I think SWTOR just had bad luck with its timing

[JollyRogers]

Another thing to consider is that there's a new generation of people playing MMO's from when the 'golden age' of UO and EQ were started. As well as a demographic shift in the targets.

 

In the early days, the target audience was niche oriented, and developers were just happy to put a quality game out with enough subscribers to keep the lights on. There was a certain stigma attached to online gamers back then, and thus the potential customer base was much smaller. That's changed and in present day online gaming is widely accepted, and thus more people are involved than the starting years. Which is good for the bottom line, but a wider diversity also means a wider range of player wants or motivations.

Catering to the pen and paper crowds in the early years was more simple, as there were certain things the target audience just would have understood. Stats, skills, turn based combat, etc... was all familiar to them, and the games could merely make an online form of it allowing for easy customer transaction into the online world.

 

There's also more of Generation Entitlement in the games now, than in the earlier years. I define Generation Entitlement not as an age range, but an attitude. Part of it can be put onto poor player attitudes, and part of it can be put on the companies.

 

Player behavior in online games, and on the forums has gotten much worse. The lack of any sort of common courtesy seems to be a thing of the pass, replaced with "where's mine!?". Immediate gratification is now the norm, instead of working towards something. Narcissism has replaced being members of a community. Poor behavior is now excused by others, when it is pointed out. And, by targeting the widest demographics possible, companies also now introduce the "lowest common denominator" into the equation.

 

Companies have done their fair share of promoting the above as well, creating environments that poor player behavior is not only rewarded, but encouraged. Social corrections are removed from the games, and forums. Behavior that would have garnered a social correction of "well that's stupid" are now forbidden, giving empowerment and weight to the maker of the statement. Like many businesses, they only see short term, and don't recognize the long term impact.

 

I don't think it was a case of "bad luck" with SWToR and when it was released. I think it was more of a case of trying to release a game that tried to focus on too many demographics. Instead of doing one or two things very well, and trying to keep that customer base, instead it tried to focus on too much, too wide, and wound up doing a lot of things "so-so", like the majority of games out there now.

[Kalfear]

Only read first post but

 

Its not TORs pricing plan or design template thats causing its issues.

 

People will ALWAYS pay for quality, if the product delivers,

I look at the F2P games out there and they are half baked products designed specifically to get players to spend money in the cash shops rather then the developers focusing on game play.

 

Even though Im vastly let down by what TOR delivered, I still will not play GW2, Tera, or even go back to Rift because they F2P now (rift partial f2p). Because they simply are not well made games (Rift could have been but went off in the gear score raid direction and thats not for me)

 

The problem with TOR starts and ends on EAowares door step in that its clear they didnt look back past WOW for design mechanics. What worked and why, how can it be modernized to fit today, and most importantly, how can we deliver a solo player game while ensureing community and socialization.

 

Thats what TOR misses on. If TOR released with a steeper level curve (so people not zooming to 50 in 2-3 weeks) and a even split of 50/50 group/solo content (so you can still solo but you miss allot if you do), working RVR (DAoC style pre RAs) rather then warzones, Rift public group events, and a host of cantina side games to give people a option other then combat orientated. TOR would have had maybe 10% of the drop off instead of the almost 50% its reported so far (opening sales 2.1 million, last report 1.3, so roughly 40% give or take a few percentages).

 

EAoware simply never learned the number one thing a MMORPG requires for long term success is COMMUNITY in the game.

 

The problem with TOR at release and to this day (and the same problem that exists after 1.3 drops) is people treat it as a single player game. Oh a few fanbois can post here and there about how awsome their guild is and blah blah blah. Its just noise and nothing but. We see it every day you log in, dead general chat, dead pvp channel, dead trade channel, there is no interaction, no communication, NO COMMUNITY!

 

TOR gets socialization and their subs will probably level out and stay steady going forth! Which is a shame cause with 2.1 million units sold in and around launch, this game should be pushing 3 -4 million if the reveiws and word of mouth had been positive.

 

So no, the subscription style MMO isnt out of date. 2.1 million people bought this game knowing it was sub base.

People will pay for a quality product. TOR just came up short on the delivery after purchase is all. Thats about the game, not the subscriber wary of subscription costs.

 

Subscription is fine if product delivers.

Theme park is still the best way for a product to be built with the tech we currently have

 

The problem with TOR was its developers and designers.

Offer a better experience and the people would have stayed for years and years and years and barely any would have barked at paying the monthly sub.

[DiabloDoom]

Another thing to consider is that there's a new generation of people playing MMO's from when the 'golden age' of UO and EQ were started. As well as a demographic shift in the targets.

 

In the early days, the target audience was niche oriented, and developers were just happy to put a quality game out with enough subscribers to keep the lights on. There was a certain stigma attached to online gamers back then, and thus the potential customer base was much smaller. That's changed and in present day online gaming is widely accepted, and thus more people are involved than the starting years. Which is good for the bottom line, but a wider diversity also means a wider range of player wants or motivations.

Catering to the pen and paper crowds in the early years was more simple, as there were certain things the target audience just would have understood. Stats, skills, turn based combat, etc... was all familiar to them, and the games could merely make an online form of it allowing for easy customer transaction into the online world.

 

There's also more of Generation Entitlement in the games now, than in the earlier years. I define Generation Entitlement not as an age range, but an attitude. Part of it can be put onto poor player attitudes, and part of it can be put on the companies.

 

Player behavior in online games, and on the forums has gotten much worse. The lack of any sort of common courtesy seems to be a thing of the pass, replaced with "where's mine!?". Immediate gratification is now the norm, instead of working towards something. Narcissism has replaced being members of a community. Poor behavior is now excused by others, when it is pointed out. And, by targeting the widest demographics possible, companies also now introduce the "lowest common denominator" into the equation.

 

Companies have done their fair share of promoting the above as well, creating environments that poor player behavior is not only rewarded, but encouraged. Social corrections are removed from the games, and forums. Behavior that would have garnered a social correction of "well that's stupid" are now forbidden, giving empowerment and weight to the maker of the statement. Like many businesses, they only see short term, and don't recognize the long term impact.

 

I don't think it was a case of "bad luck" with SWToR and when it was released. I think it was more of a case of trying to release a game that tried to focus on too many demographics. Instead of doing one or two things very well, and trying to keep that customer base, instead it tried to focus on too much, too wide, and wound up doing a lot of things "so-so", like the majority of games out there now.

[OneDon]

Only read first post but

 

Its not TORs pricing plan or design template thats causing its issues.

 

People will ALWAYS pay for quality, if the product delivers,

I look at the F2P games out there and they are half baked products designed specifically to get players to spend money in the cash shops rather then the developers focusing on game play.

 

Even though Im vastly let down by what TOR delivered, I still will not play GW2, Tera, or even go back to Rift because they F2P now (rift partial f2p). Because they simply are not well made games (Rift could have been but went off in the gear score raid direction and thats not for me)

 

The problem with TOR starts and ends on EAowares door step in that its clear they didnt look back past WOW for design mechanics. What worked and why, how can it be modernized to fit today, and most importantly, how can we deliver a solo player game while ensureing community and socialization.

 

Thats what TOR misses on. If TOR released with a steeper level curve (so people not zooming to 50 in 2-3 weeks) and a even split of 50/50 group/solo content (so you can still solo but you miss allot if you do), working RVR (DAoC style pre RAs) rather then warzones, Rift public group events, and a host of cantina side games to give people a option other then combat orientated. TOR would have had maybe 10% of the drop off instead of the almost 50% its reported so far (opening sales 2.1 million, last report 1.3, so roughly 40% give or take a few percentages).

 

EAoware simply never learned the number one thing a MMORPG requires for long term success is COMMUNITY in the game.

 

The problem with TOR at release and to this day (and the same problem that exists after 1.3 drops) is people treat it as a single player game. Oh a few fanbois can post here and there about how awsome their guild is and blah blah blah. Its just noise and nothing but. We see it every day you log in, dead general chat, dead pvp channel, dead trade channel, there is no interaction, no communication, NO COMMUNITY!

 

TOR gets socialization and their subs will probably level out and stay steady going forth! Which is a shame cause with 2.1 million units sold in and around launch, this game should be pushing 3 -4 million if the reveiws and word of mouth had been positive.

 

So no, the subscription style MMO isnt out of date. 2.1 million people bought this game knowing it was sub base.

People will pay for a quality product. TOR just came up short on the delivery after purchase is all. Thats about the game, not the subscriber wary of subscription costs.

 

Subscription is fine if product delivers.

Theme park is still the best way for a product to be built with the tech we currently have

 

The problem with TOR was its developers and designers.

Offer a better experience and the people would have stayed for years and years and years and barely any would have barked at paying the monthly sub.

 

Couldn't have said it better, especially this bit:

 

 

The problem with TOR starts and ends on EAowares door step in that its clear they didnt look back past WOW for design mechanics. What worked and why, how can it be modernized to fit today, and most importantly, how can we deliver a solo player game while ensureing community and socialization.

 

Thats what TOR misses on. If TOR released with a steeper level curve (so people not zooming to 50 in 2-3 weeks) and a even split of 50/50 group/solo content (so you can still solo but you miss allot if you do), working RVR (DAoC style pre RAs) rather then warzones, Rift public group events, and a host of cantina side games to give people a option other then combat orientated. TOR would have had maybe 10% of the drop off instead of the almost 50% its reported...

 

Went to Nar Shaddaa and saw a place marked casino and thought wow, I can gamble and play side games, realised I couldn't and then realised that aside from crafiting this game actually doesn't have any minigames/side games except huttball which is classed as a warzone.

 

With a fictional Universe so rich in social aspects I can't understand why this game has none.

 

Why doesn't it have Pazaak - a key feature in KOTOR 2. Swoopbike racing et al...

[Ashlian]

Odd that you'd agree with him since he was pretty much wrong. You've got The Elder Scrolls Online due out next year, and by most accounts it's going to be big, and it's of this current generation. Likely themepark, with little innovation.

 

But.....you can't diss Elder Scrolls Online, it's the NEXT BIG THING! Don't say it won't be all it's been built up to be! Now that D3 is out and G2 is in open beta and people can actually REPORT on what is and isn't true about them.....oh wait, I forgot Tera.....Tera will save the MMO genre, wait and see.....

 

I think I'm getting confused as to which new game will be better than all the games of the past put together, and SWTOR in particular. People have such amazing expectations until the games actually are released, then it's funny how all you hear about is the game that isn't even in closed beta yet.

 

The only bad timing with regards to SWTOR was BW's timing in opening too many servers. I would have expected the kind of dropoff in subs we've seen just from my previous 15 years of MMO experience simply based on all the players I know who rush through content and move to the next game. Rinse and repeat. Often resub for the next year's expac. They expect the earth, moon and stars and no content is ever enough. Same for pvp'ers in a non-pvp-centric game. What would ever be enough pvp when the game isn't primarily pvp focused and never will be? So not surprised at the number of people who quit playing. If they'd simply left the number of servers at a reasonable amount, there's a silent majority who would have been pretty happy waiting for new content. Why do I think this? Because most people never post on the forums, and the vast majority of complaints I hear in general chat are regarding server pop. Only the die hard for or against tend to post here. Most people happy with the game don't bother.

[Cerion]

But.....you can't diss Elder Scrolls Online, it's the NEXT BIG THING! Don't say it won't be all it's been built up to be! Now that D3 is out and G2 is in open beta and people can actually REPORT on what is and isn't true about them.....oh wait, I forgot Tera.....Tera will save the MMO genre, wait and see.....

 

I think I'm getting confused as to which new game will be better than all the games of the past put together, and SWTOR in particular. People have such amazing expectations until the games actually are released, then it's funny how all you hear about is the game that isn't even in closed beta yet.

 

The only bad timing with regards to SWTOR was BW's timing in opening too many servers. I would have expected the kind of dropoff in subs we've seen just from my previous 15 years of MMO experience simply based on all the players I know who rush through content and move to the next game. Rinse and repeat. Often resub for the next year's expac. They expect the earth, moon and stars and no content is ever enough. Same for pvp'ers in a non-pvp-centric game. What would ever be enough pvp when the game isn't primarily pvp focused and never will be? So not surprised at the number of people who quit playing. If they'd simply left the number of servers at a reasonable amount, there's a silent majority who would have been pretty happy waiting for new content. Why do I think this? Because most people never post on the forums, and the vast majority of complaints I hear in general chat are regarding server pop. Only the die hard for or against tend to post here. Most people happy with the game don't bother.

 

Truer words have never been spoken. TSW (the Secret World), Terra, GW2, Misty Pandas, game Messiahs all. All exist on the pedestal of perfection until they release. All will slay the current crop of MMOs, until they don't.

[Suromir]

if you think "timing" is why SWTOR has lost so many subs then you need to seriously rethink your assessment.

 

from downright pathetic bugs to the linearity to certain mechanics and a stupid implementation of the "Legacy" system (seriously..a lot of it doesn't make sense...children being the same age doing the same quests in the same time period? stupid....the system promotes alts, even of multiple same-classes, yet they limit you with only 8 character slots? stupid)

 

seriously....SWTOR's condition is affected by it's timing, yes...but BECAUSE of the timing? HAHAHAHAHAHA don't kid yourself...

 

it's the rushing and downright amateurish bugs and dumb design choices that has put SWTOR where it is.

 

on a side note I do enjoy the game and plan to sub for a loooooong time...but that doesn't mean I'm entirely happy or can turn a blind eye to the problems and (downright insulting) bugs this game has.

[Kalfear]

Couldn't have said it better, especially this bit:

 

 

 

 

Went to Nar Shaddaa and saw a place marked casino and thought wow, I can gamble and play side games, realised I couldn't and then realised that aside from crafiting this game actually doesn't have any minigames/side games except huttball which is classed as a warzone.

 

With a fictional Universe so rich in social aspects I can't understand why this game has none.

 

Why doesn't it have Pazaak - a key feature in KOTOR 2. Swoopbike racing et al...

 

Yeah, I remember seeing that casino for the first time in Closed beta and Ill admit it

 

I GEEKED OUT HUGE

 

LOL, buddy I made in closed beta (lol, closed beta actually did have a community and the general chats at prime time flew past non stop), when we found the casino we spent literally a hour + there running all over the place, talking about how cool a hub this will be, ect ect ect

 

To find out NONE of that was going to be in game at release was actually kinda dishearting to be honest. All that space and its what, a place only 1 or 2 classes see because class quest sends them there breifly.

 

WHAT A WASTE!

 

So much potential, so little carry through. I mean I remember the day this web site forum opened and the conversations we all had about playing paazaak and seeing the swoop races and should they have swoop or pod racing, and all that. Did EAoware think that was just for show in Oct 2008??? Disappointing and very short sighted

 

 

The only bad timing with regards to SWTOR was BW's timing in opening too many servers. I would have expected the kind of dropoff in subs we've seen just from my previous 15 years of MMO experience simply based on all the players I know who rush through content and move to the next game. Rinse and repeat.

 

Now granted I only been playing these games for 21 years but Im trying to remember what games people could rinse and repeat prior to WOW.

 

DAoC? no, standard first time through took 4-5 months to max

EQ? Hardly, 9+ months

FFXI? See above

UO? Guess depends when you played it but at launch and before their trammel update it was quite hard to max out because of PKing and lack of content

AC? yeah lets not even go there!

SWG? Well you could grind out someting in a month sure but any crafting took longer to master and if you went for jedi before Village patch it was a LONG grind.

DDO, yeah maxed out that in 3 weeks so thats definately a rinse and repeat game but it wasnt successful so not sure how it qualifies.

 

I could go on but fact is the games from 15 years ago until WOW that were successful DID NOT have drop offs like this, not even remotely. Only ones that did died (with exception of SWG that had huge drop off but kept on chugging till it closed this past year).

 

So I always gotta scratch my head when someone says they expected a almost 50% drop off in subscriptings in under the first 6 months of release.

 

I sure havent seen a successful MMORPG have that drop off and Ive played probably about 90% of the big named ones over the last 21 years.

 

Think you have mis remembered or selective memory if your saying MMORPGs that dropped 50% of their sub base 15 years ago at launch survived long!

 

Timing wasnt the issue here. 2.1 million bought the product when it released!

CLEARLY timing wasnt a problem with those numbers.

 

Oh and gotta call you on "they come back at first expansion" story. Maybe your 10 friends do but its pretty common knowledge in any industry you get but a sliver of returning bussiness from those that cancelled. Id say 10% is being generous for expected to return now they have cancelled.

 

People cancel and move on forward and rarely stop to look in reverse after they moved on.

Edited May 21, 2012 by Kalfear

[Xrayll]

Please, because this game can not keep it's subs does not mean the genre is dying. It just means this game isn't good enough.

[Yakito]

It has nothing to do with bad luck.

 

TOR had everything going for it to be successful. Huge budget, the Star Wars name, a well-known developer, a gigantic following. Most of the people I have talked to quit for the exact same reason - they cite empty promises, lack of content, lack of bug fixes, and world that feels "static" as why they are quitting. Most of them had hoped to stay for a long time but finally gave up on the game.

 

Yes, pretty much this.

The game had one of the best chances to simply rock the world with Star Wars name slapped on it, made by Bioware, and all that.

The main problem is decision making here. One horrible decision after another. My last nail to the coffin was healer nerf all across the board. You don't simply destroy and take away all the fun from a role to balance something.

Well... I gave up on the developers long ago. I haven't seen a game being developed so badly in ages! They deserve a cake for that.

[Samborino]

Well for one thing, it hasn't failed. Only in the minds of the disillusioned and haters has it failed. It remains the second most populated MMO in NA/EU. It has failed some people, and those people are very loud.

 

I think that will change sooner than you think though. Those numbers they posted with the 400k lost are still with everybody's free month. So many people quit when Ranked warzones got postponed or because they where dissapointed with 1.2 and still got that free month. So they had lost 400k subs even before that. Really the number is probably around 1million or slightly less and i think Aion has a higher sub in NA/EU since its gone F2P.

 

I really wish i was still enjoying this game, im co guild leader of a guild and I love playing with them, but there comes a point when you have to ask yourself if your just logging on and playing because you like your guild and dont want to let them down or is it because you like the game and are having alot of fun (it can be both obviously) for me it was the former and I decided that I cant justify playing a game I dont enjoy anymore Its been painful to do it for the past month and a half.

 

I just dont like the direction they are heading in this game, they make crafting viable with crit crafted gear, then they destroy that with the new augment kits. It doesnt make sense, they could have implemented it in such a way where you could still put augment slots on any gear without ruining the crafting they had built up in 1.2.

 

Whats more interesting, crafting different items and hoping for a crit as well as RE'ing items for recipes or making the same damn augment kit over and over again. I think the answer is pretty obvious. BW took the easy way out by just adding augment Kits, they could have expanded crafting even further instead of destroying it by just making any item available as a schematic to a certain crafter , what they did was a cop out that totally undermines what they created with patch 1.2 it was a bad design decision.

 

 

End game itemization is crap for PVE, with only 1 actual set of gear for each class to get per raid there is no variety, its boring and with the only form of end game progression coming from gear progression they dropped the ball pretty hard on that one. In other mmo's i always liked PVE (as opposed to PVP) because of the variety of items and stat customization you would get whereas in PVP it was just 1 set per season there was nothing really unique about the gear. Thats what PVE gear is like in swtor just 1 set per season (raid) and not even really the next raid they release will still be dropping tier 2 items that dont even have new set bonus's and basically all epic items have turned into post 1.2 is a container for mods, they should just get rid of items all together from end game drops to be honest and just release a greater variety of mods and then have no crafting schematics with new gear designs drop , that would honestly make alot more sense then the current system of masking new epic items as something more than just a container for mods.

 

So many things frusterate me about this game, but end game progression is the most important once you have a few level 50's, and the end game progression for SWTOR is far too linear for my liking. No unique items not many choices for gear beyond the few mods you can change and really there is only 2 armorings and mods per class and then 3 or so enhancements and they are always pretty much the same stat wise just with increased stats each time a new raid comes out. Alot of people dont even realize thats the reason they dont like the end game, they know something is missing but they cant put their fingers on it (i have heard alot of ppl say that) , IMO the thing that is missing is a good gear progression system, and good itemization for FP's , Ops etc. Right now HM FP's drop the same loot as Normal mode ops and share loot with HM ops as well and commendation vendors will get you all of that same loot as well. What could be more lazy then giving every end game PVE mode the exact same gear pretty much =/. They didnt even add new gear for Kaon or Lost island they just put in gear that most players already had, for its difficulty it was a joke that HM Lost island only dropped columi (and 1 piece of rakata) it should have at least dropped some new looking loot (even if it was columi equivilent) so people could rip the mods out and have some nice looking gear or something.

[Chirru]

I think SWTOR just had bad luck with its timing

 

NO!

It was the decision to create a a very railroaded small environment .

The game is so streamlined, so restrictive, that I compare it to the film

'Lord of the Rings'. Great film... but how often can one

watch Lord of the Rings before going to sleep.

SWTOR is like reading the same book

again and again...

 

SWTOR need to open up, introduce quickly the features that ought to have been there from

the Start, and create an open environment with truly thousands of quests and.... (Choice) open world PvP.

The only thing that needs to be fully voiced and railroaded is the Class story.

 

In an MMO I seek new quests to to do every day! In SWTOR I do the same Quests every day, just like in RL.

I do not want RL in a game.

 

Do I ask the impossible? I do not thinks so.

[Xrayll]

I think SWTOR just had bad luck with its timing

 

NO!

It was the decision to create a a very railroaded small environment .

The game is so streamlined, so restrictive, that I compare it to the film

'Lord of the Rings'. Great film... but how often can one

watch Lord of the Rings before going to sleep.

SWTOR is like reading the same book

again and again...

 

SWTOR need to open up, introduce quickly the features that ought to have been there from

the Start, and create an open environment with truly thousands of quests and.... (Choice) open world PvP.

The only thing that needs to be fully voiced and railroaded is the Class story.

 

In an MMO I seek new quests to to do every day! In SWTOR I do the same Quests every day, just like in RL.

I do not want RL in a game.

 

Do I ask the impossible? I do not thinks so.

 

No but it is too late to have that here. The questingsystem is up and running the "planets" are done, they aren't going to remake it all.

[erictlewis]

The reason why it is failing, and doing so quickly. The number one reason is lack of population, as in too many servers and the population is spread too thin. They need to close 2/3's of the servers and roll them up.

 

This is my sticky list of things that are also wrong.

 

(1) They made kotor 3, then decided to make it multi player without actually understanding how to do so.

(2) Trying to cater to everybody, but missing the mark.

(3) 80% of the game is solo, 20% is grouping and most of that is buggy

(4) space combat on rails

(5) deception, that is right where is the 100's of planets they talked about having, and were is the 10 years of content they talked about adding to the game during beta.

(6) In game voice communications other games have had that for years.

 

 

The took to long to develop the game and missed the mark by 5 years, and failed to keep up with current trends. Folks had high expectations, and were delivered a sub par quality product. The only thing innovative was the voice overs, and most of us space though those on our alts.

 

Folks all have different reasons for leaving, but it is clear that folks are not playing. All one has to do is look at the server list like your going to create a new toon. Last night Fatman was full, Jedi Covenant was heavy, there were 8 servers as stander the other 190 servers were all light, and that is a huge problem nobody to run flashpoint/hm content with much less op runs. I am not even sure ea/bioware can fix things at this point the bleeding is so bad.

[ratfanatic]

I think a lot of people underestimate just how many subs this game could have retained if they only had engaging world PvP.

[Xrayll]

I think a lot of people underestimate just how many subs this game could have retained if they only had engaging world PvP.

 

Or engaging PVE content. Basically anything engaging would have helped.

[dankat]

I think it was Totalbiscuit who said that The Old Republic is the last big MMO of the current MMO generation (or something along those lines). I have to say that I agree with that.

 

That is why I like the game. Am I the only one who still wants a traditional MMO? It's an enjoyable game I feel, and one that, if they get transfers and merges on, can get really popular really quickly. First let them worry about quality of life features., then more variety and spice, and then big elitist content (yes I am level 50 and have been enjoying endgame PvE).

[Ewgal]

I think that logic comes from thinking games like Diablo 3 and GW2 are going to re-write the mmo genre. We have Diablo 3 at release now and it just isn't more than a fun dungeon crawler that you can beat in a couple of days playing casually. GW2 from playing beta doesn't have much end game, so after playing it through there isn't much to do either as near as I can tell. At least with Bioware and the sub we are getting regular new content for our 50 characters while we play other classes and the other faction story lines, that's not bad in my book.

[Jederix]

-Hotkey based combat, a sign of the technical limitations of the past years, is also going the way of T-Rex, making way for more action-oriented combat (see Tera, the only redeeming feature of that game imho).

 

I hope this isn't the case. I have no desire whatsoever to play any MMO that does not use hotkey combat. My MMO days will be done, most likely, if this is how it is going to be.

[Eillack]

It has nothing to do with bad luck.

 

TOR had everything going for it to be successful. Huge budget, the Star Wars name, a well-known developer, a gigantic following. Most of the people I have talked to quit for the exact same reason - they cite empty promises, lack of content, lack of bug fixes, and world that feels "static" as why they are quitting. Most of them had hoped to stay for a long time but finally gave up on the game.

 

To summerize: Over-hype and the lack of TOR being built for them.

 

OMG there is a bug in this brand new MMO! YOU SUCK BW, rage quit!

[Kashley]

To summerize: Over-hype and the lack of TOR being built for them.

 

OMG there is a bug in this brand new MMO! YOU SUCK BW, rage quit!

 

Poster is blind. This much time has passed, the people who are quitting now are not rage quitting, they have legitimate complaints and justified reasons to leave. I guess your the kind of person who just takes money and flushes it down the toilet for entertainment.

[Jederix]

Poster is blind. This much time has passed, the people who are quitting now are not rage quitting, they have legitimate complaints and justified reasons to leave. I guess your the kind of person who just takes money and flushes it down the toilet for entertainment.

 

It's only been five months. Your last sentence is subjective BS, by the way. My $15 goes to support this game to make it better. I have the patience to wait for that because, in the grand scheme of things, $15 isn't a big deal to me. I'm sorry it is such a burden to your financial situation.

 

There is only one difference between "us" and "them". "We" have the patience to wait for Bioware to make the changes needed for this game and "they" don't. I'll let you decide which camp you belong to (we already know).

[MasterKayote]

It seems to me that many of the watermarks of MMORPGs are on their way out as we transition into a new era. Basically, I would liken SWTOR to a game released at the end of a console's lifespan.

The genre is moving in a direction of doing away with the monthly sub model, the traditional hotkey based combat, the strict class roles.

 

Stopped reading there. Seriously ... where are you people getting these dilusions? Reading too much mmorpg.com or something? You know f2p mmo's are their bread and butter right. F2P is a LAST RESORT to a failing mmo, or a low budget mmo that will never get enough players! Thats it. Any game with a decent pop is only shooting themselves in the foot by going f2p.

 

Oh and p.s ... the trinity will never truly die. Players like it ... specializing in a role gives players a better sense of importance to a group, a place, a role. Any content thats even remotely challenging to a group of do it all members will get steamrolled by a group who maximizes specific roles and plays it as a team.

[Meldwyn]

I don't think timing was as much of an issue as things like...

 

1. Single player game (wonderful the first time through)

2. Lack of community in game (lost friends as we created alts because we couldn't add anyone to friends list offline)

3. Guild perks are nil

4. No LFG tool that is effective

5. Lack of population

6. Bad customer service (plus moderators on the forums are too restrictive)

7. Rabid fan base (they can get really ugly fast)

8. Focus on things that just don't really matter and under deliver (i.e. Legacy)

 

etc...

[Klax]

Had the newer MMOs simply stuck with improved graphics, instead of all this balancing of classes and such, they might be doing better. What people really want is the latitude to invest in their online persona. That's kind of hard when every class has been "balanced" into three classes (Tank, DPS, and CC). SWTOR has been one of the worst. It's doesn't end with the space battle on rails. The entire class structure is on rails. Even a rock/paper/scissors approach would have been an improvement.

 

They could learn a lot from UO during the "guild wars" period. Less IS more. Give the players a virtual world that works (i.e. doors that open) , stop limiting where on the map you can and cannot go., and have three or four stats. So what if everyone becomes class X, Y, or Z? Who cares? Asherons Calls failings had nothing to do with the fact that your character could become any class you wanted. Luke Skywalker was a Jedi. But I recall that he could fire a blaster.

 

In UO, there were casters and melee or some combination. You didn't have to "reroll" each time you wanted to experiment with something else. UO gave the players a virtual world to adventure within, and left the rest up to you. After the advent of EQ, Origin desperately tried to "update" the game mechanics of UO and successfully killed it. They didn't realize that the problem wasn't their game, but simply the modern interface and graphics.