Bioware, the producers of SWTOR set up a free-to-play trial weekend running from Thursday 15th March through to Monday the 19th. This opened up the oppurtunity for anyone to create an account and start playing SWTOR for the weekend. Star Wars: The Old Republic is an MMORPG based on the Star Wars universe and characters. Set 500 years before the actual movies, the MMO is a great way for Star Wars fanatics or just for gamers to hop in to the world they know and love from the Star Wars franchise.
Despite not being set in the time of the movies, the world that the player is immersed within is one that is familiar and reminiscent even to the untrained eye. Planets such as Tatooine and Coruscant are examples of places you can visit. Even the same classic characters such as Jawa's can be seen trawling the barren wasteland.
The game offers a wide variety of Class and Race Options. Namely, a Jedi or Sith will be opted for as most popular, as players will want to don their dressing gowns and Lightsabres once more. However, classes such as the Smuggler, Trooper, Bounty Hunter and Imperial Agent are classes that do not revolve around the ways of the force. Obviously, Jedi's and Sith will be more popular, but it is definitely a great way to have a more immersive and wider community ingame.
Whereas the starting points for other MMO's was based on your Race, in SWTOR the starting area is based on your Class. Albeit skin colour or horns, every Sith Warrior and Inquisitor for example, will spawn on Karruban, the home planet of the Sith.
I myself downloaded the client (a whopping 25GB), and played a Sith Warrior on the PVP realm Senator Constispex. My friend George and I quested for about an hour before reaching the Sith Temple. Surprisingly the Sith characters do not start with Lightsabres, but 'training blades'. The weapons basically pummel and shock enemies, as opposed to slicing them in half. Another amazing aspect of the game to mention is the dialogue. Whereas MMO's such as World of Warcraft allowed you to receive a quest by reading a wall of text, all dialogue and quest involvement in SWTOR is acted and spoken. The player can even choose how to respond to questions and comments, and the voice acting is heard. This makes the game more story based than typical MMORPG's, but is definitely something new and creative that is nice to play with. To round off, the game has a very similar feel and HUD to other MMO's such as WoW, but the voice acting and other subtle aspects of the game bring the game more alive in the players eyes and such is the reason that I will definitely be making a future purchase of the game.
Well done Bioware, awesome game!
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