195 replies to this topic

[Amy-chan]

I might not be getting it exactly on that day but like a few days after I will be.

[Paradox Jast]

When the time comes, send me a PM. I'm probably going to preorder after my next paycheck, and I might drag my brother (or brothers) with me wherever I go.

[shadow_Uzumaki]

What's this I got in my email today? Wait, it says... I have been accepted to test Old Republic? Huh...OMG!

[Cloud]

What's this I got in my email today? Wait, it says... I have been accepted to test Old Republic? Huh...OMG!

I got one too! Lets go!

[shadow_Uzumaki]

I got one too! Lets go!

Lol, downloading it now. It'll take a bit. Though my account name in their website is shadowy_warrior.


Also, goddamn it... I have a math test and Interpersonal Communications Final tomorrow..., terrible, terrible timing, Bioware.... But no school for Veterans' Day!

Edited by shadow_Uzumaki, 09 November 2011 - 10:33 PM.

[Muffins?]

I got in too, shoot me a pm if anyone wants to play.

[Burning_Wulf]

Got one to. Just hope my laptop can handle it.

[Cloud]

How big is the download?

[Paradox Jast]

I got one too. D/L was 20 GB.

[shadow_Uzumaki]

So I finish the download this morning, and I can't play! Hrm...must be the weekend date I saw with the email.

Anyone else get a date with their email invite?

My testing schedule starts this Friday.

Edited by shadow_Uzumaki, 10 November 2011 - 02:30 PM.

[Muffins?]

So I finish the download this morning, and I can't play! Hrm...must be the weekend date I saw with the email.

Anyone else get a date with their email invite?

My testing schedule starts this Friday.

Yeah the schedule I got was from the eleventh to the thirteenth.

[shadow_Uzumaki]

Alright! While my brother plays Skyrim on the weekends, I'll (hopefully) be playing the beta all weekend!!

Here's hoping I see you guys play, too.

I'll most likely be a goody-two shoes Light Sider... Not sure what class I'll pick yet though.

[Paradox Jast]

Of course, since it's a stress test, I wouldn't be surprised if the game is unplayable. heh

"Due to an unprecedented number of connections, we find ourselves having to boot up extra servers. Please standby."


I would not be surprised....

[Cloud]

Won't be able to play it. Bandwidth is quite low.

I'll wait until the game comes out.. tell me how it goes, gents.

[shadow_Uzumaki]

Is it still unavailable? My Play button is greyed out.

Never mind, just found out it actually starts at 5 PM CST....

Edited by shadow_Uzumaki, 11 November 2011 - 10:18 PM.

[No WhereMan]

Ok, of course some of you know that BioWare had unleashed massive beta invites for Star Wars: The Old Republic. I like many others had a wonderful chance of participating in this beta test and I have to say I enjoyed my time there immensely. I will even go as far to say that it probably was one of my most enjoyable times I had on a MMO.


Since this is the first time I'm going to be delivering this type of review, please bear with me. I figured I'd state what areas I'm going to be grading the game on. Basically the areas that I will be going over will be:

1. Graphics- the visuals of the game, Cinemas, lighting effects, etc.
2. Sound- Sound effects for the game, as well as voice acting and the musical score.
3. Controls- The handling of the game.
4. Story- Plot of the game, side quest storylines and such...
5. Classes- Keep in mind this part is going to be slightly limited just because I was fiending to try the force user classes.
6. Overall- Basically, my final opinion of the game

Another thing to keep in mind, I would normally put in a section for pvp but I'd only played one game of TOR's battlegrounds so I couldn't really give you a good insight on how pvp will work, especially since I haven't gotten a chance to do any world pvp.


Graphics: B+ - Ok, if any of you have been playing even the slightest bit of attention you'll know that TOR has taken a slightly more cartoonish approach to their character designs oppose to the more realistic approach to their previous KOTOR games. Honestly I didn't find so much of an issue with that as I continued playing. Originally, I'd prefer to have a more realistic image, but I then realized that it's probably easier designing the character modeling with a more cartoonish approach. Either way, the character models don't look any worst then what you would see in the Clone Wars tv show. In fact it looks almost exactly like it. Also I'll be honest with you, after a few hours playing I hardly paid attention to the character design.

Cinemas: Outside of the amazing openers you have for the beginning of the game. TOR features several mid-game cinemas. There are some clipping involved, (IE sometimes some polygons slide through each other. Or the light that shines on a dead mob that indicates that it has loot on it, is several spaces away from the mob) Most of the graphic errors I saw wouldn't hinder overall gameplay and most likely be tightened up by release or shortly after.

Something else I wanted to touch on while I played the game. TOR, has seemed to establish a feeling of having depth in it's game. An example of what I mean, Typhon the starter world for both Jedi classes, is very massive. The Jedi Temple they have on Typhon has hallways where you can travel in. Classrooms where NPCs are looking at lessons. In the front they have other padawans training lightsaber attacks. Coruscant, has several different levels you can roam around in. In one spot you can go to the republic embassy, another spot you can go to a transit station, another spot you can go to a cantina and watch dancing twi'lek girls. (HAWT!) And yet another area you can get attacked by several groups of mobs.

The game makes each world seem like a real world. I was only sadden by the fact I wasn't able to go to more to to look around.

Sound: A Because lucasart has anything to deal with it, you know the sound is going to be a major thing. Sound effects replicate everything perfectly from the movies, the lightsabers hum, the blaster fire. I'm not 100% certain but I even think I heard a Wilhelm scream. Basically the game sounds like how you'd expect a Star Wars game to sound like.

Voice Acting: I mean what more can you expect from a game that boasts for thousands of hours of spoken dialogue, not to mention BioWare is at the helm, the voice acting is spot on. You hear a lot of the classic VAs from BioWare's passed games. I hear the guy that did Carth Onasi, Edward Asner, Steve Blum, Cam Clarke. A few others that I recognize from something just can't pin down where. Even the NPCs that don't any anything to do with what you're doing, if you click on them, they speak a little blarmb of something.

Score: Yes, the iconic star wars theme is there. And yes, they queue it up when the action is at it's greatest. I like what they did with the music here. You'll hear all of the themes played during the movies. Some somber like when you're walking through a clearing going to your next destination. Some fast and exciting when you're fighting through a group of mobs. I know the BioWare has thrown the word around a few times in their interviews but I'll support it. The game feels cinematic a good deal of the time. Like you're the star of your own movie. And the sounds, voice acting, and musical scores really add to that illusion.

Controls: B+ Controls for me was an interesting thing, because I'm used to playing WoW, (held an account since closed beta). Anyway, control is a big thing in a game especially when you pvp a lot. Which made it interesting for me when I started playing TOR. Let me explain...

TOR, uses the basic hotkey system made more popular by WoW. They do have some major differences though. One major difference, something i didn't realize for a while in the game, there is no auto-attack in TOR. I mean anyone that's played WoW or a large amount of other games can tell you, you click on a mob you'll do your auto-swing and it will either kill the mob (after a long time mind you) or the mob will just snap your character in half for the wasted attempt. In TOR it goes a bit differently. You're character instead has somewhat of an auto-defense type of thing. Meaning it will automatically start blocking and parrying the blows that rain upon it. It also has an auto reflect, for ranged attacks like blasters.

Now, the only way you can stop the mob is by physically pressing the right hotkeys to start your attacks on the mob. An interesting tactic I have to say. It makes for interesting displays in combat. Not to mention the attacking animation puts you closer into the actions.

Like i said, it took me a while to figure this out, because at first I was really disappointed with the lack of tightness with the control. After finally figured that out. I realized that the game is remarkably responsive. Decently on par with WoW's control.


Story:A+++ Finally story. This is the area where this game not only shines but is luminescent. There is so much damn story in this game, it makes me want to cry manly tears of joy. I've never enjoyed basic questing more so than while playing TOR.

It's not the fact that they've done more than the basic formula. You will have your gather this many items, or you need to kill a certain amount of a mob. What TOR does that's different from other games, is it gives you a reason to want to do these things. You, have a rich story outlining why it's important for you to gather these things. People are relying on you. This mystery can't be solved unless you get involved. I can honestly say, after playing through ten levels of the game, I honestly felt like I accomplished something. That I somehow (even though it's game induced) made a difference.

That's something that's no other game up and till now, has been able to do. TOR puts well drawn out storyline that interweaves the player into what's going on in the world. Another thing that's important to note. Every class has their own completely main storyline. For instance, a Jedi Consular will be on Typhon trying to complete a storyline that's completely different from a Jedi Knight. They might meet up later with a Smuggler on Coruscant and each of them would have 3 different reasons why they need to be on the planet.

Now keep in mind, not all of the quests are class specific, just the main storyline quests. Eitherway, it's a huge step to a completely enriching experience.

Classes: C+ Now with all that positive stuff you're probably expecting it to carry over to all categories. Well, I can't exactly say that. I have some problems with how BioWare decided to design the classes here. Once again, I'm only going to speak on the Jedi/Sith classes because those are the ones I've had the most playtime with. Either way, I think my insight is a little bit valid.

First real issue I had with the class choices. Not every race is available for every class. This disappointed me greatly, because I so wanted to make a Twi'lek Sith Warrior, just like Darth Talon. This also greatly reduced the character combination you can come up with.

Another major gripe that I have is with the Jedi classes in general. One there is a high emphasis with dual-wielding lightsabers and saberstaff wielding over the traditional single saber. With BioWare claiming that they were paying so close attention to the Star Wars Lore in general, I wonder why that major detail was overlooked. I personally feel and this was shared in the KOTOR games. Any of the force using class should be able to use any combination of the lightsaber. I also wished they brought back the duelist (emphasis on single-weapon combat) style to the game. I was looking on the forums and a good amount of people supported my view, hopefully BioWare will loosen up on this area or I feel like the Jedi/Sith classes won't be complete.


Overall: A- Despite my gripes with the race/class combinations and the handling of the lightsabers, I feel like BioWare did a marvelous job. I thoroughly enjoyed my time in the beta and eagerly await for the official release.

Will SW:TOR topple the current MMO giant World of Warcraft? In my opinion not in the slightest. WoW is like a dynasty now. It's got 3 expansions, dozens of patch updates, and already several million subscribers.

What I think TOR will bring is a higher standard with gameplay, which might actually effect WoW more greatly than anything else.

Edited by No WhereMan, 14 November 2011 - 12:25 AM.

[Cloud]

Thanks for the review, man. I couldn't get a chance to play it due to my bandwidth limits...

Your review just makes me want to play it more now.

December, get here quicker! I want my collector's edition. And then after SWTOR, its Guild Wars 2.

[Paradox Jast]

From the other side of the spectrum, I played along with my brother pretty much all day yesterday. I was a bounty hunter and grouped up with him, and Imperial Agent. I share many of the same opinions as NoWhereMan, the game definitely gets an A so far. There are still graphics missing, clipping issues, etc... but they still have a month to polish it before the game finally goes live.

Here is what I can add to the convo, from a non-jedi perspective (as Empire):

The two classes are very well balanced, even in PvP. My brother (who chose Imperial Agent) eventually reached level 10 and chose to take the sniper path. They focus on large damage with big cooldowns, and can also use things like grenades and flashbangs.

I went the route of bounty hunter. Oh - another thing - each class gets it's own 'storyline' to follow. So your main story is instanced when you have an important mission. So none of that waiting for crap to respawn. If you are the owner of an instance, you can also have your group enter with you, which is nice.

As for my bounty hunter, you start off with simple things like blaster shots and missile. As you level up you gain abilities, just like in WoW. So eventually I got things like a Rail Shot (high velocity/high impact shot which can usually 1-shot a stunned target), flamethrower, rocket punch, Death From Above (fly up with the jetpack and launch missiles at an area), delayed explosive darts, and shock darts.

Once you reach approx. level 8, you gain your first companion. That is, a character that will follow you around and do things for you (or with you) such as crafting and gathering resources from missions you assign them. They can also join you in combat, though are obviously much weaker than you and only come with a handful of abilities. My first companion, Mako, had a healing ability which really came in handy sometimes.

My brother and I also managed to do the first instance, just the two of us. It took us about 45 minutes and we wiped once (it is intended for 4 people) but we still managed to pull it off with two. The boss fights had some easy exploits, mostly as a result of line-of-sight issues where I could get aggro, run behind a pillar, and then the enemy would just stand there and do nothing but shoot at it and not hit me. This let my brother and our companions kill it.

As for PvP, the only thing we did was some strange sort of CTF. You get buffed so you have like 10x the normal amount of health, this way fights aren't over in two seconds. Jedi can be really, really annoying to fight with all of their absorbing of blasters and push-backs. The bounty hunter is probably one of the highest DPS classes, but having to chew through shields takes a lot of time and I had no defenses or heals, so it gets frustrating.

The story is very good - and it only gets better. Especially as a bounty hunter, when I get actual legit bounties to go after. I saw the random bounty generators in the game, though they didn't seem to be active yet. I wonder if players will be able to place bounties on each other? That would be intriguing.

I wonder what level you get your own ship as well. I saw a few spaceship upgrade vendors, but nothing relating to any ships themselves. The same for ground vehicles. There is a taxi system like in WoW, but with speederbikes and swoops instead of bats and gryphons.


Thats about all for now. When the game goes live, my brother and I are probably gonna be looking for people to play and do instances with. Guilds costs 5000 creds to make, too... so it can't be some instant thing. Oh... and we're also planning on playing Sith... so that may be a problem if everyone else goes Republic.

[Cloud]

Well, Paradox. Looks like we may be at odds.... but I'll enter the Dark Side this once.

I'll be joining you in battle as a Sith lightsaber user.

[No WhereMan]

Well, Paradox. Looks like we may be at odds.... but I'll enter the Dark Side this once.

I'll be joining you in battle as a Sith lightsaber user.

I'll be up front with you. If you plan on doing most of your fighting with lightsaber combat, then look to the Sith warrior. If not and you favor the force powers/force lightning approach. Then look to Sith inquisitor.