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Oceanic players: no local pre-orders

July 21, 2011 By

Well, pre-orders for Star Wars: The Old Republic are now up and running, and unfortunately for any Oceanic players, there’s no local options for us to take part. The pre-orders offer three options:

1. Collector’s Edition

As mentioned yesterday this is a mighty nice piece of gear. A whole bunch of US / UK and European options are given, but none for Asia, South America or Oceanic players.

2. Digital pre-order via EA’s Origin Service

This graphic says it all if you try this route as an Oceanic player:

3. ‘Normal’ boxed edition

See point 1.

Some key points

Aside from the obvious disappointment, there’s some key issues that need to be emphasised:

a. This does not mean we won’t be able to play the game: you can obviously order the game from overseas. I’ve asked Bioware to confirm that such orders are valid i.e. that there’ll be no regional / IP block on regions taking part in playing. The Oceanic server issue seems a little optimistic at this stage to say the least – we’ll let you know of any response on the stance with ordering from overseas.

b. It appears there will be a staggered release: according to the pre-order FAQ:

c. No-one particularly cares but us: there is the reality of being part of a ‘smaller’ region. There’s just no urgency around this for anyone but the people affected. That said, South America and all of Asia are in the same boat.

d. If preordering from overseas: there’s a few glitches in the links to pre-order retailers. Amazon US’ site lists SWTOR as being for Mac and Windows. Amazon UK says it’s not available at all. Find a retailer that suits you and go from there. I’ve done a pre-order but with the full awareness of the (small) risk that I may not be able to play it if there’s some sort of regional block on playing. I still can’t see that happening though. This Tweet from Stephen Reid puts paid to the idea:

As does this follow-up to an Aussie SWTOR player’s question:

e. It’s just a game: I’ve already seen a lot of aggro over this issue expressed on the forums, Twitter and via emails we’ve received already today. It’s understandable but at the end of the day it’s a game. Don’t do anything rash and don’t make threats – that’s a surefire way to alienate people from the get-go.

As I mentioned above we’ve submitted some questions to Bioware on the issue. Given they’re in the middle of San Diego Comic Con I can’t see a prompt response but you never know.

Over to you: what’s your take on the situation?

Update: Stephen Reid has started a new thread on the SWTOR forums with this post:

To all of our fans outside of North America and Europe:

Today we’ve announced the pre-order details for the initial launch of Star Wars: The Old Republic, and as you may now know, we’ve taken the difficult but necessary decision to limit our initial launch supply for the game. BioWare and LucasArts are completely focused on building an exceptional game and an exceptional game service to go with it. We decided to constrain our launch capacity to ensure we deliver a great experience to every player.

Part of the reason this decision was made was because of the overwhelming demand for The Old Republic, and we’re humbled by that level of excitement and anticipation. We fully intend to deliver to you an amazing game when we expand our service post-launch, but right now we cannot commit to any timeframe for when that may happen. As soon as we have more information about additional launches in more territories, we’ll let you know.

We are committed to delivering Star Wars: The Old Republic to BioWare and Star Wars fans around the world, and to growing a truly global community.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: ,

Revan novel on the way

April 23, 2011 By

KotOR fans rejoice – as long as you like novels that is. The Friday update this week isn’t a game update or even a developer blog. This week we get info on the third novel set in the Old Republic time line. Titled  Revan, this novel is written by Drew Karpyshyn, Principal Writer at Bioware, and author of the Darth Bane series.  Though Revan is the main protagonist in this novel and will be based off of the Revan who was a Light-sided male Jedi as canon states, it will also reveal who the Sith Emperor is, where he is from, and how he’s held onto power for the length he has. Drew Karpyshyn also does a Q&A over his upcoming novel, I’ll just go through and quote a couple of the more interesting ones.

Q: How does it feel to finally reveal that the title of your latest Star Wars book is Revan?

A: I’d like to start by saying how gratifying it was to work on this book. Knights of the Old Republic™ (KOTOR) was my first creative foray into the Star Wars universe, so writing Revan felt a little bit like I was returning to my roots. I also know a lot of fans have been patiently waiting a long time to find out what happened to Revan after KOTOR — it’s probably the number one question I’m asked on my website. I’m glad the story is finally being told, and I’m ecstatic that I’m the one who gets to tell it.”

Now a lot of people are complaining about not getting game info, but what other game has given us an update every week? No one has. So I’m pretty excited about the book, being a huge Revan fan I’ve always been extremely curious of what happened to the KoTOR hero and this is our chance to learn all about it.

Q: In what ways will readers who have read Revan benefit when playing Star Wars: The Old Republic?

A: I think the novel will give them a much better understanding of the Sith Emperor and the Empire, for one thing. The Old Republic Sith Empire is very different from what people know from the movies, or even from the Great Hyperspace War comics that focus on characters like Naga Sadow and Ludo Kressh. The novel will also give them some very direct background and detailed information that ties in directly with key Flashpoints in the game. I can’t say too much, of course, but like any great prequel the books will give you the details of what came before to add an extra layer of depth to the experiences in the game.

If your a total lore hound and have to know all there is to know about the game then this novel might be worth buying, or if you’re just a KotOR fanboy, like myself.

Q: What other characters from Knights of the Old Republic and Knights of the Old Republic II might we expect to see?

A: You can’t tell a story about Revan without also exploring his companions; they were such a key element of the KOTOR experience that it wouldn’t feel right without bringing some of them back. Of course it would be impossible to include all of them in a novel in a way that would make a cohesive and fulfilling story, so I focused on those who felt most directly relevant to what happened to Revan after the KOTOR games. I don’t want to give too much away, but Canderous, T3-M4, the Exile and Bastila Shan all have significant roles to play in the novel (along with some significant characters who appear in Star Wars: The Old Republic).

This one really got me excited just because I’ve always wondered about the opening to KoTOR II why the Ebon Hawk was all banged up, barely still flying only being operated by the small, but determined astromech droid T3-M4.

I can’t wait for this novel. I haven’t read the other two, Deceived and Fatal Alliance, but I just can’t pass up Drew Karpyshyn’s Revan.

Picture courtesy of clarkspark

 

 

Filed Under: Merchandise, News, Opinion Tagged With: , ,

If it ain’t broke, maintain it!

April 16, 2011 By

Men at Work

Maintenance. We all know what it is, right? How many of us have not had to do some kind of minor repairs to something around our houses, our cars, our computers? It is something that a lot of people take for granted, but it shouldn’t be. Speaking from painful, and expensive, personal experience, the car works much better if you keep the oil topped off and changed every 3000 or so miles. I don’t know about anyone else, but I am not going to be flying on SouthWest airlines ANYTIME in the near future, if they even stay in business. Something about having holes suddenly appear in the planes in flight really bothers me. But that got me thinking about maintenance in Star Wars.

One thing that I always thought was well done about the original trilogy was that things did not always work as they were supposed to. The Millennium Falcon in particular was one huge mess of problems. Han Solo and Chewbacca were always fixing things. In the Expanded Universe, the descriptions of the Falcon in particular were always somewhat on the hilarious side. It was a constant battle to see who would win, the ship’s multiple brains, the crew or the various and sundry people who wanted the crew dead. Without Han and Chewie’s skill at keeping the ship going, it would have fallen to pieces.

We see Rebel techs maintaining the fighters in the hangar bays before the battles of Yavin and Endor. Ground crews work to fuel, arm and basically get ships ready for battle. Fighter planes today are incredibly complex pieces of equipment. Pilots and ground crew alike have to know what they are doing with each and every part or bad things can happen. And if those bad things happen in flight…

This is the point. Maintenance is needed. Many people who should know better take things for granted. If the car is working, why bother to check the fluids, right? The brake fluid, oil level and radiator fluid level have to be good or a light would be coming on, right? Not necessarily. When the engine in the car I was driving seized up, the first notice I had was when it went ‘clunk’. Not a pleasant feeling, let me tell you, especially on the highway.

So… what does this have to do with Star Wars: The Old Republic? Well, every Wednesday, the website goes down for routine maintenance. This shows that Bioware is not as clueless about some things as a certain 18 year old was. They are also likely going to be taking hints from other publishers of MMOs who shall remain nameless. ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ doesn’t work very well in high tech settings. Ignoring problems when computers are involved is a recipe for disaster. The words ‘cascade failure’ sends shivers up and down the spines of most IT professionals who know them. That is, a small problem happens, and is not corrected quickly. It causes other problems and then those problems cause more problems, and on, and on, and on. It is also called ‘The Snowball Effect’. Roll a snowball down a large hill and it grows as it rolls. Entire networks have been taken offline in the past because one lowly tech decided that some insignificant seeming problem was not worth his time. Bets on how long that tech kept his job?

Bioware is likely not going to be making these mistakes. They have seen, from other publisher’s mistakes, how small, seemingly insignificant issues can cause HUGE problems. Star Wars Galaxies comes to mind, but many MMORPGs have had the same thing happen. Who remembers having a patch come out, and all of the sudden, no one can play the game? A hotfix, or quick patch later and things are almost back to normal. We can hope that Bioware does not have to do rollbacks. There was nothing quite so annoying as logging in and finding that an entire week’s worth of playing was just gone. Well, except logging in and finding out that several YEARS worth of playing was gone with the NGE… but… no ranting today…

Without maintenance, any high tech equipment will fail, given time. Nothing made by man is perfect, especially when things are made by the lowest bidder.  A quote from the Bruce Willis movie Armageddon comes to mind. “Rockhound:  You know we’re sitting on four million pounds of fuel, one nuclear weapon and a thing that has 270,000 moving parts built by the lowest bidder.” Kind of puts things into perspective, doesn’t it? We need to maintain what we build, or it will fail, usually at the worst possible time. Bioware knows this. Whether they can keep up with the needs of what will probably be one of the most demanded titles of the twenty-first century is open to debate. We will have to see, but I for one have hope. And I will not get on another plane for quite a while…

Picture from http://burhanchambers.com/

Filed Under: Community, Opinion Tagged With: , , ,

Language localization in SWTOR: the joke’s on you

April 3, 2011 By

On April 1st,  you obviously know what that means:  April Fools day.

Last year we got the Sarlacc Enforcer update –  this year we got an update over the localization of Star Wars: The Old Republic into Shyriiwook, the native tongue of the Wookies. This faux update includes three videos of the Shyriiwook version of SWTOR and a new HUD skin that is pretty much a fur ball. Other than this small April Fool’s joke no real content was posted to the site by Bioware, and as usual half the community took the joke and the other half are outraged that the release date wasn’t revealed.

No matter which side of this argument you’re on, be sure to check out the funny videos and HUD skin here on SWTOR’s official site.

I personally like these funny updates, the game will drop when Bioware and Lucas Arts decide it’s ready, so enjoy this update and may the Force be with you.

 

Filed Under: Humour, News Tagged With: ,

Bioware on Oceanic servers / guild hosting: we’re listening

April 2, 2011 By

One of the most regular points of contention for those looking to play SWTOR in the Oceanic region, is the lack of support to-date for the region – something we’ve discussed on the Flash Point podcast a couple of times. The guild hosting option recently announced only allows for selection of European and US time zones. Over at the SWTOR forums there’s a great discussion thread on Oceanic guilds, and Bioware’s David Bass has responded there on the issue:

For those that find the type too small:

I know we don’t talk about it much on the forums, but we are aware of the worries and concerns of our Oceanic community, and we take any feedback from the community very seriously, no matter how large or small. Of course, a lot of the decisions made fall on the business side of development, which means that there’s not much we can talk about or respond to at this time. We will pass your feedback on to the appropriate people, to ensure that your voice is being heard, but beyond that we can’t promise anything.

It’s a fairly safe statement to make: we understand there’s a concern but we can’t promise anything. That said, at least there’s an acknowledgement of the issue. It’s hard to envision anything substantial happening pre-launch given the guild hosting is well underway, but here’s hoping.

Filed Under: Community, News Tagged With: , ,

Star Wars: The Old Republic release date – after July 2011

March 16, 2011 By

As reported by our friends at Darth Hater, a recent presentation by Electronic Arts CFO Eric Brown has nailed down a little more firmly the potential release date for SWTOR:

So we said it’s going to launch sometime in calendar, but not within Fiscal 11. So that basically pens down between you know, April 1st and December 31st of this calendar year. It’s also reasonable to infer that it’s not in our Q1 guidance. We gave Q1 Fiscal 11, Fiscal 12 non-GAAP revenue guidance, minus 39 minus 44 cents and I think it’s not unreasonable to infer that it’s not included in that 90 day period.

So that rules out a pre-July release date, which is no real surprise given how little of the beta process has been completed, something Brown alludes to further into the presentation:

You need months of different flavors of beta testing to making the product generally available. We’re really focused on providing a great user experience, because not only do we want to retain, kind of the core tier 1 users. We want word of mouth reference ability to bring in tiers 2, 3 and 4.

Given we’re only at closed beta so far, July is probably a pretty optimistic launch month as well. There’s the cohort of observers saying 2012 will be the year for SWTOR. I’m not that pessimistic but it seems a pre-Xmas launch may be about the best to hope for. I am of course very happy to be proven wrong.

Filed Under: News Tagged With:

Game Tester feedback and waiting for PAX

February 27, 2011 By

This week’s update from Bioware is a Developer Blog from Blaine Christine, the Live Producer for Star Wars: The Old Republic. As he puts it: “I work with the development team to ensure that anything released to our fans (read – you!) meets the quality standards that are so important to any BioWare product. That means any time a new build of the game makes it into our Game Testing Program, I need to ensure that any content or features that we specifically want to have tested meet the designers’ needs and don’t contain any major bugs.” He also insures that the design team is getting the proper feedback from Game Testing (real players) to balance and build up the game itself.

Christine also confirms that Game Testing has begun. Blaine’s comment on testing so far is “We have received valuable and actionable feedback from the players that have participated thus far. Much of this feedback has already been incorporated into the game and we’re going to continue testing to validate the changes that have been made.” Rather than give actual bugs and fixes as examples Christine gave more info on what it’s like to play Star Wars: The Old Republic.

BioWare asked its Game Testers to give them some of their thoughts on the game – all Testers names have been changed to meet their NDA requirements) The first opinion I’ll post is from Game Tester JA:

“I’ve been waiting years and years and years for an MMORPG experience like this. The combat is incredible and never gets old. The grind is gone. I am so happy the grind is gone (so, so very happy). The stories are fantastic, well written, well acted, well animated, incredibly immersive, and the inclusion of choice takes it into territory that other MMOs have only dreamed of. Lastly, this game makes you feel like a bad***. The entire time. And I love that.”

Just one more because they’re almost all the same thing in different words – this one is from tester IV:

“This is the Jedi game to end all Jedi games. If you’re a gamer and you don’t throw your hands up in triumph when you get your first lightsaber, you’re not really alive. This game is, bar none, the best interactive Star Wars experience ever.”

Christine is also involved with SWTOR’s launch team, and insuring that BioWare’s customer service for the game will be far above standards. He also confirms that the closer to release they get the more Game Testers they will be needing, so keep your eyes on your emails.

Below the update post from Bioware as always is a long lists of posters from the SWTOR community. Over the last month, 80% of the posts are about how bad the updates have been. I would like to remind everyone that PAX is coming up very soon, so don’t be disappointed if the next couple Fan Friday updates are similar to what they’ve been because I’m sure that most of the stuff you want to know is gonna be released at PAX. Hopefully we get a release date and the Bounty Hunter update the community has been begging for.

Filed Under: News, Opinion Tagged With: ,
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