Well, I've finally been invited into the beta of the new Star Wars MMO this weekend. Against my better judgement, I'm going to give it a try (and hopefully get my wife hooked too). It's either this, or go back to WoW (for the 4th time), and I just can't take that again.
There is another alternative. You don't have to go back to WoW or anything else. Quit MMOs altogether. I did it two years ago and it's been great. The time it freed up has been wonderful. They're all just treadmills anyway. If they still had old-style open-world RPGs that didn't spoon-feed everyone the same quests and storyline, I'd be for them. But the new model is sorely disappointing to me. They feel more like amusement parks than immersive worlds...and I never go to amusement parks.
Actually, I miss the mmo experience. My wife and I have met some great people online over the last 6-7 years and we want to play something new with them. My angst is more about games not meeting our expectations. SWTOR looks like it will be awesome, but I've been fooled before. *shakes fist at D&D Online, LOTRO, Aion, and Warhammer Online*
Not to take away from your enjoyment, Jon, but it seems like everyone and their dog got in. I did, for example, but I've changed my mind.Originally Posted by Jon Sprunk
See... I kind of want to play TOR, but also not. Erfy is right about how much time quitting freed up for me, but it's also a case of with MMOs I tend to wake up, log on, log off at night, sleep and repeat. I can't - and won't - let myself get back into that cycle again, plus I tend to find most MMOs boring very quickly. There's also the fact that they cut same-sex romance arcs as a launch feature, instead moving them to post-release (but not opposite-sex ones), and I'll be waiting until they're in before I consider buying it.
I'm, personally, waiting for The Secret World.
I hope they include same-sex romances. I mean, it's 2011.
It'll be 2012 at least by the time they're implemented.
It'd be great to have, but in a way I'm not actually sure I'm going to bother. It might be a case of too-little-too-late, but I'm not sure I particularly want to support it. LucasArts (and the Lucas estate in general) have been very obtuse when it comes to same-sex relationships in the Star Wars universe (I believe you can count the canonically gay characters from any medium on one hand), and the fact it's been "cut for post-release" in order to improve the release features is annoying - why couldn't they cut opposite-sex too? I'm not suggesting it's done to slight people, but there's many, many, many instances of content being cut, the publisher/developer announcing it'll appear and then it doesn't.
I'm not going to be holding my breath, and after I saw this from one of the writers of The Secret World (he also wrote The Longest Journey and Dreamfall, two of my favourite games), I think I'll go with the game that is more open from the start.
Plus it's Lovecraft-inspired and part of it takes place in New England.
One of my friends is all obsessed with it already, he's been in the beta testing twice and he says it's all things wonderful, it doesn't look that appealing to me though. The best thing I ever did was quit playing Final Fantasy 11 (thank you MGS port for Gamecube!) I watched a preview vid focused on combat, it was from some big raid where they were fighting a giant mech thingy and it looked boring. It looked -DAMN- boring. "Oh hey I'm support check out all my support casting even though this is supposed to be Star Wars centric and casters should be about 1 in ten billion.." Pfffffff. I don't think I'll be playing. It looks better than the average MMO but I have a strong suspicion it'll be more of the same. I know the game has to be compelling and all but to me that would mean that when a half dozen Sith attack any giant robot or really anything at all for that matter it's dead pretty fast. Whatever, I won't be playing it, I don't have the time and I"m not paying a monthly fee for any goddamn thing this is 2011 for god's sake find a better business model. I'm out!
Edit: PS I totally support Loerwyn's assertions that there should be gay content for sci-fi fans not just of Star Wars, but for all sci-fi. Are we really going to worry if religious kooks and social conservatives are bothered by what goes on in Star Wars now? I thought that's who the Emperor was supposed to represent (or one facet of him anyways).
Last edited by saintjon; November 28th, 2011 at 06:39 PM.
Also happens to represent me a bit. Thanks for that one, saintjon.
I have been off MMO's for a few years now. Nothing ever compared to Everquest.
SWTOR might pull me back in.
It's not that, it never has been, it's George Lucas. He's got a massive hand in the universe, as do the "holding" company (LucasArts, at least when it comes to games), and there's pretty tight restrictions on what you can or can't do.
I don't think there's really any major, openly gay canonical characters in Star Wars now that I think about it.
I can't think of any. I'm having trouble thinking of any from lots of other sci-fi shows and movies too. Well either way I'm with you that it kind of stinks.
Well, I've played this game for two betas now, and I really enjoyed it. I'll be playing it come launch. I have the Collector's Edition pre-ordered and I'm already in a guild, have been since May. Heh.
Thing is, when it comes to MMOs, I'm a casual player (4-8 hours a week, tops), and I have zero interest in end game content. I'm playing it for the story, and the story lines are pretty fun. I've only played three classes in the game, but I enjoyed them all. Jedi Consular, Sith Sorceror and a Smuggler. The Smuggler was the most fun, and I'll be rolling one come launch.
I've found that the cut scenes, and the voice acting really elevated the game, in my opinion. I never liked WoW. I, personally, found it boring. It consisted of just running over to someone, reading a quest and then going off to kill ten something or others and go back. TOR is doing it a little differently. You have a main quest that leads you into an area, and in the area, you get side quests. You activate the quest giver and a cut scene starts. You have some dialogue which could end with you getting light or dark side points, or relationship points with your companion. They need something done, like retrieve some stolen parts. Well, it's on the way of the main quest, so why not? Then, if you want a bonus quest, you can kill 25 berserk troopers, and really, you have to kill that many as you run around anyway, so it's not a grind.
At any rate, I find the game to have more of a solo RPG feel to it, which is why I probably like it in the first place. That, and I'm a Bioware fangirl.
Last edited by NickeeCoco; November 29th, 2011 at 07:52 AM. Reason: Early morning foggy brain.
The game definitely has more of a RPG feel to it. I will also be playing a Smuggler at release. Was going to play a BH whose storyline is also very fun but my friends wanted to go Republic so I tried a Smuggler and really enjoyed the story and gameplay as much as I did the BH.
I didn't try the BH, but it looks like you get to be just as jerky/smart assed as you do with the Smuggler. The Smuggler dialogue makes me laugh, and, surprisingly, they do a fair amount of damage with only one blaster.
Jon Sprunk: What are your thoughts of the beta, now that it's done?
I loved it. I've been a SW fan since '77, so being able to play in that universe is like catnip. The game plays a lot like WoW, in the good ways, but has a feeling of more depth and personality.
My biggest problem is deciding which class to play first. I like them all.
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