Entering Hype – erspace

First a confession. Nope, not that sort of confession… Despite all the talk of SW:TOR videos and the like being released, I haven’t actually seen one yet. Shame on me. Mostly because I read a lot of game news and blogs at lunchtime at work, and video sites like YouTube are blocked there. By the time I get home, either busy gaming, relaxing, or chores (boo!), and the video gets forgotten.

But having said that, I am reading a lot of reactions about the recent releases of Bioware’s forthcoming MMORPG, Star Wars: The Old Republic. Some of which sound like the writers are on the verge of setting up a little shrine in their bedroom, complete with candles, incense, and little screen captures; perhaps a Boba Fett figurine or two.

It’s hard not to feel excited about this game, and I think that might be a little damaging at this early stage of development. Tobold makes a good point that this is exactly the road that Funcom and Mythic took with Age of Conan and Warhammer Online.

Those two games were hyped out the wazoo for a couple of years before the release. But ultimately, they failed to deliver on that hype. Warhammer came the closest, delivering a decent solid game, but falling short in a few areas — having said that, they’ve come a long way toward addressing those issues and Warhammer is looking good for the Land of the Dead — but Age of Conan failed to deliver everywhere except for Tortage.

The ironic thing is that hype can ruin an otherwise good thing. I’ve seen a few movies at the cinema that were hyped prior to release that I thought were terrible only to rewatch a few years later and realise that they were actually pretty good. If I’d gone in with lower expectations I probably would have enjoyed them a lot more.

So is Bioware setting SW:TOR up for a release day fall?

I do hope not. I believe they’ll deliver a pretty solid game. They’ve got the backing and resources of EA, and a team of developers skilled in making some pretty excellent single player RPGs through which they’ve shown they’re not afraid of trying new things. SW:TOR should be a great game.

But if Bioware do a poor job of managing expectations, and over-hype the game, they’re just setting themselves up for a lot of disappointed customers at release.

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Will KotORO Be The Game SWG Wasn’t?

I’m getting a little ahead of myself here considering it’s still probably two or three more years before Bioware release the now more than rumored and slightly less than confirmed, Knights of the Old Republic Online. But still I’m finding a bit of excitement building. I really am a big kid.

In fact, it’s probably the same level of excitement I felt all those years ago well before the release of Star Wars Galaxies when I read on the official forums and FAQ that players could be Jedi and do cool things like build their own lightsabres. That excitement slowly ebbed away as I continued to read the announcements of features like permadeath for Jedi, Blue Glowies, and only one character per server rules. The official forums erupted into two camps, those that loved these features and those that hated them.

The biggest problem with Star Wars Galaxies, as I saw it, was the selection of the era that the game was set in. Sure, the galactic civil war was raging, but there were only two Jedi (Luke and Yoda) and two Sith (Darth Vader and the Emperor.) It’s pretty hard to satisfy your players if they cannot play the iconic ‘class’ of the movies, and it’s pretty hard to keep the lore lovers happy if you do allow players to Jedi.

Even before the game released, I was starting to develop the opinion that SWG should have been set in the New Republic timeline. The Sith were crushed, but force wielding enemies were still around. Luke has begun rebuilding the Jedi Order. The galaxy is in chaos. There are plenty of novels for guidance, and a number of single player games for reference. It was the perfect setting for a MMORPG based in the Star Wars Universe. The developers could have lots of latitude.

Of course the other perfect setting is The Old Republic, and that’s where the KotOR games are set.

Like the New Republic timeline, The Old Republic has plenty of scope to experiment with new ideas and scenarios. In some ways it offers more to a developer than even the New Republic, since the New Republic has a huge amount of canon lore that already exists. Aside from The Knights of the Old Republic timeline, created by Bioware anyway, there are relatively few novels and stories set in this era.

Bioware also have the big advantage of having seen the mistakes made by SOE with Star Wars Galaxies from the beginning, especially in how the Star Wars fans reacted to some of the decisions. Hopefully, they can learn from them.

Still, without knowing what Bioware has planned for KotOR Online, it’s hard to say that KotORO will be the Star Wars MMORPG that Star Wars Galaxies wasn’t. But if Bioware’s game making record, and their experience in making games in the Star Wars universe, count for any thing KotORO should be a much better game than SWG turned out to be.

Like I said earlier. It’s an exciting possibility.

Now, once we have KotORO, someone just has to make a Spaceballs MMORPG and I’ll be in heaven.

May the Schwartz be with you.

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KOTOR Online – The Cats Out Of The Bag

It’s not really how I expected to see a confirmation about the long rumored Bioware MMOG, Knights of the Old Republic Online… or is that Knights of the Online Republic… whatever it will end up being called.

In a recent interview with Portfolio.com, EA’s CEO, John Riccitiello was talking about how EA owned tow of the most compelling MMO IPs in the industry. The first, he said, was based on the Warhammer property. We all know about that one. (Or we should by now!)

The second property Riccitiello said was the one people were dying to know about, and it was in partnership between Lucas and Bioware. When he was asked if he meant Knights of the Old Republic Online, Riccitiello said yes.

Wow. That’s some announcement.

This is something that thousands of Star Wars, KotOR, and MMOG fans have been salivating to find out about for a year or two now, and it gets confirmed in an investment blog/magazine.

I imagine the boys at Bioware are a little pissed at the moment. I can only suspect that they’ve been working hard on getting the game to a state where they can make an announcement, and I reckon they would want that announcement to be made with all the fanfare they can muster.

Now that the cat is out of the bag, there’s probably a flurry of activity out at Bioware central to put the finishing touches on the promotional material.

We should expect to see some of that soon.

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Rumour Mongering – KOTOR Online

There are some more rumours of the KOTOR MMOG in development by Bioware. The article on Primotech Portal is apparently based on information from a “source close to Bioware.”

The rumour is that the game is being developed at the Bioware Austin studio with some of the developers who have worked on some of the companys past big games including Baldurs Gate, Neverwinter Nights, and of course the first KOTOR game. (The second KOTOR was developed by Obsidian).

Rumour even has a release scheduled for sometime in 2009. Of course, we all know that really means first quarter 2010. So there is still some time to go before this hits the shelves, providing the rumours are true. It’s probably a bit early to order your lightsabres.

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Is Bioware Developing a KOTOR MMO?

A few months ago, I started to hear some rumours that Bioware was working on an MMO. Those rumours may be true after all. Computer and Video Games is reporting that Bioware has (or is) forming a team to develop a MMORPG based on the Knights of the Old Republic property. CVG is basing this report off an article in EGM, a print magazine. In essence, this report is still rumour… but good rumour.

A KOTOR MMO would be highly regarded if Bioware gets the ingredients right. Just like World of Warcraft and Lord of the Rings Online, there is a fairly huge fan base of the original Knights of the Old Republic games. Many of these fans would go out and subscribe this game.

Even if these rumours are true, we still have a few years to wait for this one. We probably shouldn’t expect to see it before 2010.

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