One of my absolute favorite reveals of Pax Prime came from the Sunday presentation in the main theater. Of course Darth Hater was there and they did a outstanding job of covering it for us that could not attend, they brought us the scoop on what the Developers are referring to as open world pvp. It looks fun, it looks exciting for sure!
One of the nice little tidbits that I just found that came out of PaxPrime this weekend thanks to Kristen Archer of Torwars.com was this tasty little morsel about the possibility for gambling in Star Wars The Old Republic MMO. Courtesy of an interview that Video Nvidia did with Cory Butler. At about 3 minutes in we get this question and very interesting answer from Cory,
During the Star Wars: The Old Republic panel at PAX Prime convention held in Seattle it was revealed that previously announced beta weekends in September will already start on the first weekend – September 2nd. There will be a huge wave of new beta invites going out for this beta weekend to new beta testers. This beta test will be held on a new server, different from the one being used for game testers currently in the beta. Huge number of people will be invited in all subsequent September beta weekends. You need to be signed up for beta testing on the official swtor site, if you want to have a chance for an invite into this beta weekend. We’ll see if we can get more news and details posted soon.
For this Friday’s update we were treated to a video from GamesCom of the play through of the Eternity Vault, operations raid, narrated by Dallas Dickenson. This raid or as Bioware likes to call them “Operation” looks like a blast. Groups of 8 or 16 players Republic and Empire alike will discover this mysterious location on the planet Belsavis and attempt to confront ancient force-wielders and other serious contained prisoners that who’s release could threaten the entire galaxy.
Gamescom and PAX Prime. Two of the biggest gaming conventions in the world that happen back to back and mark “the end” of big convention season. Two locations where Bioware traditionally releases the biggest announcements, or at least the most footage and information. It is also two weeks (and some change) before September when the Pre-Order Beta Testing should start as well. Could this be the greatest two weeks for all us dedicated SWTOR Fans? It sure looks promising.
In today’s Friday update we found out that at GamesCom we’ll see small presentations of Eternity Vault, the only raid in SWTOR at launch (as far as we know for now). There will be hands-on stations of origin worlds, similar to the ones setup last year (this was done for the first time at Cologne last year). There will also be an invitation only Alderaan PvP experience like the one we’ve seen at ComicCon. It also seems that BiowareTV will be live streaming from the show extensively, so even us not being there will be able to get a glimpse of the happenings. This will surely not be the only news from the show floor, but we’ll have to wait and see. Click here to read our predictions about Pax Prime
Wait, what’s that you say? Another “probable release date” rumor is spreading like wildfire through the SWTOR forums? Well then by golly, we need to spring to action and report on this!
Are we there yet?????
The “report” that’s making the rounds currently goes a little something like this:
We are officially moving the expected Star Wars launch from September to November. PopCap is not the key to getting ERTS right. We like this acquisition, but this is not going to make or break your ERTS trade this year. The success of Star Wars and Battlefield, on the other hand, will. All eyes now shift to them.
So aside from sounding like it was ripped straight out of a Nostradamus quatrain, what does this mean?
The biggest event for The Old Republic fans was SWTOR panel. We got loads of new media and information and AskAJedi.com was there to cover the whole event and provide us with a video showing all the great stuff revealed. Here are some of the things you can see in the videos below:
Jedi gameplay and backstory on Tython (Part 2 video)
More Republic group gameplay and dialogue footage (Part 2 video)
Empire group gameplay and dialogue (Part 3 video)
Companions seen in group action (Part 3 video)
PvP(vE)? There is some Empire group footage that ends with Empire group meeting up with Republic group after some PvE content (Part 3 video)
Live multiplayer demo with members of the SWTOR fan site community controlling the characters. Darth Hater, TOROCast and LordHammer representing Guild Umbra and TORSyndicate were the ones involved (Part 3 video)
Doors of the Penny Arcade Expo have officially opened and North American gamers can finally sink their teeth into Star Wars: The Old Republic. Covering the event are several SWTOR fansites. Darth Hater continues with their excellent coverage where they update their PAX dedicated page constantly throughout the day with new info. These are some of the more interesting things they noticed with their hands on experience:
All classes except the two Jedi ones are playable to the public at low level for approximately 15m.
The line to play is at least an hour.
Sith Warrior was a human female with cybernetics on face.
Ask a Jedi is also covering the event live with a constantly updated page. They had a chance to do a quick Q&A with Senior Producer Blaine Christine and Lead Writer Daniel Erickson. They covered advanced classes, companions, “is it an MMO?” and more. We’ll let you know as soon as they post this on their site. In the meantime you can read some highlights here. The same page also holds some hands on impressions and good screenshots. Also, they tweeted that:
Nothing new revealed today, but the inside word is that tomorrow will bring some GREAT news.
Within the next few hours Penny Arcade Expo, one of the biggest gaming conventions in the North America is about to begin. It is a very big convention for all the Star Wars: The Old Republic fans because, traditionally, it is the place where big reveals happen. Last year we got some gameplay footage and all attendees of the SWTOR panel got a copy of Knights of the Old Republic game. This year we’ll be having the first hands on event in the North America and all the PAX visitors will get what is called the SWTOR virus that can only be cured by more “gameplaytimis”. Some gamers will be lucky enough to get the elusive “betainvitis”, but for all of you out there that lack any of these rare and expensive medicine, we bring you the last of our gameplay videos we shot at this year’s GamesCom. This is the longest video we have and it features gameplay from most of the classes. You can see some cool Inquisitor action where he one shots some enemies with force lightning (at around 1:50). Present are also cutscenes and some more combat.
We’ll continue to monitor all the information pouring in from PAX and we’ll keep you updated with the most important news and footage. For now I would like to draw your attention to Jedi Archive Online, that have their man Lordhammer, from Guild Umbra, on the spot. They have the first images from PAX available here. Also covering the event are Darth Hater and ToroCast.
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