They were making this game a long time ago.
By John Walker on January 12th, 2012.
James Ohlen is a senior creative director at BioWare, and has spent the last six years working on Star Wars: The Old Republic. We spoke to him to find out how he thinks the launch has gone, how the game is being received, and what we can expect to see in the first update, due next week.
By John Walker on January 12th, 2012.
Next week’s update for Star Wars: The Old Republic is to be called Rise Of The Rakghouls, and plans to add some major new content to the game, focusing on story-heavy features. Senior Creative Director James Ohlen explained to us in an interview we’re posting very soon that along with “a lot of bug fixes and modifications”, there would be the titular new story-focused flashpoint, as well as expanding Karagga’s Palace to have five times as many bosses (five). And this is just the first of many updates they’re already working on. March promises a new planet, warzone, operation, guild banks… And then there’s the updates they’re already working on for next year. You can see the accompanying trailer below.
By John Walker on January 9th, 2012.
For all the grumbles you may have read, Star Wars: The Old Republic is undoubtedly one of the most remarkably complete and solid MMO releases we’ve seen so far. It’s where most MMOs get in about six months. And this patch adds more content. But there are still things to fix, and the first major patch (ie. one that doesn’t just remove an exploit) is due very soon. In fact, as Eurogamer point out it’s been released on the test servers, which means we know what’s in it.
By Alec Meer on January 4th, 2012.
Taptaptap. Is this thing on? One, two, one two. Hello mum. One two. Two. Two. Two. And she’s buyyyyyyyying a stairway to heavennnnnnnnnn. One two, one two. Okay, 2012 is go!
I’ve occasionally wondered what it would have been like had RPS been around back when World of Warcraft first launched. The excitement, the moaning about queues and bugs and griefers and customer support, the mad little adventures in a new world. SWTOR offers a taste of what might have been, though the deep familiarity of EA’s MMO means RPS as a whole hasn’t been able to conjure the drooling desperation to play that we had for WoW back in the day. I am quite sure, however, that we would have found all sorts of things like this to post about – an exploit that keeps your character safe from harm if you can activate a safety dance in time.
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By John Walker on January 2nd, 2012.
Well this is all jolly interesting. Remember the story about Star Wars: The Old Republic banning a player because he’d been to Ilum at too low a level, and been looting the containers? And remember how it looked pretty dodgy, and was probably a fake? Well here’s the thing: it wasn’t. It was real. But, as you might imagine, there were a few details missed out.
By John Walker on January 1st, 2012.
Oh goodness me, can this really be true? A pic of an email is circulating this morning purporting to be a communication from EA, informing a player that their account has been banned from playing Star Wars: The Old Republic, because their character visited, and looted within, a high level area. Because, they say, this violates their terms of service. If this proves to be the case, and that’s purely the reason, it may be the most ridiculous EA ban yet. However, there are a lot of reasons to assume it’s either a fake, or things are a lot more complicated. Take a look.
Hate leads to the fun side
By John Walker on December 22nd, 2011.
Ever since I became the Bastard Of The Old Republic, I’ve found it an awful lot easier to delve into the crueller side of gaming choices. So it is that I’ve chosen to spend my time with Star Wars: The Old Republic as a Sith. And not some stupid do-gooding Sith who just happened to be born on the wrong side of the galaxy. I mean a Sith, cruel for the sake of being cruel, delighting in mindlessly murdering innocents and needlessly upsetting everyone I meet. And in the game. And in doing so, I’m discovering that making an entire race of baddies is a pretty tricky challenge.
By John Walker on December 22nd, 2011.
Edit: Turns out you can’t redeem codes anyway, as that’s broken at the moment. A lot of players are a touch upset that their 30 days free with the game aren’t actually accessible until you enter payment details to pay for the next month.
Aaaand now my patience has run out. As if the extensive hours-long queues to get in to play Star Wars: The Old Republic weren’t frustrating enough (that’s if the game’s online to let you play, of course), now BioWare/EA’s infrastructure can’t cope with people trying to visit their website. I have never, in my life, ever seen a queue to visit a website before. Yet that’s the position I’m in, trying to enter a code so I can carry on playing the bloody game. A queue I can’t seem to win at.
By John Walker on December 22nd, 2011.
Fancy a game of Star Wars: The Old Republic? Well tough, because the servers are all down this morning until 12pm, for scheduled maintenance work. And this isn’t the first time. In what appears to be a very strange decision for such a high profile game, European servers are all being taken offline for hours during the daytime, for a game that’s only just launched. And even more strange – doing this takes down the entire www.swtor.com website too, meaning anyone wanting to say, learn about the game, can’t. And then you notice this is an international thing, and Europe starts to look a little unloved.
By John Walker on December 21st, 2011.
We at RPS know what it’s like to be too popular. Unable to walk from our Limousines to the exclusive clubs and restaurants we frequent without being assaulted by mobs of screaming, frantic fans, we completely understand the challenge it offers. And BioWare/EA are discovering the same with Star Wars: The Old Republic. The queues: they are long.
Which is a bit of a shame in your first week. With queues for servers sometimes stretching to over two hours, it is a bit offputting. And BioWare are warning it’s not going to get better soon.
By Alec Meer on December 20th, 2011.
Today’s the day, then. The day the world finally discovers if EA’s long-gestating, mega-hyped Star Wars MMO is KOTOR 3+, WoW in space, Galaxies without the madness, a Wookiee or a Jawa, a winner or a loser, an Empire Strikes Back or a Phantom Menace, a Sarlaac or a Hutt. (I don’t even know which of those is better). Many John Walkers died to bring us thoughts on the game, which we hope to have next week. I too have a copy I plan to look at as soon as humanly/wookieely possible, though I’ve been too busy breaking my beloved record player today to get started as yet.
So, who’s in, who’s out, who’s Light side, who’s Dark side, who’s loving it, who’s hating it and who’s going to waste everyone’s time by posting ‘meh’ and having it silently deleted a few seconds later? Also, below is an eight-minute ‘launch documentary’, which is a fancy way of saying ‘advert.’ Warning: it seems to auto-play, which I can’t work out how to stop. Sorry.
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