Originally posted by Yamota

Too bad SWG is no longer around, it would be so fun to see SWG having more subs. than SW:TOR, one year down the road. Because lets face it, this game IS a single player game and once you finished it, you aren't going to replay it. Unless it is really, really good, which SW:TOR is sadly not.

Thats probably why they killed it, EVE and EQII are catching some people, if they didnt kill SWG it probably would have picked up 30k or more by the end of this year.   After level 20 I just didnt feel like loggin into TOR.    Pretty flat game, they made the same mistake SWG did; releasing without all the elements.    

Ironic but I see them walking down the same  path, in a year theyll have a working space game.   Two years player housing and maybe a open world map.   Who knows maybe a CU and a NGE, since pvp pretty much sucks on TOR.    I predict 500k players next year then 200k in couple years.     

Originally posted by BullseyeArc1

 if they didnt kill SWG it probably would have picked up 30k or more by the end of this year.  

This one thing is what always gets me.

Oh I'm not here to debate TOR versus SWG.

What I mean is... if they had left SWG as it was and concentrated on fixing it.   Which yes means no CU as we knew it and certainly no NGE.

You would have had two vastly different Star Wars MMO's on the market.   They would have likely appealed to totally different player bases and maybe even had some cross subscribers to check out the other game.

Lucas Arts would have been rolling in license fees from both games... and likely both games would have been making profit for their perspective developers.

To me that would have just been doing business in an intellegent manner... it certainly would have been good money for Lucas Arts....

Originally posted by eddieg50

  As soon as the op started talking about the grind I knew he just did not understand why bioware was making a game such as this.  This is a game to be savored, this is not a rush to the end game. With story, cut scenes and great voice overs bioware wants the journey to be important.  All those who do not want to go on the journey are going to be unhappy and for the rest of us - Let the Journey begin

Which implies it's not a game to stick with.  Personally, I think an MMO should stack the content at the end game rather than trickling it out through the low to midlevels - there's no reason the journey has to be associated with the tedium of getting to max level.  The main purpose of leveling in an MMO should be to learn how the game works and the various features that can be found in the game rather than drip feeding content.  I'm not a big fan of voice acting and generally find it to be more cheese than entertainment.

Originally posted by TUX426

Originally posted by AcmeGamer

Originally posted by superniceguy

Originally posted by TUX426

 

And you call SWTOR simplistic, while playing TF2?! Huh.

 

That is a weak comment. TF2 is 1) Free to play and 2) NOT a MMORPG

SWTOR is very simplistic for a P2P MMORPG

 

[mod edit]

[mod edit]

My reply to Obriak was sincere. I don't know anyone who cares if he liked SWG or was holding out hope that he'd come to his senses and somehow dislike it. Honestly, NOBODY CARES if he enjoyed it. I knew people myself who enjoyed SWG up until Dec 15th - there was a lot to like with SWG for some players...not so much for others. As I said, some people like beets...I'll NEVER understand that...but it doesn't mean I hope someday they come to their senses and hate beets.

And calling SWTOR "simplistic", while playing TF2 (implying it has more depth), is stupid. To compare a game with the stories, crafting, flashpoints, gear, missions, factions, OPS, characters, planets, PvE, PvP, companions etc that SWTOR has to TF2 is just silly.

 

Apparently you do care since you clicked to read the thread ;)

I never implied TF2 has more depth, nor is it a game I expect depth from.  My expectations of an FPS and an MMO are very different.  In a FPS like TF2 I just want easy access, simple fun and in TF2's case, a touch of humour.  In an MMO I want something that challenges me, gives me both short and long term "goals" and all the other stuff I've already listed in this thread.  TF2 meets the expecations I have for a game of it's genre; TOR does not.

Originally posted by Obraik

Originally posted by eddieg50

  As soon as the op started talking about the grind I knew he just did not understand why bioware was making a game such as this.  This is a game to be savored, this is not a rush to the end game. With story, cut scenes and great voice overs bioware wants the journey to be important.  All those who do not want to go on the journey are going to be unhappy and for the rest of us - Let the Journey begin

Which implies it's not a game to stick with.  Personally, I think an MMO should stack the content at the end game rather than trickling it out through the low to midlevels - there's no reason the journey has to be associated with the tedium of getting to max level.  The main purpose of leveling in an MMO should be to learn how the game works and the various features that can be found in the game rather than drip feeding content.  I'm not a big fan of voice acting and generally find it to be more cheese than entertainment.

So it should be boring to max level and then gear grind/pvp over and over. They have games like that already. Lots of them. I don't play TOR, but respect the fact they tried to make levelling more entertaining. If they hadn't made so many other mistakes with the development, they would be doing much better.

And all those saying how TOR should've been made like SWG, aren't remembering it the same as I did. Started off (at launch) making a Rhodian Smuggler, thinking how cool, until i learned there was no smuggling. ?. So i ran around shooting things for no reason, resource gathering/farming, making food, etc. Got bored real quick and moved on. I assume it got better later. Seems a mmorpg with a story based IP needs some type of story/conflict to provide some need for your character to be there. Maybe a thempark/sandox hybrid type, but these 2 games have tried both seperate and both seems lacking.

Originally posted by Yamota

Too bad SWG is no longer around, it would be so fun to see SWG having more subs. than SW:TOR, one year down the road. Because lets face it, this game IS a single player game and once you finished it, you aren't going to replay it. Unless it is really, really good, which SW:TOR is sadly not.

It still amazes me how people will try and claim that a game that was closed down due to too low of a subscriber count will say that it was insanely popular and super awesome.  If SWG had a great subscriber count LucasArts would have continued to sell the license to Sony.  But it was not.

IF SWG and SWTOR were both competing in a market SWTOR would kic kthe ass of SWG.  It's like saying Everquest can beat Everquest 2, or Ultima Online can beat Lineage.  It's wishful thinking at best.  People will always choose the superior game.

Consider that on launch SWTOR has had 4x as many sales as SWG.  In ten years time you will either see SWTOR a ghosttown like SWG or you will see it as a mid-level MMO still running (on its eighth expansion).

Originally posted by Obraik

Many will probably remember me saying I wasn't going to play TOR, however I have family members and friends internationally who like to aid my crazy addictions and picked it up for me late last year.  I'm sure there are many here that are hoping to read this and see that I've "seen the light" and come to realise that SWG was crap, etc etc.  If you're one of those people then you're probably not going to like this post.

I always knew TOR was never going to be anything like SWG but I figured that this is what MMO's are these days and being a fan of the MMO genre I might as well at least play one that is somewhat sci-fi.  So for the last three months I've trying to become attached to TOR like I was with SWG.

That attempt has failed.  As much as I've tried, TOR is too linear and simplistic for me.  I don't feel like I'm playing an MMO, I feel like I'm playing a single player game for the most part - there's little in the way of a community and there's nothing there to really entice a community atmosphere.

My main complaints:

• The lack of a community feel.  For the most part, I feel like I'm playing a single player game.  For the grind from 1-50 I pretty much feel like I'm all on my own and there's little reason to involve anyone else.  I know this is something SWG tried to do as well with the legacy quests but there were alternatives.  Being in a guild seems to be for title only as you don't seem to really need to rely on your guild for much. 
• Meaningless PvP, which kind of links with the above point.  I don't see much in the way of PvP outside of the instanced areas.  I'm on a PvP server but the only places I encounter PvP is when I queue for a Warzone or if I were to go to Ilum.  I miss the PvP based on pride in SWG which actually gave it a war like feel - I felt like I had an enemy to fight.  There's no "X guild is SF in Y city and they're holding the SP...let's gather up and kill them!"  I really want something like that again.  Fighting purely for trinkets gets boring.
• The UI. Holy crap, the UI.  I can't move any of the UI windows to where I want them, I can't resize them and I can't have more than two open at once.  On top of that, the behaviour of one UI window changes if you happen to have another specific UI window open.  It's also too in your face and chunky.
• Movement controls.  This is potentially just because I'm overly familliar with the way SWG did things, but I really do miss the ability to lock the cursor and simply use the mouse to control the direction my character moves.  Instead, to do this with the mouse I have to hold down two mouse buttons, or through using the keyboard I have to use one key to move and another to control direction.  There's also no means of remapping which two mouse buttons control movement.
• A lacking of non-combat activities.  The crafting in TOR is simply, boring.  There's nothing to it and there's really no reason for me to do it.  If people needed/wanted my crafted goods then that would make the boredom worth it but nope, everything comes from loot. 

There's all the little things that SWG just had that you get used to and miss, like housing, the travel system and towards the end, the GCW systems.  I suppose three months on I'll admit, I'm missing SWG.  Not obessively so, but I just look at the MMO's out there today and can't really find anything that would keep me interested.  Everything is trying to be like WoW.  Maybe SWG was just "the perfect storm" and in general, MMO's just aren't my thing.

 

If anyone needs me, I'll be in Team Fortress 2...

Honestly i think the thing that hurt me the most on Swtor was the fact that they had all those really nicely done planets that after i grinded my 5 levels on or whatever id never have a reason to see it again. Like wow was with Negrand (loved that zone and often went back just to fly around it and helped out ppl grinding in it for a reason to stay there) once you progress through the zone theres no reason to go back other then to maybe help someone else. Swg I loved Talus and spent most my time there. Had houses set up there for years and would regularly do missions there when there was little else to do. With Swtor whats the point of putting so much time into the design of a planet your only gonna see for a few levels if you dont add reasons or atleast things to do there after you progress. I can deal with planets not having day/night cycles and no bugs flying around or no sound of wind whipping by but i think it really ruined it when i thought about it and came to the conclusion that finding my favorite planet was pointless as I was only set to be there for a certain amount of levels.

Problem with theme park games for me i guess is unlike swg theres not really a great reason to care about what zone/planet/region is your favorite cause its not like your gonna have a choice to live there or even have a reason to stick around or hang out there as once your leveled your time in said place is over and you are forced to move on to progress. Something I really miss about SWG is that while there where planets that I had to visit for certain items there was always the one I liked most to go back to and I could craft, gather resources(not always the best) and just hang out there and not be doing so without anything useful being done. Hate the fact that there isnt really a game out that gives this same sort of feeling as SWG did. Sad that all the games Ive seen or heard about follow the same boring guidelines of theme park gaming where your pretty much stuck traveling through instead of finding the place you want to spend most your time at.

Originally posted by ropenice

Originally posted by Obraik

Originally posted by eddieg50

  As soon as the op started talking about the grind I knew he just did not understand why bioware was making a game such as this.  This is a game to be savored, this is not a rush to the end game. With story, cut scenes and great voice overs bioware wants the journey to be important.  All those who do not want to go on the journey are going to be unhappy and for the rest of us - Let the Journey begin

Which implies it's not a game to stick with.  Personally, I think an MMO should stack the content at the end game rather than trickling it out through the low to midlevels - there's no reason the journey has to be associated with the tedium of getting to max level.  The main purpose of leveling in an MMO should be to learn how the game works and the various features that can be found in the game rather than drip feeding content.  I'm not a big fan of voice acting and generally find it to be more cheese than entertainment.

So it should be boring to max level and then gear grind/pvp over and over. They have games like that already. Lots of them. I don't play TOR, but respect the fact they tried to make levelling more entertaining. If they hadn't made so many other mistakes with the development, they would be doing much better.

And all those saying how TOR should've been made like SWG, aren't remembering it the same as I did. Started off (at launch) making a Rhodian Smuggler, thinking how cool, until i learned there was no smuggling. ?. So i ran around shooting things for no reason, resource gathering/farming, making food, etc. Got bored real quick and moved on. I assume it got better later. Seems a mmorpg with a story based IP needs some type of story/conflict to provide some need for your character to be there. Maybe a thempark/sandox hybrid type, but these 2 games have tried both seperate and both seems lacking.

No, I'm actually suggesting to make leveling more interesting.  Make levels purposeful by granting them after demostrating that you learnt an aspect of the game or completing something truly epic.  To put it in SWG terms as an example of something that I think an MMO should do:  If you used a survey tool to find a resource to sample, you gained a level for proving you learnt how a system worked.  Rather than having to grind each and every alt you want to make, create some RP about being able to clone the knowledge of your character that takes X amount of days/hours to complete and after which you have the ability to make a character that's the same level of your main character.  That way you can continue to play with your main character while your wait for your alt to become available.  Personally I think game developers should be focusing more on content that's actually fun rather than content that's purely made for the purpose of gaining XP that the majority of the playerbase is rushing through anyway.

Originally posted by tixylix
(mod edit)

SWG was not dead until Dec 15th 2011. Althought started to decline after the shutdown announcement on 24th June 2011

An article one day before the shutdown announcement

When they announced SWGs shutdown it had 4 FULL servers, but SWTOR is rarely getting one these days, but should get 60 in comparison.

SWTOR is dying faster than SWG was

Originally posted by superniceguy

Originally posted by tixylix
(mod edit)

SWG was not dead until Dec 15th 2011. Althought started to decline after the shutdown announcement on 24th June 2011

An article one day before the shutdown announcement

When they announced SWGs shutdown it had 4 FULL servers, but SWTOR is rarely getting one these days, but should get 60 in comparison.

SWTOR is dying faster than SWG was

SWG shutdown announcement was around 1 Nov 2005, when they announced the NGE.

Players that supported SWG after the NGE are mostly responsible for the failure of SWTOR, sending the wrong signals to the MMO-market.

I agree with your last line.

Originally posted by Sandbox

SWG shutdown announcement was around 1 Nov 2005, when they announced the NGE.

Players that supported SWG after the NGE are mostly responsible for the failure of SWTOR, sending the wrong signals to the MMO-market.

I agree with your last line.

Well, yeah it kinda was but blaming what TOR is on the players who played SWG after that seems a bit rash. NGEd SWG and TOR are still very different games.

TOR really is a mix between the fact that Bioware wanted to turn one of their games into a MMO, that they didn´t have the Forgotten realms license and that EA wanted a game similar to Wow.

I think TOR would have launched more or less the same even if there never would have been a SWG.

Besides, TOR is rather popular so another reason it is like it is are the fact that many gamers actually want it.

Many others don´t but you make a game for the people who want that type of game, not for the ones that want something else.

NGE Dec 15th 2011 > Pre-NGE > NGE Nov 2005

All the added content certainly makes up for the lack of the 32 profession system

NGE with 32 professions and Jedi being worked for would be the ultimate SWG, but does not and did not exist.

 Heh , some confessions are better left untold. :P

Originally posted by superniceguy

NGE Dec 15th 2011 > Pre-NGE > NGE Nov 2005

All the added content certainly makes up for the lack of the 32 profession system

NGE with 32 professions and Jedi being worked for would be the ultimate SWG, but does not and did not exist.

 

I does not matter how much content and other good stuff you put into the NGE, the game is unplayble as a MMO (emphasis on Massive) as long as the movement/combat system introduced with the NGE is present. Even the special designed combat zones like restuss failed any bigger fights.

Originally posted by Loke666

Besides, TOR is rather popular so another reason it is like it is are the fact that many gamers actually want it.

 

It is only popular because of Bioware, KOTOR, and had been hyped up for 3 years. Everybody including people living under a rock heard of it, that by the time it got released virtually everyone was ready for it and to buy and play it. Loads of money was chucked at it, and there looked no way that it would be a fail, gaining MMO of the week / month / year, even before it was released.

The fact that the servers are dropping fast, now proves that gamers do not want it, after playing it, especially once hit 50.

SWG was released fast, I came to it a month late as it got released faster than I thought.

Originally posted by Obraik

Originally posted by eddieg50

  As soon as the op started talking about the grind I knew he just did not understand why bioware was making a game such as this.  This is a game to be savored, this is not a rush to the end game. With story, cut scenes and great voice overs bioware wants the journey to be important.  All those who do not want to go on the journey are going to be unhappy and for the rest of us - Let the Journey begin

Which implies it's not a game to stick with.  Personally, I think an MMO should stack the content at the end game rather than trickling it out through the low to midlevels - there's no reason the journey has to be associated with the tedium of getting to max level.  The main purpose of leveling in an MMO should be to learn how the game works and the various features that can be found in the game rather than drip feeding content.  I'm not a big fan of voice acting and generally find it to be more cheese than entertainment.

I'm not sure i agree with you about MMOs being about endgame.  I think the journey there is equally important and to be honest i think thats what is hurting MMOs. Nowadays the only thing players are concerned about are how fast they can hit level cap and about world/shard/server firsts. Whats the point of being the first one to 50 or first to complete your raid gear set...well besides the whole e-peen thing??? Also, can anyone tell me what themepark MMOs since WoW has released with enough end game content that players were satisfied?

Originally posted by Sandbox

Originally posted by superniceguy

NGE Dec 15th 2011 > Pre-NGE > NGE Nov 2005

All the added content certainly makes up for the lack of the 32 profession system

NGE with 32 professions and Jedi being worked for would be the ultimate SWG, but does not and did not exist.

 

I does not matter how much content and other good stuff you put into the NGE, the game is unplayble as a MMO (emphasis on Massive) as long as the movement/combat system introduced with the NGE is present. Even the special designed combat zones like restuss failed any bigger fights.

It was playable enough for me

Originally posted by synn

Also, can anyone tell me what themepark MMOs since WoW has released with enough end game content that players were satisfied?

Dunno, still levelling chars up. The point with SWTOR is that the most casual of casual players hit 50 fast.

LOTRO has so much side stuff to distract you wihilst levlling up, it is a lot slower and takes longer to get to end level

Originally posted by tixylix
(mod edit)

Originally posted by Sandbox

Originally posted by superniceguy

Originally posted by tixylix
(mod edit)

SWG was not dead until Dec 15th 2011. Althought started to decline after the shutdown announcement on 24th June 2011

An article one day before the shutdown announcement

When they announced SWGs shutdown it had 4 FULL servers, but SWTOR is rarely getting one these days, but should get 60 in comparison.

SWTOR is dying faster than SWG was

SWG shutdown announcement was around 1 Nov 2005, when they announced the NGE.

Players that supported SWG after the NGE are mostly responsible for the failure of SWTOR, sending the wrong signals to the MMO-market.

I agree with your last line.

Not sure how that makes sense, considering that despite the profession system being simplified, SWG was still a much more complex game when it was shutdown in December than what TOR is.  Infact, I can't think of any MMO released since 2003/2004 that has more complexities to it than SWG, even post NGE.  I await the day when a game company decides to try and best that...