'Little risk of failure': Analysts predict SWTOR will turn a healthy profit

@jimr9999us The Production Costs are high, the value... not so much. The game is nowhere near as polished as Rift was in beta =(

@Nasq The amount of work it takes to make a game like SWTOR is much higher than RIFT. Secondly, RIFT did have a near perfect launch, then same will happen with SWTOR. BioWare is ridiculously focused on a smooth launch.

@Nasq

Agreed Nasq, and I say this as someone who did pre-order the collectors edition. I also tend to agree with those who point out that long term the profit margin on SWOTR tighter since Lucas Arts does take such a large chunk of profit.

It will be interesting to see what happens in the next two years in regards to subscription numbers with this game. I keep hoping I'll find myself pleasantly surprised 6 months to 12 months down the line with the game. I'm not holding my breath after seeing so many different issues that I am concerned about but I do find myself hoping. :)

>>Grumms - The amount of work it takes to make a game like SWTOR is much higher than RIFT. Secondly, RIFT did have a near perfect launch, then same will happen with SWTOR. BioWare is ridiculously focused on a smooth launch.

@Celtar
bah how does it not put my post in there? I cut and paste Grimms remarks I wanted to focus on and then posted and none of my post goes in, just the cut and paste.

So since I have to repeat myself. I wanted to know Grimm what you mean by the amount of work being more for SWTOR vs Rift? I'm not tracking on that point. If your talking about the voice over work, I don't see that being a big add to the amount of work load. Now had Bioware done a decent full scale space system for the game I'd have agreed.

As to the launch, I agree with you that I think Bioware like Trion did, will have a smooth launch. Both companies put a lot of effort into it and I think that will pay off well for Bioware like it did for Trion.

@jimr9999us

The game mechanics seem to be mostly tried and proven mechanics from older games, mainly WoW (for the MMO part) and Bioware's own RPGs (for the solo content, companions, etc).

Which means I will not be picking it.

First, because I could never really play a Bioware RPG without abusing savegames. MMOs don't usually come with a "load game" button, and Bioware seems focused on making sure choices - even bad choices - can't be undone.

Second, because a lot of the mechanics I wanted to leave behind when I left WoW are right there in TOR. Cookie-cutter prone talent trees, raid locks, segregated dual factions, player base segregated in a number of servers, linear questing, etc. Even worse, WoW is actually changing a couple of those (manual cross-realm grouping for dungeon and LFR raids, introducing a new raid difficulty without raid locks, completely changing the way talent "trees" work in Mists of Pandaria), which means that I will most likely find WoW's mechanics quite more to my liking - and even fresher - than TOR's.

Third, because I'm done with MMOs that ask me to have multiple characters in order to fulfill every group role; if I can't have a character that can be Tank, Healer, and DPS (or whatever the roles in the MMO are), I'm not going to pick the MMO.

@Grumms How is it more work? Sure there is more voice acting, but that has nothing to do with the development of the actual game. I'd argue that SWTOR required less work than Rift, since it is built off of what is basically an "mmo maker/editor" (hero engine).

The smoothness of the launch has nothing to do with production value of the game. o.O

@jimr9999us considering where the global economy is going you may be right that we may not see another AAA title like this for some time. So enjoy what we have now.

@Misq2k

Did you read the article?

Because it completely denotes the wall of text you typed out.

@jimr9999us The game mechanics are the worst part of TOR, they just ripped mechanics from older MMOs. Or went the cheap route like the rail shooter.

The voice actors, at least the ones I recognize are top quality. And this is where most of the money went (aside from bloated exec salaries). Hell, they even got Avon from Blake's 7 doing voices. I don't, however, think the actors were utilized to their fullest -- as voice direction in games seems to be so damn monotone. The art textures, even though disagree with the style and most of the actual designs themselves (is this thousands of years before ANH or just 50?), is well done. The poured a lot of money into certain aspects, mainly the one thing they're hinging the game on: story.

@Lucidus

I'm pretty sure you've already told us 35 times in all the past SWTOR articles.

Go outside Lucidus. There's a beautiful world out there not full of baseless hatred.

@Misq2k 500-600 million. HAHAHAHA.

Half a billion.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Oh internet, thank you for the lolz this morning.

@Nasq

Yeah, it is as polished as Rift was. I did beta of both. The difference is that SWTOR is actually fun to play.

@Nasq eh i played rift beta and this in beta. last phase had more issue then previous one, but overall this game is more polished then rift was and have 100 time the content

@everyone accept Ludicrous

This all starting to look like that I will indeed get to see Bobby Kotick eating crow.

/dances for joy

@Grumms

While I'm very impressed with what Bioware have achieved, I found quite a few fairly serious bugs during this last weekend beta test.

It is definitely not as polished as Rift was at this stage.

@DarkWalker long term no they can't be undone, but for conversations, you can hit "escape" in the middle and restart the conversation as if it never occurred the first time. once its finished, it's finished, though.

@Nasq Rift was also created atop an existing engine.

What Bioware did differently, aside from the voice acting, is add choices to the quests. That had to take some serious work to implement, as the choices impact your character further down the road.

This is the main reason I had a hard time stopping over the past beta weekend - the quests sucked me in knowing I had choices that would affect my character later instead of accept quest, complete quest, rinse and repeat.

@Lucidus
@DarkWalker

The only reason you hate the mechanics of SWTOR is because one, you haven't gotten past level 20+ most likely or two, you haven't developed a rotation yet with you class.

Played a Jedi Guardian to level 33 and enjoyed it very much so. With many more abilities at that level I was constantly attacking without any complaints or lack there of.

I would rather feel comfortable with the mechanics, which I did, than to have something completely new. But if you are having a hard time or don't like the mechanics in SWTOR it's going to be hard pill to swallow when new combat mechanics come out for other future MMOs/Games in general when you can't grasp such a familiar combat style.