A Tale of Two Games: ToR and WoW - Review!

[RuQu]

Even WoW is moving away from autoattack. Monks will be melee without one, just like Knights in SWTOR. Casters have never had one.

 

The OP apparently just doesn't like story, and is playing to powerlevel, as his list of game experience suggests. If you listen to the NPC's tale, they did a great job of caring about why you are on a fetch quest. For instance, on Taris some refugees want you to collect some stuff from their farm, and while there you have the bonus quest of killing the scavengers on their land. Both of those are reasonable things the refugees would want, and they are so happy when you get back that it makes it worth it. If you care. If you are only out for leveling ASAP, I suppose it doesn't matter, but then, this isnt the game for you.

[Maldragus]

Actually the OP could have said the same things without having to compare TOR to WoW.

 

The strengths of TOR seem to be:

 

1. The IP: It's Star Wars

 

2. The story, I should say the Voice Acting: BioWare spent big bucks here. It's a legitimate question to ask if it was worth it. Somewill enjoy watching and listening. It will add immersion for some. Others will get tired and click through. Personally, I'd rather read my quests but to each his own. However, some of that money could have went to other mind-bafflingly weak areas like the UI and character models. The class stories are a double-edged sword in my opinion, being both a strength and a weakness.

 

3. Flashpoints: Everything TOR does right seems to come together here. Game is loads more fun in groups. So is the voice acting for some reason. Something all MMO's could steal for more fun dungeons.

 

4. Companions: Meaningful pet for everyone is cool. The RP fun with them is cool too. Being a real meaningful extra in a group is nice. Crafting and selling with them is awesome too. Other MMO's could learn here too.

 

5. Developer: Bioware.

 

 

But in fairness, TOR has some weaknesses:

 

1. The Story/voice acting/cut scenes: Can get cheesy. Can get tiresome--for some. However the real weakness seems that this choice could have way too much impact on other parts of the game, sometimes to it detriment. Is the voice acting that revolutionary and that vital that if the resources going there mean other parts of the game suffer either due to money/time spent on VA or due to the philosophical choice, then is it worth it?

 

I guess the question is: Would you play this game if it did not have the voice acting/cut scenes?

Would the game have enough evolutionary/revolutionary improvements to differentiate from the others out there?

 

2. UI and Character models/creation: UI supposedly improving, but Bioware should be embarrassed to release the game with the completely amateurish character creation and models they've done. Some of the money they paid those actors should have been spent here. I think fans are giving TOR are pass they wouldn't give others simply because it's bioware and starwars. This area is no doubt a big step backwards. And I'd wager for some a big immersion breaker.

 

3. Instancing: How many elevators, hangars, and outer hangars does one really need?

 

 

4. Non-class questing: Lots of hypocrites here. killing x amount of mobs over and over again is the same here as in many other mmo's-- including that game that shall not be named. There's no more meaning to it just because it comes in the form of a bonus or voiced. It just shows that folks don't like to read.

 

5. World: Though worlds seem linear they paradoxically also seem to spread out and bigger than needed. This may be intentional however, either to help control the pace of leveling of to have space for future expansions. So while it really bugs me now, I'm really waiting to see what happens on this one.

 

 

6. General polish: Some combat, FPS, graphical, and quest flow issues that will hopefully improve as they update the game and it has time to simmer.

 

 

All in all, game has potential. I'm playing it and sometimes I'm enjoying it and other times I'm hating it. It's not the bees-knees, but it's also not terrible.

 

 

All that without any real wow comparisons. Tried to be honest. Not a hater or a fanboi of either game.

[Nazguapo]

The OP first complains that SW: ToR doesn't do things that WoW does, or doesn't do them as well, but then also has the audacity to say that ToR is nothing but WoW in space? Your own argument dismantles itself.

 

SW: ToR can't have everything WoW has now, because all of WoW's features are features that were spawned of extensive customer feedback over many years. Bioware is not selling to the WoW community, they are selling to the ToR community. Certain things will be in higher demand for members of the ToR community than other things that the WoW community might value. MMO communities are impossible to predict and to try and satisfy every need immediately would be suicide, both financially and practically. ToR brings to the table it's own innovations during launch, once those innovations have brought attention to the game, the developers may then begin to satisfy the constantly morphing demands of the community.

 

The OP may be qualified to review the game, and may even have legitimate concerns about the state of the game during launch, however, the overall execution is flawed. He even tries to claim his review is entirely objective, but then feels the need to throw in jabs at all who oppose his review, dismissing them as blind "fanboys".

[Xandurpein]

In my opinion the OP fails as a reviewer in two crucial aspects that really brands him (at least I assume it’s a “him”) as a rather immature person. Like many young adults he assumes that derogatory and sweeping words, with little or no substance to back it up, somehow is more convincing that a more thoughtful mode of expression. The most glaring problem is of course though his complete inability to see beyond his narrow point of view.

 

I think I recognize his type. He apparently plays hardcore WOW raiding and thinks that is everything a MMO is about. Levelling a character to the End game is at best a diversion while waiting for the next raid. I admit that this is a rather iconic player-type, but the truth is that these hardcore raiders are a minority of all players. I have played more hours of WOW in my time than I care to mention. I have even been in a raiding guild myself (although I would never label myself a hardcore raider), but most of my game time I was levelling new toons or just solo gaming at max level to get some cool vanity item.

 

I participated in the raiding guld to experience content otherwise not available and while I had a blast in the beginning, ultimately I felt that it confined my playing too much. In short, I have a daytime job with a boss that tells me what to do, and I don’t need it in the evening. That is just my opinion though and I can respect that others feel differently, nor do I make the mistake of thinking that what I enjoy in a MMO is the only acceptable one. The point is that there are many ways to enjoy a big game like SWTOR or WOW.

 

To some people the voice acting and cut scenes to every quest in SWTOR is a useless distraction, but to others it adds a whole new level of immersion to the game. Personally I absolutely love it. I don’t think I can go back to the “wall of text” quest games after this. Then again, I can respect that others feel differently. I think it’s rather narrow minded to bash SWTOR for their approach without any reservation, when Bioware has openly stated that they wish to cater for those who DO like story-telling in games and bring that to the MMO. You make yourself sound like a race-driving fanatic who bashes GTA for forcing you to step out of the car.

 

Maybe the problem is that some players in these so-called hardcore guilds, are afraid that their accomplishments will diminish if fewer players play their game. That if another game gets more players they become less cool, because they need the masses of players who don’t invest as much time and energy that they do into becoming “über-raiders”, that they can show off their epix to. If so, I’m tempted to be a little derogatory myself and say “get a life…”

 

Personally I think that a game that tries, and in my opinion succeeds, in making the levelling experience an epic story and not just a number grind, is just what I wanted. I have no problem if someone else prefer another game though. Far too much of these debates feels like people arguing themselves blue in the face if red is prettier than blue, or the other way around. To each their own.

 

Cheers

[kennn]

The OP first complains that SW: ToR doesn't do things that WoW does, or doesn't do them as well, but then also has the audacity to say that ToR is nothing but WoW in space?

 

Sounds like your argument has disrobed in front of me.

[Tahana]

Well at least the viral marketers aren't giving up hope. Edited January 1, 2012 by Tahana

[Arconee]

What is WoW? Whack o' Wookie? I'm really at a loss here... Edited January 11, 2012 by Arconee

[KhealThar]

Please be a joke. Please..

 

I love how people try to pretend WoW has competitive PVP. It was never balanced. While entertaining, it will never be at the level of FPS or RTS games. Blizzard knows this which is why when they host tournaments the quality of WoW is 1000x worse than star craft.

 

PVP in MMOs are for mindless fun, which SWTOR delivers.

 

 

Wait for GW2 where they actually want it to be an e-sport if you want good solid PVP.

Edited January 11, 2012 by KhealThar

[Gehoornde]

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. For ToR, unfortunately, mostly the worst. This isn't my first review - I reviewed the game during the beta several times, but I was shunned by incredulous and overzealous fans. After all, it was "just" a beta. Well here we are, at the dawn of release - no longer in the beta. So where does this game stand in the grand scheme of things? How does it compare to WoW, SWG, Rift, GW2? Lets find out.

 

Who am I? I'm some dude that led a top-US CS:S team for many years, was a part of two top-10 WoW guilds, and played in several WoW Arena Tournies (including the CGS invitational) and many many CS tournaments, including the CPL. I also had a stint working for an indie game developer several years ago. I like to think that I know what I'm talking about, and usually, I do.

 

Story

Story. Story. Story. We've heard it over and over again. Bioware has really hammered this home - much how Vincent Chase is Queens Boulevard, The Old Republic is story. And story is one of the few battles ToR wins. The voice over quality is top notch and primary class quests are mostly interesting and engaging. Some may be deterred by the incessant use of family drama as a plot device since it gets old pretty fast. With that said, don't expect Chaucer, but the writing is sufficient.

 

Unfortunately, the side quests are problematic and suffer from trivial subject matters ("blah blah click some turrets") or endless fetch questing (go to X, come back to Y, go to X again, now back to Y). This wouldn't have been a problem 10 years ago, but 2012 is almost here. WoW has moved us past the trivialities of fetch questing and now we do cool stuff like lassoing dragons, bombing runs or mind-controlling giants. ToR pretends like there hasn't been an entire generation of MMORPGs since KOTOR and suffers for it greatly. Bonus quests are an interesting touch, but more often than not, they insult the player. Here you are doing the most trivial of tasks (ex: clicking control panels - a Bioware favorite) and a bonus quest pops up that asks you to kill 30 of the same type of mob. And just like that, we're all sent back to the late 90s. Bioware has a lot to learn from Jeff Kaplan.

 

On many levels, however, the VO is a technical achievement. Ordinarily, I'd have no problem with pouring so much money into something like voice over, but the gameplay significantly suffered from it. To me, that's unforgivable.

 

Combat

The crux of a good MMORPG is solid combat. I expect combat to be fluid, responsive, and logical. ToR has a pretty good grasp of what it wants to do, but doesn't quite reach the bar set by better MMOs. First of all, the "heroic" combat Bioware preached for years and years isn't as heroic as they made it out to be. Animations are often choppy and blocking animations seem to happen at random times (as opposed to having weapons make contact). But lets face it, it's not a big deal. What is a big deal, however, is the lack of an auto-attack.

 

This quizzical gameplay choice hurts more than it helps. It means that the gamer needs to manually press 1-1-1-1-1 (or right-click like a madman) to use the regular "white attack" ability and to generate resources that one may use (in the case of the Warrior-archetypes). Not only is this boring, but it literally provides zero gameplay improvement - what is the reasoning behind no auto-attack? Who knows.

 

Stealth and cover are very underwhelming. Cover, in particular, is nigh worthless in PvP. The conical radius, the spent GCD, the fact that 4 classes can easily close range, and the fact that almost every class has a knock-back should be very clear indicators that a mechanic like cover is a terrible, terrible idea.

 

Stealth, as mentioned, is very odd. On one hand, it tries to mimic what stealth is in WoW (a fundamental mechanic of classes like rogues and feral druids), while more often than not it becomes merely a trivial escape mechanism. It needs to be fundamentally reworked - stealth should be a game mechanic, not a novelty.

 

PvE and Leveling

Admittedly, a high point of the game are the instances (known as flashpoints). Black Talon, Athiss, Hammer Station, etc. are all fairly well-designed. Mechanics are tried and true: get out of the fire, interrupt heals, kite bad stuff. This is where ToR really does feel like "WoW in space" and it's also arguably the best part of the game. As a matter of fact, the only reason I'm still playing is because I'm curious to see if the large-scale Operations will be as good as Flashpoints.

 

Leveling is fairly smooth, but the fact that the world is sharded can be distracting and does discourage grouping. Heroic 2+ man quests can be fun, but I found myself skipping them more often than not - the time invested doesn't seem worth it. During hardcore leveling periods, I also found myself skipping all VO. I don't care about your life story, I just want to get this quest out of the way. I feel somewhat guilty about it, but these are the scenarios that make me feel like side-quest VO is a swing and a miss - a very expensive miss.

 

PvP

PvP is a joke, there's not much more to say. It's an insult to any form of competitive activity. Huttball is one of the worst ideas I've ever seen implemented in an MMO: Warsong Gulch with a passable flag? Really? What irks me most is that someone actually made money coming up with such a terrible idea. Inconsistent traps, obnoxious commentators, bad layout, Huttball has it all. There are 15-year-olds that designed better Unreal Tournament maps. Sure, there may be some occasional mindless fun to be had with Huttball, but there's no real value here.

 

Alderaan is significantly better, but doesn't even compare to the wide variety of BGs present in MMOs like WoW or Rift. Ignoring WoW's trailblazing here, Rift's "Black Garden" was a particularly awesome innovation. World PvP is more or less nonexistent.

 

If ToR was Communist Russia, PvP would be human rights.

 

Companions

Companions were lauded by Bioware as being an evolutionary step as far as the genre is concerned. Unfortunately, they turned out to be glorified pets. They even have an ability pet bar just like in WoW! Some companions are interesting, some are boring. They do seem to break up the monotony of the often morose landscapes, but they are basically just pets.

 

Companion crafting is a great idea, however. Not having to worry about crafting stuff yourself is pretty neat. ToR sometimes surprises you with interesting and progressive innovations. Unfortunately, these moments are far and few in between.

 

DOA

Does The Old Republic have a chance? Not with what we see on day 1. No chance. Fanboys and fangirls may try to make a case for ToR, but the reality is that there is no case for ToR. There are many changes that need to make their way into ToR for it to be a competitor to 2nd tier MMOs, let alone giants like WoW.

 

UI mods have been requested since beta. A combat log has been requested since beta. There are absolutely no features that even begin to address the social element of the game: guild achievements, guild skill trees, etc. There's a need for competitive PvP, LFG finders, etc, etc. These shouldn't be post-release patches, this is 2012! These are basic elements of modern MMORPGs. I don' think ToR is finished.

 

The only reason ToR won't die in 6 months is "Bioware" and "Star Wars." Will these two names carry the burden for a year? Two? I doubt it. But then again, I could be wrong. http://warhammeronline.com/ is still going. Don't fool yourself though. It's dead.

 

You may berate me now, but don't forget this review 1 year down the line. ToR is dead. Long live Titan?

 

I'm afraid I disagree with everything you wrote.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Gehoornde

[Baaddare]

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. For ToR, unfortunately, mostly the worst. This isn't my first review - I reviewed the game during the beta several times, but I was shunned by incredulous and overzealous fans. After all, it was "just" a beta. Well here we are, at the dawn of release - no longer in the beta. So where does this game stand in the grand scheme of things? How does it compare to WoW, SWG, Rift, GW2? Lets find out.

 

Who am I? I'm some dude that led a top-US CS:S team for many years, was a part of two top-10 WoW guilds, and played in several WoW Arena Tournies (including the CGS invitational) and many many CS tournaments, including the CPL. I also had a stint working for an indie game developer several years ago. I like to think that I know what I'm talking about, and usually, I do.

 

Story

Story. Story. Story. We've heard it over and over again. Bioware has really hammered this home - much how Vincent Chase is Queens Boulevard, The Old Republic is story. And story is one of the few battles ToR wins. The voice over quality is top notch and primary class quests are mostly interesting and engaging. Some may be deterred by the incessant use of family drama as a plot device since it gets old pretty fast. With that said, don't expect Chaucer, but the writing is sufficient.

 

Unfortunately, the side quests are problematic and suffer from trivial subject matters ("blah blah click some turrets") or endless fetch questing (go to X, come back to Y, go to X again, now back to Y). This wouldn't have been a problem 10 years ago, but 2012 is almost here. WoW has moved us past the trivialities of fetch questing and now we do cool stuff like lassoing dragons, bombing runs or mind-controlling giants. ToR pretends like there hasn't been an entire generation of MMORPGs since KOTOR and suffers for it greatly. Bonus quests are an interesting touch, but more often than not, they insult the player. Here you are doing the most trivial of tasks (ex: clicking control panels - a Bioware favorite) and a bonus quest pops up that asks you to kill 30 of the same type of mob. And just like that, we're all sent back to the late 90s. Bioware has a lot to learn from Jeff Kaplan.

 

On many levels, however, the VO is a technical achievement. Ordinarily, I'd have no problem with pouring so much money into something like voice over, but the gameplay significantly suffered from it. To me, that's unforgivable.

 

Combat

The crux of a good MMORPG is solid combat. I expect combat to be fluid, responsive, and logical. ToR has a pretty good grasp of what it wants to do, but doesn't quite reach the bar set by better MMOs. First of all, the "heroic" combat Bioware preached for years and years isn't as heroic as they made it out to be. Animations are often choppy and blocking animations seem to happen at random times (as opposed to having weapons make contact). But lets face it, it's not a big deal. What is a big deal, however, is the lack of an auto-attack.

 

This quizzical gameplay choice hurts more than it helps. It means that the gamer needs to manually press 1-1-1-1-1 (or right-click like a madman) to use the regular "white attack" ability and to generate resources that one may use (in the case of the Warrior-archetypes). Not only is this boring, but it literally provides zero gameplay improvement - what is the reasoning behind no auto-attack? Who knows.

 

Stealth and cover are very underwhelming. Cover, in particular, is nigh worthless in PvP. The conical radius, the spent GCD, the fact that 4 classes can easily close range, and the fact that almost every class has a knock-back should be very clear indicators that a mechanic like cover is a terrible, terrible idea.

 

Stealth, as mentioned, is very odd. On one hand, it tries to mimic what stealth is in WoW (a fundamental mechanic of classes like rogues and feral druids), while more often than not it becomes merely a trivial escape mechanism. It needs to be fundamentally reworked - stealth should be a game mechanic, not a novelty.

 

PvE and Leveling

Admittedly, a high point of the game are the instances (known as flashpoints). Black Talon, Athiss, Hammer Station, etc. are all fairly well-designed. Mechanics are tried and true: get out of the fire, interrupt heals, kite bad stuff. This is where ToR really does feel like "WoW in space" and it's also arguably the best part of the game. As a matter of fact, the only reason I'm still playing is because I'm curious to see if the large-scale Operations will be as good as Flashpoints.

 

Leveling is fairly smooth, but the fact that the world is sharded can be distracting and does discourage grouping. Heroic 2+ man quests can be fun, but I found myself skipping them more often than not - the time invested doesn't seem worth it. During hardcore leveling periods, I also found myself skipping all VO. I don't care about your life story, I just want to get this quest out of the way. I feel somewhat guilty about it, but these are the scenarios that make me feel like side-quest VO is a swing and a miss - a very expensive miss.

 

PvP

PvP is a joke, there's not much more to say. It's an insult to any form of competitive activity. Huttball is one of the worst ideas I've ever seen implemented in an MMO: Warsong Gulch with a passable flag? Really? What irks me most is that someone actually made money coming up with such a terrible idea. Inconsistent traps, obnoxious commentators, bad layout, Huttball has it all. There are 15-year-olds that designed better Unreal Tournament maps. Sure, there may be some occasional mindless fun to be had with Huttball, but there's no real value here.

 

Alderaan is significantly better, but doesn't even compare to the wide variety of BGs present in MMOs like WoW or Rift. Ignoring WoW's trailblazing here, Rift's "Black Garden" was a particularly awesome innovation. World PvP is more or less nonexistent.

 

If ToR was Communist Russia, PvP would be human rights.

 

Companions

Companions were lauded by Bioware as being an evolutionary step as far as the genre is concerned. Unfortunately, they turned out to be glorified pets. They even have an ability pet bar just like in WoW! Some companions are interesting, some are boring. They do seem to break up the monotony of the often morose landscapes, but they are basically just pets.

 

Companion crafting is a great idea, however. Not having to worry about crafting stuff yourself is pretty neat. ToR sometimes surprises you with interesting and progressive innovations. Unfortunately, these moments are far and few in between.

 

DOA

Does The Old Republic have a chance? Not with what we see on day 1. No chance. Fanboys and fangirls may try to make a case for ToR, but the reality is that there is no case for ToR. There are many changes that need to make their way into ToR for it to be a competitor to 2nd tier MMOs, let alone giants like WoW.

 

UI mods have been requested since beta. A combat log has been requested since beta. There are absolutely no features that even begin to address the social element of the game: guild achievements, guild skill trees, etc. There's a need for competitive PvP, LFG finders, etc, etc. These shouldn't be post-release patches, this is 2012! These are basic elements of modern MMORPGs. I don' think ToR is finished.

 

The only reason ToR won't die in 6 months is "Bioware" and "Star Wars." Will these two names carry the burden for a year? Two? I doubt it. But then again, I could be wrong. http://warhammeronline.com/ is still going. Don't fool yourself though. It's dead.

 

You may berate me now, but don't forget this review 1 year down the line. ToR is dead. Long live Titan?

 

well the stories are great they really make it seem like you are part of something that is actually happening instead of just a toon killign boars

The combat actually forces you to be engaged with what is going on instead of clicking a rotation of buttons since things change durign the fights in TOR.

the quests work well with the story and make sense the 'grinding quests aka the bonus ones" do not feel like you are grinding anything at all since they all flow in with the main quests

the pvp is extremly balanced when compared to wow. Yes some classes have trouble with other class but can always dominate some of the classes of the other faction so it really requires team work here. Hutt ball is great as it actually requires team play to get the passing down correctly. With all the traps a good pass over them is supper.

 

The companions are great their AI really works well and they feel like they are another toon not just a pet. Plus they can really help if you are short a player for an FP or a heroic. Are they as good as a RlL player no are they better than a wow pet hell yes

 

Will Tor survive well only time will tell it is not a game for everyone as it puts an emphasis on both the rpg part of an MMO RPG and on teamwork and the abiliity to think on your feet

[Beldorm]

I'm done with TOR. I was done with WoW in Sept last year and waited on TOR. The OP is correct in so many respects. What we got was a copy of WoW with VO, but almost all of the mechanics other than VO are worse than WoW.

 

I am going to wait until something revolutionary hits the streets folks. However, if you are having fun, by all means continue to do so! Best of luck!

[Ganadorf]

Excellent review

 

Extremely well written, and I agree 100%

[Bird_of_Thunder]

This thread sickens me.

 

Cataclysm DESTROYED WoW! ToR is only in its early stages. In WoW, we're getting pandaland and some pandas to go with it. While pandas are the bomb, this expansion for WoW made me throw up when I read about.

 

Ulduar. The last great raid. I feel like another face in the crowd in WoW. But in ToR, I feel like I control my legacy. This game is great. I have 4 50s on Ebon Hawk. More are on the way. I'm still not tired of this game.

 

WoW's best was back in Vanilla. There, I was a standout. I played an Arms Warrior. I stood out. I saw lots more playing Fury because of Titan grip. I stuck to my blade storm. I played my warrior until Deathwing. I was there every step of the way. When Ulduar was the last great raid, I was there. Every patch, every Xpac, every level. Finally, when I defeated Deathwing, I realized something. WoW was going to fall. So took a leap of faith to this game.

 

I agree, ToR could use improvements. But overall, this is truly the best game I've played in a while. With immerse story and epic combat, I feel that when I log on to SWTOR, I go to another dimension. This is a second home for me. WoW is falling. Soon, Blizzard will drop out of Warcraft ideas, and by that time, it will fade. They will try to rise, but they will be run down. They will be bought out and their hotstreak will end.

 

Goodbye and good riddance, World of Warcraft

 

And hello, Star Wars: The Old Republic

[xXShagnastyXx]

I will continue playing at least until the 19th but I must agree that we got an attempted WoW clone that dosen't really succeed at anything WoW does. VO are nice, but it was a huge mistake to put them in for ALL quests.

 

It is blatantly clear that the developers of this game did not learn from Warhammer online. Are the same people in charge of this game as Warhammer? Just curious.

[krookie]

TOR is an OK game. I've enjoyed some of the story lines and the flashpoints. Warzone PvP is weak and open world PvP is virtually nonexistent. Endgame is "meh"and I refuse to go through another gear grind, I did enough of that in that "other game."

 

Speaking of which, one interesting thing is that after playing this game, I have a really big urge to play WoW and I haven't touched that game in years. I won't go back to WoW, of course, since from what I hear it's not the same game I fondly remember. I just find it curious how this game actually makes me want to play another.

[Chosenxeno]

The OP is correct. TOR can't and will not Survive. It has failed to meet the standards set by an MMO that is 7 years it's senior and still maintains 55% of the Subs MMORPG base. This wasn't even an Valiant effort. In a word, Clueless.

 

I came here expecting something akin to WOW with Wookies. I instead found Spaceballs...a parody of the Genre.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Chosenxeno

[Hingster]

have to agree with OP and for me im really turned off of mmo scene rt know. i leveled a sith to max and can say i didnt enjoy much of it. the only reason really i completed to 50 was to make sure i wasnt selling myself short of what the game really was by what other people said in the forums. my choice to no longer play is my choice from giving the game a 1 character to max level chance. i think that is fair Edited January 11, 2012 by Hingster

[uteboy]

God, who necro'd this again. I remember reading this when it was first posted, till I got to the bit about lack of auto attack and couldn't take the OP seriously after that.

[CygnusMX]

short and sweet.

 

I hate Wow.

I dont hate Swtor.

[supertouch]

wow sucks and it's unfortunate it became the standard for MMOs.

[Warjhinn]

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. For ToR, unfortunately, mostly the worst. This isn't my first review - I reviewed the game during the beta several times, but I was shunned by incredulous and overzealous fans. After all, it was "just" a beta. Well here we are, at the dawn of release - no longer in the beta. So where does this game stand in the grand scheme of things? How does it compare to WoW, SWG, Rift, GW2? Lets find out.

 

Who am I? I'm some dude that led a top-US CS:S team for many years, was a part of two top-10 WoW guilds, and played in several WoW Arena Tournies (including the CGS invitational) and many many CS tournaments, including the CPL. I also had a stint working for an indie game developer several years ago. I like to think that I know what I'm talking about, and usually, I do.

 

Story

Story. Story. Story. We've heard it over and over again. Bioware has really hammered this home - much how Vincent Chase is Queens Boulevard, The Old Republic is story. And story is one of the few battles ToR wins. The voice over quality is top notch and primary class quests are mostly interesting and engaging. Some may be deterred by the incessant use of family drama as a plot device since it gets old pretty fast. With that said, don't expect Chaucer, but the writing is sufficient.

 

Unfortunately, the side quests are problematic and suffer from trivial subject matters ("blah blah click some turrets") or endless fetch questing (go to X, come back to Y, go to X again, now back to Y). This wouldn't have been a problem 10 years ago, but 2012 is almost here. WoW has moved us past the trivialities of fetch questing and now we do cool stuff like lassoing dragons, bombing runs or mind-controlling giants. ToR pretends like there hasn't been an entire generation of MMORPGs since KOTOR and suffers for it greatly. Bonus quests are an interesting touch, but more often than not, they insult the player. Here you are doing the most trivial of tasks (ex: clicking control panels - a Bioware favorite) and a bonus quest pops up that asks you to kill 30 of the same type of mob. And just like that, we're all sent back to the late 90s. Bioware has a lot to learn from Jeff Kaplan.

 

On many levels, however, the VO is a technical achievement. Ordinarily, I'd have no problem with pouring so much money into something like voice over, but the gameplay significantly suffered from it. To me, that's unforgivable.

 

Combat

The crux of a good MMORPG is solid combat. I expect combat to be fluid, responsive, and logical. ToR has a pretty good grasp of what it wants to do, but doesn't quite reach the bar set by better MMOs. First of all, the "heroic" combat Bioware preached for years and years isn't as heroic as they made it out to be. Animations are often choppy and blocking animations seem to happen at random times (as opposed to having weapons make contact). But lets face it, it's not a big deal. What is a big deal, however, is the lack of an auto-attack.

 

This quizzical gameplay choice hurts more than it helps. It means that the gamer needs to manually press 1-1-1-1-1 (or right-click like a madman) to use the regular "white attack" ability and to generate resources that one may use (in the case of the Warrior-archetypes). Not only is this boring, but it literally provides zero gameplay improvement - what is the reasoning behind no auto-attack? Who knows.

 

Stealth and cover are very underwhelming. Cover, in particular, is nigh worthless in PvP. The conical radius, the spent GCD, the fact that 4 classes can easily close range, and the fact that almost every class has a knock-back should be very clear indicators that a mechanic like cover is a terrible, terrible idea.

 

Stealth, as mentioned, is very odd. On one hand, it tries to mimic what stealth is in WoW (a fundamental mechanic of classes like rogues and feral druids), while more often than not it becomes merely a trivial escape mechanism. It needs to be fundamentally reworked - stealth should be a game mechanic, not a novelty.

 

PvE and Leveling

Admittedly, a high point of the game are the instances (known as flashpoints). Black Talon, Athiss, Hammer Station, etc. are all fairly well-designed. Mechanics are tried and true: get out of the fire, interrupt heals, kite bad stuff. This is where ToR really does feel like "WoW in space" and it's also arguably the best part of the game. As a matter of fact, the only reason I'm still playing is because I'm curious to see if the large-scale Operations will be as good as Flashpoints.

 

Leveling is fairly smooth, but the fact that the world is sharded can be distracting and does discourage grouping. Heroic 2+ man quests can be fun, but I found myself skipping them more often than not - the time invested doesn't seem worth it. During hardcore leveling periods, I also found myself skipping all VO. I don't care about your life story, I just want to get this quest out of the way. I feel somewhat guilty about it, but these are the scenarios that make me feel like side-quest VO is a swing and a miss - a very expensive miss.

 

PvP

PvP is a joke, there's not much more to say. It's an insult to any form of competitive activity. Huttball is one of the worst ideas I've ever seen implemented in an MMO: Warsong Gulch with a passable flag? Really? What irks me most is that someone actually made money coming up with such a terrible idea. Inconsistent traps, obnoxious commentators, bad layout, Huttball has it all. There are 15-year-olds that designed better Unreal Tournament maps. Sure, there may be some occasional mindless fun to be had with Huttball, but there's no real value here.

 

Alderaan is significantly better, but doesn't even compare to the wide variety of BGs present in MMOs like WoW or Rift. Ignoring WoW's trailblazing here, Rift's "Black Garden" was a particularly awesome innovation. World PvP is more or less nonexistent.

 

If ToR was Communist Russia, PvP would be human rights.

 

Companions

Companions were lauded by Bioware as being an evolutionary step as far as the genre is concerned. Unfortunately, they turned out to be glorified pets. They even have an ability pet bar just like in WoW! Some companions are interesting, some are boring. They do seem to break up the monotony of the often morose landscapes, but they are basically just pets.

 

Companion crafting is a great idea, however. Not having to worry about crafting stuff yourself is pretty neat. ToR sometimes surprises you with interesting and progressive innovations. Unfortunately, these moments are far and few in between.

 

DOA

Does The Old Republic have a chance? Not with what we see on day 1. No chance. Fanboys and fangirls may try to make a case for ToR, but the reality is that there is no case for ToR. There are many changes that need to make their way into ToR for it to be a competitor to 2nd tier MMOs, let alone giants like WoW.

 

UI mods have been requested since beta. A combat log has been requested since beta. There are absolutely no features that even begin to address the social element of the game: guild achievements, guild skill trees, etc. There's a need for competitive PvP, LFG finders, etc, etc. These shouldn't be post-release patches, this is 2012! These are basic elements of modern MMORPGs. I don' think ToR is finished.

 

The only reason ToR won't die in 6 months is "Bioware" and "Star Wars." Will these two names carry the burden for a year? Two? I doubt it. But then again, I could be wrong. http://warhammeronline.com/ is still going. Don't fool yourself though. It's dead.

 

You may berate me now, but don't forget this review 1 year down the line. ToR is dead. Long live Titan?

 

 

Really... REALLY!!!... you don't have a clue.

[Chosenxeno]

This thread sickens me.

 

Cataclysm DESTROYED WoW! ToR is only in its early stages. In WoW, we're getting pandaland and some pandas to go with it. While pandas are the bomb, this expansion for WoW made me throw up when I read about.

 

Ulduar. The last great raid. I feel like another face in the crowd in WoW. But in ToR, I feel like I control my legacy. This game is great. I have 4 50s on Ebon Hawk. More are on the way. I'm still not tired of this game.

 

WoW's best was back in Vanilla. There, I was a standout. I played an Arms Warrior. I stood out. I saw lots more playing Fury because of Titan grip. I stuck to my blade storm. I played my warrior until Deathwing. I was there every step of the way. When Ulduar was the last great raid, I was there. Every patch, every Xpac, every level. Finally, when I defeated Deathwing, I realized something. WoW was going to fall. So took a leap of faith to this game.

 

I agree, ToR could use improvements. But overall, this is truly the best game I've played in a while. With immerse story and epic combat, I feel that when I log on to SWTOR, I go to another dimension. This is a second home for me. WoW is falling. Soon, Blizzard will drop out of Warcraft ideas, and by that time, it will fade. They will try to rise, but they will be run down. They will be bought out and their hotstreak will end.

 

Goodbye and good riddance, World of Warcraft

 

And hello, Star Wars: The Old Republic

 

Vanilla WOW sucked. The Only people that enjoyed Vanilla were No-Lifers. I played it for 6 years by the way. You "Vanilla WOW was great" People make me sick as the EQ people. Sorry, but the MMO population has grown up. Some of them are raising families and have friends now. You haven't been able to accomplish one of the 2 in the 7 years since "Raid 6 days a week 6 hours a day" WOW?

 

You are also one of those "waaaaaa he has epics too" people. Don't like it? Join a great guild or a good PVP team that earns the Title and Mounts that makes them "Stand out" as great players. SWTOR does not need the "No-Lifers" from Vanilla WOW and EQ deciding whats best for it. There's a reason WOW grew after vanilla. Growth is good. Being accessible is good. Being Niche and exclusive to whoever can sleep less is not a good business model. If you are waiting on the latter to happen than you might as well leave now. The Majority of MMO players like bathing and sunlight, with a splash of interaction with people outside of our monitors.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Chosenxeno

[Hingster]

Vanilla WOW sucked. The Only people that enjoyed Vanilla were No-Lifers. I played it for 6 years by the way. You Vanilla WOW was great" People make me sick as the EQ people. Sorry, but the MMO population has grown up. Some of them have family and friends now.

 

You are also one of those "waaaaaa he has epics" to people. Don't like it? Join a great guild or a good PVP team that earns the Title and Mounts that makes them "Stand out" as great players. SWTOR does not need the "No-Lifers" from Vanilla WOW and EQ deciding whats best for it. There's a reason WOW grew after vanilla. Growth is good. Being accessible is good. Being Niche and exclusive to whoever can sleep less is not a good business model. If you are waiting on the latter to happen than you might as well leave now. The Majority of MMO players like bathing and sunlight, with a splash of interaction with people outside of our monitors.

 

but there are some players that want a game that has depth to how hardcore you can play the game even if the dont want to go ther or go ther again like they did in wow but have the option too

[DoubleSpoiler]

We can go and compare WoW and TOR all day. They're both MMOs. My problem, though, comes when people assume TOR should be just like WoW. A game that's 7 years old and has had 7 years to wrinkle out its bugs and develop new features. Sure TOR could have LFG/LFD and any number of the other things people want, but something would have had to been sacrificed, and people would be complaining even more.

[Chosenxeno]

We can go and compare WoW and TOR all day. They're both MMOs. My problem, though, comes when people assume TOR should be just like WoW. A game that's 7 years old and has had 7 years to wrinkle out its bugs and develop new features. Sure TOR could have LFG/LFD and any number of the other things people want, but something would have had to been sacrificed, and people would be complaining even more.

 

Tired of this Argument. Rift had very few bugs at launch with maybe half the budget. It's launch was smooth.

 

WOW and EQ have been around long enough to provide "Modern" MMORPGs with a solid Template.

 

If you would have told me that there would be an MMORPG released 7 years after WOW, and god knows how many years after EQ, and that it wouldn't have something as simple as Chat Bubbles (lol) and Macros or a customizeable UI I would have tried to have you thrown in a Crazy house lol