The Old Republic Opens Up: NDA Lifted
Today, the NDA for Star Wars: The Old Republic has been lifted, and fans are free to discuss all aspects of the game. This includes fan sites such as the site you are currently reading, and you can expect a lot of content coming out of us in the near future. Stay tuned, and read the message from BioWare Doctor Greg Zeschuk below.
Folks,
As of now, the non disclosure portion of our Game Testing Agreement is officially lifted. While all players must still accept the Game Testing Agreement, from this point on testers may now freely talk about their experiences this past weekend in the game, as well as post screenshots and gameplay videos of their testing experiences. We encourage you to come join us on the official Star Wars™: The Old Republic™ Forums to share your experiences!
The Star Wars: The Old Republic community site will have a copy of this message on the forums and it will also appear in the Patcher. Players may not talk about nor reprint posts from our testing forums as they are still fully covered by the confidentiality portions of our Game Testing Agreement. And all players who want to participate in the upcoming Beta Test Weekends still have to accept all terms of the Game Testing Agreement. So, other than that, free feel to talk about and share your experiences in Star Wars: The Old Republic.
My thanks go out to everyone who has beta tested and continues to beta test the game. It has been with your help and feedback that Star Wars: The Old Republic is where it is today. We really appreciate your efforts.
May the Force be with you!
Greg Zeschuk
VP, Electronic Arts, BioWare Austin, General Manager
A Busy Weekend for BioWare
As many of you undoubtedly know this past weekend was BioWare’s largest Testing Weekend yet, and tens of thousands of gamers and Star Wars fans everywhere logged out of the real world and logged in to The Old Republic. Surely several of you participated in the festivities unknowingly contributing to quite the staggering statistic. As revealed by the BioWare doctors in an interview with Eurogamer at last night’s BAFTA in London, over 1 million hours were logged in last weekend’s beta testing alone.
This weekend we had a big test – tens upon tens of thousands. One crazy number is we had over a million hours of testing over the weekend. It was a huge test, and there are even bigger ones coming. The key thing is for us to take those learnings, apply them and make the service really stable. We’re happy with the game.
Our goal is a smooth launch, we want to serve our players really well. We want to serve them with a great, stable, secure, high quality experience. That’s our goal. We’re doing everything we can.
An impressive number to say the least, but probably not unexpected to those who participated and waited through some very long queues. It sounds like we can expect more of these “server stress tests” in the near future so if you haven’t had a chance to test the game, don’t give up yet!
Read the entire interview at Eurogamer.com
BioWare Doctors Discuss SWTOR Development
Talking to Gamasutra, BioWare’s leaders Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk speak about their expectations for The Old Republic, preparing for launch, and how they are handling comparisons to the biggest MMO on the market. The interview is quite lengthy and also includes talk about BioWare’s other IPs, Dragon Age and Mass Effect.
There are quite a few topics covered just on TOR, but there are a few key points. Talking about what is required to launch an MMO of this scale, the doctors admit that they do not have experience in this area. Luckily there are many members of their team who have launched an MMO before, with BioWare Mythic having launched multiple MMOs in the past. They also talk about the difference between a traditional boxed game launch, and The Old Republic as a service launch. BioWare has had problems in the past already with digital game launches, with users unable to connect and authenticate their games online such as Mass Effect 2, so they are sure to take extra preparations for such a large launch.
The Old Republic has constantly been compared to Blizzard’s World of Warcraft, and while no game can match up to WoW’s success, Zeschuk says it’s “inevitable” that the games be compared. But whether TOR can overtake WoW or not, BioWare are confident. “[Once] you’ve tried it, you just can’t go back,” says Muzyka.
BioWare Doctors Talk “The BioWare Method”
Last week at DICE, BioWare founders Greg Zeschuk and Ray Muzyka held a presentation called “The BioWare Method” where they discussed what goes in to building a successful studio such as BioWare and some of the philosophies and ideals they follow that helped them get to where they are today.
While not directly related to The Old Republic, it’s a great watch for those interested in the behind the scenes industry efforts. Topics discussed include the importance of building the right team and having a strong company culture. My main takeaway: don’t wear a finely striped shirt on camera.
The Old Republic Pricing Will Be “Standard”
Speaking to GDC, BioWare co-founder Greg Zeschuk has told gaming site VG247 that The Old Republic’s business model will depend on what the industry standard is at the time.
“The way we look at these things is, ‘What’s the standard at the time?’ Obviously we’re not quite done yet. We’ve got a lot of work left to do. But we’ll be very conscious of how the market looks.”
Both Zeschuk and his partner Ray Muzyka stressed that the business model has not yet been announced. But it looks like you can expect a similar subscription fee of around US$15 if the current standard remains the same by the time the game is released.
Old Republic pricing will depend on MMO “standard,” says BioWare [VG247, thanks leXX]
Bioware Talks About Combat in TOR
Speaking to VG247, Bioware co-founder Greg Zeschuk believes The Old Republic’s combat system needs something more than “swinging through each other” like in many other MMOs today. Instead, the combat system will be choreographed, something that is not seen in most online games.
The Old Republic’s combat system has been built from the ground up, Zeschuk confirms. “Without a doubt…If you recall some very specific things from the gameplay video, it was choreographed.” While we have not seen this gameplay video, we’ll take his word for it. Read more»
PC Gamer Magazine Gets First Look at TOR
While everyone has been begging for more info on Star Wars: The Old Republic, PC Gamer magazine got a look themselves as they had a visit to the Bioware Austin studio to have the first look at the upcoming MMO. Unfortunately the info is not available online, but you can pick up the holiday copy of PC Gamer to check it out. This includes new content developments, screenshots, and interviews with Creative Director James Ohlen, Principal Lead Writer Daniel Erickson, and BioWare Co-Founders Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk.
You can read a snippet of the article below: Read more»
Interview with Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk
The Escapist has had a great opportunity to sit down with Bioware founders Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk and have a discussion on how their previous careers as doctors have influenced their current careers at Bioware. The end result is an excellent article and you can read it here: Hippocratic Game Design.
