Sebaya Keto posted Mar 9, 12
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Author: Sebaya Keto, BioWare, Chat bubbles, City of Heroes, Damion Schubert, EA, Electronic Arts, Emmanuel Lusinchi, Game Update 1.2, Lord Adraas, Lost Island, LucasArts, Pure Pazaak, role-play, Roleplay, RP, Shinzar Durile, Star Trek Online, Star Wars, Star Wars The Old Republic, Sword of the Sith, SWTOR, SWTOR-RP, The Old Republic, TOR, Twi'lek
Yes that's Darth Revan with a green lightsaber. Even the 501st makes mistakes.
This is the article you've all been waiting to see! In this article, I'll be covering the roleplay panel as well as interactions myself and others had with the developers to ask them about upcoming features. There is a lot to cover and little time, so I'm just going to dive right in and try to get to it all. Be sure to keep an eye out this weekend as well for articles on my Game Update 1.2 Flashpoint Lost Island playtest and a final wrap-up. The Old Republic seems to keep getting better and better, and BioWare is working their butts off to make it that way, as evidenced by the dozens of coffee machines spread throughout their office.
I'll start with what I know you all want to hear about: chat bubbles. We now have the real story as to why they were taken out, and it turns out our speculation during beta was right. The chat bubbles were causing issues with lag and FPS. They didn't want to say anything at the time because they weren't really sure why. The issue is finally getting sorted out now though as the UI team is finishing up GUI customization. They won't be in 1.2 but take heart in knowing that many of the developers, especially the ones that RP, want them as badly as we do, and they're working hard on them. With luck, we won't have to wait all the way until 1.3 to get them, but it shouldn't take any longer than that to finish solving the problem and getting them back in the game!
Ganden posted Mar 1, 12
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Australian Launch, Author: Ganden, BioWare, Chat Bubbles, Cross-Faction Communication, Darth Vader, David Holloway, EA, Electronic Arts, End-game, Flashpoint, Gabe Amatangelo, Galactic Republic, Gav Daragon, Huttball, Jedi Knight, Legacy System, LucasArts, Luke Skywalker, Operations, Outlaw's Den, PvE, PvP, Republic, role-play, Roleplay, RP, RvR, Sith, Sith Empire, Smuggler, Star Wars, Star Wars The Old Republic, SWTOR, SWTOR-RP, The Old Republic, TOR, TOROZ, Warzone
On March 1st 2012, The Old Republic officially launched in Australia. A new roleplaying server— Gav Daragon—was created, along with another PvE and PvP server. To celebrate the regional expansion of BioWare's and EA's largest ever online project, an official Australian community launch event was held in Sydney. And who other than me, your Australian Editor-in-chief at SWTOR-RP, should attend the event to receive one-on-one time with EA's special guest, Gabe Amatangelo— The Old Republic's Principal Lead Flashpoint, Operations, and PvP Designer?
In our time together, we discussed a number of topics ranging from roleplaying features, PvP, Flashpoints, and Warzones. I also tried my best to find out some exclusive information about Game Update 1.2 and the upcoming Legacy System, but as always, BioWare are very good at remaining tight-lipped about their upcoming features. The good news? We only have to wait one week for all the goodies that will accompany Game Update 1.2.
Earlier in the day, our friends at TOROZ also exchanged banter with Gabe. Be sure to head on over to TOROZ to view their video interview. David Holloway asked some great questions about PvP, and in turn received some great answers from Gabe. But in the meantime, continue below to view SWTOR-RP's very own interview with Gabe Amatangelo.
GigasFist posted Feb 25, 12
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Community Q&A, Customization, LFG, RP, Ships, Speeders, Author: GigasFist, BioWare, Chat Bubbles, Damion Schubert, EA, Electronic Arts, Game Update 1.2, LucasArts, role-play, Roleplay, RP, Star Wars, Star Wars The Old Republic, Starships, SWTOR, SWTOR-RP, The Old Republic, TOR
BioWare again taunts and teases us with arbitrary release dates and comments on how much they want to add components 'in the future'—though the much wished for 'meditate' emote may be in the works with the Legacy system. Damion Schubert (the Principal Lead Systems Designer) said that in Game Update 1.2, there are several emotes planned to be unlocked through the Legacy system, but it is unknown whether the meditate emote will be among them. So far the only confirmed emote is a new dance that also makes your companion "boogie down." Yay? Players have also been very excited with the possibility of extra minigames like Pazaak and Swoop Races from Knights of the Old Republic. It is said, however, that it is "not on our immediate horizon". Looks like you will have to do with the roll function for now and just pretend to be a Swoop Racer. Customization is a roleplayers best tool, and what we ride we want to be just as unique as our character. Players want different ships and different looks, interior and exterior. Damion Schubert put to rest any ideas that they would be coming soon. "Unfortunately, the nature of our ships as central story areas for all of
our class content, and all of the associated triggers and cinematics
that must therefore be done on the ships, means that giving players new
ship models, particularly interiors, is very, very hard for us." But BioWare apparently will take us there in the future, so keep your eyes open and your creativity brewing. Less on the RP side, apparently a LFG (looking for group) function is in the works. They are looking for ways to more effectively find a group. But no details were given, saying more would be released as that release date drew near. If you are anything like me, you hate those few planets where you have to tromp through some annoying Orbital Station to ride another ship to the planet. Well god news! Small tweaks in the traveling system will be released in GU (Game Update) 1.2. No word of chat bubbles, so keep sending your angry rants to BioWare my friends! The full Q&A can be read here.
Sebaya Keto posted Feb 17, 12
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Author: Sebaya Keto, BioWare, Chat Bubbles, Community Q&A, EA, Electronic Arts, Game Update 1.2, Game Update 1.3, Hoods, LucasArts, Mordecia, Operations, role-play, Roleplay, Roll System, RP, Star Wars, Star Wars The Old Republic, SWTOR, SWTOR-RP, The Old Republic, TOR, Tziena
A new Community Q&A is up! So I know we talk a lot about chat bubbles, and our founder, Tziena, even has a recording of BioWare developers promising they would be in by launch. Obviously that didn't happen. What it seems like is that UI customization took priority, and that will be done in time for Game Update 1.2 in March. Once the UI team is free, they'll start working on chat bubbles; hopefully they can fix the issues that caused them to be pulled quickly. Depending on the issues and how serious they are, we could see chat bubbles added within weeks, or maybe a few months at most I'm sure. Either way they're coming to The Old Republic. Rejoice!
Also of importance is the mention of a hood toggle coming after Game Update 1.2. The next major update would be Game Update 1.3 which might be 2-3 months later. Either way, it's coming. They seem to be talking about headgear a lot. Companion headgear toggles are currently in the works. No ETA for them, but just good to know it's in the works, right?
Mordecia and all our other gambling entrepreneurs are going to be exciting that /roll has already been added to internal testing builds. BioWare internal testing is said to be 2-3 patches ahead of live, so that means it's likely still a few weeks off at least, but I think it's safe to say /roll will be available soon for RP events. Hopefully this will help spur people to play Sabaac more! Read on and I'll talk about the rest of what was said.
Sebaya Keto posted Jan 28, 12
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Author: Sebaya Keto, BioWare, Chat Bubbles, Cross-Faction Communication, Lightsaber, Lightsaber Colors, Lightsaber Colours, role-play, Roleplay, RP, Social Clothing, Star Wars The Old Republic, Suggestion Box, SWTOR, SWTOR-RP, The Old Republic, TOR
As you may know, the Suggestion Box is a recent addition to The Old Republic's official forums. It's a place for players to give BioWare their feedback and ideas to improve the game. Different suggestions for improving roleplaying have been scattered and quickly get pushed down in the chaos. A few threads, like one I created as a compilation, have survived though and gained a lot of support. Every once in a while we're going to go through the board and find a good thread with things that roleplayers care about to highlight here, in hopes that you will join their authors in support of that issue, and that BioWare staff will eventually respond with their positions as well.
For this first article, we'll take a look at the thread I wrote. It's very much a work in progress. I've been taking the complaints of people I know and people I've met in the thread and adding to the list. After the break, I'm going to copy the list in it's entirety, but for now, it has everything from chat bubbles to seating, and from hoods to masks. I'd encourage you to go to the official forums and look at it there as well, to at the very least give it a /signed or to add your own comments as well so we can keep the list growing and eventually attract the dev team's attention.
Beltane posted Jan 6, 12
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Author: Beltane, BioWare, chat bubbles, EA, Electronic Arts, LucasArts, role-play, Roleplay, RP, Star Wars, Star Wars The Old Republic, SWTOR, SWTOR-RP, The Old Republic, TOR
Now that The Old Republic has been out for several weeks, many roleplayers are starting to shift their focus from the excitement of finally playing this long-anticipated game to their favorite creative pastime: roleplaying. They may run into a few roleplayers while questing or socializing in a cantina, and come to the conclusion that they can get along just fine without chat bubbles – since the chat scrolls slowly enough to keep up. But when these roleplayers first step into a social hub or event buzzing with the fast-paced scroll of dozens of other roleplayers, the experience quickly loses its luster. The moment a scene has to be interrupted – often multiple times – to ask the person you’re roleplaying with if he saw your emote, many roleplayers ask the same question: When, for the love of all things holy, are we getting chat bubbles?
In the modern MMO, chat bubbles are all but a staple for making social interactions easy and hassle-free. Typically, chat bubbles have an on/off toggle in the options for those who want to avoid them or turn them off for a specific reason, such as taking screenshots. While it has been stated that BioWare’s development team is working on adding chat bubbles to the game at some point, no projected date has been given for their implementation. Chat bubbles may not rank very high on the average players' list of wants, but for roleplayers, they are an incredible asset and absolutely vital to the continued future of roleplay in The Old Republic.
It is certainly a fact that not all roleplayers use chat bubbles, and this can be well-documented by taking a look through threads that have cropped up about the topic on the official forums as well as here on SWTOR-RP. But for those of us who do rely on chat bubbles, their absence makes roleplaying in a group or crowded setting unnecessarily tedious at best, and all but impossible at worst.
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