Hey Gizmo

Yeah, been testing out PTS 1.2, and have to say the other UI changes are great. AND they seem to have increased overall performance with all settings on full bore (for me at least). So chat bubbles may be hot on the heels of this update! I hope LOL.

Hey Gizmo

 

Yeah, been testing out PTS 1.2, and have to say the other UI changes are great. AND they seem to have increased overall performance with all settings on full bore (for me at least). So chat bubbles may be hot on the heels of this update! I hope LOL.

IT figures they were removed, you cant even open the crew skill windows without a 2 second lag. I can imagine every time you say something your character freezes.

Yeah, never saw such crappy coded game.

Chat bubbles are in 1.2!!!!!!!!!

April fools.

Chat bubbles are in 1.2!!!!!!!!!

Are they? I though they were nowhere near ready.

Are they? I though they were nowhere near ready.

I hope chat bubbles will be in Game Update 1.3 or hopefully earlier. I'm loosing patience and my finger is gravitating towards the account cancellation button as I just can't enjoy myself without chat bubbles, no matter how hard I try.

If they don't exist by the time my renew is up (and a couple other issues still persist by then), I wont be renewing.

Dear Mister Schubert, in case you're reading this:

Now that Game Update 1.2 is live, can we get some news on how chat bubbles are progressing and an roughly estimated time of arrival?

/Signed

I miss chat bubbles. They make the game more lively. I hate having to just read everything in the chat window because it's very dull.

/Signed

/signed

I miss this feature very much, and find I avoid most large RP gatherings because of how confusing and difficult it is to maintain a conversation or follow another.

/signed

Theres no harm in chat bubbles. Who wouldnt want them could just turn them off.

/signed

Every MMO I have ever played had them (except EVE for obvious reasons), no reason to make a brand new one without them. City of Heroes/Villains even let you customize the colors of your chat bubbles, could color text, outline, and background of each character's chat bubbles.

/signed

As a strong Rpers from The Progenitor I support this idea. It's unbelievable a game with such a great story and a background which motivates so much role-playing doesn't care about the main features of this way to play. Even in Diablo 2 there was a support for chat bubbles!

/signed

Would really like to see this as an option to improve roleplaying.

Dear developers and other employees of Bioware, Lucas Arts and Electronic Arts!

 

A large part of the player base cannot enjoy the game properly because of the lack of chat bubbles. Therefore, on behalf of the affected players, we are hereby suggesting and formally requesting an option to toggle chat bubbles for spatial chat (/say, /yell, /emote). This thread has started in beta, reposted after the forum wipe and run a long time and has garnered a lot of support ever since. The community has come up with a lot of ideas on how to improve the situation. The following is what we propose:

 

Here are bullet points of what'sbeen suggested/proposed by the players:

• Add chat bubbles for /say, /yell and /emote chat that display whatever is said in these chat channels in addition to the chat window over the head of the player character that is saying it (both over your own as well as characters around yours).
  Preferably have them enabled by default.
  
• Add a client-side option to toggle chat bubbles on/off for any text players type in /say, /yell and /emote chat to Preferences->Chat.
  This allows every player to decide for themselves whether they would like to see chat bubbles or not for whatever reason.
  
• Add talking animations that triggers when typing into /say and /yell to visualize that the character is currently talking or shouting.
  Existing character animations may be reused for this, like the one used by the /talk emote.
  
• Lower the range of /say to 25 meters (currently 40 meters) and keep the range of /yell at 50 meters.
  This has proven a good range for spatial chat in other MMOs to prevent clutter.
  
• Add a slider to allow people to freely and indivudally adjust the range at which chat bubbles disappear from maximum range for each chat channel down to a couple of meters.
  This will allow players to find a good compromise between the amount of chat bubbles, clutter and performance for their individual taste and computer.
  
• Chat bubbles for each chat channel/type should have a different appearance style
  Take a look what other MMORPGs like Star Wars Galaxies (still one of the best implementations of chat bubbles in MMORPGs to date) and/or comics typically use for what people say (bubble with rounded edges and tail that points to the character that says it), yell/shout/scream (jagged bubble with longer tail) and "emotes" (square bubble, maybe even without a tail) to distinguish between the various chat channels.
  Chat bubbles could also be sporting the same hue/color (be it border or background, depends on the style you choose) each chat channel is assigned to on your client.
  

 

Here is a short summary of the reasons why chat bubbles should be implemented:

• Chat bubbles encourage face to face interactions with other players.
  
• They encourage multiplay instead of solo-play - most desirable in a MMO.
  
• Chat bubbles improve communication and group/Ops group coordination between players.
  
• They help to build and strengthen community, which is the main reason that keeps people playing and stay loyal to a MMO(RP)G for many years and even decades, even when the PVE and PVP content has run it's course.
  
• They allow people to focus on the world in front of them, and not a tiny chat window in a corner or anywhere else but near the center of the screen.
  
• The fast scrolling chat window is impossible to follow conversations while in an area with a large amount of people.
  
• Chat bubbles greatly improve immersion into the game world (click here to read a post explaining how if you don't understand).
  
• The game world seems to be less sterile and more alive when you can actually see player characters talking.
  
• Making new chat channels is not a useful alternative.
  
• People with various visual impairments rely on chat bubbles in MMOs to be able to communicate and play with other players.
  
• Without chat bubbles, roleplay and socializing is nearly impossible especially in crowded areas, it's tedious and simply is not fun - especially in areas where there are many people or during questing and other parts of the game.
  
• Chat bubbles help to pinpoint and find people that are talking in spatial chat in large and crowded areas.
  
• Chat bubbles benefits many players with all kinds of playstyles - be it socializers, roleplayers, Group/Flashpoint/Operations PVE players and PVP combatants (that don't rely on voice chat) among others.
  
• A large amount of the player base want chat bubbles as an option. Bioware said they are implementing player's wishes - this is a top priority wish/issue for a large part of the player base.
  
• Chat bubbles have been a standard feature in almost every mainstream, premium priced MMO released during the past decade that a whole lot of players are used to. There also hasn't been anything invented that's remotely capable of fully replacing chat bubbles for communication between players in MMO(RP)Gs yet (text to speech technology combined with positional audio is still far off from sounding natural).
  
• People have started to cancel their subscriptions due to the lack of chat bubbles and missing official assurance by Bioware that they are being implemented soon.
  
• /say and /yell chat channels are practically useless without chat bubbles. They are like /general with lower range.
  
• Having a client side option to freely turn chat bubbles on or off to each player's liking will allow every player to enjoy the game, whether they need chat bubbles or not.
  Everyone has fun, everyone is happy, everyone wins!

 

Related Links:

Sprechblasen!!

German discussion of this thread / Deutsche Diskussion dieses Threads

 

Roleplaying Suggestions [Chat Bubbles, Char Creator, Clothing, and more!]

Suggestions of features roleplayers want to have added in this game. Includes chat bubbles and many other items.

 

Official Q&A Thread for February 24th, 2012 Q&A Blog Post

Thread to post questions that will be answered to the devs in a blog post. Make sure to ask about chat bubbles in that thread if you want them in the game and/or want to know what their status is. The more people ask about chat bubbles, the better the chance the developers will finally take notice and give us an update on them.

 

 

Chat Bubbles: Sorely missed and badly needed

Article about missing chat bubbles in The Old Republic.

 

Fan Site Summit: Day 1 -- Q&A with James Ohlen

Fan Site Summit 2 Q&A Wrap-Up

Articles about the Fansite Summits from November 2011, where Bioware's Studio creative director

James Ohlen

promised chat bubbles to be a

"high priority in BioWare's list of things to do"

. On a side note,

Georg Zoeller

confirmed this on the beta forums as well by posting

"chat bubbles are a high-priority feature for launch or shortly thereafter" around the same timeframe

.

 

Interview: BioWare’s Cory Butler and the Future of Star Wars: The Old Republic

An interview with Bioware's

Cory Butler

from January 2012 which has the first official mention of chat bubbles since

James Ohlen

talking about them at the Fansite Summit and

Georg Zöller

confirming it on the beta forums in November 2011.

When asked about chat bubbles in the interview,

Butler

awkwardly avoids the topic by simply saying

"I can’t really go into the specifics about chat bubbles just yet."

.

 

Community Q&A: Feb 17th 2012

Bioware's Damion Schubert confirmed that chat bubbles will be implemented in the February 17th 2012 Community Q&A post:

"They're definitely on the list. We’ve got many active roleplayers in the dev team and chat bubbles have always been important to us. We actually had chat bubbles in beta, but there was unfortunately some serious performance issues that our implementation caused that, for example, made things really suck in warzones and the fleet. They’ll be coming soon, but in priority, the GUI team is focused first on GUI customization. I'll have a better idea of timing once we get past that. And yes, for people who hate them, whenever we do them, they'll be toggleable."

 

 

 

The old, prose version for those that like to read:

What he said! Mostly..

Talking Animations, Chat Bubbles for /say and /yell mostly, I'm sure BioWare are aware of how important these things are, in the last 4 months they've seen many people want that and have replied to chat bubbles directly in one of their Q&A, lets hope all the other stuff gets in too!