Jinook_Phi Posted April 1, 2012 Share Posted April 1, 2012 The Good & The Ugly SWTOR has me very torn. I several maxed toons on SWG until about two months past the NGE and I had three toons on WoW in the upper 80's. My Star Wars geek background is too extensive, LOL, blush, but trust me- I know a ton about SW and about any SW game out there. So what's my verdict and how does that compare with what I heard on the podcast? The Good: *BW: I think the thing that really is unfortunate is how personally hostile many of the posters can be on the forums. Ive lost it a few times myself, but more then anything, I really do try to offer a balanced view. Having met several of the people in Austin (Best Buy event), plus all of my interactions, the people at BW tend to be friendly, passionate about the game and I TRULY believe they are trying to roll out an exceptional product. *THE CORE GAME: About 70% of the time, this is best SW and MMO experience that Ive ever had. The "grind" rarely has felt like a grind. Ive found all the stories Ive played loads of fun and compelling. The cutscenes can be a bit tedious but their still worth it, I really feel invested in the game. I also think BW is slowly breaking more and more new ground in MMO's, from how you level a toon, always having a companion, the upcoming legacy system, all very engaging. The story lines, as stated, really good. *THE TONE: Mostly positive PR, meaning, the peeps tend to do a good job (at BW) of keeping a positive attitude, promoting all the new stuff as well as voicing some key messages such as bug fixes are important. Again, I think they really want to build community. The Ugly *BUGS: I get this is a new MMO, but the amount of bugs remains very high. The good news is, most of the bugs now, with a few exceptions, dont interfere with the game from a combat perspective, but they do affect immersion and other things. As of April 1st, here are the bugs I am dealing with: in game CSR email shows as not read, even though it has been- and has been stuck on the flashing green across all toons for almost a month now; in caves, if I am in a big spread out fight, whatever aggro dies in front of me, I cannot engage the remaining aggro until I loot first, it will not let me target the remaining mobs. This is a great way for a dirt nap. Stasis on my Sent, sometimes it sticks and sometimes it doesnt. About 80% of the time it sticks. Now, within the last few weeks, stasis randomly pops on a mob on its own, even if its on cooldown, it just is suddenly there. *ECONOMY. When you add up repair costs, travel costs, speeder license costs, speeder costs, premium items cost, GTN costs, on and on I could go- the game sucks a lot of money out of from your toon. I dont think this is way off, BTW, I just think its about 15% off or thereabouts. Some things should be hard and require effort. But theres no sense to it all. For example, bringing way down repair costs and stripping mods from your own gear costs, would be a much smarter way to go. *SENTINEL: The podcast spoke of Watchman but not Focus spec. The Sent's overall, are a very tough class to play which is exactly what I love about them. But we need a tad more resiliency. My Trooper is able to blast through all kinds of difficult content. If Jedi are to live up to their lore, we need to be able to, based on our skills, handle tough content too. As we are not a tanking nor heavy armor class, I dont expect to be able to do it as a trooper does. But I do expect to be able to, if I learn the skills, to survive and thrive equally in PvE *CUSTOMER SERVICE: They all seem to be nice but the current CSR system is a very long ways from being effective. Ive had serious issues come up, like being unable to log in due to a weird deal with my security key and the CSR (2 up in the process) kept telling me to NOT put in my security code from my iPhone into the game, this website. This happened over and over, as they said it was supposed to go in my iPhone. I finally just did it anyways and thats what solved the problem. The original CSR ticket I sent in on this issue told me to wait on the next patch. Nice people but horrible effectiveness at really and truly solving issues. -------- Im not a fan boy nor am I one to personally attack. The game has some amazing qualities but it has a lot of things to address. I really enjoyed the banter and tone of the podcast, its a vibe Ive sensed from BW throughout all of this, it was a very good podcast. But I also sensed a tone, just the way these two came off, that although they seem really cool and in spite of the fact they have spent a ton of hours playing- they still dont truly get the garden variety player and just how disruptive some of this remaining issues can be. MMO people are very passionate about their games and I think BW could do a much better job of really plugging into and hearing the community more effectively then it is doing now. But all in all, its been a ton of fun. I have very high hopes for this game in the months and years to come. Thank you for your time- Jin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TOURDallas Posted April 1, 2012 Share Posted April 1, 2012 Love the podcast keep it up. +1 for rss. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZooCougar Posted April 2, 2012 Share Posted April 2, 2012 Great Podcast, looking forward to the next episode. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheForcePush Posted April 2, 2012 Share Posted April 2, 2012 I enjoyed listening to your pilot podcast and look forward to more in the near future. The only suggest I might make is to add a "Developer Tip of the Week" or what ever frequency you plan to release these. It could be generic or class based, PVE, PVP, possible builds, game mechanics or crafting... stuff that you mentioned might not have been communicated well to the players. Thanks guys. Keep up all the hard work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aram_Darksun Posted April 2, 2012 Share Posted April 2, 2012 (edited) I like how they determine balance by "having a guy come in and saying this class has to much of this". Sigh. Did you like mute it after that sentance? They explained at length how they discuss it and validate it through math and testing, personal experience AND forum posts. Seriously what else can they do? Are they perfect? No, but do you really think they would keep their job if they had a blase lackadaisical approach to balance? Your lack of comprehension is an impressive testimony to the ability of people to hear what they wanna hear and take things out of context. Cudos. Edited April 2, 2012 by Aram_Darksun Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Krovan Posted April 2, 2012 Share Posted April 2, 2012 itunes is great for the apple peeps, but don't foget an rss for the rest of us! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thyago Posted April 2, 2012 Share Posted April 2, 2012 Please make a RSS feed for this. Simple and easy to do, all android users (and google reader users and more) will thank you =] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyersfan Posted April 2, 2012 Share Posted April 2, 2012 I enjoyed it. I was somewhat surprised by the brevity, but it's to be expected from people who already dedicate a ton of time to the game. I thought it had some good feedback from the developers about how they make the game and make adjustments. I'm interested in seeing future episodes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
duanewoods Posted April 2, 2012 Share Posted April 2, 2012 this was a great first podcast. can't wait to be able to subscribe so I can add it to my podcast list :-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Karkais Posted April 2, 2012 Share Posted April 2, 2012 nah you missed the mark there. "Be constructive and informative as possible." is the proper way to take it. All right. In the mission "defend the shipment" on empire side Ilum, you are supposed to click on some glowy boxes that will trigger an ambush that you must beat. For some reason these clickies become uninteractable which means that the mission cannot be completed. You get "this item is already being used" message or somesuch. Dropping the mission doesnt help. Nothing helps. This issue does not affect everyone, and I cannot say what triggers it. Now, fix it please. I have sent minimum of three bugreports about it and it has been in same shape since beta. Ive given up on bioware actually fixing it. Obviously they have at least 6-month queue of fixing bugs. The reason why Im fussed about this is because defend the shipment is a daily mission. Meaning this bug reduces my ability to gain daily commendations. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Karkais Posted April 2, 2012 Share Posted April 2, 2012 (edited) Did you like mute it after that sentance? They explained at length how they discuss it and validate it through math and testing, personal experience AND forum posts. But they didnt validate how they determine what the design 'goal' actually is. They say they check whether the game actually performs how it is designed, but they say nothing about how they arrive to that design. Or what the design is. Just how powerful are we supposed to be in their opinion? Since we don't know, we players must assume. And thats where the problems start. Having them discuss the game so flippantly while me the player is down here glaring at bugs on a daily basis, makes me angry, not happy. Edited April 2, 2012 by Karkais Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrip Posted April 2, 2012 Share Posted April 2, 2012 I love how they dismiss the destruction of BH healers as "numbers tweaking." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kirjava Posted April 2, 2012 Share Posted April 2, 2012 It's good to hear you back on a podcast Musco! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strensk Posted April 3, 2012 Share Posted April 3, 2012 My feeling is that if you actually sit around and crunch numbers on a game as a player, you seriously, seriously need to get a life. With a game this massive, it is never going to be perfect. Some things will be imbalanced, others not. I play the game fairly casually, and if this is your life, you rally need to get out more. Just saying. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
portichae Posted April 3, 2012 Share Posted April 3, 2012 My feeling is that if you actually sit around and crunch numbers on a game as a player, you seriously, seriously need to get a life. With a game this massive, it is never going to be perfect. Some things will be imbalanced, others not. I play the game fairly casually, and if this is your life, you rally need to get out more. Just saying. Some of us enjoy crunching numbers and do very well for ourselves crunching numbers for a living. I've enjoyed the podcast but like others I'm concerned that the hosts may not have the ability to be as objective as we the community would like them to be. Also, is there a RSS up yet? Not all of us are idrones. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SirUrza Posted April 3, 2012 Share Posted April 3, 2012 Very cool, can't wait for the iTunes/RSS link so I can subscribe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eshaye Posted April 4, 2012 Share Posted April 4, 2012 hmmmmm next time i would add like a video or something like possibly gameplay It's a PODcast...... Nice! Good to have something official I can listen to in the morning on the way to school/work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trishlicious Posted April 6, 2012 Share Posted April 6, 2012 Podcast? No, it is far from a podcast; what we heard was a polished and scripted corporate PR tool. After 5 episodes this "podcast" will fade away like all corporate sponsored podcasts never to be heard from again. The SWTOR podcast will fill the space long enough for the targeted audience which it is aimed and cover the negative issues which need to be quieted down before they create too much noise in the MMO market. I hope it will continue for as long as SWTOR exists though; it was a well put together podcast but I would like to hear more life in the show as it was too vanilla. - Trishlicious (Phaezyne of Shadow Hand) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Narq Posted April 7, 2012 Share Posted April 7, 2012 This official podcast will fit in nicely with all the unofficial ones. I would ask that you make this available on Stitcher (which is available online, via iOS, and Android devices). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RussellThomas Posted April 9, 2012 Share Posted April 9, 2012 (edited) Please make a RSS feed for this. Simple and easy to do, all android users (and google reader users and more) will thank you =] +1 for RSS feed Google Listen fan here i'm a big fan of this fan made podcast as well: TORked Edited April 9, 2012 by RussellThomas Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ApocalypseDan Posted April 10, 2012 Share Posted April 10, 2012 +1 for itunes/RSS link. I know a guy who says it's up already in Zune, but it does me no good to like a podcast that doesn't bother listing on the granddaddy of all podcatchers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
farfulnugen Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 (edited) Okay, so listening to this podcast, in regards to sage/sorc healing, you address the bug. I think the general consensus among players is that taking out this bug was a good thing. You then said that when you take away that bug, sorc/sages balance out. Yet, you don't address the other 2 huge changes you made to them and its affect on class balance in PvP. So if taking out the bug balances out our healer with other healers.....then the other 2 changes just outright nerf and create IMBALANCE. You talk about all the information we don't have as players -- so give us that information please. What is it YOU SEE in PVP that makes you think these 2 changes are okay and balanced considering all the interrupts/stuns/ etc that are out there? Please answer this question as it's the MAJOR question that sage/sorcs want an answer to (which you have not at all answered). Edited April 11, 2012 by farfulnugen Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
farfulnugen Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 **Crickets** Such quick responses to other posts but a major question can't be answered. And no, none of your responses addressed PVP concerns of sage/sorc changes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ApocalypseDan Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 Sorry I'd much rather have them work on getting an RSS feed going so we can subscribe via iTunes than researching an answer to a question almost every other podcast is currently talking about. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AdamDe Posted April 21, 2012 Share Posted April 21, 2012 Hello everyone! My name is Eric Musco and I, along with Brooks Guthrie are happy to bring you a sneak peek of the official STAR WARS: The Old Republic podcast. You can listen to our pilot episode here by using the embedded player, or download and listen on your preferred MP3 player. Our goal with this show is to give you, the community, insight into development of The Old Republic by hearing directly from the developers creating the game. In our pilot episode, Brooks and I sit down with combat team members Austin Peckenpaugh and Cameron Winston to talk about some of the changes coming in Game Update 1.2. Listen Now Over a month later and no new podcast... never put into I tunes... pretty sure it is dead. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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