It's the best selling MMORPG of all time. It has hundreds of accolades, and ubiquitously considered to be a masterpiece of a game. In short, lol wut?

Why would WoW be threatened by a sub-par product? Does not compute.

Ditto. I was really hoping for a patch seeing as how they got some suggestions that were ubiquitously supported in the beta forums (like fixing the UI).

I do like these forums. Considering I've been around since 2009.

I was hoping it was going to be good. It's not.

True. Some terrible games even survive (i.e. Warhammer), lol.

No worries bro, I'm moving my action bars around, it's so awes... oh wait.

Being a themepark has nothing to do with getting exhausted 30ft from leveling hubs, not being able to swim, running into invisible walls, and making entire zones the size of WoW instances.

You're right, except for the fact that WoW's world is about 300x bigger than ToR's and there are zero invisible walls and the only way you can get exhausted is by swimming too far out to sea, not going on land.

I just bought the game... http://starwarsgalaxies.station.sony.com/

We were ignored in beta. There was a sticky post that explicitly said that Bioware wasn't there to listen to beta testers' suggestions.

You're right about PvP, but there were many mods from the beta period that you could use on day 1. I'm all up for critiquing various games, but straight-up misinformation doesn't help anyone.

This.

The OP asserts that there is no foundation. He's right. This game is going nowhere fast. PS: you can't cite "raw empirical data" without, you know, raw empirical data.

So you're saying my review is objective and not biased? That's crazy! I think ToR has good AND bad parts, the bad just far outweigh the good right now.

That's an unfortunate comparison. Do you think this game will go the way of SOE?

I gave you PvP, and I'll give you player housing. What else? What major features did WoW not have. We're talking about features here, not whether or not it had a smooth launch, but by all means continue to throw out red herrings. The problem is that I can list at least 10 standard 2012 MMO features ToR doesn't have off the top of my head. But you're so adamant in defending this game, you can't stay objective. See, I don't love WoW. As a matter of fact, I haven't played it for more than a year, but I completely understand why it's successful and why it continues to be the most played MMO. Do you? If you do, then why do you even defend the lack of a combat log, the lack of mods, the lack of UI customization, the lack of PvP, etc. we see in ToR?

This is wrong, please name some of these features that WoW was lacking on release and several years later. PvP is the only feature WoW didn't have on release which could have been considered status quo. It was subsequently implemented in the upcoming months. WoW had raiding, dungeons, guilds, mounts, on day 1.

Oh, that's easy. This is where my car analogy really shines and you shoot yourself in the foot. New cars have ABS, GPS, fancy LED lights, etc. OMG, that's like decades of technological advancement!! How? I'm hoping you realize how ridiculous your question is. It's pretty easy. WoW did all the heavy lifting for ToR. They figured out that homogenizing classes is a good idea, that PvP arenas were a huge success, that multiple-level dungeons are a good idea, that LFG/LFM systems streamline the leveling process, that achievements are fun, that a moddable UI can create a huge modder community. Rift, a studio with less money, actually implemented most of these. You're now telling me there would have been no way for Bioware to implement them? Lets be fair. I don't think that ToR would have had any way to release with the same amount of CONTENT that WoW presently has (and that's where you're completely correct), but features are NOT content. I think the content in ToR is fine, it's the features, or lack thereof, I have a problem with.

I was in two beta events. Beta testers were ignored systematically. Almost everything I mention in my review had a thread with 1000+ votes on the beta forums. I'm sure I can get other beta testers to attest to this. But that's the problem. Bioware doesn't think their customers have any idea what they are talking about. Then again, I guess Metacritic is already paving the way for negative reviews. I never said they do. I don't think they do. You're sticking your head in the sand here. I specifically mentioned economic contexts. I'm not sure how much more clear I can be.

I guess you enjoy meta-discussions. Moving on. No, the analogy wasn't terrible. The analogy wasn't saying that CAR==MMO, the analogy was saying (here we go again), that new products need to be competitive with current products in the current economic context, not competitive in old markets. If ToR had launched in 2004 alongside WoW, I guarantee ToR would come out on top, but hey, we're not in 2004, we're in 2012, and ToR is a very very sad product. You don't like WoW? Fine, lets compare it with Rift. Rift had achievements, a much much better UI, more focused PvP, etc.

First of all, I was making an analogy, not a comparison. Whereas you may not be able to compare apples to oranges, you can certainly make analogous arguments that relate the two. The analogy also holds water. Why? Because it clearly displays the fact that new products need to be competitive in present-day markets, not in age-old markets and economic contexts of long-ago. This is why ToR should be compared with WoW today, not a decade ago. Second of all, Pong was meant to show the slippery slope you're arguing. A more appropriate example would be UO. Should we compare ToR to UO? Of course not, UO was launched in 1999. Could we compare ToR to some MUDs from the mid-90s? Again, that's just silly. 'Good' is not biased or subjective. Take a class on ethics (people that say 'good' is subjective always get a good laugh). But I digress: 'good', as far as a video game is concerned, means that it fulfills certain gameplay requirements, a vast amount of people enjoy it, critics find it favorable, and it's usually financially successful. ToR doesn't meet alarmingly many gameplay requirements (my review was essentially about the gameplay). Please quote me anywhere where I backed myself with mere opinion. Here, I assume you're going to be fair. Ex: if I say the UI sucks, that's not an opinion - it's a fact. I can go into the details of why it sucks, but lets be fair.

I backed everything up with in-game data/facts. I've repeatedly proven my point on this thread. Also, if someone irrationally defends ToR, it's not poisoning to the well to assert that they are a fanboy.

We've been over this before, but lets try again. You don't compare your 2012 Honda Civic with a Ford Model-T, do you? Of course not, that would make no sense. You compare it to a 2012 Ford Mustang. ToR expects to be competitive TODAY, not a decade ago. Should we compare ToR with Pong, as well? Well in that case, you've got yourself a blockbuster. I'm a fanboi of good games. WoW is a good game, ToR is unfortunately not.

Unfortunately, that argument doesn't hold much water. Even if we compare ToR with Rift (maybe a more able comparison), ToR still falls wayyy behind the curve.