Star Wars : The Old Republic (SWTOR for short, or just ToR) is the largely awaited MMORPG developed by Bioware and in some sense, the spiritual successor to Bioware and Obsidian's KOTOR games. It is not just a normal MMORPG either but it does contain many parts of it that does make it a more standard MMORPG akin to World of Warcraft which is basically as standard as you can get nowdays. In any case, there's one big part that separates it from being such a standard MMO and smaller parts that I'll talk about later, however the big part is character interaction.
I believe character interaction is what sets ToR apart from other games and chose it over story because while Bioware advertises this game basically being the forefront of bringing a focus on story to the MMO genre, I'm going to say that's not entirely accurate, MMORPGs like Lord of the Rings Online have had a huge focus on story before ToR, as well as World of Warcraft; however neither of those games had basically any character interaction at all other than your character is talked to by people, and then you do stuff for them. While that idea is still existent in ToR, and it very much is one of the things I like and dislike about the game, every single quest related character in the game is interactable, they are of course interactable on different levels but never the less you are given opportunities to respond to them in 3 different ways which usually sum up to nice, nice or rude depending on what option is given (this option usually always changes from conversation to a different conversation to a different character) and finally just rude. A majority of the time how you respond in most situations will not affect anything too drastically other than getting a different response out of the character but it will still lead to them giving you a quest. On the other hand, there are also light and dark moments where you're given two choices and sometimes three but mostly two, about how to go about a situation, and those choices drastically deliver a consequence somehow. It is unknown by me at least if those choices will actually affect anything later on in the game, the only thing that happens usually is that you get a followup letter from someone involved in a in game mail box who tells you what happened afterward.
All of that above however is just about side quests, there are main quests choices that have similar outcomes but I feel like a choice that is made in the main quest would be more likely to come back in an in game form than a side quest one.
In any case, the interactive characters and the stories that come with that are what makes ToR stand on it's own I believe, that and it being set in the Star Wars universe which brings a very unique experience to allow yourself to be immersed in to begin with. However with that said, I don't believe this game is perfect at all and that probably lies in the game play mechanics. As with most games, the PvE and PvP components are drastically different but most games also do both well, in ToR I feel like the gameplay mechanics server PvE just fine, tank, healer, and DPS serve their purposes just fine, and while it feels like the connection between one attack to another is not instantaneous and more reliant on watching the animation complete rather than being tied to the global cooldown, it isn't that much of a big deal in PvE than it is in PvP. To give an example of the not instantaneous idea, as a Jedi Sentinel I have a skill called Overload Saber, it is suppose to be an instant cast that empowers my lightsabers allowing them to do damage over time effects when they hit, the problem is that it is by no means instantaneous, if I hit the ability and then immediately do an attack afterwards, it will cancel the Overload Saber skill which again isn't very annoying in PvE but if that happens in PvP that would be a problem.
The problem with PvP isn't in the skills persay but it is because of class design and PvP zone design. The first most obvious problem to me anyways is that the game's PvP zone range for Warzones at least which are instanced areas for PvP combat, is that the level range is basically 10-50, 50 being the level cap, it probably goes without saying that entering the warzone is basically pointless at lower levels, but the game does try to balance things out by adjusting everyone's stats to basically the same level. Even still however, a higher level will have more ways and a easier time killing people than a lower level would, I've only done 1 Warzone on my sentinel at about level 20ish and a lot more on my Vanguard who is only level 23 and my experience is that because I'm a ranged class and a tank, I can do much better as a Vanguard than I did with my Sentinel at a low level ,even still however, when I fight a high level it isn't much fun to just die to CC.
So while I haven't admittedly done much in ToR yet these are some of the problems that I've encountered with the game. There is much more things better with the game than there are bad things, however the bad things do mar what would be a great MMO experience for me.
One last thing I'll say about ToR is that I think it is still designed for a very specific audience. If you don't enjoy either Star Wars or games with heavy emphasis on interaction and story, then ToR probably isn't the game for you. It does have the standard MMO components of go out to a area, gather quests, then go complete them, but honestly those almost feel like they hurt the experience more than helping it. It's not a bad thing of course because it allows for a extended multiplayer experience beyond simply character conversations, however at the same time it is somewhat of a real disappointment to be having this interesting conversation with a character, and then the next person you talk to basically just says kill 30 so so things, and collect so so things while you're at it. Nevertheless however, ToR is a excellent game, that I'll be writing more in depth about as I play it more.
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