Jun 7, 2011

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E3 2011 – Daniel Erickson Gameplay Demo + Q&A

Earlier today, BioWare conducted a very cool live gameplay demo and Q&A session to make sure that the TOR faithful at home could experience the same goodness that E3 attendees do.

During the session, Daniel Erickson piloted a level 26 Bounty Hunter (Powertech Advanced Class) through the deserts of Tattooine. This really helped show off just how big and just how open these worlds will be!

Stephen Reid helped to answer about 20 questions from the community during the demo, and there was quite a bit of interesting information contained in the answers! Here’s a quick bullet list of the topics discussed:

  • Tattooine level range 24-28 currently
  • Cannot level and play solely through PvP, since story would be a gate
  • Jawa companion for the Bounty Hunter named Blizz
  • No Ewoks confirmed!
  • Many kinds of speeders – some are faction specific, but you have a chance to obtain other factions vehicles
  • Mounts at level 25 currently
  • Different speed mounts will be available
  • No “autoloot”, but you can right click to take all
  • There is a Sarlaac you can visit – and yes, even throw people in!
  • No bag system, just one big inventory – separate tab for quest items
  • At least one more Warzone to announce (On Corellia perhaps?)
  • Special companions like Jaws have “sets” and appearances, but more human companions can use any armor
  • Droid companions get unique items and armor
  • Tattooine is and open world, all classes go there
  • Companion system going through at least one more iteration – stay tuned!
  • There are some Force using companions
  • You cannot sell your companion :)
  • There is a medical probe option to resurrect your character in-place instead of running back – puts you in stealth so you can go re-buff nearby
  • There is a respawn timer if you die in quick succession
  • There will be world bosses
  • Warp to bind point ability is available
  • Starships cannot be summoned anywhere.
  • Everything is the actual size it needed to be (i.e. ships designed outside to accommodate inside)
  • Companions can resurrect players and other companions

If you watched the stream, you know that the quality was turned down a bit both in the settings and bandwidth to assure good performance. But Stephen Reid remarked that there will be HD Tattooine footage on SWTOR.com later in the week.

You can find an archived recording of the event here.

 

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Jun 6, 2011

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E3 2011 – Daniel Erickson & Corey Butler Video Interviews

Aside from all of the other info that came out of E3 for TOR fans today, there were a couple of external interview videos released as well. It appears they both came out of some sort of media day recently at EA’s Redwood Shores office. They don’t provide any real new information, but they do sort of cover things we’ll see at E3, and there are some tidbits here and there!

First up, Machinima talked to Daniel Erickson, and the end result is the usual entraining and engaging talk that DE always delivers:

Next, in an official EA video, Corey Butler gives an overview of the game as well as new E3 stuff:

Both videos are well worth a watch if you’re an avid TOR fan. And lets face it… if you’re reading this, that’s you :)

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May 9, 2011

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Yellow Posts: Game Testing Has Gone International! Almost.

The big news of the week, aside from the Friday update of course, is that European Game Testing is on the way.  This is great news for our European friends as they will soon be able to get into the game, offer feedback, find possible bugs, and do some focused testing.

BioWare Senior Community Manager Stephen Reid made sure people knew that the email that folks were receiving was not an actual invite, but rather a notification that testing would begin soon:

Alright all, here’s some additional clarification.

First thing I want to clear up: this email was not an invite to Game Testing. (Sorry if you thought it was.) It was purely an email to encourage people to sign up for Game Testing in Europe.

Why did some of you get the email and others not? Here’s how it breaks down.

The email was sent to some European residents who have previously ‘opted in’ to receive marketing emails from EA. (You could have ‘opted-in’ on a variety of different web sites, and it’s possible you forgot that you did. )

It’s also possible that as well as signing up to get email from EA, you also signed up here at SWTOR.com (and even signed up to be a tester). You may still have received the email. I can understand your confusion, but basically, nothing has changed. You’re still on the list of people eligible to be selected for Game Testing.

Some of you may be signed up here on SWTOR.com but have not signed up to receive marketing emails from EA on another site. If that’s the case, you won’t be getting this email – but don’t panic. You are also still eligible for Game Testing.

To re-iterate: the email was not an invite to Game Testing. It was purely to spread the word about Game Testing, ideally to people who don’t already know. We have not sent any invites to Game Testing in Europe today.

Everyone living in Europe is still eligible to be selected for Game Testing, as long as they have signed up to be selected (at swtor.com/tester/). The email was sent in English, French and German as those are the primary languages for localization of the game.

Hope this clears things up a bit.

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May 3, 2011

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Yellow Posts: From The Wall of Crazy

Due to the sheer amount of developer interaction over the past week, this week’s Yellow Posts will be a consolidation of the more interesting and newsworthy…

While the topic of a release date is a touchy subject, thanks to a few posts from Stephen, we will “know” when the announcement is coming.

In terms of what I was trying to say, this pretty much sums it up. ^^

If I can have everyone reading this take away one thing, it’s this: when I use an example to explain something, that’s not a cryptic clue. Ever. Honestly, considering everything we say seems to get misintepreted, being cryptic about really important stuff just causes us problems.

My example was – you know that Christmas is coming. There are many signs to tell you so. So, just like Christmas, when we’re getting ready to announce the release date, there will be many signs to let you know. You won’t have to decipher clues, or look at tea-leaves, or consult a psychic – we’ll tell you. You don’t have to decipher anything to figure out Christmas is coming.

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Apr 28, 2011

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FSS 2011: Group Q&A Sessions With Developers

A big part of the Fan Site Summit this week was interaction with the developers whom are all busy working on our upcoming obsession.

While each site had the chance to interview one developer in a one-on-one situation, there were also Group Q&A sessions structured where each site in attendance could ask 1 or 2 questions.

The Group Q&A Sessions were as follows:

There wre some really great questions asked by all of the fan sites – from roleplaying to crafting to PvP to theorycrafting. In particular, the Georg Zoeller Q&A was great – Georg puts forth the same straight-forward approach he’s become known for on the forums.

Thanks to Brooks for handling the sound recording duties for these sessions, and providing us with quality audio!

Daniel and Blane

Daniel and Blane

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