I gave quite a lot of thoughts about writing this post and in the end I decided to go ahead and write it anyway. This blog was created so I could share with you my thoughts and ideas, whether I’m happy or not. This post is very much about my current state of mind, so please, take it as such. With this disclaimer out-of-the-way… let’s proceed.
So.. if you’ve been following the madness that is Swtor Pre-access day 1, you’ll quickly get that there’s two main train of thoughts at play here. On one side there’s those who have gotten pre-access and are enjoying the game, happy that Bioware is taking it’s time with delivering a quality game experience, and then the other who have not had pre-acces and are in varying states of disgruntlement, ranging from disappointed to outright angry.
I am one of the disappointed ones tonight to my great regret. I also feel that Bioware could be handling its launch better, but probably not in the sense your thinking right now.
It’s all about a quality player experience…
Both sides here are debating about the exact same thing, giving players a quality experience with the games. A lot of people with preaccess right now claim that quality is more important than quantity or speed and they praise Bioware actions in taking it slow. You will also see comments about Bioware owning nothing to its players, that the game actual launch is December 20th and that anything before that should be considered a gift. Bioware and these players stance is that the actual in-game experience is the one that ultimately matters. After all, launch period is just that, a period and in a week or so, it won’t matter anymore.
Normally, I’d agree with that statement, but being in the “out” gang today has been an eye-opener experience in a lot of ways. Not being able to play tonight because of a rather convoluted game launch without a lot of information to go by is actually, a game experience. It’s not an in-game experience by any stretch, but I find myself disappointed by the lack of information and my current situation not playing the game. In short, I’m still having a negative experience that revolves around ToR. So while the “In-game” crowd experience is protected, mine does suck at the current moment and pretending otherwise would be dishonest.
Information! Please give it to us!
This is what I’d wish Bioware would do differently. Nearly all the questions revolve around “When?” and Bioware answer is “We’re not telling because X”. I’m not expecting a precise date/hour nor am I criticizing having a staggered launch, I’m criticizing the fact that we simply don’t know. We don’t know how many people are let in by waves. We don’t have any inkling of a timetable. For example, they could have gone with July = day 1, August = day 2 or something similar, or they could simply give us updates of where they’re at right now.
Believe me, it does suck to see that little mail icon and each and every time think that this time it’s the email you’ve been waiting for since 2009 or even longer in some cases. Knowing when or even having a general idea of when would do a lot. Whatever you may think, opening your mailbox to see a new mail and then realizing it’s not that magic email is disappointing. It’s not exactly a pleasant experience. Information, even if its telling people they don’t get in before december 20th would do wonder to stop that sort of sad game where Santa comes into the game bearing gifts but you’re not sure if you’re the next one on the list. Even if you do know he’s going to get to you eventually, seeing him leave the room without giving you anything is a bit disheartening.
So I’m done… sorry for this downer of a post and I do truly wish the best of times to those in-game. I know, be patient and all that but the end result is that on December 13th, this monkey is disappointed and would love to have some solid information.
My preorder was pretty late and so I didn’t expect to get in quickly, and after today, I almost don’t expect to get in early at all…. from the reports I’m getting, not even the first ten days of preorders are in yet, and I’m not even in the first two months. So I don’t expect it tomorrow either. And I see why they extended the early access period too, the sheer number of preorders is kind of insane.
However if I don’t get in before launch at all, I’ll be pretty annoyed, because while they didn’t guarantee HOW early your access would be, they offered ALL preorder customers early access. I don’t honestly see how they’re going to get us all in before the 20th unless they speed things along, though. That would be a drag.
Heyo.
I’m in a similar boat, being in a territory that isn’t even officially getting a launch (Philippines). My best case scenario is getting copies shipped to the local game store by December 23 thanks to the store’s connections to EA.
While I do agree with you on the not having enough information bit, and while I do feel jealous, I haven’t really felt bad about it. I’m excited, sure, but then part of the not knowing adds to my excitement, so the lack of information adds a weird tension that I sometimes enjoy feeling.
Anyway, I do hope they give more concrete information. I’m sure Stephen Reid is probably having a hell of a day fielding questions and concerns from tons of people. 🙂 Cheers!
I can’t seem to shake that feeling of the “haves and have-nots.” Sure, some people were in beta and some people were not, and yes, it was really annoying to hear “well I’m in beeeeeta and blah blah”. However, we could console ourselves that they would have all their hard work wiped. This head start just feels like the beta, but they get to KEEP their characters. In general, I don’t like anything that makes some players feel more special than others because we will have to hear them yabbering about their exclusive game time without the rest of us LONG after the game has launched. Just like all the people in Wow who say “well *I* was in the beta.” Blech. Yuck.
They got up to approximately July 26th or July 27th yesterday.
Today I’d expect them to clear the rest of July easily and make a LOT of progress into August probably into September. (People from early August are getting in right now in fact)
If you pre-ordered in October, especially late October, I wouldn’t expect one today. Probably tomorrow though.
Also another thing to keep in mind in light of all the QQ. As recently as a week ago NO ONE was expecting to get in until the 15th at the earliest. Bioware added two days to help mitigate the damage from the staggering number of pre-orders they received.
I think they’re doing a great job but its understandably difficult to go through in the short term.
I’m going to reititerate again that this post is more of a “here’s how I feel kinda thing” and not a judgement on Bioware as a whole.
That said, I think they’re doing a great technical job of the launch, but the public relation side could be improved. There’s a difference between being light in information and keeping people in the dark and right now, a lot of people are in the dark.
I view that as a valid concern from the player base.
I can agree that it’s disappointing yes, but the early game access is just as much for Bioware as it is for the players….they get to start slow and make sure everything is gonna go right for the launch. Not everyone can get in and while yea it sucks, at least it’s helping to ensure things go smoothly. Nothing would be worse than the whole thing burning down on launch day because 1 million+ ppl all logged in at once.
Also, I forgot to mention, the reason they are being so secretive is likely because they just simply don’t know either. If they go around giving people exact schedules and information about their plans, and then something happens that causes a need for a change in those plans, well now they’ve got a whole mess of pissed off players. That’s my theory anyways.
I’m pretty sure your right but at the same time they could have been more forthcoming about where they were at for example. For example, “we just launched wave 6 which includes up to early august. Next wave should cover the rest of the month”.
My thoughts might be discounted because I woke up yesterday to an email and quickly name parked my toons before heading to work knowing when I got home I could play.
Last night I never had a queue, I did not have spawn camping and in one night I got out of most of Ord Mantell (I have a little mop up tonight). Which means for day two people they should hopefully have the same experience of no queues, no spawn camping and can get out of the starter world in one or two days for the next day of waves.
I kind of see Bioware in a no matter how they play it they can’t win mode. If they had just said no early access everyone starts on the 20th it would have been a mess. So to prevent that they went with a spread out the start so people can actually play, but then you get the problem of why Bob got in before Jack. Is by pre-order date fair? maybe maybe not. If they had done by a lottery of pre-orders would that have been better? I’d guess probably not. I’m glad they didn’t do Collector Edition–>Digital Deluxe Edition –>Standard Edition as a priority or holy hell you would have heard entitled brats bragging about their Collector Editions.
I would have like to seen a better communication from Bioware, but I also know they don’t want to handcuff themselves to a schedule given crap that could go wrong. My bigger beef has been with the guild launch program to behonest, but that is a separate issue.