Star Wars: The Old Republic – State of the Game

Whats the status of the SSSP, Is it even still happening A little info would be nice of whats to come.

Regarding population balances after F2P is implemented...

Please give it some time to balance out on its own before making changes. As someone who was here for the launch of the game when many, eventually un-needed, servers were added, I would hate to see the same problems occur after the transition.

Although I enjoy the game and have from day one, 2 things are serious concerns to me.
#1- the game is too easy. WAY too easy. There is very little challenge. Huge deals (like HK-51 or operations) that should take weeks to unravel, instead take a few days if not a few hours.
#2- PvP hacks. When the opposing team can score before you even reach mid-point there is a problem. If you don't know what I'm talking about, then look on the internet. There are tons of You Tube videos showing hacks and hacking players.

In short, we need more of a challenge, and you need a little more control of what happens.

Is November considered Fall? Not all of it is in any case.
Running out of time on that one.

And about is APAC players. Thanks for nothing.
Instead of fixing the problem now and seeing how it goes and then maybe fixing it later, good to know you have taken the apathetic lazy route. Send a mail to every APAC player and ask them if they mind a server merge.
If 20% of them do, don't do it. If at least 80% do I think it's safe to assume it's the best thing to do.
You can always split them again later.

Thanks for the update. I appreciate the insight.

I was very surprised you covered the "developers leaving" topic. That's not normally an expected topic when it comes to "state of the game" as that is usually handled internally or at a company level. Interesting that you covered it.

I really like this game and I tend to stay for a while but I think we just need one more thing in game to do. I don't know what it should be or what exactly I even want at this time, but something else would be nice. I do not want some sandbox farm SWG ripoff but rather something else I can sink my time into.

Would you care to comment on PvP next time? Can anything be done for solo queues and people who want some kind of rank but don't play with a constant 7 man team?

What about the constant amount of stuns? It really does seem absurd at times. What do you think?

Thanks.

I too would like a bit more elaboration on the "bug testing". It's painfully obvious how some of the bugs couldn't have been missed and were often reported in great detail with absolutely no acknowledgement let alone fixing them. Did anyone bother playing the game before 1.4? So when the UI appears over the loading screen, what happens next? Obviously you push it to live anyway, but maybe a heads up? It's not like it was rare...it was EVERY loading screen. And the only result you get from players is "Oh boy another thing they broke. GG Bioware." If you tell people ahead of time, "Hey, our update has a few unintended effects, notably X, Y, and Z. We're working on it. Let us know if we missed anything." That would be great.

Do you guys (all of you, not just some of you, but everyone who is involved with the game) play it? Who are your characters? I imagine you couldn't tell us because you'd get mobbed in game with /whispers about pet issues. But then again, who's to say you can't just run a flashpoint, tell the group you're a dev, looking for issues with THAT flashpoint, and let them show you outright the specific things that they see on a daily basis and have them show you? You'll get a taste for class performance pretty quickly that way also.

Then maybe make all this public knowledge. The more you acknowledge the bugs and what you're doing to work on them the more loyalty you'll gain from your players. We're more likely to stick with a game that we feel a part of.

I don't mind paying my subscription - this is the best MMO out there right now. I also won't mind paying for stuff in the cash shop, provided it doesn't have an asinine price structure like the legacy unlocks do. But not all your players are as easygoing as me. Most need a bit more attention paid to them.

So do that.

Thank you for the state of the game update! I appreciate the time you took out of your day to give it.....I hope that future updates might have a bit more to them.

With your background with DAOC a great MMO and comparing the two why does SWTOR still have the problems that it does? I played DAOC for many years, I never remember as many issues as you have here with SWTOR. sure the occasional bug would creep up but it was squashed quickly.

Another issue I have is the game engine its self I have played other mmo's meeting their minimum requirements and have been able to play them on HIGH quality graphics. I meet your requirements but have to play on low quality graphics. would this be due to the game engine that you chose to use or something else? What can be done to stream line this issue?

PEOPLE!
Read better.

" I won’t get to everything all at once, but I’ll try to hit some of the big ones"

Bioware, EA, Lucas Arts/ Disney whatever, take note of the above commenters. They nailed it down.
Games like this is not only about Ops/Raids, FP's/Dungeons and WZ's/Battlegrounds. Sure, they're the main ingredient of MMORPG's alongside the conventional features, but not the magic that gets you players. Kind of like how someone who doesn't like horror movies is still going to watch a movie, but not a horror movie.
The former players you hope will return, are players who are likely playing other MMO's right now.
I believe they'll have, regarding to (new) stuff consisting of instanced group content in wich they either have to run through a predetermined path fighting the expected group of mobs, unsurprisingly closing in on the mandatory boss or fighting a bunch of other players, a stance like "seen it, been there, done that".

To add to the above quotes; pay attention to visuals. black spots in cutscenes, incompleted animations, weird animation/ cutscene sequences alongside de-evolving technical issues (features work fine on live, broken on PTS for next patch, ignored on forum, broken on live after patch, frequent and long maintenance, bye players).
And the new players, who might not even have played a MMO before, will not take crap either.

As for this article, I was expecting to see more about the effects of the Lucas Arts sale and SGRA's. Well, honestly not so much for the latter, as it seems Bioware cowards out of that. I suppose that's because this country's public opinion is swayed by Ned Flanders and his ilk.
Other than that, I would say you bravely picked up this IP. It's time you showed you still have the skill to wield Star Wars.

Props for the update. I like the transparency and I think admitting that you recognize the problems is important. I know alot here don't agree with your assessment, but I think the steps you are taking should solve some of the problems over time. F2P gets over the money burden, more content helps the boring burden. Hopefully we'll see alot more space, lifestyle games, etc as an added attraction.

Frankly I love the game. Have been frustrated at times and gone away for a week but come back. My single biggest complaint is the grinding time sinks inthe game. Taking a long run back to a boss after a wipe or having to travel back and forth across Dromund Kass or to the farthest point on Alderaan or Hoth on my 7th alt is a huge bummer. I'm practical and realize that old quests will not be changed, but I hope maybe we'll see faster speeders in the future for Legacy 50 or CC and maybe the Ops/FPS team can design shorter run backs.

I know they're coming, but more world events, randomized PVP maps, and new/varied end game PVE would be great for the game. My open question would be around crafting and if it is working the way the team envisioned.