What is currently happening with SWTOR?

[MikeTheDuke]

This is an honest question, will we receive any answers I highly doubt that. I have spoken about this before, so I do not feel I should go over this again, but I will do in brief. This is the 10th Anniversary of the game and the Legacy of the Sith was meant to kick off host of content coming throughout the year, the “expansion” was just the first step, so they said. A lot of the hype for the game came from the staff in the very small number of live streams that, Charles and Jackie had one in November 18, 2021, and the one before that was July 1, 2021. Keith was barely able to contain himself (in Keith’s way) Both of these were talking up the release this wasn’t about the players going overboard but the staff. I will say my expectations were tempered very much since Onslaught but I was hoping for something similar, it was less in my opinion. I have said all of this before.

 

But the one thing that is really getting on my goat about all of this is absolutely nothing since Kieth posted something in March 4, 2022 where is mentions that the team is working hard (which we do not nor have ever doubted) and this is a foundation. A foundation to what? We have received some great things but we are also missing a heap of stuff, this post from Keith states it, more content with new locations, PvP revamp and more visual and modernisation improvements. But what are these things?

 

I believe we need a live stream, we need Keith to come and talk about the state of SWTOR, talk of the road map or give us some information, 7.0.2 is another patch to fix the numerous bugs still left over from launch and introduced into 7.0.2 (not to mention I am sure the new weapon outfitter will have some issues, something as complex as they have been saying it is, I am sure there is a lot of stuff going on under the covers.

 

I play another MMO and since the last live stream from SWTOR there has been countless live streams from the developers and the game is almost as old as SWTOR it too had a terrible start, reinvented itself and is now considered the best one available and each expansion is getting better and better. We know the team at Bioware have delivered the goods before and there is nothing stopping them (from the players point of view) now. Please I implore Keith and the developers, we need better communications MUCH better, this has been one of the stumbling blocks for the game over the many long years and often you hear and will give us the needed information we have been requesting. Do a live stream, open and transparent and give it to us straight, tell us what is coming, throw away the we want to keep it secret stuff, you’ll have to wait. You have a massive amount of trust to earn back from the player base and I believe being 100% honest and up front and not obfuscating or hiding behind we can’t share too much will be a HUGE step in the right direction into repairing the fracture between the devs and the players at the moment.

 

And if you think that there is no issue that everything is just hunky dory, then you really need to explain why you think that. Keith, it is in your hands.

[Shwarzchild]

I think you are right. Bioware needs to start describing their plans for the year. The community is not in a healthy space. We need actual playable content. Not just a gear grind. Players need something to look forward to, and at the moment we have the suggestion that "in the coming weeks" there will be a weapon outfitter. We have R4 on PTS or was on PTS, but no real actual suggested plan to release it live. This game needs new content badly. And it needs it pretty much asap.

[ThomaJones]

Its losing a lot of players is what is happening with SWTOR.

 

https://steamcharts.com/app/1286830

 

Only 2 months on record with a lower population and no signs of the drop stopping. Bioware needs to start firing key people and replacing them with those that understand the game is for players to play and have fun and knows not to mess with things that do not need changing.

 

I really doubt there is anything Keith or anyone else can tell the community to bring them back and retain those that are pissed outside of there being a slow rollback of key changes made by 7.0...which wont happen because those that made the changes will never allow themselves to realize their "plan" for the game is wrong. Silence is their only hope of clinging to their job for another year as the game becomes a liability for EA.

[Jedi_riches]

You are right, a lot about 7.0 seems to be the Devs asking us to trust them, it's not our job to give this game the benefit of doubt, it's their job to sell it to us and at that they have done a terrible job, this is the 10th anniversary for crying out loud and they have given us almost the square root of nothing, no road map and it seems no direction.

[JediQuaker]

Its losing a lot of players is what is happening with SWTOR.

 

https://steamcharts.com/app/1286830

Let me get this straight. March 2021 - 9,667 peak .... March 2022 - 11,568 peak

And yet somehow you take that as a decrease? 🤔

[ChaosIsGolden]

Let me get this straight. March 2021 - 9,667 peak .... March 2022 - 11,568 peak

And yet somehow you take that as a decrease? 🤔

 

I'm pretty sure it will. Just give it a few more months, and more will drop since this looks like a bad soap opera or sex. You know it's ******, but you keep coming back hoping it will get better, and I expect even that optimism is starting to drop.

[silversols]

Let me get this straight. March 2021 - 9,667 peak .... March 2022 - 11,568 peak

And yet somehow you take that as a decrease? 🤔

 

You have to look at the week-to-week change (say, using the 6-month view). Last week's peak number was 8.4k, about the lowest ever on Steam, and the peak number has unfailingly dropped ~5% every single week over the last 8 weeks. It's not a pretty sight.

[Pricia]

Nothing. Nothing is what SEEMS to be happening.

 

Every day I check the dev tracker to see if there's ANY NEWS about what's coming... and nothing.

[fushnchips]

I think you are right. Bioware needs to start describing their plans for the year. The community is not in a healthy space. We need actual playable content. Not just a gear grind. Players need something to look forward to, and at the moment we have the suggestion that "in the coming weeks" there will be a weapon outfitter. We have R4 on PTS or was on PTS, but no real actual suggested plan to release it live. This game needs new content badly. And it needs it pretty much asap.

 

I think the game is done they messed up an expansion so bad now they are drip feeding content that should be part of an expansion over 2022 I can't see any content cycles out of this failed expansion in 2022.

 

I do feel sorry for some of the people working on the game but like you guys I'm a paying subscriber and because they can't create content they reuse old content for a grind and that's just poor development a great example is even using old retired gear it shows they are out of options, ideas so it's a matter of time once us subscribers decide to play a game with real content and the people on the market do the same this game will close it's doors.

[Exly]

I don't know. When they do talk they say things that just aren't true.

 

Last July 1, then had their live stream announcing the "expansion", and -eric tried to tell us that there would be lots of stuff coming in LoTS thinking he was so witty.

 

Since then, they have walked back on statements like:

 

• The new R4 operation will be launching with 7.0.

• All subscribers will be able to switch their current combat stye.

• Weapons will be included in the outfit designer.

• 7.0 will launch on December 14, with the R4 operation launching in January (so that people had time to gear up for it).

• The whole idea that there will be lots of content.

 

It's now 4 months into the 10 year long anniversary "celebration" and we have not received lots of stuff.

 

So, I think that they aren't saying anything because they know that they have nothing of value to say, and the would just end up telling us things that they know are not true.

Edited April 20, 2022 by Exly

[JediQuaker]

You have to look at the week-to-week change (say, using the 6-month view). Last week's peak number was 8.4k, about the lowest ever on Steam, and the peak number has unfailingly dropped ~5% every single week over the last 8 weeks. It's not a pretty sight.

You mean, you have to cherry pick only some data to 'prove' your point. 😂

[DarthCasus]

You mean, you have to cherry pick only some data to 'prove' your point. 😂

 

That's not cherry-picking, its pointing to the most recent trends that are pertinent to the discussion. The current state of the game (which is the topic at hand, so we would want to look at now compared to the timespan closer to its launch) is dismal and an expansion that was hyped to high heavens for months is just about out of its rocky honeymoon phase averaging just about the same amount of players as it was beforehand. We're only 2 months in.

 

While I'm not a fan of pointing to steam charts to judge whether a game is doing well or not (that is only 1 platform so the data to make a fully informed assumption would be incomplete), there have been no reasons to assume the trend there won't continue and nothing saying otherwise in-game or out on social media. Would you argue that the game is fine on its current course and that there is no reason to worry? I'm trying to understand your motive here. I wouldn't get caught up running defense online for a sh*t show like this. Not without getting paid well, that is.

 

We have radio silence while they work on a backlog of promised features that were slated to launch with the expansion almost 5 months into the year for the 10th year anniversary, no new events, unpopular changes that are being left in the game as they are rather than given priority to assuage the people who have been sticking around despite the flustercuck, a dwindling playerbase that is uncertain of the game's path forward, and this is likely to be our situation for the next few months. Why are we here? I'm not looking forward to the next bandaid fixes, I want to know what comes after in no uncertain terms. Where art thou Musco? Dev streams that are painfully honest? XP events? Discounts? CC rewards? You would think now would be time to give people a reason to hold out and show some good will. As the game stands now, its insulting to let it drift like this until some sure-to-be ragtag update comes along that barely addresses the core issues that have been voiced if at all.

[robwettengel]

I'd chalk the problems up to BW self-inflicted wounds and wounds inflicted by EA. Keith mentioned that EA wanted to take the 10-year anniversary as a "soft relaunch" and that involved the UI redesign. The idea for this was not organic to the Team; therefore, this was an additional development goal that was foisted on the Team, perhaps by an EA exec that Keith has regular contact with, or perhaps one he only sees once a year--if at all. Point is: someone at least one rung up the food chain in the parent company issued an order. How many other things were dropped in the midst of being worked on to provide sufficient staffing to work on these unneeded UI overhaul? Then these dropped items eventually need to be returned to--how easy was it for them to do that? We also don't know when they truly began working on LotS and when the EA directive for the UI overhaul came down.

 

Communication has been abysmal. They go into minute detail about the Malgus bug and the Level Sync issues, but for most of us, this detail is meaningless because we aren't computer programmers and/or game designers. While this information is nice to know because it shows that they're doing a lot of work to attempt to squash the Malgus bug, but the information being provided is meaningless to us. It might as well be written in Old English or Aramaic. I would find it far more useful to know how many aggregate work hours are being invested into squashing a major bug that is still unresolved.

 

Their release schedule has obviously been blown to bits. I find it troubling that no new story content has yet to be pushed out to us. Makes me wonder just how much of LotS is actually in a completed state. How much of this was due to the Team's own inability to temper its vision with the possible and how much of it was caused by EA demands or others possibly within Bioware. We have no idea of how the meetings that Keith attends are typically structured. How many other people are usually in the room with him? How many total fingers are in the pot to have a say over SWTOR's development?

 

We're into the 2nd quarter now, and there haven't been any new story cutscenes, and we have heard NOTHING from the Devs regarding when we can expect new content of any type be that for the story, PVP, or the upcoming new Op. Just give us an idea when we can expect stuff, with the proviso that it is subject to change. Dates to the day need not be provided; I'd just be happy with having months named.

 

For example:

R4 Op: May 2022

PvP Revamp: June 2022

etc.

 

Thankfully, companions have been fixed, and I was delighted to read Chris' post that the root cause had been identified. Now we just need to wait for that to go to live--for which a rough ETA would be nice. I don't consider "weeks" to be good enough.

[Davvy]

Methinks BioWare needs to emulate the customer relations programs that Square Enix has for their FFXIV game.

 

They (Square Enix) are very good with responding to players' comments and requests, and put in a lot of time and effort disclosing a clear road map for their game. Compared to them, BioWare is very, very opaque, and is far from clear on what their customers can expect within the next several months, let alone any long term strategies.

[ThanderSnB]

What's happening is that Bioware and/or EA bit off more than they can chew as far as new features and content in Legacy of the Sith. It's clear they don't have the ability to add/modify game systems and create new content at the same time. It means new content will be sparse as they fix bugs and make tweaks with the systems. Two of the goals stated prior are eventually redoing the entire UI with the new style as well as improving the graphics on all 4 Starter Planets. All of these will take time away from new content.

 

As far as game updates, they have only mentioned three:

• 7.0.2 - bugfixes for companions and some other things, rebalancing tech fragments from group activities, new feature: weapon outfitter.
  
• 7.1 - new operation, manaan daily area, probably a conversation or two of new story
  
• 7.2 - some sort of PvP changes, but they haven't said what (all subject to change at this point, 6 months later)
  

[silversols]

Methinks BioWare needs to emulate the customer relations programs that Square Enix has for their FFXIV game.

 

They (Square Enix) are very good with responding to players' comments and requests, and put in a lot of time and effort disclosing a clear road map for their game. Compared to them, BioWare is very, very opaque, and is far from clear on what their customers can expect within the next several months, let alone any long term strategies.

 

My guess is BW has been opaque and silent because they don't HAVE anything to show. When a product is losing customers and at risk of losing more, there's likely immense pressure both within the team and from above to start giving promises, since that's the easiest / quickest way to stop the bleeding. If BW is not even handing out promises, then maybe they simply don't have anything to show or any idea of where to go.

[PaymentPlan]

I'd chalk the problems up to BW self-inflicted wounds and wounds inflicted by EA. Keith mentioned that EA wanted to take the 10-year anniversary as a "soft relaunch" and that involved the UI redesign. The idea for this was not organic to the Team; therefore, this was an additional development goal that was foisted on the Team, perhaps by an EA exec that Keith has regular contact with, or perhaps one he only sees once a year--if at all. Point is: someone at least one rung up the food chain in the parent company issued an order. How many other things were dropped in the midst of being worked on to provide sufficient staffing to work on these unneeded UI overhaul? Then these dropped items eventually need to be returned to--how easy was it for them to do that? We also don't know when they truly began working on LotS and when the EA directive for the UI overhaul came down.

 

Communication has been abysmal. They go into minute detail about the Malgus bug and the Level Sync issues, but for most of us, this detail is meaningless because we aren't computer programmers and/or game designers. While this information is nice to know because it shows that they're doing a lot of work to attempt to squash the Malgus bug, but the information being provided is meaningless to us. It might as well be written in Old English or Aramaic. I would find it far more useful to know how many aggregate work hours are being invested into squashing a major bug that is still unresolved.

 

Their release schedule has obviously been blown to bits. I find it troubling that no new story content has yet to be pushed out to us. Makes me wonder just how much of LotS is actually in a completed state. How much of this was due to the Team's own inability to temper its vision with the possible and how much of it was caused by EA demands or others possibly within Bioware. We have no idea of how the meetings that Keith attends are typically structured. How many other people are usually in the room with him? How many total fingers are in the pot to have a say over SWTOR's development?

 

We're into the 2nd quarter now, and there haven't been any new story cutscenes, and we have heard NOTHING from the Devs regarding when we can expect new content of any type be that for the story, PVP, or the upcoming new Op. Just give us an idea when we can expect stuff, with the proviso that it is subject to change. Dates to the day need not be provided; I'd just be happy with having months named.

 

For example:

R4 Op: May 2022

PvP Revamp: June 2022

etc.

 

Thankfully, companions have been fixed, and I was delighted to read Chris' post that the root cause had been identified. Now we just need to wait for that to go to live--for which a rough ETA would be nice. I don't consider "weeks" to be good enough.

 

I wish I had checked the forums before resubbing. Haven't touched SWTOR in ages, the new trailer and combat style rework fooled me. I was smart enough to only pop for a month, but just starting in with level sync bugs is enough to evaporate my interest.

 

On a positive note, I like the way you said things here.

[Balameb]

You mean, you have to cherry pick only some data to 'prove' your point. 😂

You did the exact same thing. Anyone can look at a bunch of numbers and made asumptions on things that looks obvious but small look at the details changes everything. That is why data needs context to actually be information.

 

Inter annual increase for a particular month would be one thing if nothing happens in the middle. But when you are using one particular month after a mayor release (that was hiped with the biggest marketing campaing for this game in the last five years), and you are berely better in absolutes. With steep decresing curve since febrary, then that increase is nothing and in context is not an increase at all. The trend is clear and current numbers shows that, unless 7.02 brings a miracle next week, there is no longer an inter annual increase and the influence of 7.X will be in absolutes negatives from now on.

[JediQuaker]

You did the exact same thing. Anyone can look at a bunch of numbers and made asumptions on things that looks obvious but small look at the details changes everything. That is why data needs context to actually be information.

Well, at least you almost managed to get my point. 😂

 

The key words are "anyone" (including you) and "assumptions" (including yours). 😉

Edited April 22, 2022 by JediQuaker