Star Wars: The Old Republic – News from the Sith Empire

There are few things more frustrating than struggling to find a topic engaging enough to write about with limited free time, while something you'd really like to be able to review is restricted by a Non-Disclosure Agreement. I got into the SW:TOR Beta, but couldn't really talk about it until now that the NDA is lifted. For those who always skip to the end of this sort of article to get the verdict, I'll give your mouse wheel a break - Star Wars: The Old Republic is a very good game that successfully incorporates the Bioware RPG formula into a WoW-like MMORPG. I intend to purchase it several weeks after launch, and I'll certainly play, but I won't raid in it and certainly won't be quitting World of Warcraft in favor of it. My preferred way to play this game is to turn off most of the things that remind me I'm playing with other people until I want to play with those people, and enjoy the story as a single-player experience on a massive scale. When friends are on, doing an instanced encounter with them or trading items is cool, but I don't intend to randomly group with JEDIDOOD just because I can.

I played through the starting areas for two classes, both in the Sith Empire faction. Let me start by explaining something that I thought was fairly common knowledge, but I continue to surprise people with. "Republic" doesn't automatically mean "good guy" and "Sith" doesn't automatically mean "villain." Moral and ethical choices like those found in Mass Effect and Dragon Age will touch on every character's personal story and the starting areas are very reminiscent in some ways of the Origin chapters in the first Dragon Age. I played a Bounty Hunter who gained both Light and Dark Side points as a mercenary who adheres to the terms of his contract regardless of new information, and a Sith Warrior who is lost to the Dark Side. The two starting planets are split between pairs of classes with Hutta given to the Imperial Agent and Bounty Hunter and Korriban for the Sith Inquisitor and Sith Warrior.

Combat options and gear choices are rolled out with completed quests much as they are in any MMORPG, but the quests are anything but typical. First, no quest text. Everything is fully voiced, including your character and every one-off NPC. Second, many quests immediately draw you into some sort of interesting story, and even the "kill 10 blargs and college their whatzits" quests frequently have a twist, where you may find that turning the quest in to the original quest NPC may have consequences you'd prefer to avoid. From the Sith training grounds on Korriban to the streets of Hutta torn apart by a struggle between powerful underworld bosses for control, the environments are gorgeous and logically laid out with "rest/town" areas placed naturally, without seeming like they were spaced out at particular intervals because players need a new quest hub about here. Each classes' abilities are used when trained in different situations, with status conditions like knockdown sometimes being important, or area of effect damage, or a hard, sustained "channeled" attack depending on the foes encountered.

I was surprised to find that the effect your decisions have on NPC party members is retained in the MMO, with every class having an NPC companion with their own outlook and motivations. These characters act like combat pets, and the AI is surprisingly decent on them, with them acting about how you'd hope they would in fights. Conversations have the familiar Bioware "wheel of options" and choosing one over another may affect your companion's opinion of you as well as your personal Light Side/Dark Side points and storyline. I delighted in my evil Sith Warrior's tormenting of his companion, administering painful shocks when she forgot her place or spoke out of turn. People began to react to my tendencies to adhere to a peculiar form of arrogant honor that does not preclude killing those who annoy me with weakness or trivialities. Very quickly, I got to know who my characters were as individuals, which added something to the experience that WoW will never have.

I was less impressed with the stability and capacity on the technical side of things, with login errors, extremely long queues with no way to tell how long a wait for a server was, and no way to back out of a choice poorly made tarnishing the experience. I also found a series of graphical glitches and missing art and animation in some spots that I hope get some additional polish before launch. Aside from the bugs and technical difficulties, I found that the community of players I had access to in the beta detracted most significantly from the experience. Within minutes, I'd turned off the ability to see chat channels and hid the names floating above other players' heads. I suspect that this is a game I will mostly be playing solo or in small groups of friends, trying to interact with the server at large as little as possible. I enjoy the typical MMO experience, but I like my Star Wars gaming to maintain a certain mood, and that doesn't include racism, homophobia or Chuck Norris jokes.

By the end of my last beta weekend, I'd decided to pursue the Sith Warrior class story past the starting areas and I got my first taste of a major faction city as well as the wider world at my disposal. I chose that class because I intend to actually play as a Bounty Hunter come launch, and I'd like to have the rest of that class experience when the full game is released, rather than losing all of what I'd earned after a post-beta wipe. As the feared right hand of a Dark Lord of the Sith, I got into the opening stages of Empire Politics, and I can see the consequences of decisions made earlier already getting ready to come back to haunt me. I look forward to my next upcoming beta weekend, so I can try out the small-group instances and continue my reign of terror. I wield fear as well as a lightsaber in service to the Code: Peace is a lie, there is only passion. Through passion I gain strength. Through strength, I gain power. Through power, I gain victory. Through Victory, my chains are broken. The Force shall free me.

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Mass Effect – Science Fiction RPG Series Done Right

I've made no secret my love for Bioware, so getting around to this was an inevitability. A lot of the games we geeks play and books we read start with the same set of core assumptions, unless they are adapted from a movie/comic/TV show. There's a guy with a sword, he lives in a place that looks and sounds a whole lot like medieval Western Europe, and there is a whole lot of magic flying around as he goes on his version of the heroic journey. That's why I value good original science-fiction so much. I love swords and sorcery, but I don't care what your favorite food is, you can't have it for every meal without becoming tired of it. (Possible exception: bacon, but I digress.) Bioware showed us they could do RPGs outside of the D&D mold with Jade Empire and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. Soon after trying out those first non-fantasy settings, they began work on Mass Effect, one of the most well-developed science fiction properties not only in gaming, but anywhere.

This game universe has, quite seriously, been called "This Generation's Star Wars."

After the success of Star Wars: KOTOR, rather than working on the sequel, Bioware suggested another developer to take on part 2 in order to work on other games (specifically, the aforementioned Jade Empire.) The concept was based on some of the core values present in Bioware games, reward exploration and interaction with NPCs in the party, make every decision important and have those choices matter. A game focused on exploring the unknown and encountering strange and wonderful alien things for the first time really couldn't be done in the Star Wars Universe anymore. Those strange and fantastic vistas have been explored, examined and catalogued so much over the last three-plus decades that they are familiar. In order to deliver the kind of experience they wanted to provide to the fans, they'd have to make an entirely new setting.

The setting that resulted is incredibly deep and rich with histories of alien races and their unique cultures and the integration of humanity into an intergalactic society. Humanity has, recently, discovered ancient alien technologies that allowed the use of devices called Mass Relays to perform jumps beyond what conventional space travel was capable of. This increased range brought human colonists to other worlds and into conflict with alien races in a “Contact War” that is ended by the Citadel Council, an intergalactic government headquartered on a massive space station built by the Protheans, the same vanished race whose technology allows for travel through Mass Relays. Humanity is offered associate membership in this government which is headed by three alien races, one of whom is the race humanity nearly engaged in an all-out war.

A few of the many races in the ME Universe. Not Pictured: Elcor, Batarians or Drell.

The Citadel's ruling races are the Asari, the Turians and the Salarians, with a host of associate races having embassies and bringing concerns to the Council, but with little actual power. The Asari are an asexual race who vaguely resemble blue skinned humanoid females who reproduce genetically by combining their own genetic material with others (male or female) of other sentient species. The Turians are an organized and disciplined race of warriors who value public service, the needs of the group over the needs of the individual, and respecting law and order. This last quality is what nearly brought them to all-out war with humans who were unknowingly breaking Citadel Law by activating dormant Mass Relays. The Salarians are a slender and seemingly hyperactive race of scientific and psionic geniuses who talk, think, act and even die quicker than other races, leaving an impact before their 40 year expected lifespans are up through the innovations they develop in their time.

The first Mass Effect game starts with an unusual event, a veteran soldier of the Human Alliance is allowed to join the para-military Citadel Organization called the SPECTRES. Commander Shepard (the player's character) jumps at the chance to be more involved in Citadel Government and being a SPECTRE is like a cross between MI6, CIA and Special Forces. Shepard and his crew are tasked with investigating Saren, a former SPECTRE gone rogue and stop whatever it is he's up to. Shepard and his crew discover secrets about the missing Prothean race and eventually stop Saren at the cost of many lives, but humanity is made a full Council Race. The 2^nd game starts with the apparent death and resurrection of Shepard who is rebuilt over the course of years by the shadowy pro-human organization CERBERUS. He is given a new ship and a new mission, to combat The Collectors, an alien race with vastly superior technology who suddenly have started abducting entire human settlements. The connections of secrets revealed between the first two games sets up the trilogy for a final chapter, yet to be released.

Recently, Bioware had a poll on Facebook regarding the new "default" appearance
for the female version of Commander Shepard. This is the lead candidate.

Shepard's gender, appearance, background and character class/specialty are all selected by the player, and choices made throughout the game affect how certain NPCs react to you, and certain decisions have lasting effects throughout the series. The conversation wheel, used later (and perhaps to not the same effectiveness) in Dragon Age 2 was introduced with these games, allowing conversations to have more of a natural and cinematic feel than the text-heavy conversation trees found in other RPGs. Skill with various weapons, technology and the psionic powers called “biotics” allow for different versions of Shepard to play very differently. The NPCs are strong personalities, typical of a Bioware game, setting the stage for drama, friendship, betrayal and romance depending on what happens in your game.

One of the things that is different in Mass Effect is the more action-oriented combat. Instead of a turn-based system or even real-time and pausable to give orders, combat is more similar to a 3^rd person, cover-based shooter like Gears of War than a typical RPG. I play for the story, but the combat hasn't turned me away, as I can enjoy either style and still get what I want out of the story. The streamlining of weapons and armor, taking away a traditional inventory and always equipping the best weapons and armor available is something I'm not a huge fan of, but those micromanaged aspects of old-school RPGs are vanishing because there are a lot of people who don't like or want them. The trend towards shorter games found in the Dragon Age series also seems to be the case in Mass Effect. Doing sidequests and optional missions is especially important in Mass Effect 2, not only because the main quest is short compared to the first game, but because the survival of your team may well depend on how thorough your preparations for the final fight are.

I'll mourn the passing of each traditional RPG element that is left by the road as these sorts of games continue to move forward with gamers' tastes, but so long as the stories remain this good, that will be tempered by a celebration of all the other elements that have improved over the years. I, for one, can't wait until they finish and release Mass Effect 3.

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Blog Gadgets

Star Wars: The Old Republic MMORPG - Bioware at E3 2011, Almost Ready for Launch!

We're closing in on the end of E3 week here, and even a fairly ho-hum show has some gems, even if the best parts aren't surprise announcements. Bioware is closing in on a launch for their long awaited take on the MMORPG genre with Star Wars: The Old Republic. This is all sorts of exciting for me. I love Bioware RPGs, even the ones that disappoint me do so because I want more. My first-ever MMO was Star Wars Galaxies, though I didn't do much in it besides crafting and building structures. I also have a great deal of affection for how Bioware in particular handles the Star Wars setting, and I'm ready to see them make the leap from single-player experience to MMORPG.

A Star Wars MMO, and not a Gungan to be seen. Meesa glad to hear that.

Gaming in the Star Wars Universe is tough even for a developer writing for the single player game. If your game is set in the time of the films, there are all sorts of obstacles. Large-scale epic stories that this setting does best don't lend themselves well to a time period where we all know who is responsible for all of the major events. Add to that the fact that many people want to play a Jedi, but hate the prequels, and there just aren't very many Jedi around during the Rebellion Era. Stories are told in the background of established events, and they are mostly meaningless, or the fact that no mention of this plot worked its way into the films strains plausibility.

Add in the challenges of a persistent multiplayer world, and the challenges are nearly insurmountable. Bioware addressed this problem years ago when they developed Knights of the Old Republic. A gripping story, plenty of Jedi, room to play without disturbing canon, the distant past of the Star Wars Universe is ripe for development. Any character or element that is created new that doesn't have a specific place in canon? No problem, that bit was lost in the shadows of the distant past, the way details often are. Bioware gave their typical treatment to the setting too, with party members with their own attitudes, motivations and stories, and if you treat them right, you get to explore those tales with sidequests of a personal nature to your companions. Tabletop RPG geeks also loved that the combat system was based on the D&D-inspired D20 system.

If the lighting-fast block and parry of lightsaber combat actually is modeled correctly while still
feeling like MMO-style combat, it should be really, really cool.

How can the key elements of this setting be brought into the very different gameplay style of the MMORPG, without losing what makes Bioware games special? The developers have talked about this at length, focusing on a story told for each individual player that is just as important as the group experience. Bioware RPGs focus on individual actions having consequences, and those consequences having a direct impact on the gameplay experience. In Star Wars: The Old Republic, the first choice to be made is whether to play as Sith or Republic, which will also affect choice of classes (more on this in a bit) and starting areas. Though individual characters have the freedom to make “good” or “evil” choices, the morality of the Sith Empire isn't subjective, the developers have said that it won't be a “good guys from a certain perspective” thing, Sith are evil.

In both solo questing and group “dungeons” the impact of individual decision making is built in, with dialogue options (while talking with fully voice-acted NPCs, a first for an MMO) and “choice points” built into missions and quests. It's pretty obvious how this works for a single player quest, but the multiplayer missions and how they've made that work is the turning point that has made me decide to put down World of Warcraft, if only for a little while, when this finally releases. Rather than having a party leader make all the decisions, or making them up to party vote or some such nonsense, the narrative in individual missions provides key points, one for each player, to make a decision that will affect the rest of the mission, with consequences for all. If this can be pulled off without creating too much conflict or arguing with other team members after the fact, it is brilliant.

So, what can you play in Star Wars: The Old Republic? So far, for sure we've seen human, Twi'lek (like the dancing girl in Jabba's Palace) and Zabrak (think Darth Maul) as races in promos, and as I mentioned before, your classes are based on your faction. Both factions have four classes at launch, which doesn't seem like very many as compared to many other games, but the customization of powers and abilities as characters level supposedly will make this a non-issue. (We'll see.) For the Republic, the available classes are Jedi Knight, Jedi Consular, Trooper and Smuggler. For the Sith, there are Sith Warrior, Sith Inquisitor, Imperial Agent and Bounty Hunter. To my way of thinking, that looks like two flavors of Jedi for each, one dull sounding class (Trooper and Agent... really?) and one non-Jedi but still awesome class for each side.

Of course, not everyone will have a lightsaber. With the existence of the Smuggler,
though, expect this guy to be rare on launch day.

I have a lot of hope for this game, though I don't think it is a “WoW Killer,” if such a thing is even possible anymore. I want to see the focus on storytelling change the landscape of a style of gaming where story is secondary currently, players groan as they skip quest text and suffer through cinema scenes so they can kill something else and take its stuff. I really hope that Bioware can tell a story compelling enough to make gamers demand that kind of narrative out of their MMORPG experience. One thing I do know for certain if that I'll be giving it a shot at release. I'll be doing the bidding of those who pay the best for a talented Bounty Hunter... the Sith of Korriban.


One last bit of site-related news, I'm now on Tumblr at unemployedgeek.tumblr.com, posting small updates on topics I've covered here or stories too short for a full article, tidbits about myself, links to these articles and reblogs of interesting tidbits I find around the web that are relevant to my interests. Check me out there, and I encourage tumblr users to reblog anything you find on my tumblr if you like it!  I'm also @DocStout on Twitter, and of course, I have the Facebook link at the side of this very page. Slowly moving into Web2.0 as though I were an actual young person!

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Blog Gadgets

I'm not here, I'm in Kirkwall

Really short article today for Fat Tuesday. Today is not only a day to pig out, eating desserts and other fatty foods (because even if you don't celebrate or believe in Lent, who doesn't like dessert?) Today is also the call to power. That's right, Dragon Age 2.

Installing this now, and from the demo... Varric is already The Man.

I've been a Bioware fan since the original Baldur's Gate, and have owned almost every game they've published since (and beaten most of them.) The focus on strong narratives, and getting something out of talking with the characters in your party and addressing their needs, learning their pasts, or just not angering them so much they attack you or leave...

Now Minsc Leads! Swords for Everyone!

I think the storytelling and art direction started strong and just got better and better. I'll likely do a few more DA2 articles in the next few days, so I'll get back to more stories of unemployed life and other geek culture (movies, music, TV and comics) articles once I've gotten this out of my system. I can even use Dragon Age to talk about a few of those divisive issues I touched on yesterday, in particular DRM and DLC in games.

Should be fun.

So enjoy your Mardi Gras week, get plenty fat on desserts, (I know I will) and here's a picture of a traditional food eaten this week, the Paczki. (I'm Irish, but I grew up in and currently live in a half hispanic, half polish area.)

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