4.5/5 pitchforks
Released on Dec. 20, 2011
Rated Teen
Star Wars fans are a difficult crowd to please. The movie series has successfully become the most iconic science-fiction franchise through numerous television shows, novels and video games. With so much content it is easy to find subjects to dislike. However, after playing for roughly 165 hours, it can be safely declared that the recently launched massively multiplayer online role-playing game, “Star Wars: The Old Republic” strays far from the distasteful category and is an excellent addition to the Star Wars collection.
“The Old Republic” uses an instantly familiar model seen in other MMORPG’s such as Blizzard Entertainment’s behemoth, “World of Warcraft,” ArenaNet’s “Guild Wars,” or Trion Worlds, Inc.’s successful new title, “Rift.” But the game is not simply a “Star Wars” version of the aforementioned. It successfully capitalizes on an area most other MMORPG’s gloss over. “The Old Republic’s” uniqueness and enticement comes from its focus on delivering a wonderfully gripping story, which is driven by: fully-voiced dialogue, eight unique class plotlines, character choice, companions, cinematic scenes and the enticing Star Wars universe.
Although the game’s structure is familiar to seasoned MMORPG players, it may be a bit frustrating for newcomers to the online gaming world since the game offers no tutorial. Within the first ten minutes of gameplay a player is introduced to dialogue choice, class and generic quests, bonus objectives, follow-up quests, map waypoints, numerous abilities, transport speeders and vendors. I have spent enough seemingly endless hours in front of a computer screen to feel right at home, but if this was my first MMORPG experience, for a few hours, “The Old Republic” would be utterly confusing. Nevertheless, the game’s story succinctly captures the player's attention from the get-go, and makes learning play-mechanics a secondary task to accomplish along the epic journey.
“The Old Republic” avoids the generic MMORPG plot premise, in which a game’s story is temporarily unique depending on where a character’s starting zone is but transitions into a humdrum story as the game progresses; instead it follows BioWare’s award-winning story-telling mechanics and embraces eight entirely unique storylines that follow a player throughout his or her adventure, from level 1 to 50, and change depending on how that player plays. “The Old Republic” allows players to take the role of eight classes; four each for the Galactic Republic and the Imperial Empire. Each side has two force users: Jedi Knight and Jedi Consular, or Sith Warrior and Sith Inquisitor. They also have two military oriented classes: Smuggler and Storm Trooper, or Bounty Hunter and Imperial Agent. These entirely different stories give “The Old Republic” unheard of replay value for an MMORPG, and bestow importance on the player’s role and the choices made during the game.
I spent most of my time embracing the dark side of the force through a Sith Inquisitor and Imperial Agent, and fooled around a little with the light side on a Jedi Knight. The drastic differences in each class’s story and the environment are impressive. The Sith Inquisitor’s plotline is a gumbo of deceit, fear, paranoia and power, while the Jedi story focuses on equality, restoration, righteousness and understanding. The non-player-controlled characters throughout each story also reacted quite differently to my presence. I was typically feared as a Sith Inquisitor, and respected as a Jedi Knight, but depending on how the gamer plays the game this could dramatically change.
As with any BioWare role-playing-game moral choices play a crucial role. During dialogue enactments the player is frequently given a choice to make that will define the character and eventually shape the story you play. Particular quests give the option to choose the light or the dark side, and the decision earns the player points for the respective choice. These points limit or grant use of particular items during the game, and impact how your companion characters react to you.
I often found myself in a forked road where my character could do some truly terrible things, or display a rare act of kindness in the war-torn galaxy. Especially throughout the Inquisitor’s storyline these choices made me morally pause and consider whether to follow what I’d personally do in that situation, or what my character would do. Considering the Inquisitor is groomed to be an arrogant Sith who desires to overthrow the Emperor to recreate the Imperial Empire, and who will also betray, torture and kill anyone who attempts to stop the Inquisitor from achieving this goal, I chose the dark side quite frequently. However, another gamer played his Inquisitor as caring and helpful to the plights of others, which dominantly led to light side choices. Even though the core plotline was the same, our games played out very differently.
One such instance, and my favorite decision thus far, was during the Inquisitor’s class quest on Balmorra. I was manipulating a major in the Imperial Military to further my aspirations of power, when he chose to hold my progress hostage until I located and rescued his son, a new graduate of the Sith Academy who became captured by the Republic. After slaying a small Rebel army to reach the major’s son I discover the trapped Sith is a poster child for a vile and arrogant white-supremacist who is used to being freely handed everything he wanted; the type of character you encounter in every game and relish the idea of murdering. The difference between “The Old Republic” and those other games? The player gets to kill the brat and his father if that is what he chooses. What really made this a standout moment was the voice acting.
“The Old Republic” is the first MMORPG to encompass a cast of fully voiced characters. The Los Angeles Times reported the game cost nearly $200 million, and had a cast of almost 1,000 actors who recorded dialogue for 4,000 characters. This is the defining attribute of “The Old Republic” no other current online game can fathom matching. There are plenty of characters who don’t even speak common, but they also are brought to life with a real voice. The experience is astounding and the quality of voice acting superb. It’s like playing BioWare’s “Knight of the Old Republic,” but with thousands of other players.
Each dialogue and moral choice the player makes has the potential of having an impact somewhere in the game. Typically this change is found either in that particular quest, or through companion characters. The implementation of companion characters is one of the best aspects of solo play, and outshines the traditional sense of pets found in many other games. Throughout the galaxy-hopping adventure each character encounters six distinct non-player-controlled companions who join the ensemble and offer a single combat role of: melee tank, ranged tank, healer, ranged DPS (damage per second) or melee DPS. Dialogue actions can either gain or lose affection with a companion. Higher affection levels grant romance stories and improve efficiency when deployed on profession missions.
The only downside of companions is their necessity in solo combat. Surviving combat during solo missions is incredibly difficult without a companion to help, and if that character dies or does not summon properly, the likelihood of dying increases exponentially. This reliance upon companions becomes increasingly prevalent when plagued by a persistent glitch that won’t auto-summon the companion after entering a new zone or dismounting a speeder. Another double-edge sword is a companion’s customizability. Companions are almost as customizable as a player’s own character, via armor selection and purchasable appearance customizations. The only downside to this is their armor constantly needs upgrades for the character to be viable in a fight, which can become expensive. Up until about level 20, companions can also fill a missing role in flashpoints, the scripted dungeons meant for four players.
The flashpoints are fun and vary in environment and objective, but most lack the feeling of epic found within the class story. The first flashpoint for each faction is heavily scripted and plays largely through cinematic scenes and player choice. However, past the initial introduction the flashpoint play becomes stale and focuses more on obtaining better gear than a story. Although most flashpoint stories do not compare with other plots unfolding in the game, a greater story arc is present and completely reveals itself in the last three flashpoints. Perhaps the redeeming aspect of the flashpoint system is once the player reaches level 50 every flashpoint is repeatable on hard mode, offering greater difficulty and better rewards. Nevertheless, for players who do not like the feel of the flashpoint formula, each planet has four or more heroic quests that are meant to be completed with two or four people. These quests offer greater experience and loot than any other quest on the planet, and are typically some of the best quests available.
A favorite aspect of “The Old Republic” is space combat. “Starfox 64” is in a top-five favorite video games, and that is likely why “The Old Republic’s” space combat will quickly hook a player’s interest. Both games play essentially the same, albeit “The Old Republic’s” design is a bit simpler and much prettier. After completing the class quest on the second planet the player is rewarded with a spaceship and with it freedom. Nearly every planet is available to be explored and numerous space missions are available that increase in difficulty as the game progresses. Purchasing or crafting upgrades for the ship is crucial, and after the first three missions upgrading is necessary to survive. Although the space missions are scripted and there is not too much variety among them, they serve as a vastly different break from the game’s other content.
The player versus player system in “The Old Republic” is surprisingly well done and enjoyable. The game takes an idea attempted in several other MMORPG’s where any player level 10 and higher can join in on the battle, and everybody’s abilities will scale towards the highest level player. This idea typically fails, however when playing in a “Hutball” match, a gladiator form of American football, every player feels equally strong. Match rewards are based on an incentive system to prevent players from farming experience points or redeemable badges. The matches are server internal and on my server the Republic dominates Alderaan Civil War and Voidstar, so I did not experiment with the option too frequently. When I did venture towards a good old-fashion bloodbath the player versus player certainly did not disappoint; however, the game does lack a reporting system for players away from their keyboard, which can lead to unbalanced teams in Hutball, especially.
The game’s greatest detractor is its obsession with interface and combat glitches. For the first two weeks it struggled from server queues upwards of 20 minutes and various account issues. Additionally, the game is still plagued with numerous interface issues and server lag that becomes increasingly worse the further a player progresses in the game. On several occasions I would have found the pesky droid duo I was looking for if the screen had not randomly turned black when entering new zones or displayed random billows of smoke during cinematic scenes. The larger problems seem to stem from BioWare and Electronic Arts not properly anticipating exactly how popular their game is and being unable to adequately control the traffic. But for a MMORPG popularity means success, and that is a good thing.
Glitches aside, the game is missing many crucial features. Bioware overlooked several social inclusions in the game: guild banks, roll mechanics, a looking for group channel and linkable trade professions. A few other gripes include the bank items not automatically stacking, the $15 monthly access fee, the un-customizable user interface and the utterly confusing purpose of workbenches.
“Star Wars: The Old Republic” sets a new standard of achievement in MMORPGs. Before the gear-grind begins the game has potentially thousands of hours of gameplay, and more is being frequently added. The voice acting, cinematic scenes and dialogue choice make the game astoundingly unique from other mainstream online games. “The Old Republic” offers a thrilling adventure that will leave players awe stricken, gleeful, and laughing manically – often all at once. While it is not perfect, the game is off to a great start with a promising outlook. The biggest threat to its success will be the $15 monthly access fee, especially when there are free-to-play blockbusters like “Guild Wars 2” releasing this year. But the Force is strong with this one, and if players are willing to pay for “The Old Republic’s” epic adventure, I only foresee its power growing.
Reach the reporter at tdmcknig@asu.edu
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