Tag Archives: star wars

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2 is now available on Steam, together with enhanced performance and visuals.

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Mass Effect 3, Star Wars: The Old Republic and Dragon Age 2 have amounted to what has been a ‘great’ 18 months in the partnership between BioWare and EA, COO Peter Moore has explained.

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EA and BioWare announced today that it will be expanding Star Wars: The Old Republic by adding a new free-to-play option this fall.

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Damion Schubert, principal lead systems designer in SWTOR, has tried to alleviate migration fears for players who’ve yet to manually transfer their characters onto another server.

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KotOR II fans rejoice: the Sith Lords Restored Content mod is finished, and you can now play the game with some of the restored content cut when Obsidian was pushed to kick the game out the door in 2004. While not all content cut from the original release has been restored, there’s still plenty of new dialogue, cut-scenes, and the end-game should make more sense to folks now without all the cliffhangers. A massive list of fixes have also been put into place, and if you have an hour or so, grab a cuppa and pour over the patch notes here where you will also find a download link. Thanks, RPS.

EA CEO John Riccitiello has told CNBC “there’s a lot of power in free-to-play,” which has proved a tough model to compete with when it comes to MMOs.

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Star Wars: The Old Republic’s executive producer Rich Vogel has told Gamasutra he is no longer with the company, as reports out of Austin, Texas state Bioware has issued a round of lay-offs today. The redundancies at BioWare Austin are part of the restructuring plan announced in May, which EA said were necessary to maintain SWTOR growth. Vogel’s departure preceded the layoffs affecting BioWare Austin today.

BioWare has announced its unlimited trial for Star Wars: The Old Republic launches today with patch 1.3.2. The trial will allow players access to eight classes and the respective origin worlds as well as one PvP Flashpoint PvP – up to level 15. Players who have previously participated in the Weekend Pass Free Trials or the Friends of Star Wars: The Old Republic Trial are also eligible to join.

Analyst Michael Pachter believes subscription MMOs have peaked, stating that if BioWare couldn’t make a success out it with Star Wars: The Old Republic, “then no one can.”

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Want an incentive to switching your SWTOR character over to another server? BioWare has read your mind and is offering up a Gannifari pet if you do, and to sweeten the deal, it’s also handing out 25 Black Hole Commendations so you can buy some super special high-end kit. According to the firm, “hundreds of thousands of players have already taken advantage,” of the free character transfer service so go along with the popular kids and do the same. More information here.

SWTOR team members have explained how the tie-breaker is decided on the Voidstar PvP map, an area which by all accounts, can be a frustrating situation for many players.

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BioWare has posted a new Q&A for Star Wars: The Old Republic regarding the MMO’s latest content release, update 1.3: Allies. While it mainly focuses on what’s included in the content: Legacy Perks, Ranked Warzones, Adaptive Gear, and a new Group Finder, it also fields questions regarding armor sets, abilities, and class changes. It also stated that more character slots will be made available in “the near future.” You can look over the Q&A in its entirety here. Update 1.3 launched on June 26, the same day as the firm’s Mass Effect 3 Extended Cut DLC. Thanks, TenTonHammer.

BioWare has updated the list of SWTOR servers eligible for character transfers. Those wondering if their server has been deemed worthy, hit up the list here. BioWare will be offering free character transfers from select origin servers to pre-determined destination servers, and said servers and their corresponding destination servers “will be revealed on a regular, ongoing basis going forward.”

EA’s Frank Gibeau has said one of the ways the firm plans on attaining and retaining more players in Star Wars: The Old Republic is by offering the free trial, continuing to improve the gameplay, and by adding more content. This, he said, proves the firm plans to be in the “in the Star Wars business for a long time.”

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BioWare has announced that starting next week on June 12, SWTOR players will – if they choose – be allowed to transfer their characters over to a different server, free of charge. These will direct transfers from one origin server to a pre-selected destination server, in order to “provide a better gameplay experience for our players by ensuring population balance across the service.” In a blog post, the firm also detailed more on the class changes coming with Update 1.3, one of which is 100% threat generation when in tank stance. Single-target taunting will stay the same, unchanged, and that AOE-threat generation will improve as well. Read the full thing through the link. Thanks, Talkar.

BioWare co-founder Ray Muzyka took the stage at EA’s E3 press conference to announce Star Wars: The Old Republic will be going free-to-play up to level 15 next month.

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BioWare’s Emmanuel Lusinchi has said there are many variables and metrics when it comes to figuring out how many players an MMO such as Star Wars: The Old Republic has; therefore, when a number is provided by the company or a retailer, it’s not the full picture.

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Spike TV will exclusively announce the newest game in the Star Wars universe, which debits at E3 2012. A tease will be shown first on May 31, as a part of the pre-E3 episode of GTTV, followed by the live, world gameplay premiere during E3 All Access Live on June 4 at 10.00pm EDT/7.00pm PDT.

Over on the SWTOR forums, a player going by the name Scorpienne has complied a report which features population estimates on the MMO’s servers. According to his estimates, some servers only have, on average, 344 players online at a given time.

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BioWare heads Greg Zeschuk and Ray Muzyka have confirmed a round of layoffs for Star Wars: The Old Republic. A post on the official website confirms the layoffs but is scant on details, and only states the following alongside praise for the team: “We still have a very substantial development team working on supporting and growing the game, and we feel we are in a strong position, with your continued involvement and feedback, to continue to build Star Wars: The Old Republic as one of the most compelling and successful online experiences in the world today.” The statement goes on to say the team remains “dedicated to delivering a high quality service in SWTOR” over “the weeks, months and years to come.”