The reason I posted this here, is because I think the game still has potential.

Oh, believe me, I'm fully aware of how MMORPG.com works - and I've been here for years. It's the same old story of the majority mindlessly hyping the next big thing (these days, it's GW2) - and when it fails to live up to expectations (GW2 will do that for a LOT of people, trust me), the mindless hating starts.

Now, SWtOR has a LOT of things to dislike - that's very true. Overall, it's probably not better or worse than other established MMOs like EQ2, AoC, Rift, and so on. It does have a few very cool things - and that's basically what I'm here to remind people of. Well, those who're looking for a place to have some fun and who haven't written the game off completely.

The best part remains the Star Wars stories that, for the most part, are pretty good and certainly much more entertaining for me than the quests in Rift, WoW - and all the others, except TSW. TSW is fantastic in its own right, but it suffers from a lack of replayability. I can't see TSW last - no matter how fast they push out content. TOR, however, can last a VERY long time for people who haven't experienced the stories yet.

But, whatever, hate on it as much as you like - but don't forget that you probably used to play it and enjoy some of it ;)

If any smugglers are on and can tell me: Is Ivory still hanging out on the smuggler ship?  If he's not, I might reconsider, (atleast the f2p)

edit:the reason I ask is I played 6 months in beta and posted many bug reports.   I leveled 5 smugglers.  I felt nothing I posted made any difference.  After launch my feelings were confirmed.  Though I went on to do the whole game, finishing all raids and getting battlemaster in pvp.

Sounds like you should of played a character through, on each side, the first time around. I actually enjoyed my 2nd character more than my first (consular then agent). After the first major changes to PvP, I stopped doing that. I did have some problems with slowdowns, but I did quite well in ranking at the end - so nothing major.

I checked in on the free week during the legacy update, nothing special for me. Sorta neat (for appearance purposes) that I could be a Chiss Jedi or a green skinned Empire character, but I always wanted to be an "alien" anyways...

Checked in a couple weeks ago during another free week period, nothing worth mentioning.

Freeform space sounds good, something else entirely though...

Originally posted by Thanes

If any smugglers are on and can tell me: Is Ivory still hanging out on the smuggler ship?  If he's not, I might reconsider, (atleast the f2p)

edit:the reason I ask is I played 6 months in beta and posted many bug reports.   I leveled 5 smugglers.  I felt nothing I posted made any difference.  After launch my feelings were confirmed.  Though I went on to do the whole game, finishing all raids and getting battlemaster in pvp.

Sounds like you got a lot of bang for your buck - and maybe that's worth considering when bashing the game?

Getting Battlemaster in the past was a lot of work, so it's hard to see how you could not have enjoyed it. It's much easier today.

As for developers not changing things for individual players - that's universal. Personally, all the bugs I experienced during launch and the month following are gone. They were never that bad, but I was pissed at that "Green Ray" thing on several planets and the way the "Healing Green" stuck to my character. Those things are definitely fixed. The WZ performance is much, much better - as I said.

With the Legacy system and the Group finder - the game is finally in a state worthy of mass consumption. I fear it's too late now, but population is - at least - quite healthy on the unlocked servers. So far, I've had to wait no longer than 60 seconds for any WZ to pop.

Do the worlds feel alive yet?
Do NPCs interact with the players?
Do NPCs still stand around in frozen animations forever? (Is that Jedi near the med-bot and crafting station in the light-side starting area still holding the padawan in a force grip?)
Are there nature sounds included now?
Do you hear bugs and birds?
Are there day/night cycles to show the passage of time?
Does it rain or snow yet?

To me, these were the killers of the game. They have had a few patches and I was just wondering if they have even looked at any of these things.

Originally posted by AlBQuirky

Do the worlds feel alive yet?
Do NPCs interact with the players?
Do NPCs still stand around in frozen animations forever? (Is that Jedi near the med-bot and crafting station in the light-side starting area still holding the padawan in a force grip?)
Are there nature sounds included now?
Do you hear bugs and birds?
Are there day/night cycles to show the passage of time?
Does it rain or snow yet?

To me, these were the killers of the game. They have had a few patches and I was just wondering if they have even looked at any of these things.

Nope, nothing has changed - though it does rain on select planets :)

I agree that was a major weakness of the game and it still is.

Was quite strange logging in and seeing  230+ people on the fleet. A friend of mine has also recently re-subbed and on skype he kept asking me a crapload of questions. He played for the exact amount of time as i did and for some reason missed a crapload of content. He's usually quite attentive when it comes to detail.

Anyhoo, still enjoying it. Call it WoW with Lightsabers if you wish, but i love both WoW & Lightsabers :D

It's WoW with lightsabers and a shit-load of story content that's actually interesting :)

Originally posted by DKLond

It's WoW with lightsabers and a shit-load of story content that's actually interesting :)

+1 Internet Point for having the balls to tell the truth.

Originally posted by DKLond

It's WoW with lightsabers and a shit-load of story content that's actually interesting :)

Minus automatic standart attack.

Really am glad this hasn't become the  "Jump on the ToR hate train" thread. Some actual constructive reasoning behind trying the game again.

Originally posted by Indrome

Originally posted by DKLond

It's WoW with lightsabers and a shit-load of story content that's actually interesting :)

Minus automatic standart attack.

True, but the downside is the 1.5 second GCD :)

Still, I think PvE combat in TOR is much better than in WoW. But PvP combat in WoW is superior.

Originally posted by ezduzit

[mod edit]

Player characters didn't have voices when you played?  So, you quit the game in the alpha testing phase?

For my experience , the Lag spikes are totally random.

When i played at January, the lag was at Illum, something terrible and made the game almost unplayable (something totally normal with high population at the other hand). Bu the warzones run smoothly in a regular PC.

With my first comeback at 1.2 , somedays the things goes right, somedays not very bad... but nothing really game-breaking.The population was really low.

But with my last return few weeks ago, the 7 days trial... dude , the game was unplayable, I was at Red Eclipse and with a much better PC but the lag spikes was at almost every warzone. 

And it was not the population, with 3 times the population of Red Eclipse (Basilisk Droid at January ) didnt experience a lagspike at a warzone, just at Illum

So I think this lagspikes thing is something totally random for each player, server  and day.

Originally posted by ezduzit

Originally posted by DKLond

Originally posted by ezduzit

[mod edit]

[mod edit]

[mod edit]

I think you're just too cool for any game...

Originally posted by AlBQuirky

Do the worlds feel alive yet?
Do NPCs interact with the players?
Do NPCs still stand around in frozen animations forever? (Is that Jedi near the med-bot and crafting station in the light-side starting area still holding the padawan in a force grip?)
Are there nature sounds included now?
Do you hear bugs and birds?
Are there day/night cycles to show the passage of time?
Does it rain or snow yet?

To me, these were the killers of the game. They have had a few patches and I was just wondering if they have even looked at any of these things.

 I finialy set myself up to try the game since is free to play till level 15 to see if I might like the game after all.

Even though I am a hugh Star Wars fan this game never got me excited to try, my main concern was STORY, as I said many times before I love story in my SINGLEPLAYER RPG Game, I love Lore in my MMORPG so I can carve out my own story.

But regardless I am given it a try.

First thing when entering the game made me think that I would go see a movie or tv serie if it was made like the beginning CGI trailer.

Then entered character creation, well it seems most things people complained about seems pretty true, I didn't really like character creation. I created a Jedi Knight.

I also need to agree on the graphics looking faily dated.

Again need to agree that the ingame world feels lifeless, creature's and npc enemy's just stand there waiting to be killed. The city's do look good but that's just about it since it still feels lifeless.

I tried to explore but didn't find anything worth exploring for but this could be due to the starter area's, yet even in a starters area I feel there should be reason to explore.

Performance wise I have nothing to say other then the game does perform very well.

I really tried to refocus the way I enter a MMORPG and tried to go in looking at the game as a single/multiplayer game, but even that didn't help much for now.

The well voice overs are done nice but at the same time it bothers me that with every mission I take I get a conversation clip, again if I want that I rather play a normal singleplayer game.

All in all it didn't feel like I was playing a Star Wars MMORPG apart from the CGI clips and the story.

I also feel it's the first time I entered a MMORPG to be so negative about it.

I will try the game a few times more as sometimes a MMORPG needs to grown on you, but I don't believe it will actually improve on what I already dislike about the game.

Ive been thinking about it. I am bored atm.

Originally posted by AlBQuirky

Do the worlds feel alive yet?
Do NPCs interact with the players?
Do NPCs still stand around in frozen animations forever? (Is that Jedi near the med-bot and crafting station in the light-side starting area still holding the padawan in a force grip?)
Are there nature sounds included now?
Do you hear bugs and birds?
Are there day/night cycles to show the passage of time?
Does it rain or snow yet?

To me, these were the killers of the game. They have had a few patches and I was just wondering if they have even looked at any of these things.

The same here. I had fun with game, I liked the stories and the action, but I missed the virtual world feeling... 

I think devs failed in creating a good virtual world where you can play and have fun or just travel around a enjoy the world... 

Originally posted by spacebot

You guys talking about the hero engine. I've heard Bioware took an early version of it to use and didn't bother getting any updates from the hero engine people. Not saying I like/hate the hero engine; just that its poor performance in swtor is bioware's fault.

This.   The engine was still in the prototype stage when BioWare bought the rights.   BioWare really wanted the developer tools that came with the engine.    The engine and server side code...   That's all on BioWare through/from Mythic.

Originally posted by Airtaee

For my experience , the Lag spikes are totally random.

 

When i played at January, the lag was at Illum, something terrible and made the game almost unplayable (something totally normal with high population at the other hand). Bu the warzones run smoothly in a regular PC.

With my first comeback at 1.2 , somedays the things goes right, somedays not very bad... but nothing really game-breaking.The population was really low.

 

But with my last return few weeks ago, the 7 days trial... dude , the game was unplayable, I was at Red Eclipse and with a much better PC but the lag spikes was at almost every warzone. 

And it was not the population, with 3 times the population of Red Eclipse (Basilisk Droid at January ) didnt experience a lagspike at a warzone, just at Illum

 

So I think this lagspikes thing is something totally random for each player, server  and day.

I've never understood why some areas are more lagging than others. Fleet, with lots of players running around runs fine for me, Tatooine, with almost no one in the zone is really laggy and always has been. I've just upgraded to 60meg broadband and thought Tatooine might be different but it seems to make no difference. I've got 4gig of RAM so shouldn't really be having problems. My only complaint with the game is the random and unexplained lag. I can only conclude it's down to poor coding.