Star Wars: The Old Republic Discussion

That's a good idea. 

Still, I hope that people are being negative nancys for nothing.  I would hate to see SWtOR go away

An article that says for everyone to calm your tits

SWtOR is not dead or dying

And from Dulfy:

Roapmap Tease

*fingers crossed for good things for SWtOR and BioWare*

What I took from that Kotaku speculation is more in the lines that Bioware considers ceasing to create new content for the game, not shutting it down right away. If so, then trust me, it won’t be much different than now. We will probably even get a couple of more years of live servers before the final goodbye.

As it is, I heavily suspect that the bulk of the content we got as “new” in the past 2 years was actually developed in 2015 when it was the last time SWTOR got a lot of attention, funding and staff from EA. Just recall the plans for KOTFE, the weight of story decisions, the promised chapter length, etc., etc, etc. As it stands, the first chapters of KOTET are pretty close to what Bioware was selling us. Which is normal since those were developed first and got the most attention and polish. We went on different maps, the pacing of the missions was good, lots of decent cinematics, met different NPC’s and even many minor characters had good dialogue and screentime.

Then with the monthly release of chapters things started to go down in quality and the promises suddenly looked hollow. Obviously those chapters were meant to be worked on more between releases, but as we know, the team got downsized, many assets were forwarded to try and save the ME Andromeda bomb and the skeleton crew left in TOR probably ended with a lot of content for KOTET, KOTFE and probably the basic Iokath maps and outlines, that was done in 2015 at anywhere between 20-80 % completion. I guess the question was what to work on and what to abandon in order to keep the schedule. And it shows. As we progress in the chapters, there are less and less cinematics, less minor NPC’s worth mentioning and the gameplay quality…ho, boy. Anyone recall the Chapter where we had Satele and Marr nag us endlessly to build the ultimate weapon that is the only way to defeat Arcann? For some reason that involved running through the wild getting constantly jumped on by stealth animals that incapacitated you for 5 seconds each time. And that was the whole gimmick of the chapter to simulate length and encounters. Anyone remember using the ultimate weapon at all during the fight with Arcann? Thought so. Prime example of something that was supposed to be significant but ultimately cut.

Don’t get me started on the “KOTOR style” dialogues, which were an obvious shortcut for undeveloped content, but are a somewhat genius save, I’ll give them that.
I think the reason KOTFE ended up as less than the planned 16 chapters is lack of resources, not the “what fans asked for” excuse Bioware tried to sell. The walker sections scream “idea that wasn’t developed much, but thrown in as is because we had to use something”. Map recycling was in full force. I suspect everything we got post KOTFE is actually the planned KOTFE chapters but they were the least developed in 2015 and the team couldn’t do the proper work on them, so they had to come as standalone FPs. Still barely any work was done on them. And it shows - Iokath is a boring mess, Umbarra is a disaster in every aspect and Copero is terrible on gameplay and balance. To me they are clear examples of late “alpha” state that was pushed to be released.

We didn’t get any expansion in 2017 and we won’t get any in 2018 too. This is very unlike the previous years and says “maintenance mode”. Bioware switched fully to Anthem and if that flops, it’s game over. Even if it doesn’t flop, there is DA4 which will consume all the resources. As it stands, SWTOR didn’t receive any attention from Bioware since 2015 and the game still brings in the cash, so it’s no surprise BW considers to stop development and continue in maintenance mode like in the past 2 years.

So oblivion is preferable to some playability?

Disagree completely, enough of this third party bigger Jaws crap. It's time to get back to business.

Indeed. I'd miss FP healing but other than that I'd want to be able to replay the class stories anytime I want... you know, like every other game I'm into? Recording is all well and good but I can't record every dialog choice.

Except how would that work now, since some Pubs sided with the Empire and some Empire with the Pubs?  They 'betrayed' their faction.

Even though all of my characters so far have stayed faction loyal (I think) I have NO interest in going back to help the Republic after the way they were portrayed during this whole KOTFE/ET story.  The Empire came out looking better, but still.  No thanks.

I've said it before though, I have no idea where they go from here.  They've already turned comps into cardboard cutouts.  Our ships are empty.  Kinda in a corner at this point.

When did I say that?! I answered the question "what is happening with MMORPG that got shut down". The answer is "they disappear". I am not aware of any MMO that was shut down but remained alive just without new content. It's either constant development or nonexistence. And EA already closed 2 MMO they owned when those games stopped being profitable enough. I see no reason for them to change their attitude, considering EA is doing much better with other forms on online gaming (Anthem would be another one).


My dream about SWTOR remains the same - transforming that beautiful game into single player one. I would buy it again gladly.

From the SWTOR forums:

KeithKanneg
Today , 12:55 PM | #1 This is the last staff post in this thread.

Hey all,

As Musco mentioned in the Live Stream yesterday, we’re busy working on an update to the Roadmap which should be available in mid-February. Keep in mind, we’ve just released Game Update 5.7, so expect the Roadmap to give you insight about the next 90 days or so.

I’m not ready to discuss all of the summer events and beyond that we’re planning. And, I definitely will not provide any information on what’s included in 6.0 . So, as always, hang in there, and we’ll provide you with what’s going on with SWTOR!

For the many of you who have asked privately, yes, I'm doing great, but December and January are typically very busy months for us with all the planning activities. Personally, I've been playing quite a bit, and am focused on crafting Superior Augments for my characters. Hopefully, I'll reach Elite Warlord on my 2nd character, very soon, and to be honest, I'm pretty happy with all the changes we made this past year for Galactic Command.

Will update you soon,

Keith---


It's better than nothing.  I'm guessing he posted this in an effort to dampen down some of the hysteria.  The forums are downright ridiculous right now.  People are morons.

So is there anything in 5.7 for players who don't raid, or who's mains aren't a smuggler or inqusitor?

Not going to predict anything, but have to say Keith's post did not convince me. Did not we hear about MEA DLC that everything is fine, right until it's cancellation was officially announced? Do you see anywhere EA-BW post with direct answer "no, no one is discussing SWTOR closing"? And that's with over 20 threads on off-forums about the question! You can say "they do not want to agitate someone by admitting they payed attention to Kotaku article". But a) "someone" is already agitated, b. information came from the guy who warned us about MEA DLC, c) silence to the last minute is typical for any corporation (game-companies are double so because of cash shops).

We do know for sure that every creative body is thrown on the Anthem development right now and SWTOR is right now on the maintenance mod. For me the question is, would that maintenance period (until Anthem is released) be profitable enough for EA to give the game another chance after that.

Call me a doomsayer, but signs are not good. We will see what they can show us in February.

Welp got 300 on my agent last night and she's decked out in 242s (and 244 boots). I'm calling that a clear win. It's amazing the difference that can make. HMs are becoming routine now (though it also helps that mostly people who know what they're doing are queuing for those) Incidentally, FP run, Kaidan Fan et al?

Now the thought of grinding all that on other characters...

True, given the type of RPGS people are looking for; well written chars, excellently voiced, in-depth lore and great gameworld that's largely their very own creative tapestry and not adapted from any novels / sources, Bioware still stands at the top though they really blotted their copybook with ME3 and Andromeda. The last really spectacularly. That is their fault since they painted themselves into a corner. It's not surprising gamers are looking at them with a questioning eye. Can they still do it? I wouldn't like Bioware to prove that they couldn't do it any more with DA4.

If it comes to that, then other devs will take over. I can think of one which showed promise and likely could shoulder the mantle; Larian Studios. 

I really like how the Lethality Operative feels. I like the general mobility (although you obviously mostly have to stay in melee range to keep shivving them) and there's something satisfying to me about triggering those bursts once you get your DoTs up. Madness Sorc a close second and the one I'm probably the most used to (outside of tank Guardian, but that's not in the discussion for my favorite class/playstyle). I guess I pretty heavily skew towards specs that heavily feature DoTs, although at least I think they feel completely different from one another in spite of having some similarities.