Join the StarWarsMMO.net staff!
If you’re here then chances are you’re highly anticipating Star Wars: The Old Republic. If you are passionate about this game then why not take an active role in its community? We are looking for volunteer staff to assist in all aspects of the site. If you have an idea for a column you would like to write, are an experienced web developer, are passionate about Star Wars lore, or are interested in helping out but are unsure what type of role you could fill, please send an email to jeff@starwarsmmo.net, or, if you have a LucasForums account, apply here with your interest and we will contact you with more details. Please include any samples of your work you may have if applicable. We look forward to hearing from you!
Friday Update: Fan Friday, Sith Temple Studio Insider
Yes, it’s Sunday. But this past Friday there were two updates to the official Star Wars: The Old Republic site.
The first, Fan Friday, once again features community fan art, but also introduces a new section called Fan Site Spotlight, in which a SWTOR fan site is, well, spotlighted. The first installment features Mos Eisley Radio, one of the most popular podcasts covering The Old Republic. To read the interview with the podcast hosts as well as view the spotlighted fan art, check out the Fan Friday post on the official site.
Going along with Fan Friday, a new Studio Insider has been posted, this time focusing on the Sith Temple concept art. The art and insight that went into creating it, as well as the latest community Q&A, can be viewed here.
This week’s community Q&A topic is flashpoints. If you have any questions you’d like answered, head on over to the official forums and ask away.
STAR WARS: The Old Republic Fan Friday
As always, members of the Star Wars™: The Old Republic™ community continually inspire us. We have so many talented community members, and we’ll continue our tradition of highlighting some of our favorites in this week’s article. Enjoy the excellent fan art!
We’re excited to present our very first Fan Site Spotlight this month featuring Mos Eisley Radio, and we also have more details about The Old Republic at PAX East.
Studio Insider – Sith Temple
In every Studio Insider, we take you behind the scenes to give you an exclusive close look at the development of Star Wars™: The Old Republic™ and answer your questions about the game. This week, Concept Artist Diego Almazan tells us how he created the concept for this imposing Sith burial ground.
Don’t miss the Community Q&A! This month, ask us your questions on Facebook, Twitter, and on the forums. (Source)
Community Q&A: Flashpoints
The Old Republic™ community has a lot of questions and we want to answer as many as we can. In fact, we’re starting this new discussion on our forums solely dedicated to finding out what you want to know. Each month we’ll create a new thread for you to ask questions in. We’ll be reading and reviewing all of your questions and featuring some of them in a future Community Q & A section of the Studio Insider!
This month, we want your questions about Flashpoints. Please feel free to ask us anything you want to know about them!
Some things to remember when posting:
- Please keep questions courteous and respectful
- Avoid asking questions that have already been asked this month
- Ask only one question in the thread
- Do not bump posts.
Keep in mind that there are some questions we’re not able to answer right now, so please don’t feel upset if we do not select your question, and please do feel free to ask it again in the future!
Thanks! We’re looking forward to reading your questions!
The Old Republic™ Team (Source)
Latest Official Site Updates: Community, Voss Planet Reveal
There have been two recent updates to the Star Wars: The Old Republic official website. The first is an article by Damion Schubert, Principal Lead Systems Designer, on the community aspect of the game. Here is an excerpt:
Massively multiplayer games are not new. The first true massively multiplayer game was a text-only virtual world called MUD, put together by Richard Bartle and Roy Trubshaw in 1978. This little window of dizzying text descriptions was a far cry visually from the seductively lush 3D virtual worlds of today, but it was enough. Enough to get the genre started, and enough to get armchair designers across the world to imagine the possibilities, and debate philosophical matters of game design. One of these questions, still asked today, is whether or not massively multiplayer environments should strive to be games or to be worlds.
Next, a new planet has been revealed: Voss. This has been a fairly common update recently, except this one is a bit different: it is a planet never before seen in the Star Wars universe.
We’re thrilled to announce not only the next planet to be featured in Star Wars™: The Old Republic™ but also a planet never-before-seen in the Star Wars™ mythos: Voss.
An alien species resides on the mysterious world of Voss and is said to have an incredible aptitude for the Force. These Voss Mystics – rumored to be enigmatic healers as well as seers – struggle to protect their utopian society from annihilation.
Discover the secrets of Voss as you are forced time and again to choose between maintaining the appearance of neutrality so important to your leaders or striking against your enemies while you have the chance.
Access the HoloNet records to learn more about the darkness at the heart of Voss. Encounter the narrow trails and wide rock shelves in this video and visit the media section for never-before-seen screenshots, concept art, and wallpapers depicting the madness and despair creeping through the lands.
Updates to Site Design and Layout, Plus New Media
You have have noticed some changes to the site over the past few days, well it is getting to the point where I’m close to satisfied with how the site is laid out now. Now, rather than having the front page as a portal to the various sections of the site, you are brought straight to news. Another advantage to this new layout is that now virtually every page on the site should now be able to be navigated to in two clicks or less.
We also have updated our categorizing system, and now use tags rather than categories to keep track of our content. If you’re looking for posts on a certain topic, rather than wading through many posts inside of a general category, you can visit the archive page to get a listing of all topics on the site, as well as the historical archives that used to be in our news sidebar.
You might also notice a couple sections of the site we previously had are not around anymore. These would be the features and community sections. For our site features such as interviews, we will be implementing a new way to display those amongst our news posts so that they are highlighted. The rest of our features section consisted of the various trailers and videos released by the official site, and these now have their own home on the trailers page. As for the community section, it never became the section I wanted it to be and was really just a listing of links. These will all be a part of the site in some other form.
Look for more changes to be implemented soon. The site will be continuously updated not only with new content but the way you, the readers, navigate and use the site to give you the best experience possible.
Lastly, new media has been added to both the screenshots and concept art sections. We now have large galleries of screen captures from the developer walkthrough, as well as captures from the cinematic trailer. Enjoy!
I would love to hear feedback of any kind on the updates, as well as ideas for new features you’d like to see implemented. Make sure to leave a comment below!
This Week in the Forums (5/7/2009)
Better late than never! Let’s take a gander at some of the highlights over in the Star Wars: The Old Republic forums at Lucasforums.com. If you haven’t registered yet, please do!
The Diverse Worlds of The Old Republic
A new official Star Wars: The Old Republic. It’s worth it for the in game footage and sightings of such words as Korriban and Ord Mandell!
What’s your MMO game psychology?
Jae Onasi graces us with a link to a survey that will divine numerically your MMO game psychology. Are you an explorer? Socializer? hardcore level grinder? Find out!
What are you watching/reading now?
maverick187 kicks things off in our brand new anime forum, Section 9, by inquiring as to what anime his fellow SWTOR fans are watching. What are you waiting for? Join in!
Feedback
Until next time, leave us any questions or comments in the comments for the main site or leave them in the Feedback forum. Head on over to the Mandalorian Outpost if you want to join a guild, Section 9 to discuss anime, or Hutta Hangout to talk about just about anything!
This Week in the Forums (4/30/2009)
Join me as we look at some of the highlights over in the Star Wars: The Old Republic forums at Lucasforums.com. If you haven’t registered yet, please do!
Pastrimix wonders what the mechanics behind Star Wars: The Old Republic will be. Will it take on the characteristics of a traditional RPG or will it be more action oriented? Forum Super Moderator Darth Moeller thinks that it “will have similar combat to other MMORPGs, with realtime action-based combat but still have skill trees similar to that in Diablo or WoW and have different feats that you can use in combat.” tommycat and miltiades both hypothesize that it will resemble Bioware’s Mass Effect.
With the recent reveal of the Bounty Hunter as not only an official class, but one that will be exclusive to the Sith, tommycat wonders if SWTOR will be balanced at 4 classes each. While some speculate that there will be a balanced number of classes, the idea that there will be 8 is not officially confirmed. Newcomer TheRogueForums thinks that perhaps some classes between the two sides will be shared. Regardless of the number, Miltiades points out that the class and choices the player makes will greatly impact the outcome of the story of the game.
We recently welcomed a new section on the Star Wars: The Old Republic boards, Section 9! Section 9 is the place to go to discuss all thngs anime with your fellow SWTOR fans.
Feedback
Until next time, leave us any questions or comments in the comments for the main site or leave them in the Feedback forum. Head on over to the Mandalorian Outpost if you want to join a guild, Section 9 to discuss anime, or Hutta Hangout to talk about just about anything!
This Week in the Forums (4/22/2009)
Another week flies by! Today as usual we will be looking at some of the highlights over in the Star Wars: The Old Republic forums at Lucasforums.com. If you haven’t registered yet, please do!
Will TOR have the Bioware punchline?
DAWUSS wonders if Star Wars: The Old Republic will have another mind blowing KOTOR style twist. Will Bioware pull another “You ARE Revan” style twist? “No”, says forumgoer Miltiades who thinks that instead Bioware will try something new with a “great revelation, big secret somehow, somewhere, in the game. Whether it will center around your character, or around one of the major NPC’s in the game” he is not sure. PastrimiX humorously quips that he is sure Bioware will have “the Generic Soldier, the Gooddoer Neophyte, and BioWare’s other standard NPC archetypes.”
Low Expectations or High Hopes?
Perhaps the greatest lurker of all time, pyros rose from the dead to voice his concerns that the incredible roleplaying world crafted by Bioware and Obsidian may become tainted by the stereotypical “MMO Gamer”. He closes with this thought: “I really hope i’m being too harsh on the community I really hope that with the Bioware take and the amazing storylines and quest arcs that people will want to “live” the game not beat the game.” Wise words, pyros. User adamqd echoes his concerns by saying, “I want it to be great, I just hope Bioware can make a game that is as much for people who have investment in KotOR, as well as for those who will play this because they want a grindy, “Day in the Life”, casual fan, sandbox”.
The Star Wars: The Old Republic community is still buzzing about Bioshock 2. If you want to talk about something else, start a new thread!
Feedback
That’s all for now, TOR fans! Remember to leave us any questions or comments in the comments for the main site or leave them in the Feedback forum. Head on over to the Mandalorian Outpost if you want to join a guild or to Hutta Hangout to talk about just about anything!
This Week in the Forums (4/15/09)
Greetings! Welcome to another week of This Week in the Forums. Today we will be looking at some of the highlights over in the Star Wars: The Old Republic forums at Lucasforums.com. If you haven’t registered yet, please be sure to do so!
Forum vet Xirion teased everyone with an image that depicts a supposed galaxy map from SWTOR with planets divided between the Republic and those under Sith control. Forumite adamqd claims that the picture does not line up with EU and KotoR planet locations and hypothesizes that ” it was just drawn (Minus names) for the Time-line and isn’t actually scaled/matched to a current Map.” To answer these raised questions, forum user Hallucination humorously responded that “The planets moved”. Tommycat sums up the debate by stating “More or less, I want to know where they got their information. I won’t trust it until there’s proof.”
This Week in the Forums (4/8/09)
Well TOR fans, it’s time again.Time for “This Week in the Forums”, a weekly recap of the topics users are buzzing about in our forums. Once again, if you haven’t registered already please do so! We want an accurate count of the Star Wars: The Old Republic fans out there!
This Week in the Forums (4/1/09)
Hello again TOR fans, it’s time again for “This Week in the Forums”, a weekly recap we like to do highlighting some of the more popular threads in our forums. Once again, if you haven’t registered already please do! Let’s dive in!
Lightsaber Hilts
User Pwnzor326 wonders if the large “2 liter bottle” lightsaber hilts that are prevalent in the official SWTOR screenshots “bother anyone else but [him]“. Our forumites answered with a resounding “YES!” and proceeded to tear the designs apart. Forumgoer SW01 even went as far to say as “They are hideous. And ridiculous looking.” Ouch! I hope someone from Bioware is reading this! Speaking of Bioware’s community involvement, Miltiades included a very interesting link in which Bioware official forum moderator and lead writer Rob Chestney claims that “BioWare is strongly committed to its community and we look at all the issues brought up consistently in the forums, including the size of the lightsabers”. Interestingly enough, Bioware does pay attention to forum posts! Don’t sit on the sidelines for this one folks, join the discussion!
