Why are all the planets so linear?

[Katsuragisama]

Correct you are Sir! I was once, and up to very recently, one of SWTOR's biggest supporters, biggest fan if you will. I see you have looked at my post history. You will see many many post and threads from me defending this game, the developers, the community manager, the customer support team etc...etc....etc.... However, they have drained me by one misstep after another. You can only misstreat your customer so many times before they just give up and fall in line with the majority of the crowd -- the so-called "haters" if you will. A good obediant dog will bite back if hit enough times.

 

It dawmed on me that these people are not haters at all. They are people that love star wars and are supremely dissapointed by this product. I, in fact now understand, was doing more harm than good. Defending this game is NOT what this game needs or what Star Wars deserves. What it needs are more people screaming out just how bad every aspect of this game is. From every level, every department of this current SWTOR team. EA fired many people; however, not enough in my opinion. I would of sent every single one of them to the unemployment office. Harsh? Yeah it is, but If I fail this bad at work, or perform so poorly representing my company through pathetic customer service, you can bet your life I would be held responsible and accountable.

 

So, yeah you caught me. I have gone from staunch supporter of EA/Bioware/SWTOR to a harsh critic. This game, NEEDS to change! I love Star Wars, and it deserves so much better than the current level of incompetence that it has been given.

 

Game doesnt really need more people to point out the flaws in the game. Not that it is a bad thing, it just doesnt really do much good. Devs and higher management continuously stick their head in the sand or their fingers in their ears and ignore all of it.

 

From bugs in BETA...

To bugs of today...

To the "40% of people said the $15/mo was too much." (I mean, really. Not even EA could possibly believe this...)

All the way up to the "Our game is awesome. People love it and want to play it.", while they lost 80% of the people that tried the game, and all of us knew from the start it was a subscription.

 

They will continue to bury their head in the sand; living in delusion, denial, and shame.

Edited December 9, 2012 by Katsuragisama

[mokkh]

I disagree. WoW, Rift, STO, CO, Aion, are not like that at all. LOTRO isnt either for that matter. Again, name another MMO that is linear and anti-explore as this one. Im sure there are some, maybe one's I havent played.

 

From my experience: WoW, Rift, and LOTRO, are exactly the same. Exactly. the. same. People don't call this a wow knock-off for no reason. Sure there may be some "open" zones in those three games (like there are in this one) but the whole reason why people have been and are reluctant to play more than one character is because you are constantly treading the same ground. There is more to explore here than people give this game credit for but because they aren't prompted to explore, they just assume that nothing is there. Truthfully, there are no benefits to exploration in this or any of the games you mentioned either (oh yay I got a tabard with a globe on it!) so the entire argument is moot to begin with. Are there numerous bottleneck choke points? Yes. Is that all that exists? Not by a long shot. It's just like the common misconception that all leveling experiences are the same, I have 8 50s and each one has leveled up differently, there have been minor points of overlap because I chose to do so and of course the starting/capital planets but other than that the experience was not replicated at all.

 

What I don't understand is that if those other games were so enthralling and great you wouldn't be here to complain about this one.

Edited December 9, 2012 by mokkh

[Tsillah]

The linear desing is directly linked to the extensive work in the story lines. Although I am not a big fan of the exhaustion zones, I do understand it.

 

All other games that were mentioned don't have this level of story telling. Aion is a prime example of this. The story line is the same for every class and the zones were designed for cross faction PvP. It was much more focused around PvP in general. Of course we all know what happened to Rifting to the other side. But yeah I am not a fan of the "but other games do it too", when these games all pretty much failed at delivering.

 

Now, this game is far for perfect, but that goes for every other MMO out there. When you create a total sandbox, you will have people complaining about the lack of cohesion, if there's a lot of story driven content, other people feel it's too linear.

 

I know it's linear and I am ok with that. I do like plantes like Hoth and Tatooine. Interestingly enough it's easier to go over mountains than in a game like GW2 for example.

 

The reason why has to do with extensive story telling. What I think adds to it is the mapping system. I much prefer a map of the planet that can zoom in far enough than having to switch to zone view to see stuff on the map in more detail, but that might be an engine issue.

 

All I do know is that BW games tend to be more linear but also have a lot more story to them than other RPGs or in this case MMORPGs. I will say this though. BW have had a tendency in SWTOR but also more obviously in DA2, to recycle map layouts. I do wish they had spent a little more resources in the map design, because it is noticeable how certain building structures, caves and even zones all have the same basic layout. That bothers me more than the game being linear.

[Klarick]

From my experience: WoW, Rift, and LOTRO, are exactly the same...What I don't understand is that if those other games were so enthralling and great you wouldn't be here to complain about this one.

 

We are comparing how linear the games are. How did you miss the whole, entire point of the thread?

 

As far as your question concerning WoW, Rift, LOTRO, etc, etc, etc I still play them and am a current subscriber to them. Am I not allowed to play more than one MMO at a time? Odd.

Edited December 9, 2012 by Klarick

[Tsillah]

We are comparing how linear the games are. How did you miss the whole, entire point of the thread?

 

As far as your question concerning WoW, Rift, LOTRO, etc, etc, etc I still play them and am a current subscriber to them. Am I not allowed to play more than one MMO at a time? Odd.

 

You yourself opened that door by explaining that you are disenchanted by the game as a whole. That already is deviating from the thread, thereby making the thread about "yet another reason why this game is bad". You cannot blame him for not sticking to your perception of what this thread is about, if you yourself do not stick to it in your comments.

 

Now, in my view you can't really compare a single element like this without considering the bigger picture of the game. If the game was more sandbox it would have consequences on other parts of the game. Therefore to simply compare a single element of a game as you propose is rather a futile exercise, because without its context and connections to other elements of the game, this comparison means nothing.

 

It's like comparing an electric car with a car with a combustion engine and complaining that the combustion engine uses engine oil and they should stop using it because electric cars don't need it either. It just doesn't make sense as a discussion.

 

Yes the game is linear. It's that type of game. It probably does have to do with the engine and focus on story telling, but for stories the game needs to be more linear because a story goes somewhere. It's already written. You don't buy a book and complain why you have to read it from start to finish following the page numbers. Stories and linear go together. Simple as that.

Edited December 9, 2012 by Tsillah

[BounceDK]

Why are they full of stuff that wants you kill you everywhere you go. Its so boring to "explore".

[Fardarter]

Beating a dead horse here. I am assuming you are new to the game. This topic has been literally beaten to death. For the record I agree the game is on rails. It hasn't changed in a year since launch or the year prior during testing, i wouldnt expect too much to change.

 

the only thing I can see happening is future content wont be so scripted to cut costs, a side effect might be a more open world.

[VanderII]

I dont know that I have ever played an MMO that is so linear as SWTOR. You really can't explore much because the planets are actually "hallways" that you cant really divert from. Is this bad gaming design? Or, a product of the HeroEngine?

 

SWTOR feels more like a single player game to me. I mean we shouldn't have expected much more considoring Bioware is not an MMORPG company and never was. I guess we got what we should have expected from this inexperinced group of developers.

Yes,l it's true, planets on SWTOR are too linears and statics.

[Tsillah]

Yes,l it's true, planets on SWTOR are too linears and statics.

 

Well, the game has been built. It cannot be changed. So now what?

[VanderII]

Well, the game has been built. It cannot be changed. So now what?

now we're playing this game, it's only an observation.

[Aroseby]

To the op, I found this:

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2588318833

and this:

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/7006341983

and this:

http://mmorpgfanfic.com/news/mmorpg-news/blizzard-thinks-cataclysm-was-too-linear-world-of-warcraft/

etc, etc, etc

[Tsillah]

now we're playing this game, it's only an observation.

 

That the game is linear is an observation. That it's too linear is an opinion.

 

I think that it's needed to support the story telling in combination with a leveling experience. I think a sandbox approach with a strong story line is only possible if you take out leveling and power creep in general.

 

Of course then people will complain that the game lacks progression.

[VanderII]

That the game is linear is an observation. That it's too linear is an opinion.

 

I think that it's needed to support the story telling in combination with a leveling experience. I think a sandbox approach with a strong story line is only possible if you take out leveling and power creep in general.

 

Of course then people will complain that the game lacks progression.

In all planets you have to follow the path, you can't change direction, near the pathway there are mobs enemies which attack you only if you put your foot a little out the path. If you follw the path enemies won't attack you.

It's all statics and linear (witout too)

[Asturias]

To the op, I found this:

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2588318833

and this:

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/7006341983

and this:

http://mmorpgfanfic.com/news/mmorpg-news/blizzard-thinks-cataclysm-was-too-linear-world-of-warcraft/

etc, etc, etc

 

LoL, thanks for posting and I believe this right here sheds some light on the stupidity of the forum Trolls that SWTOR has acquired.

[EzoEo]

I disagree. WoW, Rift, STO, CO, Aion, are not like that at all. LOTRO isnt either for that matter. Again, name another MMO that is linear and anti-explore as this one. Im sure there are some, maybe one's I havent played.

 

STO is the most linear of them all. Every space quadrant is basically rectangles and the planets are cut and paste maps which are just squares.

 

Rift is a but more open but once you visited all the maps you realise just how small the vanilla game was, LOTRO is the more open of the them as it more of an open world than most theme part MMOs but it still have limitations.

[Aelther]

Well it's a bit silly that you even expected some kind of exploration in a BioWare game. All of their games are crew based corridor RPGs with the focus on story.

You can expect open world in Elder Scrolls MMO, but definately not in SWTOR. And I doubt they will ever change that.

[grombrinda]

Quote: Originally Posted by Master-Nala

Please name one game that allows you to explore every area you can see. Honestly, I would like to try it because exploring is one of my favorite activities. Artificial walls have existed in every MMO I've played and there have been a lot.

 

I can only think of one game that was actually conceived of a actual world that did reward you with exploration. Even though that game is old .You could go from one end to the other, north,south east,or west. Only barriers really in the game were mountains ,but there were paths to find. Also the ocean posed a problem ,but they did sell boats in the big cities. I remember going up and down the sides of mountains looking for metal ore , as they were never pointed out with node markers. Heck even going on the seas you could go fishing with the chance to pull up sea serpents and sometime if you were lucky, sunken treasure. If you are inquiring about achievements, eh this game was out way before that was a thought. Anyways that game was the greatest sand box game of it's time.

 

Ultima Online

[cs_Kimmo]

Yes, I do agree with you somewhat. All MMO's havet to have some barriers. Though I have yet to find on in EvE online lol (but EvE is a different creature all together).

 

I would argue however, the walls in SWTOR are much much closer than they are in a typical MMO.

 

Although I agree with you on almost every subject you've posted on forums so far, EVE's exploration is beyond horrible. Every solar system is a 3D-ball with a static background with an n amount of celestials scattered randomly here and there. In hostile nullsec there's nothing to see except from force fields with POSs and space vibrators inside them. Granted, there are some NPC sites, but 99% of the time they consist of red boxes orbiting a ruin of some sort. Same goes for losec, minus the titans.

Edited December 9, 2012 by cs_Kimmo

[MastaKorgy]

I dont know that I have ever played an MMO that is so linear as SWTOR. You really can't explore much because the planets are actually "hallways" that you cant really divert from. Is this bad gaming design? Or, a product of the HeroEngine?

 

SWTOR feels more like a single player game to me. I mean we shouldn't have expected much more considoring Bioware is not an MMORPG company and never was. I guess we got what we should have expected from this inexperinced group of developers.

 

Although I can agree that somethings should be changed for the better, the current planet setup is quite nice and I specifically prefer it above other MMOs.

[deags]

Well it's a bit silly that you even expected some kind of exploration in a BioWare game. All of their games are crew based corridor RPGs with the focus on story.

You can expect open world in Elder Scrolls MMO, but definately not in SWTOR. And I doubt they will ever change that.

 

This isn't any other Bioware RPG though, it's an MMORPG and Bioware didn't really get the MMO part right, even a theme park MMO should let you off the rails every now and then, The game really seems to discourage exploring places just because you feel like it. Even finding DataCrons is a on rails experience, as the only way to get to them is path bioware designed you to go down with no alternative roots.

[Edzew]

To the op, I found this:

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/2588318833

and this:

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/7006341983

and this:

http://mmorpgfanfic.com/news/mmorpg-news/blizzard-thinks-cataclysm-was-too-linear-world-of-warcraft/

etc, etc, etc

 

umm all those links are talking about questing and story... we are talking about the map and worlds.

 

ill agree the story lines in wow was liner BUT if you wanted to get off the path and run to the left you could and you could continue to do so for a long time, you could explore and see all kinds of things. you cant do that in this game. that is what we are talking about in this thread.

 

LoL, thanks for posting and I believe this right here sheds some light on the stupidity of the forum Trolls that SWTOR has acquired.

 

yea it shows yall don't read what people are posting. you see one word and jump to conclusions

 

 

It's not a singleplayer game. I love Bioware's singleplayer games, this game however feels very much like an MMO. If making it less linear and cutting the story is what would make it fit for MMO culture you might as well not make it a Bioware game.

 

I'll never understand why the **** anyone would come to a Bioware game and expect there to be little to no story. Stories are what they do. They are the masters of weaving intricate tales. This game has made so many concessions for it's ******** MMO aspects you can see it clear in the design.

 

umm this for me so far feels nothing like an MMO...at all!! I havnt had to interact with a single person so far. I dont think anyone has said anything about cutting the story, BUT i have said in other threads that the stories have sucked so far and that the voice acting is atrocious so if stories are what Bioware dos best then *** mate?? why/how did they fail so horribly with this game?? (im talking about their stories right here)

 

Do you really want huge and empty maps? Why would that appeal to you? I find these maps to be much too big already. There's so much tedious walking between objectives. It justs makes for more tedious content with respawning mobs.

 

well in SWG we had player cities and it was amazing!!! you also had points of interest. in wow you had nifty lil things to find and if you were a hunter you had rare pets to collect. for explorers its all about nifty lil things like a statue of some great worrier that is tucked away in the side of a cliff that no one would normally see or finding a rare pet in an isolated lil grove. some people don't really care about power leveling and getting to the top level as fast as you can, some people like to deviate from the path and see what else the world has to offer.

 

You yourself opened that door by explaining that you are disenchanted by the game as a whole. That already is deviating from the thread, thereby making the thread about "yet another reason why this game is bad". You cannot blame him for not sticking to your perception of what this thread is about, if you yourself do not stick to it in your comments.

 

Now, in my view you can't really compare a single element like this without considering the bigger picture of the game. If the game was more sandbox it would have consequences on other parts of the game. Therefore to simply compare a single element of a game as you propose is rather a futile exercise, because without its context and connections to other elements of the game, this comparison means nothing.

 

It's like comparing an electric car with a car with a combustion engine and complaining that the combustion engine uses engine oil and they should stop using it because electric cars don't need it either. It just doesn't make sense as a discussion.

 

Yes the game is linear. It's that type of game. It probably does have to do with the engine and focus on story telling, but for stories the game needs to be more linear because a story goes somewhere. It's already written. You don't buy a book and complain why you have to read it from start to finish following the page numbers. Stories and linear go together. Simple as that.

 

i have no clue what this person is saying...its not making any since at all to me B^( from what i can tell they are saying that since this game is story based it has to go somewhere and that somewhere is a strait line.. so im asking this....... WHY?? why must i follow a line?? why cant i deviate from the path?? how would that hurt the story??

[Edzew]

See, in my opinion, and keep in mind, it's just my opinion, this is what got the game in trouble in the first place. Staff lay offs and firings ended up getting rid of most of the development team that worked on this game, and most of the customer service that were talking with the player base. And in return, EA had to hire new people from other projects, that notably didn't go well, to bring in their own designs and now we are given the cluster-**** that we have today.

 

The firing of the staff was a knee jerk reaction that ended up putting the game in a bad position since now over half of the original staff of Bioware is gone, hell, even the founders jumped ship. And without them, and the original design team of the game, TOR has started to steadily fall down hill. I honestly think if they had kept the original team and not thrown around the layoff hammer the game would be in much better shape. I mean when you really think about it, it's easy to fire people, but then once they are gone you start looking for others to come in and take their place, and those other people have a totally different idea for where they want to take the game.

 

 

In a way i kinda agree with ya... i think they fired the wrong people, the people they should have fired were the ones responsible for telling the developers what to do and what not to do..i hope the person that decided to not have any non human playable races got fired first!!! then the person who decided to make the planets small and linear and basically a hallways... then the person who approved the voiceacting then the voice actors B^P i almost hate the voice acting more than not being able to deviate from the path. i say they should get rid of the higher ups that are making these stupid stupid decisions and keep the peeons that are just doing what the dumb dumbs are telling them to do.

 

 

From my experience: WoW, Rift, and LOTRO, are exactly the same. Exactly. the. same. People don't call this a wow knock-off for no reason. Sure there may be some "open" zones in those three games (like there are in this one) but the whole reason why people have been and are reluctant to play more than one character is because you are constantly treading the same ground. There is more to explore here than people give this game credit for but because they aren't prompted to explore, they just assume that nothing is there. Truthfully, there are no benefits to exploration in this or any of the games you mentioned either (oh yay I got a tabard with a globe on it!) so the entire argument is moot to begin with. Are there numerous bottleneck choke points? Yes. Is that all that exists? Not by a long shot. It's just like the common misconception that all leveling experiences are the same, I have 8 50s and each one has leveled up differently, there have been minor points of overlap because I chose to do so and of course the starting/capital planets but other than that the experience was not replicated at all.

 

What I don't understand is that if those other games were so enthralling and great you wouldn't be here to complain about this one.

 

i have a toon for every class and have played a little of every class.. the reason i haven't continued to play every class much further than a few levels is due to the boring storyline and the fact that i cant deviate from the path set infront of me..and also the horrible voice acting gets old and very annoying very fast!!!

 

the only other MMO that did this (having a very linear map) was the Planet Kashyyyk in SWG but i understand why they did it for that planet

[Rhinzual]

Please name one game that allows you to explore every area you can see. Honestly, I would like to try it because exploring is one of my favorite activities. Artificial walls have existed in every MMO I've played and there have been a lot.

 

Dark Souls is pretty close. That big tree you see in the Firelink Shrine is a place you can visit. You can even go down it (The Great Hollow) and come out to Ash Lake, look straight ahead and see so many trees of the same size. You can look up (while underground) and see clouds in the sky. Later in Tomb of the Giants, you can find a spot where you'll see the top of The Great Hollow and look down to see those exact same clouds and yes, The Great Hollow is that frigging big. That's just one example from that game.

 

I could say Morrowind too because hey, you really could go anywhere you saw, it was a real sandbox game. Saints Row: The Third counts too. The first three Breath of Fire games, etc.

[Angedechu]

Ok, let's compare apples with apples. The initial zones of two MMORPG.

 

The first one will be TOR.

 

The second one will be ''that certain game''

 

Starting zones of TOR.

Tython

Ord Mantell

Korriban

Nal Hutta

 

Starting zones of ''that certain game'' (never played Horde in ''that certain game'')

Elwynn Forrest-Westfall

Teldrassil-Darkshore

Dun Morogh-Loch Modan

Azuremethyst Isle-Bloodmist Isle

 

Tython : a relatively open valley for the most part, but the mountains to the West are very corridor-like

Ord Mantell : several wide areas, but a lot of indoor fight (by definition very unopen) and a lot of very thight areas on the coast

Korriban : Horribly unopen IMO, altough very atmospheric.To be honest, most of it is fighting is in tombs

Nal Hutta : the swamp is quite open.

 

Elwynn-Westfall : with the exception of a small lake to the North, perfectly open

Teldrassil Darkshore : Darkshore is a bit hard to navigate at time because of ti's North South flow, altough it was adressed in CATA.

Dun Morogh-Loch Modan : The lake was a navigation obstacle, but changed in CATA. Ironically, despite being mountains, only an handful of mountain paths.

Azure-Blood : some mountains with dubious paths, and one annoying final zone, quite open now.

[Angedechu]

Also, people, I would like to point out an anoying thing.

 

Whatever the way you think about it, WOW is much less linear than TOR.

 

In TOR, you are basically forced to go on every single planet, and in the same order despite permutations

 

In WOW, leveling in dungeons is quite possible. AND there is at the very least a choice of zones to go. If you start from the scratch, you can level on Kalimdor or Azeroth. You can perfectly well do Elwynn then Westfall, or Elwynn then Redridge. The only instance of a zone you are positively forced to do are starting zones in BC and MOP. And even there, after those zones, you have choise (Zangar or Terrokar ?) (Four Winds or Kassarang ?)

 

Having the choice between two zones make a game LOOKs way less linear.