Star Wars: The Old Republic

 PC
User Score
6.0

Mixed or average reviews- based on 2879 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,378 out of 2879
  2. Mixed: 545 out of 2879
  3. Negative: 956 out of 2879
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  1. Fatteh
    Mar 8, 2012
    4
    After the initial wow factor has worn off I would probably say this would be a great game to play co-op but just shy off the mark as a greatly immersive MMO. Its handles great, the story telling is good but towards the mid levels it looses it attention. Fantastic having the story lines voiced so no great walls of text to read through and skip. The missus managed an extra month beforeAfter the initial wow factor has worn off I would probably say this would be a great game to play co-op but just shy off the mark as a greatly immersive MMO. Its handles great, the story telling is good but towards the mid levels it looses it attention. Fantastic having the story lines voiced so no great walls of text to read through and skip. The missus managed an extra month before calling it quiets on this one too. Its no Galaxies but pretty entertaining for a while.… Expand
  2. TwistedComplex
    Dec 31, 2011
    4
    I wish to retract my former review. After reaching max level, my guild cleared all the end game content in one night. Absolutely unacceptable, and coupled with the fact that Ilum is completely broken, this does not bode well for SWTORs future
  3. The-Crow
    Oct 3, 2012
    4
    I forgot to cancell my pre-order in the end but I put a lot of time into the early accessn the better part of 7 days or something.

    In Brief. 1) It really is an unabashed WoW clone and it shows, the gameplay feels dated. 2) Theres nothing specifically bad about the game but there is nothing outstanding either, leaving me indifferent to it. 3) Storylines I tried thus far were    I forgot to cancell my pre-order in the end but I put a lot of time into the early accessn the better part of 7 days or something.

    In Brief.

    1) It really is an unabashed WoW clone and it shows, the gameplay feels dated.

    2) Theres nothing specifically bad about the game but there is nothing outstanding either, leaving me indifferent to it.

    3) Storylines I tried thus far were poorly paced, dull and predictable. Infact the Bounty hunter one is full of cliches which would be tolerable if they were not such poor representations of the cliches in question. The great soundtrack is not even used to good effect building to dramatic or "tragic" events.

    4) Worlds feel dull and lifeless.

    5) Everything is on rails, areas have specific paths to your next goal and there is very little "getting off the beaten track" or exploring.

    6) Game engine is dated & fairly average, graphics only slightly better than KOTOR & KOTOR2 which are quite old games. This would not be such an issue if the gameplay was not so slow and boring.

    7) By level 10 in both Jedi knight & Bounty Hunter I was bored.

    8) pacing of the game is quite slow even for an MMO, they really want you to hang around and subscribe as long as possible.

    9) You could be forgiven for not realising Bioware made this game, it lacks polish particularly in the storytelling which is what Bioware games are famous for. Quite a dissapointing effort from one of my favourite studios. That said ME2 and DA2 were both had a similar lack of polish & care and i guess early signs that the quality control Bioware was once famous for was fading fast.

    10) there are several Free 2 Play MMO's using unknown IP's that I have enjoyed more than this.

    I ended up selling my unopened box copy because the game is just plain boring.

    Star Wars: The old Republic is Star Wars but mediocre, im not sure even going F2P can save it.    … Expand
  4. mikey42782
    May 28, 2012
    4
    Knights of the old republic, was groundbreaking for me..i had never even heard of it, and i will never forget the day i saw it in walmart, looked at the box and said to myself? this looks awesome i must have it..
    ..and the gods smiled on me for it was awesome. Then Kotor 2 came out..which wasn't nearly as good..
    But then years ago i heard a rumor about KOTOR becoming an MMO. I was    Knights of the old republic, was groundbreaking for me..i had never even heard of it, and i will never forget the day i saw it in walmart, looked at the box and said to myself? this looks awesome i must have it..
    ..and the gods smiled on me for it was awesome. Then Kotor 2 came out..which wasn't nearly as good..
    But then years ago i heard a rumor about KOTOR becoming an MMO. I was upset. I didn't want them turning one of my favorite games into a game that all of a sudden now tons of people were going to play who really didnt give a **** nor appreciate the Star Wars universe the way that true fans do. Most of my life people made fun of me for loving Star Wars and being a nerd..and now people play it..anyway so the MMO came out..i was skeptical at first and i purchased it..which brings the first bad point-
    You have to pay for the subscription when you purchase the game..so a 60 dollar game automatically becomes a 75 dollar game..you can't install it unless you agree to those terms and set up a subscription. that was my first beef..but i fought through it.
    I install the game, cut scenes were pretty bad ass i must say, got me into it..i used to play star wars galaxies and loved it, and they got rid of galaxies FOR THIS...i love being a smuggler..so natrually that was my first guy..i wanted to be a half ass han solo, exploring the galaxy, trying to beat the infamous Kessell Run. I'll tell you this much tho..if you want to be a smuggler?? don't expect to do any smuggling what so ever. The second bad point? the graphics..its pretty much DA2. Same sound effects, same animations save for the blasters. Same faces. And Dragon Age 2 compared to the first was just a botched abortion. Game play is the same as any other MMO..While my subsciption is still active, i have not played the game in almost 2 weeks. I am tired of it. i am tired of the repetitive grinding, i am tired of being on a planet with a lotta players because if they are doing the same quest as me, sometimes i will fight through all the **** to get to the objective, then some asshat will come out of stealth, and do it before me, then i have to wait..but that is a common issue with MMOS i guess..what some people have said on here is correct..its a single player game with mmo elements...a star wars wow if you will
    I hate to say this, but i think that EA ruins everything it touches. When Bioware sold out to ea, i ranted and raved and said watch **** bioware is going to go the way of the buffalo. and i seriously think it is going to be. when dragon age 3 comes out i will probly not buy it..i refuse to buy mass effect 3 because of origin. i am going off on a tear...If you have played star wars galaxies, you know that you got your own ship when you started out..which is awesome..you could get into space combat, deliver cargo, you could spend hours flying anywhere in the galaxy..you could also have someone make a new ship for you with a brand new chasis design, upgrade your ship, paint your ship..it was awesome..
    space combat here? sure you can upgrade your ship half ass..but the space combat is on rails and linear, the missions are just variations of the ones you did at earlier levels. it was a very big dissapointment for me because i was expecting something more along the lines of tie fighter..for 60 bucks? i thought it would..
    anyway, the goods to it? the envirornments are pretty cool. Some of the ablities. the voice actings decent, the combat is pretty fluid..
    cons? i have a decent rig and sometimes the lag is atrocious. sometimes when i go to get quest it will take me about 5 minutes for the npc to give it to me due to buffering..another con being a smuggler, killing a high level boss and recieving a light saber with dark side affilation which i cannot use at all..
    i hate to say this but i do believe i will be cancelling my subscription..    … Expand
  5. Esoteric
    Dec 31, 2011
    4
    This is bugged just like Warhammer Online was [same devs] at launch. Apart from completely broken animations and combat responsivity this is just another generic online game with awful graphics. Character customization is even more primitive than in WOW [which is quite an achievement]. Also, this game have very high pc requirements, so if you don't have top RIG then stay away.

    5/10
  6. aadms
    Jul 6, 2014
    4
    I was so excited to be able to play this game with my upgraded computer only to be highly disappointed in its presentation. It plays exactly like WoW, which, to me, is a boring and outdated game experience. The characters and their animations are laughable, as well as the graphics which look pre-2005. And it runs at horrible framerates with lagging and disappearing. If they are runningI was so excited to be able to play this game with my upgraded computer only to be highly disappointed in its presentation. It plays exactly like WoW, which, to me, is a boring and outdated game experience. The characters and their animations are laughable, as well as the graphics which look pre-2005. And it runs at horrible framerates with lagging and disappearing. If they are running this game at such low resolution, I don't understand why they're having this problem. Of all the MMOs out there, this one is the ugliest and plays the worse. This game looks and plays worse than the beloved KOTOR from 2004, so why is it being touted as a game today? Because EA wants to cash in on the MMO market, but like everything they touch, turns to dry dust. No excuse to make this bad of a Star Wars game. Why anyone would pay a subscription to play this is beyond me.… Expand
  7. cmoyano
    Jan 14, 2012
    4
    my god what is this **** Boring Queuing simulator that should never have been made, where is KOTOR 3 bioware? Huh where the **** is it? gamecube graphics; FF14 UI; and about as much fun as have a spear up the ass. I know these results are going to be skewed by people suffering from denial that bioware could ever make a bad game but this is just as bad as DA2. Buy anything else for a bettermy god what is this **** Boring Queuing simulator that should never have been made, where is KOTOR 3 bioware? Huh where the **** is it? gamecube graphics; FF14 UI; and about as much fun as have a spear up the ass. I know these results are going to be skewed by people suffering from denial that bioware could ever make a bad game but this is just as bad as DA2. Buy anything else for a better gaming experience… Expand
  8. Jounar
    Jan 13, 2012
    4
    Sadly after all the hype SWTOR is nothing more than a badly copied WoW clone but missing far to many features to be called a real MMO. Character creation is not only rather basic but seems to share the same graphics with NPC's so expect to see very similar looking throughout the game. The graphics are very dated for a modern MMO and are easily put to shame by the likes of AoC, LOTRO, RiftSadly after all the hype SWTOR is nothing more than a badly copied WoW clone but missing far to many features to be called a real MMO. Character creation is not only rather basic but seems to share the same graphics with NPC's so expect to see very similar looking throughout the game. The graphics are very dated for a modern MMO and are easily put to shame by the likes of AoC, LOTRO, Rift and even WoW. Whats even worse is the promo screenshots and videos Bioware use to advertise the game use a high res texture setting than player can't use no matter how powerful there PC's are. Combat which makes up the majority of a players time in the game is dull, uninspired and fells very unresponsive overall. PvP combat in the PvP arena's is even worse as the game engine just doesn't seem able to handle having lots of players fighting close together.

    The current high graphics setting is just a renamed medium setting due to how awful the Hero engine is and even using low/medium settings the game still performs poorly on high spec PC's. It took Bioware almost a month to admit this on there forums after first claiming it was a UI bug and that the real high res graphics settings are only used in cutscenes with NPCs. For a 2011/2012 AAA MMO with such a huge budget the graphics are a complete disgrace and feel like something that was released in 2006 except game back then had much better visuals.

    The much hyped class story is ok for the most part but nothing that will have single player game developers shaking in their boots and while it makes the normal kill 10 rats type quests all MMOs have less obvious it only makes up about 5-8% of the missions a player needs to do to hit max level. This makes running alts no different than any other MMO and worse than some as you need to do the exact same missions in the exact same order for every character.

    The various planets are very nice and also very instanced so the game world feels very empty for the most part. The planets are not however very open compared to other MMO's and the game through mission hub placement always pushes you in the direction of the next set of missions. There is also no public quest style missions which for a big budget MMO is a huge oversight imho. The dungeons or flashpoints as SWTOR calls them are the exact same deal we have seen in every other MMO since EQ1 with trash mobs to be cleared before reaching a boss. The starter flashpoint for both factions is much more like the standard single player missions due to alot of interaction with NPC's but these are the exception. Crafting is handled well in SWTOR with the players companions doing most of the more boring leg work in gathering crafting materials but to get the best items you still need to raid for recipes and materials and in all cases better items can be gotten from the level 50 daily missions players can run.

    SWTOR is a single player Bioware game with some basic MMO option bolted and I do mean basic. A very poor LFG system, horrid UI, guilds being nothing more than a friends tab, the most basic looting system any MMO has ever had and a class system with less options than those found in EQ1.

    When compared to games like LOTRO, Rift and of course WoW the lack of polish for such a costly to produce game is just shocking with bug that were known about in the July beta of 2011 still being in the released product. What a shame EA didn't allow an extra 6 months worth of development and a more adventurous design team weren't behind the wheel.    … Expand
  9. Tent27
    Dec 20, 2011
    4
    I can't stop shaking my head in disbelief. Am I supposed to be impressed with a 300 million dollar game that looks, plays and feels like a game from 2004? So glad I played it on my friends computer and didn't get it myself. Textures in Knights of the Old Republic look better. Don't believe me, put them side by side and compare. The new bioware destroys everything it touches, and Star WarsI can't stop shaking my head in disbelief. Am I supposed to be impressed with a 300 million dollar game that looks, plays and feels like a game from 2004? So glad I played it on my friends computer and didn't get it myself. Textures in Knights of the Old Republic look better. Don't believe me, put them side by side and compare. The new bioware destroys everything it touches, and Star Wars is it's next victim.… Expand
  10. nopistons420
    Feb 7, 2012
    4
    its not an MMO; more like a single player game with a monthly fee. it feels unfinished; unpolished; and just overall lacking completely in features. it makes no difference if you choose light or dark side; the combat is boring, companion system is buggy. the only real reason anyone would play this game is if they are huge star wars fans other than that they got the mmorpg part of the gameits not an MMO; more like a single player game with a monthly fee. it feels unfinished; unpolished; and just overall lacking completely in features. it makes no difference if you choose light or dark side; the combat is boring, companion system is buggy. the only real reason anyone would play this game is if they are huge star wars fans other than that they got the mmorpg part of the game totally wrong… Expand
  11. RecoveryRx
    Jan 3, 2012
    4
    Every review on here that is 0-3 or 9-10 is a complete joke in my opinion, every single one of them. Here's the bottom line on TOR, a game I was insanely excited about and now won't sub past my first month: the story and voice acting is amazing, the rest of the game is either mediocre or a huge back step for the mmo genre as a whole. Listen carefully - this is the biggest disappointmentEvery review on here that is 0-3 or 9-10 is a complete joke in my opinion, every single one of them. Here's the bottom line on TOR, a game I was insanely excited about and now won't sub past my first month: the story and voice acting is amazing, the rest of the game is either mediocre or a huge back step for the mmo genre as a whole. Listen carefully - this is the biggest disappointment I've ever experienced in a video game. EVER. I am 33 years old and have been playing video games my entire life, this is the cake. It is shocking people, SHOOOCKINGGG!!!!!! how uninspired the world is, how mediocre and "just good enough" almost all of the game mechanics / systems are. And it's BAFFLING that a game with this much of a budget could be this bad.… Expand
  12. GhostDog24
    May 3, 2012
    4
    I think for an MMO it's a great game, because it's easy to play with (still a WOW copy) and have some new feature in it, but for a RPG is piece of s**t... I would be much more happier with a KOTOR III instead of this, since this is the KOTOR series next "episode" without the "Commander Shepard" (in this case I mean Revan or the Jedi Exile). Just think about it for a second, What would youI think for an MMO it's a great game, because it's easy to play with (still a WOW copy) and have some new feature in it, but for a RPG is piece of s**t... I would be much more happier with a KOTOR III instead of this, since this is the KOTOR series next "episode" without the "Commander Shepard" (in this case I mean Revan or the Jedi Exile). Just think about it for a second, What would you feel if after the ME2 they came out with a ME MMO and there you play with some "no name" character, where the first thing is to kill Commander Sheppard (the KOTOR series are not about jedi or sith fight, its about Revan and his heroic acts) or what would the star wars series be without Darth Vader? I read the Star Wars The Old Republic: Revan book and I hope one day BioWare or LucasArts or someone else will make a game of it (just like they did with The Wither) SO basically it's a good game but I'm disappointed with the storyline if I think of this as a continuation of the KOTOR 2, but if it's not then the story is acceptable. But since I can't think of the story in any other way I just give a 4.… Expand
  13. Ruzgfpegk
    Apr 15, 2012
    4
    Story (SP content) : 9/10 (at least, if all are as good as the one I played)
    Immersion : 8/10
    Graphics engine : 7/10 Game balance until 1.2 patch : 5/10 (7 PvE, 4 PvP) Pleasure to play until 1.2 patch : 6/10 Game balance since 1.2 patch : 2/10 (4 PvE, 1 PvP) Pleasure to play since 1.2 patch : 2/10 The balance was broken so much in 1.2 that I kept losing in PvP for hours (playing Republic    Story (SP content) : 9/10 (at least, if all are as good as the one I played)
    Immersion : 8/10
    Graphics engine : 7/10
    Game balance until 1.2 patch : 5/10 (7 PvE, 4 PvP)
    Pleasure to play until 1.2 patch : 6/10
    Game balance since 1.2 patch : 2/10 (4 PvE, 1 PvP)
    Pleasure to play since 1.2 patch : 2/10

    The balance was broken so much in 1.2 that I kept losing in PvP for hours (playing Republic healer).
    I'm part of a guild with more than 100 members and since a few weeks if we get more than 3 people online at the same time it's a celebration, and since 1.2 I'm often alone.
    Quoting the Ancient Aliens narrator, "where did they go?". Now I know.

    Healers (I play one) are useless since 1.2, both for themselves and the other players, even with a massive amount of endurance and with a full heal skill tree.
    What do experienced players say to the healers now? "If you see one of these enemy classes, RUN". Are you SERIOUS? Playing PvP to RUN? Is that how BioWare sees a balanced game?

    I wanted to love this game but BioWare disgusted me from playing.
    As it is, I wouldn't want to touch it again even if it was Free to Play.
    I hope it will get better in the future, but in the meantime I'll just stop playing AND paying.
    Did you already feel like you wasted your time playing for months hoping it would get better? I did.

    I just hope they'll release a patch to let us play in single-player mode with more bots, and with pre-1.2 skill trees, as the game seems to have been designed for this.    … Expand
  14. OhRly
    Sep 26, 2012
    4
    The cut scenes, acting, and dialogue are amazing but that's not what a game is, the game play is what the game is, and the game play is flat, it's WoW with a Star Wars setting, massively disappointing.
  15. tzedan
    Dec 29, 2011
    4
    I beta tested this game and found that it is a single player RPG with MMO bolt-ons. This is not a bad thing, but if I am going to play a single player RPG then I want awesome rocking graphics! It is true that the graphics are better than World of Warcraft, but WoW is seven years old and SWTOR looks only marginally better. If Rift can manage near photo-realistic graphics then so can SWTOR.I beta tested this game and found that it is a single player RPG with MMO bolt-ons. This is not a bad thing, but if I am going to play a single player RPG then I want awesome rocking graphics! It is true that the graphics are better than World of Warcraft, but WoW is seven years old and SWTOR looks only marginally better. If Rift can manage near photo-realistic graphics then so can SWTOR. I had high hopes for this game and IMHO it tries to be an RPG and an MMO and it fails at both… Expand
  16. Todayshero
    Apr 2, 2012
    4
    I'm a huge PVP player and was looking forward to some epic battles in the middle of city districts and getting caught off guard while trying to shop at the local droid station. Unfortunately the warning that SWTOR gives before entering a pvp server is far from the truth. It states you will be in constant battles between players, I was in 4 pvp fights before level cap outside the warzone,I'm a huge PVP player and was looking forward to some epic battles in the middle of city districts and getting caught off guard while trying to shop at the local droid station. Unfortunately the warning that SWTOR gives before entering a pvp server is far from the truth. It states you will be in constant battles between players, I was in 4 pvp fights before level cap outside the warzone, and 1 of those was because we got people to tell us where anyone was. The game is far to controlled, has no end game worth mentioning, the only thing that is even remotely different and worthwhile in the game is the main story line of each class, which will send you playing warzone over and over again trying to level up just so you can get to the next part without dealing with side missions you've done plenty times before. This is a single player game smashed into an mmo which then goes by mmo rules, and if you've ever played an mmo you know what I'm talking about. Less than stellar NPC (standing around waiting for you to come kill them), same skill to button type combat. In my opinion, an mmo isn't worth playing if it has no pvp and the end game wasn't well thought out. Whats the point in maxing your level if there are neither of these. It wouldn't take a lot of changes to make this game great, but it's highly unlikely those changes are coming.… Expand
  17. garland_spqr
    Jan 15, 2012
    4
    Up until now I have liked every Bioware game and some of them are my all time favorites. This game however, is a gigantic disappointment.
    I played a Jedi sage to level 30 when I stopped as every second spent felt like a waste of time. I expected a game with a good story and rich lore in a vivid star wars world. Sadly, I found nothing of it.
    In my opinion, Jedi sage until level 30 has no    Up until now I have liked every Bioware game and some of them are my all time favorites. This game however, is a gigantic disappointment.
    I played a Jedi sage to level 30 when I stopped as every second spent felt like a waste of time. I expected a game with a good story and rich lore in a vivid star wars world. Sadly, I found nothing of it.
    In my opinion, Jedi sage until level 30 has no story. The quests consist of: disable an array there, hack a terminal there, loot quest items from dead bodies etc. The quests do not feel connected to each other or embedded in a story, everything feels very random and pointless. There are no memorable characters throughout the journey and the companions are annoyingly flat placeholders with no story.
    I expected living, breathing city worlds full of life. They are nothing more than tunnels filled with lifeless mobs. I expected varied crafting professions that let you explore the world. They are nothing more than a "click and wait" game. I would have liked to see flashpoints connected to the planets you travel through, but they are just random missions on the fleet. A starwars game should be filled with passion, but this game is passionless. The dialogue and codex writing is very mediocre and not anywhere near the quality of Mass Effect or Dragon Age.
    Its possible that things look different with other classes, but from a jedi sage perspective, this is a poor game.
    The only things I liked are the music and the voice-actors, which are both brilliant. The rest is forgettable.    … Expand
  18. Sula
    Dec 21, 2011
    4
    Polished game BUT very limited gameplay, WoW-like clone with VO slapped over and more instancing.
    End-game is about running instances over and over and not much aside of that.
    Insane amount of money spent on Voice Over and cutscenes shows with this game lacking in other departments. Though if you like a game to concentrate on nothing else than on grinding instances and battlegrounds once    Polished game BUT very limited gameplay, WoW-like clone with VO slapped over and more instancing.
    End-game is about running instances over and over and not much aside of that.
    Insane amount of money spent on Voice Over and cutscenes shows with this game lacking in other departments.

    Though if you like a game to concentrate on nothing else than on grinding instances and battlegrounds once you finish questing, then you'll find good game here.

    If you want more diverse experience and more mmorpg, social and "world-like" feeling avoid it.    … Expand
  19. TixyLix
    Dec 20, 2011
    4
    What they've done is created WoW seven years later, only this time the quests are linked up by chat wheel cutscenes. I was hoping that Bioware would change things up, nope.....

    The worlds feel sterile, the NPCs all stand in one place, barely animated at all. The sound effects are very poor, they just seem missing as all I hear is footsteps and music. The planets are small questing hubs    What they've done is created WoW seven years later, only this time the quests are linked up by chat wheel cutscenes. I was hoping that Bioware would change things up, nope.....

    The worlds feel sterile, the NPCs all stand in one place, barely animated at all. The sound effects are very poor, they just seem missing as all I hear is footsteps and music. The planets are small questing hubs and then you travel between them via a main lobby and everything is either instanced or phased. You barely see anyone as there never seems to be more than 100 people per zone and world PVP is pointless so everyone is in battlegrounds.

    They had the perfect opportunity to fix what is wrong with todays MMOs and instead they just made a worse version of WoW, like every MMO has done since...

    I'm only giving it 4 because it isn't a total train wreck and is polished, I just wont be playing it any longer.    … Expand
  20. QuakerOfDoom
    Dec 20, 2011
    4
    I'll be honest here, I only got to Level 33 before quitting out of boredom, so if there is something to make up for the poor post-endgame, consider this a 6 instead of a 4. It's just that I just can't support Bioware anymore for what they've done to the SW:TOR games, with the retcons to Revan and the boring quests. I've always been a huge fan of Bioware ever since the SW:TOR 1, but everI'll be honest here, I only got to Level 33 before quitting out of boredom, so if there is something to make up for the poor post-endgame, consider this a 6 instead of a 4. It's just that I just can't support Bioware anymore for what they've done to the SW:TOR games, with the retcons to Revan and the boring quests. I've always been a huge fan of Bioware ever since the SW:TOR 1, but ever since they were bought out by EA, the quality of their games has noticeably dropped. TOR, being, in a nutshell, WoW with lightsabers, has done little to change my opinion of this. I really hope Bioware manages to buck the trend with the upcoming ME3, but I can't help but feel doubt about Bioware's ability to continue making quality games after this.
    Anyway, if you're into WoW, you might like this game. If you're not, then TOR won't do anything to change your opinion.
    P.S. I know that I will be called a troll for expressing my honest opinion, but I don't give a ****    … Expand
  21. RampantAndroid
    Dec 26, 2011
    4
    Zones are instanced, gameplay is otherwise identical to WoW, pretty much. The game pretty much bores me to tears. I gave it chance because it was Bioware, but after Dragon Age 2 and now SWTOR, I honestly wish Bioware would go under so I remember them in a somewhat positive light.
  22. Mema
    Dec 30, 2011
    4
    Gameplay: The same as World of Warcraft.... seven years ago. The space combat is a poor reskin of Star Fox. The quests are just rehashed kill x amount of y and fetch/deliver quests.
    Graphics: Absolutely appalling for a game released in 2011, even for an mmo.
    Story: An insult to Star Wars fans. Hopefully it isnt canon. The voice acting is on and off. Some characters have better stories    Gameplay: The same as World of Warcraft.... seven years ago. The space combat is a poor reskin of Star Fox. The quests are just rehashed kill x amount of y and fetch/deliver quests.
    Graphics: Absolutely appalling for a game released in 2011, even for an mmo.
    Story: An insult to Star Wars fans. Hopefully it isnt canon. The voice acting is on and off. Some characters have better stories then others. Disappointment of the year.    … Expand
  23. liabilityman
    Jan 13, 2015
    4
    TLDR: "I couldn't be the character I wanted to be....and this is a MMORPG!"

    Having loved SWTOR, this game excited me initially. After about a day of play, the gameplay for which was quite fun, all I wanted to do was tweak my characters appearance. Change hairstyle for example. When I eventually found out that the only way to do so is to spend real-life money, all my enthusiasm for this    TLDR: "I couldn't be the character I wanted to be....and this is a MMORPG!"

    Having loved SWTOR, this game excited me initially. After about a day of play, the gameplay for which was quite fun, all I wanted to do was tweak my characters appearance. Change hairstyle for example. When I eventually found out that the only way to do so is to spend real-life money, all my enthusiasm for this game disappeared. Yes it might be a minor reason, but to me it broke all immersion and attachment to the game. I couldn't be the character I wanted to be....and this is a MMORPG!

    I severely dislike the FTP model used in SWTOR, with free players having ridiculous restrictions.

    I have played other FTP games such as DCUO, which were a lot of fun, and ultimately let you play how you wanted. Paying for things was optional if you wanted the extra stuff. In SWTOR however, I feel like they only give you access to half the game.

    Very, very disappointed. Bioware/EA, whoever is responsible, needs to sort stuff out.

    I should know better with an EA game.    … Expand
  24. Astralis
    Mar 17, 2012
    4
    I was offered the seven-day free trial and played for four days. I really enjoyed the ambiance and the universe of the game. It feels like a Star Wars world. But the quests are boring and repetitive. There really is little difference between Wolfenstein and this, besides better graphics and music. Running through miles and miles of sewers shooting the same creatures and people over andI was offered the seven-day free trial and played for four days. I really enjoyed the ambiance and the universe of the game. It feels like a Star Wars world. But the quests are boring and repetitive. There really is little difference between Wolfenstein and this, besides better graphics and music. Running through miles and miles of sewers shooting the same creatures and people over and over and over and over is not a good time. Doing the same thing in a building and then reaching a "boss" character that you can't kill and then have to realize you need to play the whole quest again because you forgot to get a weapon that was hidden under rock is tedious, not fun. Then when I saw the price to buy the game ($59 at the time of writing this), I realized I wouldn't spend that much to play this game, but the world is worth exploring a little bit. But you have to participate in every single little bit of fighting -- by smashing all the buttons -- and gets so repetitive that it really only goes so far for me. Then I saw it costs $20 for a limited amount of time to play per month! That's when I stopped playing altogether. It's not worth spending $59 one time, certainly not an additional $240 to play it for a year. As of this review, many people are leaving it and playing Massive Effect 3 instead, so the servers are not really full these days. I'm not so sure they'll be coming back, either. I won't.… Expand
  25. BXBlodia
    Dec 25, 2011
    4
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. SWTOR is a strange case. Was it a single player RPG, It'd be a very, veery good game. Most class storylines are very good (except for smuggler, jedi knight and sith warrior unfortunately), and the game has good flow and quite a lot of content. However, it's all single-player content, and there is literally no reason to subscribe for longer than the free month at the moment.
    Unfortunately, someone decided to make it into an MMO. Which lead to simplifcation and a huge amount of time sinks. So much for the Next-gen experience here, sadly.
    Another thing I do not understand is why would anyone create an MMO in which one of the factions will suffer an utter defeat, and it's clear from the very start. Every quest line on both Empire and Republic side leads to the inevitable end: Empire loses. Everyone important dies. You cannot even save anyone. Your decisions are meaningless.
    Another issue I have with the game is that SWTOR's Sith are... dumb. There's no other word for it. They are written to be superpowered angsty teens who know NOTHING about ruling an empire. If you look at the (TABOO!) EU stories, comic books and even Palpatine himself, the Sith are cunning (both in new hope era and old republic, so there), and they'd never act like idiots. Which is what SWTOR's Sith turn out to be. Infighting, petty conflicts, impulsiveness. They screw up everything they touch, and apparently all the want is to CAUSE TERROR AND FEAR. You cannot rule an empire that way. Sith have no way to go other than lose here.
    Multiplayer part of the game is horrid. The netcode stutters, animations fail to play (tested on my brand new i7 aswell as my brother's older machine) and there is no class balance. I wouldn't expect class balance so soon after release, but it's strikingly apparent that some developers loved their classes more than others. Instances are boring too, we seriously have seen this kind of gameplay and over what, 7 years? it grew pretty stale. There's no reason to even socialise in this MASSIVE MULTIPLAYER game, because your sidekick can get the job done. At worst he/she/it will die.
    Was SWTOR a single player RPG, it'd be a very solid title, a strong 8/10 (4/10 if smuggler. yes, it is THAT bad). BioWare decided to make it into a MMO though. Therefore, 4/10. Because the single player part receives a 7 overall from me (i just can't forgive the smuggler. sorry), and the multiplayer is a strong 3.    … Expand
  26. Thorn14
    Dec 20, 2011
    4
    My experience in this game has been a level 40 something imperial agent and just a myriad of other lower level everything

    Okay, first thing we see in the game and this is a major bleh for me. The Character Creation. It is absolutely dreadful. Obviously its not on the level of suckiness that you see in your average F 2 P Korean Grindfest, but not by alot, especially if you've played any    My experience in this game has been a level 40 something imperial agent and just a myriad of other lower level everything

    Okay, first thing we see in the game and this is a major bleh for me. The Character Creation. It is absolutely dreadful. Obviously its not on the level of suckiness that you see in your average F 2 P Korean Grindfest, but not by alot, especially if you've played any Bioware game in the past. There are only 4 body types for men, and they are each varying degrees of awful to meh. Theres Shape 1, which is Justin Beiber (and what is used for "kids") Shape 2 which is your average Bruce Lee build, theres Shape 3 which is Big Mc Large Huge and Shape 4 which is Lord Lard Ass. Shape 4 is absolutely awful, and for Sith Warriors, is the shape of your Master, which, if you look at his Wiki, is not how he should look at all. It makes no sense.The races are...well...everything is just "Human but" Obviously this was done for cutscenes and voices (No wookie would talk like your character) but there are still races like Togruta or Nautolan that would be fine but are not in. Chiss are pretty sweet however. There is no long hair, at best you have hair that goes down to your chin. I guess this is because it would be too graphics intensive? Complexions and Scars aren't so bad, shame you can't stack them. And yes, no sliders still, you choose predetermined faces. For a game where you spend alot of time looking at your character in cutscenes, the amount of corner cutting in CC is disappointing. It should have been one of the top five priorities. The number of unique models in this game, NPC wise is also staggeringly low.

    The graphics were no doubt simplified to accommodate as many systems as possible, like World of Warcraft, I understand that. But if that is the case, why does the game, for me and so many others run like absolute crap?

    It took me about 10 minutes AT LEAST to go from start up to getting my character in play. All my options are on low too. Yet I can play Skyrim and The Witcher 2 on Medium no problem. I understand its an MMO but this is just inexcusable Okay, gameplay. Know World of Warcraft? Good news! You already know how to play 85% of the game! Played KOTOR only? Bad news! Theres nothing from KOTOR in this! Its your standard MMO affair. Tanks, Heals, DPS, Burst Damage, DOT, Taunts, Rotations, ETC. If you're used to MM Os then you're in luck. It does that pretty well, although tanking as my Jedi Guardian has been a fittingly in character practice in patience. You dont get your first taunt until 15, and it has a long cool down. Your robot companion tanks better than you. The gameplay is the same tired WoW gameplay, and the game suffers big time for it.

    The missions are the biggest flaw in this game. Every quest is a variation of "Go here, kill stuff along the way for bonus maybe, kill boss or interact with object" or "Collect 5 blah blah blah" with varying degrees of logic in their drops,.

    All the flavor in the world, which does help a little, doesn't change the fact that is every quest. But maybe that is nit picking. Your choices in quests rarely matter as well.

    Story is this game's real saving grace, and why it goes from "Mediocre MMO" to "has potential." Imperial Agent's story was a freaking blast. But after you finish all the storylines, if you even do that, what next? Endgame in this game is pretty much non existant. one mediocre raid...

    And yes, Bioware continues the proud tradition of Dark Side = Stupid Evil Jerk Ass . I was hoping DS Jedi Knight would mean "Emotional and prideful" but nope, just "AHAHA LOOK HOW EVIL I AM FOR NO REASON"

    One issue isevery faction goes through the same planet order. Your Bounty Hunter and Sith Warrior's planets after the first one will be the exact same, as will the quests, save for your personal quests. This will make replay value for someone like me who can't stand doing the same thing again very difficult. Also this makes the whole "KOTOR 3-11" claim bull crap. Class storylines are only 20% of the game. Everyone shares about 80%

    And one of the best features I would list was removed.. Your armor could be matched to the color of whatever your chest piece was, avoiding clown armor. They removed that... All in all ,the story of this game is pretty decent, and had me hooked for the first 2 weeks. Sadly, the gameplay made it where it was a chore. I was FORCING MYSELF THROUGH GAMEPLAY for the story. Thats unacceptable for an MMO, where gameplay should always be important.

    Maybe this game will improve in the future, but for now, this game is just another WoW clone, in space, with kinda cool cut scenes, and with less content. Cant search the AH, no dual speccing and respecing is EXPENSIVE. There are just so many features you should expect missing. It attempts to be like WoW, without the things that made WoW popular. It just has neat storylines. But that is all it brings to the table.    … Expand
  27. Fappachino
    Dec 20, 2011
    4
    I really feel betrayed by Bioware.When they announced this game a few years ago i was over the moon knowing that my favorite things were being combined, Star wars and MMOs.Knowing it was Bioware i had great hope for this game ever since i played KOTOR which still-is one of my favorite Rpgs to this very day.Fast forward to now and what i got was:
    >Repetitive quest
    >Hours of Grinding >Lack    I really feel betrayed by Bioware.When they announced this game a few years ago i was over the moon knowing that my favorite things were being combined, Star wars and MMOs.Knowing it was Bioware i had great hope for this game ever since i played KOTOR which still-is one of my favorite Rpgs to this very day.Fast forward to now and what i got was:
    >Repetitive quest
    >Hours of Grinding
    >Lack of immersion

    I could go on.They claimed it was something 'new' but it was just vanilla WoW.They claimed they went all out on voice acting which is mostly true but the fact that it's only used to tell you to go kill 10 x and report back kills the whole feel. Ok game if you're just looking to play it for a month but i really can't see myself or anyone of my friends playing this more than a month.    … Expand
  28. PretentiousCat
    Dec 20, 2011
    4
    When I first heard about this game, many moons ago, I was instantly hyped. I loved KotOR and the atmosphere. I was de-based on Bioware after the DA2 fiasco but I said I'd give them a second chance.

    After playing the early release, getting into the mid 40's in the first day of playing, I realized something. The rumors of a copy-pasted WoW were true. The skills were the same, the combat was    When I first heard about this game, many moons ago, I was instantly hyped. I loved KotOR and the atmosphere. I was de-based on Bioware after the DA2 fiasco but I said I'd give them a second chance.

    After playing the early release, getting into the mid 40's in the first day of playing, I realized something.
    The rumors of a copy-pasted WoW were true. The skills were the same, the combat was the same. Heck, even the quests were the same.

    What they didn't copy was the sense of accomplishment you get from attaining a high level and good gear.

    And don't get me started on the gear in ToR. Terrible textures, nothing that sets you apart from other classes and the clown syndrome is everywhere with mismatching gear.

    This game is nothing more than a mix of social networking and a glorified Facebook game.
    Avoid it at all costs.    … Expand
  29. amateurdude
    Dec 20, 2011
    4
    What can you say about this game which hasn't been said about every other MMO out there. Everything this game does.. There's other (you know what ones) that do it better.

    It's.. Just the same old regular crap that every other MMO to exist has already spewed out. When you have a terrible developer such as Bioware of Dragon Age 2 infamy and the pants on head retarded EA publishing this was    What can you say about this game which hasn't been said about every other MMO out there. Everything this game does.. There's other (you know what ones) that do it better.

    It's.. Just the same old regular crap that every other MMO to exist has already spewed out. When you have a terrible developer such as Bioware of Dragon Age 2 infamy and the pants on head retarded EA publishing this was doomed from the get go.

    And they didn't disappoint.

    If you're looking to play an MMO either stick with WoW, check out Rift, or give DCUO a go. Other than that avoid this if at all possible.    … Expand
  30. Quickfire
    Dec 20, 2011
    4
    What can I say about this MMO.
    The positives would be the limited physics in the game, reasonably well written storyline, conversation wheel system (unique), fantastic environment modeling and choreographed combat moves.
    The negatives would be lack of multiplayer support features, closed areas, lack of sandboxy content for casual players, poor NPC models and textures, poor space combat    What can I say about this MMO.
    The positives would be the limited physics in the game, reasonably well written storyline, conversation wheel system (unique), fantastic environment modeling and choreographed combat moves.

    The negatives would be lack of multiplayer support features, closed areas, lack of sandboxy content for casual players, poor NPC models and textures, poor space combat (no multiplayer), clunky combat flow and animations, lack of appearance/weapon/race/class choices and a poorly implemented UI and communication system.

    This game lacks many features considered standard for modern MMOs. It might be best to wait a few months for game improvements before purchasing this product, as you are really funding an extended beta after launch.

    A poor quality release with major potential down the road.    … Expand
  31. Dangerous_L
    Dec 21, 2011
    4
    This game is hardly an MMO. It feels more like a single player experience that you could bring friends along with. I didn't find the grouping mechanics to be all that good, linearity is ridiculous, PvP is a mess, FORGET about exploration (especially levels 1-25)... People are comparing TOR to WoW. I'll tell you this much, I literally went back to WoW after playing this game. I'm actuallyThis game is hardly an MMO. It feels more like a single player experience that you could bring friends along with. I didn't find the grouping mechanics to be all that good, linearity is ridiculous, PvP is a mess, FORGET about exploration (especially levels 1-25)... People are comparing TOR to WoW. I'll tell you this much, I literally went back to WoW after playing this game. I'm actually telling you that WoW has better group mechanics, less linearity, and much better PvP. Not to mention overall atmosphere. SWTOR lacks any atmosphere, I didn't click on any of the worlds I played. Anyone who says this game has more polish needs to get their eyes checked. SWTOR may be worth checking out, like, 6-8 months from now when they work out the kinks. However, it is NOT worth $60+sub. If you're looking for WoW-type gameplay, go play WoW. It's established, cheaper, and works better. God knows I wish they would have just made this a single-player game.… Expand
  32. enrogae1
    Dec 21, 2011
    4
    I see the smear campaign has begun. I will try to be as subjectively objective as I can. This is no Asheron's Call, Ultima Online, or Shadowbane. It is as much a theme park game as every other "AAA" MMO to come out in recent years. It looms as a shadow over other titles, such as Age of Conan or Star Trek Online. It is supremely better than anything modern except for the one datedI see the smear campaign has begun. I will try to be as subjectively objective as I can. This is no Asheron's Call, Ultima Online, or Shadowbane. It is as much a theme park game as every other "AAA" MMO to come out in recent years. It looms as a shadow over other titles, such as Age of Conan or Star Trek Online. It is supremely better than anything modern except for the one dated title that everyone likes to compare it to... I won't even bother saying it because we all know which one.

    Does it share elements to this grossly successful "other" title? Of course it does. Just like "it" did, The Old Republic has copied elements from what worked in other, successful MMO titles. Is it a clone or a copy? I would have to say maybe, but it is something new and refreshing in many other ways. It is a theme park MMO... and that type of MMO hasn't changed much since Everquest (except to remove that pesky sandbox, which many of us still lament).

    Does it deserve a 1 or a 0? Of course not. It's better than Dragon Age 2, and even IT didn't deserve a 1 or a 0. I doubt any of the people posting such scores have played much of the game, and if they have then I'm not sure why they rate it so low. 1 or a 0 is reserved, in my mind, for a game that is unplayable or total garbage. That isn't even close to SW:ToR. Here's my quick breakdown:

    The Good:
    1. Voice Acting is Sufficient. You won't hear anything as well-done as the Mass Effect series, but it is adequate... and in places, pretty good.
    2. Stories are Adequate. The story lines in this game won't compete with a half-decent novel, but they are as entertaining as your run-of-the-mill prime time show.
    3. Group Questing is Actually Entertaining. I have always hated being in a group for questing in any other MMO. It's a penalty, curbing reward possibilities and just making everything take longer. The conversation and dialogue with NPC's makes grouping with a friend much more enjoyable.
    4. Instancing is at least Well-Done. I hate instancing... with a passion. Something ought to be said, though, about the way it was done in a way that is less immersion breaking here. Walking through a glimmering force field into a private instance with NO load screen is a step forward, to be sure.
    5. Art Quality is Good. Sure, the graphics aren't top-notch (see "The Bad"), but the environments are often beautiful nonetheless. You don't need Arkham City graphics to be pretty (Arkham City was beautifully ugly), and ToR shines here. Worlds like Taris and Nar Shadda offer stark changes in artwork that is easy to appreciate.

    The Bad:

    1. Character Creation is Severely Lacking for a Modern MMO. In the days of character models such as those in any Cryptic game, Aion, or even EvE's new generator, the customization in SW: ToR's character creation system is pretty much a joke. The mesh/textures on character models are also very "flat".
    2. Engine is Poorly Optimized. There are many posts on the forums about bad FPS. Personally, I run an AMD x4 Phenom II Quad-Core 3.2ghz, 6gb Corsair RAM, and a GTX 580 (GTS250 for Physx, which doesn't apply here)... and I'm lucky to average 30fps on max settings (ironically the same average as people with far lesser systems). Considering the lack of technically advanced graphics, something is amiss here.
    3. The first several worlds are very "corridor-ish". The worlds don't seem very big, there is little exploration at the onset of the game. You are funneled from point A to point B to completed objective H. 4. It doesn't feel "alive" the way an MMO should. The only critters in the world are occasional HUGE monsters that are too busy grazing to attack. This seems like laziness, to me.
    5. Sometimes combat does seem clunky, sometime it doesn't. Most of the time I have fun with it, and I suspect a lot of people's issues stem from timing issues with abilities that can be corrected at some point.

    These are just my highlights. There are other issues I have, such as it not being sandbox (they always said it wouldn't be, so this was expected), and lack of immersion things like being able to sit in chairs or sit on the ground without looking constipated. Despite the flaws, there are many good qualities here... so don't let the zero's, one's, and two's on here dissuade you from trying the game. At the end of the day, I have fun when I log on... for now. I'm quite certain, having been in the beta since early on, that I will get my money's worth before I stop having fun. Give it a try.    … Expand
  33. kingcheese
    Dec 21, 2011
    4
    WoW in space. Not a bad thing exactly since WoW is/was a good MMO, but it's 2011 and I was expecting something new. Instead we get the same old stuff but with voice acting. Really awkward voice acting.
  34. Jabrony
    Dec 21, 2011
    4
    Heavily instanced and linear like old single player RPGs. Basically a combat lobby like WoW but nowhere near as deep when it comes to group combat, fight dynamics, or even exploration. Gamers looking for deep gameplay should look elsewhere. The game's main selling point is story and VO. Story itself gives only the illusion of choice as there is never lasting consequence (save forHeavily instanced and linear like old single player RPGs. Basically a combat lobby like WoW but nowhere near as deep when it comes to group combat, fight dynamics, or even exploration. Gamers looking for deep gameplay should look elsewhere. The game's main selling point is story and VO. Story itself gives only the illusion of choice as there is never lasting consequence (save for aesthetics) to your decisions. This means that there isn't much room for game-play inside of the story, unlike previous Bioware titles. VO quickly becomes annoying after watching an NPC glorify a "kill ten rats"quest via 2 minutes of b-grade acting for the hundredth time. This game is a shallow copy/paste job of WoW but severely lacking in nearly every feature we would expect to see in an MMO released in 2011/2012. The list of missing features is loooooooong (and frankly shocking)... I would normally hold out hope for improvements via patches but many of the game's issues seem impossible to fix due to decisions made early-on in the design process (the heavy instancing, linearity, gear treadmill, etc...)

    Lastly, if the game were not a subscription title I would rank it higher. But as it stands now, it appears folks saw the success of WOW, made a SP game with MP elements, and called it an MMO to hopefully get more cash.    … Expand
  35. ReviewerX103
    Dec 21, 2011
    4
    This game is not all bad but overall not good. The soloplayer content is good for a mmo in my opinion. The content is story driven and keeps you moving. The group content... well saying just lacking would be an understatement. This is easily the most solo player focused mmo game in the genre. It is very obvious little went into designing content for anything above small group, and evenThis game is not all bad but overall not good. The soloplayer content is good for a mmo in my opinion. The content is story driven and keeps you moving. The group content... well saying just lacking would be an understatement. This is easily the most solo player focused mmo game in the genre. It is very obvious little went into designing content for anything above small group, and even that is limited. Really it is a mmo only in respect to alot of people being online at once... all other aspects of what you expect from a mmo are missing.

    Graphics wise the game is honestly really poor, it appears very little of the massive budget went into building a large world with unique and detailed elements. Even if realistic is not the goal ascetic wise the graphic related things such as texture detail and polygon counts are horrific for a late 2011 release. Animations are in the same boat. The graphics and animations might of been acceptable in 2006, but every other AAA mmo released since WoW easily outclasses ToR in the areas of Graphics and Animation.

    Voice overs are decent, better then any other mmo and most offline games I have played this is a plus. The storytelling lacks compared to the rest of the Knights of the old republic games. And the use of cut-scenes are overused for mundane events and just drags out the "Kill X mobs" quest. The whole lightside/darkside with quest gives a false sense of choice since the outcomes are the same no matter what you choose.

    Combat is a near perfect WoW clone same with the UI. While this is not a bad thing, It is not revolutionary or even remotely different. If you are tired of the WoW playstyle well this is more of the same in that respect.

    Instances are way overused for things that honestly have no reason to be instanced, and exploration is limited in the zones.

    In conclusion:

    If you are a Starwars and a big WoW fan you can probably get some enjoyment out of this game. If you are a Starwars Old Republic fan but not a mmo fan you will be applauded by what you see. If you are a mmo fan but not a Starwars fan you will probably play for awhile but leave once the new mmo feeling goes away.

    Those tired of group focused mmos should give this a try it might be up your ally. But for those wanting the group/guild focused mmo you should play another title and stay far away from this one.

    This game is still an infant atm, and no mmo should be counted out especially at this early stage, but this is currently a very unimpressive mmo, if it can even be called a mmo, compared to what else is out there. This game does not even close to live up to the rest of the Knights of the Old Republic series. BioWare has a lot of work to do and very little time if they do not want to lose the big population they started with.    … Expand
  36. Wireded21
    Dec 22, 2011
    4
    I had 8 days of free early access due ot cancelling my pre-order but EA forgot to remove my early access code so thanks EA. I'm glad I did, had a good 8 days but it's not worth £45 + a monthly sub. It should be F2P as it doesn't offer anything innovating to make a subscription worthwhile. It really is WoW with a StarWars skin. It's a good game in it's own right but not goodI had 8 days of free early access due ot cancelling my pre-order but EA forgot to remove my early access code so thanks EA. I'm glad I did, had a good 8 days but it's not worth £45 + a monthly sub. It should be F2P as it doesn't offer anything innovating to make a subscription worthwhile. It really is WoW with a StarWars skin. It's a good game in it's own right but not good enough to justify a subscription.… Expand
  37. x_ares_x
    Dec 22, 2011
    4
    First off, BioWare doesn't only verify a credit card like most sensible companies, they deny it if you don't have at least $14.95 plus tax on it. They hold the 30 days of "free" time along with any forums access hostage if you don't have a payment ready. Now, onto the game itsself. - No macro system. You just cannot make any macros at all, no way, no how. No mouse-over heals, nothing.
    - No    First off, BioWare doesn't only verify a credit card like most sensible companies, they deny it if you don't have at least $14.95 plus tax on it. They hold the 30 days of "free" time along with any forums access hostage if you don't have a payment ready. Now, onto the game itsself. - No macro system. You just cannot make any macros at all, no way, no how. No mouse-over heals, nothing.
    - No addon system (not that I'm an addon fan, I hate them actually). This method of game playing is not implimented and honestly, I doubt it ever will be.
    What the lack of these two things mean is - there will probably be far too few healers in the future, especially in raids. There are a LOT of people who cannot function adequately without at least mouseover healing. -Uninspired combat. Sure, there is no auto-attack which is a plus, but there's also zero innovation outside of this, if you can call this innovation at all. It's mostly like every other MMORPG fight mechanic which has existed for the past 10 years or more. This isn't 1997.
    -No user interface customization. You can't move the chat box or anything else, which means you either keep it too small to read well, or you have to deal with it encroaching on your left Quickbar.
    -No autogrouping to run instances. Expect to see a LOT of "LFG for !".
    -Lethargic character creation. Do you enjoy looking like everyone else (including NPCs)? No? Too bad.
    Rift, Champions Online, and a massive number of other companies have very in-depth character creators and have come out long before this game. This is 2011, not 2000. There simply is no longer any excuse for slacking here.
    -Very small race selection. This is a game based in a universe where there are supposedly thousands of aliens. Even the movies had more than nine. If you count Human, Cyborg, Miraluka and Rattataki as looking so similar that they're all Human dirvatives, the choice is even smaller. -The entire game is one huge instance. What this means is that say you're on Ord Mantell. There will be three or four copies of this same exact world on the server. Most of the time you can see people chatting, but do not expect to see those same people in the game, necessarily. While there will be a given number of people in a given instance, the game world still feels dead and somewhat empty. You often do see others running about, but it just feels too sparse. If someone needs help and you group with them, it's up to you or them to figure out which instance the other is on.
    -Overall-
    The game is expansive, it has more than one well-known name behind it. However, it also feels rushed and half-assed in some parts. The subscription model seems backwards and bent on driving customers away, not welcoming them in. I think BioWare really screwed the pooch on this game and released it far too early. Why they would do that is beyond anyone's guess. This is not a new company who just popped up last year and decided to create a new Star Wars IP. These people should know better. Because they do no know better obviously, the game is feeling more and more like a World of Warcraft clone only there to make a cash grab.    … Expand
  38. nhpc
    Dec 22, 2011
    4
    It's World of Warcraft in space with better music. There is nothing revolutionary about the game, contrary to what the paid reviews and shills would like you to believe
  39. Andrewlol
    Dec 23, 2011
    4
    the game starts it bad with soo much little choices to create a unique character , cause everything looks the freakin same , get into the game and the soo praised story gets boring on the third quest , combat fells so outdate and its exactly like wow , the whole game feels like wow but the good tools in wow like dual spec , lfg tool , raid finder tool, are missing althogether , finding athe game starts it bad with soo much little choices to create a unique character , cause everything looks the freakin same , get into the game and the soo praised story gets boring on the third quest , combat fells so outdate and its exactly like wow , the whole game feels like wow but the good tools in wow like dual spec , lfg tool , raid finder tool, are missing althogether , finding a group to do a flashpoints is so hard cause the lfg channel is useless , pvp is no way near balanced cause when you join a warzone at lv 10 and face a bunch of 50s you see the whole increasing stats system and no brackets falls apart, i dont know whats in the end game but if its close to early and mid game , you gonna see a hugeeee drops in the subs after the first free month.At least for me i wont be coming back after the first month if i play the whole mwhahaha ;p.I put the wrong score on ma other rewiew mwhaha… Expand
  40. Jingo
    Dec 25, 2011
    4
    This was a big disappointment. Sure, it's great that Bioware has inserted a ton of voice-acting in the otherwise text-based genre, and a bit more story in questlines. But that's it. For the most expensive game in history? It's a real shame. The graphics are so 2002, the environment is utterly lacklustre. But the worst thing was the combat. You just click on your enemy once then select someThis was a big disappointment. Sure, it's great that Bioware has inserted a ton of voice-acting in the otherwise text-based genre, and a bit more story in questlines. But that's it. For the most expensive game in history? It's a real shame. The graphics are so 2002, the environment is utterly lacklustre. But the worst thing was the combat. You just click on your enemy once then select some hotkeys. Ugh. In a world when a cheap game like Mount and Blade gives you the immersion of timing and aiming your sword-swing while galloping past on your horse, why is it that the most expensive game fails so miserably? A bit of innovation, some modern game-play controls and up-to-date graphics would have made SWTOR a real hit for me, but there's no way I'm shelling out subscription money for a game that could have been made when Saddam Hussein was still ruling Iraq.… Expand
  41. Augustus75
    Dec 25, 2011
    4
    I am rooting for any mmorpg that takes immersion seriously, but as of now do not believe story alone can accomplish this. The frequent instancing creates a ghost town feeling. The pasted on, wallpaper backgrounds in each zone do not allow for players to interact with the environment as freely as in many other mmorpgs. To me, each zone feels exactly the same as the last, turning left andI am rooting for any mmorpg that takes immersion seriously, but as of now do not believe story alone can accomplish this. The frequent instancing creates a ghost town feeling. The pasted on, wallpaper backgrounds in each zone do not allow for players to interact with the environment as freely as in many other mmorpgs. To me, each zone feels exactly the same as the last, turning left and right through a tunnel/dungeon environment with different backgrounds. Although the story is fun, and does create the sense of being in a movie, the initial excitement for me wore off mid-level, leaving a real feeling of claustrophobia. Compared to Dragon's Nest and Vindictus this game can be called an mmorpg. But compared to those games already established in the genre SWTOR rates low as an mmorpg specifically due to the lack of an open, persistent world.… Expand
  42. Ganbitsu
    Jan 8, 2012
    4
    Honestly this game is plain boring, maybe Jedi Knight's storyline should be boring? And most of the time the "storyline" is just text added to the standard "kill 5 rats" quests. Also for a product of such price i wish it had less bugs, dropping through Star destroyer's floor during pvp match is kinda annoying. Canceled sub after one week.
  43. rakista
    Dec 26, 2011
    4
    Besides the voice acting there is nothing to distinguish this game from any of the other WOW clones. The engine alone is just dreadful with delays beyond the global cooldown on skills making PVP an exercise in anger management at times. The PVE areas because of the extreme instancing are dead. Some planets have less than 10 people on 20 square miles of virtual space. Space combat is aBesides the voice acting there is nothing to distinguish this game from any of the other WOW clones. The engine alone is just dreadful with delays beyond the global cooldown on skills making PVP an exercise in anger management at times. The PVE areas because of the extreme instancing are dead. Some planets have less than 10 people on 20 square miles of virtual space. Space combat is a mini game rail shooter, need I say more?… Expand
  44. crnppscls
    Dec 26, 2011
    4
    I've never paid £39.99 for a pc game so this was a first for me. Also i've never played wow (but plenty others) i did have really high hopes for the game but was a bit meh in beta.
    The voice acting i like, plus there are some soul searching decisions you have to make especially if you play a dark side char. It isn't awful by any means, but there are just a lot better mmo's out    I've never paid £39.99 for a pc game so this was a first for me. Also i've never played wow (but plenty others) i did have really high hopes for the game but was a bit meh in beta.
    The voice acting i like, plus there are some soul searching decisions you have to make especially if you play a dark side char. It isn't awful by any means, but there are just a lot better mmo's out there, i am just so disappointed in this release. The questing is normal and generic to any other game, 'epic space battles': non existent, character customisation is a joke, it is not a pretty game either, the bland textures used seem to distract you from any exploration of your new world + the heavy instancing where you can't progress because of barriers.
    Seriously, i think people have become so sick of these generic mmo's (most of which you can play for free) and relied on bioware being their last bastion of pc greatness to deliver something groundbreaking. Well they didn't. If you're a diehard lover of sw lore, you will love it (probably) but for the price of the game and the sub, a lot of people won't bother basically because there is better out there.
    And another thing lol, i spent months telling my console owning friends that this title will be the pinnacle of pc greatness and they all wished the game was available on console. Now i have to say it's uninstalled but you lot just wait for gw2 and then we'll see .    … Expand
  45. Stumblebee
    Dec 30, 2011
    4
    I believe that I've played enough of the game to now form a solid opinion of how I feel about it. The reason that I'm doing this review is because I feel that while the user reviews are fairly accurate (if some are a little bit harsh. I wouldn't give the game a 0 just because you're disappointed in it) it seems the majority of the critic reviews are a little biased, only pointing out theI believe that I've played enough of the game to now form a solid opinion of how I feel about it. The reason that I'm doing this review is because I feel that while the user reviews are fairly accurate (if some are a little bit harsh. I wouldn't give the game a 0 just because you're disappointed in it) it seems the majority of the critic reviews are a little biased, only pointing out the positive features rather than the negatives, which in my opinion need to be made aware of at the same time.

    Graphics: "With the graphics settings cranked to full the game is arguably the best looking MMO to date. From the fine details like the equipment players can wear and the expressions on the faces of NPCs during conversations, right up to the brilliant looking environments." is a quote from an Australian review which I find bizarre, as even with the settings cranked up the full the graphics just look... odd. While they are better than the majority of western MMOs and better than alot of older MMOs, if you compare the graphics of TOR to the graphics of MMOs released from last year to MMOs about to be released next year, they are by far not the "best looking mmo" If anything, the graphics look like Dragon Age's except, even more cartoony and low quality. The animations are stagnant and stiff, the running animations especially look like they've been done by a bad actor who doesn't know when to run on cue.

    Sound: Your typical Star Wars music, everything sounds right and fits the theme, the score is great also. However, some lines are reused when it comes to voice acting, but I'll let it slide.

    Gameplay: While the gameplay is like World of Warcraft (the endgame especially, when it's around ten people slashing on one enemy. You'd think that only one lightsaber slash would kill a human, it did with Qui-Gon Jinn!) I feel like there was no escape from that style of gameplay for TOR and what's so bad about it being similar to WoW's? it's still fun and to be honest, they make the gameplay more exciting than WoW's anyway. The most unique thing about the game is the dialog choices, but it just feels... slapped on. If anything, it makes it feel like the multiplayer aspect is slapped on more than the dialog. It really does feel like a single player game with a chat room. There's no need to find a party at all. The fact that this is more important than the multiplayer aspect is disappointing. Oh, and don't get me started on PvP. It's nonexistent. The gameplay is fine for a single player game and is still fun at times, but for an MMO, it's just not good enough.

    Story: My favorite story by far is the Bounty Hunter's, it's a ton of fun. I like how each class gets their own unique story.. but, why can you have sex with everybody? It seems like everyone wants to get in bed with you from the second that they meet you. There are SO MANY people you can have one night stands with, it's weird.

    Server performance: I've experienced no lag, but there's something even worse than that concerning the servers. There are too many for a game just launching. It seems that every server is either full or empty. That's your choice. You either wait in huge queues or you go on a barren land of a server, maybe that's why nobody wanted to party with me. Extend the server capacity, Bioware. OH! And there's even queues for the website and forums. No point.

    Random niggles I found on my journey: There are a few graphical glitches in the game, some are quite funny because of it, but every MMO has glitches on launch, so I'll let it pass.
    Why am I stuck in a building most of the time? I'd like to see some outside.
    I'd also like to go more than knee deep in water.
    Why is every playable race humanoid? Is it because they're not pretty enough for the oh so important sex scenes? They're just different colored humans. The most alien looking are Twi'leks, but they're humans with tentacles on their head! I'd like some actual alien looking playable races
    I'd avoid the forums, it seems to be a war between die hard haters who have a vendetta against the game and people who bow at Bioware's feet. You'll get caught in the crossfire even if you create a topic featuring constructive criticism or a simple question. I fear for the game once some of the community lose interest and go back to their regular MMOs. What are we left with?    … Expand
  46. me2et
    Dec 31, 2011
    4
    Alright i'm not gonna mindlessly bash this game il give you a reasons why i hated this game,the first thing that you notice that immersion in this game is great you even forget it's an MMO is that a good reason,no it is not as you play your first 10 hours you will have many fun hours playing it and then it hit ya : this is an MMO....this game feels like KOTOR with online option this byAlright i'm not gonna mindlessly bash this game il give you a reasons why i hated this game,the first thing that you notice that immersion in this game is great you even forget it's an MMO is that a good reason,no it is not as you play your first 10 hours you will have many fun hours playing it and then it hit ya : this is an MMO....this game feels like KOTOR with online option this by no mean's an MMO,that's why i'm giving it a low score as an MMO game if it were a single player it would give it at least 8 but the game combat feels like wow A LOT no new stuff and do no't tell me voice acting and stuff most people care about the gameplay don't get me wrong story graphics play some part but why do you think people play dota or minecraft no story just pure great gameplay so yeah the game feels cheap and the graphics is like KOTOR do not give in to the hype it's REALLY like DCUO fun but short fun but not a great mmo so yeah wait some month....and all those 1 million player's are gonna be at most 600 and about BioWare pushing new content it's gonna happen but it's gonna take a lot of time reminder : voice acting as Trion's Rift is the fastest content pusher i really think this game is JUST HYPED… Expand
  47. ThomasVII
    Dec 31, 2011
    4
    I'm enjoying the voice acting and the graphics are great (except for the lack of AA?). I'm finding it very difficult to get immersed and thats very important to me in an mmorpg. Seeing 'my' companion everywhere I go, running along side another 'chosen one' really ruins the personal aspect of them and the story line.

    I'm playing a Jedi Consular, master of the force. Except I'm pressing one    I'm enjoying the voice acting and the graphics are great (except for the lack of AA?). I'm finding it very difficult to get immersed and thats very important to me in an mmorpg. Seeing 'my' companion everywhere I go, running along side another 'chosen one' really ruins the personal aspect of them and the story line.

    I'm playing a Jedi Consular, master of the force. Except I'm pressing one of the three buttons to strike with my lightsaber or throwing dirt in my opponents eyes coupled with a ming vase to the face, that happens to be buried under the hull of a spaceship? That, to me, doesn't feel very 'Jedi like'. I expected to be throwing NPC's and other players around the room, jumping ridiculous heights or at least feeling like I have some degree influence over the physics around my character. I will try out other races and classes during the 20 days I have remaining of my sub but I shouldn't have to work at enjoying a game.

    The story is single player orientated and it shouldn't be. An mmorpg for me should feel like you are part of something bigger than you are, like every player around you is important and not for the most part background/ tools to be used. Being surrounded by the 'chosen one' ruins it for me. The story doesn't suit the genre. If I wanted a great single player adventure with a social aspect, I could play Final Fantasy 7 with Skype running indefinitely, with no subscription costs. I'm really disappointed. I wanted SWTOR to really shine.    … Expand
  48. Fenristhewolf
    Jan 3, 2012
    4
    I have played various MMO's over the years including WoW which I have played since BC and I had the chance to do extensive Beta Testing for SWTOR before it was released. I enjoyed certain parts of it and the interface and UI was very friendly as somone who has played WoW extensively. I had no problem adapting to most of the controls. My biggest issue was the amount of lag that wasI have played various MMO's over the years including WoW which I have played since BC and I had the chance to do extensive Beta Testing for SWTOR before it was released. I enjoyed certain parts of it and the interface and UI was very friendly as somone who has played WoW extensively. I had no problem adapting to most of the controls. My biggest issue was the amount of lag that was prevalent in certain areas. My system runs games like WoW and Skyrim on Ultra without a problem and I was very frustrated by the lag issues even in a fairly unpopulated questing area. The Story and zones were fun and enjoyable if on the small side as far as zone size and variety but the lag and gameplay bugs made it frustrating to play, based on that I would have to give it a negative review untill those issues can be resolved. If those can be fixed I would probably rate this a 7-8.… Expand
  49. bigbradford
    Jan 9, 2012
    4
    Overall I'm very disappointed with the game. While the story and voice overs are nice the first play through they get very repetitive the second time. The quests like others have mentioned are very boring; loot x, kill x and repeat that to 50, though each class has a unique class quest. The visuals are okay but nothing jaw dropping. At release there were bugs and glitches everywhere;Overall I'm very disappointed with the game. While the story and voice overs are nice the first play through they get very repetitive the second time. The quests like others have mentioned are very boring; loot x, kill x and repeat that to 50, though each class has a unique class quest. The visuals are okay but nothing jaw dropping. At release there were bugs and glitches everywhere; some couldn't play the game at all, game freezing during load times, guild and party chat were not showing, end game fp's and op's were broken, customer support is non existent etc.

    I can kind of understand Biowares motive in getting the game out before Christmas but this game was NOT ready, Bioware and EA should be ashamed of themselves, there was literally zero communication from the devs about the bugs and general problems people were having and that was most likely due to the holidays but there is no excuse for that.

    This game has potential to be very good but it really doesn't offer anything over the more established game that is World of Warcraft other than the fact that it's Star Wars, light sabers weee! Overall some what decent game with a lot of work ahead to really differentiate itself from what is already currently available.    … Expand
  50. dwillo82
    Jan 8, 2012
    4
    WoW in Space without the polish and missing many features. I feel that the game has failed to provide for meaningful or entertaining gameplay. Whilst the story aspect was amusing for a time I found that it became apparent that this was the focus rather than providing for deep gameplay mechanics. Overall the game is simplistic and lacks real choice in either character development (from aWoW in Space without the polish and missing many features. I feel that the game has failed to provide for meaningful or entertaining gameplay. Whilst the story aspect was amusing for a time I found that it became apparent that this was the focus rather than providing for deep gameplay mechanics. Overall the game is simplistic and lacks real choice in either character development (from a story perspective) and with regards to perks and skills (gameplay perspective).

    Combat is repetitive, linear, and has been done better before. There is only a few options on which to conduct a battle, with little real options and each battle feels VERY similar. This is my biggest gripe in that the core gameplay has been done better before, and offers nothing new to the extent that I played this game extensively for about two weeks and quickly tired of it. I didn't even finish my free 30 days. PVP doesn't feel right. Ability delay and a general clumsiness pervade and the war-zones are terrible (BIOWARE what were you thinking with Hutt Ball.. no Sith or Jedi would play something like that!). There is little to no open world PVP and certainly no incentive to engage in it. I think in my many hours of gameplay I got into 1 open world fight - now I admit I didnt go looking for it that hard but surely it should have found me on a PVP server? I chose a PVP server to get ganked yet was never forced or inclined to engage in open world PVP at all. The worlds feel empty and soulless due to the sharding issue but it is more because the game feels designed the game to play like a single player game with a chat window attached. How could chat bubbles not be included? I just cant fathom the decision making that went into that. Imperial fleet is probably the only place the game feels full but there is no connection between people speaking in general and PC's which may as well be NPC's. I played up to 40 as a Sith Inquisitor and I found the story to be well voice acted but for the most part boring and generic. Thats not including the standard "go here, kill 20 things" quests which are fully voice acted - to the games detriment, at the end of the day it just extends the grind. I would have loved to stay around for longer in this game. I love the Star Wars universe and I really wanted a MMORPG to engage me. Unfortunently I'll take engaging gameplay over voice acting and "story" any day.    … Expand
  51. wesleyarts
    Jan 11, 2012
    4
    Horrible and mediocre game boosted by Star Wars IP and paid reviews and advertising. The character creation is limited, the animations are clumsy, the combat has no auto attack. The Graphics are cartoonish and abuse of vívid childwish colors tones. The end game is incomplete, the only raid is bugged. It was amde to WOW fans but even at this point they manage to deliver aHorrible and mediocre game boosted by Star Wars IP and paid reviews and advertising. The character creation is limited, the animations are clumsy, the combat has no auto attack. The Graphics are cartoonish and abuse of vívid childwish colors tones. The end game is incomplete, the only raid is bugged. It was amde to WOW fans but even at this point they manage to deliver a mediocre experience. The game has around 60 Hours of game play, then you have nothing to do besides pvp. The crafting is easy but useless as player made items are second class compared with mobs drops items. The pvp is unbalanced in the most intense use of the word "unbalance". Classes are too simplistic and missleading as you think having a cool class name as Sith Warrior or Smuggler would be great, besides the class name there is nothing interesting to make you play after the level 30. The game is a failure and wont stay p2p for too long. Wait for at least 6 months to use a free trial to test the game for yourself, do not take the risk of buying this mediocre game hyped by EA paid reviews.… Expand
  52. PhillipTheGeek
    Jan 12, 2012
    4
    I was expecting good things from SWTOR, but unfortunately I have been disappointed. Gameplay wise: Graphics crashes (Midget Jedi's, Metallic Huts and Fighting the Scenery - all of which amused rather than annoyed me.), Poor PVP. Missions which while well presented have the depth of Attack of the Clones (though better acting). Lack of duel spec's which make doing anything as a healer or aI was expecting good things from SWTOR, but unfortunately I have been disappointed. Gameplay wise: Graphics crashes (Midget Jedi's, Metallic Huts and Fighting the Scenery - all of which amused rather than annoyed me.), Poor PVP. Missions which while well presented have the depth of Attack of the Clones (though better acting). Lack of duel spec's which make doing anything as a healer or a tank slow without the DPS options. As for healing (I normally play healing classes), thats hard work on a dodgy laptop with a tracker pad, lacking mouse over healing really leaves me quite drained. Space combat which was beaten when I recently had the privilege of playing a 1980's Star Wars Arcade Machine. (I won't even mention the annoyance of lacking a mac client at launch. I suspect this will mean that we will have a badly imported client at a later date.) But worse than Gameplay feels the community. Communications seem poor and only used to complain (Normally about WOW, though I did like the discussion I saw by people still burnt out on RIFT). Guilds seem non-existent at the moment leading to both a lack of community and camaraderie. I had high hopes that guilds would be treated well with the pre-registration of guilds however so far I have not seen it in game. Bioware could have spent another 10 years getting things and I feel it is brave of them to release something so we can see some of what they had in mind. I wanted more but I got quite a shallow single player game with pretentious of being an MMO. I will come back in the future for the occasional month and hope that enough has been provided to make me want to stay, but for now I won't waste my time.… Expand
  53. SmellyMessiah
    Jan 15, 2012
    4
    Star Wars: The Old Republic (ToR) had very high hopes, being the successor to the very successful Knights of the Old republic series, and being the latest work by Bioware, one of the better developers in recent memory. However, instead of creating the next big MMO and a true game-changer, they decided to directly compete with World of Warcraft (WoW) like all other recent, and failed MMOs.Star Wars: The Old Republic (ToR) had very high hopes, being the successor to the very successful Knights of the Old republic series, and being the latest work by Bioware, one of the better developers in recent memory. However, instead of creating the next big MMO and a true game-changer, they decided to directly compete with World of Warcraft (WoW) like all other recent, and failed MMOs. As a long time WoW player, and someone who has played most of the big MMO releases of late, I can say with some authority that the game doesn't put anything new on the table. Sure, the presentation is slick, and the voice acting is nice, but is this what compels someone to pay to play a game month after month? The gameplay feels like a direct clone of WoW, and it simply doesn't work in the Star Wars universe. The fast-paced action of the films and some of the better games does not translate here. A ranged class takes â… Expand
  54. Shadius
    Jan 17, 2012
    4
    I really don't understand why there is no "jk2:jo" combat system, such a perfect action style pvp could be.
    I don't understand why "planets" are so small and 80% of them are built with narrow corridors. I want to kick those guys who did all this stupid 5 min runs "fleet-ship-star port-land". >40% of playtime i just run from 1 npc/location to another. What for?
    Lack of classes. Mirror    I really don't understand why there is no "jk2:jo" combat system, such a perfect action style pvp could be.
    I don't understand why "planets" are so small and 80% of them are built with narrow corridors. I want to kick those guys who did all this stupid 5 min runs "fleet-ship-star port-land". >40% of playtime i just run from 1 npc/location to another. What for?
    Lack of classes. Mirror classes. And still unbalanced?! How they could fail with that?
    Instances, mirror worlds, flashpoints, battle grounds, awkward auction. MMO? Really? What's wrong with people nowadays? They didn't see what true mmo is?

    It should be simply b2p game. And called coop rpg, not a mmo rpg. Then i would give it may be 8 or even 9/10.    … Expand
  55. Setebos
    Jan 17, 2012
    4
    Unfortunately I can't recommend this game.

    The game is a closed box game very similar to many BioWare titles. Taking a BioWare game and turning it into an MMO doesn't make a good MMO or a good single player game. If comparisons are used, it's a WoW gameplay duplicate in a Guild Wars I setting. Graphically there's a lot of amazing settings. Unfortunately, as you move through the game,    Unfortunately I can't recommend this game.

    The game is a closed box game very similar to many BioWare titles. Taking a BioWare game and turning it into an MMO doesn't make a good MMO or a good single player game. If comparisons are used, it's a WoW gameplay duplicate in a Guild Wars I setting.

    Graphically there's a lot of amazing settings. Unfortunately, as you move through the game, you never have reason to visit any of these settings again. Once you're done with an area, you'll never have to go back. It almost seems all wasted effort.

    The game itself is fairly polished. I didn't experience too many glitches or bugs while playing. They did a good job with QA and beta testing to ensure that the start game experience is tight.

    Unfortunately, there's just nothing new here. I think BioWare is stuck in the "what works" mode. They released a well received game years ago, Knights of the Old Republic. Then *every* game released by them since has had the exact same gameplay as Kotor, and very similar storylines. The only thing changing is the graphics. (play Mass Effect 2 & Kotor side by side and you'll feel like Mass Effect 2 is an updated Kotor).

    Argh, a game with limited fast travel. Too much walking. Why do I need to walk five minutes to get to my ship, to fly to another planet, then walk five minutes to get out of the star port? If the world was open, then walking would have a secondary impetus of exploring. However the world is simply a corridor where you walk to the next mission objective. There's simply isn't anything to explore.

    Enough bashing, I'm simply disappointed. I've played the game nearly 40 hours, so I've gotten my money's worth in time compared to a single player game. I simply didn't get my money's worth in enjoyment.    … Expand
  56. Feycat
    Jan 18, 2012
    4
    This game is a lot of fun if you play it as a single-player Bioware RPG. Up to 50, the game is amusing, the cut scenes are interesting, and the gameplay isn't bad. However, once you hit 50, your storyline runs out, and you're forced to grind the same instances you've played through ad nauseum leveling up in order to continue to advance. As a single-player game, each class is an amusingThis game is a lot of fun if you play it as a single-player Bioware RPG. Up to 50, the game is amusing, the cut scenes are interesting, and the gameplay isn't bad. However, once you hit 50, your storyline runs out, and you're forced to grind the same instances you've played through ad nauseum leveling up in order to continue to advance. As a single-player game, each class is an amusing run-through. As an MMO, this game is awful. Poorly balanced, too easy to level in (casual play results in 50 in about 7 days of /played without ever being able to finish a single planet without drastically outleveling it.) The instances are fun in normal mode as you level, but nightmarishly badly balanced for class and performance in Hard mode. The PvP warzones are a joke, as there are only three and you have to do them over and over.

    The latest patch just cements that this novice dev team really has no idea what makes an MMO work. Avoid this game if you're looking for a new MMO home. Enjoy the ride to 50 with each class as a single-player co-op game, and then put it away.    … Expand
  57. Gakka
    Jan 20, 2012
    4
    It's an okay single player game till mid thirties, then the grind and the travel times just become too much to handle. Also notice I said single player game because the MMOs aspect are sorely lacking. Where are industry standards like eg. proper LFG system, flexible and moddable UI, dual spec, etc. I think it is worth the box price but I don't see this game having any long termIt's an okay single player game till mid thirties, then the grind and the travel times just become too much to handle. Also notice I said single player game because the MMOs aspect are sorely lacking. Where are industry standards like eg. proper LFG system, flexible and moddable UI, dual spec, etc. I think it is worth the box price but I don't see this game having any long term entertainment value for me at least.… Expand
  58. Madamfantasy
    Jan 20, 2012
    4
    The only reason to play this game is for the story/leveling. Every other aspect of the game is sub par to other "great" mmorpgs. Raiding is a joke - there are guilds that cleared hard modes 15 days into the game, generic giant bosses even though bioware said multiple times that they would not go by that standard instead they would make it more heroic.

    Pvp is broken - on all pvp servers    The only reason to play this game is for the story/leveling. Every other aspect of the game is sub par to other "great" mmorpgs. Raiding is a joke - there are guilds that cleared hard modes 15 days into the game, generic giant bosses even though bioware said multiple times that they would not go by that standard instead they would make it more heroic.

    Pvp is broken - on all pvp servers the Republic is outnumbered at least 2:1. Empire players have long pvp queues and most of the time you get into a warzone it is Hutball. Ilum (pvp world) is a joke if you play Republic cause you will get stomped as soon as you get in by 100 empire players, then camped at medcenter without being able to spawn correctly.

    Quests are generic (only addition is voice acting) - go there get me that, kill 10 of those then you get bonus quest, kill 10 of those... Your choices do not make any difference at all in the long run. Some of the quests are in a phased zone - meaning you can't encounter anyone there. I thought the worlds were too big cause i ran and i ran for minutes not encountering anyone. Oh and yes running - there is lots of it. If i measured how long i have run from one quest to another with how long i did actual gameplay - it would be 50/50.

    Some worlds are beautiful, others are blend meh. The game is really hardware heavy, even though you can't see why. Overall graphics are like from the 2006. single player games. Overall i am disapointed since it comes from Bioware and it is Star Wars.    … Expand
  59. frank12
    Jan 24, 2012
    4
    I had high hopes for this game, but unfortunately it only led to more disappointment. The game is transparently a WoW clone, but Bioware fell short in almost every aspect. It should have been released 6mo-1yr after it was. Poor optimization causing low fps on high-end rigs, massive ability delay (which destroys any semblance of competitive PvP), and a lack of basic MMO features such asI had high hopes for this game, but unfortunately it only led to more disappointment. The game is transparently a WoW clone, but Bioware fell short in almost every aspect. It should have been released 6mo-1yr after it was. Poor optimization causing low fps on high-end rigs, massive ability delay (which destroys any semblance of competitive PvP), and a lack of basic MMO features such as combat log, customizable UI, and LFG. Customer service is non-existent. This game received decent scores from critics because they only level to 30 or 40 and then rush a review out. After that, the lack of endgame content and functionality becomes apparent. Pve is a joke (cleared on nightmare mode in less than a month, despite raid-wiping bugs, by a PvP guild), and pvp even worse due to faction imbalance, complete lack of world pvp, and the aforementioned fps and ability delay issues. Bioware/EA had a potential bonanza with a Star Wars licensed MMO, but unfortunately rushed out a game that was poorly developed and conceptualized.… Expand
  60. ArcticF0X
    Jan 26, 2012
    4
    Level 50 Scoundrel - Valor rank 33 - Completed most Hard Modes.

    With all the money & development put into this game, one has to wonder where on earth it all went. To put it bluntly, the game looks & feels outdated. The combat is not very fluid. Ability delay which should have be fixed in BETA is still present.The HeroEngine is terrible. Why is it that i can play BF3 on max settings with    Level 50 Scoundrel - Valor rank 33 - Completed most Hard Modes.

    With all the money & development put into this game, one has to wonder where on earth it all went.
    To put it bluntly, the game looks & feels outdated. The combat is not very fluid. Ability delay which should have be fixed in BETA is still present.The HeroEngine is terrible. Why is it that i can play BF3 on max settings with 64 players with an enviroment that is destructible & get 60+ frames but in SWTOR, anything with 30+ people on screen it becomes a slide show? Shoddy.

    The planets are a major let down. Maybe because they don't actually feel likes planets. Most of them are lifeless & dull. Coruscant is a big living, breathing city. In SWTOR, Coruscant feels like a set of corridors with hardly anyone around. This goes for most of the planets, they feel lifeless. Mobs stand in one place waiting to be killed. There is hardly any ambient music whilst you're exploring the planets. Environmental sound is severely lacking. When i can hear my own footsteps in the middle of 'big city' you know something is wrong. Add all of that together with alot of 'loading screens' & you have a game world that feels bland & dull.

    No customizable UI.
    Unable to choose warzone maps.
    RNG end game PvP gear grind.
    The abomination that is Ilum.
    One of the worst character creation screens. A human with an earpiece = cyborg? Really?

    It seems to me that they wasted all their money on voiceovers & cutscenes that they forgot about the things that really matter.    … Expand
  61. doritosandmarij
    Feb 6, 2012
    4
    This game is not an MMORPG worth checking out; it is a retarded little brother of World of Warcraft. I didn't like the partying system, nor the crafting system, nor the levling or questing system, and the game had nothing unique to it besides the Star Wars lore.
  62. SnakeBytes
    Feb 10, 2012
    4
    I must say, Bioware have been very innovative with SWTOR.

    They created a singleplayer railroad buggy experience that looks & feels like it was made in 2004 with some multiplayer features tacked on & able to charge people monthly for it. The only good things in SWTOR are the voiceovers & Huttball. As it stands right now, this game does not feel like a game that is supposed to be an AAA+    I must say, Bioware have been very innovative with SWTOR.

    They created a singleplayer railroad buggy experience that looks & feels like it was made in 2004 with some multiplayer features tacked on & able to charge people monthly for it.

    The only good things in SWTOR are the voiceovers & Huttball. As it stands right now, this game does not feel like a game that is supposed to be an AAA+ MMO with 4+ years of development & massive budget behind it.    … Expand
  63. SupR_G
    Feb 13, 2012
    4
    A depth-less game with only face value. Almost everything in this game has no attention to detail. The graphics are vastly outdated, the PVE/PVP experience is shallow, the game struggles with performance/bugs, a lack of customization for characters/ships, utterly pointless (and boring) space combat and more. This game might have been impressive if it was 2004, but with today's standards,A depth-less game with only face value. Almost everything in this game has no attention to detail. The graphics are vastly outdated, the PVE/PVP experience is shallow, the game struggles with performance/bugs, a lack of customization for characters/ships, utterly pointless (and boring) space combat and more. This game might have been impressive if it was 2004, but with today's standards, and the standards set by Bioware's other releases, it certainly falls far below expectations. It might be enough to keep the hardcore Star Wars fan happy, but for the rest of us, it's a lame experience.… Expand
  64. Valladria
    Feb 14, 2012
    4
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Ordinarily, I also advise patience with new MMOs but the poor implementation of new content and the often flawed, or non-functional, nature of technical remedies does not give me faith for the future. I would also like to praise the game for utilising such immersive class quests and for successfully evoking the simplistic fun of arcade games via space combat missions. Whilst some reviews praise the lower reliance on co-operation in The Old Republic, I find the emphasis on single player content tedious and counter to the essence of an MMORPG. My complaint in this domain is derived from the fact that the game has limited repeatability value despite claims to the contrary by Bioware. In truth, only a small proportion of the levelling experience is related to class-specific content thus you must either tolerate conversations with generic quest NPCs whilst levelling new characters or must skip them, thereby rendering the experience rather hollow. Moreover, any sense of choice in conservations is limited by the need to make choices that boost your companionsâ… Expand
  65. zenzu
    Feb 23, 2012
    4
    Character creation is a let down. Graphics and overall art direction is a complete let down, I was hoping for gritty shadows of the empire and got bright and colorful jar jar. The stories are wonderful... if I wasn't always distracted by how silly and cartoonish the NPC's are. I'm a huge star wars fun, and I think this game has tonnes of potential... almost exactly how age of conan hadCharacter creation is a let down. Graphics and overall art direction is a complete let down, I was hoping for gritty shadows of the empire and got bright and colorful jar jar. The stories are wonderful... if I wasn't always distracted by how silly and cartoonish the NPC's are. I'm a huge star wars fun, and I think this game has tonnes of potential... almost exactly how age of conan had tonnes of potential. Age of Conan failed due to horrendous bugs, swtor might because it was made like a carebears episode.… Expand
  66. SwarleyStinson
    Mar 27, 2012
    4
    SWTOR Could have been a great game but its huge potential is wasted by the Devs making bad decisions and taking far to long to release new content. It has taken 4 months for the game to reach the stage it should have been at at launch and still doesn't have an LFG system or any way of dealing with the dwindling server populations. The Devs give the excuse that everything is technologicallySWTOR Could have been a great game but its huge potential is wasted by the Devs making bad decisions and taking far to long to release new content. It has taken 4 months for the game to reach the stage it should have been at at launch and still doesn't have an LFG system or any way of dealing with the dwindling server populations. The Devs give the excuse that everything is technologically complex and whatever the player-base want the game to have, they claim the are working on it with no ETA. Rift is an example of how Devs really can make new content with both high frequency and polish, so Bioware really need to just get up of their asses and work harder. The games main feature, legacy, the thing it has instead of all the staple MMO features the game is lacking is not released yet and even then is very underwhelming based on hints of future patches. Via the legacy system and the fact that the classes have stories, the game encourages you to play as many characters as possible, but there is only one leveling path so it is very boring doing the same quests over and over again. Bioware have made it very evident that they really just do not know how to run an MMO. The world PVP area was such a failure they abandoned it completely, and PVP in general is crap. The class stories are very good but the side quest stories are crap and you will end up skipping all the voice acting from about half way through the game onward. Overall the game has just got stuck in a position where it is months behind what is expected of it with no way to recover, and at the immensely slow rate new updates are released it will take well over a year until this game is actually good enough to be worth paying a subscription for, if it even survives that long and remains P2P.… Expand
  67. Honest_Review
    Feb 27, 2012
    4
    I was pretty excited about the release of this game; and I got it knowing that it was going to be "just another MMORPG". The character editing tools are limited, but no more than any other MMORPG. I feel the class quests are where the game shines. I only poked around the Imperial Agent and Inquisitor's storyline, but I was impressed with the development of their stories. PVP is similar toI was pretty excited about the release of this game; and I got it knowing that it was going to be "just another MMORPG". The character editing tools are limited, but no more than any other MMORPG. I feel the class quests are where the game shines. I only poked around the Imperial Agent and Inquisitor's storyline, but I was impressed with the development of their stories. PVP is similar to WOW, with fewer maps. As for the space battles, I was disappointed to find out that they were scripted, similar to a Star Fox level; but I feel it's better to have scripted space battles than none at all. This game could have easily received a 7 or 8, but SWTOR has more bugs than a pay-by-the-hour motel room's mattress. The bugs in this game break the game. The company is doing a good job at fixing these bugs, but at their current rate SWTOR won't be worth your money for another 4-6 months.… Expand
  68. SpecialKris
    Feb 29, 2012
    4
    My experience with the game is that of 2 level 50 characters and another in the mid 20's. This said this is a difficult game to review as it does some things very right but there are other glaring deficiencies that certainly drag it down. Starting with a positive, The game looks quite good, and if you are a star wars fan the story modes for each class is generally excellent and whileMy experience with the game is that of 2 level 50 characters and another in the mid 20's. This said this is a difficult game to review as it does some things very right but there are other glaring deficiencies that certainly drag it down. Starting with a positive, The game looks quite good, and if you are a star wars fan the story modes for each class is generally excellent and while very linear does draw you in and will keep you interested. The game also has heroic objectives on each planet, which encourage you to join groups of 2-4 to complete for good rewards, though at this stage they are becoming difficult to complete as they aren't necessary to progress and the numbers in the leveling portion of the game playing are certainly decreasing. Upon reaching the level cap you do remember unfortunately that the game is a MMO and at this it fails at this quite badly quite badly. The PvP is horrible, both unbalanced and very unrewarding. With only 3 battlegrounds and an inability to queue for the ones you enjoy (if there magically is one you can enjoy) you are simply stuck playing what the game gives you. The battlegrounds are server specific too, and you will find yourself coming up against the same squads time and time again. Great if you're winning not so great if your losing. The world PvP is mostly set in one zone, and at this point in time is not doing well either. You are stuck in an instanced environment with generally extremely unbalanced numbers on either side that is suffering from a plethora of bugs. Most people playing are also suffering from extreme frame-rate chopping which make this style of combat even more un-enjoyable. As for Instances (flash points) , they are very story based, which I admit first time through felt quite good, but upon multiple - which in any mmo you can be expected to have to do - runs they get long, drawn and boring. You can skip the multiple cut-scenes and text which is good, but only if the other members of you group do as well. That said some of the bosses are well designed with quite good mechanics, though the trash to get to them can be quite extensive and from my experience I've found the dungeon completion time a bit on the long side. One last complaint in this regard is that all the dungeons are based in the general area of your main faction base. In theory this should be great, but actually finding the dungeon you are after can become a bit of a chore, and the game would benefit immensely from a flashpoint finder/or teleport to the instance function.

    For the diehard MMO fan too the loot is a bit of a letdown. Most slots of armor in the game are 'socketed'. This means that the item graphic you love at the start of the game could theoretically be with you until the end if you just keep changing the items that are inside. A good mechanic, though it takes something from the joy in getting a new item drop as it is often just the same as what you had, particularly if you've been keeping on top of modding your items.

    In conclusion this is a good game if you are a star wars fan wanting to play through a long an extensive story mode. If you are just an MMO fan looking for great combat, well designed encounters and phat lewt I would probably give it a miss.    … Expand
  69. Csquared1
    Mar 13, 2012
    4
    1 Story : This game has pretty good story lines that are driven well throughout the journey to max level and all additional questing does a good job of adding flavor, this portion of the game rates very high for me.

    2 Gameplay and character advancement: Not going to sugar coat it...this is WoW reskinned and the space combat portion is Afterburner reskinned, there IS NO denying it, the    1 Story : This game has pretty good story lines that are driven well throughout the journey to max level and all additional questing does a good job of adding flavor, this portion of the game rates very high for me.

    2 Gameplay and character advancement: Not going to sugar coat it...this is WoW reskinned and the space combat portion is Afterburner reskinned, there IS NO denying it, the simularities are so legion, i'd need an entire page to list them. One thing they did do very well with was enabling players to advance with customizable armor peices, instead of requiring the player base to wear that levels' gear drops, but then they inexplicably drop the ball at max level with raid armor and high level pvp armors, making players take off their favorite look instead. I didn't so much mind the WoW cloning..except it's done poorly, which makes me wonder what took them developing this game. Glaring flaws include the clunky text chat system, the lack of any sort of macro system, which has been available in MMO's since Everquest, poor pet control and pathing, no voice chat and errors with exsisting 3rd party voice chat systems that simply shouldn't exsist in this day and age and a failure to make any sort of improvement on the talent tree system that WoW players are very used too. The space combat system? I played a lot of Afterburner in.....1990 i think, you'll have to forgive me it's been a long time. It was a good game, but to say that this could have been done better would be the understatement of the year...FOR GOD'S SAKE that's a 20+ YEAR old game feature!! So much could have been done with space combat....it could practically be it own game, but instead....Afterburner...this makes me want to punch babies. If you like Starwars this game is worth a look....so long as afterburner doens't piss you off. If you wanted a change from WoW this will be a good diversion for a while, but i'll say this, without major fixes this game will not last as long as it's parent. On the upside the development team do seem to be working overtime to make additions, at this point i'd still give this game a 50/50 shot at surviving past it's first year. There are game designers out there that are hungry. It seems as if this team has gotten a bit fat off of past success. A little about me before you assume: I've played Everquest, City of Heros/Villains, World of Warcraft on the MMO front.....and yes....I've played Afterburner...one of the kings of the coin-op generation IMO    … Expand
  70. Vatolicious
    Mar 16, 2012
    4
    This is not a bad game. It is a good basic MMO. The updates they are talking about will make it better, but the updates are all things that should have been in at launch. Questing it boring, leveling is slow, pvp is pretty fun, ship fighting is fun however repetitive. The end game is VERY dull and offers nothing other MMOs havent been doing for a decade.
  71. MrBoyore
    Mar 16, 2012
    4
    Star Wars: The Old Republic is a major let down. The greatly hyped voice acting, cut-scenes, and story driven grind are not what they are cracked up to be, and the game fails to be as revolutionary as it originally claimed pre-release. First, let me start with character creation. You can choose one of two sides: Republic or Imperial. From here, you have to choose 1 of 4 classes: JediStar Wars: The Old Republic is a major let down. The greatly hyped voice acting, cut-scenes, and story driven grind are not what they are cracked up to be, and the game fails to be as revolutionary as it originally claimed pre-release. First, let me start with character creation. You can choose one of two sides: Republic or Imperial. From here, you have to choose 1 of 4 classes: Jedi Knight, Jedi Consular, Smuggler and Trooper on the Republic side, and Sith Warrior, Sith Inquisitor, Imperial Agent, and Bounty Hunter on the Sith side. As you could imagine, every class has a similar counterpart on its opposing faction. From there, you pick a gender, race (which depends on your class choice), and then you can customize your facial features and body type. Customization is very limited: you must choose from a set of predetermined faces, scars, hair styles, etc. The races themselves are basically humans, with odd skin tones or maybe a few spikes/tentacles. You can't play a wookiee or really anything that isn't too different from Human (they even have a race called "Cyborg" which IS human but with various cybernetics on their face, as if this makes them a different species or something). So basically, in game, you look like everyone else. There isn't much different at all. Now, on to the great voice acting and cut-scenes. Every voice acted cut scene seems the same or at least very similar, and the animations of the characters aren't very intricate or exciting. In fact, they are clumsy and stale when they do move if at all. Watching these cut-scenes may be an upgrade from purely text-based quest givers, but sometimes you wish you didn't watch them: they are that boring and unimpressive. You just don't feel any more immersed because of these. The camera angle is also recycled throughout and remains stagnant in each scene-you never see your character in action apart from talking to the specific person. The animation quality lacks throughout combat and gameplay as well. Everything just seems to move awkwardly. The art style is okay, but nothing special. Sometimes you may question why they went for the awkward cartoon art style, but I would accept it in an MMO for the sake of latency in large battlefields (though other MMOs have proven that a higher quality graphics render can survive with massive amounts of people on screen). When you get to the action, you can't help but feel like you are playing WoW again, but without an "auto-attack" (though the replacement for this does not make it any superior). You use various skills and abilities unlocked by talking to a trainer, and these skills are largely "click on target, press button, wait for animations and damage to finish, move on to next ability or enemy" and it is extremely boring. In fact, much of the game resembles WoW in many aspects. As stated before, you unlock skills by talking to a trainer. You fight with stale abilities. You have your basic class archetypes: healer, tank, dps. For a game that was supposed to be so revolutionary, there is almost nothing new (save the dialogue/cut-scenes, but these aren't impressive as previously discussed). You do have a good/bad meter, much like those found in Kotor I and II, but they really don't make up for anything. Yeah, you can be a "good" sith or an "evil" jedi, but largely your faction is still the same along with your enemies and the game as if you played the typical good jedi and evil sith. Companions aren't that interesting either: they play much like pets in other MMOs, but they have back stories. I enjoy the space battles and the fact that you can own a starship, and that is probably one of the few reasons this game got a 4 instead of a 2 or 3 from me. I find the starship to be actually different, new, and fun, succeeding in being a revolutionary idea truly worthy of supporting and praising, as it has not been done in many other MMOs and still remains enjoyable, unlike the much-hyped voice acting. There are really no other qualities to redeem this game though, and it isn't fun. I wanted to stop playing in the starting zone in fact, but trudged on for God knows why. I've only really been impressed with Bioware for Kotor, and this game did not do anything to improve that mindset. They have lost their touch since those games, or maybe just fell behind and became irrelevant and outdated, and this game shows every bit of that. It is a stale, lifeless and all around poorly made relic of the past that doesn't fit well with new MMOs or even new games in general, and even the great classics of the past would mock it and shun it. Bioware just made a grab at the WoW and Star Wars audience, trying to get their money by shipping out an unimaginative game. I don't recommend it for anyone.… Expand
  72. Gesundheit
    Mar 21, 2012
    4
    Was intending a pretty complete review but whats the point. You have reviews here that say basically 'mediocre=9' and 'not great but theres trolls here so I give it 10' Anyway - its not massive - you may have 15 people on the planet with you and half them will be in solo instances - that's not Massive or a way to build friends lists. Some great voices and good acting - in the classWas intending a pretty complete review but whats the point. You have reviews here that say basically 'mediocre=9' and 'not great but theres trolls here so I give it 10' Anyway - its not massive - you may have 15 people on the planet with you and half them will be in solo instances - that's not Massive or a way to build friends lists. Some great voices and good acting - in the class storylines. I have played 4 classes and one was excellent, 2 very good and one pretty poor. I liked bounty hunter best and republic trooper least - also did jedi knight and sith sorcerer. But the non-storyline quests are mundane 'kill 20 greater slimes' quests - grind. And when they make me run all over and back again - in a world with instant holo-communicators - that's just inexcusable. The class balancing, options beyond the classic healer, tank, ranged dps, melee dps , integration between the solo training content and the later group/endgame content is bad. Integration of the crew ship is bad, integration of space combat is bad. PVP is pretty much all separate - different gear, different skill trees - that's bad. PVP and raiding players all start to look identical - cause there's basically one look for your class with some minor color differentiation. The custom armor is nice - before endgame - but I haven't seen one whole set of armor - at best there is a matching chest, pants, hat. Reverse engineering is disappointing - both in the limitations on what can be reversed and the sometimes extreme number of items to improve a schematic. Getting materials is also a disappointment with some materials nearly impossible to find (e.g. electrum) and the harvesting crew skills having such limited missions. And then of course most trades are useless at endgame - anyone want a level 49 purple armor or weapon when the raid and pvp vendors give out level 51, 56, 58 stuff? 3 for system requirements - The lag for having 20 people around is bad - too bad for the system requirements. Likewise the graphics are no better than a 4 year old EQ2 - except they take 3x the resources. 8 for great class stories and actors - definitely some 10's but not all of them. 3 for grindy - mundane non-storyline quests - an average 5 minus some for un-neccessary run-arounds that don't fit in a world with instant-comms. 3 for PVP - 7 for fun instanced PVP - but subtract a bunch for making me play huttball over and over and over and not fixing it so some classes can't ruin that game by flying across the court without running or passing the ball. 2 for open-world PVP - basically Ilum. 3 for way over-hyping the marketing and under-preparing the support team. 3 for innovation. Nothing new here that was done well. A lot of important stuff missing. Subtract for messing things up for explorers. Oh and for that VIP lounge pass I paid a million for to get essentially - nothing. And it seems a crime to make us put so much into companions only to make them useless in the endgame. Overuse of british accents for the imperials and too much gibberish from the many alien languages on the republic side - both annoying by level 20. Fun for 3 months - about the levelling of 3 toons - maybe 5 months for some people. Then the questing gets too grindy and you start to look at endgame instead. Only to find population problems in addition to the usuall 'shortage of non-fun raid roles' problems. A really good MMORPG is fun for years. I give it a 4 overall. Well below the bar set by existing competing games. Lacking in anything new. Under-performing relative to the machine it needs. But still quite fun - for a little while. Several good performances and some nice artwork.… Expand
  73. Jadagar
    Mar 29, 2012
    4
    Two years ago, I would have told you that BioWare could do no wrong, that it develops games with the story and the role-playing elements in mind. How strange that my opinion of this once-great company could change so abruptly. Star Wars: The Old Republic is one of several major disappointments I have weathered over the recent years. Not only is it shoddy from a technical standpoint, but itTwo years ago, I would have told you that BioWare could do no wrong, that it develops games with the story and the role-playing elements in mind. How strange that my opinion of this once-great company could change so abruptly. Star Wars: The Old Republic is one of several major disappointments I have weathered over the recent years. Not only is it shoddy from a technical standpoint, but it fails both mechanically and creatively. Let me be clear: I am not talking about the bugs. All MMO's release with bugs. For me, bugs are an inevitable and forgivable aspect of the genre. What is really astonishingly bad is that, for all its production value, the voice-acted missions (from beginning to end) are copy-paste sob stories with the same fetch-and-kill parameters. Invariably, you will spend hours at each quest hub listening to the same briefings you heard at the previous one. If you are like me, however, you start smashing spacebar with no fear of the consequences (because there aren't any). Oh, sure, each class gets their own set of marginally interesting missions, but... guess what? They make up about 10% of your journey from levels 1 to 50. The other 90% is filled with the aforementioned tedium. There is no hot-fix or patch (at least in the foreseeable future) that can change this sad fact. Can it get any worse? Why, yes, it can! BioWare has put deliberate emphasis on replayability, implementing the Legacy system, which will give you bonuses to experience and customization as you bring new characters to max level! So if the nigh nonexistent end-game content isn't enough, relax! You can suffer through all the hum-drum solo content again and again and again until all your character slots are full! Hooraaay! While I realize that grind-factor is a difficult element to work around, there are at least aspects of the game that can alleviate some of the drudgery... right? Wrong. Not yet, anyway. At best, PVP is chaotic and limited. World PVP is nonexistent, thanks to the all the zones being sharded into instances. Space combat is a culmination of rinse-and-repeat Starfox-esque side-quests, which MIGHT be fun, except there is ZERO variety. Oh! And if you're playing SW:TOR for the social experience, forget about it. That aspect of the game consists of minimal customization and an immovable chat window that looks like tiny blue vomit. In essence, there's no way to make your character feel like he/she is yours. You're playing on the same rail as everyone else, and you're expected to do it more than once. Granted, this might all change someday, as MMOs are wont to do. The problem is, SW:TOR already feels dated and it will take the better part of two years to get it up to snuff. I expect, by then, the competition will have evolved. Bottom line: BioWare has a LOT of work to do if they hope to pass this game off as "adequate". Then again, I suppose it doesn't matter, so long as they make a profit off of their disenfranchised fans… Expand
  74. puzzlemate
    Mar 21, 2012
    4
    So I had hoped for so much more from this game and BioWares track record of making quality games.

    It's 3 months in and the game hasn't developed at all in a direction I can appreciate, enjoy or endorse. If you want to play it to play a single player game experience in a given class? Go for it. Entertaining in this regard _once_. If on the other hand you are lookign for a game that has    So I had hoped for so much more from this game and BioWares track record of making quality games.

    It's 3 months in and the game hasn't developed at all in a direction I can appreciate, enjoy or endorse.

    If you want to play it to play a single player game experience in a given class? Go for it. Entertaining in this regard _once_.

    If on the other hand you are lookign for a game that has actually invested in deep, engaging and compelling multiplayer experiences? Look elsewhere. The dev team has clearly missed the mark. A perfect example of this is treating PvP (something they have devoted entire servers too) as a pure afterthought, by their own admission, that it 'wouldn't be popular'... In a two faction game about warring empires in the star wars IP? Not Popular? The class to class balance is non-existent and the gear and craft system was clearly never thought about past level 45 out of 50. The efforts to address both of thse are being mishandled while they try to sell their 'Legacy' system as a major feature, which is pure fluff and promotes more single player mechanics than team ones.

    There was a lot of quality put into this game for look, feel and atmosphere. Sadly not even a fraction of it into the game itself.    … Expand
  75. Mdavion
    Mar 29, 2012
    4
    This game is suffering badly from to long production time. None of the modern MMO standards are in this game, no targets target, no Auction house functions working, non fluid mounting of speeder , stalling game graphics , cant get from point A to point B without having to take a detour thru C D E F G due to map designs and or Clusters of Monsters in the way, NO customization of UI ! . IThis game is suffering badly from to long production time. None of the modern MMO standards are in this game, no targets target, no Auction house functions working, non fluid mounting of speeder , stalling game graphics , cant get from point A to point B without having to take a detour thru C D E F G due to map designs and or Clusters of Monsters in the way, NO customization of UI ! . I went into this with huge enthusiasm and were treated to a game that could have been produced in 2004 yes World of Warcraft times ! after 2months of bugs, more bugs and the aforementioned problems i simply said enough is enough and went back to Rift that has everything working!… Expand
  76. BrightCandle
    Apr 5, 2012
    4
    The story in this game really lifts it above the average MMORPG. Unfortunately the game is technically problematic, with major graphics glitches, problems installing and lots and lots of bugs besides.
  77. ZaRDoZ3000
    Apr 11, 2012
    4
    I love star wars and I really wanted to love this game, but after playing for nearly 4 months I log in once a week for 10 mins, catch up with my rapidly shrinking guild, then log out bored. Endgame has a F2P feel to it, but there is no endgame content to buy. The argument is made that it's a new game, but it has had so much spent on development, and been delayed for so many years, that itI love star wars and I really wanted to love this game, but after playing for nearly 4 months I log in once a week for 10 mins, catch up with my rapidly shrinking guild, then log out bored. Endgame has a F2P feel to it, but there is no endgame content to buy. The argument is made that it's a new game, but it has had so much spent on development, and been delayed for so many years, that it doesn't feel new. That said leveling up your first character is kind of fun, if you like the age old Kill 30 stormtroopers then click 3 crates, then return to guy who gave you quest. You say you saved his farm or whatever, but you know all the npc's re-spawned and he secretly sends every person he meets to his farm, and that you are probably the 10th person to save his farm that day.… Expand
  78. DaMo
    May 2, 2012
    4
    How this game got such positive scores from proffessional reviewers is beyond me. I can't help but wonder if another developer & publisher combination had released this game the scores would be different.
    The game has it's qualities, including great sound, story and the fact that its based on STAR WARS but this is a game, not a movie and its here where Old Republic dramatically falls    How this game got such positive scores from proffessional reviewers is beyond me. I can't help but wonder if another developer & publisher combination had released this game the scores would be different.
    The game has it's qualities, including great sound, story and the fact that its based on STAR WARS but this is a game, not a movie and its here where Old Republic dramatically falls short of expectations.
    The issues started with the release. Rushed to achieve a Christmas release the game was launched barely finished with little of the polish expected from a subscription based game. Open world PVP is broken, Graphically the game is poor and nothing has been done to refresh the genre. It will be interesting to see what the subscriber numbers are in the next few months. For a premium subscription players expect a premium product and service. This game achieves neither.    … Expand
  79. ZetignaGaming
    May 5, 2012
    4
    This game set a record for the most subscriptions at release for any MMO. However, when you consider the budget spent on this game, it leaves you feeling like EA just didn't know how to spend their funds correctly.
    Cookie cutter MMO's are a dime a dozen. Whats sad is that SWTOR had all the hype and fan base any starting MMO would die for. The game has now been out for about 6 months, and    This game set a record for the most subscriptions at release for any MMO. However, when you consider the budget spent on this game, it leaves you feeling like EA just didn't know how to spend their funds correctly.
    Cookie cutter MMO's are a dime a dozen. Whats sad is that SWTOR had all the hype and fan base any starting MMO would die for. The game has now been out for about 6 months, and already servers are dying. The question is why....

    1. Graphics - This games graphics are just aweful. Starting from the character menu where you option are 10 ugly faces, scars, ugly tattoos, and whether you want to be human, blue human, green human, or red human. In game it gets no better. Its 2012 and as a gamer, my expectations are set high for a reason. I dont expect to play skyrim in space around 2000 people, but I dont expect starwars legos 2004.

    2. Dynamics of Gameplay - None of the classes bring something to the table that someone else cant just fill or that you cant just do without. Everyone has stuns and knock downs and for this reason you dont really NEED anyone. You are left with the same old holy trinity of tanks, healers, and dps for PVE. As far as PVP goes, well 50 people on either side with stuns and knockdowns make for a sad and unenjoyable session.

    3. Questing - Honestly, the only difference in SWTORs questing vs. most MMO's is that instead of reading you watch a video. Thats really the only difference. You still have the same old grab 2 of these, jump over there, hit that guy. Nothing really different from anyone else.

    Overall this is an average game for an average player. I really feel that its quality doesn't give the reason to pay $15 a month for it. Huge changes would have to be made in order for this game to survive 2 years. Also, it would have to do what almost no other MMO has ever done. Die and ressurect.

    Good luck and happy hunting!    … Expand
  80. Mutica
    Jul 29, 2012
    4
    I waited 3 years for this game, bought the collectors editions and drank the cool aid. Almost right way at launch I saw problems, but was too deluded too much a fanboy to be honest. There are major server issues, the game engine can't really handle a modern day MMO. There is a general lack of character responsiveness, your abilities don't fire correctly and combat isn't smooth; theseI waited 3 years for this game, bought the collectors editions and drank the cool aid. Almost right way at launch I saw problems, but was too deluded too much a fanboy to be honest. There are major server issues, the game engine can't really handle a modern day MMO. There is a general lack of character responsiveness, your abilities don't fire correctly and combat isn't smooth; these things coupled with empty worlds, the linear style quest progression (lack of open world/ sandbox ) really break immersion. Also, no weather or day/night cycles... not interactive environment (can't sit in chairs..etc) hmm, no chat bubbles; well these may seem like minor things, but there are so many of these things. I would run out of room here to list everything. In the end, you don't truly feel immersion in the Star Wars universe, you feel frustrated. I hope in the end other game studios can learn from the failure of SWTOR; in the end the reason we first and foremost play games is the gameplay, we don't want games where the character, your avatar feels unresponsive, where you don't feel in complete control of all the actions. The SWTOR game engine and servers don't seem to allow for this responsive, fluid gameplay... now some of the fanboys will say this issue sometimes called 'ability delay' has been fixed from SWTOR, but its just not true, 6 months after release, these issues still break immersion. The fact that this issue hasn't been dealt with, leads me to believe that there are limitations to the game engine itself that the developers can't code around. Now SWTOR went with a unfinished HERO Engine and maybe the fact that it was unfinished has lead to these issues. Other things: limited end game content, either a bit too easy, or a bit too bugged. I don't even want to get into the frustration of not being able to finish raids because of bugs, lots of bugs. Limited character customization; broken crafting system, lack of crafting economy; poor auction house (although its improving) ... the list goes on and on.

    Even if you are a die hard Star Wars fan, please do yourself a favor, play the original KOTORs, and then get yourself lost in another MMO, if you really want an MMO, this game in the end will only break your heart. A wasted opportunity.    … Expand
  81. dkao12
    Feb 1, 2013
    4
    I waited till I turned lvl 50 on one of my characters before I reviewed this game. My honest thoughts are that this game was nothing but disappointing experience. as a MMORPG game, it's not bad but it's like any other generic MMORPG. As a Star Wars game, it was a huge disappointment to me and for a fantastic franchise such as Star wars you expected a lot. Bioware and EA failed to live upI waited till I turned lvl 50 on one of my characters before I reviewed this game. My honest thoughts are that this game was nothing but disappointing experience. as a MMORPG game, it's not bad but it's like any other generic MMORPG. As a Star Wars game, it was a huge disappointment to me and for a fantastic franchise such as Star wars you expected a lot. Bioware and EA failed to live up to our expectations. The cinematic CG trailers and the fully voiced characters were only the best parts of this whole game.
    - The gameplay was stale and uncreative; it does nothing to new to the MMORPG genre. There is not a single dynamic quest or instance (where is the Duel of Fates-inspired jedi battles or anything that doesn't have you kill this guy then go to the next objective and kill the next guy), it felt tedious like a chore. The space battles was a huge let down; just an on-rails shooter. Sadly, it was one of the only moments where it felt like Star Wars. 3/10 (Though I scored it low on this because the gameplay was terrible and unplayable, but as a Star Wars game it could have been a lot better)
    - The graphics on high definition looks okay but it could have been a lot better, espicially coming from Bioware. Character models look very ugly and literally everyone looked the same, if you compare to games such as Star Wars kinect (I know that game is awful but the graphics were better than this game). 4/10
    - The story was fairly interesting because it is separated into three chapters and each chapter has a different goal to reach. Characters and NPCs are fully voiced by many recognizable voice actors which I enjoyed a lot. The only real reward I got from each class quest was to see the story progress. Most companions were funny and interesting, and each of them had unique personalities for you to explore (even romance). 6/10
    - The music was great and fantasitc. What do you expect from Star Wars, it's awesome! 8/10
    - The lasting appeal I got from this game wasn't very good. Badly placed checkpoints, lots of bugs and glitches, barely a "free-to-play" game (ex. I had to pay either real money or game credits to HIDE MY HELMET), small server spaces, stuff in the cartel are too expensive, had to be lvl 15 to RUN!? (unless you're a subscriber...) and have to pay for an expansion. 1/10 Overall, I thought this game was extremely disappointing and the only reason I had to kept playing this was to meet my subscription fee's value. If you like the old MMORPG style gameplay and love the Star Wars franchise, I say at least give this game a go. AND I CAN'T BELIEVE THE HORRIBLE CLOSURE I GOT FOR ONE OF MY FAVOURITE STAR WARS CHARACTER OF ALL-TIME (I'm sure a lot of people know who I'm talking about here).    … Expand
  82. Tytos
    May 3, 2013
    4
    Outdated gameplay, terrbile engine, dull dumbed down story-telling, very little endgame content, very little character-customization, this was destined to fail (unfortunatly).
  83. BlackWidow
    Jul 29, 2020
    4
    I loved KOTOR 1 and 2, and since SWTOR was free, I decided to give it a whirl. Sorry I did. I wasted about 3 days and $15 on a subscription trying to get into it, but just couldn't. I'm not a huge fan of MMOs but there are a few that I love. This game is not one of them. Let me break down the good and bad points.

    GOOD 100% Free To Play Both PVE and PVP choices Great character    I loved KOTOR 1 and 2, and since SWTOR was free, I decided to give it a whirl. Sorry I did. I wasted about 3 days and $15 on a subscription trying to get into it, but just couldn't. I'm not a huge fan of MMOs but there are a few that I love. This game is not one of them. Let me break down the good and bad points.

    GOOD

    100% Free To Play
    Both PVE and PVP choices
    Great character creation and customization
    Lots of quests
    Lots of weapons/Armor
    Pretty nice loot system
    Huge game world

    THE BAD

    Terribly outdated graphics
    Boring and repetitive side quests
    All the main story lines are garbage
    Poor voice acting on many characters
    Ambient sounds lack realism
    Combat system is not very good
    Limited healing options when solo
    Limited options to actually play solo

    I guess that's about it. In closing, I'll give this horrible attempt at a Star Wars game a 4 for effort.    … Expand
  84. JohnnyStephens
    Nov 2, 2013
    4
    Exciting but as you go further to the game it's getting boring. I love star wars but this is not a game that can remind you the movies. Play it if you want, but do not have high expectations.
  85. babaganush
    Apr 21, 2014
    4
    i liked the game and pre-ordered it like loads of people, i love the missions and quests and story along with each, it gets a 4 mainly for going free to play, for not having that great of PVP, for the houses and space combat being a joke, i like having my ship be my house but that limits me creating the space into something unique, star war galaxies, and rift i could/can buy something andi liked the game and pre-ordered it like loads of people, i love the missions and quests and story along with each, it gets a 4 mainly for going free to play, for not having that great of PVP, for the houses and space combat being a joke, i like having my ship be my house but that limits me creating the space into something unique, star war galaxies, and rift i could/can buy something and make the inside something no one else has, also flying freely through space would have been much better, no those arcade missions which were fun but no where near as fun and free space could have been, if they ever make enough money again and start adding those features, then i will start up my account again and probaly even pay for it again, since i was willing to do so in the 1st place and hate free to play stuff cuz everything is so limited, makes me think they will never add anything awesome to it again. forgot to add i had a level 50 sith sorcerer, so and made 6 other characters, next highest was 30-40 commando, so i played the game plenty before i judged it.… Expand
  86. AiurDJS
    Jul 14, 2015
    4
    This game is empty. You don't want to play an an Empty MMO game... or EMMOG for short.

    I was playing it at launch, and I quit after finishing the main storyline for one character, because this game is just a pathetic copy from World of Warcraft but without any open world PvP. They created so many planets, and there is nothing to do on them. There are no people there. All you can do in    This game is empty. You don't want to play an an Empty MMO game... or EMMOG for short.

    I was playing it at launch, and I quit after finishing the main storyline for one character, because this game is just a pathetic copy from World of Warcraft but without any open world PvP. They created so many planets, and there is nothing to do on them. There are no people there. All you can do in this game is play the instanced content. This is just stupid, and a waste of time.    … Expand
  87. Dextrous
    Sep 19, 2015
    4
    I agree with a lot of the others. It isn't a bad game. It has some strong points, but weak points pull the game down pretty hard. The gameplay is fun, but nothing special; the content is interesting, and the customization allows you to express yourself and feel unique from others of your same class/race.

    Pros: * It has excellent story missions and the coherence of that story runs    I agree with a lot of the others. It isn't a bad game. It has some strong points, but weak points pull the game down pretty hard. The gameplay is fun, but nothing special; the content is interesting, and the customization allows you to express yourself and feel unique from others of your same class/race.

    Pros:
    * It has excellent story missions and the coherence of that story runs well all the way through the game.
    * The voice acting runs from pretty good to amazing in some places.
    * It has a pretty decent item appearance customization system.
    * It has an _excellent_ item modification system which allows you to keep your old gear up to date with your level.
    * A lot of effort was put into making the social aspect of the game accommodating with things like: the RNG cutscenes, the ability to join in on others story missions, granting access to your stronghold to friends, guild strongholds, and the hologram system which lets distant party members participate in quests cutscenes.

    Cons:
    * The game used to be better in the past, they've unfortunately followed the World of Warcraft model of simplifying their talent and ability system, which makes the whole thing feel.. uninspiring.
    * The customer service is really awful, the response times are absolutely terrible, and they seem to only be capable of very basic assistance, not to mention that they exclude a huge amount of their player base from the forum support.
    * Microtransactions. The game is riddled to hell with microtransactions. I half expect them to soon limit players to 1,000,000 steps a day, with a 40cc purchasable item to grant another million for that day. Seriously, even as a subscriber you are terribly limited from what would seem like basic functionality, and while you do get some coins from the monthly stipend and class story mission progression, it just isn't enough to sustain you unless you refrain from things like changing your characters hair color or style.

    I honestly think that this would have been a highly enjoyable and popular game if the "Cartel Market" (in-game shop) were reigned in.    … Expand
  88. DarthNoxxiouss
    Feb 17, 2016
    4
    I'll start by saying that this game really IS worth playing to finish off a couple class storylines (I highly recommend Sith Inquisitor, Imperial Agent, and Jedi Knight). I've been playing this game since beta back in winter 2011, and I only started to REALLY get bored of it after the Fallen Empire Expansion, which was too bad really, because it looked pretty good on paper.

    Back in the    I'll start by saying that this game really IS worth playing to finish off a couple class storylines (I highly recommend Sith Inquisitor, Imperial Agent, and Jedi Knight). I've been playing this game since beta back in winter 2011, and I only started to REALLY get bored of it after the Fallen Empire Expansion, which was too bad really, because it looked pretty good on paper.

    Back in the day before a couple fairly major changes that other people have listed (crafting, unoriginal new quests, companion changes, and changes to multiplayer content), this game used to really hold my attention because of its original, unique story telling, especially the story quests for each individual character class (8 classes = 8 stories). Endgame content when level cap was 55 was pretty good too if you had a good guild to run with.

    But after 4 years of playing this game, it's time to look for something new.

    Sincerely, bored.    … Expand
  89. Broyax
    Apr 17, 2017
    4
    J'attendais de Bioware un KOTOR 3... et voici... un KOTOR 3 à péage ! pourtant la partie solo est très bien développée avec ses dialogues (en excellente VF) à choix multiple typiques du savoir-faire Bioware et sa mise en scène à la Mass Effect. On prend vraiment plaisir à évoluer dans ce KOTOR (devenu TOR à cause de la cupidité effarante d'EA) les premières dizaines d'heures et l'ambianceJ'attendais de Bioware un KOTOR 3... et voici... un KOTOR 3 à péage ! pourtant la partie solo est très bien développée avec ses dialogues (en excellente VF) à choix multiple typiques du savoir-faire Bioware et sa mise en scène à la Mass Effect. On prend vraiment plaisir à évoluer dans ce KOTOR (devenu TOR à cause de la cupidité effarante d'EA) les premières dizaines d'heures et l'ambiance Star Wars (musique et effets sonores soignés par exemple) est un régal. Graphiquement ce n'est pas extraordinaire mais l'artistique rattrape le coup avec bonheur.

    Il faut évidemment s'habituer au système de combat qui donne l'impression désagréable de jouer à un RTS -on clique sur des petites icônes à tour de rôle (chacune selon leur bon vouloir)- mais aussi à un hack & slash avec un sabre laser. A ce titre, le jeu abuse jusqu'à la nausée des combats qui n'en finissent pas (mais il paraît que c'est ça le MMO...). On s'y fait à la longue, de même qu'à cette interface perfectible et quelques bugs plus ou moins gênants ici et là (mais pas rédhibitoires). Quant aux combats spatiaux, ils nous ramènent à une époque que l'on croyait révolue : celle des Rebel Assault... Affligeant !!

    Comme il s'agit d'un MMO qui croit qu'il va se remplir de millions de joueurs, les environnements sont conçus comme tels et tout simplement gigantesques, on perd un temps incroyable à les parcourir (en dézinguant tout ce qui passe...), écumant ainsi l'océan incommensurable de missions fedex dans lequelles on fait le larbin et gentil toutou de service. Car il est indispensable de "leveler" sinon vous n'aurez pas le niveau nécessaire pour poursuivre la quête principale (l"histoire de classe) dans de bonnes conditions.

    Autant dire qu'après une cinquantaine d'heures, l'entousiasme des débuts finit par retomber selon les scénarios des classes assez inégaux. On a donc intérêt à tous les essayer (ou tenter de le faire si on en a le courage), car certains sont très intéressants et contre toute attente, ceux du Guerrier Sith et de l'Agent Impérial se démarquent. Voilà donc ce MMO Bioware dont l'intéret réside dans sa partie solo (mais qui finit par lasser !) même si les instances à plusieurs (massacre de vilains et de boss à la chaîne) restent sympathiques pourvu qu'on laisse le cerveau au vestiaire... contrairement au PVP grotesque encore plus mauvais et confus que le multi des Battlefield : il fallait le faire !

    Pour finir, une remarque sur le comportement d'EA/Bioware qui exigent votre carte de crédit deux jours à peine après la sortie du jeu (que l'on a déjà payé le prix fort de 55 euros !!) pour vous faire prendre un abonnement minimum d'un mois supplémentaire facturé 13 euros !! j'ai payé pour un mois (55 euros), pourquoi ces gens-là veulent-ils déjà m'extorquer de l'argent alors qu'il me reste 28 jours de jeu !!! bien sûr on peut annuler juste après mais cette prise en otage de la CB des clients est pathétique et édifiante.    … Expand
  90. Captiosus
    Dec 20, 2011
    3
    Last I looked, this game was made by Bioware. Bioware: The innovator of western RPGs and deep character creation systems. Remember the character creation screens from Mass Effect? What happened? SW:TOR is cookie cutter from the beginning with pathetic character creation and continues being a cookie cutter affair thereafter. Although most people will compare the game to Warcraft, the more ILast I looked, this game was made by Bioware. Bioware: The innovator of western RPGs and deep character creation systems. Remember the character creation screens from Mass Effect? What happened? SW:TOR is cookie cutter from the beginning with pathetic character creation and continues being a cookie cutter affair thereafter. Although most people will compare the game to Warcraft, the more I played SW:TOR, the more I was reminded of the ORIGINAL Guild Wars: Instanced zones, lack of any real end game, rapid leveling, linear zones, 4-player groups. The biggest difference was Guild Wars gave you all of that for the purchase price where SW:TOR wants you to pay the purchase price PLUS a subscription fee for it. | | | The game itself is a buggy mess that chugs along. I don't claim to have a super-computer, but my system is far above minimum recommended specs and can play Skyrim fairly well, yet SW:TOR would often chug, choke, and drop frames. | | | Combat isn't spectacular at all. It's the same repetitive formula of MMOs since the days of Everquest. Cast and wait, cast and wait. The gave the classes fancy names, but it's still the same Tank/Healer/DPS trifecta from the last decade and the talent system looks like they literally transplanted it from WoW into the game and made it flow upwards instead of downwards. | | | The story was the key selling point of the game but even the story is lacking. Marred by bad writing, bad voice acting, and the lack of key Star Wars universe races, the story fails to inspire or even impress. For the company that was one of the first to really use a karma system, Bioware's implementation of a karma system in SW:TOR is laughably bad and has little impact on the story. | | | 300 million budget and the best Bioware could come up with is a poor hybrid clone of Guild Wars and Warcraft? Not only am I disappointed but this, along with Dragon Age 2's shortcomings, gives me pause to concern regarding the future of Mass Effect 3.… Expand
  91. Swampy
    Jan 14, 2012
    3
    Revisiting my initial review after a month of play; and not much has changed in my views except it's even worse than I initially feared. While the story is nice, it is basically all this game has to offer and makes it VERY linear. There's no incentive for exploration, actually there's not a lot of incentive to do anything but drive the story forward. Technically the game is shabby, theRevisiting my initial review after a month of play; and not much has changed in my views except it's even worse than I initially feared. While the story is nice, it is basically all this game has to offer and makes it VERY linear. There's no incentive for exploration, actually there's not a lot of incentive to do anything but drive the story forward. Technically the game is shabby, the engine is poorly optimised and there are bugs too numerous to list here. The customer service is also terrible, and don't try and leave an opinion on the official forums; you'll be savaged by the rabid 'Bioware/EA defense force' (aka fanboys).. and if you think that isn't bad enough, write any negative criticism and you'll walk a fine line of getting warnings! Apparently they don't mind criticism.. so long as you're not being critical.. I kid you not.. it's actually in their forums t&c's.… Expand
  92. haydensterling
    Mar 1, 2012
    3
    Are. You. Kidding. Me? This score just proves how bought and paid for gaming journos are. I played for the first month. Everything is instanced. Everything. Skillsets are...underwhelming and reaction time on casts is poor. How on earth can you release an MMO in 2011 and not have endgame? Have they learned nothing from the speed at which WoW players are able to blow through content?Are. You. Kidding. Me? This score just proves how bought and paid for gaming journos are. I played for the first month. Everything is instanced. Everything. Skillsets are...underwhelming and reaction time on casts is poor. How on earth can you release an MMO in 2011 and not have endgame? Have they learned nothing from the speed at which WoW players are able to blow through content? More excuses from EA/Bioware. Oh, how the mighty have fallen.

    And as for the vaunted voiced dialogue? Better left unsaid, pun intended.    … Expand
  93. RustyShackle
    Dec 20, 2011
    3
    Singleplayer game with multiplayer thrown on so they can charge $15 a month. Virtually no endgame. If you enjoy starwars, might want to check it out for 1-50, but after that drop it instantly.
  94. PCforever
    Nov 25, 2012
    3
    I came across a post which pretty much sums up accurately what is wrong with this game that I couldn't put my finger on:

    - No being able to assist through the tank, like every other GOOD mmo out there allows you to do - No being able to heal through the mob, like every other GOOD mmo out there allows you to do - Full groups are forbidden to enjoy one of the most endearing aspects of    I came across a post which pretty much sums up accurately what is wrong with this game that I couldn't put my finger on:

    - No being able to assist through the tank, like every other GOOD mmo out there allows you to do - No being able to heal through the mob, like every other GOOD mmo out there allows you to do - Full groups are forbidden to enjoy one of the most endearing aspects of the game; your companions. That's right, play with your friends and we get punished by having our companions banished. - Not being able to take companions on Operations. If I want to fill my raid slots with gimped DPS and healing AI over real humans, that should be MY choice. - Groupmates being forbidden to watch certain class quest cutscenes. I am standing RIGHT next to my Mercenary friend, why can't I see the cutscene of him having a conversation with the other NPC standing right in front of me? Oh no, you have to stand there tapping your foot, not being able to enjoy your friends class quest cutscenes. What amateur did you hire off the street to design this illogical, immersion killing nonsene of being forbidden to see many of your friends class quest cutscenes WHEN I AM STANDING RIGHT NEXT TO THEM? ADD AN OPTION TO SOCIAL "Watch Class Quest Cutscenes instead of standing around being bored waiting for your friend." How's that for a SMART idea? The single player/story part of this game is amazing. The MMO/Grouping dynamics were designed to make you hate grouping and go solo. Don't care and won't be reading what other players think, this is my feedback to Bioware and hopefully they'll hire COMPETENT devs to fix these problems.    … Expand
  95. Thicky
    Jan 2, 2012
    3
    I'm going to try and keep this short because when it comes to great companies like Bioware and great IP's like Star Wars it's difficult for people to read negative reviews and not take the things they love most personally.

    The game is nearly as good as WoW. Well when WoW was released 7 years ago. There's zero excuse for a AAA title with this much time and money dedicated to development    I'm going to try and keep this short because when it comes to great companies like Bioware and great IP's like Star Wars it's difficult for people to read negative reviews and not take the things they love most personally.

    The game is nearly as good as WoW. Well when WoW was released 7 years ago. There's zero excuse for a AAA title with this much time and money dedicated to development to be lacking such basic features as an Auction House or a /roll command for looting. There are so many things left out of the game you have to wonder what the beta tests were for.

    - Battlegrounds are a disaster. There are no level brackets so if you're not max lvl then you are getting pummeled into the ground.

    - There are no diminishing returns so stunlocks are the norm.

    - Everything is instanced. You're going to meet your buddy in town? Make sure you're in the same instance.

    - Zero need to group up, you have a team of NPC's to command.

    - Crafting requires no gathering or even leaving the town, your NPC's will do everything for you.

    - Don't fall in the water, there's no swimming physics so you drown in a puddle.

    Dammit I wanted to keep this short but there are so many problems. I won't even get into balance because honestly that wouldn't be fair. But let's just say that some classes have skills that still don't work or they do things like make you fall through the earth.

    I played Rift and I was one of those people telling others to stop complaining about things because I thought by complaining they were making the game look bad and as such the game would fail. I silently agreed with their complaints but I stayed silent.

    Well this game isn't as good as Rift was and I won't be clucthing to the railing as this ship sinks. Maybe Blizzard can get the rights to Star Wars...

    TLDR: Save your money, F2P games are better.    … Expand
  96. MaestroBlaBla
    Dec 24, 2011
    3
    LucasArts should scrap this too. SWG was slightly epic. This is tacky and feels more like a $ sink-hole. As far as i know, it is the most expensive mmo to play. Tested CB(thank-god)......WAS VERY UNIMPRESSED
  97. Gankatron
    Jan 22, 2012
    3
    Most of the reviews critical of gameplay are fairly accurate, so I won't restate them.

    The biggest problem for many of us are the "Error 9000" disconnections (every 5-10 minutes) and terrible frame rates even with moderate to high end computers. Although BioWare has recognized these bugs for weeks, they do not have a fix, nor have they stated that they even know what the cause(s) of    Most of the reviews critical of gameplay are fairly accurate, so I won't restate them.

    The biggest problem for many of us are the "Error 9000" disconnections (every 5-10 minutes) and terrible frame rates even with moderate to high end computers. Although BioWare has recognized these bugs for weeks, they do not have a fix, nor have they stated that they even know what the cause(s) of these problems are.

    They seem to be on the BioWare side, and most speculation seems to implicate their use of an inferior engine.

    In any case expect substantial loss of subs as the game is unplayable for those affected.    … Expand
  98. Cik
    Jan 1, 2012
    3
    Not an mmorpg game, but a single-player rpg / cooperative-online rpg being advertised as a massively-multiplayer game. So the game, its content and features are certainly a 3.0 for the lack there-of as a massively-multiplayer game that has a $15/month subscription. It's more like a series of Star Wars the Clone Wars mini-games with absolutely no semblance of massively-multiplayerNot an mmorpg game, but a single-player rpg / cooperative-online rpg being advertised as a massively-multiplayer game. So the game, its content and features are certainly a 3.0 for the lack there-of as a massively-multiplayer game that has a $15/month subscription. It's more like a series of Star Wars the Clone Wars mini-games with absolutely no semblance of massively-multiplayer purpose. But the game is a multi-user single-player lobby-system rpg, though for that it should be buy-to-play, not a $15/month subscription model.

    Just to name a few, and generally speaking, PvE is 5/10; shallow - linear - static - absolutely nothing massively-multiplayer about it, and very much like the heavily linear PvE game-play of Age-of-Conan. The voice-overs is where the points come from, but again that is what I would expect in a single-player rpg.

    PvP is non-existent. Its a lobby-system third-person shooter within a confined shoe-box of capture the flag or control-points that offers no value or purpose to the over-arching republic verses empire struggle for control within a massively-multiplayer universe. It's a redundant short-lived purposeless activity of 10 v 10 lobby-system shallowness.

    Massively-multiplayer universe is not persistent or influenced by your actions at all; your influence is non-existent, so when you do accomplish a clean-up of bad guys in favor of your faction in a story, nothing in the environment has changed what-so-ever. This is a very static and meaningless world.

    Crafting itself is a mini-game that has absolutely no value compared to what drops from general and elite mobs in the world. The importance of Community-driven and incentivised Crafting and Merchandising doesn't matter as in this game, blue, and rare item drops from non-elite mobs and elite mobs drop at an astounding rate, diminishing the value of community-centricity and value of crafting and merchandising. So this where I would disagree on the importance of Crafting, rather than the mechanism for it. The importance of it upwards to mid-game is demeaning and non-existent, but an interesting mini-game.

    There is not open-world player housing or player-controlled merchandising.

    There are absolutely no server or community-wide dynamic events; none what-so-ever, which should incentivise and motivate one faction to thwart an enemey invasion or control of a territorial choke-point which comes with it risk of loss or substantial reward for winning. Non-existent.

    Warzones are few and far between; 3 battle-grounds where there is no reward for winning. They are mind-numbingly repetitive and shallow.

    Space combat is x-wing fighter; shallow and cheap at it's core.

    Achievements are non-existent, as are challenging titles. Everyone's a jedi, but at one point in Beta I could achieve a "Vicious" title as a Republic character for leaning toward the Darkside. . .that has been removed as one example of several other achievements that have been removed which could 'distinguish' your character from someone elses'.

    Character customization and distinguishment from an opposing player is non-existent. Every character playing looks exactly like someone elses, as do titles. You cant customize your character with distinguishing looks, appearance, title, dyed armor or clothing or color-crystal sabers, because there is no breadth or depth to any customization mechanics, features, titles, or modifications that are anything but few and which provides no visual distinction.

    Be warned that if you purchse this game, you are purchasing a Single-Player lobby-system Knights of The Old Republic 2 with Cooperative-Online game-play elements, not a Massively-Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game.    … Expand
  99. Topster
    Sep 3, 2012
    3
    Do NOT be fooled by this game's vastly overinflated metascore. First, the good: The storylines for this game are very well-done, especially the Imperial Agent's, and it adds a bit of single-player charm to the game. It almost make syou wonder why they wouldn't simply make a single-player KotOR game.

    The bad: Absolutely everything else. I would almost suggest buying this game just for    Do NOT be fooled by this game's vastly overinflated metascore. First, the good: The storylines for this game are very well-done, especially the Imperial Agent's, and it adds a bit of single-player charm to the game. It almost make syou wonder why they wouldn't simply make a single-player KotOR game.

    The bad: Absolutely everything else. I would almost suggest buying this game just for the class storylines if each plot point weren't separated by hours of quest grinding. At first the "fully-voiced" dialogue (about half of which is alien language so you'll be reading most of the time anyway) will be cool, but very soon you'll find yourself skipping through it all because it all breaks down into "kill X number of these guys" or "collect X amount of these things". There's a shockingly small amount of content, which is unforgivable in a day and age where there's a plethora of other MMOs with at least twice the content out already. As of this writing there are exactly two lmax-level flashpoints (dungeons).

    Of course there's PVP, which is fine, although again the options for warzones are meager and get boring very quickly.

    In a nutshell, this game fails to make any MMO element worth the (as of right now) $20 pricetag of the game. If you personally don't mind endless hours of monotonous grinding, I can suggest this game for you. If not, I can't in good faith suggest you spend your time on this. You WILL be wondering, as you kill your 347th rakghoul, "why, WHY can't they just have removed all these MMO mainstays and allowed me to just play through the story?"

    The obvious answer is "because no one would opt to pay $15/month when they could run through a class storyline in about 4 hours." And I don;t know about you, but that's not a good enough answer for me.    … Expand
  100. screenjab
    Dec 31, 2011
    3
    After much hype, finally the reality of this bland game becomes apparent. Disappointing in almost every conceivable way, I not only would never recommend it to anybody else, but would go further and yell...
    RUN!!
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Awards & Rankings

19
#19 Best PC Game of 2011
8
#8 Most Discussed PC Game of 2011
9
#9 Most Shared PC Game of 2011

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
85

Generally favorable reviews - based on 73 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 68 out of 73
  2. Mixed: 5 out of 73
  3. Negative: 0 out of 73
  1. RPGamer
    Apr 23, 2012
    80
    LucasArts generally exercised greater quality control of Star Wars games than most licensed properties receive, though that didn't necessarily translate into titles that were actually good. I've played a few other Star Wars games in the past, and while the SNES platformers were pretty good, this one is even better. Knights of the Old Republic may just be the best game in the franchise, and succeeds at being a top-tier RPG even if one has no interest in Star Wars. BioWare did the license proud.
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  2. GameCritics
    Mar 31, 2012
    70
    I wound up bailing out on Star Wars: The Old Republic well before hitting the level cap, but not before digging into it more so than any other MMO I've played. Even if it is an unhappy marriage between two wildly different game types, the fact that it kept me hooked for so long at least counts for something.
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  3. NZGamer
    Mar 5, 2012
    83
    A good game. It pays excellent homage to the film series (even though it's set before the movies), and is a really solid MMO.
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