Massivity #4: So What If Star Wars: The Old Republic is a World of Warcraft Clone?

Filled with sprawling worlds ripe for discovery, teeming with thousands of new people to meet, and capable of sucking up entire months' worth of playtime, massively multiplayer online role-playing games offer one of the modern world's most extreme forms of escapism. Join GameSpy columnist Leif Johnson as he turns a critical eye on the biggest and best of today's MMORPGs and quests for the virtual worlds most worthy of your time.



Is This the MMO You're Looking For?

Let's get this out of our systems right now. For all of its focus on a well-written story, its player ships, and a fortune's worth of excellent voice acting, BioWare's Star Wars: The Old Republic still feels very much like that hulking leviathan created by the boys at Blizzard, especially in its earlier expansions. It's true. Indeed, if you're looking for an MMO that challenges conventions of how you level, how you fight, and even how you interact with other players, you'll be better off looking elsewhere (maybe even at Guild Wars 2). Rather than bash it for unoriginality, however, I'm here to argue that's not such a bad thing.

Now hold on, Leif, you might say (or something slightly more nasty), World of Warcraft borrowed all of its ideas from other MMORPGs, so it's more accurate to say that SWTOR borrowed from EverQuest or Warhammer! Well, not quite. World of Warcraft has been the big boy on the market for quite some time now, and its streamlined gameplay successfully tossed much of the bulk that weighed down its source material. It's the model that most competitors look at. Even if you still insist on contesting that point, it's hard to escape the impression that the game looks and feels much like World of Warcraft specifically in general, even more so than Rift. Still not convinced? Just ask BioWare's own Greg Zeschuk, who said that "every MMO that comes out, I play and look at it. And if they break any of the WoW rules, in my book that's pretty dumb."

It's most apparent in the combat, which admittedly lacks something of WoW's fluidity. Almost every ability triggers a mildly annoying cooldown, leaving your only other option to hammer on the one cooldown-free attack while you wait for the others to recharge. The situation does get much better as you learn more abilities, and the stellar fast-paced animations (particularly for Jedi) do much to make up for any perceived slowness. Lightsabers deflect endless volleys of blaster fire, blasters deliver satisfying charged attacks, and the sight of Smugglers dodging to cover gives group-based combat a sense of immersion that other titles seldom match. In fact, the sole reason why I chose to advance my Jedi Consular to the more melee-based Shadow specialization was because I enjoyed seeing my lightsaber swinging around more than magic flying from my fingertips. Tedious animations in games such as Rift have always kept me from fully enjoying the game, and I'm glad to see that BioWare has been more successful in capturing the spirit of WoW's movements.

But even if the combat doesn't grab you, it's all but impossible not to get caught up in SWTOR's sweeping storyline and voiced cinematics, even if you're not a Star Wars fan. As I'm sure most of us already know, this is BioWare's main contribution to the genre and the aspect that marks the biggest departure from World of Warcraft. It's also enough to talk about SWTOR as being the first MMORPG to take the last three letters of the genre seriously. This is key, since SWTOR's quests would count among some of the most banal "collect or kill" missions in MMO history without the considerable power of the voiced cinematics behind them.

Yet sometimes, admittedly, the cinematics get in the way of the multiplayer experience. When I first pressed the space bar to skip over voiced dialogue in Star Wars: The Old Republic, I felt as though I had sinned. I fought it, trust me. But for every second I spent worrying about whether my Jedi Consular should "force persuade" a crime boss in a Coruscant cantina or merely beat some sense into him, the little group I'd joined for a local instanced heroic quest ran ever farther away from where I was anchored to the cutscene. And when one threatened to start the content without me, I tapped through all the options, finished the quest, and ran to follow my fellow adventurers.

Events like this are commonplace and trivial in other MMORPGS; if you miss the quest text while picking up the mission in a hurry, all you really need to do is look back over it in your quest log if you're so inclined. Not so with Bioware's hyped focus on story; unless you drop the quest or decide to pick it up later (possibly resulting in otherwise needless backtracking), you can only view the transcript of the interaction instead of rewatching the cut scene unless you level an alt. Even then, owing to SW:TOR's conversation choices, the experience might be completely different depending on the decisions you make.

If only your decisions still mattered. The original consequence-based concept always appealed to me because I liked the idea of having to live with the decisions I'd made in the cinematics. It was a great move for both immersion and for replay value. Unlike BioWare's single player games, there would have been no handy "save" button that I could use in the event that my Morrigan-like companion ditched me because I didn't torture a Jawa or somesuch. That's no longer the case. In the current build, I was free to make choices that quickly earned the disapproval of my companion without worrying that he'd run off to hunt Banthas for eternity or something. I'm sure the decision will keep a huge segment of the player base happy, but it somewhat kills the whole point of having decision options in the first place. If that's not enough to kill your sense of immersion, then you might balk at learning that SWTOR currently lacks those little actions that the small but loyal role-playing community goes nuts over, such as fishing-like activities, bubble text, or even that old favorite, sitting in chairs.


But at least it looks great. SWTOR's graphics follow World of Warcraft's lead in presenting comparatively lightweight visuals that most computers can handle, even if they're considerably more impressive than those in World of Warcraft itself (especially as regards to landscape). On rare occasions, they even manage to stun. My favorite moment in the game so far was my ascent to the ancient forge where the first lightsabers were made on Tython, during which I climbed a lonely wooded hill surrounded by a sweeping panorama of slate grey mountains. On Coruscant, I peered up at the towering dome of the Senate and actually felt myself swaying from the sense of height. To be fair, the first couple of worlds seem a little cramped and linear, but I think it's safe to tease the NDA a bit by relating that the environments open up considerably once you venture past Coruscant.

The heavy focus on cinematic storylines makes it tempting to view SWTOR as a single-player game masquerading as an MMORPG, but the game has more than enough heroic missions that technically call for two or more players to counterbalance the feeling (even if many of them can be "soloed" with your companion). In all honesty, though, I don't think I've grouped so much since classic World of Warcraft, and the lack of a dungeon finder does much to instill a sense of community. There's also some decent PVP battlegrounds available. I'm normally not very big on player-versus-player combat, but playing "Huttball" provided some of the most fun I've had in a PVP environment in ages. Here, you play in an arena that looks like the sadist's version of "American Gladiators," complete with flaming platforms, poisonous ooze, and a hovering metal ball. Some players argue that such a fun approach clashes with the lore, but I personally enjoyed the break. If anything, my time in Huttball turned me off to the idea of playing Sith come release since almost every Sith player played a lightning-flinging Inquisitor. At least the Republic side felt more balanced.

The only flashpoint (or instanced dungeon, to maintain the WoW comparsion) that I was able to experience was a low level affair called the Esseles, which seemed a little too easy for me to truly enjoy the combat. All of the classes are still largely DPS-based at so low a level, though, so that may have been the reason for what I perceived as a lack of challenge. Whatever it lacked in combat, however, it more than delivered in the group-based story options, which allow players to roll for who gets to direct the action of the cinematic. I won't spoil anything, but it's often fun to see how the encounter will turn out based on who wins the roll. At the very least, it keeps group runs from feeling exactly the same with each playthrough, but I could see most players getting tired of it really quickly.


All this points to a decent launch, but I remain skeptical about SWTOR's future. If BioWare intends to keep story as their main focus, then they're going to have to churn out content with something approaching the frequency of Rift's updates. For that matter, any new batch of story-driven content will have to be better than the lackluster content updates we've recently been seeing for Dragon Age II. Even so, SWTOR still has the potential to be a serious contender to World of Warcraft. It offers basically the same gameplay that so many millions have grown to love, while its heavy emphasis on a personal story, gorgeous visuals, and voiced quests does much to prevent it from feeling like a simple clone. The key word here is evolution, not innovation. And that's why the similarities may not end up mattering after all.

But can it overcome World of Warcraft in light of this? At this point, I'm going to have to say no. Players who have grown to hate the standard model of MMORPGS over the last few years won't find much to hold their attention here, story or no story. I also can't help but believe that the fantasy genre stills works best for the format, and that many players won't so easily abandon characters that they've already invested years into. There's simply not enough to draw that large of a playerbase, unless BioWare accomplishes a miracle and attracts players who've never played an MMO before. But if a change of scenery is all you really want, I'm ready to say that SWTOR may satisfy your needs more than other contenders (such as Rift). And for a couple of months, at least, I think that's really enough for me.


Leif Johnson is a Chicago-based freelancer who likes sushi and long walks along the Brandywine. Find out what he's doing over at his blog or follow him on Twitter.