On the Two Fundamental Issues of SWTOR's Success

[Shaede]

Intro

 

Aside from a minority of zealots, it's obvious that the vast majority of SWTOR is identical to its predecessors World of Warcraft and Knights of the Old Republic. Now, as we all know, WoW is not a perfect game (but it is a highly profitable one), and neither was KOTOR. WoW in particular has been constantly evolving to meet new demands from gamers. The KOTOR inspired genre has led to games such as Mass Effect and Dragon Age. As a new MMO, SWTOR must stay competitive with these changing demands if it wants to stay relevant in the market. It must also find a way to combine the best of both genres into a single unified philosophy. These two demands lie as the heart of SWTOR's success, and failure to respond to them will literally translate into a failure to succeed in the MMO market.

 

Part 1: The Dated Nature of the Game

 

For reference, Knights of the Old Republic was released in 2003. Its sequel came out at the very end of 2004, less than one month after the initial release of World of Warcraft that November. That makes this genre, in its original form, about 8 years old. In that time, both genres have evolved vastly. SWTOR was officially announced in October 2008, though the game had apparently been in some development for at least 2 years by that point. This puts the design phase somewhere around 2006, just before the release of World of Warcraft's first expansion in January 2007 and Mass Effect just a month later. Inspiration from both Mass Effect and Burning Crusade can be seen all over SWTOR.

 

The Burning Crusade made some new changes to World of Warcraft on release. Questing was organized into "hubs" more efficiently than in the "vanilla" world, and new "mini-game" quests were added to break up the normal kill quests. Also, daily quests were added for the first time for the more casual players at the level cap. We see all of these features prominately in SWTOR.

 

Mass Effect cleaned up the dialogue scenes from KOTOR, adding the familiar rotary dialogue menu now seen in SWTOR. Like Mass Effect, the options were organized with the "good" choices often at the top and the "bad" ones at the bottom. Sub-menus were placed on the left side of the menu, if available.

 

SWTOR is largely a combination of The Burning Crusade and Mass Effect with some exceptions. More about this in part 2.

 

Burning Crusade has since been followed by Wrath of the Lich King and Cataclysm. New features, such as dual specs, group finders, and token based raids were added in the former. The latter added more polish to the starting content and completely changed the talent system to be more streamlined and differentiating. Notice that none of these evolutions are seen in SWTOR (except tokens), who's design was based primarily off the 2007 model. WoW has also added more gear customization options since then, and in the next expansion, is threatening another condensing of and streamlining of a talent system they think has been fundamentally broken since release (turning into something a little closer to Diablo III's system). SWTOR, as a result, seems left behind with the very mechanics that World of Warcraft is attempting to outgrow.

 

Mass Effect was followed with Dragon Age two years later. Dragon Age responded to the binary morality system of Mass Effect and took the genre in a totally new and immersive direction. The result was a morally ambiguous player story with many possible different endings. A year later, Mass Effect 2 pushed the genre is a different direction by streamlining the leveling system of the first and doing away with the collection of gear (focusing instead on gear modification). In this way, each franchise evolved the KOTOR system in different and interesting ways, each surpassing the original. Let's pretend Dragon Age II never happened for now. SWTOR does not benefit from most of these improvements to the genre, though. The gear collection and modification from KOTOR remains the same, whereas the simplified dialogue and morality system of Mass Effect 1 is likewise unchanged (though, in its defense, this was unchanged in Mass Effect 2).

 

Perhaps a more comprehensive list of the changes between these games would clarify these points further, but that would end in a long article. I can only hope that those reading this have played most of these games (and I assume many have) and can come up with your own list of changes and updates (for good or ill).

 

The reason that SWTOR feels like a dated game is because it is a dated game. The game's philosophy and mechanics can be traced back to the 2006-2007 era with little to none of the revolutions in each genre since that time. If you look at the complaints and criticisms to SWTOR, many (but not all) of them point to features that have been invented since that time. If SWTOR wants to remain competitive with other games on the market (such as the next WoW expansion or even their own Mass Effect 3), the next year's worth of updates will need to respond to the ~6 years of evolution that has happened during SWTOR's development. At the same time, SWTOR must struggle to meet the demands that were already present in the 2007 era it so closely resembles, which in itself, is no small goal.

Edited January 2, 2012 by Shaede

[Shaede]

Part 2: The Combining of Mass Effect and WoW

 

Mixing genres is never easy, unless of course you're simply adding RPG elements into a genre without it. As Mass Effect and World of Warcraft are both RPGs, it might seem as though the two are easily mixed. The reason this isn't the case comes down to 1) the fact that one is a single player experience and the other is massively multiplayer and 2) SWTOR emerges from a single player RPG whereas WoW an RTS. These two genres have two vastly different approaches to the character you play and the world you occupy. Combining them is not as easy as it sounds. Instead, one must literally absorb the other. This is exactly what has happened with SWTOR.

 

Single player games typically revolve around a strong central heroic figure. Let's briefly look Bioware's games as examples. In KOTOR, you play as Darth Revan (I apologize for having no sympathy if this is a spoiler for you). Revan is, simply put, the most powerful being in the Star Wars universe at the time of this game. In KOTOR 2, you play as "the exile", a "wound in the force" who apparently has the capacity to destroy the force itself. Once again, you play as what seems to be the most powerful entity in the Star Wars universe at the time. In Dragon Age, you play as one of the last Grey Wardens, and apparently, one of the most powerful who ever lived. Dragon Age 2 sets your character up in the very prologue as being the central character for the age. Shepard in the Mass Effect series is the biggest bad*ss in the galaxy, no doubt. In Bioware games, you play a character that everything and everyone revolves around.

 

In the Warcraft series, which eventually became World of Warcraft, you play as some detached floating hand that oversees the events of numerous characters. There is no central figure that the world revolves around, though there are some (such as Arthas or Illidan) who drive the story forward. The single player RTS simply does not focus on the individual to the degree of the single player RPG. The RTS focuses, instead, on factions.

 

As a result, it was easy for Warcraft to evolve into an MMO where the player can become lost in a world larger than themselves. The player could play some unknown human paladin or tauren shaman and get involved in the overarching war for dominance between the various factions. The important characters be NPCs rather than the players themselves. The player could become a single unit in a much larger fight, much like an RTS.

 

The Bioware games have much more difficulty converting into an MMO. If the player is the central force that everything revolves around, the world as a result feels much smaller. It's more difficult to be immersed in a game world filled with other players, who themselves, are points from which the universe also revolves around. Seeing a group of bounty hunters, for example, who are all "Grand Champion of the Great Hunt" reduces the player's own accomplishment of the feat to near meaninglessness. It becomes a mere rank that marks your progression in the game (imagine, for instance, if there were many Shepards running around the galaxy. The Illusive Man would be pleased, but the player would feel his role to be undermined).

 

Another problem comes from how progression within an MMO setting works. When a mechanic becomes linked to the progression of your character, it belittles the meaning of that mechanic outside of being a form of progression. The best example is the morality system, where your character can accrue dark side or light side points. This could, hypothetically, serve as a way to alter the way your character looks with regard to how you roleplay him or her. Instead, due to gear requirements, it becomes a way to facilitate a grind, forcing you to play a binary character that loses the complexity or nuances of a Dragon Age character (Mass Effect and KOTOR share this issue of course, it's simply more pronounced in an MMO).

 

Another example of this comes with your companions. With affection becoming a stat that has in-game benefits, such as experience, money, credits, and crafting, it becomes reduced to another stat that, like it or not, you need to raise. Gone is the illusion that you get along with some companions and not others. You better like them all regardless of how you want to play your character if you want to keep progressing, and since SWTOR doesn't have an end goal like single player games, progressing is all that matters.

 

Bioware had to choose whether or not to have such strong central character and whether or not to keep the same mechanics that worked in their single player games in the MMO. What they didn't seem to expect was how fundamentally different those same mechanics feel in a massively multiplayer online environment without a definite end. In a sense, the Warcraft series was lucky. It could lean on nameless heroes, faction grinding, and years of lore (that admittedly is running out). SWTOR certainly has the lore to back it up, but not the mechanics ripe for an online experience. It leans heavily on WoW's quests hubs, talent trees, instances, raids, and battlegrounds for support in its new environment. Sure, these all predate WoW in various ways, but this unique combination and application of all these features is still WoW. Yet, they conflict with the other aspects of SWTOR just as much as the role of the player in Warcraft III conflicts with his or her role in KOTOR 2.

 

SWTOR feels like two conflicting genres pressed together into an enjoyable, yet troubling, fashion. The potential is there, but still untapped. If SWTOR wants to meet continued success, it will have to figure out how to blend these two styles of games into a single unified experience for the player. It's too late to hope for something radically new from SWTOR, but it still has the potential to shape itself into something revolutionary. It's not there yet. Even WoW, on release, was a just clone of earlier online games. It's since evolved and turned into something original (it would seem more original if it didn't set the standard for new MMORPGs).

 

SWTOR certainly has that potential, but not if it doesn't first take a good long look at itself first. Nobody wants another WoW to play and nobody wants a KOTOR with a monthly subscription. This first year will tell us whether or not Bioware is willing to bring SWTOR into its own, or if they were just hoping for another WoW-clone to make enough of a profit to satisfy the EA's investors. Despite my reservations about SWTOR, I really hope it's the former, because like many others, I want a good Star Wars MMO to play and I like the innovations that Bioware has made to gaming in the past.

 

Part 2.5: Morality in an MMO Setting

 

This came to me just after finishing all of this, but it's another core issue that I have with Bioware's systems in an MMO setting.

 

Despite being a terrible movie, Star Wars II did get one thing right; Committing genocide against sand people probably marks the beginning of one's fall to the dark side. Sadly, this is exactly what any character in their mid 20's must do (to a huge extent if you count all the bonus objectives). How is this permissible for a light side character? Simply put, it's not something that comes up because it's understood as part of the game's mechanics.

 

If you want to get more powerful, you have to kill lots and lots of things.

 

Though that might sound like a dark side only route to power, it's actually the only route to power available to any character, light or dark, in an MMORPG. Sure, some missions have you killing droids, and perhaps that's not immoral. Certainly, though, many quests have you killing sentient beings.

 

I play a Jedi knight as one of my characters. In the ultimate act of irony, each attack gives me "focus" (notice WoW's "rage" mechanic here). As I defeat opponents, I get "centered". When I'm fully "centered", I can use "Zen". Then, when I'm back in to story mode, I'm lectured about how one must refocus one's self and recenter one's self after combat. Wasn't it just the other way around? Do I get more focused or less focused from battle? The combat mechanics and the story dialogue give me completely opposing answers, and that undermines my connection with and the believability of that character.

Edited January 2, 2012 by Shaede

[YooYooMa]

This game is nothing like KotOR.

 

KotOR had a good story and was a 1:1 replication of the d20 Tabletop RPG system.

 

This is just mediocre fanfic writing with generic MMORPG mechanics.

[Shaede]

This game is nothing like KotOR.

 

KotOR had a good story and was a 1:1 replication of the d20 Tabletop RPG system.

 

This is just mediocre fanfic writing with generic MMORPG mechanics.

 

It's good to know you could read that post and come up with a good response for it in 60 seconds.

Edited January 2, 2012 by Shaede

[NicWester]

People worry too much about whether the game will be a hit or not... Just worry about how much fun you are/aren't having and call it a day.

 

In the end, the opinions of everyone on-line don't count for a damn thing.

[kongzi]

...

 

Thanks for this well written post. I agree to it completely.

[AlkalineKitten]

I need Part Two now, man.

 

Good read, need more.

 

Burning Crusade has since been followed by Wrath of the Lich King and Cataclysm. New features, such as dual specs, group finders, and token based raids were added in the former. The latter added more polish to the starting content and completely changed the talent system to be more streamlined and differentiating. Notice that none of these evolutions are seen in SWTOR (except tokens), who's design was based primarily off the 2007 model. WoW has also added more gear customization options since then, and in the next expansion, is threatening another condensing of and streamlining of a talent system they think has been fundamentally broken since release (turning into something a little closer to Diablo III's system). SWTOR, as a result, seems left behind with the very mechanics that World of Warcraft is attempting to outgrow.

 

Preach on, I've shared this design thought for the past year.

Edited January 2, 2012 by AlkalineKitten

[DeaconX]

Well written. Insightful. Gave it 5 stars.

[Daeborn]

Well written. Insightful. Gave it 5 stars.

 

I don't. Anyone who thinks to be successful TOR needs to become another dumbed down MMO like WoW needs his head examined.

[Shaede]

I don't. Anyone who thinks to be successful TOR needs to become another dumbed down MMO like WoW needs his head examined.

 

I'd like to see the quote where I made this argument.

 

Working on part 2 now.

Edited January 2, 2012 by Shaede

[Ambrogino]

Excellent post, but IMO only 1 thing needs to transpire to settle down both extreme groups, (trolls and fanbois) .

 

Developers need to address the forums. If they were to post, beyond the fact that they're deleting or moving a thread, a dev diary, or how about in the acutal thread, their own personal thoughts and timeline, many in this community would settle down. This would allow for more constructive criticism and create a much better gaming experience.

[Mandrax]

Another WoW comparison, goodie, we really needed another one, there just aren't enough on the forums.

[Shaede]

Another WoW comparison, goodie, we really needed another one, there just aren't enough on the forums.

 

I don't see why not. One can't discuss a game's mechanics without discussing the game's mechanics. If the mechanics come from a previous game, it can be helpful to discuss what worked or didn't work for that game.

 

Also, part 2 is up. Thanks for the comments, everyone (if you actually read my posts).

Edited January 2, 2012 by Shaede

[Shaede]

A bump for those who may have lost it before part 2.

[Krafen]

Your analysis makes sense, particularly in how the game feels dated and the awkwardness of a game full of people who are all the central galactic figure.

 

I generally enjoy playing, but often encounter jarring aspects, which you have helped clarify. Hopefully, your analysis will be similarly useful to the developers.

[Dosma]

Excellent read and good points. I for one am having fun with the game and am enjoying it for what it is so far. Hope fully as you pointed out Bioware can take this and run with it. I have faith in them all the way from KoToR so I'm hoping for big things but it will take time to get there. If anyone can bring this game along it would be them. After Galaxies it would break my heart to see another Star Wars MMO with such great potential be wasted but I have good feelings about this game so far even with all the whining going on in the forums.

[Godsfear]

/slowclap

/slowclap

/slowclap

/slowclap

 

 

Do you work for a Videogame review site sir? Very nice to read a very thoughtful opinion. Kudo's to you sir, kudo's to you.

[Shaede]

Do you work for a Videogame review site sir? Very nice to read a very thoughtful opinion. Kudo's to you sir, kudo's to you.

 

Wow, thanks!

 

I don't, I'm just a humble gamer like all of us here (and a no-name indie developer who works for peanuts). I consider that a huge compliment though!

 

I added a section 2.5 for the patient reader that I felt was extremely important and I totally overlooked it. I encourage anyone who's already read it all to go back and check it out, it's not long, I promise!

[NephilimNexus]

SWTOR certainly has that potential, but not if it doesn't first take a good long look at itself first. Nobody wants another WoW to play and nobody wants a KOTOR with a monthly subscription. This first year will tell us whether or not Bioware is willing to bring SWTOR into its own, or if they were just hoping for another WoW-clone to make enough of a profit to satisfy the EA's investors.

 

Given a choice between the two, personally I'd rather just play KotoR Online over WoW. Then again, I'd rather wipe my butt with a cheese grater than play WoW. But that's just me. I fear the developers at Bioware are of a quite different opinion.

 

Anyone who thinks to be successful TOR needs to become another dumbed down MMO like WoW needs his head examined.

 

Sadly, that would pretty much include nearly every every MMO out there. It's simple, really. Companies are run by their accounting departments. Accountants, as we all know, have all sense of imagination & inventiveness surgically removed at birth.

 

So whenever a bright, young game designer comes in and says "I have an idea for something completely new and original!" the accountants just look at him coldly, turn back to their charts showing the difference between their subscription rate and WoW's and reply "That's nice. Now how can we make our game more like WoW? Because WoW makes lots of money, and we want to make a lot of money too, so clearly the solution is to be as much like WoW as possible without getting sued for plagiarism."

 

It's not just games. How often have you seen a McDonalds and Burger King within one block of each other? Some accountant said, "Hmm, that place sells a lot of hamburgers. We want to sell a lot of hamburgers, too. So obviously we need to put our burger join as close to that spot as possible. Never mind that there are other neighborhoods that have no burger joints at all. We don't know if putting one there or not will make money, but we know that this spot makes money because there is already a burger joint there. We just have to steal all their customers with our utterly indistinguishable product. Why is our product indistinguishable? Didn't we just explain that?"

 

And so it is with MMOs, too. They look at WoW's 10+ million subscribers and say "Clearly that formula that works, so let's be just like them. It's a lot less risky than doing anything original. Original is scary because it's untested. Why risk failure when you can just copy someone elses' success?"

 

It's everywhere, now.

[Godsfear]

Just posting to rate.

 

5 star.

[Shaede]

Sadly, that would pretty much include nearly every every MMO out there. It's simple, really. Companies are run by their accounting departments. Accountants, as we all know, have all sense of imagination & inventiveness surgically removed at birth.

 

So whenever a bright, young game designer comes in and says "I have an idea for something completely new and original!" the accountants just look at him coldly, turn back to their charts showing the difference between their subscription rate and WoW's and reply "That's nice. Now how can we make our game more like WoW? Because WoW makes lots of money, and we want to make a lot of money too, so clearly the solution is to be as much like WoW as possible without getting sued for plagiarism."

 

It's not just games. How often have you seen a McDonalds and Burger King within one block of each other? Some accountant said, "Hmm, that place sells a lot of hamburgers. We want to sell a lot of hamburgers, too. So obviously we need to put our burger join as close to that spot as possible. Never mind that there are other neighborhoods that have no burger joints at all. We don't know if putting one there or not will make money, but we know that this spot makes money because there is already a burger joint there. We just have to steal all their customers with our utterly indistinguishable product. Why is our product indistinguishable? Didn't we just explain that?"

 

And so it is with MMOs, too. They look at WoW's 10+ million subscribers and say "Clearly that formula that works, so let's be just like them. It's a lot less risky than doing anything original. Original is scary because it's untested. Why risk failure when you can just copy someone elses' success?"

 

I couldn't have said it better, myself.

[Sttm]

Very good read. It helped to coalesce some thoughts I have been having playing SWTOR and how the issues I am having with the game have grown more troublesome as I level up.

 

Being the powerful central figure is one of the larger issues I have with this game. Mainly because my character is not powerful, it's seemingly very weak. For instance leveling a Juggernaut, you finish the starting area with this quest for an old and powerful light sabre, a great weapon, but then when you get the weapon, it actually barely changes anything. In fact I found my Sith Juggernaut to hit for considerably less then his own companion Vette, who is his slave.

 

Or playing my Vanguard I am supposed to be this hero of Havoc Squad, best of the best in the galaxy, but then in actual combat I find that I can barely defeat a gold mob, and only after I get 20+ and have my healing companion out. Which makes the story seem silly as I am less powerful then a gold mob and about equal to a silver, except there are dozens of gold mobs and hundreds of silver mobs around.

 

So while SWTOR through the story line builds up your character to be this great galactic champion, in reality your character is very weak compared to common mobs. Which feels so wrong, and in fact makes the game considerably less fun having to take so long and be so careful about pulling mobs, instead of being able to be that galactic champion, that Shepard, who just opens fire and kills everything around him.

 

If the story says I am a ****** with an ancient lightsabre, then I should be able to walk up to 10-15 mobs at a time and be that ****** cutting them down right and left leaving destruction in my wake.

[RWRobart]

 

 

The player could play some unknown human paladin or tauren shaman and get involved in the overarching war for dominance between the various factions. The important characters be NPCs rather than the players themselves. The player could become a single unit in a much larger fight, much like an RTS.

 

 

Do you know I brought DKs to the Horde. It's true Thrall told me so. I also killed the litch king but I still had to get a dumb flying license to fly in Org...

 

I guess if you never do any quest in WoW (not me but this was my fav quest chain in wow http://youtu.be/qCCsMJN3Hek) and never run any instances (No I killed Taragman the Hungerer) then you have a point.

[Uncenso-red-]

OP, you have (effortlessly, it seems) articulated the crux of why I will probably never play this game. There are other reasons to be sure, but thank you. I admit I had been on the fence for some time now.

 

I believe I was fortunate my hardware wasn't good enough to run SWTOR, otherwise I'd be logged in right now trying to squeeze water from this rock.

Edited January 2, 2012 by Uncenso-red-

[imaslapu]

"Aside from a minority of zealots, it's obvious that the vast majority of SWTOR is identical to its predecessors World of Warcraft..."

 

I had to stop reading right there and LOL.

 

But seriously, couldn't you post this up on a blog and then simply post the link here?