Of Pixels and Shinies

YouTube user Logun24x7 has posted a video chronicling not only how SWTOR's graphics have progressed until now, but also showing how they stack up compared to other MMOs.

Have a watch.




While he probably could have found better photos for the other MMOs, they're really of no concern to me.  The bottom line is: SWTOR is looking good, and it's exciting to see how the art direction has matured.

If anything, this really highlights the need for a robust Character Creation system.  We've seen several different body types shown so far (skinny, muscular, and rotund), which is promising, but it will all come down to the face.  What varieties of "decals" will we be able to use for each character?  How will our character's alignment (Dark Side vs. Light Side) ultimately influence how we'll look?

As Logun states, with other MMOs, your character is usually seen from the "chase cam" perspective.  While face customization has always been important to folks, it's arguably more important in SWTOR simply because of the amount of time we'll be spending looking at our mugs during cut-scenes.

"Sell All Grays"

Georg Zoeller stopped by the main SWTOR forums today, as he has been doing fairly frequently lately, and dropped this tidbit regarding Companions:

In TOR, you indeed have the option to command your faithful (or scornful) companion to make a trip to the nearest market to lighten your backpack and fatten your wallet by selling objects of purely monetary value.

As you command your (possibly hateful or even loving) companion to do so, which they will only agree to if you are not engaged in hostile activities and they are convinced your life is not in immediate danger, they will arrange for quick transport to the closest market and return after a short while (roughly a minute, subject to tuning) with your hard earned money.

It is assumed you trust your (trustworthy) companion in so far as to accept whatever they tell you in regards to the prices they negotiated and will not undermine your (purely professional) working relationship with them with potentially insulting questions about taxes, fees, union dues and other applicable fees.

In other words, yes you can do that.

I can get on board with that.  It's clear that BioWare wants the Companion to be something more than just a mobile DoT effect.  I don't want to read too far into Daniel Erickson's comments regarding "setting up shop," or "opening your own business," but it seems like the Crafting aspect has the possibility of being much deeper than the system in many other MMOs.  I appreciate a player-driven economy, and I do hope to see some sort of option available to throw myself into that role when SWTOR launches.

The Joys of Beginning Anew

It's about that time again.  Coffee is brewing.  Knuckles have been sufficiently cracked.  Mynocks have been gently plucked from exposed wiring and several Ewoks have been punted for good measure.

And now, I breathe new life into this oft-neglected little journal.  Fiat lux!  Well, no.  On second thought... Fiant tenebrae!

Like most of you, I've been following SWTOR since October of 2008.  In that time, I always had an urge somewhere in the recesses of my mind to put pen to paper, so to speak, and write a bit about what we were seeing.  I've done a proper job on procrastinating though, so flash forward to now.  There still aren't nearly as many SWTOR-centric blogs as I had imagined, so I figured, "Why not?"  While we're certainly not first out of the gates, there's quite a bit of room in which to maneuver and so far, I'm in good company.

Interests-wise within the game, I expect to focus quite a bit on crafting and PvP.  I've done the raiding scene in a number of other games, and while I'm not going to rule out participating in SWTOR Raids, I'm certainly more interested in the smaller-scale flashpoints.  The Companion Skills system really piqued my interest as a dedicated crafter, so expect to see a few posts here and there regarding that.

So for the meantime, pull up a chair and make yourself comfortable.  There's quite a bit of work to do on the site to make it presentable, but I suppose the default styles will have to do for now.  Cheers for stopping by, and I do hope to make it worth your while to return eventually.

And So It Begins...

Star Wars MMO?  Based on the Old Republic era?  Developed by BioWare?

Oh my...

Well now the waiting game begins.  Undoubtedly, following this game will eat up a fairly good chunk of my time. I've told myself numerous times, "Ok, I'm going to sit this one out and not follow it too closely," only to find myself pouring over forums, scouring developer posts for tidbits, and pressing F5 on update days.  I'm going to probably keep this blog on the back burner until I really have the time to talk about SWTOR, and especially until we have more information to go on.

So at any rate, I'm staking my claim to this corner of the universe for the time being.

Until we meet again.