SWTOR LOLReview

Let me start by telling you I have no business writing a review of any game given my relative lack of experience and shoddy-at-best writing ability.

A priori info: I am not a SW buff. I enjoyed the movies, but can't even give you a good synopses of the story. I am not a lore hag, as I've never cared much for stories. I'm a fact kinda girl and stories are for people who have creative minds or at least the capacity to remember them a week later. While I've played many more games than most women my age, my history is mostly in fantasy games and MMO's.

SWTOR let me, and anyone else who had even a remote interest, participate in an open beta weekend, wherein I started to level a Jedi Knight. Aside from the obvious bugs (lights extending through an entire plane, people missing from their close-up dialogue cut-scenes, terrain that's in my way, but not visible at all, etc...),It plays very much like any other MMO - all the UI elements are in the normal places (or somewhere else really obvious), settings are accessed via the same hotkeys, movement works the same, combat works the same, etc... Nothing new here at all, which will make for a super easy transition for people who've been playing other MMO's. The UI graphics are nothing special.

This game is very talky-talky, as a friend put it. I'm normally not one for a lot of talk, but the story is engaging and the dialogue is well-enough thought- and acted - out to merit listening to. It's a good thing too, because if you don't sit through it, you don't get your quests!

I found the sounds overall to be of high quality, but a little annoying and unfitting. When all I'm doing is one-shotting 5 enemies with a single AOE spell, I don't need a dramatic accompaniment. The walking sounds are a little too crisp and often not what you'd expect for the terrain you're crossing. By default, all sounds are at 100%. I'd suggest turning them all way down unless you're truly excited about every step you take in this game, which I was not.

Having been spoiled by Rift's graphics - lighting, bump-mapping, terrain availability (I kept thinking to myself "I could climb that if this was Rift"), and textures, nothing is this game is even remotely impressive - not the characters, nor armor; not the environment, nor UI; not anything - it's all pretty sucky comparatively. I wouldn't think it fair to compare this game to Rift if it were not also an MMO. Skyrim, obviously, is not a fair measuring tool. With all the money and hype associated with this game, I truly expected more and was constantly disappointed.

Gameplay is very similar to other quest-driven games. You talk to this person, who tells you to talk to another person who will either tell you to talk to yet another person, go retrieve or destroy items, or kill x number of bad guys. You walk your ass over to the area marked on your map and easily complete your quest(s), then make your way back to your quest giver.

One thing I did notice was respawn times on the mobs was just about perfect... you could go all the way into the cave to do your quest, then all the way back out without fighting the same mobs twice, which is a welcome change from WoW or Rift where you almost always have to stealth by or fight mobs you just freakin killed. Quick travel makes it much less of a pain to get around (assuming you've gotten all of your travel points, which I did not).

The major difference between the game design of SWTOR and those from whom it hopes to steal market share is, as I've mentioned, that the dialogue is rich and engaging as are character development and story lines - no this is not just some random Night Elf  sending you off to waste some time; It is a very important mission given to you by a very important person and here's why... The voice acting really makes you feel like you're part of something and not just some fool with too much time on their hands.

Overall, I'd say it's worth buying, but not worth paying a subscription fee. Good thing there won't be one or they might not make back the money they spent making this game. It's definitely worth a good spin if you're a SW fanboi or just looking for something to make you feel better about the other games you're playing (like Aion did). You'll have to be willing to overlook their relative lack of beauty, sophistication, and detail in graphics and accept that this is a talky-talky lore-driven game with light sabers. According to some who know more about Bioware's history than I do, This is on par with expectations of Bioware products.