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Star Wars: The Old Republic News - Blaine Christine Interview
Posted by Michael Bitton on Oct 20, 2009 | 6 comments in our forums
Steven Crews of the MMOGamer got a chance to sit down with BioWare's Blaine Christine, Producer on Star Wars: The Old Republic for an interview that sheds some light on some of the game's more controversial aspects.
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One of the major points the interview hits on is the rampant speculation by many MMOG fans that The Old Republic seems more like an online single-player game than a true tradtional MMOG, and Blaine Christine took some time out in the interview to address that:
The MMO Gamer: From the beginning, BioWare has always pitched story as the centerpiece of the game. But you’ve also said that this is going to be a true, “traditional” MMO—and in a traditional MMO you spend about 99.95% of your time engaged in killing things.
So, is story really the centerpiece of the game, or is it combat?
Blaine Christine: That’s a great question, and another important point: Essentially, if we break it down, and this is really rough in terms of percentage…
We’ve talked a lot about story as we’ve delivered demos over the course of the summer, but a very important message is in terms of time spent, you’ll spend more time in story in our game because we have the fully voiced system, and we have the conversation trees instead of just getting a quest from a quest-giver that is text on screen…
But in terms of how you play the game, it’s going to be a relatively small amount of time that you’re going to spend in these conversations. Let’s say roughly 10-20%. Whereas the rest of the time, we’re assuming, you’re going to be running around.
There is exploration, there is combat, it is a wide-open world. Going to have crafting and harvesting, going to have guilds and social activities…
We certainly expect you’re going to spend a lot of time doing that. We don’t want to mislead people into thinking, there’s been speculation out there, “It just looks like a single-player game!”
We’re trying to really get the message out, all of the other stuff is there, it’s just a little harder to demo that. Of course we want to demo the coolest stuff, and things that we feel is new into an MMO, but all of the other stuff is definitely going to be there.
Find out more about the single player speculation, and why anyone would want to play anything other than a Jedi in the full interview over at MMOGamer.
Thanks go out to user mrroboto40 for the tip!
That brief exert has made me feel more at ease about where they will take TOR. Now the question is will there be any space content at release or in the near future there after?
I also hope the crafting will be better decendent of the SWG form. It will probably be avaible to all characters but limited by specialty or skill point system. (Speculation, I know) I wonder if there will be other forms of non-combat skills such as gambling, like in the original games, or performance arts (ex. dancing, music, juggling etc. etc.) and of course racing?
I was a bit puzzled, did MMOGamer say: in a traditional MMO you spend about 99.95% of your time engaged in killing things. or was it part of the quote from Bioware?
To me that's the current form of what MMORPG have become, atleast to me the more traditional MMORPG's offer allot more then most of the game to be combat, else to me it's more like a Action Online Game then a MMORPG if a MMORPG has about 99,95% combat only which to me is a very limited MMORPG.
Hopefully Bioware does not follow up on this 99,95% combat, else everything else mentioned in the interview like crafting/harvesting/exploring would be about 0,05% of the game.
Overall nice interview, still feel SW:Tor might turn out a great "Game", still not convinced about it feeling like a MMORPG. Hope they proof me wrong.
Awesome Interview Indeed!!!!!
cleared a lot up
That didn't clear up anything.
"We'll be all things to all people, you don't need to know how, and if I knew how, which I don't, I couldn't tell you anyway. Trust us, we're Bioware."
"We'll have 90% combat, 90% story and 90% running around and doing other things that you do in MMO's that you don't do in Baldur's Gate."
I'm sorry, but a good MMO is about building the game from the ground up to generate interdependencies between players, to create the need for interaction, the need for community. It is not about building a single player game and putting in the ability for people to chat. Why have the ability to form a guild if there is no need for a guild or point in being in one? Did anyone really get a sense from that interview that Bioware understands and is doing something to create an MMO, in the traditional sense of having people interact?
"A Jedi is a force sensitive - the ultimate warrior ... some smugglers are also the ultimate warrior".
I don't really understand why they are bothering to consult with LucasArts. A hot-shot smuggler defeating a fully trained Jedi? Han Solo v Luke Skywalker a fair fight? I don't think so. Does LucasArts care at all about cannon, because Bioware sure don't.
I know that is fairly negative stuff. I wish it wasn't.
bioware said the 99.5%, they also said that the old republic is going to be nothing near those numbers :)
Decent interview but I am still on the fence. It just worries me that they still talk up the story in every interview knowing people are looking for details about the rest of the game and all they give are bland generalizations. For a company that wants to people to understand that there is more to their game than the story line, they arent putting much effort into showing it.