STAR WARS: THE OLD REPUBLIC GAMEPLAY REVIEW

I didn't get to play the game as much as I would have liked this weekend but I did play some. I am going to be brief but I will answer questions if anyone has them, assuming I know the answer of course.

I am going to skip straight to gameplay and ignore stuff like character customization, graphics, animations, and that sort of thing, only because I am not sure you all are interested in that. I will answer questions related to it if asked though.

Gameplay:

The game is like wow. If you hate wow, or are tired of its combat system, then you won't like SWTOR, simple as that. It has a hot-bar with abilities, and a GCD when you use them. That said, calling it wow with light-sabers is a bit too simplistic. The classes I played, bounty hunter mostly with a bit of imperial agent, feel entirely different than anything in wow. Plus, the removal of auto attack makes a greater impact on how the game feels to play than I expected it would. The best I can think to describe it is that it is kind of like playing WoW, but with entirely new and different classes with different class mechanics.

Based on the abilities I saw at low levels there doesn't seem to be much spammable CC like polymorph/fear. All the CC abilities I saw had cool-downs. One of the cooler ones is a flash grenade type thing for the imperial agent. It is an aoe incapacitate effect that breaks on damage and lasts for 8 seconds with a 1 minute cool-down. Bounty hunter had a similar ability, it was a single target dart that you shoot and it was an 8 sec incapacitate with a 20 second cool-down.

Players seem to do very little damage in comparison to player character's max health. at around level 5 or so the biggest burst I could line up with my imperial agent was about 250-300 damage and I think my max health at the time was 1500 or so. Where as in wow my abilities tend to be able to one shot myself at low levels.

Mobs on the other hand have a lot less health than players. Mobs tend to come in packs as well. Often there will be 2-3 extra trashy mobs with 200 or so hp and one slightly tougher mob in the pack with 500-600 hp. Most of the time the mobs you kill have much less than half your total health. I wonder if this is bio-ware trying to get around the need for a resilience type stat.

Story and shit:

Edit: I should probably mention that I suspect that my opinion on the story and stuff is artificially elevated simply because its not something that I expect from an mmo, and if this were a single player game that my opinion on it wouldn't be nearly as high.

The main hook of this game though, is the story based experience. IMO, bio-ware hit the nail on the head with this part of their game. It is easy to forget that you are even playing an mmo while playing this game. The storyline for the quests are interesting, and the voice acting and dialogue options make it effortless to follow.

Not only that, but you get to be more involved in the story by making decisions on how to carry out the quest. The option for choice comes along a lot more often than I thought it would, with pretty much every quest having 2 ways to complete it. Sure, the options can be pretty black and white at times, but I found the black, which is what I tended to do, to be very satisfying.

Towards the end of the origin world, you pick up a companion. I only got this far with the bounty hunter, and at least for that class, you can begin to involve your companion in dialogue with other npcs. She even jumped into a few conversations of her own accord. I believe there are multiple companions available for each class, and it could make things interesting if you have different dialogue available depending on which companion you take with you. One thing I was a little upset with, was the companion system, in which case, I tried to talk with her, and apparently there was no conversation available. However, she does say, "We'll talk later." which does give me hope that at least occasionally there will be optional conversations you can have with your companions.

You can customize your companion's gear also. They seem to be able to equip anything you can equip, assuming that they have the required armor proficiency. What this means is that it doesn't seem like there is separate companion armor. However, the gear your companion begins with says "Mako only," Mako being the name of companion character in question, so it could be there are items that can only be worn by your companion, or it could just be that its only the starter gear they don't want you to equip. In addition there is a special slot on your companion, where you can put items to change the look of the companion character them-self. I got one as a quest reward and the change was pretty dramatic. It looked like a completely different person, it wasn't just a change in hairstyle or something like that.

Classes:

Imperial Agent

Before I played the game, the imperial agent was the class that I was most interested in playing. I figured it would be squishy, high damage, and have good CC, but I was also concerned that the cover mechanic wouldn't be very good in pvp. It isn't as squishy as I thought it would be, though it isn't as tough on its own as the bounty hunter is. It wears medium armor, and has a decent amount of health so it can take blows pretty well even outside of cover. In cover the agent takes much less damage than even the bounty hunter did, and gets access to abilities that are only usable in cover. I only had one ability that was usable from cover for the level I played at, and it was called snipe. It was a 2 second cast shot that did pretty good damage, but it only did slightly more damage than an instant cast shot that I had that was usable both in cover and outside of cover. It was great for bursting down one foe before the battle beginnings but the difference in offensive power inside of cover compared to outside of cover didn't even compare to the difference in defense. Cover is relatively common while questing, though sometimes there are times where you will have to take a moment to get in position if you want to start on a group of mobs from cover which can be annoying.

The damage an agent did was really good, it felt a lot more bursty than the bounty hunter though the overall damage seemed the same, with the agent probably doing a bit more overall. There was good variety in the way damage was dealt, using a pretty even mix of sniper shots from cover, a high damage power shot, and the basic attack which provided an enjoyable mix of animations as well, with the basic attack being a small flurry of fire opposed to the other two being one huge shot. You also had a DoT in the form of a poisoned dart, and an aoe attack in the form of a frag grenade.

The CC available was pretty decent for a low level, and incapacitating a group of 4-5 foes with the flash-bang grenade and taking half of them down with snipe+power shot bursts before they could even shoot back was lots of fun. If any of the enemies got close you could do a melee range 4 second stun and either blast them with your rifle or shiv them with your vibroblade.

Still cover is a bit of a concern for me. I was glad to see that the damage you deal from cover wasn't really much more than dealt from outside of cover(at least before level 10), but the amount of damage mitigated by cover seems to be a pretty big deal, and I just don't see how a class that has to limit its mobility to 0 to be at maximum effectiveness can be viable in pvp, especially against the light-saber classes. I am hoping that one of the agent advanced classes, probably operative, doesn't have much use for cover, so at least one agent advanced class can be useful in pvp.

Bounty Hunter

Coming into the game the bounty hunter was my second choice, but since playing the game it has become my first choice. The bounty hunter is heavily armored and heavily armed with more gadgets than batman, well maybe not more than batman, but it has a lot of gadgets. The bounty hunter plays a lot different than the agent, there is no cover mechanic to discourage you from running and gunning and you have the heavy armor needed to take the extra hits from not being in cover.

You start out with your basic attack which shoots a flurry of lasers from your pistol, a wrist rocket attack, and I think rocket punch as well(if not at level one then at level two.) The wrist rocket doesn't do much more damage than your basic attack, but it knocks enemies back(which you can use to knock people out of cover as well), and if they are weak enemies it knocks them down as well. It makes fighting weak enemies really cheese because you can just spam knock them down until you overheat, which is the bounty hunter resource. You build up heat with your attacks and once it caps out you have to wait to cool down a bit before you can use abilities again, or you can use a 2 minute cool-down called, vent heat, which lowers your heat by a certain amount. Rocket punch is pretty fun ability to use as well, it has a 6 second or so cool-down, and you do a Ryu(street fighter) style uppercut while setting off your jet pack for a little bit of extra force.

Later on you get other abilities like flamethrower which is a channeled cone area of effect attack that does quite a bit of damage. A 3 second channeled ability that fires off a bunch of shots from your pistol that does a stupid amount of damage and stuns your target for the duration. A dart attack that incapacitates your enemy for 8 seconds much like the agent's flash-bang ability but single target with a much lower cool-down Death from above which is a 1 minute cool-down ability that makes you float in the air and rain down heavy fire on an area, seems like it could be used as a pretty good defensive cool-down against force users as well.

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Choosing the iPad 2 this black friday!

What this review will do is consider the differences between the iPad and the iPad 2, and how these changes affect the overall impression of the device - whilst at the same time treating the iPad 2 as an entirely new device on the market (which it is) and give it the fair assessment that it deserves. There are plenty of reviews, guides and analysis of those aspects on Pocket-lint already, and we feel that now, as we reach Mk.II of Apple's iOS tablet experiment (or revolution depending on how you judge it), that you're au fait with the iPad basics, such as the App Store and all the joy that brings, and the general behaviour of the iOS platform. If Apple had rolled out iOS 5.0, it may have been a different story, but we can only deal with what we've got (for now, at least)...

So let's jump straight in with the obvious: it looks a lot more svelte than it's big brother. We don't want to say sexy here, let's just say that the iPad 2 is a damn fine looking piece of "tronic" (electronic). From the front, when taking it out of its box you may not notice the changes straight away (unless you've opted for the white iPad 2 that is). Sure, you'll probably notice the ultra-slim silver trim around the edges - but surely not even the most eagle-eyed user will notice the front-facing camera at first sight.

No, it's only when you pick up your iPad 2 that you'll really notice the difference: 15 per cent lighter doesn't sound a lot, but those 117 fewer grams (Wi-Fi and 3G version) makes a big difference in the hand. As does the 4.2mm trimmed off the thickness: the iPad 2 is so thin at the edges that it is almost blade-sharp.

The iPad 2's curved edges make for easier manipulation of the buttons too as you push up against the device rather than sideways on. The 30-pin dock connector is still down the bottom as per the Apple norm as is the speaker grill - although this is now curved up around the bottom corner and is much bigger. The result is bigger, clearer sound, and it's also much less of an issue when it comes to accidentally covering it up when playing games.

You've also now got a couple of camera lenses on show. On the front you'll see the 0.3-megapixel video calling camera which is capable of shooting 640 x 480 30fps (the brightness sensor has been bumped up above it), and on the rear you'll see the 0.7-megapixel, 720p video shooting (again, 30fps) camera to which you can apply a 5x digital zoom. The cameras mean the inclusion of a couple of new Apple pre-installed apps, FaceTime and PhotoBooth, both of which will be familiar to Apple-users already. We also found that the front camera works within the (albeit iPhone-stretched) Skype app which gives the iPad 2 a fair head start over Android rivals at the moment.

Using the rear facing camera in public is something that is certainly going to draw attention and not for the self-conscious. Holding what amounts to an A4 pad in front of your face to take a picture isn't easy and even then the picture quality you'll get is sub par at best. Add in the smart cover (an optional £39) and you've then got the worry about what happens to that, as you'll inevitably end up holding it while you hold the iPad 2, whilst you also try and take a picture. Although it does fold back on itself. But let's be fair - is the iPad going to become your camera of choice when on the move? It is unlikely to see the easy snappy action that your mobile phone gets, so perhaps it isn't a huge practical issue. Photos can be shared and videos thrown into iMovie (an optional £2.99).

Like the iPhone you get touch focus and a digital zoom and there are a number of apps to help you make the most of the camera. Included and entertaining for about 2 minutes is an iPad version of PhotoBooth. It's really there to show off the power of the new iPad and its dual-core processor, but it will no doubt entertain your kids for longer than it will you.

But it's inside the device that you'll really notice the improvements. No, we're not advising you to hack open your new toy - just fire up some apps and take a look just how quickly they load. The iPad 2 now sports a dual-core A5 processor, with double the RAM (now DDR2) at 512MB. These hardware upgrades, along with Imagination Technologies' PowerVR SGX 543MP2 (in theory more than twice the horsepower of the SGX 535 found in Apple's A4 chips) means a 9x increase in graphics performance.

Just open the BBC News app for example. Side-by-side with the first iPad the app is loaded with the current news stories around 2 seconds faster. But it's when clicking on video content that you'll see the difference. As the iPad changes into video mode, the news story is up and running in a fraction of the time that it used to take. You'll also see a massive difference when clicking a link in an email, attaching photos to an email, changing between apps within the multi-task bar, or changing to Street View on Google Maps. Basically, it does everything your the original iPad does, only much faster. Hell even swiping around the homepage feels faster.

Battery life still seems as good as ever, we've been taking our iPad out and about all weekend - using the Orange 3G connection to download apps and browse, as well as using both cameras and we've still got alot of juice in the tank. Apple is stating "the same amazing 10-hour battery life" and we're not going to argue with that. We've certainly not noticed a difference from the fisrt iPad.

And, despite the lack of a higher resolution display (it's the same 1024 x 768 display as the original), games look superb and play without any stutter. We gave Neon Battle HD a testing and, despite it being a terrible game, it performed much smoother than on an iPad 1. Real Racing 2 HD, which has been "iPad 2 optimised" was noticeably different as well - the edges of vehicles were much less jagged and light effects were a lot more natural. Real Racing 2 HD also has the added bonus of, with the optional HDMI connector, outputting the game to your TV in glorious 1080p, leaving the screen for maps and the like. It's amazing.

So far so good. But there does of course have to be a few negative points from somewhere, and with the iPad 2 (or at least with the three new iPads we've got our hands on - 64GB Wi-Fi and 3G version from Orange, Vodafone and Apple) there seems to be a bit of a glitch with backlight bleeding. The glitch isn't noticeable on the usual homescreen, or on most apps, or browsing. It's only when viewing at a dark image, or viewing a movie with night scenes that it becomes apparent. The backlights are clearly visible around the edges, creating a yellowish tint, which destroys the overall atmosphere of the scene or image.

A quick look on Google highlights that we're not the only users suffering this issue - and a call to the Apple Store indicates that it's quite popular. The Apple rep did say, to be fair, that they would exchange any damaged product but stated that it was a known issue and it may happen again on a replacement device. Our advice would be to wait around a few weeks for a new batch (even if the problem is only sporadic) - although, looking at the iPad 2 sales news, you've probably got no choice but to wait anyway.

Now, in the introduction we did state that we'd treat the iPad 2 as a new device, judging it on its own merits. But it's just so damn hard to not be a bit annoyed at Apple. And not because it is holding stuff back for the next version (as it always does with all of its devices) such as NFC, or direct HDMI out, but because it missed the obvious inclusion that would have led to the iPad 2 putting the original into the shade, and create an instant wow-factor. We know that an iPhone 4 higher-resolution "Retina display" would probably be too costly in terms of manufacturing to include on a 9.7-inch screen. But would it have caused too many heart-attacks in the Cupertino boardroom to include a higher resolution display?

The Motorola Xoom is going to come packing a 1280 x 800 display, as is the skinnier-than-thou Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 - the two devices that will probably be the iPad 2's main competitors when it comes to tablet supremacy for 2011. It may well be that Apple has missed a trick in not altering the iPad 2's display from the 1024 x 768, 132ppi, LED-backlit IPS LCD as was used in the original. It's certainly a shame to have the power of the dual-core A5 chip, with its 9x faster graphics, and not have a sparkly new display to show its capabilities off.

In a survey of the 632 users who queued up at the Regent Street store for the launch of the iPad 2, 33 per cent said they wanted it for games - they won't be disappointed. We're sure that game developers will make good use of the newly introduced three-axis gyroscope giving you a total of six-axis when you combine the accelerometer - but it's the speed that makes the iPad 2 another heavyweight Apple product that will sell by the millions.

Whether that speed alone is enough to convince the nay-sayers, who are slightly underwhelmed by the iPad 2's release (could iPad 1.5 have been a better moniker?), or even prove to be enough to battle the Android threat from the likes of Motorola, HTC and Samsung, remains to be seen. There are elements of the iPad 2 that will frustrate, its reliance on the PC is certainly one and the way it handles notifications is another.

Over all the iPad is a great product,

And with a black friday sales price of $449.99, it's worth every penny 

(iPad 2 black friday sales)