I have a hazy memory of seeing an advert for Star Wars: The Old Republic - presumably online. I remember seeing the giant structure that sits over the Alderaan Warzone. The exact time that this occurred escapes me, but I assume it must have been early 2012. I remember thinking, 'Cool. This looks like an interesting Star Wars experience.' But it was an online game with other (real) people and that wasn't for me.
Eventually curiosity got the better of me and I took the plunge. I believe I must have delved in around the time of the free-to-play launch, so late 2012. From then on I've never looked back and have been a subscriber for most of the time since.
What I'd initially feared as a forced social experience turned out to be quite the opposite. Yes, there were lots of other players running around, but the depth, quantity and quality of the story and the single-player aspects had me hooked immediately. It took me years to try PVP content via a Warzone and I've still never undertaken group content beyond that. My SWTOR experience is none the worse for it, either.
When I play a game, especially an RPG, immersion is everything. I want to live and breathe the world of the character. The story, the look, the intangible 'feel' of SWTOR made that very easy very quickly. That each player class had its own unique story helped massively. I wasn't Player 1 running through the same missions with a Jedi, Sith or smuggler avatar - I was a young Jedi Padawan finding his feet on Tython, I was a freed slave broken by the Sith on Korriban, and I was a smart-ass pilot running weapons behind the lines on Ord Mantell. I was immediately invested in each character I made, thinking long and hard about the names I gave them and developing back story and incidental elements to fill in the gaps as they progressed on their adventures. Not quite fan fiction, but enough of a narrative that I felt like I was playing through them rather than as them.
I guess in this vein, amongst the tropes of RP, PVE and PVP, I've always been an RPvE type of player, if you will.
The amount of content in SWTOR has meant I've only completed the class stories at most once (I'm still not quite there with my bounty hunter and trooper!). I take my time. Like everyone, I'm guilty of running off in a completionist frenzy from time-to-time, but I generally try to slow myself down and appreciate the little details. SWTOR is a beautiful and complex game that rewards you for taking the time to simply admire it. To drink it all in.
This approach, and the sheer amount to do, has meant I'm constantly discovering new things. As mentioned, I've still never experienced group content - perhaps over the next few years I will? Just with solo content, the last eight years has been nothing if not a learning experience. SWTOR is a game that is easy to pick up and difficult to master (at least nowadays - it used to be a lot harder right from the beginning). As such, it's quite conceivable to spend your SWTOR experience running the main stories, bashing your favourite abilities and just having a blast - not really worrying about gear too much or quite what your abilities are doing in detail. Delve a bit deeper, however, and the process can be very rewarding. I've really enjoyed getting more involved in my character's stats, abilities and gear. Not because I necessarily need them to be 'better' (although it does help when trying to do later game content not originally designed for one person) but because I enjoy sculpting the character into the best version of themselves. And who doesn't get a kick from taking down a group of previously tough enemies with ease?
Once the floodgates open you may find yourself quickly immersed in stats, spreadsheets, forums, gearing guides and a lot of deep in-game crafting. It's a rewarding process but can at times feel without end. Especially when the latest patch raises the level ceiling, changes the gearing process or otherwise undermines everything you've been working towards!
However, learning about your abilities, how they interact, when to use them and how enemies might counter them is incredibly satisfying. It gives you a renewed sense of the complexity of the game and, certainly for me, makes me feel even more invested in the characters I've made.
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| Voltic (right), my Inquistor - the look and feel of a character, as well as their companions, is key to immersion for me |
Like many players I was uneasy with some of the direction after the conclusion of the main story arcs and the release of expansions, particularly Knights of the Fallen Empire and Knights of the Eternal Throne. The coalescence of all the class stories into a single reality, while perhaps being practically necessary (although likely not the developer's original intent for post-1.0 content), has dulled the individuality of all our different characters. To the point, in fact, where I started to create alternate reasonings for those characters I did take through the expansions. Now, I tend to skip KOTFE and KOTET entirely. I do miss the days during the original class stories where the actions of one protagonist would be referenced in another's story - the sense that there were eight stories being told simultaneously in a galaxy of infinite voices. I welcomed the change starting with Jedi Under Siege that diverged the Republic and Empire experiences again.
I hope I'm conveying a sense of my SWTOR experience. I enjoy reading how others play the game and it's always interesting to see how different people approach it. As an example, I wouldn't say I have a 'main' in the conventional sense (that is, a class I know inside-out and tend to play primarily), as many players do. I have a character that I usually run through new content first with (the first character I ever rolled), but I have only relatively recently taken the time to really get to grips with the intricacies of even this class.
As with most newbies I started with several DPS characters. In the last few months I've really enjoyed starting to heal. First with a Combat Medic Commando and more recently by transferring my Ruffian Scoundrel to Sawbones.
I've experienced 6 of the 8 class stories through to completion and have started a couple second time round. That it's taken me almost eight years to get back to the Jedi Knight story is a testament to the amount of content in the game. I'm genuinely excited to go through the class stories again - as so long has passed I've forgotten much of them completely.
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| Among my many alts is Narquis, Sith Warrior head-canon servant to Voltic (complete with Kylo Ren-style costuming, of course) |
(Credit to those posters on TOR Fashion who've put the hard work into creating a lot of these looks that I've borrowed for my characters!)
The future of my SWTOR experience is exciting. I'm probably at the point in my personal progression that most players are much earlier in their MMO lives. It's therefore a good thing that the game will be around for several years to come yet, giving me time to fully experience the depth and complexity that I'd previously glossed over. Exciting times and I love it.
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