I played GW2 a bit this weekend and there were a couple of things that I really liked. First and foremost, SW:TOR needs to take note out of GW2's book on how to create a truly living and breathing world. The art design and the atmosphere/music/interactivity were seriously second to none. I felt that there was so much world to explore and it was truly beautiful. That's my biggest gripe with TOR. Furthermore, I loved that I could go wherever I wanted to and do whatever I wanted. Lower level areas scale you down to that level so that the content was still challenging and you can play with your friends that are lower level than you. Questing feels very organic with the dynamic events and I don't feel pigeon-holed into a specific area. Guild Wars 2 is very poorly optimized, much like TOR and combat honestly feels incredibly clunky. I was expecting the combat to be fast and revolutionary, but instead it just feels like a clunky mess. There's just too much going on in pvp, WAY too many particle effects, and at the end of the day it just seems to be all flash with no substance.

This guy has the right idea. Grabbing a brew and relaxing in the sun always makes a rager less ragey.

And I'm pointing out that they DID respond to this issue in the Q&A and it was a worthless response. The OP is not "dreaming" for a dev response as they've clearly proven that they can and will give direct responses on issues. I'm not sure where you were going with your post. Are you trying to say that the OP should just stand idly by and not share his concerns?

What I'm saying is that you CAN get a direct response from development that is sufficient. It may not be date specific, but the answer that we did get concerning the issue was completely insufficient. The Q&A's have provided some valuable direct information (i.e. such and such will be released with patch 1.2.)

Not true. A direct answer that will suffice is: Yes, we are aware of the issue and we will be implementing a loop music feature in the future; however, we do not have an ETA for said feature. This is a hell of a lot more direct than: Derp, interesting idea, let me think about it! Derp Why even answer the question if you're not going to provide absolutely 0 valuable information.

NO, we DID get a response--and it was absolutely terrible and ambiguous and I was outraged. In the March 23 Q&A: joetacticSW: Can we have a ‘Loop music’ feature or some other way to make our experience less quiet? Damion: Interesting idea. Let me give it some thought! What a load of crap of an answer. I completely agree with you OP and a number of people have requested the same thing. I honestly feel that this was one of the primary reasons that I absolutely couldn't stand leveling an alt. There is no immersion, no ambiance, no life other than the cut scenes. It really shows that Bioware spent most of its time and energy on the cut scenes and neglected the immersion that an MMO world is supposed to grant the player. I cannot express how disappointed I am that something as simple as music is missing from the game. /rant

True--I totally would have voted for BOA, but that doesn't change the fact that public perception of EA has taken a turn for the worst and it needs to be remedied.

http://consumerist.com/2012/04/congratulations-ea-you-are-the-worst-company-in-america-for-2012.html Poor Bioware, just trying to do what they do best but the man is keeping them down. Maybe something like this is the kick in the butt that EA needs to get their act together and start thinking more about the customer. No company continues to be successful by pissing off loyal customers. There's not much that Bioware can do in terms of developing under the umbrella of a corporation that has taken a flogging by the public as of late. There's no way that this game was ready for release just before Christmas and an award like this shows exactly who we have to blame for paying for a product that Bioware knew wasn't ready. Discuss, quick before the thread closes!

I can't help but feel that EA's arrogance has gotten them backed into a corner--they were so confident that the game was going to be a raging success (which it was) and continue to be a raging success (which is clearly not the case) that they neglected to address something that is incredibly important to the longevity of a NEW MMO. There NEEDED to be a plan in place for when server populations began to fade, yet it seems that this was all an afterthought by Bioware and EA. I find it completely unacceptable that they launched the game in Austrailia/Asia without the means for current players in those regions to transfer their characters. It was such a bad business decision that it's disgusting. History has told us time and time again that the most important months for a new MMO in a post-WoW world are the first 3 months. EA/Bioware needs to man up and take responsibility for their inability to facilitate something that, at its core, is the foundation of an MMO—community. It’s tough for anyone to admit defeat, but sometimes you just have to roll with the punches and make a comeback. Here is what I see happening if something doesn’t happen FAST: 1. 1.2 is released and a number of excited customers come back to check out the new content. 2. Said customers realize that 1.2 lacks substance. It has fantastic features, but not much that really adds longevity to the endgame. Players unsubscribe within a month 3. Bioware is back at square one AND STILL left scrambling to get character transfers up and running. 4. They finally get server transfers up and running by the time Diablo 3 is released. Players are already over TOR and move on to the next best thing. 5. TOR is left to wallow in a perpetually mediocre state. I’ll be surprised if the game can keep 500,000 subscribers after Diablo 3 and GW2 are released. Sad, but I fear that this is the reality of the matter. I hope I’m wrong. I want to be able to come back, but there is just too many issues that the game needs to address before I can even think about playing it again. Good luck Bioware, you have your work cut out for you.

If only the TOR community had more players like the OP that actually bring genuine ideas to the table. This is a very commendable thread and I support it 100%, thus the bump. Anything that the devs can do to involve the community to generate positive feedback is a fantastic idea. I know there are some truly artistic, dedicated fans out there that would rise to this challenge if was presented to them. Thanks OP for yielding a constructive thread on these ugly, ugly forums.

You're kidding me right? There is so little music in this game that it's absurd. I agree that the music that we do hear is fantastic, the problem is, you never fricken hear it! I hope you like the sound of your own footsteps and the humming of your speeder, because you're going to be hearing it a lot! I found Damion's reply to the loop music question in the Q&A to be quite insufficient. Really? You'll think about it? Say what you want about WoW, but I never got that epic burst of music when I walked into Kaas City like I did when I walked into Stormwind for the first time. It was disheartening and underwhelming to say the least.

This is such a BS rebuttal to a valid point. Do you seriously think that doing the same types of quests over and over is fun? There is literally NO variation in the types of quests you do in TOR. WoW did an excellent job of spicing things up when Burning Crusade launched. I don't think it's too much to ask for a game that's supposedly not just about the destination. As far as I'm concerned, they should create a 'team', like Bioware always raves about, just dedicated to providing the player base with interesting and unique side-quests. Hopefully this is represented on the job descriptions of the team that's now supposedly in charge of in-game dynamic events.

Unfortunately, I think it's that time for me and TOR to part ways for the time being. It's not that TOR is a bad game, in fact, it's a great MMO. The problem for me is that I think I'm just tired of the same old formula. I've been level 50 for quite some time now and nearly all of my guild mates have quit. We all agree that TOR has been the best MMO to come along since WoW and that the leveling experience was exceptional, but ultimately it stopped there. There just isn't enough here YET to warrant spending $15/month and ultimately, I can't drive myself to play when all of my guild mates have stopped playing. I'll probably be back when the game adds something new to the genre AT ENDGAME. For as young as the game is, I expect it to do great things and 1.2 is a step in the right direction. 1.2 is adding a number of quality features, particularly with fine-tuning challenging content and the migration to a player-driven economy; however, it’s still not adding anything NEW to the genre. Give me some more story, meaningful world pvp, space combat, mini games, etc. and I assure you that I will re-subscribe. I've compiled a list of things that I think TOR did well and things that it needs to change before the game can win me back as a customer. Things that SW:TOR did well: 1.) Obviously, the story. The story is what kept me subscribed for 3 months. I leveled to 50 as an operative, co-oping with my Brother who played a mercenary. There is no other MMO on the market that is as fun and engaging to level in as TOR. 2.) Voice-acting – It was stellar. I listened to every cut scene that I could just because it was that good. It really pulls you into the world and gives you a sense of purpose and reason for doing the mindless quests that MMO’s tend to throw at you. Some of the NPC’s had fantastic personalities, and I look forward to playing through again someday as a different character. 3.) Respond to customer feedback – After watching the Guild Summit live stream, I can honestly say that Bioware truly cares about taking this game to the upper echelon of MMO gaming. I think 1.2 proves that they mean business and they’re going to do everything in their power to not only retain customers, but to also recoup lost subscriptions. I’m almost certain that someday I’ll be back, but until then I’ll just patiently wait. 4.) Feels like Star Wars. I’m not a huge Star Wars fan, but I did enjoy all of the movies. I feel that TOR’s ground game did an exceptional job at making me feel like I was actually in the Star Wars universe. The foundation is strong. 5.) Sound & Music – The sound effects were Star Warsy and the music, when it was actually playing, was pretty epic. 6.) PvP – Performance issues aside, the pvp in TOR is genuinely fun. There are definitely some balancing issues to consider and the resolve system seems like it needs to be fine-tuned, but all-in-all, I enjoyed pvp. Things that SW:TOR didn’t do so well: 1.) Performance – While I wasn’t particularly affected by performance issues (other than in Ilum, Alderaan, fleet), there is no way that my machine shouldn’t be able to run this game at full everything given the dated visuals at a solid 40 to 60 fps. The game just simply needs to be optimized better which is the key to accessibility. From what I’ve seen with 1.2, performance has improved, but that could be a direct result of population and/or hardware differences. I’m anxious to see how they intend on fixing this. 2.) Static, boring world – Beyond character cutscenes, the worlds themselves were incredibly dull and lifeless. Way too many npc’s just standing around waiting to be killed, and the fact that they are in groups makes it even worse. I don’t think that the whole “heroic feeling”, multiple mob packs was a smart design decision, at least when nearly EVERY pack you fight results in 4 brain dead mobs firing at you until they die. To me, it just makes the areas feel cluttered and unrealistic. 3.) Strong quest delivery, but my God are the quests themselves boring. WAY too many kill and click quests. I realize that this is an MMO, but seriously, there was almost NO variety in the types of quests that you do. If you expect me to roll an alt and partake in the acclaimed legacy system, you HAVE to give me quests that are a little bit more engaging. I kept waiting for a quest on Hoth where I was asked to pilot an AT-AT or something cool like that. NOTHING, all boring kill quests and clicking computers. SO disappointing. 4.) Lack of Music – This was a really big personal immersion breaker for me. The music, when it played, was absolutely phenomenal; however, it seems like it hardly ever plays. I’m so tired of listening to my speeder hum and my footsteps that it’s ridiculous. Implement a loop music feature or something to help immerse the player while they’re traveling in large areas such as Hoth or Taris. 5.) Instancing and traveling – This bugged me to no end. Allowing players to bypass orbital stations in 1.2 is the first major step in making travel not so painful, but on live now, it is so tedious and monotonous to travel that I almost don’t even want to bother with it. Everything is so instanced that it seems to really detract from the ultimate goal of the game—to create a living breathing world that players can immerse themselves in and explore. I have a hard time feeling immersed when there are loading screens upon loading screens, and there is no seamlessness of which to speak of. Elevators are nothing more than cheap loading screens, you can’t fly your ship around the galaxy. Even the WoW devs admitted that partitioning their zones in Cataclysm killed the sense of massiveness and exploration in their game and they are reverting back to seamlessness in Pandaria. I would love for TOR’s universe to be fully explorable, although I feel that it may be a pipe dream at this point… 6.) Lack of challenge – It sounds like this is going to be addressed in 1.2 which is great for the longevity of the game, but until I see concrete evidence that the game will actually pose a challenge, this is staying on the negatives list. Beyond the easy operations, flashpoints are a cake walk too. My guild mates and I pretty much one shot every flashpoint on hard mode in subpar gear. How about adding a nightmare mode for flashpoints as well for those of us that REALLY like a challenge? I’m sure I’m missing some things, but I’ve already rambled for too long. Hopefully this information is useful to Bioware. I’ll continue to stay updated on the game and I truly do have high hopes for its future. Honestly, it’s the first MMO since WoW’s release that has kept me subscribed for longer than a month, so that alone says that this game has a strong foundation and it’s only going to get better. Thanks for reading and may the force be with you all. I hope to return someday. TL;DR – TOR is a great MMO for being so young, but I can’t fork out $15/month for something that isn’t quite up to my standards yet. I plan on coming back when the world of TOR feels more alive.

My biggest issue was definitely the lack of open world pvp and the segregation of the factions. I think I saw 2 republic players on my entire ride to 50, which in my book is completely unacceptable. How are we supposed to feel like there is a massive struggle for galactic control if there is no actual struggle at all? Solution: More open world activities that brings factions to the same locations on the worlds. This could be world objective based, dynamic events, world bosses, rare monster spawns, capturing opposing faction camps, etc. There is NONE of this. Even the daily questing on Ilum doesn't promote open world pvp. Second solution, merge the dang servers. There just isn't enough population on the servers to make the gigantic worlds feel alive. I fear part of the reason I didn't see any opposing faction players is because server population cap was too low with too much instancing. Stop trying to appease the solo, for lack of a better term 'carebears', and give those of us that rolled on a pvp server something to be excited about. Thanks for listening!

Technically, all you'll need to get is the new chest piece which contains the new mod...not that big of a deal imo. You'll be clearing nightmare modes for Black hole comms anyway, you're gonna get another chest piece. /thread