Calculated Posted January 19, 2012 Share Posted January 19, 2012 (edited) Hello there, dear readers. I'm known only as Khem'zur, the sorcerer, on the EU RP-PVP server of Lord Calypho. I have come to share some of my criticism and opinions about the game at the moment and how I think those things could be addressed. Introduction: First of all, a bit of my background. I've played a lot of games. I'm playing games from the days I was just 4 years old. I'm going to be 18 years old this year, so no, I cannot count myself amongst the white-beards of gaming, but still. I came from games like Colonization, X-Com and others. I always loved RPGs (and I still do, TES, Dragon Age, Witcher, Mass Effect...), so when I first heard of their multiplayer versions, I was really curious. I first experienced the MMO genre with, anyone could guess, World of Warcraft. I was a long time fan of the Universe (loved Warcraft II, and III), so I really fell into the game. I used to play it for very long periods of time and I would guess no game ever came near that. But I got bored of it. The endgame just haven't provided enough stuff to do to hold my attention. New expansions made me come back for a bit and then leave. No, I'm not just trying to tell the World my story, I'm trying to set where the problems of TOR come from. I tried lots of MMOs since then, including Guild Wars, Anarchy Online, Pirates of the Burning Sea, Age of Conan, EVE, and more. None of those managed to hold me as long as TOR did now, but I'm thinking about leaving even this game behind. I will classify the problems as I see them into 4 main categories, Graphics and Interface, Crafting, PvE and PvP. I will try to use points through out the text as much as possible. Graphics and Interface Remember, those are my opinions, and with the graphics it's even more so, everyone has their own taste, but from what I've heard many players agree on those points. -The choice of game engine was a mistake, and BioWare has to face it. -The game needs lot of optimization. ->I play on HP DV7-6050EC (Core i7 2630QM - 4 cores, 2GHz with turbo at 2.9GHz, ATi HD6770 1GB, 4GB RAM) with everything off or on low and I still experience occasional stutter and I'm thankful for 40 FPS. ->Every patch so far made the game perform WORSE, which is something that is unacceptable. (Yes, I turned off Anti-aliasing.) Items (graphics wise) -The first endgame problem is that both PvP and PvE sets usually look like complete crap. (I count myself amongst the lucky, Inquisitor PvP set is quite nice) -The only sets that feel at least remotely Star Wars-y are the Trooper ones. ->There should be more then 1 set of models for PvP and 1 for PvE being retextured. WoW gone this way and people hated it, TOR goes the same and people, again, are really pissed about this. ->Some of the sets are jokes - Jedi Knight PVP sets being the example for them all. -I don't remember any armor looks progression at all with my Sorcerer through out 20-50, which could be just my case, but it surely isn't very good for the presentation. -Weapon models are usually nice, but I expected to see more then the ~15 Lightsaber models (for Empire, that is), that are in the game right now. Something exotic / different would be nice. -Mounts... Again, 5 models, several hundred retextures. This is not the way for a good game developer to go. Most of the speeder models even look terrible. -BioWare said they don't want animal mounts because it wouldn't feel Star Wars-y enough. With the graphical state of the game at the moment, this would be the last of their worries. Animal mounts are a must, even if they were really rare or hard to obtain. Interface -The interface needs to be modifiable, the current state is unacceptable for a triple-A MMO game. -The action bar situation at the moment is a joke. Players should be able to place them anywhere he wants (aka all in the middle, etc.) and have more than 4. -Maybe it's just me, but the whole interface seems really slow to me. (If you could, please add your opinion on this in a reply.) -Addons are not a must as far as developers keep working on the interface as needed, which is not the BioWare case. -GTN interface looks terrible and isn't useful at all. I've read a suggestion from another player which I identify myself with - GTN should copy Auctioneer (WoW addon) interface, and add an option for players to post Work Orders, crafters could then work on the items on demand, trying to win the Order with price (or quality - Exceptional / Masterpiece...). -It is needed to allow the players to transfer Settings between characters, not just for keybinds right now, but mostly if you ever add the modifiable Action Bars. -Integrated LFG system would be very nice. -Dual specs. I've heard things against and for them, but I'm definitely for. Yes, they make the player less unique, but hardly any player in the game is only going for either PvE or PvP, tanking or dps, etc... -Combat log is a must. -Also, there should be a system that would let you analyze the combat data, and let you export them out of the game. Yes, I'm talking about theorycrafting here. It's nothing that breaks the game, neither it's exploiting. Many people enjoy it (and lots of them are already doing it with notes of the damage,...) and it could even help BioWare balance the different specs of classes. Crafting aka Crew Skills -Crew Skills seem really redundant, added just for something to be here. -The items from Crew Skills are 99% useless. ->Biochemistry is the only useful Crafting skill so far. It doesn't need to be nerfed, but other Crafting skills NEED to be BUFFED. ->On max level, there is basically no reason at all to choose anything else then Biochemistry. ->If you want to make Crafting more interesting, the game needs Unique stuff only craftable by a certain skill. As far as I known, Biochemistry and Cybertech have something like this (Medpacks/Stims/Adrenals and Grenades). -I see no reason for the Crafting to be limited to the player Crew and take so long. I would add an option for the player to be able to craft instantly in special places. PvE -The PvE endgame of this game is crap. I haven't gotten to Hard/Nightmare operations so far, but from what I've seen, it's nowhere as dynamic as WoW raids are. All of the encounters are basically tank-and-spank. I would guess it's the same in Hardmode / Nightmare, just with an added gear check (Please, if anyone with the experience could comment on this, do so.). -There are basically no interesting mechanics in the PvE endgame. -I would anticipate that the PvE item sets would be at least somewhat unique, but I had been disappointed again with all the Tioneese/Columi/Rakata crap. Everything is the same. No WoW-like trinkets with something to them. No unique names. No unique styles per set. All. The. Same. ->This takes all the motivation to do PvE from me. The content is not challenging at all (not meaning mobs doing bigger damage or able to withstand more, I mean the mechanics) and the rewards are basically crap. ->If this game is to survive, those things needs to be flashed out for the future content. PvP I'm an Empire player, and on our server we outnumber Republic 5-to-1. This has a lot to do with what I'm going to write here. -PvP in this game consists of two parts. Broken Ilum and Warzones. -I'm not even going to talk about Ilum. -Warzones are the start. There needs to be more, with more interesting mechanics. -I used to be a fan of the 50 bracket, but I see the error of this now. Basically, level 50 players have to wait for 10+ minutes for Solo queue (on our server, as Empire, which outnumbers Republic 5-to-1). -When we finally get into a warzone, we are usually greeted by a full 4 player premade of hardcore Republic PvPers that smash us. For example I usually loose 4 games from 5, just because of this. ->It would be much better, if Expertise was changed to work ON level 50 players only. So, it would reduce the damage you get from level 50, add damage you do to level 50, and your healing on 50s and the Bracket could be removed. ->Expertise was basically the main source of trouble for lower levels in Warzones. -Also, a special Warzone queue for premades wouldn't hurt the game either. -PvP endgame is too much of a grind right now, there is nothing to really look for, neither anything that would require a certain amount of skill. ->I really hope the Rated PvP is coming into the game. ->As much as some players hate Arenas, I think they would not only make the end-game PvP more interesting in TOR, but that they are necessary to make PvP more interesting. -Valor ranks tell nothing of the players, you basically even get more of those if you just farm medals from Warzones. Player should get way more valor depending on how he helped the game advance. -I'm also no fun of the long grind it takes to get to Valor Rank 60. The only thing this tells about you is how much of time can you spend (and how much patience with other players you have) on PvP. -Also, I as one of many hate the RNG system that currently decides whether you get gear from PvP or not. Yes, I'm talking about bags. Centurion gear requires a lot of those and is several % lower on the stats then Champion, which on the other hand pure RNG. You open 20 bags and get nothing and another person opens 5 and have 5 different pieces. I say no to this. ->At least the Battlemaster bags were changed, even tough I'm probably never going to really grind for those. Support: -The last little section is for support. -As far as my experiences with support go, it's crap. It seems a machine / maybe even a person, only looks on the Category and send you a generic reply, without anything to do with your problem without reading it. This is totally unacceptable. -Also, the game really seems to be from American developers for American players. Maintenance times in the prime hours for EU, that is something that I find very, very bad. ->Yes, I've read most people play later in the evening, but I still find it unacceptable to not be able to play during the day. This is something that should definitely be changed. Conclusion: One thing that really isn't going well for TOR is updating. The game gets worse with every new patch and still BioWare is trying to release more content. You should focus on the bugs first, on balance second and on new content last. Some things that should have been out at release are still missing (interface modifiability) and some parts of the game are still buggy as hell. Also, the there is literally no optimization to talk about. Edited January 19, 2012 by Calculated Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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