Too many cutscenes

[Gritalian]

Well, you get sprint at level 16 (note: It may actually be 15, but both weekends I tested I was out leveling and didn't train till 16). Sprint greatly speeds of traveling until you can afford a land cruiser.

If you can't get to level 16 with 4 days of playing, you probably shouldn't be putting in any type of review. It really seems like you signed up for the Beta just because you heard there was a beta to a new game without any previous knowledge of what the game is. Your complaint about dialog taking too much time is just absurd given that it's an RPG... made by Bioware, and it's been pretty much the biggest selling point on the game for the last two years. It would be equivalent to me beta testing Battlefield 4 and making a review complaining that there was too much violence.

You complain about the time per level, yet World of Warcraft used to take 4 hours a level from about 44 on (about 8 hours per lvl just to get from 56-60, when the cap was 60). They had to speed it up because they added more levels. If you expect a brand new mmorpg to get you through each zone (which has been designed and edited for the last 3 years) in the matter of 5 quests like low level Cataclysm stricken Azeroth, then the problem isn't the game you're testing, it's your expectations of a new game were based on a game that has been out for 7 years and has 85 levels, 60 of which have been in the game since the beginning.

[WoWGoneBad]

I played this last weekend, travel is still done at snails pace. And i hate to say but if you want a successful mmo you cant just omit the current conveniences and expect your mmo to do well. Bioware needs to look at what other mmos are doing and apply some of their concepts that make it easier on the player, not harder.

One thing i think they should implement next for example is a random group finder.

dude as WAY too many people said befor this s NOT WOW!!!!! we do NOT need DF tools. and whn was the last time ANY mmo allowed traveling faster at low lvls.

IF i recall correctly WoW you do not get mounts until 20 and they have very LONG travel distances but nobody complains about it because its the TOP mmo HUH.

[ruinshin]

Also, yeah..

No to DF tools. They are useful, I will admit.... But they ruined the community, and they spawn self entitled tanks, DPS, and heals..

The amount of tanks I've had to put in their place in Wrath was outstanding. Luckily, as a feral, I could tank when the tank wanted to skip bosses and no one else did.

[KvanCetre]

If your familiar with ffxi yes i could see that. Back when it took an entire weekend to get from 1-12. This isnt 2003 though, alots changed. And peoples perception of lvling in a mmo have changed as well. Ask a wow player if they would find getting 9 levels in 8 hours acceptable.

I find 1-20 in a few hours to be unacceptable. I'd prefer to take two months to get to max level, though I'll probably be there in one. Why? Because getting to max level should be an enjoyable journey, not a rushed trip.

I got to 21 my first weekend, 16 last weekend (I didn't get to play at all Friday). Both weekends, I had other things to do.

Honestly, I feel the leveling is still a bit fast, but we'll see if it slow down.

[Gritalian]

dude as WAY too many people said befor this s NOT WOW!!!!! we do NOT need DF tools. and whn was the last time ANY mmo allowed traveling faster at low lvls.

IF i recall correctly WoW you do not get mounts until 20 and they have very LONG travel distances but nobody complains about it because its the TOP mmo HUH.

In the current version of WoW, you're basically given flight points to everything. So now new Horde players don't have to experience ever having to travel from Hammerfall to Searing Gorge by land, and Alliance players don't even have to know Winterspring exists.

[Daverid]

One of the most enjoyable times I had in World of Warcraft was running from Darnassus to Westfall on my very first character at level 10. It took hours. No mount, I wasn't aware of the tram. I wasn't aware of a lot of things. I died a lot. I ended up swimming around mountains and dying of fatigue.. It was the first time I had dealt with it.. I released as a ghost and ran to Westfall in ghost form and talked to the spirit healer. She rezzed me back in Wetlands. It was epic. It was fun. It took hours. I didn't gain a single level. I didn't earn gold. I essentially wasted my time..

But it was new. It was fun. I had to worry about elites, pathing.. Cata lacks that.

Soooo I love alot of things from Vanilla/TBC WoW.... And my first toon being a Night Elf I made this same journey.... But I don't see how you could have possibly found this "Fun" ... Crocodiles, Spiders, Raptors, Murlocs agro'ing from miles away ... Dying countless times ... And why did we have to do this? Because Westfall was 20x better zone then Darkshore... Because Blizzard designed a horrible zone and put the only low level dungeon for alliance in the far better zone.

If there's one good thing that's come from Cataclysm, it's the Revamp of the old zones. I still don't agree with all the Heirlooms and just how insanely quick it is to level these days... But I DO NOT Regret them changing the zones to make them more; Relevant, streamlined (As in moving between zones) and fun. Darkshore is actually a blast now, and no one ever again has to make that Pathetic journey.

Your head is definitely clouded by Nostalgia if you actually think that Journey was fun.

However Case and Point: Walking, not a big deal ... I walk around the place tons because I just don't get on my mount for some reason... I honestly wouldn't care if we didn't get mounts until lev 35,40 or even 50 in SWTOR... It's not really a big deal. I don't mind putting in that time investment. Just as long as the walk is actually relevant to a quest or something :S

[WoWGoneBad]

In the current version of WoW, you're basically given flight points to everything. So now new Horde players don't have to experience ever having to travel from Hammerfall to Searing Gorge by land, and Alliance players don't even have to know Winterspring exists.

really has it gotten that bad been a LONG time since i lvled a toon you get ALL FPs at start now ?

[Fishyface]

Most the responses that ive gotten in last page or so have been just questioning and assuming my experience in mmos. I suggest you stop focusing on what ive done as none of you got anything correct. Most of you just assume im some sort of wow only playing person (if you knew me you would know that is far from the truth). So i dont like swtor for the reasons i listed, it seems like ive committed a crime and must be hanged or banned according to some of the responses ive gotten.

As i stated in my original post its my opinion. I did this for information purposes for others as a counterpoint to all the hype that is out there for the game. Some people get captured by the hype and never read into the game itself, then when they buy it that person is massively disappointed. I did this so those people know that its not all just sunshine and flowers in the swtor beta.

Like it or not the hype blocks out alot of criticism for a game when its in beta, and its really hard to get a good idea of what the game actually is. The people who give the most informed opinions in these type of situations are the people who are interested in trying it , but not completely convinced that it is good. I would say that i am one of those people, i walked into the game without much of an opinion on it as i had payed little attention to it since 2009.

It is completely true that ive only visited the official swtor website about 5 times total in the past two years. the last 3 have been to get my beta account and post some feedback.

[Cellery]

Well, you get sprint at level 16 (note: It may actually be 15, but both weekends I tested I was out leveling and didn't train till 16). Sprint greatly speeds of traveling until you can afford a land cruiser.

Sprint was trainable for me at level 14 this past beta weekend. It's a speed boost of 35% I believe. At level 25, you spend 20k credits for speeder training + 4k for the mount itself to get a 90% speed boost. I played Empire side. Korriban was fine as far as the running around factor. Dromund Kaas was kind of painful to walk around on foot but looking at your map and planning an efficient route made it totally manageable. Based on changes put in & my change in efficiency of quests, my first beta weekend I got to level 22, this past one I got to level 26 (watching all of the dialogue). I played probably something resembling 30 hours over the course of 3 days for this past weekend. 30 hours for 26 levels is totally reasonable in my book--especially since it only felt like 10.

[ruinshin]

Soooo I love alot of things from Vanilla/TBC WoW.... And my first toon being a Night Elf I made this same journey.... But I don't see how you could have possibly found this "Fun" ... Crocodiles, Spiders, Raptors, Murlocs agro'ing from miles away ... Dying countless times ... And why did we have to do this? Because Westfall was 20x better zone then Darkshore... Because Blizzard designed a horrible zone and put the only low level dungeon for alliance in the far better zone

I found it fun because if you were smart you could survive these, or survive a long as trip. Darkshore sucked. Ashenvale was probably one of the better zones story wise, but it was so damn large and crowded with mobs that you either stayed on the path or died, and it wasn't very streamlined. Fun, but it could have been better.

I liked the challenge of doing it.

[Daverid]

Most the responses that ive gotten in last page or so have been just questioning and assuming my experience in mmos. I suggest you stop focusing on what ive done as none of you got anything correct. Most of you just assume im some sort of wow only playing person (if you knew me you would know that is far from the truth). So i dont like swtor for the reasons i listed, it seems like ive committed a crime and must be hanged or banned according to some of the responses ive gotten.

As i stated in my original post its my opinion. I did this for information purposes for others as a counterpoint to all the hype that is out there for the game. Some people get captured by the hype and never read into the game itself, then when they buy it that person is massively disappointed. I did this so those people know that its not all just sunshine and flowers in the swtor beta.

Like it or not the hype blocks out alot of criticism for a game when its in beta, and its really hard to get a good idea of what the game actually is. The people who give the most informed opinions in these type of situations are the people who are interested in trying it , but not completely convinced that it is good. I would say that i am one of those people, i walked into the game without much of an opinion on it as i had payed little attention to it since 2009.

It is completely true that ive only visited the official swtor website about 5 times total in the past two years. the last 3 have been to get my beta account and post some feedback.

You can't just brush everyone's opinions aside because our judgement is 'Clouded by Hype' ... You played ONE beta weekend and are giving your opinions.. Some of us have done exactly the same and are giving our opinions. We actually enjoyed the leveling experience and cutscenes in the portion of the game we played, you did not. Everyone is free to speak on the topic as they like.... You opened up a thread on MMO-C stating an opinion ... It was obvious you were either going to get lots agree, lots of disagree or people on the fence... Sadly (For you) you received mainly disagree's. Big Deal.

I love Bioware games ... But I also take all my games at face value, I thought Skyrim was going to be God's Gift to mankind, and whilst it was amazing.. I was hurt that the main questline only lasted 20hours... I do my best to not get caught up in hype... Yet I, and many others, have actually played this game now and found it to be awesome! And we believe the SWTOR Beta IS mainly Sunshine and Flowers

[Shamburger]

You can't just brush everyone's opinions aside because our judgement is 'Clouded by Hype' ... You played ONE beta weekend and are giving your opinions.. Some of us have done exactly the same and are giving our opinions. We actually enjoyed the leveling experience and cutscenes in the portion of the game we played, you did not. Everyone is free to speak on the topic as they like.... You opened up a thread on MMO-C stating an opinion ... It was obvious you were either going to get lots agree, lots of disagree or people on the fence... Sadly (For you) you received mainly disagree's. Big Deal.

I love Bioware games ... But I also take all my games at face value, I thought Skyrim was going to be God's Gift to mankind, and whilst it was amazing.. I was hurt that the main questline only lasted 20hours... I do my best to not get caught up in hype... Yet I, and many others, have actually played this game now and found it to be awesome! And we believe the SWTOR Beta IS mainly Sunshine and Flowers

I second everything in this post.

I respect your opinion fishy and maybe even agree with a point or two, but trying to pass off anyone who disagrees with it as "clouded by hype" just makes it look like you don't even take your own review serious. With comments like that not many other people could.

[Unoriginal]

I played this last weekend, travel is still done at snails pace. And i hate to say but if you want a successful mmo you cant just omit the current conveniences and expect your mmo to do well. Bioware needs to look at what other mmos are doing and apply some of their concepts that make it easier on the player, not harder.

One thing i think they should implement next for example is a random group finder.

ROFL LOOL NO , No one wants LFG BACK EVER. That idea is stupid.

[mystik]

Now that the NDA is lifted i can talk about swtor as well.

There are wayyyyyyyyyyy too many cutscenes (average of one every 2 minutes literally) and they encompass every aspect of the game. Some are interesting but im getting cutscenes for completing objectives and that is completely unnecessary. Travel time is also a major issue. After i completed the newbie area it took me 7ish minutes to walk through the station so i could get to courissant. Walking to and from quest givers also ate up a large amount of time as the newbie area is quite large.

The leveling curve is very very slow, it took me about 8 hours of play for 9 levels. At least 45 minutes of that 9 hours was cutscenes that you have to participate in because they require you to look at the options and choose.


This is not going to be the spiritual successor of wow like most people think it will be. If you took away the cutscenes its wow in space like everyone has been saying. The combat feels exactly like wow, mash 1 2 3 and and you kill the mob. Maybe combat gets better after 10 but i took a look over the abilities at the trainer and there wasnt anything more interesting than a couple of stuns.

If you enjoy story more than combat and mechanics you might have a better experience than i did, if you dont though i would look elsewhere as lvling time is extemely inflated because of these cutscenes.


This is my 2 cents for people like myself that have never played a bioware game, and only play mmos. Take it as you will.

wow wait.... did you seriously call this "the spiritual successor of wow"? I had to stop right there. this is in no way what you are looking for.

this is not hack and slash, power rush through everything. where the hell did you come up with spiritual successor of WoW? nobody ever called it that.

sigh these 2 types of haters it seems

hater 1) OMG WOW CLONE IT'S TOO MUCH LIKE WOW. WHY IS THERE GROUPING AND HOTKEY COMBAT.

hater 2) OMG IT'S NOT LIKE WOW ENOUGH. WHERE IS MY CROSS SERVER GROUP FINDER. WHERE IS MY TRADE CHAT TROLLING.

[willtron]

Mash space bar, problem solved.

indeed /10 chars

[Fishyface]

wow wait.... did you seriously call this "the spiritual successor of wow"? I had to stop right there. this is in no way what you are looking for.

this is not hack and slash, power rush through everything. where the hell did you come up with spiritual successor of WoW? nobody ever called it that.

sigh these 2 types of haters it seems

hater 1) OMG WOW CLONE IT'S TOO MUCH LIKE WOW. WHY IS THERE GROUPING AND HOTKEY COMBAT.

hater 2) OMG IT'S NOT LIKE WOW ENOUGH. WHERE IS MY CROSS SERVER GROUP FINDER. WHERE IS MY TRADE CHAT TROLLING.

You, like many others, cant seem to tell the difference between criticism and hating. I said some people see swtor in that kind of light, i never have. Read the post i made before this one before you assume things. You seem to have seen one sentence and pounced on it without even bothering to read the rest of it.

---------- Post added 2011-11-19 at 04:33 PM ----------

I second everything in this post.

I respect your opinion fishy and maybe even agree with a point or two, but trying to pass off anyone who disagrees with it as "clouded by hype" just makes it look like you don't even take your own review serious. With comments like that not many other people could.

I never said i was dismissing peoples opinions, where the hell are you people reading this stuff?

[Shamburger]

You, like many others, cant seem to tell the difference between criticism and hating. I said some people see swtor in that kind of light, i never have. Read the post i made before this one before you assume things. You seem to have seen one sentence and pounced on it without even bothering to read the rest of it.

---------- Post added 2011-11-19 at 04:33 PM ----------



I never said i was dismissing peoples opinions, where the hell are you people reading this stuff?

Like it or not the hype blocks out alot of criticism for a game when its in beta, and its really hard to get a good idea of what the game actually is. The people who give the most informed opinions in these type of situations are the people who are interested in trying it , but not completely convinced that it is good. I would say that i am one of those people, i walked into the game without much of an opinion on it as i had payed little attention to it since 2009.

"My opinion is one not affected by any hype and therefore accurate on what the game actually is."

Passively saying it is still saying it.

I played this last weekend, travel is still done at snails pace. And i hate to say but if you want a successful mmo you cant just omit the current conveniences and expect your mmo to do well. Bioware needs to look at what other mmos are doing and apply some of their concepts that make it easier on the player, not harder.

One thing i think they should implement next for example is a random group finder.

I think that's exactly what the genre needs. All the people that find the need instant-type gratification can stick with the games that currently provide it. And the people that don't need "current conveniences" can play TOR or whatever else comes along. Neither side of the fence should care really.

Also LFG is the LAST thing this (or any future) game needs. I assume you mean cross-sever LFG (correct me if I'm mistaken). In-server LFG could be ok.

[atrixx]

I never said i was dismissing peoples opinions, where the hell are you people reading this stuff?

I would suggest re-reading your own posts without a biased view, but there is no way to be biased about your own comments. You posted your opinions and made it clear that you personally don't like the RPG questing style in SWTOR. You prefer the faster model provided by WOW. So bet it. People will like one or the other, or both, depending on their mood. People will play either or both...it doesn't matter. However, don't expect everyone to agree with your opinion. I am a pure Blizzard and BioWare fan boy. I enjoy WOW but I also love BioWare's RPGs. Bringing it to the MMO platform is just a very nice blend.

I did the weekend beta test. Played with a couple toons and got one to 12 or 13. It really felt like a KOTOR/DA style questing which I enjoy in a RPG...hence MMORPG. There are setting and ways to bypass the cutscene interactions which have already been discussed. However, it is key to point out that those interactions which award light/dark side points also impact your character's story and progression. So while it may not see like a big deal early on, when you get close to max level the results of your actions are going to start having an effect. Not only when it comes to dealing with others, but the points will start to unlock various in game features and such that will require X amount of light or dark side points.

If you enjoy the hack and slash run to the exclamation mark, hit accept, go kill X number of things run back to the question mark and hit complete...this isn't your game. If others want the same easy and simplified road, this isn't their game. We are seeing what is happening to WOW when developers try to form the game to meet everyone's needs. We have 7 years of unbalanced classes, continued variations on questing and raiding models, and a game that really just gets watered down to be the most casual friendly game on the market. Is it a bad thing? Nope. It allowed them to get to 12 million members, albeit that it is down to 10.3 now due mainly (apparently) to issues with retaining players in Asia...which Pandaria and Pokemon should address. BioWare would be smart to stick to their winning RPG formula and avoid going down Blizzard's path of a RPG-Lite model. They are competitors, but there is no rule to say that players can't enjoy both. Now when GW2 comes out, that is a completely different story since that more directly targets Blizzard's niche on the full fantasy genre compared to SWTOR which is a fantasy/sci-fi hybrid. Which by all accounts should work out much better than the pure sci-fi MMO Star Trek that tanked hard core. BioWare is going in with probably 3-4 million players at launch by all estimates, that's not to shabby and larger than any other recently launched MMO.

Some of those people will like the RPG style questing system. Some what and prefer WOW's Hack&Slash/RPG-Lite setup. Thanks for your opinion, but don't discount others because you feel we are delusional due to fan boy love or whatever. If it isn't for you, it isn't for you. Don't WOW my TOR. :-P

[Trollsbane]

Most the responses that ive gotten in last page or so have been just questioning and assuming my experience in mmos. I suggest you stop focusing on what ive done as none of you got anything correct. Most of you just assume im some sort of wow only playing person (if you knew me you would know that is far from the truth). So i dont like swtor for the reasons i listed, it seems like ive committed a crime and must be hanged or banned according to some of the responses ive gotten.

As i stated in my original post its my opinion.

This is very true. Chill the fuck out, people.

I don't agree with him either. Like I posted earlier, the things he doesn't like are things I think are great. But I certainly didn't attack him for it, and neither should you.

[Bramickias]

Too many cutscene in a story-driven MMO .... it's like saying there is too many cars in Gran Turismo.