The end of the arguement. Is SWTOR in decline? Can it be saved?

[Sparklehorse]

Ah the american schooling system.

 

 

1 to 3 is not most, its the opposite.

 

There are from 1 to 3 servers with Heavy population per zone (EU, US), dont forget that there are 2 more types its Very Heavy and Full (i know, you havent seen those since the launch).

 

Most servers are from light to standard, and in Light, Standard, Heavy, Very Heavy and Full population types, you gotta admit... its low.

 

For americans - its like you have F, E, D, C and B (your school grade system) and mostly (190 out of 200) you would be getting F's and E's, 10 out of 200 would be D's would that still be good?

 

Thanks for the lecture from the high horse but the key word in my post was not heavy it was "standard." As in, "there are far more standard pop servers than light. It was in response to a post that stated most servers were dead which was inaccurate.

 

Much like your assumption about my education.

[Durasturan]

I call BS, I wont say who it is that I know very well that is in GW2 beta for NDA reasons, but I can tell you first hand this is simply not true. The forums are very supportive, people are already calling it the true successor to WoW, having done what no other MMO since could.

 

LOL, GW2 forums are worse than B on a friday night, no joke, you will find no greater hive of scum and villainy, they make SWTOR Gen look like eden.

[Sparklehorse]

LOL, GW2 forums are worse than B on a friday night, no joke, you will find no greater hive of scum and villainy, they make SWTOR Gen look like eden.

 

What he said.

[EnufThree]

LOL, GW2 forums are worse than B on a friday night, no joke, you will find no greater hive of scum and villainy, they make SWTOR Gen look like eden.

 

How can anything be worse than the TOR forum? Aren't we considered to be the lowest of the low?

[Durasturan]

Now I doubt that you know anything from beta at all..

 

At the end of MAY???

 

If your husband really was in beta then you would know that the first opening of the beta is end of APRIL, on a weekend. Which means April 20th or April 27th.

 

So yeah, your not in beta. If you were, then you would see that the beta forums are flooded with compliments on finally breaking the WoW mold and making a game that is a true successor to WoW.

 

GW2 beta started in DECEMBER, the beta started before SWTOR even released. The non-NDA semi-open beta starts at the end of this month, but closed beta has been ongoing for nearly 5 months. You have no idea what you're talking about.

[Rayla_Felana]

How can anything be worse than the TOR forum? Aren't we considered to be the lowest of the low?

 

A recent article I read suggested this.

[Deyjarl]

It is a downtrend in MMOs in general, not just this one.

[Durasturan]

How can anything be worse than the TOR forum? Aren't we considered to be the lowest of the low?

 

I'd say we're no lower than the 4th or maybe the 5th circle of hell (Greed and Anger respectively) whereas the GW2 Forums are probably 7th Circle, Violence. An example. On the GW2 forums your response to me wouldnt have been what you said above, instead what you would have said is:

 

"NOTHING IS WORSE THAN THE TOR FORUMS YOU BABY ****** MORON. THAT PLACE IS STUPID AND ONLY #%* #%*& NOOBS USE IT! L2PLAY YOU MORON."

 

No joke, nearly every response is just people yelling at each other, no joking, no kidding, no friendly puns or silliness, just raw anger and violence.

 

Those forums should be avoided like an outbreak of Rakghoul Plague.

[Rotton]

English ...Do You Speak it?

 

It is a most wonderful word twisting thing huh?

 

Now does anyone here watch stocks to invest in? Thing is this, LAST YEAR THESE CUTS WERE PREDICTED, because the titles were OVERBUDGET. Now its RUMERED that is going to happen because of this or that.

 

Its a coorprate move, that has been linked to SWTOR going down the drain.

 

Has anyone seen or played Champions online? Star Trek online? As much of a trekkie as I am, if these game havent died, I highly doubt this on will for some time to come, and EA is still a heavy hitter that knows when they got a licence to make cash, and here it is wrapped up in a Star Wars bow, not to mention the long relationship Lucas Arts has with EA.

 

If you want to link these layoffs, that I might add , Has not been confirmed on layoffs or reasons, then show me a press release from EA saying SWTOR is Failing, or that they have future plans on letting Lucus Arts down and pulling the plug.

 

NOT to mention Bioware wasnt just hatched out of an egg, they have more than one succesful title under their belts to make revenue with, doubt they are going to let this investment go after all this.

 

Rottons Worthless Opinion...take it for what it is worth:cool:

[Toxen]

2nd link is broken

[Skylarke]

 

You remember when ToA hit and the exodus began?

 

That was what caused me to finally leave DAoC.

 

[otakuon]

Don't know about TOR specifically, but video game sales in general have decreased significantly. It's party due to the general decline of the world economy and the continued diversification of entertainment. Many more people are spending their time on smartphones or just not playing video games at all...i.e. surfing the web and interacting on social networking sites.

 

Sources:

 

http://www.zacks.com/stock/news/73046/video-game-sales-plunge-in-march

 

http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2012/04/arstechnica-wii-software-decline/

 

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/us-video-game-sales-drop-25-percent-march-16128349#.T4y-Je2y6mQ

Edited April 17, 2012 by otakuon

[Macabrae]

Just saw this on CVG.

 

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/343845/ea-poor-battlefield-3-old-republic-performance-result-in-layoffs/

 

"and Star Wars: The Old Republic, which received similar treatment and has supposedly already seen subscription numbers decline, are big contributing factors to the cuts."

 

http://startupgrind.com/2012/04/exclusive-electronic-arts-set-to-lay-off-500-employees/

This one is a bit more in depth.

 

http://articles.marketwatch.com/2012-02-02/markets/31029084_1_ea-shares-earnings-report-unit-sales

This seems to be more focused on the stock from EA and seems to lean both ways.

 

It seems EA have had a poor financial year due to BF3 and SWTOR.

 

I have found this on several other sites, it seems to be reliable.

 

I don't want to start a flame war or an "I told you so" thread. Instead, I was wondering what people would like to see to maybe improve the player base.

I am one of the people that is on the fence, I have around 90 days or so left on my sub but am, as of yet, not convinced to renew it.

Following the new "world event" (which I though was good mostly) maybe this is the way forward?

So lets hear it, what would it take (for those that aren't sure or maybe have already cancelled) to bring you back?

For those that are already commited, what more things would you like improved or added?

 

Lets try and keep it on track and pleasant ok?

 

Ok, weigh in.

 

Read this where EA denies the rumor

 

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/rumour-ea-preparing-for-500-1-000-layoffs/094475

 

or

 

http://www.itproportal.com/2012/04/16/ea-games-denies-layoff-rumours/

[Deewe]

I don't want to start a flame war or an "I told you so" thread. Instead, I was wondering what people would like to see to maybe improve the player base.

I am one of the people that is on the fence, I have around 90 days or so left on my sub but am, as of yet, not convinced to renew it.

If proven true I'm sad for the peons who did their best to salvage the game from your total lack of vision and good management.

 

 

That being said, first look at these topics and do a reality check:

Start

here

, go through

this

and maybe double check with

that

.

 

 

Now whatever you do:

Top priority: either merge the clusters or offer free character transfer.

This has to be done in a semi controlled way, meaning use this to balance factions.

If you don't then the game is doomed. Don't even waste people time and $$$ doing anything else on the game before.

 

 

Then the game, (if you still want to call it a MMO), has mostly 2 majors issues:

1. Lack of content at level 50
   
2. Lack of world PvP
   

 

You need to add more and even more instances and world content for PvErs. Don't imagine any number because it won't ever be enough: it's an MMO. You will never be able to deliver content fast enough. So just keep it coming the faster you can, in a polished way.

In due time you'll have fluffy and sandbox content that'll close the gap for you.

 

 

Now for PvP people always gets bored very fast of Warzones. You can add PvP (and PvP) ranked arenas to mitigate the issue still it won't do the trick. It would just be a plaster. Especially on PvP server you need to make PvP "available" anywhere = on any planets and from level 1. Note I did not say promote griefing nor ganking. As long as PvP = instanced something, or specific planets only it doesn't works.

 

 

Once you'll done the above you'll be able to dig in things like adding a decent 3d space sim, working on things like making the world feel more alive, add playable wookies/droids, housing furnishing and other non combat based activities.

 

 

Top of that never ever forget the roots of the game:

• It's Star Wars: not AoC Wars, not Rift Wars, not Diablo Wars, not Wow shoulder pads Wars
  
• Characters locked in iconic roles = no cross skills transfers
  
• Factions being locked = no same faction PvP
  
• Class story
  
• Special note: ditch the specific color palette for planets and classes.
  

 

And please do something to get rid of most of the loading screens

Edited April 17, 2012 by Deewe

[WLpride]

As far as saved can go...

 

Game is in rough shape from the beginning because of the engine and the nature of MMO and PvP.

 

Many good 'fixes' have come already and I think the current team will find good use for PvP and Warzones, maybe even Ilum eventually.

 

PvP Story lines are still kinda less then epic once one has done it once. I mean there isn't a lot of replayability in the scope of all the Planets...

 

Can it be saved....

 

So far I see a problem with it's core style - PvE. Although touted as very much PvE, it seems to lack IN stories, just a run-through storyline per character. For example I would expect extensive multi-direction Companion Side quests.

 

Daily's - Pretty big waste of time IMO, they should be so grindy with the idea.

 

I think the rest of the game will come along nicely, even Operations.

 

Yes I think there is one major flaw that probably won't change, the general theme just isn't that MMO'ish even though many parts are very quality.

 

Probably will never get to WoW status, just a steady 1.5 million... That sounds like a money maker to me, I hope EA can get it together and not look so much like trash.

 

SWTOR seems to be well funded I don't think there is anything that they can't do, frankly, except hurt themselves by knowingly mis-target their audience here. What they have now is a success for everyday SW fans and young MMO players in general love it all around already!

 

I don't think it will be saved to become a true Categorical Pinnacle, no, it's far too Pop. It likely will never earn "favorite of all time" recognition, but anything is still possible. I'd give it another 18 months before completely writing it off, BW has a lot of work to accomplish and they WILL delive 'something'.

 

cheers

[otakuon]

In my opinion, the foundation has been set. BW accomplished what they wanted to do originally which was make a compelling leveling experience with a story (if you didn't like that, then the story probably wasn't for you...that's going to be a matter of personal preference).

 

Now that the base has been established, they only need to build up on that. I think we can see they are going in the right direction. If they can do these world events like the Rakghoul plague every month or even every two weeks (that might be asking too much), this will be an amazing MMO. Something tells me that Tatooine is only the beginning and we will see Rakghouls spread far and wide across the galaxy. I have a feeling that this will be the "story" of TOR for the next sixth months to a year.

 

And that right there is what WB needs to do...they did to be consistent with an overall "story" for the game that ties into events and chains off of content previously delivered. If they can do that, then they can maintain that "forth pillar" of the MMORPG genre that they are seeking to accomplish.

 

The thing is, those of us who were here from day one will always be ahead of the content curve. We played the heck out of the game during the first few weeks it launch and we will do the same every time new content drops. This is true for the starting population of every MMO. Once an MMO matures, new players will come to it, and they will be at par with or behind the content curve. They are the lucky ones...

[xNocturnal]

My favorite part is how this comes from "multiple sources", but they still use the word "supposedly already seen subscription numbers decline..."

 

If it's known, why is it "supposed"?

 

The other article is just as vague.

 

. <--- This is a grain of salt. You may take it if you wish.

 

Agreed with this quote.

 

There have been SO MANY death threats for new MMO'S. Look, give the MMO some time and perhaps we can experience some goodies.

 

The game hasn't been around for quite long. We should understand that new MMO'S experience their flaws. Let's just hope that Bioware stands up to this and makes things right.

[Rotton]

The thing is, those of us who were here from day one will always be ahead of the content curve. We played the heck out of the game during the first few weeks it launch and we will do the same every time new content drops. This is true for the starting population of every MMO. Once an MMO matures, new players will come to it, and they will be at par with or behind the content curve. They are the lucky ones...

 

True this:cool:

[DarthVindictus]

GW2 may technically be 'different,' but it's still getting the same treatment. It isn't going to be as good as you think it is, because no game can live up to expectations. No MMO has ever lived up to expectations since WoW, and WoW only managed to because at that time expectations were non-existent for MMOs.

 

First off, a disclaimer, I did not sign an NDA, I had prepurchased Guild Wars 2, so I had an account, and had acquired the game client through a leak. They had a closed stress test on Friday to prepare for the first open BWE. Essentially, I was able to sneak in (I actually didn't know it was a stress test and thought it was the first BWE) So I got to play Guild Wars 2 for about 6 hours.

 

Honestly? What I saw in that 6 hours as far as the dynamic content system, the combat, and responsive controls (vs the delay in TOR and rooting you to the ground for a lot of skills) blew me away. I have never experienced in landscape PVE, the situation I experienced there which was people not even grouped together, working cooperatively to do events. In TOR and other traditional MMO's, you are conditioned to avoid large groups of people as they will tag your mobs and make questing harder for you. Here, you're encouraged, as there's no penalty for other people helping you kill mobs, nor is there any tagging. You're rewarded for playing cooperatively. It's amazing.

 

It actually lived up to my expectations and I haven't been able to enjoy playing another video game since. I can't stop thinking about it and after having actually played it, I'm more hyped than ever.

 

Compare this to my reaction to TOR.... when it was first announced? I was really really excited. As news and screenshots and videos came out, I became increasingly disappointed and had pretty much lost interest. Then I got a beta invite. Sure, I guess I'll try it out, I'm bored. My reaction to TOR was "well, this isn't as bad as I thought it would be, maybe I'll play it for awhile, it has a few cool features"

 

But I never felt a compulsion that I HAD to play it during beta. It's just that I had set my bar for it so low that once I got into the beta it exceeded expectations.

 

Guild Wars 2 I had extremely high expectations for, the more I heard about it the higher my expectations were raised actually (contrast to every bit of news about TOR lowering my expectations). Then I got to play it, and my expectations were met, and even slightly exceeded by a few features I didn't know about.

 

The good thing about Guild Wars 2 for those of you who still want to play TOR.. is that you can play both concurrently because it has no subscription fee. The game design lends itself to casual spontaneous play as well.

 

So while I encourage checking out GW2, don't take that necessarily as you should quit this game for it. If you enjoy this game, keep playing, but also consider GW2. I think it'll work out well.

 

Me? I'm a bit burnt out on TOR and have unsubscribed and will stay unsubscribed for a little while, but I do intend to come back here and finish a class story or two eventually, there are some good features to this game. I just need to get some breathing room as rolling more alts doesn't help when 90% of the content you do leveling up is the same. So like a single player game that you're playing for the story.. you take a break before replaying it (that's what I did for Guild Wars as well)

Edited April 17, 2012 by DarthVindictus

[Zannis]

The one year bucket list, in order of importance:

 

1. Server Transfers/Merges and PTS character copies. The biggest issue atm by far.

 

2. Ranked WZs, world PvP. Giving up on Ilum was a black eye, as was the delay on ranked WZs. Focus on making these right before trying to move onto ranked Arena's or w/e the next big step in PvP might be.

 

3. Functional LFG tool. Heroic questing, Flashpoints and Operations need to be more accessible. Multi spec also a catalyst for easier group formation.

 

4. Continued UI refinement and the possible addition of third party addons. In game combat log.

 

5. Continued refinement of performance issues. Mac support would be nice. Working on tech to reduce load times should also be a priority.

 

6. Better attention to itemization and crafting. Less class nerfing to make content more difficult, more attention to quality of life issues affecting each class.

 

Bioware needs to make this list their priority in the first year. Four months in, and they seem to be moving towards that general direction.

 

In addition to keeping up a reasonable stream of content (new WZs, FPs and Ops), the most commonly sited 'fantasy' feature on the forums seems to be free form space flight. Deliver PvE/PvP flight skirmishes in the first expansion.

 

Follow through on all of this, and the game will have 3 million subs going into it's first expansion.

Edited April 17, 2012 by Zannis

[jestertron]

My issue is, if you think the game is in decline and you obviously hate it, why are you still here? I'm not talking about the original poster, I mean anybody who goes to the forum and complains about this decline. Just unsubscribe and play something else. Then EA/Bioware will wonder why subs are dropping when they see nobody playing and at least posting. Silence is scarier than words sometimes. Edited April 17, 2012 by jestertron

[Blistrich]

My issue is, if you think the game is in decline and you obviously hate it, why are you still here?

Because the game isn't in decline, people obviously like it, and they're still here because they know beyond all the debate over balance, substance and content delivery, we are all gamers who will either stick with it or drift in and out.

 

I know this, because every game I permanently left before this (and there have been many), I never once gave a single further thought about the community, the mechanics, or the forums when I did.

 

When you leave, you dump it, and it's gone.

 

When you linger, you're just keen on voicing your doubts because you're bored and restless... or disappointed and talkative... or a devious little troll.

Edited April 17, 2012 by Blistrich

[AshenK]

The fact is TOR is already on it's last legs if it wasn't then why would there be a post like this one. And no TOR cannot be saved, the theme park MMO is now a dying breed as more and more games are going to be going down sandbox roads. Secret World and Guild Wars 2 show that those are the style of games that players want.

 

I mean it shows look at the in game event going on right now, I'm seeing more posts asking BioWare to shut it down and remove it then to keep it around. 1.2 is an epic failure that has upset the biggest part of the community the PvPer's and once you upset them they are not going to forgive you for it.

 

So no this game cannot be saved and we shouldn't want it to. This games failure will show that the theme park WoW clone idea just does not work anymore.

[iceperson]

Just saw this on CVG.

 

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/343845/ea-poor-battlefield-3-old-republic-performance-result-in-layoffs/

 

"and Star Wars: The Old Republic, which received similar treatment and has supposedly already seen subscription numbers decline, are big contributing factors to the cuts."

 

http://startupgrind.com/2012/04/exclusive-electronic-arts-set-to-lay-off-500-employees/

This one is a bit more in depth.

 

http://articles.marketwatch.com/2012-02-02/markets/31029084_1_ea-shares-earnings-report-unit-sales

This seems to be more focused on the stock from EA and seems to lean both ways.

 

It seems EA have had a poor financial year due to BF3 and SWTOR.

 

I have found this on several other sites, it seems to be reliable.

 

I don't want to start a flame war or an "I told you so" thread. Instead, I was wondering what people would like to see to maybe improve the player base.

I am one of the people that is on the fence, I have around 90 days or so left on my sub but am, as of yet, not convinced to renew it.

Following the new "world event" (which I though was good mostly) maybe this is the way forward?

So lets hear it, what would it take (for those that aren't sure or maybe have already cancelled) to bring you back?

For those that are already commited, what more things would you like improved or added?

 

Lets try and keep it on track and pleasant ok?

 

Ok, weigh in.

 

Well, with sources like that.. oh wait, there aren't any sources.

[Blistrich]

The fact is TOR is already on it's last legs if it wasn't then why would there be a post like this one.

Welcome to The Internet, sir.

 

It's rough in the beginning, but it gets better.