http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=293965Demo gameplay handson impressions: full compilation of all conventions and events | 04.07.2011 , 03:40 PM
Report Post
I thought it would be handy to gather up all the impressions and hands on playreports from the demo sessions, to get an impression over time of the state of the game and what all kinds of different players thought of the game.
Since full reports in full text would be a massively huge pile, I kept it limited to the core quotes in those reports, good as well as bad or neutral. If people think I forgot some important quotes, just let me know and I'll add them.
These are my sources used:
Handson impression from SWTOR players: Summer/Fall 2010
Gameplay impressions from PAX East 2011 visitors
PAX East 2011 demo reports from press and game critics
UK Community Event 2011 demo gameplay reports
Combat and overall gameplay
Summer/Fall 2010
* What makes me happy, however, is the automatic use of medipacks. (See: Health potions.) Should your character die from an incoming attack, a medipack will be automatically consumed to save you, should it not be on cooldown. This saves you from having to rapidly dive for your medipack key (Brennan, Massively)
* With everything complete, I had a new pop-up on my screen: call my quest-giver via holo-com. I clicked that button and my character pulled out a small holo-device -- the classic Star Wars telephone. A little hologram of my quest-giver appeared, and it triggered a cinematic dialogue sequence right then and there, advancing me to the next stage of the quest. I thought this feature was very cool, and it gave a seamless transition into the next quest phase. It's very much in the vein of Star Wars to use a device like this instead of hoofing it back to the quest-giver, and I really appreciated it (Brennan, Massively)
* After dying as the Trooper and respawning I took notice to a health pack which returned probably about half of my health after one use, obviously including a lengthy cool down time (Samm, Torocast)
* After the first few quests, I wanted to keep playing. Star Wars The Old Republic is addictive from the start. I probably spent a good 30 minutes or so stomping around the beginning area of the game for the Trooper just killing mobs over and over again, and I had no problem with it, I enjoyed it (Samm, Torocast)
* Not only was combat very fast and seamless, the UI was very snappy and responsive (which for me at least is a make or break deal). You can sit down and feel comfortable right off the bat if your are an experienced WSAD player (Harvest151)
* Gameplay wise the first thing that really surprised me was that combat felt very smooth and right/nice. You don't really notice it until you get to play but it's smooth, you're always busy fighting and not just standing still waiting on or casting skills, even with the 3 abilities I had. I think a large part of this is due to the fact several abilities can be fired while moving. Combat felt very dynamic and fluid (Raul)
* Bind Points - Each town seemed to have a place you could bind at. This seemed very similar to DAoC's bindstone system (Raul)
* Combat felt.. more action packed? I mean I had only 3 actual skills at this level but I was still constantly doing something, being able to move and shoot had a big impact on that. Due to the nature of the AOE attacks (like wrist rocket) and fighting multiple enemies you would also manage your targets while moving. Like if one guy had 10% health left and a guy next to him 60% you'd switch target to the 60% guy before firing your wrist rocket because it does (or seemed) to do more damage to the primary target. I can imagine that when acquiring CC skills you will be doing a lot more target managing like this. Fighting multiple opponents was a good move on their side. It makes a lot of difference. Because you are almost always fighting multiple opponents and because you have several AOE attacks the fights become a bit more interactive. Flamethrower for instance is a cone attack channel. So you want to position yourself in a direction so that you hit as many opponents as possible. So even at a low level you are managing several things in each fight rather than pummel one enemy for several seconds (Raul)
* Although endowed with initially weak powers, your character will face adversaries far more interesting than the usual snakes and rats found in other MMOs (Jeuxvideo)
* All of it feels very natural from the very beginning of play. BioWare has chosen to immediately equip the player with potent powers that are visually satisfying (Jeuxvideo)
PAX East 2011
* In fact, the animations for all the spells and effects were fantastic. When I watched videos of the game prior to playing it, I was severely underwhelmed. But playing the title and experiencing the combat makes a world of difference. It’s still fairly traditional stuff, but it’s fun (William Murphy, mmorpg.com)
* The game setting looked great and the instance ran very smoothly. One of the best things Star Wars: The Old Republic has done is to improve on the pace of the game from the last time we had seen it (Garrett Fuller, mmorpg.com)
* Again I want to point out the speed of the game which has improved drastically since the last build we saw. The light saber fighting flowed much faster and felt more like an action RPG (Garrett Fuller, mmorpg.com)
* Overall the team I was with worked very well and the classes definitely had to support each other to get to the base. No one was bored by any means (Garrett Fuller, mmorpg.com)
* One of the nice parts about combat is that it's far more forgiving than the usual holy trinity model -- taunts are present, but the loss of aggro doesn't equal party death. Things are a bit more bouncy and frantic, and it looks like most classes have tools to get out of trouble when necessary. There was a slightly loose feel to combat here, with a number of things happening without becoming overwhelming. Having an ironclad hold on enemy attention wasn't nearly as important as keeping awareness of the battlefield, and it's nice to see that the small party size is being used to push players toward a greater variety of roles (Eliot Lefebvre, Massively)
* Gameplay ranged (appropriately) from simple to complex and never too much in one direction. [Taral V] was an enjoyable challenge though, and it was one that encouraged us to try out different tactics and strategies each time, to varying degrees of success (Grant, desktopreview)
* While the group cut a swath through the initial mobs, with a nicely coordinated effort between the Scoundrel, Sage, Jedi Guardian (which was a scrapper) and Republic Trooper (which was a tank), it still felt satisfying and logical. When the group faced off against a boss and his pet, the group ran into trouble. The boss’ pet was felled once, but the group was still wiped each time. It only made the group more diligent, rather than frustrated. There was a freshness and style to the combat that hasn’t been felt in a long time, partly because the game’s futuristic setting and the familiar archetypes, and partly because the game feels really well-designed (Falcon, tmrzoo)
* Once in the thick of things, the action didn't stop. Powers and abilities are varied and go from visceral thrusts of the light saber to massive bursts of force knocking back entire groups of enemies. A leap in and stun would allow my Commando and Consular to beat up on the enemies easily while the Smuggler kept me at full health. It's a team-work game, and from conversation afterwords it is very easy to have crazy amounts of fun in any role. Action was fast and responsive, powers are cool visuals to watch, and darn it, it never got old leaping 30 feet and slashing down at an enemy (Siegel, Newsarama)
* It was fun, it was tough, it took team work and individual play; it was everything you want out of an RPG, and you were playing side-by-side with actual people (Siegel, Newsarama)
* One thing that bugged me as a healer was that I could not target an ally and an enemy at the same time, as is possible in many other recent MMOs (Warhammer Online and Vanguard, to name two off the top of my head). So, in order to switch from firing my gun to healing my ally, I had to manually switch between my targets. Additionally, I found that rolling into cover as a healer often severely limited my healing potential – if one of my allies ran outside of my range or field of vision I had to jump out of cover and run to catch up to them so I could heal them (Newman, PikiGeek)
* Other than these gripes, the game played extraordinarily well. There were a lot of really interesting abilities I barely had the opportunity to explore, and the group dynamic was great, even with half my group being complete strangers (Newman, PikiGeek)
* [the fighting] feels good. It’s not groundbreaking MMO combat, but it sure plays well. It’s fast paced. It actually plays a lot like Knights of the Old Republic. It may not change a whole lot, but it changed enough to make it noticeable and have it be enjoyable to play (Bedivere, Fronttowardsgamer)
* All classes had crowd control capabilities as well as buttons to recover quickly in between combat sessions, several ways to damage enemies, and more (Buckland, AtomicGamer)
* I mentioned earlier I felt right at home here, which is because the combat is very WoW-like. You know, that standard MMO battling that we’ve all come to know and love throughout the Everquest and World of Warcraft years of domination. Not that it wasn’t fun and exciting, mind you, but it was standard. I honestly don’t think this is where The Old Republic will shine or stand out in any way, other than the fact that you’re swinging around lightsabers and such. I have to admit, that’s pretty cool! (Chad, Dualshockers)
* It’s easy to see that BioWare has learned a lot from other developers when it comes to designing interesting dungeon content. The mobs never looked like they were just standing or patrolling without purpose. The Imperial troops interacted with the encroaching wildlife so that sometimes we’d wander to a fight already in progress between the two. Was it on rails? Yes. Did I give a damn? Not at all. I felt like was taking part in a Jedi strike-force and I loved every second of it (William Murphy, mmorpg.com)
* The lack of downtime was awesome, if anyone needed to heal between fights we just used our self-heals and were fighting again almost immediately. (AtlasFontaine)
* the gameplay is great. Getting into cover [as Imperial Agent] was a little odd, mostly because it was a new experience, but once I got the hang of it, it wasn't bad. (dmanmax)
* With that said gameplay felt good. Real good. Don't fear not having an auto attack the specials chain together very nicely. It's a little different, not a lot different. (Hardradi)
* combat was fluid, responsive and fast paced. There was no auto attack and that seemed to make the combat more immersive for me. All my attack sounds seem to fit their attack. I thought I noticed the music score changing to become more ominous when we got close to the boss near the end of the fight (Hardradi)
* The gameplay was incredibly fluid thru this part. As a side note, I was amazed at how much crowd control that we had at our disposal. (Hengist)
* Combat feels pretty satisfying, the abilities have great animations, and so do the enemies when they are taking damage.(ErnieVega)
* Combat was interesting and challenging. I was totally involved while playing but watching others play I was in awe. Watching play I said many times "Did you see that?! What was it? Who did it? Sweet!" (TheDuck)
* The pace of combat is fast, and you have a lot of things going on all at once. I was more concentrated on my bar, trying to remember what abilities did what, then the actual fights. You get swamped with mobs in many of the encounters and so trying to pick them up, and maintain aggro is a little hard. (Engrey)
UK Community Event 2011
* Combat is very similar to WOW both melee and ranged, i did find vendors, trainers and a taxi system on my short travels (Darth-reaver)
* The actual core mechanics of the game are not much different from any mmo, limited amount of starting moves, spam them to kill enemies. pick up loot, complete quests, get rewards and xp. If you are looking for the new wheel mechanics wise you might want to look elsewhere. That being said the combat system is as fun as any mmo can be at low level. The combat animations are varied and feel slightly more dynamic than other games. You start off with some buffs and a kind of generic out of combat self heal, which is useful. Several green items dropped for me in my limited play time and I could buy and sell with local vendors. Taking on multiple enemies at once was nice, you don't have to worry about not having cc and pulling adds (Nighthaunterz)
* The game flowed really well, I wasn't focusing on levelling at all. I was more engaged with following the story and completing the tasks my Jedi masters set out for me. The hour and a half flew by (Nighthaunterz)
* Combat dynamics were quite similar to wow in some ways, but its early level content so I'm sure with progress through the game the differences will become apparent. However, you do feel the sense of an 'epic fight' right from the get go as the developers have spoken about, whereby you're fighting 3-5 mobs at a time. A feature you certainly don't experience in wow in the origin phases of the game (rapidity)
* Gameplay wise, everything felt really smooth, I was pleased by the character movement, jumping was fine (if a little clunky) rolling to cover looked nice (even if it felt a bit unwieldy sometimes) and combat felt pretty good, this is important, I always felt that once NGE came in combat in SWG was really 'light' feeling, here there's meaty effects, you really feel like you're shooting something and making it die/explode, it just felt right (Saigo)
* The Good: The polish and finish to the game. No matter if you love it or hate the game there is a high level of polish in the game, not always noticable as your playing but when I sat back and looked at the 20 or so screens in view the quality level was breath taking (Costello)
* The Good: The fun factor. Whether its flying through the air as a sith or taking head shots as an agent the game grabs your attention. Of course I can only speak for an hour and a half but for that time there is story and action that has to keep any Kotor fan happy with a number of different abilities and attacks available to the different classes that keep things fresh as you level up (Costello)
* The Bad: The gameplay - so we aren't talking about the story, the cinematics the VO or any of those lovely things - isn't going to make you take a second look at all those MMO's you used to play and wonder how they got it so wrong. From my experience ToR has taken what others have done and tweaked it so instead of a charge its a leap (looks much better) or instead of disappearing to avoid danger your rolling behind cover. And I think this will work very well for the legions of MMO fans out there that will pick it up very quickly. But for single player gamers that are used to the latest FPS or action game its going to have difficulty appealing (Costello)
* the combat was smooth and satisfying. I had my doubts before playing as to whether or not bioware could pull off saber combat that is true to the star wars universe, but they proved unfounded. it works really well (wintersweater)
* Overall the combat was incredibly responsive, I really could not tell I was playing with 200ms, the only moments of lag were when the 1k ms spikes came, honestly I can tell in WoW when I have 200ms, and this game felt way, way more responsive at 200ms then WoW ever did. My attacks linked really well and I had a blast, the combat was reasonably difficult aswell... I also want to say that I would be happy with rerolling alts all the time for this game, but I did want to state my raid experience [extensive WoW raider in a Top 10 in the World guild] earlier so hopefully you can feel "something" when I say that the combat was really fun and responsive, even at an early level (Kandycane)
* I also noticed I was able to queue for a warzone at level 1 (Kandycane)
* It wasn't complex combat by any means, but it was more interesting than half the classes of WoW at max level, the cover mechanic really adds a big dynamic to the fight and I can only imagine what it will be like when you throw companions and advanced classes into the mix (Kandycane)
* For the first 10 minutes, concious that I 'only' had an hour, I was tempted to skip the dialog so that I could get to see some action, but I soon relaxed a bit and thought I might as well enjoy myself - the dialog is superb and engaging. The mix of story, combat, exploration and introduction to the game's mechanics is pitched just perfectly - I love it! (MEHColeman)
* One of the buttons came up with a message "Your target does not have a target". So I guess there is a way of selecting your target's target - very handy (MEHColeman)
* I came accross 3 types of mobs while I played. "Normal", "Strong" & "ELITE". Normal mobs go down very quickly, 3-4 shots each mobs. Strong mobs are a little tougher. you can manage 2 of these bad boys but you will need to use cover and maybe a medpack for any more than that... You really need to highlight each mob before you fight anyone. you need to check if they are normal, strong or elites as each fight is unique. you cant just go running in guns firing or your dead. you have to treat each fight as a unique encounter. At level 3, having to do this is awesome and shows you need brains to play (PugNoobie)
* The combat was fun, and I mean FUN. The attacks and blocks seemed flawlessly choreographed, for instance the mob would recoil when hit and the combat seemed alot more significant (Vixone)
* While questing I came across another Sith Warrior (obviously also playing at the event), we dueled a few times and (unlike WoW) the duel gets ended when either of the players enters combat with a mob (Vixone)
* There were some fairly challenging encounters on Korriban, more challenging than I'd typically expect during the starting levels of an MMO. I had a few "oh crap, oh crap" moments in fights where my HP was dangerously close to zero. This was a nice surprise, given that most MMO's from WoW onwards have made things overly easy for the solo player in my opinion (Helderash)
Classes
Summer/Fall 2010
* The cover system -- the smuggler's signature ability -- played very much like going in and out of stealth. Cover reduces the damage your smuggler takes while simultaneously offering him or her more options via new skills which will only appear while in cover. Just as you may have predicted, your skill bar will slide up while the smuggler is in cover, revealing a whole new "cover" hotbar. Using skills consumes energy from the smuggler's bar, but energy is rebuilt over time. Much like those of the rogue, the cooldowns I dealt with were short, making their attacks rely on utilizing energy efficiently. During the demo, I got to play with three different attacks -- a normal rapid-fire blaster burst, a set of slow but powerful blaster bursts, and a flashbang to stun targets (Brennan, Massively)
* Combat was fun and exciting as I pushed shift to find cover spots. While I loved the "cinematic feel" of the combat moments, there was one little problem that brought me out of the experience -- my enemies fired directly at me in cover, and their rounds would pierce walls. I'd still get shot and I'd still flinch from the damage (even though I was behind a wall) and that broke the immersion (Brennan, Massively)
* It appears all classes will have a revive ability, which lets you revive a fallen party member while out of combat (Brandon, Torocast)
* The Trooper’s play style is lots of little attacks with low damage dealt but can take a beating like you would not believe. I tested BioWare’s statement of “our players should feel heroic and be able to take on multiple targets at once, not just one” and boy did the Trooper take the hits. My Trooper stood up to six (Smuggler-esque) mobs as well as a combat droid with a ton of hit points, which took quite the beating from my Trooper (Samm, Torocast)
* The second attack [from the Trooper] was an explosive AOE grenade fired from his gun which required four ammo points. This leads me to the Troopers’ third ability, Fast Reload. Fast Reload quickly loads six ammo points into the chamber of the Trooper’s gun. Ammo points are required for the Trooper to use certain abilities like Fire Grenade. Fire Grenade did a decent amount of damage to the main target, where everyone around him seemed to take about half give or take a few points. And finally the most enjoyable attack of the trooper, Stock Strike, slamming a mob in the face with the butt of your rifle had some awesome enjoyment to it (Samm, Torocast)
* The Smuggler boasted very fast low damage abilities, as well as a stun here or there. Once in cover mode, which is where I assume the Smuggler belongs, his abilities become significantly stronger and you are able to take out mobs with ease. I would like to apologize to BioWare for any doubts that I had ever had with the Smuggler, thinking the cover system was just some cheap stunt to add something innovative to the game. The cover system made the Smuggler that much more enjoyable to play. It added a completely different aspect to the game, however reminded me distinctly as if I were going to a stealth mode on my Rogue in World of Warcraft. Now before I get SWTOR rage spammed, let me explain a second what I mean. Going into the cover mode brings up a different ability bar (which all of us already know, I am aware) however what you do not know is the attacks while in cover mode seem to do a higher rate of damage (Samm, Torocast)
* The class I enjoyed the most hands down was the inquisitor, but im a sucker for the story. The powers were lacking at the lower levels and with no Area attacks, pulls were a bit more cautious than say, the BH where I had multiple forms of multi-enemy attacks (Harvest151)
* The Bounty Hunter on the other hands was a flurry of pain. Blasters firing, rockets, and flamethrowers going off. You hardly noticed the cooldowns at all. The downside to the BH is heat buildup. Your weapons generate "heat" which in sustained combat must be vented through your armor. It was a unique mechainc and added a layer of priority and strategy (Harvest151)
* The trooper (very brief experience) used what I can only compare to a WoW rage mechanic, just think ammo. The abilities had quick cooldowns, but they are ammo based. You have several quick reload type abilities and a channeled full reload which pretty much opens up even your heaviest attacks, but at increasing ammo cost. You could also self buff (similar to the agent's "Laze Target") powering up your weapon for increased damage at increased ammo expenditure cost. (That might not be right, but while charged up my weapon did seem to use ammo faster). Overall each class felt very unique and different (Harvest151)
* Out of my three combat abilities (blaster pistol burst, wrist rocket, flamethrower for Bounty Hunter) two could be used while moving. So you'd generally run towards a group, shoot your wrist rocket knocking them back and off their feet, while still running towards them you'd be spraying them with blaster fire, then when you're close cover them in fire with your flamethrower. At the same time the AI runs for cover, like they might run back into the building and hide in there, hide behind cover, or just get some more range on you. You're also always fighting multiple enemies at once which does seem to make a lot of difference in gameplay, you're targeting the middle ones for AOE, feel outnumbered, etc. In short, Combat felt very dynamic and fluid (Raul)
* The various fighting powers seemed to compliment each other well. The Smuggler, in cover behind environmental objects, lined up his adversaries from range, accompanied by the Consular, while the Jedi Knight was in charge of finishing the job in melee. Unlike some competitors, BioWare has designed the instances to not spread out over too much time. This first special zone was completed in an hour and a half, and with the key some nice rewards to equip our avatars (Jeuxvideo)
PAX East 2011
* [INDENT]- The Jedi Guardian was actually a lot more fun than I anticipated. (William Murphy, mmorpg.com)
* I remembered from my playthough on Smuggler starting missions that cover was very important to a Smuggler's defense. However, I noticed that cover wasn't always so easy to find, and there were a couple of instances where I thought a fallen branch or rock would have been cover, but it wasn't (Larry Everett, Massively)
* Playing a Vanguard felt fun right off, with my weapon capable of tossing grenades, electrical discharges, and suppressing fire at the click of a button. If enemies got close, I could also use my personal shields as a tool, overloading them for stuns, knockbacks, and simple damage (Eliot Lefebvre)
* [The Jedi Consular Sage] had a cool ability that let me pick up a big pile of rocks and launch it at helpless enemies. I was also equipped with quite a few crowd-control abilities that would knock enemies down, silence them, and otherwise make them useless to the fight. I could also help out with healing if needed. She seemed to do a great amount of damage and was very versatile. It's a fast-paced role with a lot of different abilities, and managing them was the key to my success (Leah Jackson, G4TV)
* The Jedi Knight was instantly accessible and instantly fun to play (Siegel, Newsarama)
* As a Guardian-specialized Jedi Knight, I was primarily a damage dealer, but could also function as an off-tank with taunting and threat-building abilities.The class was very, very fun to play, particularly the leaping slash attack the Jedi Knight could execute from long distances. The taunts and attacks that threw all nearby enemies away from where my character stood gave him a nice amount of utility (Johnston, Arstechnica)
* I played as the Jedi Knight/Guardian, so I was throwing my lightsaber, jumping into combat from 20+ feet away, and even using Force Pull to yank some enemies away when they'd jump on our Sage or Scoundrel. It's important to have an off-tank, too, because several fights had more than one big, tough dude to fight (Buckland, AtomicGamer)
* I chose to play the Jedi Consular, which is kind of like a jack-of-all-trades hybrid class that does damage, has some healing abilities and some party buff actions that can be performed. She also fought with a lightsaber and could use the force to cause some havok. In other games I would possibly call this conglomeration of abilities something along the lines of a battle mage (Chad, dualshockers)
* The Jedi Consular is like if a Mage, a Warlock, and Machamp from Pokemon had a baby. You apply DoTs, throw rocks, and force push people around. The JC has a tone of utility, from minor healing to applying shields to party members. I have not had that much fun playing a class in an MMO in a long time, if I ever rolled for the Republic I would be playing a JC (Engrey)
* The Jedi Consular has a ton of CC and AoE abilities to keep enemies in check, you can sweep an enemy in a vortex, stun people, force push, and I am sure I am missing a few. (Engrey)
* I have to say I loved this [Jedi Sage Consular]. I have always loved ranged DPS and this did not disappoint. With a combination of DPS, CC, Buffs and the odd heal here and there (and I hate healing) this was a class you could get your teeth into if you love the more technical characters. You are always doing something... none stop. (TheDarkKnight)
* Overall, the class [smuggler] played well and I always felt in control of my party's health. The class is HOT centric, from what I gathered.(Cellotlix)
* One thing I noticed is that it seemed like every class had more than one role in the group. I was a healer, but I was also in charge of some CC and some off damage. The Sage Consular was mostly damage, but also CC and off healing in a pinch (Cellotlix)
UK Community Event 2011
* At level 4 [as Sith Inquisitor] i had 4 attack abilities and 1 buff, i only learned from the trainer twice and peeked at what i could expect, i can truly say i was always excited to level in that respect. I had learned force lightning at level 3 and overload which was a AOE knockback at 4. Combat did feel a little button smashy at first until i did get overload which sort of put me into a bit of a rotation (Dariel)
* The system where you build up some kind of combo points worked nicely for the Jedi Knight, the finishing attack was very satisfying. There are med packs, I used them a couple of times (Nighthaunterz)
* Sith Warrior basic fight mechanics are built on building rage and unleashing it in strong saber attacks that take big chunks of ife from normal mobs. Basically the stuff that has been seen at PAX East, but the storyline is just awesome - you get to be pretty damn mean as a Sith - for example one quest involved me interrogating prisoners to illicit certain information. I pretty much chose the most dark side options out of the lot and ended up killing 2 of the 3 in spectacular force chocke / sword impaling fashion. Exactly what you'd expect from an evil Sith Lord in waiting. I can't tell you how satisfying it is to kill things in this game as well - enemies really react to strong blows from your weapon and the combat sounds are epic in the way that Indiana Jones punching sounds were epic in those movies - not quite real but almost hyper-realistic (JamieM)
* As a Sith Warrior i started with 2 basic attacks - a light slash attack that builds rage quickly and effectively but is low damage and a second heavier attack that consumes the rage and usually knocks out a lvl 1 mob in 1 hit. You start with an ability that also heals you by channelling hatred - this is basically a mobile unlimited health regen tool that stops you having to spend down time eating/drinking a la WoW. Another improvement that will make a big difference levelling. With key binfding you get through mobs pretty fast and can take on 4-5 at a time no probs (JamieM)
* The Bounty Hunter is as fun as I remember. Much like the Trooper its a run and gun. Straight line... either the mobs move or they die. I only had two attack abilities to start with. Blaster pistol and wrist rocket, which is very effective with small groups (TheDarkKnight)
* The healing skill caused a nice graphical holo screen to appear in front of the agent that the character interacted with while they regained health and energy. A few skills that I started seemed to have no cool down which made the battles rather easy on occasion. A sniper skill was available but only when behind cover, it took time to charge up and during this period you could get interrupted but it caused good damage if successful (DarthViscus)
* Played as the trooper. Got to level 4 in the time (with also a quick go on an all the other republic classes), and i can say i was thoroughly impressed. I enjoyed how the trooper is able to kite around enemies to avoid their melee attacks, and just generally really liked the attacks on offer early on for the class. Full auto and butt strike are especially enjoyable to use, though i did find there to be a glitch with butt strike with a long delay between the attack and the mob getting hit (rapidity)
* Play style the Jedi [Knight] feels totally different to Smuggler, it felt more akin to my [WoW] Warrior, I prefer a straight up smash mouth rush in hack hack fight and the playstyle suited me a lot more, once you get a couple of levels you get your force jump and a defensive skill which are both satisfying to use, I wanted to force jump and 'swipe' everything as it just felt so RIGHT, I didn't have any force powers so to speak but as a starting class I really enjoyed the opening area and while the smuggler felt a little clunky the Jedi had nothing of that to it, everything felt smooth (Saigo)
* The Good: The individuality of the classes. Even at low levels the 2 classes I had played felt completly different and offered unique challenges and appeared to have their own personalities and ways of serving the empire. I can't go as far as to say it offers completely different gaming experiences as kill 10 thugs or 6 slugs is still killing something. But it will definetly open up the alt options or perhaps more importantly mean that there is a class for everyone (Costello)
* One of the first quests is to kill flesh raiders as a Jedi [Knight] you start with two main attacking abilities one does low damage and generates focus (+2) the second ability does around x3 the amount of damage but consumes 3 focus. Also noticed that my focus deteriorated slowly overtime when not engaged in combat and maximum focus was 12. Generally was taking on 3-4 standard mobs right from the get go usually taking around one of the bigger hits to kill. Was missing auto attack on the first few kills particularly when the mob was really low on health and just needed a basic attack to finish off but it soon became a non-issue. The out of combat heal restored health fairly rapidly and so downtime was very limited. I picked up two more abilities once I reached the Jedi template around level 3 the first was a force leap which was extremely satisfying and the second granted a short defensive boost though had a relatively long cooldown (Aestel)
* Playing with the cover system for smuggler was perhaps the most enjoyable thing this evening. Its awesome, and easy to use. it adds a whole new tactical dimension to the game that Ive only seen in FPS. Plus, it was easier to solo big mobs, since the charge blast from your pistol (in cover) is pretty much a world ender (wintersweater)
* In cover I [Imperial Agent]had access to 3 abilties, these were "Default attack"(yes this is a made up name, I can't remember it's exact name) "Snipe", a 2 second-ish cast and "Overload shot" (again not sure on ability name, it's something like that though). Essentially the default attack consumed no energy and was therefore usable every global, The snipe and the Overload shot abilities both consumed about half my energy, I'm not exactly sure on the regen rate but I probably had to use 3 "default attacks" before I had enough energy to use a special. Out of cover I still had access to the default attack and overload shot (may not have been the same ability, but it essentially had the same effect). However, I also had access to Shiv, an awesome melee spell that made me twirl around and initiate a backstab on the enemy, along with a buff that increased my agility (I think) for 30 minutes (Kandycane)
* the awesome OOC heal ability that the Imperial Agent got (obviously all classes have an equivalent) had a cool animation where a small droid came above your head and then displayed a picture of a face and some vitals whilst your character is interacting with the holo image, I thought this animation was really awesome anyway and it is so seemless I really didn't notice the downtime at all, I was pretty much able to go from 1 fight to the next even using this after every pull it didn't really slow me down (Kandycane)
* Jedi Sage started off with 2 attacks - the saber attack and the rock-throwing one. It took a minute to work out what attack mode (ranged or melee) I should be using. I ended up starting with the ranged rock-throw and followed up with saber slashes. Once you unleash the projection attack, you can run toward your target and follow up with your saber straight away. At level 3, I was able to take on 2 lvl 7s at once on a couple of occasions - the Project attack stuns for a short while, so you can alternate attacks to keep one mob stunned while you concentrate on the other (MEHColeman)
* Playing was the Trooper felt very different to playing as the Sith Warrior. Firstly, while the combat is fun and fast paced at some points I felt there wasn't very much 'weight' behind my attacks. My grenade launcher did AoE damage and knocked over the main target, but didn't do the damage I felt it should. Personally, I think it should be higher damage, but slower cooldown. The cooldowns are very fast and are only limited to how much ammo you have (DeathCorp)
* I can say I actually enjoyed the challenge [Trooper]. I felt like, while I was taking on groups of about 3 - 6, my tactics had a real impact on my performance.
* At one point I grouped up with 3 other Troopers. I had a lot of fun with this group, even though it was hard to stay together as everyone kept getting lost/seperated. At one point, we all used our grenade launchers on a group of about 3 separatists. That was absolutely beautiful and lived up to my expectations of a trooper group. I felt very powerful. They all died instantly and the fireworks were glorious (DeathCorp)
* The Sith Warrior, was deep, fast paced and straight to the point. Instantly, you realize you have been dropped into plot-line involving deception and sith-like politics. Clearly they've kept with the iconics, you are, literally, The Sith Warrior. Your art is in killing, not manipulating. The combat, was fast, but you felt like you had weight behind your attacks. I was taking on about 10 Korr'Slugs at one point, but the difference to the Trooper was that your attacks had real weight behind them. The animations felt powerful. Auto-attack? So glad it is not in. You feel like you are in real control of the combat, timing your skills has a lot of effect on your performance (DeathCorp)
* As expected, you typically face off against multiple opponents and combat was fast paced. I had a good combination of damage dealing abilities and CC abilities (e.g. area stun). Force leaping across the battlefield made me grin every single time (Helderash)
Mobs and AI
Summer/Fall 2010
* The NPC’s at the entrance and inside seemed to be amped up a bit. They were taking cover which forced me to flush them out with the flamethrower while Samm focused on sniping from a distance and weakening the tougher tank type enemies (Brandon, Torocast)
* You can still shoot enemies when you are close to them. But what I noticed was that if you get close to a ranged enemy that enemy will walk backwards to get distance on you itself. since the NPC AI runs for distance and cover itself you could potentially trigger other nearby melee opponents (Raul)
* I moved close to some and they would run backwards away from me to a further distance. Some would also run for cover. Like I was fighting inside a building and one enemy would run back through the door into another room and hide behind the wall there. Since there were enemies in there as well I had to position myself so that I could still shoot him from the room I was in through the doorway. Others would run for cover as well behind crates or tents. I also found that a lot of materials in the world were 'solid'. What I mean with that is that they trigger Line of Sight and you can't just shoot through them (Raul)
PAX East 2011
* The mob AI was interesting, the ranged classes tried to stay at range, and did get behind cover most of the time. Only once was I charged. (Hengist)
* The looters and their AI was amazing and just as described, smart intuitive and responsive. As soon as I charged into a group of 3 the other 2 immediately ran for cover and started firing while I engaged the primary in melee. As soon as I finished him with a Blast and moved on to the next the add immediately went melee and engaged me while the third continued to shoot me in the back. The combat was fast but the animations brought me back to the old SWG animations which were beautiful to see,but the choreographed combat made it 100x better (Ace_Odear)
* Visually it was apparent what each mob did. If a humanoid had a sniper rifle get in melee or it will light you up. If it looked big and nasty it was and it hit very hard. The little "swarm" solo mobs actively attempted to get behind you as did the "sneaky" humanoids. (StoneYeti)
* Mobs were tough and challenging. Many times other mobs would join in an already crazy fight so we would have 10 mobs shooting lasers and all kinds of **** flying around. (TheDuck)
UK Community Event 2011
* The Enemy AI seemed a little off though, I never really experienced the enemy trying to flank me, the few melee opponents I went up against usually decided to just charge over the barricade I was covering behind and ranged opponents, although mostly trying to seek cover mostly never tried to flank, I even had times when they were flanking me from my position of attack and they would actually move so I gained a cover bonus on them (Kandycane)
* The main bug I found was that you could not target mobs through doorways. The game would tell me I had no line of sight. In one case, a mob stood on the border of the doorway. I could stand face to face with him and he would not attack me. The moment i placed a foot accross the border of the doorway he would become active and attack. but then if i stepped back he would reset. I also couldt shoot anyone through an open door way and had to enter the room fully to attack them. This needs to be fixed as I found it very annoying and hard to combat ppl I wanted to keep at range (PugNoobie)
* During combat I was also suprised to see mobs running behind cover and blocking my melee attacks. Also I found that mobs seemed to walk quite freely, almost as though they didn't have a preditermined path to follow (Vixone)
UI and controls
Summer/Fall 2010
* I really, really liked the overhead map. The map was all blue with light blue lines running through it. The map showed the elevation of the land as well as the buildings in the area. I realized this is a small thing in comparison to the rest of the things I could cover, but it seems that some UI perks, such as an overhead map, are implemented only as an afterthought in some games. However, the BioWare team seems to have taken time to think about how the player will navigate the world (Everett, Massively)
* Right off the bat, I felt quickly at home behind the controls. Why? Well, it was in no small part due to the fact that the game's design feels very much like World of Warcraft (Brennan, Massively)
* The UI is intuitive and exact. No delay from keypress to action. I thought it felt perfect (Caldruid)
* The UI is a lot like WoW as are the movements, so you can just sit down and instantly play the game without feeling unfamiliar or at a loss what to do or press. The map gives a lot more detailed information, where important NPCs are, what their names are, what their purpose is (armor vendor, weapon vendor etc.) as well as having maps for inside buildings etc (Raul)
* you can make your map transparent and then you get some sort of magnifying glass area which makes only that area non-transparent so you can check stuff out better.
* Even though inside buildings had their own maps you could still access these maps by clicking on the icon on the map for that building.
* Areas on the map are always shown, like where a village is etc even though you haven't been there yet. But more details show if you do visit it. And it shows you if you haven't visited that specific area yet
* a simple glance at the interface shows just how far BioWare has digested and integrated the best of the competition while adding its own personal touch. While the action bar situated at the bottom of the screen, [with experience meter, and life and vitality gauges (?)] remains an old standard of MMORPGs, the map functionality is much more original. This clever arrangement makes the open map transparent when you move your character (Jeuxvideo)
UK Community Event 2011
* The world map was nice, you could run and turn your character with the full screen map open in a transparent manner, which made navigating easy if you ever got stuck (DarthViscus)
* the UI looks pretty nice as it stands, however as I was told "the latest version has a much nicer UI" which was a nice little nugget of information, but right off it's intuitive, there's the usual 'skill bar' your health, mini map, quest tracker, everything you'd expect, but a real nice touch I found was that if you targeted a mob and it couldn't see you then there was a middle segment that was 'neutral' as soon as you became more visible it would turn orange, and when engaged red with an angry looking eye, nice touch! (Saigo)
* UI was easy to get to grips with there was a nice aggro indicator in the center of the UI to indicate if nearby mobs were likely to engage you. Also there is a codex system which kept track of important events that happened during your story (Aestel)
* The map is easy to read (and easily the most detailed I've seen in an MMO) and there are markers where you have to go (AdmiralMalice)
* UI really needed improving. Some of it was good (inventory and chat with NPCs), but the character sheet looked ugly, some of the buttons were too big/too small, and I didn't enjoy having targeted players appear at the bottom of the screen (wintersweater)
* you had 2 sets of inventories, one for purely quest items and one for the other stuff which were tabbed so you could switch between if you ever needed to. When you go into a dialogue you gained a debuff/buff which was essentially "immobilising you", observing someone in a conversation essentially showed them standing idle with a speech bubble above their head with a series of ellipses (Kandycane)
* I won’t talk too much about gameplay as other people have done that extensively. For my part I found gameplay and controls suitably intuitive without being particularly innovative (AgripAA)
Full compilation of impressions and demo gameplay experiences from players and reviewers, from all the conventions and events: see here
