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It Can't be Impossible to Change Genders


Wakwazu

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There was community post stating that it would be too difficult to modify all of a character's gender based interactions and equipment. The community is eager to echo this every time someone asks about changing their character's gender.

 

Where does the difficulty come from? Other MMOs have successfully offered faction changes and solved many of the same problems that SWtoR would have with gender changes. Faction based equipment, gear, titles, and more are simply swapped out for their appropriate equivalent. Replace the word Faction with Gender.

 

For relationships just reset the relationship status of character. Mark the character as having had no romance with another companion or NPC.

 

This isn't something that's impossible to do. It's not like creating a new talent system or building a new game engine. It's as simple as resetting some quest flags.

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Ultimately, it doesn't matter what other MMOs can or cannot do. It only matters what BW can do with SWTOR. Each game is different; each game engine is different, and as such a feature that may be easy to implement in one game may be much more difficult or impossible for another game based upon that engine, mechanics, and overall game design. What I really find incredulous are that, despite the decades, armchair developers think that game design is as simple as booting a computer, when in all reality, it is their own minds that are far too simple to grasp such concepts.
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People just need to learn to live with some of the choices they make, even in a video game. I hope gender swaps are never added to this game. Don't like the fact you made a female Zabrak? Either delete the toon and start over with a male or live with the female. Those are your options.
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Most other MMOs don't have a game where everything is fully voiced, where gender affects how certain NPCs interact with a character. I can't even imagine how many problems switching genders would cause for this game. Not worth it, for a number of reasons.

 

Too much hassle to implement with little reward.

Edited by Nickious
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There was community post stating that it would be too difficult to modify all of a character's gender based interactions and equipment. The community is eager to echo this every time someone asks about changing their character's gender.

 

Where does the difficulty come from? Other MMOs have successfully offered faction changes and solved many of the same problems that SWtoR would have with gender changes. Faction based equipment, gear, titles, and more are simply swapped out for their appropriate equivalent. Replace the word Faction with Gender.

 

For relationships just reset the relationship status of character. Mark the character as having had no romance with another companion or NPC.

 

This isn't something that's impossible to do. It's not like creating a new talent system or building a new game engine. It's as simple as resetting some quest flags.

 

It's not as easy as that because of the flags set while leveling up, some of those are related to gender. With Bioware and their storylines, you never know when those flags will come into play in the future (ala Mass Effect series). If you simply reset those flags after you have completed the story, then Bioware would have to pick a default flag for those options that you didn't pick and can no longer pick because you advanced past that point in the story. That is probably opening up a can of worms they rather not.

 

It's not impossible, but it is probably far more trouble and work than its worth.

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It's not impossible, but is it worth forgoing the bug fixes, new content, and so on that could be done with the resources it would take to implement it?

 

And probably it isn't as simple as you think either. Changing complex software rarely is, and MMOs are some of the most complex software there is.

 

So, it's a stock answer but it's still true: I'd rather the devs spent their time on something else.

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Unlike other games, gender in SWTOR is actually a choice that makes a difference in the story. It's not just a cheap gimmick that gives you ***** or huge muscles to stare at while you play. Your gender affects your quest options, it affects your romances, it affects your companion conversation....

 

It's more a part of your character than gender is in the real world, sometimes. It is not a trivial change, and I'm actually glad that it isn't. They wrote the different genders well and they made the two genders different enough that it is worthwhile to play the same character twice, one of each gender. I'm very glad that SWTOR is not like those other games where gender - and faction - are just accessories that have no meaning.

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Going into SWTOR 2 for sure... (cf episode VII) but not sure they're going to name it SWTOR again

 

While i am entertained was entertained with SWTOR for a time, if they do ever decide to make a new MMO, I will have hoped they will have learned a great deal of lessons from the results that were the less than spectacular first impression that left SWTOR with a unfair, but bad reputation, even after they were able to put a bit more polish into it. The "people still play that game" comments are less than amusing.

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While i am entertained was entertained with SWTOR for a time, if they do ever decide to make a new MMO, I will have hoped they will have learned a great deal of lessons from the results that were the less than spectacular first impression that left SWTOR with a unfair, but bad reputation, even after they were able to put a bit more polish into it. The "people still play that game" comments are less than amusing.

Dunno why but you reminded me SWG :o

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