by Sativa » Wed Sep 07, 2011 9:41 pm
Got to Beta test for 3 days last weekend. This game is excellent. The graphics are better than expected. The voice acting and story line stuff is awesome. The combat Is very similar to you standard MMO but seems a more engaging. The questing is a lot of fun. Although there is some elements of the gather this thing and kill 10 of these guys, the presentation makes it more immersive and less like a grind.
I played as a bounty hunter and was very satisfied with the character progression and depth. I didn't have enough time to get my spaceship but I did do a few group quests and some "Flashpoints" which are like dungeon instances with boss fights etc but they're related to the storyline. The group combat and flashpoints were really fun. The thing i found most enjoyable about the combat which was particularly evident in boss fights was the use of movement. Hiding behind objects, running from a boss when you get aggro etc. There is no standing in one spot hitting, 3, 3, 3, 5, 7, 3, 3, 3, 5, 7, 4, 3, 3, 3.... etc.
I had a little experience with the crafting and weapon modifications. It has all the depth and complexity of any crafting system I've seen but the time spent seems more productive and you won't spend time traveling from node to node or herb to herb. While there are things lying around to scavenge or safes to crack, you can use people in your crew to complete gathering tasks which again, takes the much of the grind out of it. That said I expect the higher level crafting will still require effort to complete epic items. I don't get the impression it will be too easy. Another thing your crew is great for is selling your vendor trash for you. So awesome.. "Do you want your crew member to sell your grey items? They will be gone for 1 minute" Hell yes!
I did not experience a single crash or server disconnect but I did have to wait in a queue for about 10 seconds on Saturday night.
Considering my hardware I did expect better gfx performance. GTX480 and a quad core at 3.3 GHZ with 8GB ram. I would drop to around 20 fps in busy areas but mostly averaged 50-70. They still haven't implemented AA and I'm excited to see how spectacular it will looks when they do but I would expect that I should get 40-70FPS all the time even with AA on. I get 100+ maxed on BC2, 60-90 on Crysis 2 with DX11 and DXHR and I think at least Crysis 2 and DXHR have more demanding graphics than TOR. I expect performance will be substantially increased by release. All that said, I would play it now, the way it is.
I really only scratched the surface of what was available to me in the BETA but that small amount of exposure has me convinced that this game will definitely be worth the box price and at least a few months subscription if not a few years.