a better word) focused. They're purportedly being built as stealth-capable dual-blade wielding blink-tanks.