[We need social features!]

Actually, I believe their strategy is a big part of why they are different. Most game developers make mediocre game that produce mediocre sales. It's only the select few such as BGS that actually make games that continuously break new records and continue pushing the industry forward. All these game developers have very talented employees that work for them. It's how they use that talent that differentiates these studios from one another.

It's actually planned risk at the hands of the publishers. In fact, 10% of the games made only turn a profit, but those games that do usually make up the difference of the other 90%. Knowing this, publishers intentionally have "Game of the Year" titles that they know that will sell well, and the rest are more or less gambles (like Rage, published last year).

 

Either way this is getting off-topic. You either agree that the game is in serious need of social features or you disagree and are content with how the game currently is. For me, and I'm sure there are many others out there, this simply is not enough. Once the next big MMO comes along, there won't be much keeping players tied to this game if BioWare doesn't give the community more reason to stay.

Personally, I think more social features would be welcome. It would be a cute little distraction for me more than anything major. However, I think the idea that these features are "Necessary" is incorrect, which was the point I tried to get across originally.

[3 Things That Could Improve Star Wars: The Old Republic]

Laws are based on reason and for the benefit of the society. Now before this becomes an ethical discussion, and what is good for soceity... let me say that...

 

Gambling is going to happen no matter what. People make monetary gambles or other decisions that is a gamble in their life. So whatever kind of gamble we are talking about... its going to happen. Its something everyone is confronted with, and should learn how to evaluate what is a good or bad gamble. This is a valuable lesson in life that can save people some pain in suffering. And simulated harsh realities expose how gambling should be avoided as a means to make a living. It becomes a life lesson learned in something that is going to happen in either money or without money.

 

Also, they can have mini games without gambling. However, they can introduce the mini games without gambling for the US since it is rated teen for 13 and up, but in Europe they can easily add gambling where it is not a concern, and it is 16 and up. In games people make special regional releases, and that is how they succeed at delivering thier product. While swtor is a great franchise it should live up to its art style, lore, and demographics and thus it should have more mature content and... it already does considering its a SW sci-fi game with many mature themed topics with fighting.

 

Then lets talk about laws for the betterment of society. Why would online video game with fake money, which is still rated by ESRB to be teen, be bad when there are so many other things which are bad. Why draw the line there?

 

If simulated games encourage the behavior that people practice then isnt a game with violence already bad? So if it is already a bad game, and makes society worse for it, then why dress it up as something nicer and pretend its good.

 

You know why? Because people argue that video games dont make people violent. Since violence is something people learn to be bad. They feel pain, and learn to avoid it from a young age.

 

Gambling on the other hand can become an addiction to those who have convinced themselves they are willing to hit rock bottom and hurt themselves - which they are fine doing, at a chance to support their gambling habit. This is also because they are part of a culture that encourages all the glitz and glamour and the positive character of a gambler to exist as an idea and manifests into something bad without any exposure that it is futile to win and make a living off of in a simulated reality. Similar to feeling pain, losing big in a simulated reality creates that life lesson learned skill. However, put a gambler who starts small and has good ups and downs will like their hobby and the risk involved, until they lose big when they go higher stakes and become addicted to win their money back or they are addicted to the risk of it.

 

And... it exists everywhere already. The idea of gambling exists, and people will run into it eventually, so why not prepare them for it?

 

It similar to alcohol as well. And the famous expression: Everything in moderation. Which means when kids are around responsible parents who teach their kids to treat alcohol as a social drink rather than a drug, then in moderation alcohol is not a bad thing... but it is potentially very bad. Yet, it is legal... because it is everywhere, and people are also exposed to a culture of partying until dawn mentality and forgetting most of what went on. I think partially the reason some of these people get very drunk is because they get nervous and becoming drunk makes them more comfortable so its more medicine than social

 

Anyways, to conclude, its just nit picking on what is good or bad for a game which already has things people can argue about not being good anyways.

 

So where do people draw the line? On whos behalf are they drawing that line for?

 

That's alot of words that say absolutly nothing. Same old blah blah blah nonsense, waxing borderline philsophical thoughts about what is or is not ethical behavior that always comes up when somebody mentions the law, while completly missing the actual point.

 

Regardless of your own personal views of morality and judgement, online gambling is considred illegal in many of the areas that The Old Republic is sold and played, and thus cannot be added into the game. What's more, because the US players can access the EU servers, the same US laws apply, and as such they can't add to one set of servers but not another.

[We need social features!]

For eight years straight I knew players in SWG that did nothing but dance in a cantina or craft items. If BioWare gives us the tools to create our own fun and enjoyment through a variety of mini-games, that could bring more hours of enjoyment than you may think.

But can you reasonably expect that a large ammount of people are going to behave like that? I don't. Certainly not in the kind of numbers Bioware needs. This once again goes back to what I said about Galaxies, die-hards, and a polarized view. Yes there were players who enjoyed some of the features that game had, and there are alot of people who are deathly loyal to SWG. However, there weren't enough of them to remain profitable, as the former design lead of SWG has attested.

 

Money is clearly a constant in every game developer, but some are much better than others. Bethesda Game Studios is easily one of the best in the business and it's because of how they make their games. They don't go into their office thinking what kind of game is going to make them the most money. They go into their office thinking what kind of game would be fun to play. This is a large reason to why they have made a GotY title since Morrowind in 2002 and continue to be a pioneer and innovator in the industry.

I think that's being a bit naive. Bethesda (and every other company) is interested in making the game that's going to be the most appealing to the most ammount of people. Bethesda makes better games, no doubt about it, but it isn't because of a different design strategy.

 

You don't get anywhere in any business without being ambitious and trying to make the best product on the market. There are plenty of MMOs out there that are mediocre but very few that are actually worth playing. Sooner or later, one game developer will take advantage of that fact and they will reap the benefits while others continue to chase dollars in dead-ends.

The only reason you try to make the best product is because you're chasing dollars, just like everyone else. Maybe I'm seeing something that isn't there, but there seems to be this underlying idea that a company needs to be more interested in the product than the profit, and that's never going to happen.

[Space..Infinite universe, yet stuck on rails.]

I agree with the OP, if you didn't play SWG or didn't do space in SWG then you don't know what you missed out on. Space is awesome, Star Fox is not space and I would have preffered to have no space then to have Str Fox style space. It's just not Star Wars like. SWG was Star Wars X-Wing series style space, but better.

 

Space is an empty black void of death waiting to strike. Any kind of navigation from one system to the next requires Hyperspace, which is a rigidly navigated and carefully calculated route. Space is not a place you visit in awe and wonderement of its splendor: it's something that you move through in order to get to your next objective, and this is especially true in Star Wars. There is no exploration any of the major stories, the novelty of being in space is completly gone, but all of the dangers are still there.

Jump to Lightspeed in particular was an absolute borefest. Sure, you got to go "anywhere", but there wasn't anything to do once you were out there. I for one have always though "it's not the destination, but the journey" is an absolute lie.

[Please expand Crafting to Legacy and Guild]

binding to Legacy and guild makes no sense.

[We need social features!]

This topic isn't about sandbox vs themepark. SWTOR will never be a sandbox and anyone who is foolish to believe it has any elements of a sandbox is kidding themselves. What I am asking for are features such as pazaak, swoop racing, gambling, etc. that would be great mini-games and would bring hundreds of hours of enjoyment to players. This is Star Wars and I expect to feel immersed in the Star Wars Universe. I have no interest in paying a monthly fee for a game that has nothing to offer outside of three features they update every six months.

How long is that REALLY going to keep you engaged?

How often do you play solitaire or blackjack on your computer? How much appeal is there nowadays for racing games that aren't full-on driving sims like Forza Motorsports?

Maybe it's just me and how I think, but I really doubt there's "hundreds of hours" of enjoyment for players. Regardless of the appeal or the immersion factor, Pazzak, Sabacc or any other kind of gambling isn't going to fly because of online anti-gambling laws, which in some states forbid it alltogether, even if there's no monetary gain.

 

I do think it's so strange that these features have been request alot lately within the last few weeks in terms of "Immersion into Star Wars", when they were absolutly minor or nonexistant parts in the overall franchise. Nobody gambled in the actual movies. Pazzak and swoop racing was nothing more than a short distraction.

 

That is truly sad then as MMORPGs were built off the "die-hards" and the tabletop RPG players. The entire industry has been hijacked by an unruly and massive casual base with promises of profits and riches beyond developer's dreams. MMOs were special because they weren't just games, but something much more. Now they have been reduced to nothing but casual themeparks with e-sports and cosmetic items to decorate avatars.

That's history for you man. This same process has happened with every form of media, nearly every technological advancement, and in some cases entire industries (such as the automotives). The early adopters experience a great deal of freedom, customization, and creativity as everyone collectivly tries to figure out what can be done with it, what's feasible, where the limits are, and so on. In the case of mass media, like genres of music or video games, it often involves trying to determine a sense of identity. As the product becomes more refined and improved, it's made less complex and therefore more accessible to the mass market.

You really can't hold it against a developer, or any kind of company, for trying to make more money, because that's the whole reason the company exists.

[A solution to the loss of names due to transfers]

If your going to name a character then do so accordingly, without using names like Jðhn, Bàstila or skywalkêr they don't help the system at all because basically it's taking the easy way out by using cheap coding to advance in any name they want, not only does it look silly but it's also a cheat as well in which does make the naming policy flawed.

It does help the system because the system MUST have a unique name for all of the characters on its servers, just like all of the word documents you may have on your computer at home. Go ahead and try naming all the documents in the same folder the same thing and tell me what happens.

 

It's not a flawed system or policy. I don't like seeing the goofy alphabetic characters either (I especially don't like to see in-game characters named after out-of-game character like Luke or Leia).

 

I know you have a habit of using words whose definition doesn't fit, but it's not a "cheat" if its spelt out in the rules as allowed and is available to anyone.

[We need social features!]

I'm not sure if you ever played SWG, but it was known for much more than just its community. It arguably to this day still has the most in-depth crafting system out there, one of the best systems for profession customization, and the entire game was completely player-driven.

Which goes back to what I was saying about a game of die-hards. For a lot of people (I would dare to even say most of them) the SWG crafting system was maddeningly and needlessly complex. There were people who were masters of crafting that had played since day 1 and still didn't know all of the various intracacies of the system.

For people like yourself, who look at MMO's as an alternative reality or something approaching it, that has great appeal. For people like myself who want to get in and have their fun without learning a second job, it's frustrating, and that's why SWG has such a polarized view.

 

 

Maybe it's just me, but SWTOR doesn't even feel like an MMORPG should. An MMORPG, at least in my opinion, is a game that is supposed to keep you hooked for many years and honestly I find myself bored with the game because I have exhausted all the content it has to offer. There are no systems or features giving me incentives and reasons to stay, and I believe that is poor game development. Any MMO that relies solely on new operations, warzones, and stories to be released (which will inevitably be buggy) for longevity is suffering from a lack of understanding.

The problem with that statement is that is how nearly all MMO's operate, particularly more "themepark" ones, which is the norm nowadays.

[We need social features!]

Just for the sake of contrast: people DO play MMO's just for the raid encounters or the like.

 

Look at World of Warcraft. It doesn't have anything approaching these "Social" features. Its community is crap to be honest, and they are continuously adding new mechanics and features to make the need of a strong community obsolete. You can play an MMO now the same way you can play Call of Duty, and its maintained its #1 position in the genre for over a decade now.

 

I love community, I hate being in guilds where one half never shows up and the other half never talks (which is most guilds in WoW) and various things that remove the human element, but it is worth noting that clearly what you're suggesting isn't as necessary as you imply.

 

SWG had a great community. Some people have said that was the only really good thing the game had going for it. A large part of that community actually came from pure dedication to the franchise and the game rather than any of the social features that were inside it. You never hear of "casual SWG players". It was a game of die-hards, and TOR doesn't have that mindset.

[Atmospheric Flight + Space Interface]

False. When I played WoW, I in fact spent more time exploring the zones than questing. I spent days exploring Northrend when I first got there withOUT a flying a mount. I had a blast doing so.

 

You didn't get there by only doing exploring though. It's statistically impossible. I know because I did that experiment. Level 1 character, doing nothing by exploring. The only way to get out of a combat experience was to run away from it. I fully explored over 15 zones (which at the time was somewhere between 20 and 25% of the game) and didn't even make level 8.

 

So, what I said originally, which is that you can't make a character solely dedicated to Exploring, is absolutly true, and I know because I did it (it was by the far the most painful experience in my gaming lifetime)

[Kotor 3]

It's a bit late for that, for starters.

 

Second, the first games followed a set story line, slowly moving through the timeline, viewing different conflicts through the eyes of different characters and also varying perspectives. What we have now doesn't have that same flow at all, which is 8 completly seperate stories at the same time, in mostly the same places.

 

The comparison to Final Fantasy is also kind of bunk because the huge majority of games in that franchise are complely autonomous of one another. The only time that they are connected to one another is when they have two numerical series (such as X 2). The connectivity and canon of Star Wars however can't be understated however. It covers tens of thousands of years in the galaxy and so many different characters and stories that have been written throughout the various decades, that even though there are stories (like Knights of the Old Republic) that are completly seperate from the storyline in the movies, it fits snuggly in the much larger picture and feels like a small part in this huge epic.

 

I think what's most important though is that there's more to the KOTOR stories that TOR is solely lacking, which is moral themes and dilema's. The First Knights of The Old Republic, ultimatly, dealt with redemption. Can people be reedemed against their will? At all? If given the choice of going back to the old ways, would you? The Second game touches on some of those same things but mostly touches on atonement and consequences. Can you anticipate the consequences of your actions? If you knew what would happen, would you still have done it? The Old Republic doesn't have that: It has cut-and-dry Light Side and Dark Side morality (which to be fair so did KOTOR) and no real justification or consequences for your actions. There's nothing to "think" about with The Old Republic, and that's what you need so desperatly in a single player game.

[Atmospheric Flight + Space Interface]

The only thing that stood out for Star Wars: Galaxies was the space exploration and player housing. If those two things could be brought to SWTOR my love for this game would be through the roof!

 

It also serves absolutly no point. The Old Republic is all about storytelling. You can't do created story-content with sandbox features like player housing.

[A solution to the loss of names due to transfers]

The alt codes is another flawed attempt in the naming policy, they are more like cheat codes more than anything else, they aren't a solution, they are apart of the problem such as Jðhn. Players that prefer to use a single name would have to go with a nickname to identity them, this would avoid the confusion, since players do seems to value their first names more overall, but that doesn't mean that players value their legacy names any less, why make everything unique? it just causes major problems with the community especially now after the transfers.

 

It would be nice to see a John Smith and a Jon Smith, or even a John Doe and John Smith interacting on the same server status, we can already add siblings and foes to our legacy family tree's why can't we do the same with actual players? this would be another interesting feature to uphold.

 

Sooner or later Raith, you're going to have to learn that just because you don't like it, doesn't mean that it's flawed.

 

Why make everything unique? simply put, because it has to be.

[Gambling - Pazaac, pod racing, slot machines .ect.]

The problem is that there are anti-gambling laws in many states that forbid gamblling in an online environment, even if it isn't for real money.

[3 Things That Could Improve Star Wars: The Old Republic]

The problem with introducing pazzak or betting games of any variety into The Old Republic or other MMO's is that you automatically become susceptible to state or federal anti-gambling laws, many of which completly outlaw any form of online gambling.

 

I disagree with the overall mindset in these proposals. Players don't play (and pay for) MMO's to watch things. They play to DO things, and I think the idea that people will spectate other people's events is unrealistic, particularly if it's always on.

 

People watch sporting events, poker competititions, and the like because it's only on a certain time. If you want to watch the Cubs, you HAVE to be at the park or near a tv or radio when the game is going. While that works well for sports and true spectator events, it works very poorly for an MMO game which is supposed to be "always on", that you can do whatever you want, whenever you want.

[Defections]

If people read/quoted my post they would understand that a very simple solution would be to postpone this until ALL class quests were done and then have a defection quest. It would take some work for devs but it would avoid the issue of class quests.

 

It should be a one time thing. Maybe two but how could your original faction ever trust you?

 

It would be simple if the class stories that we have were done and finished at that point, which simply isn't true. There's no way Bioware could have a ten year plan for this game and not plan on expanding its story at some point.

 

When they expand the story out, if defections are introduced, now they have to create 16 class stories instead of 8.

[A solution to the loss of names due to transfers]

You still haven't caught on have you? When Pirates of the burning sea had it's own server transfers, at least players didn't have to change for the most part, you could have two Billy's on the same server or more, with different surnames, visa versa so it wasn't like names would be much of a problem.

 

There's plenty of not catching on to go around Raith. You still haven't caught onto the idea that the only thing that Burnig Sea and Old Republic have in common is that they are MMO's and your characters have names.

[Defections]

not true,look at how anakin skywalker became darth vader...he killed lots of sith (or imperial forces,i think sith and imperial are quite similar really..and count dooku did count as sith),but sidious manipulated him until he became a fallen jedi,than the apprentice of sidious

 

While true, there is no Sidious type character in any of the Republic Stories, nor is there a Luke Skywalker trying to save you.

[Defections]

There's not a class story in this game that actually leaves room for you to think "this character could reasonably be believed to defect to the other faction"

 

Every person who is in their perspective faction is in it to win it.

 

The Trooper class gets particularly iffy because you have a former LT who got demoted because the original Havoc Squad defected, a former Imperial soldier who defected to the Republic because of gross ignorance of protocol and regulation, a combat droid hard-wired to promote and believe in the fighting spirit of the Republic and Democracy, and a Voss seargeant whose entire team was killed by Imperials.

 

At no point would any of these individuals be okay with defection, nor would it make sense for an individual who spends the entire first act hunting down republic traitors to later become one himself.

[A solution to the loss of names due to transfers]

the simple fact i have paid to play this game in the past should be reason enough for bioware to want to do what i ask.

 

Not really. You're not some magical snowflake of individuality here. We all pay to play and we all play by the same rules. When you sign up for your account you're told (if you actually bother to read) what you get for your terms of service.

 

Being able to ask bioware to ignore their own rules is not one of them.

[Implement better naming system.]

Sure they have different first names but did they all have the same last name? They're all part of the same legacy though. I just threw the same first name suggestion in for others, I could care less. I'd love to be able to name my characters a first and last name seperate from the legacy name as was done in the movies. Sure one could argue that they were all different legacies, but I don't buy it, they were all so intertwined that if you were modeling your characters after the movies, then they'd all have the same names.

 

Leia was a Skywalker, had the last name of Organa.

Han wasn't named Skywalker, nor was Chewy or Obi-wan...but of course through the movies he was only called Obi-wan...

Yes, Anakin did get a name change which would have be awesome if it was allowed in game.

 

=] I just don't understand why an archaic name system is preferred over something that could add a better level of customization.

I couldn't disagree from this further.

Han is not part of Luke's Legacy. the Solo family name was once a very weathy and very important one in Correllia, and Han lives up to his namesake. He also spends the majority of the time in the last two movies completly seperate from Luke.

The same is said for Leia Organa. While she may be related by blood to Luke, her story is her own, as is her Legacy. She is more concerned about the continuation of the Rebel Alliance and their continued success in the Galactic Civil War than she is in either Luke or in Han.

 

Again, by the definition of what a Legacy is, they are all distinct from one another, allthough they are related.

[Implement better naming system.]

Conversely though, everyone in the new squad, "your" squad, only goes by their real name and not by a call sign.

[Implement better naming system.]

you mean how everyone, with the exception of one person, has the exact same names throughout the entire Saga? and that the only time where someone does actually change names is when they change from being a Jedi to a Sith, which this game doesn't even allow you to do?

 

Or that there are no two people that have the same name?

 

Should have thought that one through a little more before you blurted it out.

[Implement better naming system.]

. There's only so many combinations before names become gibberish or completely unappealing.

 

That is utter and complete garbage. If that were true, new fantasy novels wouldn't always be creating new names for people, places, and things.

 

There may be only so many variations of Luke Skywalker, but there is no limit to creativity.

[What SWTOR is]

I can't help but laugh when individuals deride this game for "lack of control" over the class story. Personally I'd like to see the kinds of games that they're playing, because the overwhelming majority of games (even RPG's) have just as much (or little) control over the narrative.

 

Even "sandbox" rpg's don't actually give any level of flexability in the narrative: you just have the choice to completly ignore it if you so choose.

 

Plus let's also consider the history of storytelling over the past millenia. At no point has the audience had more control than the storyteller over the outcome.