Would that WoW told the story like SWTOR did

[ravenmoon]

so i was playing through levelling a Trooper Vanguard, and was again struck at how cinematic this game plays, and how cool the story is, - you certainly feel like a hero, and you feel your actions have good and understanble reasons. There is so much engaging you in thestory line that makes going out and blasting and using your cool abilities that more special.

then i thought of wow and the new updated models and the rich lore /diversity, and was just thinking if only they could pull off telling a story with the same sort of finnesse in-game like they do on SWTOR, close ups on quests, with camera angles and what not, character lips properly synced to words, to add to the good story line and great voice acting you typically get.

it would be so cool, cos wow really has such a nice atmosphere and feel - which is largely thanks to the art team, the music team and the work of the lore team of WC3 , which sets the foundation for nearly all the depth we see in wow. Sadly it has come off a bit aimlessly listless at times, but the systems team also deserves credit not just for making wow fun, but the themes of the classes, do add a lot of character as do the races, but it's so sad that they don't play a meaningful role for what they are in the story you unfold. There is no difference in being any class in wow, or any race or any gender. THe only difference as far as the story in wow is concerned is if you're horde or alliance.

and this is a bit of a shame given how rich the back drop is for both race and class, and the scores of information and depth of what they are and mean, even to the effect of having racial capital cities and everything, it's there, but not used in the story . And whiles you have some cool storylines like the Forsaken cataclysm one, it is still under-utlisized grossly compared to the sheer detail and scale you see the art team goes into for the environment or the sound/music team goes in for the score, and you just feel with 11 classes and lots of different activities and combat experiences throughout, the lore team has kinda not measured up the same calibre of WoW factor the other teams have.

IF wow lore team were going for WOW factor, something on the scale of detail you get in SWTOR for the story is what they would have been gunning for. WoW could voice very quest in there and provide camera angles when you engage an npc like Swtor does and it still would be only a fraction of the audio experience we have in swtor, because there are no conversation options, and your character doesn't actually say anything. And even if your character was given lines, again - it's the same lines in voices of the different races and gender that respond, there are NO choice options, and it's the NPC remains the same so it doesn't have to change - and they won't do it.

Such a shame.

[Champagne Supernova]

I suppose that's one of the bad reasons of launching almost 11-12 years ago compared to nowadays. There's no way they would resurface past content just to add voice acted dialogue to it, and seeing how much flak they got for re-vamping 1-60 content during Cata instead of focusing on making a good expansion probably means they would be very hesitant to touch old quest content without some lore quest nerd bitching about it. People even bitched about the cinematic's in Cata on certain quest zones, if they bitch at that, surely voice acted quests will only add to the fire.

It's the reverse effect in Star Wars though, people love the story voice acted quests but bitch and moan about endgame content. So it's not a surprise to see Bioware cater 100% to the story and purely release an expansion dedicated to just that, with just a few flashpoints and operations so the story ends up as the main focus. So seeing how Endgame raiding is WoW's focus, the developers are mainly going to focus their attention in that specific area which appeases people the most. rather than re-visit or create new voice acted standard quest content, which let's be honest, people most of the time skip anyway.

[Darth Belichick]

EA and/or Bioware is actually being smart and listening to their fan base. Yes, some people do hardcore ops and clear all hard modes. However, the majority stick to Story Mode ops and level alts and the like as they prefer the story side to the end game stuff. I'm one of them. I enjoy doing my flashpoints and occasional ops on my 60 sentinel, but overall I'm really enjoying the story aspect of other characters.

[Deleted]

When it comes to story telling, and feeling you're in a living world when you level SW:ToR is head and shoulders above WoW in my experience. And probably most other MMO's.

But that was always the focus when they started the game, which you could see as the endgame was still very much unpolished.

Now for a long time they were sort of riding the start, but not much happened with regards to new stories (Revan and Ziost were good but short) but it seems they're going back to that now, which will be pretty awesome.

[Frontenac]

It would be hard to turn WoW in a kind of SW:TOR. WoW is a faction based game in which races are important, contrary to SW:TOR where they are mostly cosmetic. So you would have to choose if the stories would be based on classes or on races. If they are class-based, that would mean up to 22 stories (eleven stories for eleven classes in both factions). If they are race-based, that means 14 stories for each of the 14 races of the game. It is a lot of stories in both cases.

What I would like is a fully voiced RPG in a Warcraft setting. It could be called Legends of Warcraft. It would be online, with new chapters or even new stories downloaded regularly. They could begin with two stories for each faction. The stories would be based on race. The Night Elf story would be about the Night Elves and in the Night Elves point of view. To begin, I would take Human, Night Elf, Orc and Undead. There would be three classes which would work much like KotOR : one warrior-type (like the Guardian), one caster-type (like the Consular) and one in the middle ground. Their names would change depending on the race. Ex. : Human choices could be Paladin, Rogue and Mage, while the Night Elves would have Sentinel, Druid and Priest(ess) of the Moon. Their could be companions as in both KotOR and SW:TOR.

Or they could choose to base their stories off both races and classes : the Legend of Stormhoof, the Tauren Shaman or the Legend of Anoria, the Blood Elf Mage.

There could be even neutral races. I would love to play as a Centaur or a Quilboar. Maybe even a demon of the Legion or a Death Knight of the Scourge.

[derpkitteh]

EA and/or Bioware is actually being smart and listening to their fan base. Yes, some people do hardcore ops and clear all hard modes. However, the majority stick to Story Mode ops and level alts and the like as they prefer the story side to the end game stuff. I'm one of them. I enjoy doing my flashpoints and occasional ops on my 60 sentinel, but overall I'm really enjoying the story aspect of other characters.

speaking of storymode ops... i'd like a true story mode op. where you go in with soldiers under your command and complete the op completely solo. no loot, maybe, or maybe something cosmetic? idk. but i'd like that option, it'd be nice.

i love swtor's leveling because of this, it's really great. if it ever gets less sleazy f2p, i might buy time and actually play.

[Nazrark]

speaking of storymode ops... i'd like a true story mode op. where you go in with soldiers under your command and complete the op completely solo. no loot, maybe, or maybe something cosmetic? idk. but i'd like that option, it'd be nice.

i love swtor's leveling because of this, it's really great. if it ever gets less sleazy f2p, i might buy time and actually play.

They played around with this in the [WEEKLY] Revan mission. Feels like they were playing with it.

[Darth Belichick]

They played around with this in the [WEEKLY] Revan mission. Feels like they were playing with it.

I'm hoping they play with it some more and make it a true feature in the next expansion.

[quras]

I'm hoping they play with it some more and make it a true feature in the next expansion.

I don't need it to be the end game content as a whole but that encounter was a bit more fun because of all the "companion" type people there. The fight itself was borked because of all the stuns, knockdowns and knock backs but over alll how they used other companions it was interesting.

I do hope they do something like that moving forward but not as some end game OPS. Just something fun to do to maybe gear companion again.

[Darth Belichick]

I don't need it to be the end game content as a whole but that encounter was a bit more fun because of all the "companion" type people there. The fight itself was borked because of all the stuns, knockdowns and knock backs but over alll how they used other companions it was interesting.

I do hope they do something like that moving forward but not as some end game OPS. Just something fun to do to maybe gear companion again.

Oh definitely. If anything make it a little better game play wise, however, don't make it give raiding gear. Giving your companion gear as well as Ult. Comms is fine.

[JusticeAndVengeance]

I agree. The main reason I left WoW after 6+ years of subscription (besides being a Star Wars junkie) was that the SW:ToR style truly makes your character a meaningful centerpiece to the story arcs. Your character truly becomes part of the lore vs. WoW's style where you (mostly) just exist in the game world. It's nice to actually be the epic hero throughout a story arc.

And for those with comments about the status of endgame content- that is something that simply improves/expands with time. It's come a looooong way already. I miss some of the functions in WoW, but I feel SW:ToR will continue gaining the polish it needs over time.

-Justice

[Packing an i5]

I dont think blizzard was wise to even redo what they did in Cataclysm with the old world. The vanilla zones were more timeless and now a lot of people are just nostalgic for them because the cata zones are 5 years and growing out of date there are natural disasters still swirling around , references to the defeated boss deathwing. A few years later they finally fixed up stormwind. I really wish they would remove the swirling water vortex in Stranglethorne vale and clean up/repair Booty Bay.

All they needed to do was improve the quest rewards in the old world vanilla zones those were horrific. For a long period you would be stuck with white gear and when you were given a choice of an enchanted item it would often be too weak even for the level appropriate to finish the quest or there would be no good choice for your class/spec.

That doesn't happen as often now and quests reward more money than they use to + heirlooms are available. Vanilla quests rewards money wise were awful for a good many levels the only point of quests was the experience not to gear up or get money for that you needed to grind and hope for drops.