Star Wars: The Old Republic
Star Wars: The Old Republic (SWTOR) is a free to play 3D Sci-Fi MMORPG based on the popular Star Wars universe. SWTOR takes place 3000 years before the films, and allows players to become Jedi, Sith, Bounty Hunters, Troopers, and other iconic classes! Each class features a custom storyline, complete with fully voice acted dialogue and dynamic questions that allow players to make meaningful choices that impact their own personal story.
As players progress they will meet a variety of class specific companions, each with their own special traits and behavior. These companions come with detailed armor sets, unique abilities and personal stories that progress alongside the players. Players will also gain access to a class specific ship, which allows players to travel in between planets and engage in space combat missions.
As a Free-to-Play player, some restrictions are present when attempting PvE dungeons/raids and PvP battlegrounds. A F2P player can only participate in 5 battlegrounds and can only gain loot from the bosses in the first 3 dungeons they attempt every week; players are also restricted from doing any Raids as a completely F2P player.
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Additional Information
Latest Updates
Looking for something to play that captures the scale of World of Warcraft without the monthly fee?
1 day agoI mean...who plays SWTOR for the stories, right? (/sigh)
2 days agoMore events return as players wait on new content.
1 month agoMinimum System Requirements (Windows)
Windows 7 / 8
Memory4 GB or better
Storage15 GB
Intel Pentium Dual Core G6960 2.93 GHz / AMD Phenom II X3 B75 or better
GraphicsNvidia GeForce 465 GTX / ATI Radeon HD 5850 or better
Additional NotesSpecifications may change during development
I've played this for a long time, and this is a great addition to the scifi mmo community. Thoroughly enjoyable content across multiple planets.
...
Until you hit endgame, anyway. When you look back at each class storyline, at first it seems as if the content has huge variety, but once you get to a certain point - such as the planet Corellia, around levels 47-50 for Republic characters, you realize nothing before truly mattered, aside from gaining lightside/darkside points or affinity with a favored NPC companion. Your choices at the battle of Corellia make or break your legacy at the end. You can play up to level 55, and from there you cannot progress any further without producing money and paying for extra levels and story content (and equipment). If you do, you can progress up to level 70.
Pro's:
-Great graphics.
-Companions have great personality and strange quirks.
-Sense of challenge and adventure.
Con's:
-Huge game size: Around 19 GB installed.
-Newest content requires purchase of expansion packs and subscription status.
-Pay to win. The most challenging missions with the biggest rewards require equipment purchased with real money.
-If you cannot afford the previous two, at the very end (level 50-55) You find yourself indefinitely in limbo - you cannot progress to the more difficult missions available at your level due to lack of purchased equipment. You will die trying.
Introduction: I have been playing this game since beta mode becasue I was an insane fan of Star Wars (I still love it but not that much when I was a kid) and this game quite changed through many patches expansions but latest expansion gave insane system core improvements, crafting changes etc, that I could talk about for hours, but some points still ruins/highs up the game so here we are:
-Pro's:
-Very good storylines (for story fans I would recommend reading Knights of the Old Republic comics and play RPG by the same name, before playing TOR)
-Enough content
-Very decent leveling system
-Friendly community
-Con's:
-Still p2w
-Free-to-play mode is just a feeling of "getting stabbed in the back"
-Very reapetitive and boring quests/operations
-Poor customization without buying additional appearance packs (hairs, races etc)
-Poor support
-Dead servers
Final thoughts: its a must try for newbies looking for good stories and star wars fans with good atmosphere and galaxy, but lacking of many things that others MMO's has isnt calling to stay for long.
I subscribed to this game for about a year, and pushed my character well into the endgame (which, like all MMOs, turns into a dungeon running grindfest... No really compelling content) - what finally drove me away is the complete apathy of the devs to anything not related to the cash shop (got bugs? Too bad, but we've got a new pack to buy!) and the broken PvP. Hacks abound, with the most popular being speed hacks (also drops skill CDs to <1sec) and warp. Even the Galactic Starfighter, almost a game in itself, is full of exploits, to the point where skill and gear are irrelevant next to the god mode.
Find a hacker and document them breaking the game? Great! They'll get a 1 week ban every time they get caught. Support is a joke. If you're looking for mediocre, repetitious PvE mechanics and gimmicky nostalgia, this is the place to be. If you're looking for good PvP, seek elsewhere.
As far as the game itself goes, it isn't bad at all I must say. The story for almost all classes is not only interesting, but highly entertaining. Playing as a Sith warrior, Imperial agent, Republic trooper, and a smuggler, I can say that each of these four classes have either amazing stories, or awesome character interactions. I love the romance aspect between you and your companions, and even some of the characters outside your party (For example, a certain sergeant you meet as the republic trooper). I had a wonderful time progressing my characters.
All that being said, and as a huge Star Wars fan myself, it pains me to see such an amazing game ruined with it's fees. People say things like, "quit complaining f2p" like because we either don't want to spend the money, or even don't have the money to spend, than all these points suddenly become invalid. I'll spend money on a game if it's good enough, or if the prices are fair. This game, in it's current state, is not worth the amount you'd be paying. If they were to do what ESO is doing, or even what WoW is doing, it'd be a bit more reasonable. Maybe charge players for the game initially, then have micro-transactions for extra in-game content. As it is now, the only thing I'd know to compare it to is Runescape, but with the (as I mentioned) pvp items that you need to buy with real money or cartel coins.
"You, cash cow give us money, you gain a few hotbars and can carry more then 30 items and sprint at lvl 1 and more, But no money and we make your time playing a living hell."
unquote
Pros: give money and it's a good mmo.
Cons: don't give money and it's Shit(poop, crap, not worth it.)
You have to pay them to even make a bug report.
so if you find a Game breaking bug and your a FTP then you cant even report it LOL
I rate this game at -10 out of 10 for Free to pay, oops i mean play.
~ David a player that will give money to GOOD or great FTP games.
Cosmetic gear is easy to get, too, especially if you're leveling with a friend. You get social points for questing with another person, which you can use to unlock sets of cosmetic gear from each planet, so there's quite a few sets that are available. You can also get a lot of sets from the Galactic Market (auction house) for credits, which you earn through questing. If you are subscribed, you get 500 cartel coins per month to spend in the Cartel Market. Cartel coins are the currency that cost real money. You don't NEED it to play the end-game well. I have raided with people who are F2P and do better than I could. Most of the stuff in the Cartel Market is cosmetic: mounts, pets, armor sets (without stats, purely cosmetic), race unlocks, character customization unlocks (not that there is a lack of customization, it just unlocks some more options like white eyes or more tattoos), and companion skins (you can buy some of these from a vendor for in-game currency anyway). And not only that, almost all of the items from the Cartel Market can be purchased and then re-sold on the Galactic Market for the in-game currency, so F2P players can, theoretically, access a lot of the Cartel Market items without needing the spend any real money.
But trust me, this game is deserving of your subscription.
However, I will admit the F2P is not fun, for me at least. You are very, very limited on what you can do. The most frustrating thing is having a cap on your credits, which I think is 300k currently. Considering that most of the cool, high-end cosmetic items like mounts can run for 1 million credits, F2P players couldn't buy it from the Galactic Market if they wanted to. But like I said earlier, I know quite a few people in my guild who raid with us, and they are F2P players. I've never seen them complain, and they always do well. You can't buy epic gear with real money - you have to farm it out, just like everyone else. Which isn't too bad, either. Took me a few weeks of grinding dungeons to get enough gear to start raiding casually with my guild.
So is this game pay-to-win? No. But you certainly get a lot of perks and cosmetics for being subscribed.
Other than the non-existent pay-to-win issue, I only have a few minor complaints: the combat and movement can be choppy sometimes; if you play on a PVP realm, prepare to be ganked and camped often; the Republic and Empire classes mirror each other, so there's not as many classes as it seems at first (but you still get talent trees, which is nice); lastly, the customer service can be iffy - sometimes it's prompt and efficient, other times you're wondering if all you're getting is automated responses after days of waiting.
However, it's still a game worth playing, especially if you're into Star Wars. I'll admit, I'm not a big Star Wars fan, but my friend that I leveled with is, and we both had fun with the game.
tl;dr This game is not pay-to-win, you only get cosmetics with real money, and it's worth being subscribed if you like the game. Questing system is very fun and unique. Amazing voice acting. Choppy movement/combat at times. Very active game with a great community and fun events to bring guilds together.
Unfortunately I'm no longer playing this (WOW has hypnotized me, again) but hopefully soon-ish I shall return.
IF YOUR A STAR WARS FAN..... give SWTOR a try!
:D
Please remove star wars the old republic from being in free to play category,This "game" is not free to play but a demo.
Don't play this the leveling is too slow.
F2P for SWTOR is exactly as allacore666 described it - very restrictive and not very fun unless you buy add-on features via micro transactions (and that adds up quickly!).
As for the game play itself, it does have some good elements:
The class stories, the voice acting and the companions (pets) and their stories are novel and interesting.
But the bad outweighs the good:
EA doesn't fix any bugs and each patch introduces new ones.
Their developers do not play their own game and completely disregard the input of play testers, with the result each patch brings a new embarrassment. I recall patch 1.7 forced everyone to PVP naked, because your armor would actually make you weaker - took EA weeks to fix the problems even though the testers told them months in advance of the patch release.
To the Star Wars fan, this game does not feel like Star Wars. Yes, you have lightsabers and that's about it:
No pod races, no multiplayer space missions, no epic faction battles, no open-world PVP. In fact, PVP in warzones is often against your own faction and open-world PVP, which really only happens during special events, is just free-for-all ganking.
The same Imperial guilds have mirror chapters on the Jedi side and freely switch from one faction to another for trades and item transfers. Lightside vs. Darkside really doesn't exist in this game.
PVP is rather disappointing in general: the classes have some serious imbalances and EA has persistently failed to address these issues. Just as with any other game issues, EA also failed to fix bugs in warzones that have been around since launch in Dec. 2011.
Cross-server PVP, which was asked by and promised to the community never materialized either.
Any kind of PVP that involves more than 2 dozen players causes the Hero engine to generate unbearable lag (which is one of the reasons that open-world PVP and epic battles do not happen). In warzones, the lag can be tolerated since there are only 16 players fighting in a separate instance. SWTOR PVP has also quite a few cheaters, namely lag-switchers and speed-hackers. EA's enforcement of the EULA is very mild. If a cheater gets caught, which is rare enough, they receive an email warning. Repeat offenders get suspended for up to 1 week only, but lose nothing that they have gained by cheating (i.e. warzone points, credits, experience, ranks).
PVE missions and raids are faction-neutral. You do the same raids as a Jedi or an Imperial. But they are actually interesting the first time you do them. Later, when you have to grind them over and over they get boring very quickly. PVE is just like it is in any other MMO - the bosses have millions of hitpoints and special attacks, but once you learn the pattern (or watched the youtube video) they are all very easy. The only thing that keeps PVE lively (or frustrating) are the many bugs in all of the raids and missions.
The micro transactions in the game (Cartel market) borders on Pay-to-Win: you can generate millions of credits by selling Cartel items that you purchased with real money, then use these credits to buy yourself high-end gear without ever really playing the game or doing the raids.
Lastly, the community is not very friendly. While it is not as bad as some true F2P games such as LOL, don't expect anyone to help you or even answer your questions in chat or on the forums. Trolls are abundant and, as it is with cheaters, EA does practically nothing about it. In rare cases, 3-day chat suspensions are about the worst punishment that they might dish out.
Overall, SWTOR had a lot of potential but EA/Bioware did not keep the promises they made at launch. Hence, player numbers have been dropping steadily since launch.
Now the game is not worth the $15 sub and because it's F2P model is so draconian, it's not worth the free download either.
I've played this game at launch, payed for 3 months sub, upfront. Played all the classes at least once, stuck with my Bounty Hunter till lvl 50, managed to win a set of tier 1 pvp gear and I skipped about 20 lvls of story and solely focused on pvp because...
The story is absolute time wasting CRAP! Holy shit...hours of dialog, choices that do absolutely nothing to the gaming universe or to your story whatsoever.
So...I killed a hut, big deal...hes alive again for the next random guy to do the story mode. Oh and then, the hut I killed had his buddies try to hunt me down and kill me on some random planet, so I killed them. The same way I kill everything else, hit the "1" key...then "2"...then "3" and oh look, they're dead. Just like everything else.
Dungeon runs...whoop dee shit, do that crap over and over and over with ya damn eyes closed. Any dumbass can do this, even monkies could do it. And it's so boring, omg it's boring...least watching paint dry has some cool physics at the micro level about it.
Now, pvp is where its at, right? think again...Better than the damn story, but shank me dead, hours and hours, over and over again of trying not to die coz your teammates die, you lose buffs oh and look, you can't kill shit without them. And the enemy is IMMORTAL! I mean, you knock a guy senseless with a backhand, he has stars around his head not doing shit, and you gash his neck, stomach and then slowly drive your lightsaber down through his head and exiting his groin, and he takes a 10th of his healthbar in damage? wtf...and the guy is a damn smuggler, wearing cowboy leathers and boots...
I tell ya, this game did not impress me at all, just another stupid world of warcrap clone. Lucas Arts made some promises of innovation, feeling like a hero, changing the galaxy, imersive storyline etc etc...FAILED completely on all of it.
This game is JUNK JUNK JUNK!!!
This is also PVP too so in what aspect does a F2P stand a chance against a P2P if that F2P can never get on par with someone who is P2P?
Either make it subscription based completely like before or don't even bother to advertise F2P with these many heavy restrictions.
I agree with the post above. Just sounds like a trial version.
I have seen it all now tho. Pay to play, pay to enjoy, pay to compete, pay to win.. Stop labeling them F2P...
And how many models do these type of games go through.
Subscriptions
F2P
Microtransactions - IMO the worse model i have seen used. Free to play - Login and pay to enhance gameplay, meaning you have to buy almost everything to get into the higher content. Again don't bother to PVP unless you want your ass handed to you. War of legends wins that award.
If this game came out as a free model to begin with it is great stuff. Warframe has just as many restrictions and also much less content. So, for a free game or launching as a free game, it is good.
BUT! (here comes the hate)
This game did NOT come out as a free2play. It didn't even come out as a pay2play (like Guild Wars 1 and 2). It came out as a subscription game! The game was hardly ever worth the subscription model (I am a crazed Star Wars fan, and it was a really fun game because of that, yet STILL not worth a monthly subscription). Hence why it failed miserably. Oh, and the fact that after you bought the game with its 30 days free they forced you to buy a subscription plan as well for that to work, is a slap in the face and they should be ashamed.
The game, obviously, isn't worth a subscription fee, that is why it dropped to a f2p model. Now, for a f2p model it offers a lot, but nearly a lot as other mmo games. The quality and content is indeed better than most f2p games, but the restriction model is a disgrace. Other companies have gone to a f2p model and they are much more flexible, and they should be.
When a game falls from a subscription model to a f2p model it proves one thing, that people don't think it is worth the money developers think it is worth. The idea of turning into f2p is to make less at starters just to keep people coming, and to bring new people in as well. If successful, then it may even make as much money as the subscription model, or in same cases as we have seen in the past even more. These guys, offer NOTHING in the f2p model to keep people there. It isn't cheaper, it is the same thing in terms of costs. To play the game full, you have to pay s subscription!? To play the game full without paying for a subscription, you have to pay for 3 times the value of the game!? In both cases, WTF?
To play the game in an ok manner, you probably pay as much as the games value....... again, wtf people?
The developers obviously didn't get the point and are a bunch of greedy asses. The money that they milked in from this game already MORE than covered all profits and made them richer quite marginally than before, and gives them opportunity to be MUCH more flexible with it.
They should take example from such games as TERA (also went f2p) and of course GW2 (simply pay and play, end of story). So, of course, with so many ridiculous restrictions that actually affect the way you play, by comparisson it is a piece of shit that should burn and die out.
Worst part of all to prove how greedy as fk they are, previous subscribers and owners of the game get no or minimal (if any) benefits from the fact that they had actually payed for the title and for subscriptions. Subscribers have to either stop playing the way they did if they do not pay anymore, or keep paying subscriptions or even higher costs. Bull-----shit!
In other words, the game didn't go free to play. It just created a trial version for itself, that is why it sucks. They never stopped trying to force money out of customers, and EA along with BioWare should rot in hell and die out for ruining such a great opportunity of a game.
Shame on you BioWare, I respected you once. Thanks for putting your hand so far up my ass I can never feel the pain of rape again.
Stay away from this title people, it is an insult to old subscribers, current subscribers and future subscribers. It is not a f2p game, it is a trial version.
they let you do 3 free pvp match a day....and charge you 2.50$ to have unlimited as week...............they f-n charge you 90c to teleport NTY
Pros
- Eight different amazing story lines (each class has a different and unique story)
- Every class has five unique and interesting companions that travel with you all the time
- Every character is voiced and the acting is of high quality all the time
- Crafting is not boring and is easy to learn and pick up
- The community is actually pretty awesome
- Each world is different and has its own style, making exploring fun and engaging
Cons
- Free to play is restrictive, but I know people who have played the entire game that way and had no problems
This game is really good. It has its flaws just like every other game, but it's a solid MMO and I think everyone should give it a shot.
to much restriction and boring story
?
I better go back to STAR WARS CONQUEST
than freaking everything is free not like hey its free no month payment but you will not have all stuff in game antil you PAY!!! -.- 1 most thing i hate about mmorpg thats the onley thing i hate
1. You want a game that is INTERESTING, has good GRAPHICS, doesnt have any RESTRICTIONS based upon your status and you want it ALL FFOR FREE.
Basicly, you are asking for a satisficing experience from a company who has spent alot of money to fulfil your request, and you want it for FREE. From my point of view, I found the game interesting playing as a f2p player and realised, that I wont be satisfied with so many restrictions so I subsribed, because I have a job, I can support myself and I know, that everything COSTS MONEY, and NOTHING GOOD IS FOR FREE. Please sumbit a review about the game itslef, not how it has hurt you because you are a debt-beat....
Take it from a former player if you play this game at some point you will hvae to spend money. do not play this so called free to pay to play model that ea is reting to make you eat.
If you really want play play swtor you should just subscribe.
DOnt look at the free2play as a restriction look at it like a kick start.
So my opinion is just try out the game for yourself. Also I'm having a lot of fun as a free to play player, so just make your own decisions.One more thing before I go, if your a fan of mass effect or games where you make your own choices you'll absolutely love this game.
free to play sucks on this game
i mean omfg being a F2P player is like playing it ar uber hard mode
Good start on this "free" experience =/