Where are we going, and how did we get here?

[Toraak]

9 minutes ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

???
When did they ever say it would take a mmo focus and multiplayer content when the game is as solo friendly as it has ever been and ranked and nim r4 was cancelled?
Did you play before kotfe, because the heavy decline on population happened there. I remember on shadowlands imp side 2-4 fleet instances regulary on 3.0 to 1 instance on 4.0 with 80 people if lucky when i took a break from the game. Pub side would have probably been even worse

This is very accurate. Population took it's major hit during 4.0 where the was zero MMO content added.

[ExarSun]

If i remember correctly, after scraping the KOTET chapters, they made an announcement which was in the spirit of.....hey no more chapter...instead group focused content like Flashpoints and so on. Ranked and NIM were cancelled way after that....probably they finally released the obvious truth - catering to 1% of the population after KOTET got them in the deepest pits of players loss...by then it was too late to do anything.

I have played since they released ROTHC. When 4.0 hit i dont remember 80 players on the fleet, the opposite - i remember this happened after KOTET when they announced there will be no more chapters and no more story content of that sortm....slowly and slowly and here we are.

There is no point debating such things with apologists though. Results and hard facts speak for themselves.

[Pietrastor]

1 hour ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

Yet again, swtor main issue is and was VA, they dig a hole on it and were unable to dig out of it. I counted the number of main story missions ff14 had but i forgot, think it was something on the 600-800 missions from lvl 1 to 80. Yet like 50-60% have no voice whatsoever, 10-20% with some npcs voiced, the rest with 1 npc voiced, player character has no voice. Here you have NPCs + 16 main character voices for each language and different options on the wheel to reply. If they did the same model ff14 did, swtor could have had way more story and way more difference between each origin story, and maybe even able to continue with the different class stories.
So the writers must be very restricted on what they have to do on a "write a good story in 100 words or less" so the VA then doesn't get way out of hand and the budget goes out of the window.

Thats why i think they keep bringing malgus back, his backstory is part of the old game so no introduction of a new main bad guy that will need even more story and introduction and break their budget on VA.
If this VA continues in end of 7.0 you kill malgus... again... for the third time? i lost count, and on the first ten seconds of 8.0 if it comes out "SoMeHOw MalGUs ReTuRnED", or maybe is just plain bad writing taking a page out of disney star wars movies. 
 

No. FFXIV has less VA but ESO voices all NPCs despite having lesser budget than FFXIV. Voice Acting ain't free and too much of it WILL start to add up to the overall budget with time but it is simply a false notion that it is the main content roadblock in game dev. It's not and after 30 years or so of VA being big part of games I'm surprised people still blindy repeat this falsehood.

Voice Acting is the easiest, fastest and most predictable part of game developement. It usually ammounts to single-day recording sessions for most characters and most of them even done remotely these days (many VAs simply set up home studios for convenieance and work oppurtunities).

The actual big issue and time-consuming developement happens in writing, designing and implementing the quests, adding conditionals and flags, combat encounters, puzzles, MAPS/levels these quests place on, cinematics with cameras and lighting, special effects, character models etc etc. This is where you need tons of developers with salaries = where the lion share of the budget goes. That's also the reason why VA is done fast at the very end/final months of game dev while all the design and creation of content can take up years and years prior to VA recording sessions.

Again, I'm not saying excessive VA won't impact the finances, but SWTOR already cut back heavily on that by adding non-PC-voiced quests and increasinced the reliance on alien jibberish prerecorded VA. Especially the latter part is telling - we don't see tons of new quests with alien VA that eliminate the issue of a budget for Voice Actors altogether becuase they simply STILL do not have the manpower to develop large quantities of new quests, regardless of VA

[xxSHOONYxx]

7 minutes ago, ExarSun said:

There is no point debating such things with apologists though. Results and hard facts speak for themselves

Indeed there isn't, because you have a distorted view of what happened and the player counts and mask them as "facts" and "results", have a good one.

SoR had 17 servers, kotef and kotet turned that into the 5 we have now

[Pietrastor]

18 minutes ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

Indeed there isn't, because you have a distorted view of what happened and the player counts and mask them as "facts" and "results", have a good one.

SoR had 17 servers, kotef and kotet turned that into the 5 we have now

People begged for server mergers long before KOTFE so just because it happened AFTER means nothing, the issue was already there and Bioware was just stubborn for years. The threads are still there and can be easily dugged up from the 2014-2015 era

[xxSHOONYxx]

26 minutes ago, Pietrastor said:

No. FFXIV has less VA but ESO voices all NPCs despite having lesser budget than FFXIV. Voice Acting ain't free and too much of it WILL start to add up to the overall budget with time but it is simply a false notion that it is the main content roadblock in game dev. It's not and after 30 years or so of VA being big part of games I'm surprised people still blindy repeat this falsehood.

Because npc VA is not the issue? is having 16 PC record the same thing for each language. 
Triple A games don't go to that extent for a reason, the most successful rpgs/games tread very lightly on it, especially those that have wheel choices. And when the game was about to be released and journalists were talking about how it was the most expensive game done to date their extensive va was given as the reason why.
The most successful and praised game as of late has no PC VA, baldurs gate 3. Kotor had no PC VA, Mass Effect had a male and female Sheppard only, skyrim has no PC VA, other games have 2 (female and male) and have a pitch option that is the same voice with different pitch, and the list goes on.
Having multiple PC VA is basically multiplying the cost on VA for each one you add. Usually npc "speaks" or just a bit more as as PC VA, so 1/17 of the budget goes on NPC and 16/17 to 16 different people to say the same thing, take PC VA away and that budget will increase story by a lot more. 

 

26 minutes ago, Pietrastor said:

adding conditionals and flags, combat encounters, puzzles, MAPS/levels these quests place on

This is not true, they mostly already have the code, they just need to change a few bits of it that is mainly what will play when "1,2,3,4" will be chosen. Once you code how to "open a door" you don't have to write it every single time on every door, you call the function to the previous one you wrote (as an example). Nothing major has to be created and why sequels of games are much faster to produce, because most of the code is already written. As an example, legend of zelda took 5 years to make, majora's mask the second one took 1 year, most of the code, ai of npcs, behaviors and such is already done. 
And for maps they mainly use reused assets, they did that with uprisings, with many character models and they just change the size of them, or how they went back to voss and ord mantel. 

Edited January 31 by xxSHOONYxx

[xxSHOONYxx]

21 minutes ago, Pietrastor said:

People begged for server mergers long before KOTFE so just because it happened AFTER means nothing, the issue was already there and Bioware was just stubborn for years. The threads are still there and can be easily dugged up from the 2014-2015 era

Thats true, bust most of those posts were PvP servers. It's not fun to minding your own business and getting ganked so people left or didn't choose that server to begin with

[Pietrastor]

24 minutes ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

Because npc VA is not the issue? is having 16 PC record the same thing for each language. 

But they already cut on that heavily by having non-PC-voiced quests. And much more alien jibberish. So where are all these new quests that were previously roadblocked by excessive Player Character VA?

 

24 minutes ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

This is not true, they mostly already have the code, they just need to change a few bits of it that is mainly what will play when "1,2,3,4" will be chosen. Once you code how to "open a door" you don't have to write it every single time on every door, you call the function to the previous one you wrote (as an example). Nothing major has to be created and why sequels of games are much faster to produce, because most of the code is already written. As an example, legend of zelda took 5 years to make, majora's mask the second one took 1 year, most of the code, ai of npcs, behaviors and such is already done. 
And for maps they mainly use reused assets, they did that with uprisings, with many character models and they just change the size of them, or how they went back to voss and ord mantel. 

Oh yes it absolutely is true. Developing the tech and systems helps a ton but even the most straightforward sequels don't get developed and released in 6 months, it STILL takes years becuase most of the stuff still has to be implemented MANUALLY. You still have to write and design it. Cutscenes still have to be manually set up, along with alot of lighting. Combat encounters may reuse all the old models in the world but it still has to be placed and conditioned within the map and new quest chain logics. Thers's no going around it. Even maps with reused assets still have to be put together manually, thers's just less new textures and objects being created by the art team. Not to even mention the bug-testing phase...

Sorry but you've set your sights on VA as the main culprit and refuse to admit the much more important and time/budget consuming aspects of developement. Literally any developer or modder in the world will tell you the same thing.

Edited January 31 by Pietrastor

[xxSHOONYxx]

38 minutes ago, Pietrastor said:

Sorry but you've set your sights on VA as the main culprit and refuse to admit the more important facts. Literally any developer or modder in the world will tell you the same thing.

I never moded a game or did anything of cinematics or art but i know how to code. And once you have the base of the code the rest is applying the base of the code and calling different parts of it to do new stuff and once you create that then you can use it to create more with it. Some you don't even have to manually write it, you call the function with the new parameters of it and that is it.
Idk how this game is written but something like this can be possible easily with a switch function that is already written and access the new voice/text files.
Once you have the code for a conversation again all you have to do is update small things and what it plays out and the words that are shown on the screen. Many sequels/expanions or new games take more time because they can't set on a directive vision, you see stories of some games that are in development hell because they swap game directors and they start from scratch, don't like how its going and start again. 
And of course i have an issue with VA, PC VA to me has no place on a rpg or mmo where the player is "you", and only good when the main player is a person you are playing as like for example Geralt in witcher 3.
 

38 minutes ago, Pietrastor said:

But they already cut in that heavily by having non-PC-voiced quests. And much more alien jibberish. So where are all these new quests that were previously roadblocked by excessive Player Character VA?

Some quests were added like that, idk, i haven't done story in ages and space bared everything i did after vanially and a some of rothc and revan. Gibberish is mainly on companions as far as i know though. Good on them if they are getting rid of PC VA then.

 

Edited January 31 by xxSHOONYxx

[DarthNillard]

13 minutes ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

I never moded a game or did anything of cinematics or art but i know how to code. And once you have the base of the code the rest is applying the base of the code and calling different parts of it to do new stuff and once you create that then you can use it to create more with it. Once you have the code for a conversation again all you have to do is update small things and what it plays out and the words that are shown on the screen. Many sequels/expanions or new games take more time because they can't set on a directive vision, you see stories of some games that are in development hell because they swap game directors and they start from scratch, don't like how its going and start again. 
And of course i have an issue with VA, PC VA to me has no place on a rpg or mmo where the player is "you", and only good when the main player is a person you are playing as, Geralt, Shepard and so on.

Let me stop you right there friend.  Everything you say after that part is what you assume to be true, but you are absolutely wrong.  There is a lot more to games then just infinite lines of code lol...

[VegaMist]

6 hours ago, ExarSun said:

After KOTET when they said the focus would be on mmo stuff and multiplayer content focus...what happened...everyone left and we are left with this sad state...

Yeah... And then they introduced flashpoints that you are forced to play solo in order to get any story progression, as if only instance owner getting progression in KOTFEET wasn't bad enough.

[Pietrastor]

33 minutes ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

I never moded a game or did anything of cinematics or art but i know how to code. And once you have the base of the code the rest is applying the base of the code and calling different parts of it to do new stuff and once you create that then you can use it to create more with it. Some you don't even have to manually write it, you call the function with the new parameters of it and that is it.
Idk how this game is written but something like this can be possible easily with a switch function that is already written and access the new voice/text files.
Once you have the code for a conversation again all you have to do is update small things and what it plays out and the words that are shown on the screen. Many sequels/expanions or new games take more time because they can't set on a directive vision, you see stories of some games that are in development hell because they swap game directors and they start from scratch, don't like how its going and start again. 

TBH, I'm surprised that as coder you don't realize what happens after "your work". You coded a dialogue editor system. Great! That will save time in future and no RPG can be made without your initial part in the first place. But all the new dialogue for a sequel/expansion/patch still got to be written from scratch, quests have to be designed with their internal logic and sequencing. Story conditionals and flags have to be placed. Yes, you're usually calling out existing functions and scripts but you STILL have to call it out in the first place in every instance, and value it appropirately within the internal progression flags database. You have to realize that all of this is done manually and simply takes freaking time and sheer number of people doing it to accumulate multiple quests.

Along with arranging assets, placing events/characters/enounters etc. Cinematic triggers, leveling gains etc etc. Coding an engine is great, but you still have to actually place a tree on the ground next to a building mesh tho, it's not done automatically unless you've specifically coded a procedural engine and even those often end up with custom changes.

Again, this is why even direct sequels that reuse assests will STILL takes 2-3 years to develop. Or more like 3-4 years nowadays  2-3 was back in the PS360 era.

33 minutes ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

And of course i have an issue with VA, PC VA to me has no place on a rpg or mmo where the player is "you", and only good when the main player is a person you are playing as like for example Geralt in witcher 3.

Well that is a subjective preference tho and why I would more likely agree with your take that voiceless PCs work better in RPGs, its kinda besides the point in a game that already decided to voice its PCs. Some may be skipped, but from a design POV it would be jarring and compleltly unacceptable to me to suddenly never hear the PC voice again after so much voiced content.

33 minutes ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

Some quests were added like that, idk, i haven't done story in ages and space bared everything i did after vanially and a some of rothc and revan. Gibberish is mainly on companions as far as i know though. Good on them if they are getting rid of PC VA then.

They didn't get rid of it completly, but all the side quests are now non-PC-voiced. Been that way since 2015's KOTFE expansion.

Edited January 31 by Pietrastor

[xxSHOONYxx]

19 minutes ago, DarthNillard said:

Let me stop you right there friend.  Everything you say after that part is what you assume to be true, but you are absolutely wrong.  There is a lot more to games then just infinite lines of code lol...

And that has to do with VA how? Wow had a budget of 63 millions and throughout expansions and keeping it running its another 200m. (https://gamerant.com/world-of-warcraft-development-facts-trivia/#it-took-more-than-63-million-to-develop)

Swtor for release only had 200m of development cost. I wonder where all that money went then when you compare the sheer magnitud of wow world and content to swtor

Edited January 31 by xxSHOONYxx

[DarthNillard]

47 minutes ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

And that has to do with VA how? Wow had a budget of 63 millions and throughout expansions and keeping it running its another 200m. (https://gamerant.com/world-of-warcraft-development-facts-trivia/#it-took-more-than-63-million-to-develop)

Swtor for release only had 200m of development cost. I wonder where all that money went then when you compare the sheer magnitud of wow world and content to swtor

How does what I quoted you saying about you never moded or did cinematics but you have coded have to do with VA? You are deflecting and going in 100 directions, none of which serves any purpose.  I have actually hired voice actors and done minimal voice acting myself (3 times, and this is no flex - it was irrelevant background conversation work when real voice actors couldn't make their call date/time).  There are a TON of different ways you can pay for VA.  Bioware isn't posting their line item reports of where they've allocated their money for the last 12 years, so unless Keith wants to weigh in this is all guessing anyway.

If you would have been here from beta, one of the selling points of this game was how it was fully voice acted (at launch anyway).  One of the biggest missteps IMO they ever took was abandoning that when they did the KOTOR like scruff with KOTET/KOTFE and the hybrid mess they've been doing ever since.  In 50 years when/if this game is ever brought, the story is what it will be favorable known for and the VA is a large part of that.  Just saying....

Edited January 31 by DarthNillard

[xxSHOONYxx]

17 minutes ago, DarthNillard said:

How does what I quoted you saying about you never moded or did cinematics but you have coded have to do with VA? You are deflecting and going in 100 directions, none of which serves any purpose.

Because every game has to do that other part, but one has that extensive VA and one doesn't. If that huge development cost gap is not on VA on what it is then? Worse product, less content and more expensive

Edited January 31 by xxSHOONYxx

[DarthNillard]

1 hour ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

Because every game has to do that other part, but one has that extensive VA and one doesn't. If that huge development cost gap is not on VA on what it is then? Worse product, less content and more expensive

Again, none of us actually know so there's no reason wasting our time speculating.  But one thing SWTOR is paying a ton of money for that games like WoW and ESO don't have to pay for is the Star Wars IP Licensing. Those fees never stop while a licensed game is still live, and really add up over time.

But also, who cares? What is the end game to this narrative you are trying to push? Nobody at any time on the Bioware/Broadsword side has said or acknowledged that the content or quality of the game has ever fallen off due to cost constraints tied to Voice Acting. Or that they can't pump out content because they can't afford to pay for voice acting.  They've definitely referenced that their resources (money, people/team size, or a combination of the two) isn't what it once way, but this game is also over a decade old and hasn't been a Bioware priority since Anthem development kicked into overdrive and resources were pulled from this game for that, or one could argue, it hasn't been an EA priority since the botched launch and early swap to a F2P model with microtransactions. But again, none of this can be proven so I digress.

Edited January 31 by DarthNillard

[Pietrastor]

1 hour ago, xxSHOONYxx said:

If that huge development cost gap is not on VA on what it is then? Worse product, less content and more expensive

It's the bigger team size(s) working much longer = tenfold more salaries to pay for many more years. C'mon, ain't that obvious?

WOW is 7 years older than TOR, even more than ESO and FFXIV. That's an entire generation in game dev. RPGs and MMOs used be done in the late 90s/early 00s on a 20 mill budget with 20 devs comleting the entire game, but things changed and games evolved heavily. Not necessarily in quest complexity but enormously in fidelty and presentation. And the expected array of features, along with quantity of content. Yes VA is part of that but it's just that, a small part of a much bigger picture. Older RPGs and MMORPGs did not have any cinematics, cuscenes nor cinematic conversations. Or they featured extremly limited number of it. They did not feature complex 3D graphics, shaders, multilayered textures, 10 hour scores, special effects etc. All that requires more and more complex assets to be created and manual sequencing that take longer and longer to do. That only added the workload to complete each quest.

We went from RPG having text-only quests using exclusively a top-down view to full cinematic presentation in a span of just a few years in the 00s. Same goes for EVERY other genre. Audience expectations grew in time and so did the dev teams to accustom for all the expected features and the level of presentation. At the end of PS360 era every AAA release was already easily 100+ million production cost on average and 200 people working in it, far cry from the 90s/early 00s. Nowadays it's even more so, with every AAA game crossing 200-400mill budget or more and 300-500 devs working fulltime during the main production process.

Do you know what GTA6's estimated budget is? 2 BILLION dollars. That's 10 times more than TOR which used to be called the most expensive game ever just 12 years ago.

Edited January 31 by Pietrastor

[eabevella]

16 hours ago, ExarSun said:

For me Echoes of Oblivion ends the story of the game. Done! Everything after that is a big pile of ...., the weakest storytelling i have ever seen. And no...no sane person would compare the KOTFE/KOTET story with that of 7.0....roflmao.... I quote enjoyed the Chapters, at least the story was decently executed and well voiced, long and with cinematics. This Mando stuff is incredibly boring, plain and of low importance. Why would a godlike power-level person like the Commander go and deal with random Mandos and their squabbles...why... Why would a Sith go and sneak like a coward on random planets instead of attacking them with a whole army/fleet and stomping everything....Suddenly the stupid Sith in Manaan 7.0 Darth Norok has more power/influence that the Commander?? What?? Darth Nobody...i mean Norok can suddenly order a whole army and a full scale invasion on a fkn big planet, but the Leader of the Hand/Alliance Commander has to sneak and 1v1 average soldiers and Mandos...what?....oh and the Republic part is even worse...i mean i have totally no clue or idea why we went to Manaan and what we acomplished there...

Who exactly is the main antagonist in the game....Oh no...not Heta Col...she could be roflstomped by most of the PC's companions...i mean just send some of...Arcann, Senya, Scourge and Lana and the whole lot of Mandos are fkn done. Acina/Vowrann....please...there is no character development, no power ups, nothing belivable about their abilities to lead the Empire...they just suddenly became the leader...They are not shown to actively participate in the leading or war part.  Why would the PC take orders from them???????? Who TF leads the Republic...some development on the political and power games there....No...instead go clean this cantina with a mob and take out the trash...better story for sure. Malgus, however formidable he is is defeated by the PC for the 10010000th time...and he sits and gives the same useless information for 2 years.... no developing whats left of the Jedi Order...instead we go spend some time with Arn and Tau...who are as interesting as the new disney movies... This is the worst world and character building after what happened in 6.0....the worst....but hey...there is ANOTHER superweapon and another betrayal....how very interesting...

After KOTET when they said the focus would be on mmo stuff and multiplayer content focus...what happened...everyone left and we are left with this sad state...Nobody like grinding pixels without good world and story to immerse in to...but i guess this it too difficult to realise...

I am tired of hearing people excuse the writers/devs with EA or managers....or executives....bad decision are bad decision and facts are facts. I suppose the big bad EA or some exec or some investors wanted them to specifically prune abilities (seriously tho...the characters feels so weak its unreal), make the game totally grindy and slow and deliver the worst story and updates with 7.0 and on the games anniversary year...oh, sure, sure...

 

Man, I wish I could replay EoO.

And I agree that despite how KOTxx is a single tracked story that is written for a specific class (which is imo why so many people dislike it), the story itself has many interesting new concepts that fit the universe and the cinema is well made. EoO gives a satisfying ending to the story despite how obvious it is that it didn't get as much budge as KOTxx.

I don't really want to blame the writers of post 7.0 story, I think they did what they can with so little materials that have to be dragged on for years. The Heta/Malgus plot feels like it should only be a couple of planets and a couple of flashpoints worth length-wise, but the writers are forced to cut the already small story into even smaller bits so that the higher up can pretend they are delivering the promise of "continuing to make contents" when I suspect they never plan on adding new budgets into making actual new story back when they announced the "exciting 10th year anniversary". Kind of funny when you realized they put apparently some real $$$ to make that new promotional cinema. It's very well made, I'll give them that, but now it just looks like a very expensive bait.

[eabevella]

8 hours ago, DarthNillard said:

How does what I quoted you saying about you never moded or did cinematics but you have coded have to do with VA? You are deflecting and going in 100 directions, none of which serves any purpose.  I have actually hired voice actors and done minimal voice acting myself (3 times, and this is no flex - it was irrelevant background conversation work when real voice actors couldn't make their call date/time).  There are a TON of different ways you can pay for VA.  Bioware isn't posting their line item reports of where they've allocated their money for the last 12 years, so unless Keith wants to weigh in this is all guessing anyway.

If you would have been here from beta, one of the selling points of this game was how it was fully voice acted (at launch anyway).  One of the biggest missteps IMO they ever took was abandoning that when they did the KOTOR like scruff with KOTET/KOTFE and the hybrid mess they've been doing ever since.  In 50 years when/if this game is ever brought, the story is what it will be favorable known for and the VA is a large part of that.  Just saying....

I mean, just read all the posts of the new players who get into SWTOR in recent years, all of them praise the class stories and the voice actors, none of them say how good the MMO bit is. To think the higher up decided that cutting corners with their biggest sell point is the right direction... lmao

[Whykara]

5 hours ago, eabevella said:

I don't really want to blame the writers of post 7.0 story, I think they did what they can with so little materials that have to be dragged on for years.

Who would you blame for the writing if not the writers? Small budget can be used as an excuse for many things, but not for bad writing. There are excellently written games with virtually zero budget out there. Kotor 2 had a 30 person team working on the game for 14 months, with arguably more publisher interference than this game has, and managed to pull off one of the greatest stories in video game history. I personally am very happy to blame the writers and no one else for the writing. If the writing is good, I'm equally as happy to praise the writers. I wouldn't praise the budget for the character interactions in 7.4 that I quite enjoyed for example. 

[eabevella]

8 minutes ago, Whykara said:

Who would you blame for the writing if not the writers? Small budget can be used as an excuse for many things, but not for bad writing. There are excellently written games with virtually zero budget out there. Kotor 2 had a 30 person team working on the game for 14 months, with arguably more publisher interference than this game has, and managed to pull off one of the greatest stories in video game history. I personally am very happy to blame the writers and no one else for the writing. If the writing is good, I'm equally as happy to praise the writers. I wouldn't praise the budget for the character interactions in 7.4 that I quite enjoyed for example. 

Whoever in charge of the making of the game of course.

Same reason you can't blame the writers and the special effect animators but not the CEOs for the trash Hollywood movies in recent years.

Games with "virtually zero budget" use the budget well. You don't pay someone to write a 10k words novelette and stretch it into a movie trilogy because it's cheaper this way instead of paying the same writer triple to write a 50k novel. There's simply not enough stuffs in the Mando/Malgus story but they still stretched it like how they stretched the Hobbit into tree movies and we all know how that turned out.

KOTOR2 have 14 months that's exactly why Malachor V is an unfinished dumpster fire but that's not the writers nor the programmers' fault.

[ExarSun]

On 2/1/2024 at 6:43 AM, eabevella said:

I don't really want to blame the writers of post 7.0 story, I think they did what they can with so little materials that have to be dragged on for years. The Heta/Malgus plot feels like it should only be a couple of planets and a couple of flashpoints worth length-wise, but the writers are forced to cut the already small story into even smaller bits so that the higher up can pretend they are delivering the promise of "continuing to make contents" when I suspect they never plan on adding new budgets into making actual new story back when they announced the "exciting 10th year anniversary". Kind of funny when you realized they put apparently some real $$$ to make that new promotional cinema. It's very well made, I'll give them that, but now it just looks like a very expensive bait.

Oh....I dont know about that. The 7.0 plot is an incoherent mess. There is absolutely no logic and no purpose to the PC actions, the world building, plot advancement....anything. I bet some of the players of the game could write a better story than 7.0 is... To be fair the 6.0 story wasnt much better, but at least it had some pacing, some feeling of purposefulness to the players actions, some kind of you know....real plot...and not running around doing nothing of note...going to planets for plots that have no connection to each other...none at all.

It feels lazy, low effort, like with anything 7.0.

[Traceguy]

On 1/31/2024 at 6:16 AM, ExarSun said:

For me Echoes of Oblivion ends the story of the game. Done!

I agree 100% with everything you say about the imp/pub leadership, mando stuff, and our PC, but for me, the ending of Shadow of Revan is where the game is officially done for me.

KOTFE throws our PCs into a stasis for 5 years. In those 5 years, the galaxy is rebooted, and everything our PCs have ever done, gained, or accomplished is pretty much wiped out. You could basically take the game starting with Chapter 1 of KOTFE and package it as its own sequel game to SWTOR, where the PC has nothing to do with the original game.

Edited February 2 by Traceguy

[ExarSun]

KOTFE does not reboot the story. Although i understand and agree with the notion that the story is focused on certain class and background....this has been the case since the end of Vanilla....5 minute class mention/quest from ROTHC and SOR does not equal different type of story per character...it still is focusing everyone to one and the same narrative for everyone.

Now....KOTFE AND KOTET advances the story, the plot, there is character development, world building, the PC learns how to lead, trains for power-ups, deals with dangerous foes, politics involved...romance...real relationship with companions and npcs...it was interesting enough for me...and I and lot of my friends and guildmates were subbed non-stop. Lets not pretend that after KOTET the game improved...oh no...the downward spiral began...I dont know the reason...was the devs on some serious drugs to listen to the few people that wanted no chapters, but sparse and portioned content (because they said something idiotic like this) or they pushed away resources for Anthem, which anyone with a brain would have known was a dumpster fire....doesn't matter. We are at the "endgame" now...

Up until 6.0 the PC - was some of the strongest characters from their faction, defeated some godlike characters, absorbed their innate force powers....managed to build a serious power base and relationships with some powerful people....and instead of going to iokath....since you know....WE OWN THIS PLANET...to try and build new weapons, since the eternal fleet and gravestone were gone to zildrog (which was one of the most lazy and uniteresting ways to cripple the alliance)....or i dont know try to make a power move about the leadership of his/her faction...because the PC is...SO MUCH STRONGER THAN EVERYONE and so much more experienced in leadership and war....they instead decide to be a foot soldier for this ridiculous and boring imp vs rep war...ok fine...we go down that route...at least in 6.0 there is some semblance of a war and struggle for power between the factions, you deal with the leaderships of Onderon and Mek Sha, you deal with your own leadership, there is some plot advancement but not by much....some slow world building... Echoes of oblivion wraps so much up, it was done beautifully IMO. I was expecting more of that......nothing more of note is also shown for the so called imp vs rep war...no serious battles/moves between the factions.

Now we come to this Mando Nonsense before 7.0...While a Mando infighting is boring by itself, because they have no notable purpose or ambition to forward the story...we are presented with Heta Kol...who is she....what are her motives, how does she lead and inspire her troops, what is her background, motives and overall plans for doing what she does....NO...GOD NO...none of that...instead some short reasoning that feels written by a little kid..."uh huh i wanna leeaaad the mandoos - me, me, me...you a bad boss shae".... Malgus is somewhere doing something, which we expect to be a new threat/revolution/chance etc...

7.0 drops....OH MY GOD...i am not going to talk about the ridiculously dumb decision about ability pruning, class balance (Nonexistent), making the game grindy, boring, gear, needless changes....mass exodus of players etc...enough has been said...but not enough has been set for the PLOT....THERE IS NO PLOT...PC randomly goes to Manaan, where the Rep and Imp are....fighting but not really?? NO...Some lowly weak stupid Darth has decided to invade the planet...what?? Republic tries to help but not really...they send ONE JEDI...ONE...what?? Incompetent leaders?? Who makes those decisions? Why? The power structure of both factions is not shown...Where is the leaders decision making, they ruling the faction is never shown...random people making decisions on the fly.... This is written like children playing a game of catch me.It does not forward the plot...nothing happens in the story...no important characters. The PC is shown to be nothing like a leader, but a simple peon, who can be sent to any mission by anybody....and not really important missions - go press those buttons, go stop this cannon...what....Elom wraps up Darth Malgus little runaway period...but in a stupid way...he is caught....only to sit for years a prisoner, accomplishing nothing and giving bits of information about some....you guessed it - superweapon.

After that more Mando nonsense...but big time nonsense...you sneak like a coward just to cater to the dumbest plan i have ever heard...."lets not crush my opponent with overwhelming force or simply kill them"...but instead make an elaborate scheme to try and surprise them BY LITERALLY going in alone, but in secret....how come the alliance/task force/hand organization and your followers, namely Lana who is overprotective have nothing to say or even be a part of this....all that for watching a little knife duel between shae and heta...where Heta escapes yet again...the PC is getting tanked by some fkn weakling Rikan who should be dead just by looking at him....Sahar has no idea what she's doing, no plan, no development, no world building yet again...no nothing....So let me get this straight?? Some rogue Mando cell is attacking Empire and Republic and they do absolutely nothing...for 2 years?? LOL? Just now in 7.4 Krovos sends a letter explaining they will deal with this Mando nonsense. I cant even immerse myself in such a ridiculous story-telling.

Voss.....is just really a big nothing...you go there to clean cantinas and take out the trash...i mean thats what the strongest person in the galaxy and a experienced war leader does right?? Right?? One voss prophecy that reveals ABSOLUTELY NOTHING...So...you go there...for nothing...great story telling i must say...

Kessan's Landing...at least here there is some resemblance of a plot...but so short, it feels nothing was accomplished. And this is the story....for 2 years... So wrapping it up. The PC feels not only weak, but going to places without purpose, doing the lowliest of soldiers work, is all of a sudden non-important. No meaningful relationship with your faction leadership...what are the emperor/empress and republic senate chanselor doing??? Where are the Jedi Order...the Dark Council...we are dealing with some nobodies instead of them...Malgus plan is illogical and incoherent, Mandos = trash plot, no interesting character...no notable characters really... The PC is being painted in a stupid incompetent light, being literally a peon, negating: years and years of dealing with the worst threats and strongest enemies in the galaxy, actually taking part in politics, and leading for years, building a power base from nothing.

And all for 1 hour of story for 2 years...this is incredible. I have forgotten what decision my alts made, how i wanted to roleplay them, how i wanted to headcannon their choices and why...because nothing is happening with the story. Saboteur option is going nowhere. Romances - going nowhere, never mentioned again.

I can literally go to google, and write - Star Wars OLD Republic fan fiction and just find better story-telling than this...I would bet real money that most of the players here can think of a better story than what 7.0.I have absolutely no idea how those people here are allowed to destroy this IP so bad.

Someone should  hire this game's leadership and writers and rewrite the movies and make Palpatine and Vader go themselves but all alone of course and deal with every random resistance cell on every planet. I mean...yeah...why waste time actually ruling, grand scheming and dealing with serious threats....when they can go to nar shadaa and be the best cantina cleaners there is.

Edited February 2 by ExarSun

[Pietrastor]

The bloated stretching and comical padding is the main issue here. We all have our story preferences but before the whole Malgus/Mando era started, even if you didn't like a particular story being told you were never stuck with it for too long in SWTOR.

 

Didn't like the Hutts? That story was one and done within the same expansion.

Hated Dread Masters? Over after 2 years post-launch.

Didn't like Revan? His entire saga was done within 1 year.

Hated KOTFEET? Done after 2,5 years.

 

But the Malgus & Mando stuff been going on since fall 2018 with NO end even on the horizon..........

Edited February 2 by Pietrastor