Originally posted by Phry

Originally posted by Tardcore

Originally posted by CujoSWAoA

My favorite part of the video is how the Engineering Team didn't even try to hold onto anything.   The suction was majorly weak and the Team just flailed their arms and ran around like headless kawakian monkey lizards.

Hilarious.  Glad to see there's comedy in SW:TOR.

Hey. Something we can agree on. I really feel the whole way that scenario was put together was terrible.

Councilor: "Sorry we don't have time for anything else, you all have to die."

Engineer: "Ok let me just stand here with my thumb up my ass and do nothing about my situation, not even try to beg you out of killing me or finding an alternate solution, or grabbing onto or even straping myself to one of those big ass chunks of machinery left and right of me with my belt."

Very poor and lazy story writting in my opinion. With a little more effort they could have made that scene meaningful rather than embarrassingly shallow.

if SW;TOR is their masterpiece.. im starting to get really worried now about whether Mass Effect 3 will be any good...

Yeah, I had the same issues with some of DAO2 as well.

Originally posted by Tardcore

Originally posted by CujoSWAoA

My favorite part of the video is how the Engineering Team didn't even try to hold onto anything.   The suction was majorly weak and the Team just flailed their arms and ran around like headless kawakian monkey lizards.

Hilarious.  Glad to see there's comedy in SW:TOR.

Hey. Something we can agree on. I really feel the whole way that scenario was put together was terrible.

Councilor: "Sorry we don't have time for anything else, you all have to die."

Engineer: "Ok let me just stand here with my thumb up my ass and do nothing about my situation, not even try to beg you out of killing me or finding an alternate solution, or grabbing onto or even straping myself to one of those big ass chunks of machinery left and right of me with my belt."

Very poor and lazy story writting in my opinion. With a little more effort they could have made that scene meaningful rather than embarrassingly shallow.

Yeah, lets be honest here. It looked like complete sh*t.

The moment that those two Jedi allowed that to happen, they stopped being Jedi.

End of story.

Lame, as, hell.

What I really don't like about that walkthrough is that if I choose to save those crew members and the others in my party choose to kill them. Even with me getting lightside points for my good intention, my story is still tainted by a choice I wouldn't have picked.

For me that would get annoying fast and would likely result in my simply opting to do the content solo wherever possible.

Edit: Also, what the heck is up with the size of that bridge? You'd need a mega phone to ask the helms men for a status report. :p

Edit2: Ah so I can redo the flashpoint again to get a different story line. Great, so I just have to hope that that time around my new group agrees with my decisions.

Why do I suddenly get the feeling that this game is going to coin the term 'story grinding'?

Firts thanks to Whilan for the Q&A parsing.

Then combat wise I do agree it seems contrary to what they have been advertising combat does not so much feels heroic in boss kiting: 4 players against a single boss.

Also it seems they still have some issue with the AI. Having the mobs in wait mode till you attack them doesn't look nor feel that great, even at low level, especially in an instance.

Storywise Tardcore has a point at least the engineer should do something: beg/cry/rage/grab something. Also it does not makes sense to be obliged to cut the main reactor that way. They should add a linesaying we are sorry (playing jedi) the main circuit is down/unreacheable we have to cut the main power from here and as so sacrifice the engineers... you will be remembered.

Not only it would add drama but also it would make sense.

Originally posted by cinos

What I really don't like about that walkthrough is that if I choose to save those crew members and the others in my party choose to kill them. Even with me getting lightside points for my good intention, my story is still tainted by a choice I wouldn't have picked.

For me that would get annoying fast and would likely result in my simply opting to do the content solo wherever possible.

Edit: Also, what the heck is up with the size of that bridge? You'd need a mega phone to ask the helms men for a status report. :p

I think theres an option to completely bypass any group voting and have your own option always. You can also consult with your teamates about decision thats about to be made, you can say "Ok guys lets go for light side here" and do so all together.

I thought the engineer was going to turn out to be an Imperial agent. It would make more sense since engineering would  have control over all of the lock downs on the ship etc.

Giving the benefit of the doubt, maybe some of the other choices of dialogue might not have been as bad.

Oh SNAP!! I gonna quit me day job and become a Bioware story line writer :)

Originally posted by c4_Garuda

Originally posted by cinos

What I really don't like about that walkthrough is that if I choose to save those crew members and the others in my party choose to kill them. Even with me getting lightside points for my good intention, my story is still tainted by a choice I wouldn't have picked.

For me that would get annoying fast and would likely result in my simply opting to do the content solo wherever possible.

Edit: Also, what the heck is up with the size of that bridge? You'd need a mega phone to ask the helms men for a status report. :p

I think theres an option to completely bypass any group voting and have your own option always. You can also consult with your teamates about decision thats about to be made, you can say "Ok guys lets go for light side here" and do so all together.

I don't think that would work though, as I believe these choices are meant to diverge the story line. If I were able to disregard my groups choices and just go with what I solely choose then wouldn't our group become segmented as the stories split with each new choice?

Also yeah you can always plan ahead with the group, but you just know someone is going to troll and choose the opposite option don't you? :p

Hope this isn't indicative of the rest of the game...I figured combat would be a little more engaging this late into beta or at least look like it's engaging.  I'm still seeing a lot of dead animations and the ones that are there are spotty at times.

It seemed to me that more time was spent watching people talking than any actual combat. And the combat that did take place just lacked any difficulty, like they were just there as something they had to put between story sections. I know this is Bioware and they're big on story but I really can't see how a game played mostly through chat decisions can be that enjoyable.

And can I just say: Portable Barrier? Seriously? The Smuggler takes his own cover along with him? Is it just me who finds this daft? I like the idea of a smuggler jumping from cover to cover, but bringing their own along is just.. what?! It's just stupid. If they want something to hide behind, bring a force shield or something, not a small barrier to hide behind like some sort of cowardly combatant. Bah.. I had hopes for the Smuggler class but that totally changed my opinion.

Originally posted by Nazgol

I am impressed. This is a level 9 flashpoint, the equivilant of say RFC or the Stockade in WOW. 

WoW being 7 years old. Besides even if it is a lowlevel dungeon it still is no excuse to create a game for the braindead.

I win.

Watching this story-driven walk-through gave me this impression:

Have you ever watched "American Idol"? If you have then you've probably seen those auditions that didn't go so well, but the person refuses to believe that they're not as good as people have been telling them. And when the judges ask who those people are, they're always friends and relatives...you know, people that LOVE them. Somehow being encouraged by people that LOVE them, got them believing in their talent so much, that they can't actually hear the reality of what they sound like--which at best might be mediocre, but nowhere near serious competition level. Alas they end up embarrassing themselves on national television.

The goodnews for Bioware, is that it's stories are competing against other videogames, so the bar isn't that high--but I've yet to see anything from them that would lead me to conclude that their talent with storytelling is at a level that it should be the driving force behind it's MMO development. The "choice" dialog mechanic, and all, might be pretty cool if the story is engaging enough that you might want to see what happens if you choose differently...ie replay value--but from what I've seen, I just want to go all "light-side" and don't care one bit about what happens from making "dark side" choices. They might as well map all lightside dialog choices to one side and all darkside to the other, so I can click through them without having to hear/read any bad dialog and/or sloppy writing. That way I don't accidentally make a dark choice, and I don't have to cringe so much at the awesome and/or amazing story.

I have to say after seeing that I would never, ever, ever want to pug in SWTOR. Regardless of the fact I still get the light or dark side points for the choice I make, I'd just hate to get stuck with some emo kid with lucky rolls making nothing but lame darkside choices because he can "relate" to Anakin... 

Just out of curiosity (looking for some impressions on the story) I started reading some of the comments below the video, and it appears a lot people are loving this footage and calling the story "amazing" and "emotional" and all that good stuff. It really must be me...I just don't get it.

Originally posted by ScoutMastr

Just out of curiosity (looking for some impressions on the story) I started reading some of the comments below the video, and it appears a lot people are loving this footage and calling the story "amazing" and "emotional" and all that good stuff. It really must be me...I just don't get it.

Yes, because there are a lot of us that are sooooooo tired of hitting accept after a wall of text and not caring about what we are doing. SWTOR is a game changer because they are taking what so many love about story in single player games and adding it to an MMO like no other before. I found the scene where they decided to let them die would have been difficult for me to do lol...because I have high morals and values in real life..goody goody me lol, so I need to force myself to try to be evil and try something new and these types of scenes to me are awesome;...I actually felt bad for them lol.

Originally posted by Leoghan

I have to say after seeing that I would never, ever, ever want to pug in SWTOR. Regardless of the fact I still get the light or dark side points for the choice I make, I'd just hate to get stuck with some emo kid with lucky rolls making nothing but lame darkside choices because he can "relate" to Anakin... 

Devs have already said that your choice is what gives you dark or light side points ... even if not the one chosen with the roll. Also your own personal choice from the last instance you ran is the one that counts. You can just go back and do it again to both have a chance to see a different result or even change your choice.

You don't have to worry, you are not locked into another person's choice. You only see it played out differently depending on rolls.

Originally posted by keithian

Originally posted by ScoutMastr

Just out of curiosity (looking for some impressions on the story) I started reading some of the comments below the video, and it appears a lot people are loving this footage and calling the story "amazing" and "emotional" and all that good stuff. It really must be me...I just don't get it.

Yes, because there are a lot of us that are sooooooo tired of hitting accept after a wall of text and not caring about what we are doing. SWTOR is a game changer because they are taking what so many love about story in single player games and adding it to an MMO like no other before. I found the scene where they decided to let them die would have been difficult for me to do lol...because I have high morals and values in real life..goody goody me lol, so I need to force myself to try to be evil and try something new and these types of scenes to me are awesome;...I actually felt bad for them lol.

     I played City Of Heroes almost from the very start and I was the type that ALWAYS read the story, it was what kept me interested in the game for over 6 years.  Unfortunately I then tried WoW and I was sorely disappointed in how lacking every single story was, so I quit after less than a month.  Same for Rift after my second beta weekend.  For me the stories are VERY important and this game seems to be pushing that "pillar" hard, so I am more than happy to give it a chance.

Originally posted by GMan3

Originally posted by keithian

Originally posted by ScoutMastr

Just out of curiosity (looking for some impressions on the story) I started reading some of the comments below the video, and it appears a lot people are loving this footage and calling the story "amazing" and "emotional" and all that good stuff. It really must be me...I just don't get it.

Yes, because there are a lot of us that are sooooooo tired of hitting accept after a wall of text and not caring about what we are doing. SWTOR is a game changer because they are taking what so many love about story in single player games and adding it to an MMO like no other before. I found the scene where they decided to let them die would have been difficult for me to do lol...because I have high morals and values in real life..goody goody me lol, so I need to force myself to try to be evil and try something new and these types of scenes to me are awesome;...I actually felt bad for them lol.

     I played City Of Heroes almost from the very start and I was the type that ALWAYS read the story, it was what kept me interested in the game for over 6 years.  Unfortunately I then tried WoW and I was sorely disappointed in how lacking every single story was, so I quit after less than a month.  Same for Rift after my second beta weekend.  For me the stories are VERY important and this game seems to be pushing that "pillar" hard, so I am more than happy to give it a chance.

 The thing is, I understand how they're trying to emphasize the story, and it might work to make things more interesting and meaningful if it's a GOOD story, but this story was very poorly done in my opinion--it made no sense. That being the case, it's no better than those "wall of text" quests...again, in my opinion.

I guess what really bothers me is it wouldn't have taken much to make the story actually make sense, and considering Bioware is loved for it's stories--these types of stories--I'm a little concerned that the rest of the story content will be low quality as well.

Originally posted by Leoghan

I have to say after seeing that I would never, ever, ever want to pug in SWTOR. 

How do you meet new people if you dont pug?  In fact, how do you even start a new mmo if you dont pug?  Bring players you know from other games and only group with them?

Originally posted by svann

How do you meet new people if you dont pug?  In fact, how do you even start a new mmo if you dont pug?  Bring players you know from other games and only group with them?

In this case, the guilds are already pre-forming.

If you don't remember early WoW, the population consisted of guilds (mostly closed off and hiding from the "scrubs") from other games, and everyone else.  Somehow everyone managed to muddle through. :shrug:

If history repeats I would expect the complaining about how horrible PuGs are to be even louder than usual, for a while.  You'll be in those "no one's run this instance? really?" situations for a while.

Originally posted by ScoutMastr

Watching this story-driven walk-through gave me this impression:

 

Have you ever watched "American Idol"? If you have then you've probably seen those auditions that didn't go so well, but the person refuses to believe that they're not as good as people have been telling them. And when the judges ask who those people are, they're always friends and relatives...you know, people that LOVE them. Somehow being encouraged by people that LOVE them, got them believing in their talent so much, that they can't actually hear the reality of what they sound like--which at best might be mediocre, but nowhere near serious competition level. Alas they end up embarrassing themselves on national television.

 

The goodnews for Bioware, is that it's stories are competing against other videogames, so the bar isn't that high--but I've yet to see anything from them that would lead me to conclude that their talent with storytelling is at a level that it should be the driving force behind it's MMO development. The "choice" dialog mechanic, and all, might be pretty cool if the story is engaging enough that you might want to see what happens if you choose differently...ie replay value--but from what I've seen, I just want to go all "light-side" and don't care one bit about what happens from making "dark side" choices. They might as well map all lightside dialog choices to one side and all darkside to the other, so I can click through them without having to hear/read any bad dialog and/or sloppy writing. That way I don't accidentally make a dark choice, and I don't have to cringe so much at the awesome and/or amazing story.

I think I see what your saying here. 

The stories will still be linear in SW:TOR, but Bioware is giving you the illusion of choice by enabling you to click a response that is either loosly or specifically aligned with a moral path of light vs dark.  However, regardless of your choice from dialog, your story, and the story of everyone around you, will be exactly the same regarless?