SWTOR Vs WoW: Blizzard gets it

[BlackZoback]

Oh what?

 

1) Communication - WoW's dev team actually posts in threads and interacts with the community a lot more about issues

 

2) Financial success - this goes without saying

 

3) Content - Again, WoW has beefy patches

 

It's fine to like SWTOR and not play WoW but you need to give credit where credit is due.

 

I rather like the way BW handles communication, it save them from "bus shock" incidents and from players demanding a response in every single complaint they present.

 

Also 2 and 3 apply to ToR, so even if you hate is so much, you should give credit where credit is due.

[Touchbass]

I rather like the way BW handles communication, it save them from "bus shock" incidents and from players demanding a response in every single complaint they present.

 

Also 2 and 3 apply to ToR, so even if you hate is so much, you should give credit where credit is due.

 

I listed the areas where WoW is superior to SWTOR, not that SWTOR is lacking in those departments.

 

EDIT: Btw, if you think releasing a raid without the corresponding Hard Mode version of it is smart business and beefy content ...

Edited March 25, 2012 by Touchbass

[Esproc]

which wow forums are you talking about when it comes to devs talking to peeps on the forums, eu or us.

 

PS if you want to talk directly to the devs they talk to us on twitter and also update us alot via dev posts.

 

to a post a few post up about fun etc, i just want ot put this out there. are we talking about fun in an addictive state or a game thats fun and you can put down and do other things along side it.

 

The Devs sometimes grant a reply on the forums, but I was still waiting for a form or reply regarding the guilds that test for them, and exploit game dynamics that they never reported, for achievements and gear, guilds like Paragon. Oh, they supposedly got an 8 day ban, but there is/was no official comment.

[Shingara]

I listed the areas where WoW is superior to SWTOR, not that SWTOR is lacking in those departments.

 

i think one of the things that makes people feel that swtors cs team feels bad is the way that they contact people with hello im droid, no 1st hand names etc makes it feel less real if you know what i mean and feels less relevent and sometimes calming to know its a real person your talking to and can understand whats being said.

 

Saying that though you have to give bw some slack when it comes to the cs and the cs teams, you cant build a cs team for the requirments of the number of people playing over night, i doubt they ever expected pre pre-order to have this many players at this time and cs team workers and managers cannot be hired and trained even in the time we have had since launch.

Edited March 25, 2012 by Shingara

[Touchbass]

i think one of the things that makes people feel that swtors cs team feels bad is the way that they contact people with hello im droid, no 1st hand names etc makes it feel less real if you know what i mean and feels less relevent and sometimes calming to know its a real person your talking to and can understand whats being said.

 

Yeah the customer service in-game in WoW was really good when I last used it. Everyone was friendly and they helped you even when you made a colossal screw up

 

EDIT: To you edit, yes I understand that, that is why i say WoW is superior in those departments but it doesn't mean that SWTOR fails in those departments, just got beaten out but things can change

Edited March 25, 2012 by Touchbass

[aznthecapn]

The tree was not a mini game, it was a choice to decide how you wanted to play your character. There was still some choices before LK and the mandatory "must put 31 talents in a tree" before you could choose another tree to add. This cut out any real choices of Hybrid specs and real choice to play style. I'm sorry that people could not learn how to think for themselves and to choose a talent by reading the description of what it did, but lack of reason nerfed it and killed it for me as well as others.

 

What you're describing is a minigame. Most of the choices were made for you. Sure, there were some people who would use unique or situational builds to feel special and there were the occasional hybrid builds (SL/SL lock for example) but for the most part there was ultimately a generally accepted right and wrong way to build your character. Looking at the talents they have now, a lot of them look like choices based on playstyle - not what you must have.

 

I do not know how long you have been/do play WoW, but it is way easier to play. After I cancelled my subscription to WoW, before SWTOR came out, I tried a 5 day pass. The game play is so face roll that I couldn't believe it, nor could I play for an hour as I was so disgusted with it. It was so nerf easy that there was no challenge whatsoever, not even an aggroable mob until you actually attacked first.

 

Were you in the starting zone? Mobs in the starting area have been like that since Vanilla day one. Its to give the new people a learning curve. A couple levels in and the mobs have normal aggro function. As far as easy to play, its been easy to play. It was far more complex to understand, but the act of pressing buttons and getting results has always been easy. The exception is a few classes from time to time will have incredibly complex rotations (i.e. feral DPS druids).

 

Before I cancelled my sub I would race through the raids, easy, and I got bored, I don't want that grind any more. With 2 accounts and 13 85's, 3 84's, I would log, look around, debate dailies and what not and log off. And this was before the 5 day faceroll trial, that helped explain how people were super leveling, to me anyways.

 

That's part of getting older and the genre losing its appeal. I feel the same way right now. I feel the same way about SWTOR too. Once you spend a couple weeks on the gameplay, it pretty much plays just like WoW.

[RikHar]

I hate to beat a dead horse too much.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Apparently not.

 

 

/yawn

[Shingara]

Yeah the customer service in-game in WoW was really good when I last used it. Everyone was friendly and they helped you even when you made a colossal screw up

 

EDIT: To you edit, yes I understand that, that is why i say WoW is superior in those departments but it doesn't mean that SWTOR fails in those departments, just got beaten out but things can change

 

WoW cs were good even if some cs peeps blew up on the forums and to people BUT they had to be simply for the number of peeps that worked for bliz cs. I can understand that swtor will have a huge backlog of tickets that they work through simply with it being a new game and tickets going in for stuff like whats this do, they said this to me, why cant i get this etc.

 

time will tell, heinsight is 20/20 and all that.

Edited March 25, 2012 by Shingara

[IGX_]

Meh, kinda sick of playing games that start dumbing downs things. Look at Vanilla WoW raids compared to their expansion raids.

 

Seems swtor will probably end up going the same way (I hope not) just to please all these hand me everything on a plate wow players.

 

Thank goodness for a certain game company who actively fights off these sort of players.

Edited March 25, 2012 by IGX_

[BlackZoback]

I wonder if the average MMO player realizes that mini games are highly sought after in MMOs and Pandarens have been a part of WoW lore since WC3. Everytime someone brings up pandas (notoriously fierce when defending their home or family) I have to wonder if those same people were as vehemently opposed to cows that walk on two legs?

 

As far as your comment on the talent system goes, I've copied this for you:

 

I'm well versed in my WC3, and if Bilzz gave a damn about lore they would have made Brewmasters(or the any of the other unique classes) instead of Monks... then again if your marketing towards kids monks would make the better fit.

 

Also mini games for the most part have been nonexistent in MMOs, so saying they are highly sought out is a bit of a stretch.

[Shingara]

Meh, kinda sick of playing games that start dumbing downs things. Look at Vanilla WoW raids compared to their expansion raids.

 

Seems swtor will probably end up going the same way (I hope not) just to please all these hand me everything on a plate wow players.

 

Thank goodness for a certain game company who actively fights off these sort of players.

 

I think one thing is for sure with whats has been happening and what has been said by bw and that is they dont bow down to the loudest simply to shut them up. BW defo do things there way and how they want the game tobe not change the game everytime something comes out prior or current that people compare them too.

[IGX_]

I think one thing is for sure with whats has been happening and what has been said by bw and that is they dont bow down to the loudest simply to shut them up. BW defo do things there way and how they want the game tobe not change the game everytime something comes out prior or current that people compare them too.

 

Then that's good to hear.

[aznthecapn]

I'm well versed in my WC3, and if Bilzz gave a damn about lore they would have made Brewmasters(or the any of the other unique classes) instead of Monks... then again if your marketing towards kids monks would make the better fit

 

They decided to expand the thinking and make the Brewmaster a part of the Monk class. Its the tanking tree. A Brewmaster isn't really a "token class" like most of WoW's classes (I'm not counting the Death Knight - dumbest thing ever). Monk has been standard across many RPGs for many years and are not indicative of kid targeted marketing.

 

Also mini games for the most part have been nonexistent in MMOs, so saying they are highly sought out is a bit of a stretch.

 

Correction then - they are highly prized in RPGs. I would also argue that they have been high sought after in THIS MMO. Just do a search for people asking for Pazaak as a minigame. As it is, the space missions are minigames.

[Callianna]

I wish people would stop comparing swtor to wow they are two totally different games with only the mmo part being the same. If you like wow better than play wow if you like swtor better than play swtor, if you like both than play both, period. There is no need to bash either game they both have good points and bad points.

[Braaaiins]

I hate to beat a dead horse too much, but the obvious fight going in the MMO space right now is between WoW and SWTOR.

 

When SWTOR came out there was a vocal minority arguing that what SWTOR is now is better than WoW at release. They reasoned that SWTOR offers more to players than WoW did at release, their comparisons are often driven towards saying, "yeah - SWTOR did this wrong at release, but WoW did it worse when it was first released." The argument relies on the idea that developers cannot compete with 10 years of ongoing development, that features and content in WoW now was developed over 10 years.

 

This is of course all rubbish, and Blizzard seems to get that:

 

 

 

Whilst the criticism is certainly in keep with Blizzard "post-competitor release PR machine", he's damn right. He couldn't be more right if he tried. I do not PvE... at all... aside from raids I run with my guild. Why? Because finding a group is so very tiresome, especially considering that in most MMOs today the feature to find a group easily is center stage. A lack of Dunegon Finder is a big thing, a big omission, something that should be in 1.2. We're not getting it in 1.2, that's obvious, and we'll get it at some point in the future, but it's such a big thing that SWTOR is half a game for not having it.

 

That's a bit part however. 1.2 goes a long way to bringing SWTOR in line with modern MMOs, as opposed to being 10 steps behind them. Bioware obviously knows that they are competing with WoW now, not WoW at launch. 1.2 and 1.3 are likely to add in pretty much every major feature that WoW has on SWTOR, and we're likely to see more in the way of gameplay variety coming in the future.

 

I'm not suggesting that Bioware should be trying to emulate WoW. I am saying that Bioware should be looking at WoW and other MMOs and seeing uniform features - like dungeon finders - and saying "yeah, that's something we should have had at launch, and something we should get into the game asap." And it was foolish of Bioware to release the game in the state it was in. Whilst it's certainly an accomplishment to have made SWTOR, it's also a testimony to the failures of the team. I'm hopeful - as are many others - that they've come to realise their folly.

 

 

 

*ahem* TL;DR

Edited March 26, 2012 by Braaaiins

[Shingara]

I wish people would stop comparing swtor to wow they are two totally different games with only the mmo part being the same. If you like wow better than play wow if you like swtor better than play swtor, if you like both than play both, period. There is no need to bash either game they both have good points and bad points.

 

Amen.

[Kleve]

I hate to beat a dead horse too much, but the obvious fight going in the MMO space right now is between WoW and SWTOR.

 

When SWTOR came out there was a vocal minority arguing that what SWTOR is now is better than WoW at release. They reasoned that SWTOR offers more to players than WoW did at release, their comparisons are often driven towards saying, "yeah - SWTOR did this wrong at release, but WoW did it worse when it was first released." The argument relies on the idea that developers cannot compete with 10 years of ongoing development, that features and content in WoW now was developed over 10 years.

 

This is of course all rubbish, and Blizzard seems to get that:

 

 

 

Whilst the criticism is certainly in keep with Blizzard "post-competitor release PR machine", he's damn right. He couldn't be more right if he tried. I do not PvE... at all... aside from raids I run with my guild. Why? Because finding a group is so very tiresome, especially considering that in most MMOs today the feature to find a group easily is center stage. A lack of Dunegon Finder is a big thing, a big omission, something that should be in 1.2. We're not getting it in 1.2, that's obvious, and we'll get it at some point in the future, but it's such a big thing that SWTOR is half a game for not having it.

 

That's a bit part however. 1.2 goes a long way to bringing SWTOR in line with modern MMOs, as opposed to being 10 steps behind them. Bioware obviously knows that they are competing with WoW now, not WoW at launch. 1.2 and 1.3 are likely to add in pretty much every major feature that WoW has on SWTOR, and we're likely to see more in the way of gameplay variety coming in the future.

 

I'm not suggesting that Bioware should be trying to emulate WoW. I am saying that Bioware should be looking at WoW and other MMOs and seeing uniform features - like dungeon finders - and saying "yeah, that's something we should have had at launch, and something we should get into the game asap." And it was foolish of Bioware to release the game in the state it was in. Whilst it's certainly an accomplishment to have made SWTOR, it's also a testimony to the failures of the team. I'm hopeful - as are many others - that they've come to realise their folly.

 

I have long argued that SWTOR is NOT WoW with lightsabers or a WoW clone. Had BioWare created WoW with Lightsabers or a more deliberate WoW clone, they PROBABLY would've ended up with a more full featured, BETTER game.

[BCBull]

I wish people would stop comparing swtor to wow they are two totally different games with only the mmo part being the same. If you like wow better than play wow if you like swtor better than play swtor, if you like both than play both, period. There is no need to bash either game they both have good points and bad points.

 

Funny I was bored with WoW after 5 years, and now I'm bored of swtor after 3 months.. Why you ask? BECAUSE THEY ARE THE SAME *********** GAME!

[Jalez]

Swtor is better than WoW

 

Daoc is better than WoW

 

Eve Online is better than WoW

 

WoW sucks, expand your horizons people, plenty of MMO's are better than WoW, WoW has a good PR department Ill give it that......but the cartoon that is WoW is for 10 year olds and under,not a game for adults

[aznthecapn]

Swtor is better than WoW

 

Daoc is better than WoW

 

Eve Online is better than WoW

 

WoW sucks, expand your horizons people, plenty of MMO's are better than WoW, WoW has a good PR department Ill give it that......but the cartoon that is WoW is for 10 year olds and under,not a game for adults

 

Opinions are fun!

[Touchbass]

Opinions are fun!

 

Yeah, opinions are like a$sholes, everything has one and they all stink

[ChastenRuin]

Yes, SWTOR is now competing with today's WOW. I get that. I think everyone already gets that. So that Blizz dev or whomever he was really didn't even have to bother wasting his breath saying that. But I think the true facts are what he's trying to divert from with that little tidbit. What is it called, something like "strawman" or other? I forgot the word for it. Hey, you want an English Master, consult my mother.

 

Anyway, my point is this. Yes, WoW has more today than SWTOR does. Right now. But there are other facts to consider here...

 

1. Yes, SWTOR launched with way more content than vanilla WOW did back in it's beginner days. Also with way more interesting content, though that's just my opinion. For an MMO that has just launched, the content it came with is well beyond impressive.

 

2. SWTOR's content is growing even now as we speak. Blizzard hardly ever made new content for WoW that wasn't an expansion you had to buy. It seems, contrary to the title of this thread, that it's really Bioware that "gets it" in this department. You don't wait almost a year to update your game. That's stupid.

 

3. SWTOR shows more potential than WoW. Coming out the gate with so much content, and constantly updating with new content, SWTOR will be WoW's size well before long. And then easily surpass it. Comparing WoW now to SWTOR now is like comparing the might of a full-grown horse to a tiger cub. Yes, the horse is bigger, stronger, and could easily stomp the cub to death, so the cub is no match for the horse at present. But give the cub like a couple of years to grow height, muscle, powerful fangs and sharp claws, then put them in a match and see who wins. If you're smart, you won't put your money on the horse. If you're really smart, it won't be your horse you're pitting against the tiger.

 

Add all this to the fact that Star Wars is by far a much more powerful franchise than Warcraft ever was or ever will be, along with Bioware's excellent story-telling techniques (also the fact that story and lore always took a backseat to everything else in WoW and was all but completely ignored by Blizz devs) and you have a recipe for the first true powerhouse contender for the MMO crown. If Blizz does decide to kill WoW, whatever. It would only be saving them the inevitability of watching Bioware pull the plug for them later. I know there are those who would disagree. But this is just how I see it.

 

 

 

1. WoW had more content at opening. We had to 10 more levels, more zones to level in and you could level a new character an entirely different way than you had the first without repeating ALL of the same content (sans class quests).

 

2. WoW did add content to vanilla. They opened new areas of the game in Silithus and Un Goro, they added the level 50 dungeon Dire Maul, BlackWing Lair, An Qiraj (a world even requiring both factions participation to open the dungeons) and Naxxramus (another world event) as well as Zul Gurub which was the first foray into 10 man raids. You didnt wait a year for major updates, they came within 3 months and content added as the game went on. It was actually a shame, because Naxxramus was released about 2 months before Burning Crusade and a lot of guilds never mastered it until WoTLK.

 

3. WoW showed more potential. People kept coming. Servers remained high pop for a long time. The complete opposite trend of this game where people were leaving within the first month and some big launch servers feel today more like morgues than vibrant communities. Half the new players levelling characters on my server are re-rolling from dead servers. Also, SWTOR has gone deeper on the discounts more quickly than WoW did. Already they are giving 4 day trials and the first month they gave a title if you re-subscribed. If you have to give an incentive to resub after the first month, you're sales and marketing department is scared of the retention numbers.

[Bluerodian]

I wish people would stop comparing swtor to wow they are two totally different games with only the mmo part being the same. If you like wow better than play wow if you like swtor better than play swtor, if you like both than play both, period. There is no need to bash either game they both have good points and bad points.

 

It boils down to the gameplay. When you strip off the story and look at everything left, you get a fairly mediocre and formula MMO. I'm guessing people, myself included, would have liked to have the story tacked on to something that's actually a new sort of experience in how a game is played, instead of the tried and true tired formula.

 

Story only goes so far.

[Shingara]

1. WoW had more content at opening. We had to 10 more levels, more zones to level in and you could level a new character an entirely different way than you had the first without repeating ALL of the same content (sans class quests).

 

2. WoW did add content to vanilla. They opened new areas of the game in Silithus and Un Goro, they added the level 50 dungeon Dire Maul, BlackWing Lair, An Qiraj (a world even requiring both factions participation to open the dungeons) and Naxxramus (another world event) as well as Zul Gurub which was the first foray into 10 man raids. You didnt wait a year for major updates, they came within 3 months and content added as the game went on. It was actually a shame, because Naxxramus was released about 2 months before Burning Crusade and a lot of guilds never mastered it until WoTLK.

 

3. WoW showed more potential. People kept coming. Servers remained high pop for a long time. The complete opposite trend of this game where people were leaving within the first month and some big launch servers feel today more like morgues than vibrant communities. Half the new players levelling characters on my server are re-rolling from dead servers. Also, SWTOR has gone deeper on the discounts more quickly than WoW did. Already they are giving 4 day trials and the first month they gave a title if you re-subscribed. If you have to give an incentive to resub after the first month, you're sales and marketing department is scared of the retention numbers.

 

Question one, if you love wow so much why are you here. wow released those things and so what, rift released more things also but who cares, warhammer gave more content to wow then the wow devs did. Fact is swtor has released with more and is updating and adding more content then not just wow but alot of other mmos also.

 

Question 2, why is it that giving trials to a game is a bad thing. to everyone else its common sense. they flood the market with free trials and more people will try it for free and then buy it rather than seeing an advert and then thinking ill try it.

 

Question 3, if what you say about the giving stuff away means to numbers being lost what do you say about what bliz are doing by giving people free lvl 80's, diablo 3 for free with a years subscription and bribing people to buy the years subscription so they can beta test mop and then ontop of that having to lay off 600 staff as they cannot afford them anymore.

 

PS 10 mans were the norm for dungeons never mind raids before they limited the party size to 5. And so what if there were 10 more levels, difference does that make, its just the maximum xp required divided by a specific fraction and that is all. swtor, rift, warhammer, mxo etc could all have had 100 levels if they wanted, the only thing that sets the levels is the template set by the designers and nothing else, more levels does not and never shall compell more content.

 

Lastly its also common these days to give rewards for time spent, being a beta tester or being the 1st people on the game from launch. And it isnt a case of being scared its a case that people like to show that they were here from the start in a few years time or helped or did something that no longer can be done.

Edited March 26, 2012 by Shingara

[CrisG]

I think it is very clear to any who know gaming and the SW games and the history of MMO, and having played some of the very first ones, that Bioware knows very well what they are doing and there is no doubt in my mind that WOW is a pale shadow of the experience that SWTOR is, SWTOR is by and far in my experience the best MMO that has been created yet, and it looks to get better and better.