Posted by Josto in Off-TORpic | 20 Comments
Off-TORpic: Blizzard Adding “Appearance Tab” To World Of Warcraft
Off-TORpic is our occasional peek outside the world of Star Wars: The Old Republic. Sometimes it’ll be Star Wars. Sometimes it’ll be games. Sometimes, something else all together. But all the time it will be Off-TORpic.
A vast majority of those reading this have probably played World of Warcraft. Whether you loved it or hated it, it set some new standards for the MMO genre. This created somewhat of a “copycat” atmosphere in the industry which has brought the development of several titles that have tried to emulate its success, with varying results. But one thing Blizzard isn’t afraid to do is change its own formula, flying in the face of their previous ideals.
At Gamerscon today, Blizzard announced its newest change to World of Warcraft: Transmogrification. This vendor will allow players to change the appearance of their armor, matching the look they like with the stats they need:
Blizzard Developers:
Visiting a Transmogrifier will present players with a new interface that will allow them to change the appearance of an item while retaining its original stats. This means that you can raid in your paladin tier 12 Immolation set, but look like you’re wearing Lightbringer, while priests can bring Benediction back
There’s a huge, everlasting thread on the official forums dedicated to an “appearance tab” in TOR, but currently the only visual armor customization options we know of are being able to match the color of your gear to the color of your chest piece. In light of this new information, is this enough? Should we expect more customization right out of the gate?
Love ’em or hate ’em, Blizzard is doing good work for all of us by pushing features like this out.
Transmogrification UI
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
This is a great addition to WoW, assuming that players will need the gear in order to use it in their appearance tab, then players will be more likely to do older stuff in order to get older gear. I like this a lot!
this should have been brought in a long time ago, some armor sets were very cool, while others were very ugly, now, they can all look like that cool set you loved :)
But nothing they do would make me go back to WoW, I’ve had enough. Maybe if TOR got canceled, I’d think about it. But for me, star wars + MMO = pure win!
Oh my god the only good thing to come out of Cataclysm. Yes yes, hate me if you must but I stopped playing the game when that expansion came out but this is one of the only things I have seen that makes me cringe that I am not playing cataclysm.
I have always wanted to just keep the look of t1-t3 on different toons and now its only finally came to be.
While I would like this feature in SWTOR, I also am not that worried about it. Why you may ask though? Well why would I want to change the look of a character I do not have yet? I may end up liking “gear set number 1” when it comes out on my Sith Warrior Juggernaut. Who knows, maybe the 2nd tier of gear may look and appeal to me even more. I may want the feature in the future but that is what patches are for anyways, so I will wait and see as it comes. It doesn’t get in the way of me playing the game or not that is for sure though, I just wish I could play it now!
Seems to me a desperate attempt from blizz to retain it’s player base. I’m still planing on letting my account to run out regardless of armour it is still the same boring game regardless.
I don’t think TOR should be released until every feature someone somewhere might want is added.
EA/Bioware’s infinite resources should easily cover any costs involved.
An innovative feature for WoW. However I’m gonna say it’s too little too late. To me it looks like they’ve figured out a new way to recycle their old content. Blizz is grasping at straws as far as WoW development goes. All the talent has been moved to Titan. I myself can’t wait for a new game that is actually entertaining. I’m lookin’ at you SWTOR! However that being said I have enjoyed WoW for the 5 years i’ve played it. I’m just tired of the same old same old.
Innovative, really ? It’s more how to recycle old stuff.
Actually Stephen Reid twitted:
Silvara1 Kerry
@Rockjaw Can you clarify if SWTOR will have dressing room & appearance tab options? As haven’t found any info regarding these options yet?
2 hours ago
in reply to ↑
Stephen Reid
@Rockjaw Stephen Reid
@Silvara1 Both something we want, but possibly not for launch.
55 minutes ago via Twitter for iPad
So I guess an a-tab wont be in at launch possibly, but they are definitely are considering it seriously.
I believe being able to match your color scheme to the chest/body piece is more than good enough at launch. It’s better than some MMOs have provided.
After that I’m sure they have stuff on the ‘Wall of Crazy’ they wouldn’t mind getting to, dyes and maybe an appearance tab.
Although, to me, an appearance tab isn’t a huge priority.
Transmogrification, heh, all I have to say is Bill Watterson better be getting some royalties…
They clearly stole the idea from Calvin’s box.
That’s very WoW’s style, but that’s a good question, do they pay royalties for all the references that they use?
I don’t think so, since it’s usually pretty clear where they come from.
I hate this. I always thought that people who wanted an “appearance” tab were dumb. It doesn’t make sense. You should see what you are wearing and that’s that. If you want to look different then wear something else. I don’t even like the ability to make your hat or cape invisible. It takes away realism.
Transforming the look is kinda a different way to go about it. Usually games have appearance slots that you can put on items to cover over the other gear. Different way to do it, but gets the same thing done, and easier than having to find cosmetic gear. But now every paladin will be running around in the same looking gear. :)
i always think about going back to wow but then i see my homepage and i’m like: i won’t have any time to play wow when i get swtor. i wish i had enough time to do both
I like the idea of what they’re doing here. It makes more sense for WoW though, with their endless tiers of possible gear, than for SWTOR, a brand new MMO where everyone won’t necessarily be wearing the exact same thing.
For me, being able to make my gear matchy-matchy is plenty. I hate looking like some sort of medieval supervillain, going by the moniker Captain Clash, determined to blind all helpless passers-by. “Fear my neon pink pedal-pushers, all ye who vow to do good!”
Took them 7 years to realize people love diversity and customization. And in the end they do it through recycling.. :D
I love all the people calling this innovative and a good idea when this is just something recycled from several mmo’s :L
I’m actually one of the apparent few that does not like an appearance tab. I’m all for armor dyes, but a lot of times the armor you get looks a certain way because of where and from whom you got it. It makes zero sense to me for someone to be going into battle at the highest level in a wedding dress, or even to a lesser extent, in a simple pantsuit.
If you get a set of gear, if the look is really ugly enough to you that you don’t want to wear it, well, that’s a decision you’ll have to make. But I don’t want to see a Juggernaut tanking in next-to-nothing while an Agent healing him is wearing heavier armor.
One other thing… the modding system will allow for a variety of looks at end-game, especially if someone got an armor suit that they really liked when leveling. Modding + color matching is a pretty good way to customize at launch.