No Legit Azeroth Comparisons

[ImperialSun]

And which one is more popular?

 

Star Wars has undoubtedly a huge fan base and tremendous amounts of back story and a great place to tell more stories. But so did Lord of The Rings. It takes more than that.

 

Forget games for a second, I am talking purely about the respective universe, lore and very fabric of the IP...

 

Star Wars...nuff said.

 

Warhammer...nuff said.

 

WC...erm well we cant really think of anything original so lets kind of copy Warhammer but make it sugar coated and Fisher Price....kind of like Warhammer meets Playschool...

 

Terrible and always has been imo...even back in the days of WC3 et al.

 

Driz

Edited January 13, 2012 by ImperialSun

[EssBen]

excellent post......not that it will change a single mind.

 

I feel for those experiencing bugs and client performance issues......but then again I signed up expecting that sort of thing having been around the block a few times.

[Bezit]

TOR didn't only have 3 years of development, they started in 2005, and released in 2011. Also, the reason you can compare this game to a game that is "11 years old" is because the content they release has been new. If you want to compare SWTOR to what wow was 3 or 4 years ago, it still wouldn't meet the bar of expectations.

 

Also, WoW has listened to the mmo fanbase and implemented changes that create a better game and playing enviroment for the player. As a creator of an mmo, which objectively is more similiar to WoW than any other game that has been created, why wouldn't you take what another company has developed, learned, and created, and add on to that instead of giving us something that isn't nearly as polished.

 

They didn't create battlefield 3 to compete with Counterstrike source, which is older than WoW is, they released it to be the most innovative and stunning fps in sound, graphics, gameplay, and balance.

 

You don't release a game in 2011, then compare it to a 2004 game... if we did that with everything then we wouldn't be the most advanced society in the known world. It's like owning a car that drives smooth, and operates well, because the company that built it has had 7 years to make it better. And then someone tries to sell you a car with half the features of the car you have, doesn't make much sense to me.

Edited January 13, 2012 by Bezit

[ImperialSun]

TOR didn't only have 3 years of development, they started in 2005, and released in 2011. Also, the reason you can compare this game to a game that is "11 years old" is because the content they release has been new. If you want to compare SWTOR to what wow was 3 or 4 years ago, it still wouldn't meet the bar of expectations.

 

Also, WoW has listened to the mmo fanbase and implemented changes that create a better game and playing enviroment for the player through suggestions from their fanbase. As a creator of an mmo, which objectively is more similiar to WoW than any other game that has been created, why wouldn't you take what another company has developed, learned, and created, and add on to that instead of giving something that isn't nearly as polished.

 

They didn't create battlefield 3 to compete with Counterstrike source, which is older than WoW is, they released it to be the most innovative and stunning fps in sound, graphics, gameplay, and advancement.

 

You don't release a game in 2011, then compare it to a 2004 game... if we did that with everything then we wouldn't be the most advanced society in the known world. It's like owning a car that drives smooth, and operates well, because the company that built it has had 7 years to make it better. And then someone tries to sell you a car with half the features of the car you have, doesn't make much sense to me.

 

You mean Blizz has listened to the self entitled COD generation who demand ezmode or they quit. This is why WoW has things like dual speccing and cross server LFD along with mind numbing arena based PvP...

 

All aspects that are detrimental to community and MMORPGs in general...great for a quick pick and play FPS....but who wants a MMORPG that is just a series of lobby screens...

 

And you cite this as a positive? lol...

 

Driz

[Gleneagle]

You are forgetting 2 very important things.

 

1. Swtor has to compete with Wow now, not wow 7 years ago.

I'm playing TOR, and not playing WoW. TOR wins.

2. They should have had a long hard look at wow and seen what wow did right and wrong.

I bet they did. How could they not? Problem is it is vastly easier to compare end results, just as it is vastly easier to talk the talk than it is to walk the walk. The devs couldn't very well copy the Blizz code and paste it in TOR: for one thing TOR uses the Hero engine.

The User Interface in swtor is amateurish, both skillbars, maps etc, and the auction house etc. This could have been easily avoided. You say they aren't gamebreaking, but they are bad enough for people to stop playing, especially since the market is so much bigger nowadays.

The UI isn't 'amateurish'. It isn't as refined as you would like, but it cannot rightly be described as 'amateurish'.

Edited January 13, 2012 by Gleneagle

[failr]

With stuff like this:

 

http://i.imgur.com/Yc6so.jpg

 

It is honestly very hard not to compare TOR to WOW lol

[MikeMonger]

Seriously now...does anyone think that the WOW phenomenon was not a complete and utter fluke?? ... do you think that will ever happen to any other MMO??

 

Meh, you never know. Love it or hate it, the one thing you can't deny is that WoW did introduce millions to MMO gaming and essentially created a new market that wasn't really there before.

 

The exposure's already there...millions of current and former WoW players who might be willing to give another game a shot.

 

So it's possible. Not super likely, but possible.

[Bezit]

You mean Blizz has listened to the self entitled COD generation who demand ezmode or they quit. This is why WoW has things like dual speccing and cross server LFD along with mind numbing arena based PvP...

 

All aspects that are detrimental to community and MMORPGs in general...great for a quick pick and play FPS....but who wants a MMORPG that is just a series of lobby screens...

 

And you cite this as a positive? lol...

 

Driz

 

What the game has became now is a *********** joke. I played wow from march 05 to november of last year, and I probably won't play it again until MoP comes out.

 

I agree their game direction has taken a horrible turn for the worse, but if you think dual speccing ruins a community, you must not be very bright. Or that arena pvp is mind numbing... I'd like to see anyone new or fresh to the game get any type of decent rating their first year playing the game.

 

They could have altered the LFD system to only include your realm and not others so the community could monitor the ninjas/bads. It's called innovation, and this game lacks a lot of it. They really didn't introduce a single new thing to mmos except, IN MY OPINION, way too many cutscenes and an advanced pet system.

 

I agree that wow has become a lobby with queue screens, but this doesn't detract from the fact that SWTOR is lacking many basic features that WoW, and other MMOs released in the past year or 2 have implemented, that make playing the game less of a hassle.

 

The game just didn't really do anything for the mmo community, it gave us a very less polished wow/rift/aion, with a handful of basic mmo features missing and nothing more than that.

[kajind]

i disagree that you cant compare the two. in fact i only have enough money, and more importantly time to play 1 mmo. On that condition alone i not only can, but must compare them and choose 1, luckely i chose tor. my choice asside it makes since for people to compare wow to swtor.

[Templeman]

I don't mind wow vs tor comparisons. At the end of the day all that matters to me is what am I enjoying more. For now the answer is tor. Later it might be wow but I am not thinking so right now.

[Rollcageuk]

TOR didn't only have 3 years of development, they started in 2005, and released in 2011. Also, the reason you can compare this game to a game that is "11 years old" is because the content they release has been new. If you want to compare SWTOR to what wow was 3 or 4 years ago, it still wouldn't meet the bar of expectations.

 

Also, WoW has listened to the mmo fanbase and implemented changes that create a better game and playing enviroment for the player. As a creator of an mmo, which objectively is more similiar to WoW than any other game that has been created, why wouldn't you take what another company has developed, learned, and created, and add on to that instead of giving us something that isn't nearly as polished.

 

They didn't create battlefield 3 to compete with Counterstrike source, which is older than WoW is, they released it to be the most innovative and stunning fps in sound, graphics, gameplay, and balance.

 

You don't release a game in 2011, then compare it to a 2004 game... if we did that with everything then we wouldn't be the most advanced society in the known world. It's like owning a car that drives smooth, and operates well, because the company that built it has had 7 years to make it better. And then someone tries to sell you a car with half the features of the car you have, doesn't make much sense to me.

 

You seem to have completely forgottten a rather key part of my post.

WOW has had a lot more development time, and despite EA pouring millions into TOR, WOW has still had more money spent on it.

You simply cannot fit everything into it, even if you wanted. also, I did say in my post that you can't compare a 2011 game with a 2004 one. What I said is you can't compare either one and expect any kind of realistic expectations from it.

 

You post like you want WOW but with lightsabers, and WOW as it is now.

 

Also...

A small fact that may have surpassed you, WOW as it is now sucks. yes it has the engine, but a lot of it is pure plain boredom, mixed with laziness mixed with a lack of invention and then make it so hard that 2m+ subscribers quit.

I don't want WOW with lightsabers, I want SW, but with a working AH.

WOW servers are graveyards, people login, do quest of the day or raid, logout. Go walk around outside IF/Org, they are morgues. Do you really want that? I certainly don't. BW need to find their own feet and develop the game as they see fit. The AH from WOW is good, but is it the best, who knows? Maybe BW can redevelope it in a way that blows your mind. But you just want them to import WOW and click go.

 

If WOW do it right....why the heck are they creating PandaVille and Pet Battles? Does anyone actually think that will work? No one, not even the WOW fanbois have actually said they think it will be good. I certainly don't want SW to take those ideas and implement them.

Edited January 13, 2012 by Rollcageuk

[Mephismo]

Why do you have to love or hate either game ?

I like them both.

I probably like this game because it is like WoW in many ways, is that strange ?

[kajind]

With stuff like this:

 

http://i.imgur.com/Yc6so.jpg

 

It is honestly very hard not to compare TOR to WOW lol

 

sorry for the double post kinda but i just looked at that and laughed, it would have been better if it just stopped at skill comparisons however. the boss choices for the swtor shots were of a very limited subset of encounters.

[Vulgarr]

I just want to correct one fact

 

TOR began development in 2005. We only heard about it 3/4 years ago. So it was 6 years in development - longer than WoW or any other MMO.

 

Having said that, I think you do have to compare the games as they both are _TODAY_ just as you'd compare any other competing products based on the versions you'd actually be purchasing. Think of purchasing a new car and applying the same philosophy - people would expect the 2011 model to match the 2011 model of a competing car that came out in 2004, even though it had 7 years of refinement.

 

 

 

Well, some features can definitely be pushed back... but missing things like guild progression and guild features? World events? An achievement system? A workable auction house interface (with free text search)? I think these are the type of things that should have been part of launch. No one expected a flu PvP ladder and ranking system on day 1. But some of the standard features, yes.

 

 

 

This is true... players (and payers) have to decide if they're willing to stay in a situation that will undoubtedly improve.

ok so we can compare the games as they are today. ToR was in development since 05 and had what, 150 million as development costs?

 

wow has been in development since: 2001, blizzard had spent 100 million on initial development and over 200 million as of 4 years ago for upkeep and ongoing development since wows release in 04.

 

7 years thats 500 million in development/upkeep costs, if another 4 years added the same 200 million upkeep/development costs as the first 4 years and the 100 million for intitial development.

 

so we have ToR 150 million for development over 6 years.

wow having been in development since 01, thats 11 years, and over 400 million dollars in development/upkeep costs, and 100 million dollars for initial development. so 500 million total.

 

those added years wow has had to establish a glitchy experience, broken pvp and dumbing down of gameplay to make faceroll content to entice a broader market.

 

source for wows annual upkeep costs.

 

of course a game thats been in development since 2001, is continuously being developed for, has had over 500 million spent on development and upkeep, is going to have more content than that of a game that has only been in development since 05 and had 150 million used in development costs.

 

a developer can only deliver so much content in a certain period of time, unless they have had a successful game that funds the development of new content and the extra development teams to produce said content, like wow.

 

if you want to argue that a development team isnt keeping up with whats new, i give you duke nukem forever as an example. they got into the cycle of trying to keep up with the jones' and the game was in limbo forever and bankrupted the developing company. because they kept updating the game to try and stay current. instead of releasing what they had.

[kajind]

Why do you have to love or hate either game ?

I like them both.

I probably like this game because it is like WoW in many ways, is that strange ?

 

no, in fact that's why i like it. leveling was like a more fun version of wow. however i don't have the time available to me to play 2 mmo's

[Ramaos]

I fully agree with the OP.

 

I didn't buy this game to play WoW. If I wanted to do that I'd renew my subscription. I still have WoW installed it's just a few clicks and a patch away.

 

I'm playing SWTOR because I think it's great. Sure there are issues but as the OP pointed out, time and development will fix these. Blizzard earns a huge amount of money and has had time to pump it into development.

 

I hope SWTOR blossums into a magnificent game

Edited January 13, 2012 by Ramaos

[failr]

sorry for the double post kinda but i just looked at that and laughed, it would have been better if it just stopped at skill comparisons however. the boss choices for the swtor shots were of a very limited subset of encounters.

 

Yeah I dunno I didn't make it, just saw someone post it on the forums and found it hillarious.

[daays]

AoC sucks...it has none of the good things from WoW in it.

"ST FU GO BACK TO WOW!!"

*75% of the population leaves*

 

WAR sucks...it has none of the good things from WoW in it.

"ST FU GO BACK TO WOW!!"

*75% of the population leaves*

 

Aion sucks...it has none of the good things from WoW in it.

"ST FU GO BACK TO WOW!!"

*75% of the population leaves*

 

SWTOR sucks...it has none of the good things from WoW in it.

"ST FU GO BACK TO WOW!!"

......

 

i sees teh patterns

 

People don't want WoW.

 

They want all the good things developed from the game.

Like all the mods that helped improve game play experience over the years.

 

Wanna know the ironic thing? Everything WoW has done to it's default UI and other interfaces have been because of mods from the community.

Edited January 13, 2012 by daays

[Hautaaja]

You should understand human nature, instead of going into the specifics of why you can or can not compare them.

 

The fact is that even if WoW did take years to get to where it is now, people expect the same kind of polish and features in a game that is structured in a similar manner. There is no way in hell anyone can deny the fact that this game resembles WoW VERY much, so much that for many players it REQUIRES some of the same features that Blizzard found out WoW requires after much trial and error.

Edited January 13, 2012 by Hautaaja

[Infinitearms]

I don't see anyone comparing tor to wow or even talking about tor at all on the wow forums or in game . But every time I log in on tor there is some ************ about wow and half the threads on the forum are about it . Reminds me of pretty much every recent mmo I have played general chat full of kids trying to justify there purchase by talking down wow . I think the day a new mmo comes out and no one in game is talking about wow and there are no forum posts on wow I will have found a game worth subbing to

[Ilsildor]

You did make me think about something.

 

People shout "mmos always have problems at launch, if you cant deal with it blah blah"

 

Most problems have always been server issues and such. Sure theres always bugs and glitches too.

 

 

What hurts swtor is the amount of people who have poor performance and the huge list of bugs. More then i ever remember in an mmo

[Veluthurk]

I disagree with the OP. Huge similarities despite the different theme or time frame.

 

One thing I pick up on in threads like this and with my own feeling - WoW is old. I've been playing it since Jan '05 and quit last Aug. I am just flat worn out with the game. It was past time to move on. Not going back for MoP either. Been game-less until I DL'd TOR out of boredom on Christmas day. If SWTOR hadn't been released I wouldn't be playing anything.

 

I'm giving BW the benefit of the doubt and will sub for a while.

[Scar]

you lost me at :

 

"Ok, wow came out in 2004. As far as MMO’s go, it pretty much beat any others out at the time. It appealed to a huge already established WC fanbase"

 

And assuming you are taking Swtor side in the matter ,

 

if you tell me there are more WC fans then Star Wars out there you dont deserve my time to read the post

 

At the time of November 2004, there were 12 million registered accounts at bnet. SG had over 11 million copies sold. Each of the WC series had sold in the mid-to-high single digit millions.

 

No SW game has ever had that sort of popularity.

 

SW may be a bigger world wide IP. But not in the gaming world.

 

Developers have normally shown to be a bigger draw than the actual IP. Watch Titan. It wont be because of Titan's IP: it will be because of the name of the developer.

[SaberSecreT]

I'm, for one, glad this game didn't take the Duke Nuken Forever path, a game that tried so hard to keep up with the new technologies, upgrading everytime something new came up and redoing itself over and over, trying to surpass the current thing in the market just to see a new one came up.

 

Tor could have been in the making for 11 years to current match Wow, but in that case, it wouldn't match the wow that will be there on that current time, since time doesn't stop for wow, they also keep developing.

[Vulgarr]

I don't see anyone comparing tor to wow or even talking about tor at all on the wow forums or in game . But every time I log in on tor there is some ************ about wow and half the threads on the forum are about it . Reminds me of pretty much every recent mmo I have played general chat full of kids trying to justify there purchase by talking down wow . I think the day a new mmo comes out and no one in game is talking about wow and there are no forum posts on wow I will have found a game worth subbing to

funny, there are 8 topics about ToR on the first page of the wow gaming forums at this time (where all off topic posts about other games are sent by moderators)