Star Wars the Old Republic: Limited Pre-order is now available.

[xfreidax]

I think you missed his point Sosseres. When you roll a toon in Rift, you can switch classes within the class archetype at will.

To give you an example, my rogue in Rift. I had 5 different specs that I could instantly switch to so long as I'm out of combat. And the 5 specs are very different, with completely different play-styles.
1.) Assassin pvp build. Stealth based spike DPS ganker. Strong against casters. Melee class.
2.) Marksman pvp build. Debuffer/DPS, kiting style play. Ranged class.
3.) Bladedancer pvp build. Dodge based melee DPS. Good against other melee. Melee class.
4.) Bard pvp build. My support hybrid. Buffs, heals and can soak damage because I pair it with the tank class. Ranged class.
5.) PVE tank build. My only pve build for tanking instances.

My mage.
1.) Pyromancer pvp build. Fire based glass cannon caster. At one stage in the game, can literally 2 shot people.
2.) Stormcaller pvp build. Lightning based AOE caster. Very effective in certain maps where there are choke points.
3.) Warlock/Necromancer pvp build. DOT based caster with high HP. The bane of assassins, kite dot kite dot, dead rogue.
4.) Dominator pvp build. CC/debuffer based caster. Drains mana/energy, debuffs healing, aoe snares, instant polymorphs. Cleric killer.
5.) Chloromancer pve build. My only pve mage build. For healing instance runs.

No other mmo in the market right now offers this type of class flexibility. Not to this extent at least.

[vicious796]

Anybody else actually playing SWTOR besides me? They cleaned it up real nice since the last beta build. Bought it this weekend to avoid the opening weeks of bad.

[lazarus626]

I've enjoyed playing KOTOR but didn't really pay attention to the SW:TOR MMO. I tried a few MMOs but I only felt EVE online justified itself in that genre (there might be a few others I've forgotten about). But Most games would've been better played as a single player or at a multiplayer level, but not as an MMO. Very few games felt like it's gameplay benefited from the MMO experience (I dare say, it sometimes even cheapens the experience).

Nevertheless, I'm kinda intrigued about the tragic events that followed the Revan/Meetra tandem (why bioware.. why?!), as well as the various sabre/force forms. So does this game allow me to play as a gray jedi or a dark jedi focusing on niman/jar'kai and tràkata sabre techniques? I also thought that the Darth Traya style of telekinetically wielding sabres (or even telekinetically wielding a double-bladed sabre) would be so awesome.

(click to show/hide)

Niman/Jar'kai: is a well-balanced sabre form usually employed for dual-wielding lightsabres.
Tràkata : is the technique that turns a lightsabre on/off in the proper timing to bypass enemy lightsabre defenses.

Having a heightened level of force prescience could act like the jedi version of spider-sense, allowing full spatial awareness within a limited range from the user, which should allow the use of tràkata on multiple blades with deadly efficiency.

[TMRNetShark]

Anybody else actually playing SWTOR besides me? They cleaned it up real nice since the last beta build. Bought it this weekend to avoid the opening weeks of bad.

I've been playing the shit out of it. I have a lvl 20~ for a Trooper, BH, and IA... the IA is my main (and by far the COOLEST).

Even the opening weeks weren't bad... until launch day when the servers were swamped and ques were about 30 minutes-2 hours. 

All in all, I'm paying next months sub for sure.

[xfreidax]

A lot of bugs. More than I expected. Chat not working. Space combat not working. Joining warzones kicking you to character select. Resource nodes bugging out. No loot from instance bosses. Game is stuck on medium graphics, this one I have no idea how it got past beta. Companions bugging out.

Otherwise a decent mmo. My fear of it being a massively single player game turned out unfounded. I've done lots of grouping just leveling. The heroic missions are a nice touch. Instances seem a little simple so far, too simple for my taste. The only mechanic used is boss enrage timers and don't stand in aoe. The voice acting is good and adds value, though your dialogue choices don't actually change and affect much. PVP feels clunky, especially as melee. Zero world pvp right now, this is a big minus for me.

I'm playing an Imperial agent, operative. Swiftsure server.

[Proin Drakenzol]

Just picked it up. Pretty interesting so far, playing a Pureblood Sith Sorcerer. Just hit level 11.

Alcea on the Ajunta Pall PVP-RP server.

(click to show/hide)

Alcea, also known as Hollyhock, means "ambition" in the language of flowers. It was also the symbol of the Tokugawa Shogunate. And appropriate name for a Sith, imo. Also, I like flower names for females.

My first MMORPG was Rift (which I still like a lot) and this game has a different feel to it. I really like the role/soul system Rift uses and not having "roots" for the "tree" is kind of weird. OTOH, the quest have been much more engaging than those in Rift, I like the voice acting, it's a nice touch, as are the responses.

The biggest negatives to me, so far, are a lack of speech bubbles for /say (I don't like trying to watch the chat window if I'm talking to a another player in /say or /party and it breaks immersion for RP) and the locked in Action Bars. My Rift setup is the main action bar, two more horizontal ones to the right of it (stacked on top of each other) and a vertical bar on the left side of the screen. My only option is two stacked in the center and then one on each side (that I've found so far). I also don't like that I can't reposition where windows are when they open. I like looking at the character screen front and center, not to the left or right without me even being able to control that.

So far the single player aspect has been pretty cool and I like that I can play a light-side Sith. The interface itself is still a little clunky. The way they do instances is interesting and the whole setting has a lot of verisimilitude that other MMORPGs I've seen lack.

And the female Sith inquisitor voice is <3.

Has anybody found how to make macros, yet? I'm making a healer and the ability to cast @mouseover rather than having to select targets would be nice. That way I can still have the enemy selected for the occasional FORCE LIGHTNING!

Nevertheless, I'm kinda intrigued about the tragic events that followed the Revan/Meetra tandem (why bioware.. why?!), as well as the various sabre/force forms. So does this game allow me to play as a gray jedi or a dark jedi focusing on niman/jar'kai and tràkata sabre techniques? I also thought that the Darth Traya style of telekinetically wielding sabres (or even telekinetically wielding a double-bladed sabre) would be so awesome.

You can play as a darkside Jedi or a lightside Sith if you want. Jedi Consular Shadows and Sith Inquisitor Assassins use double-bladed lightsabers and are either tanks or dps. Jedi Knight Sentinels and Sith Warrior Marauders both dual-wield lightsabers.

[vicious796]

A lot of bugs. More than I expected. Chat not working. Space combat not working. Joining warzones kicking you to character select. Resource nodes bugging out. No loot from instance bosses. Game is stuck on medium graphics, this one I have no idea how it got past beta. Companions bugging out.

Oh my God, really? I've seen the resource nodes bugging out but I'm curious as to whether or not that's a spawning problem and/or someone collected it recently and for some reason it never despawned but still isn't collectible for some reason. However, I've had no problems with chat, space combat, warzones, loot, or graphics settings. None.

Otherwise a decent mmo. My fear of it being a massively single player game turned out unfounded. I've done lots of grouping just leveling. The heroic missions are a nice touch. Instances seem a little simple so far, too simple for my taste. The only mechanic used is boss enrage timers and don't stand in aoe. The voice acting is good and adds value, though your dialogue choices don't actually change and affect much. PVP feels clunky, especially as melee. Zero world pvp right now, this is a big minus for me.

I'm playing an Imperial agent, operative. Swiftsure server.

Your warzone problems might come from being Empire - you're greatly outnumbering the Republic players right now by everyone's smell tests. World PvP will come with time, people are focused on leveling right after launch, after all, and the live and let live sentiment is abundant. Start some, though, and I'm sure you'll find someone camping you sooner than later.

Just picked it up. Pretty interesting so far, playing a Pureblood Sith Sorcerer. Just hit level 11.

Alcea on the Ajunta Pall PVP-RP server.

(click to show/hide)

Alcea, also known as Hollyhock, means "ambition" in the language of flowers. It was also the symbol of the Tokugawa Shogunate. And appropriate name for a Sith, imo. Also, I like flower names for females.

My first MMORPG was Rift (which I still like a lot) and this game has a different feel to it. I really like the role/soul system Rift uses and not having "roots" for the "tree" is kind of weird. OTOH, the quest have been much more engaging than those in Rift, I like the voice acting, it's a nice touch, as are the responses.

The biggest negatives to me, so far, are a lack of speech bubbles for /say (I don't like trying to watch the chat window if I'm talking to a another player in /say or /party and it breaks immersion for RP) and the locked in Action Bars. My Rift setup is the main action bar, two more horizontal ones to the right of it (stacked on top of each other) and a vertical bar on the left side of the screen. My only option is two stacked in the center and then one on each side (that I've found so far). I also don't like that I can't reposition where windows are when they open. I like looking at the character screen front and center, not to the left or right without me even being able to control that.

So far the single player aspect has been pretty cool and I like that I can play a light-side Sith. The interface itself is still a little clunky. The way they do instances is interesting and the whole setting has a lot of verisimilitude that other MMORPGs I've seen lack.

And the female Sith inquisitor voice is <3.

Has anybody found how to make macros, yet? I'm making a healer and the ability to cast @mouseover rather than having to select targets would be nice. That way I can still have the enemy selected for the occasional FORCE LIGHTNING!

Nevertheless, I'm kinda intrigued about the tragic events that followed the Revan/Meetra tandem (why bioware.. why?!), as well as the various sabre/force forms. So does this game allow me to play as a gray jedi or a dark jedi focusing on niman/jar'kai and tràkata sabre techniques? I also thought that the Darth Traya style of telekinetically wielding sabres (or even telekinetically wielding a double-bladed sabre) would be so awesome.

You can play as a darkside Jedi or a lightside Sith if you want. Jedi Consular Shadows and Sith Inquisitor Assassins use double-bladed lightsabers and are either tanks or dps. Jedi Knight Sentinels and Sith Warrior Marauders both dual-wield lightsabers.

I, too, would like to make some macros but I don't think it's possible right now.

[xfreidax]

The game being stuck on medium graphics affects everyone. Nobody is running on high regardless of machine specs. Try setting your graphics from high to medium. You will notice the UI doesn't flash and nothing changes. Going from medium to low, you will see the UI reload. The only time you get to see the high rez textures is during cutscenes. Next time you're in your ship try this. Click on your holoterminal. The game will load the high rez textures for a second in preparation for a cutscene. You will see very clearly then that you are actually running the game on medium, regardless of what settings you have under settings. This is not working as intended. Bioware is patching in the fix with 1.1

The chat bugs are numerous. As you play more, I'm sure you will encounter them. Party chat will stop working for some people for no apparent reason. Guild chat will stop working on occasions as well. The only chat that works without fail is /say.

Space combat, one of the major bugs they just fixed. For many of the missions, the second you complete bonus objectives the game will crash. This affected the space station missions 100%. The other major bug with space combat, for some people ship blasters will stop working and do zero damage for no reason. Once you get this bug, your space missions will remain bugged forever. Reboot doesn't fix it, neither does doing a fresh install. You're stuck with a broken mini game where only missiles work.

World pvp will not come later. Unless they change the system. I've killed plenty of republic players but none of them ever come back. Because there is zero incentive to fight at all. You don't get valor, no xp, no credits, nothing. I make it a point every zone to hunt down the republic gankers. Kill them twice and they stop coming. I myself get bored of this within half an hour. The endgame pvp zone illum is empty because of this. Everybody is grinding warzones.

The resource nodes bugging out, what you see now is after the fix. Before, every other node you come across will be bugged. And once a node bugs out, it will remain that way until server restart. In some of the early zones, due to the number of people, about 75% of the nodes were bugged this way.

The instance bugs you will encounter once you start doing hardmodes. Wipe to a boss and you will get no loot from him. Doesn't happen all the time but it happens often enough to drive me nuts sometimes.

And I recently noticed another kinda amusing bug. Companions will drop dead for no reason after riding elevators lol. Get off the elevator, walk a few steps and I hear Kaliyo's death throes. Turn around to look and yup, she's lying dead on the floor. 

[AceHigh]

xfreidax, I like your way on giving report on issues and other things in this game. Can you give me a brief report on end game content from your experience once you get there? I will not touch an MMO until I hear some good things on end game content first, especially after the end game disappointment in AoC.

[TMRNetShark]

The game being stuck on medium graphics affects everyone. Nobody is running on high regardless of machine specs. Try setting your graphics from high to medium. You will notice the UI doesn't flash and nothing changes. Going from medium to low, you will see the UI reload. The only time you get to see the high rez textures is during cutscenes. Next time you're in your ship try this. Click on your holoterminal. The game will load the high rez textures for a second in preparation for a cutscene. You will see very clearly then that you are actually running the game on medium, regardless of what settings you have under settings. This is not working as intended. Bioware is patching in the fix with 1.1

The chat bugs are numerous. As you play more, I'm sure you will encounter them. Party chat will stop working for some people for no apparent reason. Guild chat will stop working on occasions as well. The only chat that works without fail is /say.

Space combat, one of the major bugs they just fixed. For many of the missions, the second you complete bonus objectives the game will crash. This affected the space station missions 100%. The other major bug with space combat, for some people ship blasters will stop working and do zero damage for no reason. Once you get this bug, your space missions will remain bugged forever. Reboot doesn't fix it, neither does doing a fresh install. You're stuck with a broken mini game where only missiles work.

World pvp will not come later. Unless they change the system. I've killed plenty of republic players but none of them ever come back. Because there is zero incentive to fight at all. You don't get valor, no xp, no credits, nothing. I make it a point every zone to hunt down the republic gankers. Kill them twice and they stop coming. I myself get bored of this within half an hour. The endgame pvp zone illum is empty because of this. Everybody is grinding warzones.

The resource nodes bugging out, what you see now is after the fix. Before, every other node you come across will be bugged. And once a node bugs out, it will remain that way until server restart. In some of the early zones, due to the number of people, about 75% of the nodes were bugged this way.

The instance bugs you will encounter once you start doing hardmodes. Wipe to a boss and you will get no loot from him. Doesn't happen all the time but it happens often enough to drive me nuts sometimes.

And I recently noticed another kinda amusing bug. Companions will drop dead for no reason after riding elevators lol. Get off the elevator, walk a few steps and I hear Kaliyo's death throes. Turn around to look and yup, she's lying dead on the floor. 

Hmmm. I've only noticed what you said about the high rez textures, the resource nodes, the companion death bug, and the no moving mouth on NPCs in cutscenes. The space combat one hasn't come up at all though. Everything else is what I've encountered and I have not had one crash to desktop yet.

No chat bugs either... maybe I'm just lucky and havn't noticed it yet XD

[vicious796]

The game being stuck on medium graphics affects everyone. Nobody is running on high regardless of machine specs. Try setting your graphics from high to medium. You will notice the UI doesn't flash and nothing changes. Going from medium to low, you will see the UI reload. The only time you get to see the high rez textures is during cutscenes. Next time you're in your ship try this. Click on your holoterminal. The game will load the high rez textures for a second in preparation for a cutscene. You will see very clearly then that you are actually running the game on medium, regardless of what settings you have under settings. This is not working as intended. Bioware is patching in the fix with 1.1

And here I just thought the high settings sucked. I wondered why my computer was in no way stressed over it.

The chat bugs are numerous. As you play more, I'm sure you will encounter them. Party chat will stop working for some people for no apparent reason. Guild chat will stop working on occasions as well. The only chat that works without fail is /say.

I suppose I will just have to play more - I mean, I've only played since Friday night. I haven't seen any, yet, but you're also not the only person I've seen with these remarks.

Space combat, one of the major bugs they just fixed. For many of the missions, the second you complete bonus objectives the game will crash. This affected the space station missions 100%. The other major bug with space combat, for some people ship blasters will stop working and do zero damage for no reason. Once you get this bug, your space missions will remain bugged forever. Reboot doesn't fix it, neither does doing a fresh install. You're stuck with a broken mini game where only missiles work.

Hmm, I've only done one space combat mission - do you think I should avoid the others until a fix comes?

World pvp will not come later. Unless they change the system. I've killed plenty of republic players but none of them ever come back. Because there is zero incentive to fight at all. You don't get valor, no xp, no credits, nothing. I make it a point every zone to hunt down the republic gankers. Kill them twice and they stop coming. I myself get bored of this within half an hour. The endgame pvp zone illum is empty because of this. Everybody is grinding warzones.

While I see your point and understand there is no incentive to world pvp right now, I still think in a month or two you'll see it more often even if they don't install a rewards system. It'll be an agree to disagree type thing, I believe, as I totally see where you're coming from but I still believe in leveling sickness.

And I recently noticed another kinda amusing bug. Companions will drop dead for no reason after riding elevators lol. Get off the elevator, walk a few steps and I hear Kaliyo's death throes. Turn around to look and yup, she's lying dead on the floor. 

I've seen this happen once with me so far while leveling. I thought maybe she had aggro on something below and I somehow missed it .

[AceHigh]

So nobody here is yet at 50 level to tell me about end game content? I already found a guy that powerlevels 1-50 for just 180USD, but I need to know if the end game content is worth it or not.

[xfreidax]

I would advice against that Ace, paying a guy to level you to 50. End game is nothing new. Dungeon grind for gear, then raid grind for more gear. Currently there are 7 hardmode flashpoints, swtor's version of heroic dungeons and 3 level 50 flashpoints. They are adding another one this month so around 8 instances to run at 50. The only thing different about swtor instances is that in some of them, depending on choices made during cutscenes, you go different paths and face different bosses. Otherwise the actual fights are pretty simple. Mostly tank and spank, sometimes with adds and aoe. That's about it. And bioware seems to love boss enrage. So if you bring in a group of dps in greens, you will wipe if you can't kill the boss in time.

The raids I've not experienced yet. Raid size is either 8 or 16 man. Only difference being the amount of loot that drops, quality of loot is the same. There are currently two end game raids. Each raid comes in 3 difficulty level. So you get to grind the same fights x3. From what I hear, it's more of the same. Again, heavy use of boss enrage mechanic.

The other endgame would be the pvp grind for pvp gear, aka warzone grinding. Swtor has 3 warzones, their version of battlegrounds. Only thing different about swtor warzones is huttball. This particular warzone is neutral, meaning you can get matched to fight same faction. It's capture the flag with a twist. The twist being you can pass the flag to other players. It can be quite fun, hutball, but currently it's a jedi/sith playground with all the force speed, jumps, pulls etc. The rest of the classes are left twiddling their thumbs or fighting aimlessly in mid ignoring the game. It's all force users, stringing force powers to blitz across the map.

There is an endgame world pvp zone but it's empty most of the time. Reason I stated above. Bioware is promising to fix this zone so people will actually fight instead of just flipping objectives and trading control, avoiding fights at all cost.

There is one more endgame, kinda. Gearing your companions. You get 6 companions at 50, 5 + a droid. So yeah if you're so inclined, it will take awhile to deck out your posse. Although at endgame, there's no real reason to do this since you will rarely use them anymore. Expect maybe when you are farming stuff.

So if you skip the leveling content, I'm guessing you will get bored fast. I guess you can always roll alts, to see the other stories.

@Viscious
No don't avoid space combat. Do the dailies, they are a great source of xp and credits while leveling. The space station bug they already fixed. The blasters not working bug is not widespread. In my guild of 30+ active players, only 2 of us have this bug. It was introduced in one of the recent patches, so if it's not affecting you now, you probably won't get it.

[AceHigh]

Thank you very much, that was a good report. I was also advised to watch some end game play on stream channels. I guess I will do that before I make final decision.

[vicious796]

Thanks, x, I'll continue to do the space combat. I actually quite like it, honestly. It reminds me of the old-school Star Wars combat games whose names I can't remember now. I don't mind that it's on rails - I think it would be better as free range, true, but I don't mind it.

Also, Ace, part of what makes this game what it is is the leveling experience. Fully voice acted with multiple systems to play around with. You have your light/dark decisions which affect what you can use at the end of the game (as well as the actual story to a degree) and your companion affection system which also has several things to it. Moreover, despite the fact that I'm a big leveling person and always enjoy the process in every game I've played I can honestly say this has been the most fun I've had leveling a toon because of all the different things at play.

***EDIT*** I also forgot to mention @xfriedax

The actual glitch with the graphics is that there is a medium setting at all. It's been addressed in the forums by the dev team that the high-rez graphics from the cutscenes and such were never supposed to be functional in the real-world due to the strain it would set on mid-grade (and even some high-grade) computers. They are, however, looking into different ways to allow those graphics for folks with high-end PCs.

Honestly, I think they just figured they'd hear more bitching from the stupid if they allowed the high-rez at launch. "OMG my netbook can't handle these high-end graphics! Fix it!" comes to mind.

[AceHigh]

Also, Ace, part of what makes this game what it is is the leveling experience. Fully voice acted with multiple systems to play around with. You have your light/dark decisions which affect what you can use at the end of the game (as well as the actual story to a degree) and your companion affection system which also has several things to it. Moreover, despite the fact that I'm a big leveling person and always enjoy the process in every game I've played I can honestly say this has been the most fun I've had leveling a toon because of all the different things at play.

In my experience in MMO the end game content makes it or breaks it. The leveling can be absolutely fantastic, but in a few months when most people have lvl50 and discover that the end game is more boring than leveling itself, there may be some bad consequences for the game. the fact that powerleveling in this game can be done in 10 days means that people that play normally will still level much faster than in other MMOs

[xfreidax]

Yeah I saw the latest dev post. I'm not sure I buy it though. How does a blooper like that make it past QC and beta. I'm guessing they are pulling the high rez graphics from the game because of some other issue. Maybe problems with the game engine. The explanation doesn't add up.

For a 2011 game, those textures are really bad. What they are passing off as high now. It's even lower rez than wow textures and that game came out in 03. The funny thing is, the faces are higher rez than the armour graphics. So you have this weird disconnect. The heads are all crisp and clear while the bodies a blurry mess. I can live it, but seriously for a new game, swtor probably has the worst graphics out there when it comes to character models and skins. And even with the current low rez textures, a lot of people are having framerate issues with the game, even on machines way higher than recommended specs. Look at the support section of their forums. I don't think I've ever seen a faster moving board than that. The lack of a search function is one reason but damn, start a thread there and in 5 mins, your thread is buried on page 4.

[AceHigh]

I remember there was a blog by a frustrated employee who said that the game would crash and burn because they wasted more money on voice acting than the rest of the project costs. While he was wrong about the part where the game fails, it does give a hint that Bioware spent too little resources on programming department and too much on voice acting department.

[vicious796]

Yeah I saw the latest dev post. I'm not sure I buy it though. How does a blooper like that make it past QC and beta. I'm guessing they are pulling the high rez graphics from the game because of some other issue. Maybe problems with the game engine. The explanation doesn't add up.

For a 2011 game, those textures are really bad. What they are passing off as high now. It's even lower rez than wow textures and that game came out in 03. The funny thing is, the faces are higher rez than the armour graphics. So you have this weird disconnect. The heads are all crisp and clear while the bodies a blurry mess. I can live it, but seriously for a new game, swtor probably has the worst graphics out there when it comes to character models and skins. And even with the current low rez textures, a lot of people are having framerate issues with the game, even on machines way higher than recommended specs. Look at the support section of their forums. I don't think I've ever seen a faster moving board than that. The lack of a search function is one reason but damn, start a thread there and in 5 mins, your thread is buried on page 4.

Call me a conspiracy theorist but I really do believe they dumbed the launch graphics down to avoid the additional complaining of the idiots who try and run the high-rez graphics on their 10 year old system that only cost them 150 bucks back in the day at Best Buy. At launch they're trying to solve real problems - not the 10,000 idiots who will flood the forums complaining that their game won't play on high-rez when its the fault of their own computer specs.

Then again, you are correct with people having framerate issues and that sounds like an engine problem to me. I know very, very little about it, of course, but if the game engine isn't up to snuff it doesn't matter what your specs are.

[TMRNetShark]

Yeah I saw the latest dev post. I'm not sure I buy it though. How does a blooper like that make it past QC and beta. I'm guessing they are pulling the high rez graphics from the game because of some other issue. Maybe problems with the game engine. The explanation doesn't add up.

For a 2011 game, those textures are really bad. What they are passing off as high now. It's even lower rez than wow textures and that game came out in 03. The funny thing is, the faces are higher rez than the armour graphics. So you have this weird disconnect. The heads are all crisp and clear while the bodies a blurry mess. I can live it, but seriously for a new game, swtor probably has the worst graphics out there when it comes to character models and skins. And even with the current low rez textures, a lot of people are having framerate issues with the game, even on machines way higher than recommended specs. Look at the support section of their forums. I don't think I've ever seen a faster moving board than that. The lack of a search function is one reason but damn, start a thread there and in 5 mins, your thread is buried on page 4.

Call me a conspiracy theorist but I really do believe they dumbed the launch graphics down to avoid the additional complaining of the idiots who try and run the high-rez graphics on their 10 year old system that only cost them 150 bucks back in the day at Best Buy. At launch they're trying to solve real problems - not the 10,000 idiots who will flood the forums complaining that their game won't play on high-rez when its the fault of their own computer specs.

Then again, you are correct with people having framerate issues and that sounds like an engine problem to me. I know very, very little about it, of course, but if the game engine isn't up to snuff it doesn't matter what your specs are.

No, you are probably right about that one. I mean, I have a system that is well over the recommended specs and I get a few slowdowns here or there. I have everything on high, but I wouldn't go as far as start complaining about the looks of the game. The art style is very good and I honestly like how it looks... but lets admit one thing for starters. Aion, Rift, and GW2 ALL look better in terms of graphics. EASILY.

Then again, it's a trade off (personally speaking)... do I want good looking high fantasy or do I want Star Wars?

Star Wars please.

Hey, if graphics break a game for you... then maybe you should try some PC ports that have some more issues in the hardware department (cough anything from Ubisoft). I mean, I'm not impressed with the graphics at all with SWTOR... but at the same time... I wasn't impressed with the gameplay/story/everything but graphics with FF13 (but the graphics were nice!).