Now the SWTOR beta has officially come to an end and we are all awaiting the December 20th launch that is just a couple more weeks away. While some were able to game test for an extended period of time, others were at least given a weekend to check it out and the reaction from the community of testers was mostly positive. Nearly everyone who tested and was surveyed said they would recommend the game to a friend. In honor of the end of beta and the upcoming launch of SWTOR, we are asking you all to share with us your favorite moments or experiences of beta testing- no matter how long or short your experience was. Did you play with friends or solo explore? Did you rush to level as quickly as you could or take your time to experience all of the story line? Did you try different…
TOR TV: The Inquisitor Takes You Through Athiss
Greetings good Sithizens and other lowly Jedi. Normally we make our Sith Inquisition posts here on Thursdays, but we just finished production on a very impressive video yesterday and we wanted to share it with all of you. This is a full playthrough of the Planet Athiss flashpoint from the perspective of the Inquisition’s Lord himself. We go through all three major bosses and get a basic grasp of the mechanics, as well as the trash and mechanics of the flashpoint overall. It’s just under an hour long, and brought to you in full 1080p eye bleeding quality. Feel free to ignore the chatter throughout the video, we were discussing the flashpoint, some basic mechanics, and other happening during the last day of beta, but I turned it down specifically so the audio of the flashpoint could be heard. You can find more great videos of The Old Republic Here!
A 43-Year Old Gamer’s Rant about SWTOR
The thread, “Seriously!? (great wall of text from a 43 year old gamer)” is posted on the Official SWTOR forums and is well worth a read, despite the fact it’s roughly 1,000 words long. While it is a rant, the TLDR version will give you some insight to the game and it also makes you think for a minute before whining and complaining about SWTOR. Of course we get that it’s every gamer’s right to whine and complain when they don’t like something but then again, we have to be realistic about our expectations from the games we play these days. While I’m nearly half his age [EDIT: LOL Lisa 😉 ], I’ve been playing video games, including MMORPGs nearly as long as I can remember and I agree with much of what he has to say. A snippet: “I shake my head (but understand) at 90% of the poster’s…
SWTOR Brings in 2 Million Game Testers
We know that SWTOR is popular. In fact, unless you’ve been living the past few months under a rock, you are aware of the hype that surrounds this upcoming MMO. What you might not know is just how much interest there really is in the game. There is such a strong interest in SWTOR that Bioware has broken records with pre-orders and possibly records with game testing as well since they brought in 2 million game testers- all volunteer testers at that. Testers averaged 12 hours each over Thanksgiving, according to Gamespot.com. Instead of enjoying turkey with the fam (or maybe after enjoying their dinners) there were still tons of gamers who found time to pop in and check out SWTOR for themselves. EA says more than 725,000 unique players joined the game over the Thanksgiving weekend, making it “one of the biggest beta tests in history.” 2.4 million gamers…
Macro Possibilities in SWTOR
One of the biggest complaints to come out of SWTOR testing so far has been the lack of auto-attack. Another “issue” with the game so far is that there is no ability to create macros. As any MMO vet will tell you, macros are essential to play the game to its fullest potential. There are also certain games and classes that would be nearly impossible to play efficiently without great macros (think of warriors in WoW). The only way to do this currently in SWTOR is with the Razer keyboard and while it (and the mouse) are pretty darn nifty, we don’t all have the funds to spend on such items just to get the most out of our game. They can be very pricey- after you’ve already paid a great deal on the game itself. When staff was asked if they would change this in the future, they did…
SWTOR Mosaic – What to Do with 13,000 SWTOR Screenshots
So what would you do with 13,000 SWTOR screenshots from the beta? There are probably a lot of ideas you can come up with but will any of them be as cool as what this player did? Michael Guy (t0liman) created a fantastic SWTOR mosaic out of all of this screenshots from the final beta weekend. He captured over 24 hours of game time on the final weekend of SWTOR beta and also created a 35 minute montage video from the screenshots: This is how he says he did it: “Using “Foto-Mosaik-Edda” to do the heavy work of rendering the mosaic, I then reduced the size to fit the 10mb file limits for twitter using Photoshop (Plus, finding the point between juggernaut 200 megapixel posters and “instantly crash all apps in windows” with 8GB RAM, 400 megapixel’s, then working out how to resize 900mb PNG’s to 9mb, is fun) the…
Walmart SWTOR Pre-Order Fiasco
Uh-oh! Sounds like Walmart has goofed on gamers who pre-ordered copies of SWTOR from the retail giant. Great concern surfaced today from customers who had preordered their copies of SWTOR from Walmart only to find out that the retailer had cancelled their status but failed to notify buyers of the news. The official forums for the game were set ablaze overnight with complaints from gamers who say they preordered from Walmart but that when they went to check on their order it said they were cancelled on Saturday “due to a lack of product availability.” You can imagine the panic that ensued as gamers worried whether or not they would be getting their copy of the game, especially with the launch date quickly approaching. Bioware’s Online Community Manager Stephen Reid also acknowledged the issue on the Old Republic forums: “Hello everyone, We will investigate this issue ASAP, although we may…
SWTOR Pre-Launch Guilds Are Locked
Its official now- SWTOR pre-launch guilds are locked. If you didn’t get your info in on time, you will now have to wait until after launch to sort out your guild. Per SWTOR official news: “Today we are announcing that the Pre-Launch Guild Program for Star Wars™: The Old Republic™ has come to an end. Guilds that have met the prerequisite of having four members redeem their Pre-Order Codes at our Code Redemption Center are now locked for transfer into the game in time for our December 20th launch. If your guild has qualified for import, you can expect to receive an email at some time over the next several days. This email will give you further details on how to check the status of your guild as well as further details about how to join your guild once you’re in the game. Your email will also tell you which…
The Guild Sphere: Aureus Knights
It’s the first day after the end of the last Beta session of Star Wars: The old republic. I hope you all had as much fun as I did. In today’s column The Aureus Knights took the time to answer our questions. Aureus Knights are a world wide community of online gamers. Although many members are MMO veterans from the early UO, EQ and MUD days, the members span all demographics and play styles. The guild strive for a fun, laid back and social gaming environment that anyone can feel welcome in and enjoy. read more after the jump. Where did your guilds name come from? Aureus is latin for Gold. So our name means Golden Knights. The guilds founders were sitting in EQ2 (the game where our guild was first formally created) and we wanted to create a name involving Knights but we didn’t want to be one of the million…
TOR TV: What to Know
Youtuber LumpOfCole has created a short video guide on all the basics there is to SWTOR – Assuming of course that you know how to play a MMORPG. This is a great video for people who haven’t played the Beta or didn’t get there characters past level 10. Definitely a video I would recommend people to share with there fellow guild members and friends who will be green when SWTOR goes live. Enjoy!
Amazon Germany Showing SWTOR Ship Day December 15th
Possibly due to stocking days when most stores fill up their shelves, some reports are saying that SWTOR will ship to Europe on December 15th. This news came after the confirmation that SWTOR would, in fact, be a worldwide release on December 20th and that European players would not have to wait days after North America to get the game for themselves. Some gamers are reporting stores in Europe letting them pick up pre-orders on the 13th as well as having email alerts of shipping on the 15th or arrival by December 15th. One poster on Reddit had this to share: I just got an email from Amazon (Germany), stating that the “release date” of SWTOR has been moved up to the 15th and that they will ship it earlier because of that. However, the email also states that the official start is still the 20th and only preorders will…
The great hunt: SD-01 Strategy
Welcome to “the great hunt”. Our new column here at SWTOR strategies, were we will talk strategies for each world boss in the game. My name is Zexu and I’ll be running through how to defeat every world boss on the Galactic republic worlds. Today we’ll be going over SD-01, a large droid found on Corusant. This footage was taken during the November 25th weekend beta test, so SD-01’s abilities may have changed. This encounter was completed with ten players at levels 16 through 20. We used two tanks (Jedi Shadow and Jedi Guardian), three healers(Scoundrel, Sage and Commando) and five DPS. Let’s go over his abilities. SD-01 has two abilities. The first ability is applied to the highest threat target IE your tank. The stack increases how much damage the tank takes. It stacks up to ten times making your tank un-healable. To combat this simply have an off…
Intergalactic Intel: Bounty Hunter and Jedi Knight
“This is the last one before your posts go back to normal right?” “Yep!” I was excited to finish this last article, new ideas, the podcast, so much to do. “Did you figure out a name for the podcast?” I nodded. “Not a pun like Kai wanted, but still good. Galactic Transmission.” As stated there is a lot to do. Just a few reminders before we begin as always, this is a simple review and the classes can change greatly towards the end of their levels. Tomorrow a video of myself and a few friends killing the SD-01 boss with commentary, and strategy will be up. Finally I would like to welcome my good friend and my brother Curoar to the podcast team. Next week I’ll have our first live show of Galactic Transmission, on Friday. Without further ado, the Bounty Hunter and Jedi Knight. Bounty Hunter: Story: I highly…
Anthony Daniels C-3PO in SWTOR
If you thought you heard a familiar voice coming from one of the droids in SWTOR, chances are you were right. If you keep your ear out for it, you will be able to hear and confirm that Anthony Daniels, the actor who played C-3PO in all of the Star Wars films is also in SWTOR. IMDB lists him in the full voice cast but doesn’t specifically list the character(s) that he plays but many people have recognized the voice while testing the game. IMBD also says of Anthony Daniels: In addition to playing C-3PO in all six “Star Wars” films, he played the part in the NPR radio dramatizations of “Star Wars” (1981), “The Empire Strikes Back” (1983), and “Return of the Jedi” (1996). See more trivia » He was born February 21, 1946 in Salisbury, Wiltshire, England, UK and his voice acting of C-3PO is probably his most…
Friday update – Choose Your Side: Imperial Agent vs. Jedi Consular
This Friday’s Update brings us a new Choose Your Side video featuring the Consular vs. the Agent, and a Pre-Order Announcement for Razer’s Old Republic Peripherals. The Agent vs. Consular video contains footage of the many abilities available to each class, along with testimonials from members of the Bioware team like Alexander Freed, and Jo Berry stating their cases on who’d win. Lisa already covered the Razer story yesterday, so I won’t get any more into that one, but enjoy the movie below: From the moment we announced the eight classes in Star Wars™: The Old Republic™, fans have been pitting them against each other, arguing who would have the advantage in a one-on-one fight. The hallways of BioWare echo this debate, with the writers, combat designers and other developers all chiming in on which class they feel reigns supreme. In the latest entry of our series “Choose Your Side,”…
Mirrored Classes According to MMORPG.com
Michael Bitton from MMORPG.com has been sharing their own opinions and updates about SWTOR. Recently they wrote about five “not-so-great” things about SWTOR. This is actually refreshing with all the good news going around and all the hype about the game. Seeing negatives keeps the balance and it keeps it real. No game is perfect, even if it seems close. However, they later admitted that they forgot one important thing on their original list so they wrote a new feature and dedicated it all to this one omission- mirrored classes. Here’s what they had to say about mirrored classes: Having mirrored classes generally implies that each class has a counterpart on the opposing faction, but in Star Wars: The Old Republic this idea is taken quite literally. SWTOR’s class mirrors are actually not just extremely similar, but identical. For example, if you’ve played a Smuggler, you’ve played an Imperial Agent,…
Razer’s TOR Peripherals Available Soon
Are you a SWTOR-aholic? You’ll be happy to hear that computer hardware designed by Razer for The Old Republic will soon be on sale. We know it won’t be long now because Amazon launched product pages for the items that will be available. You can’t place any pre-orders at this time but you can look through the photos to get an idea of what your options are so you can decide which ones you want to invest in. At this time, there are 4 gaming accessories available from Razer. TOR Gaming Headset- All gamers need a good headset to keep up with all the action within the game. This particular headset features a 5.1 surround sound with three-dimensional audio that will surely give you a tactical advantage. The sound is clear and precise so you can keep up with everything around you and the suggested retail price is $129.99. TOR…
New Level 10 Ability – Emergency Fleet Pass
For those of you in game testing, you might have noticed something pretty cool when you leveled back up to level 10 on your new characters. There is a new ability, although there is some confusion about its actual purpose. As the Reddit poster explains: “This should make some people happy. Decided to level a Sith Warrior on the friends & associates beta server tonight while the main beta servers were down, hit level 10, and this popped up. Edit: Here’s the downside – it currently has an 18 hour cooldown.” So what do you think of it? Personally, I’m thinking the cooldown is way too long to really be useful. It might help you out if you get stuck and want to avoid killing yourself and it could be a quick way to get back to your hub city when your hearth isn’t up. It could be helpful to…
SWTOR Original Music Tracks on Facebook
Are you counting down the days to December 20th yet? There are any hyped up fans who wish they had a time machine to take them to the 15th-20th so they can begin playing immediately. You are not alone because I am right there with you. The folks who run the official SWTOR Facebook page want to help us on the countdown to launch so they have a treat in store for those who follow them on Facebook. As they posted on their Facebook page: As we are on our final stretch to launch on December 20th, we have a special treat for all of you! Starting today, and continuing every day until launch, we will release one music track from STAR WARS: The Old Republic right here on Facebook! Spread the word and don’t forget to ‘like’ us on Facebook so you don’t miss a single track! We will…
SWTOR Will Have Time Cards
It’s getting closer to launch day and if you’re part of the many getting prepared, you might be ready for stocking up on game cards now. For those who were concerned about whether or not they will have a credit card to use for SWTOR subscriptions, Stephen Reid had some useful info to pass along via Twitter: @streamingpirate We’ll have time cards. As we said in the pre-order FAQ… from July. 😉 That pre-order FAQ he’s referring to states this: “I don’t want to pay my subscription using a credit card. Is there any other way to purchase subscription time? You can use your PayPal account to pay for your monthly subscription. You can also purchase 60-day pre-paid subscription cards through your preferred video game retailer.” And can be found right here. This is great news for anyone who doesn’t have or doesn’t want to use a credit card for…
Beta Patch notes: 0.742.27 ( Build Date: 2011.12.01)
BioWare just pushed out a new build for the SWTOR beta today. Here are the patch notes of what was changed. For the first time we are trying to include tooltips from Torhead. Please give us a heads up how it works for you as we are not sure if we should keep them yet. Anyways.. Here are the latest patch notes: General Experience gains on Origin Worlds have been adjusted to help solo players reach level 10 more easily. Improved the overall performance of vanity pets. Using the /stuck command will no longer kill the player unless a safe location cannot be determined. Players can now only use /stuck every 120 seconds. Moving to a new planet instance no longer uses the player’s Quick Travel cooldown. Classes and Combat General Further improved and balanced all class content above level 30. Slightly increased mouse targeting distance. Implemented improvements that increase…
The Sith Inquisition: Kotick Attacks The Old Republic; Experts Fight Back
In a recent articles , Bobby Kotick, head of Activision, publicly stated that he felt The Old Republic had little real chance of success, not only because Lucasarts was going to drain most of the revenue their direction, but because the amount EA needs to receive in the number of subscriptions from launch or withing one quarter of launch is simply too high. He went on to describe other minor points of error he felt were important, but they simply weren’t important enough to be restated here. Experts immediately retorted with accusations that Kotick, despite being one of the biggest heavy hitters in the industry, had no real information or facts to back up what he was saying. One analyst, Michael Pachter was quoted as saying, “Based on used commentary and user surveys, the profit potential for The Old Republic is high.” This outpouring of support from industry experts begs the…
Gamepro slams Star Wars: The old republic
We read through many many reviews of Star Wars: the old republic here at swtorstrategies. Most of them are positive about the game, but from time to time you come by people that really don’t like the game. Here is one from gamepro were the staff won’t be playing SWTOR when it comes out in a few weeks.
Torhead Launch Contest
We are all about bringing you cool and awesome stuff so we had to make a post to tell you about Torhead’s launch contest where you have a chance to win some really neat prizes. There will be a grand prize and first, second and third prizes just in time to help you get the most of your gaming experience with SWTOR. Grand prize features the Astro A40 Gaming Headset and Razer Naga. I currently use the Naga and I love it. These are really awesome prizes and it’s easy to get your own chance to win. As explained by Torhead: “With the big Star Wars: The Old Republic Beta Test Weekend kicking off soon, we are celebrating the launch of Torhead with some awesome loot. Even though Torhead is able to garner a lot of TOR’s information automatically what really makes the site great are the user contributions. This…