Will You Trust Bioware Again?

[iheartnyc]

A lot of us bought this game believing that Bioware would come through with a great game. Plus it was Star Wars. Then we started seeing the warning signs within a few weeks of launch:

 

-No high-res textures

-Realizing that the Hero engine SUX on MMOs

-Too many servers not enough "concurrent population"

-No World PvP

-Individual instanced planets not conducive to a "grand-scale MMO feel"

 

Some of the other warning signs came later, and were bearable although irking:

 

-Taking too long to implement ranked PVP

-Taking too long to implement server transfer

-Taking too long to implement LFG/LFD tool

 

To be fair, a lot of us were patient. "It's only been 1 month" "It's only been 2 months" "It's only been 3 months" and of course, Bioware promised us these things would come.

 

As someone who read and posted on these forums everyday since launch, I know that the above issues have been the key critical issues that really got people passionate. It's now been 6 months, and NONE of the above have been resolved at all. NONE. ZERO. ZILCH. We kept waiting, and waiting. And NADA. NONE. Did I emphasize that enough? In half a year, NONE of the major issues that people really really cared about, have been resolved.

 

In an MMO, it's not as simple as, "well at least we got our 6 months of playtime, well worth the money." MMOs don't work like that. We grind and we continually run the same boring content over and over again because of the future promise that we are building something for the long-term. That this will be our character for the next 2-5 years. With the game showing absolutely no progress on the major issues, what is our incentive to continue grinding, if by the time we have all BiS gear and clear all content, the game dies? We grind in the hopes of being best prepared for the next stage of the game, the new content and ranked content.

 

I am seriously disgusted at Bioware right now. My subscription ends at the end of July (I did the 6 month subscription). Next time Bioware releases a game I think I will wait 3 months after reading all the reviews and forums before investing my time and energy into their product.

 

Will you do the same?

 

p.s. The breaking point for me came when I realized that the Hero engine has crippled this game. From what I've read, my OPINION is that there is no way (without a complete overhaul of the game engine) that SWTOR will ever be able to handle the massive levels of world PvP that we were hoping for without a concurrent massive drop in frame-rate/lag spikes. And the "high-rez" textures will never come. Please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

Edited May 21, 2012 by iheartnyc

[sittingpretty]

In response to this before it gets closed no never again will i trust them i saw world pvp once to lvl 50 pubs killed my lvl 34 it was leet do they fix problems no but hey they say they will eventually hopefully they have customers around to see it. Now back to sitting in queue like ive been doing for the last 3hours good luck on having fun again.

[pairadox]

Ill bite.

 

I take issue with the population problems right now. Mostly because these issues are really what prevents me from enjoying the game to any degree at this time. I have, quite literally, no one on my server anymore. I have six level fifties, and they are all unplayable, since there really isnt anyone to attack any of the content with... or even pvp against. And honestly, rerolling.... it feels almost like a slap in the face after having put the time, effort and energy in place to level those toons to begin with.

 

Long before the game was released, I got the sense that they were being rushed/pushed to getting it out before the end of the year. I get why. I dont agree, but I get why. I also get that mmo's evolve and are built on over time. The populations will fluctuate as content is released, devoured, and people get bored.

 

What really will sink or swim any trust in bioware is what they choose to do over the summer months. The type of content they choose to release, and the type of content that doesnt necessarily involve a ton of other people. For instance, home decoration, space content, etc. I guess ultimately, it depends on what direction they take the game in.

 

Will they just follow the path of WoW, or will they do something that makes the game unique?

[Catch_TwentyTwo]

In response to this before it gets closed no never again will i trust them i saw world pvp once to lvl 50 pubs killed my lvl 34 it was leet do they fix problems no but hey they say they will eventually hopefully they have customers around to see it. Now back to sitting in queue like ive been doing for the last 3hours good luck on having fun again.

Wow, the OP of this thread is on a real "I H8 BW" rant tonight?

 

All this becasue he can't get his "Battlemaster" title sorted so that everyone will know how 1337! he izzzzz.....

[wolverstreets]

Man. You have no idea. I left WoW to play DCUO. I left DCUO to play this game. I was talking so much trash on SOE. Saying they couldn't coordinate a game right and they were clueless about pvp. And that if Bioware was given the rights to the DC characters they would've made a great game like they were doing with Star Wars...

 

boy was I wrong.

 

Blizzard sucks.

 

SOE sucks.

 

BW sucks.

 

Here I come Guild Wars 2. Don't let me down. I've been hurt in the past.

[Buddhalux]

Give them a chance, DirX10 only came out 6 years ago. They still have time up upgrade. For me, they're just like Funcom. Never again am I wasting my money and time on their product.

[sittingpretty]

Wow, the OP of this thread is on a real "I H8 BW" rant tonight?

 

All this becasue he can't get his "Battlemaster" title sorted so that everyone will know how 1337! he izzzzz.....

im not the op and i have my titles but hey keep riding the bandwagon of a game with broken customer service more power to you

[iheartnyc]

Wow, the OP of this thread is on a real "I H8 BW" rant tonight?

 

All this becasue he can't get his "Battlemaster" title sorted so that everyone will know how 1337! he izzzzz.....

 

Well everytime I typed, "/played" in game, I know how much time I've invested into this game. I'm on Master Dar'Nala, and often there's less than 100 people on fleet come midnight now. It used to be 300+ strong before D3. I see the game dying before my eyes and it's sad. Mostly beacuse of the issues that I pointed out earlier, which have gone unresolved and ignored for the last several months.

 

And before anyone questions my loyalty to the game, I'm one of the few who are still waiting in 20+ min ques for PvP at 3am in the morinng on a weeknight. I'm always on chat trying to stir up conversations and make it feel more like an MMO and actively helping low-levels when they need someone to run them through a flashpoint. I make it a point to run flashpoints with low-levels at least once a week just to hepl them out (in fact did so last night despite the fact that my alignment point are locked and frozen). I've spent my time and energy trying to build this community, but really, that should be Bioware's job, not mine.

Edited May 21, 2012 by iheartnyc

[Uncledeath]

Likely not again...

 

The ironic thing is what had me purchase the game was my previous experience with Mass effect 2, without that I would have never tried this game looking at the reviews and game footage on youtube.

 

However I took a gamble and found myself really liking the game, in fact it was a very enjoyable experience much different from WoW that I was looking for.

 

With that being said, after investing quite a bit of time playing the game and getting through the "cool" factor of the experiences in the game I'd have to say it just kinda dropped off. After a while it just became uninteresting, condensed and the factors that I thought were variables..like the interactive choices really became lackluster and irrelevant to the whole gameplay feel.

 

So bottom line, in spite of enjoying myself immensely initially it didn't at the end of the game come anywhere near the complete Star Wars world that I was looking for, in terms of ambiance or gameplay. It's feeling more like a summer fling than a long-term relationship basically.

 

This affected my decision so much that I didn't even bother to purchase Mass Effect 3 which was a game I was really looking forward to...but since I felt I got a taste of Biowares cup of tea enough through Star Wars I figured there was no point experiencing the same type of gameplay again...especially when a lot of ideas that were supposed to be unique and inspiring in star wars fell flat. Not to mention one of the worst things you can do imo is make promises you can't keep, in that regard alone It's hard to trust a companies credibility.

 

One day I'll log in and fart around this game again...but ultimately as far as an MMO it probably was better left unattempted...It's a shame they couldn't make it gel together and their goals seem to be too ambitious to meet reality...they should have stuck to conservative ideas and implemented them well...at least they could have added depth in the long-run or it just looks like they grossly underestimated how much time investment it takes to develop these elements of a game.

[wolverstreets]

Wow, the OP of this thread is on a real "I H8 BW" rant tonight?

 

All this becasue he can't get his "Battlemaster" title sorted so that everyone will know how 1337! he izzzzz.....

 

Awww man. OP complaining about not being able to play with people. L2P by yourself OP!

[Girdeux]

It was funny when before TOR came out that negative reviews about the Beta surfaced, then all the fanboys jumped in defending Bioware that itll all be fixed by the time it was released, you know the Dev team has problems when they cant even figure out how to copy characters from the realm to PTR and cant even implement "ranked" warzones.. There is way to many big problems this game has:

 

Dead servers, Tunnel Vision 1-49 gameplay, End-Game, the "Legacy" system, yada yada yada.

 

Bioware unfortunetly took too long to act for server transfers to be released and too stubbon to merge servers..The Voice Overs are good, but its obvious now that itll require alot of money for them to continuously release content for it.

Edited May 21, 2012 by Girdeux

[iheartnyc]

It was funny when before TOR came out that negative reviews about the Beta surfaced, then all the fanboys jumped in defending Bioware that itll all be fixed by the time it was released, you know the Dev team has problems when they cant even figure out how to copy characters from the realm to PTR and cant even implement "ranked" warzones.. There is way to many big problems this game has:

 

Dead servers, Tunnel Vision 1-49 gameplay, End-Game, the "Legacy" system, yada yada yada.

 

Bioware unfortunetly took too long to act for server transfers to be released and too stubbon to merge servers..The Voice Overs are good, but its obvious now that itll require alot of money for them to continuously release content for it.

 

I was one of the fanbois. My guild (before it died) was one of the fanboi guilds. We kept saying, "it's a young game give it time."

 

6-months in, and it's not so young anymore. And ALL of the original problems still exist. Remember that EPIC multi-thread "The Official High-Resolution Textures Thread"? Whatever happened to that? Enough of the people complaining quit the game, and that issue just kind of disappeared without any official resolution. And without people QQing, no updates from Bioware. I doubt anybody is working on that issue now (despite the fact that they said they are working hard to resolve it since January)

Edited May 21, 2012 by iheartnyc

[Trenter]

Trust them? Will I play another Bioware game again? Of course. I've enjoyed most of their titles (absolutely loved some of them). I'm having fun with TOR and even though there are some things I miss or would have wanted differently, it doesn't impact my view on the company. It's not so much about "trust" for me actually... A new Bioware game comes along, I throw some cash on it. I will either enjoy it or I won't. Best case scenario; I've invested in quality time and myself. Worst case scenario; I've wasted a couple of bills. Not really a biggie. Edited May 21, 2012 by Trenter

[Robert_Guiscard]

DA2 + ME3 + SWTOR = 3 back to back disappointments. It's a shame - I've been playing Bioware games since BG came out for the PC in ye olden days, but after three consecutive subpar games...my solid support for Bioware has considerably eroded. While I can't say that I'll never buy a Bioware game again, I know this much - I'll never pre-order one again. Or, for that matter, buy one before it has been out for at least a month or so and I can get feedback on it. So, no, I can't say that I will trust Bioware again, not unless it does a serious turnaround. But with EA at the helm, I doubt that's possible.

[dalekjs]

No, I will not. Dragon Age 2, Mass Effect 3, and this mess leave a bitter taste in my mouth.

 

Understand though, that I'm a complete mmo noob. This was my first mmo, having never touched any. They were never my cup of tea, and I thought they were idiotic. I only got this because it was the closest I can get to KOTOR 3. Six months later, and I'm not as big a noob as I was. I have level 50s here and raided and played pvp, I'm looking forward to GW2, and I managed to enjoy a bit of WoW. And I'm finding SWTOR unplayable. There's nothing to do at end game, my server is dead, the server I re-rolled on is dead, and the third one is dying as well.

 

The engine is horrid. I get so much lag it can become unbearable. Every time I log in I end up lagging within 5 minutes. Due to the pop, I can't even play anything anymore. I can't do flashpoints or raids or pvp, and rerolling lost its charm. The voice overs where good the first time around, but they are a waste of time by the third or fourth or eighth run. Even the stories aren't very good. Other than the agent story, and parts of the warrior, nothing has moved me as much as Kotor or Jade Empire.

 

The thing that annoys me the most is how much potential it had. The silence from the developers, the insane amounts of time it takes them to add basic mmo functions, the game breaking patches that go untested, the useless features (Legacy is stupid, and this coming from someone who played every class quest to the end), and the engine, all of these are incredibly frustrating because you know they could have been avoided.

 

If the game's decline is noticeable by someone new to the genre like me, then you've got problems.

 

I've moved on. I have about 28 days left in my account, and I hadn't logged in in ages. I don't really see the point.

[iheartnyc]

Trust them? Will I play another Bioware game again? Of course. I've enjoyed most of their titles (absolutely loved some of them). I'm having fun with TOR and even though there are some things I miss or would have wanted differently, it doesn't impact my view on the company. It's not so much about "trust" for me actually... A new Bioware game comes along, I throw some cash on it. I will either enjoy it or I won't. Best case scenario; I've invested in quality time and myself. Worst case scenario; I've wasted a couple of bills. Not really a biggie.

 

If this was a single-player game, I whole-heartedly would agree with you.

 

My issue is that this is an MMO. And in end-game, that is all about gear-grinding and valor grinding. Why do people grind gear and valor in an MMO? Simple. Because end-game is supposed to be competitive, and there's the element of needing to be adequately geared to run certain content. NOBODY enjoys the act of grinding. It's really brutal actually. We grind because we have a "sense of urgency" that we need to get this piece of gear or else we can't do this raid, or we will get steamrolled in ranked PVP.

 

In other words, grinding is the price you pay in advance for the promise of benefiting later upon the occurence of a future event (the payoff).

 

With populations dropping, and none of the key issues being resolved, the grinding becomes a major cost-benefit calculation. At worst, we will have wasted many hours of our lives doing something we really don't enjoy, without ever having been able to see the payoff. Maybe grinding doesn't apply to casual players. But if you're like me, and have the latest MMO mouse and keyboard and headset, and experiment skills/gear to get every ounce out of the game, then the last few months have been a terrible grind and we may never get the end-game to have made such a time investment worth it.

 

So the question really is, which game will be most viable end-game? SWTOR? Tera? GW2? Elder Scrolls Online? That is where the serious MMO players will gravitate. Because if I can choose to spend 3 hours a day grinding gear, am I going to do it on SWTOR, where there is no promise of that grinding bearing any benefits, or will I do it on D3 tonight? D3 despite its serious problems (class unbalance, no PVP, a silly AH system, server problems), at least shows promise right now. SWTOR, what can I do? Grind some more for Rakata gear to run an OP that I can't ever find players for? Or grind more comms so I can get fully augmented War Hero gear? That stuff takes a ridiculous amount of hours to grind. Sure it will be worth it if the game is thriving next year and it gives me an edge in ranked PVP. But what if I do all that grinding, and then the game is F2P and by next year you can buy augmented War Hero gear fullset for 300K (I'm alluding to the disaster that was gimping pre 1.2 BM/Champion gear).

Edited May 21, 2012 by iheartnyc

[DiabloDoom]

Can't remember a game that never had problems during their first year, only to be followed by more problems. If you are going to ragequit everytime something new isn't completely refined (which is laughable) you'll be forever downloading new games. You want to see problems, go do some research on indie games like Mortal Online at the beginning, damn that was messed up, or even better, check what games were like 12 years ago, back then you'd be lucky if you got a major update in the first 3 years. Don't forget the lag that 56k modems caused. I played Mir which game me lag every second step, and that went on for 2 years till I got 128k optical fibre broadband. Talk about spitting out your dummy.

[Jandi]

I said back in January that without long-term, meaningful goals to keep the dedicated players playing, the game will die out because without that group of people, the vaunted casuals will have no one to organize and lead raids/fps for them and got flamed to all hell for it.

 

Where are the casuals now? Oh, that's right, those that are left are crying that there is no groups. Well, shock and horror there isn't because the people who can pull their own weight and WANT to make groups happen are gone due to NOTHING to do after you reach 50. I had cleared EV on hard back in late January/early Feb, what possible reason would I have to keep playing my main? *None*.

 

I've been playing alts to see the stories since then, sporadically. Got Guardian at 45 and then all I have left is the trooper. Done every other base class. After that, I have 0 reason to keep paying. Loot is completely meaningless because you can't do anything with it and the Operations are so stupidly easy, boring and short that once you've cleared them you just feel "meh". No sense of achievement, no sense of "we managed to do something". Just "meh".

 

This is the most easy and casual MMO of this classic formula ever made. They were banking on the casual crowd and ignored those of us with a hint of foresight and understanding of MMOs and the people that play them yet we were completely and utterly ignored. Well, bask in your casual glory now. I don't feel bad for BW at all, they chose to ignore the gamers of their community.

[Drudenfusz]

Can't remember a game that never had problems during their first year, only to be followed by more problems. If you are going to ragequit everytime something new isn't completely refined (which is laughable) you'll be forever downloading new games. You want to see problems, go do some research on indie games like Mortal Online at the beginning, damn that was messed up, or even better, check what games were like 12 years ago, back then you'd be lucky if you got a major update in the first 3 years. Don't forget the lag that 56k modems caused. I played Mir which game me lag every second step, and that went on for 2 years till I got 128k optical fibre broadband. Talk about spitting out your dummy.

Sure, there are games which did much worse during the first year than SWTOR. And Sure, back in the days the technology was a real issue. But SWTOR is now, released 2011, still it feels much older, like BioWare missed the direction MMOs headed in recent years.

 

I think most people writing in the thread have already proven that they have not rage quitted this game, only that they are disappointed, and have lost their trust in BioWare. I can't blame them.

[Trenter]

If this was a single-player game, I whole-heartedly would agree with you.

 

My issue is that this is an MMO. And in end-game, that is all about gear-grinding and valor grinding. Why do people grind gear and valor in an MMO? Simple. Because end-game is supposed to be competitive, and there's the element of needing to be adequately geared to run certain content. NOBODY enjoys the act of grinding. It's really brutal actually. We grind because we have a "sense of urgency" that we need to get this piece of gear or else we can't do this raid, or we will get steamrolled in ranked PVP.

 

In other words, grinding is the price you pay in advance for the promise of benefiting later upon the occurence of a future event (the payoff).

 

With populations dropping, and none of the key issues being resolved, the grinding becomes a major cost-benefit calculation. At worst, we will have wasted many hours of our lives doing something we really don't enjoy, without ever having been able to see the payoff. Maybe grinding doesn't apply to casual players. But if you're like me, and have the latest MMO mouse and keyboard and headset, and experiment skills/gear to get every ounce out of the game, then the last few months have been a terrible grind and we may never get the end-game to have made such a time investment worth it.

 

So the question really is, which game will be most viable end-game? SWTOR? Tera? GW2? Elder Scrolls Online? That is where the serious MMO players will gravitate. Because if I can choose to spend 3 hours a day grinding gear, am I going to do it on SWTOR, where there is no promise of that grinding bearing any benefits, or will I do it on D3 tonight? D3 despite its serious problems (class unbalance, no PVP, a silly AH system, server problems), at least shows promise right now. SWTOR, what can I do? Grind some more for Rakata gear to run an OP that I can't ever find players for? Or grind more comms so I can get fully augmented War Hero gear? That stuff takes a ridiculous amount of hours to grind. Sure it will be worth it if the game is thriving next year and it gives me an edge in ranked PVP. But what if I do all that grinding, and then the game is F2P and by next year you can buy augmented War Hero gear fullset for 300K (I'm alluding to the disaster that was gimping pre 1.2 BM/Champion gear).

 

Alright, I can definately respect this. The reason I responded the way I did was basically because I personally don't see Bioware making another MMORPG. Atleast not for quite some time.

 

I'm not big on end game content (Ops, WZs, FPs) and I log in quite casually. I have my own projects in the game that I find more entertaining, like crafting, RP, gearing companions, exploring the worlds, collecting holocrons etc. I haven't reached a sense of grind in TOR yet, and I'm happy for that as long as it lasts. I do see where you're coming from however and I do agree with you even though I can't really relate to your issues.

[iheartnyc]

Can't remember a game that never had problems during their first year, only to be followed by more problems. If you are going to ragequit everytime something new isn't completely refined (which is laughable) you'll be forever downloading new games. You want to see problems, go do some research on indie games like Mortal Online at the beginning, damn that was messed up, or even better, check what games were like 12 years ago, back then you'd be lucky if you got a major update in the first 3 years. Don't forget the lag that 56k modems caused. I played Mir which game me lag every second step, and that went on for 2 years till I got 128k optical fibre broadband. Talk about spitting out your dummy.

 

Bro, I have not rage-quit. I am still here. And I am still one of the few people consistently on at 3-4am everynight (ask anyone on my server, I'm always by the PVP terminal hopping around waiting for a pop).

 

And I think the time has passed when we can really get away with calling the game "new." It's been half a year, and we have not seen any progress regarding the key issues we raised at launch (high-res textures, lack of world PVP, massive lagging/FPS drop when you have more than 20 people on your screen at once, lack of ranked PVP, lack of LFG, lack of server transfers). All of these things, which we raised in late December/early January, and in Beta if you were present, are all absentee. We've had a few "Teases" and broken promises, but nothing solid yet.

 

And the scary thing is, just having one of these things alone may not be enough to save the game. A server transfer or LFD would be great sure. But to get people who have moved onto D3 or other games to come back, we need more. And to be fair, the LFD or server transfer should have taken place in April or March.

 

And yes, I will be on SWTOR tonight owning all you guys in PVP. Going down with the ship at least until my sub ends.

[Goretzu]

If the game's decline is noticeable by someone new to the genre like me, then you've got problems.

 

I've moved on. I have about 28 days left in my account, and I hadn't logged in in ages. I don't really see the point.

 

If they'd got SWTOR out of the door with all (or most) of the issues mentioned in the OP sorted and:

 

- RvRvR (al la Rift or GW2 style WvWvW)

&

- A JTL space game

 

then SWTOR would have been a completely different thing, it might have been something rivial WoW in sub number.

[Armourboy]

I don't know I've never been a big fan of console games anyways ( well since I found MMO's in the early 2000's) so BioWare hasn't been getting much of my money anyways. I don't really have too much fault with BioWare atm, it is their first MMO, and you know it does take time to learn how to run one of these things. I however, do blame EA alot for what has happened to the game.

 

I think its pretty obvious at this point that they game got pushed out to early due to pressure to meet the holiday deadline, and with another 3-6 months of tuning the end game and having the game essentially launch in its 1.2 state it would of been fine. Problem is now its lost its momentum, hit a brick wall, and it feels like its sliding down slowly leaving a trail of slime behind.

 

The ultimate killer for me has been the leveling experience after the first class you level. I'm an altoholic, I have 8 85's and another 5+ 80's I have leveled in WoW, and I'm still leveling another. The difference is that at least the first 60 levels can be played in various different zones, heck even in Outlands you can now. However, with SWTOR its pretty much the same thing on every new character, I couldn't even manage to get a second to 50 which is unheard of for me. Game just ended up being way to linear and felt way to boxed in.

[Girdeux]

I was one of the fanbois. My guild (before it died) was one of the fanboi guilds. We kept saying, "it's a young game give it time."

 

6-months in, and it's not so young anymore. And ALL of the original problems still exist. Remember that EPIC multi-thread "The Official High-Resolution Textures Thread"? Whatever happened to that? Enough of the people complaining quit the game, and that issue just kind of disappeared without any official resolution. And without people QQing, no updates from Bioware. I doubt anybody is working on that issue now (despite the fact that they said they are working hard to resolve it since January)

 

Unfortunetly Bioware have now run the ship aground....In my personal opinion the game wont ever recover now. And as you said there is many problems since the game launched and beta that havent been fixed or adressed yet..Alot of the population problem has been that alot of people had very high expections for this game, but the game was mediocre. Though lets face it, the game is WoW in Space(i dont even like WoW and havent played since TBC) except the WoW devs seem to be alot more competent, with the Cross-Server Realm Zones. Wow!

 

Also I agree with the poster above me talking about Alts and Zones. The game is WAY to Tunnel Vision/Linear. You dont have any choice about levelling in different zones, making it a boring snoozefest when rerolling alts. I imagine that has to do with too much of the budget being spent on Voice Overs if they made more same level zones...

Edited May 21, 2012 by Girdeux

[iheartnyc]

Alright, I can definately respect this. The reason I responded the way I did was basically because I personally don't see Bioware making another MMORPG. Atleast not for quite some time.

 

I'm not big on end game content (Ops, WZs, FPs) and I log in quite casually. I have my own projects in the game that I find more entertaining, like crafting, RP, gearing companions, exploring the worlds, collecting holocrons etc. I haven't reached a sense of grind in TOR yet, and I'm happy for that as long as it lasts. I do see where you're coming from however and I do agree with you even though I can't really relate to your issues.

 

Well one day you may want to be able to run HM ops or try a bit of competitive PvPing. It's great fun. And at that point, you will need to grind. Just pray that when you are finally done gearing yourself up, that there are enough people left to group with to actually run the content through with you to make it worthwhile.