The developers of Star Wars: The Old Republic talk about the future of the game and reveal how well KotFE has been received by the fans.
Our colleagues from mmorpg.com had the opportunity in the past few days to conduct an extensive interview with three of the leading developers of Star Wars: The Old Republic. Bruce Maclean (Senior Producer), Ben Irving (Lead Producer), and Charles Boyd (Lead Designer) answered questions and talked in detail about the previous successes of the “Knights of the Fallen Empire” expansion and what the future holds.
This was just the calm before the storm
Normally, BioWare does not talk about player numbers and EA certainly does not. However, since Electronic Arts has published some data, they can be freely used, and the developers are quite proud of that. Since the launch of the expansion, there has been an increase in subscribers of a whopping 33%. While the numbers may be “good”, “what was really overwhelming were the reactions of the players.” Nonetheless, it is important not to lose sight of the fact that only 9 of the 16 chapters have been released and this is just “the calm before the storm”. The effects of many decisions will only become apparent in the future when the story reaches its “incredible climax”.
Future chapters of equal length
When asked what fans can expect from the length of the upcoming chapters, the response was relatively relaxed, stating that the previous chapters are a good benchmark. However, they are not trying to force a specific amount of content into a chapter; they simply want to tell the story that is meant to be told. Players have already noticed in the first 9 chapters that their lengths can differ drastically – some will be shorter while others will be longer.
Chapter 1 soon for free
Those who have not yet been persuaded to take a look at “Knights of the Fallen Empire” because they did not want to subscribe will soon run out of excuses. The first story chapter of the expansion will be available for free to all Free2Play players starting December 15. “There are some players who left the game just before the release of the expansion. We want to give them the opportunity to experience Knights of the Fallen Empire.”
New classes in the future?
Finally, they briefly talked about the upcoming film, Episode 7 “The Force Awakens” and what new inspiration could be drawn from it. “Of course, we cannot have Darth Vader traveling through time for 1000 years (…), but if a new planet is introduced in the films, we might consider adopting it if it can be logically linked.” At the same time, they made it clear that SWTOR is far from over. There is still “much for the developers to explore”, such as new races, planets, and possibly even new classes.
The pay wall that does not want to be a pay wall
Cortyn says: The interview becomes a bit strange when discussing the differences of KotFE compared to previous expansions. The big news here is that KotFE is free for all subscribers, which creates a “particularly low hurdle” for entry. Particularly obscure is the statement: “There is no pay wall that prevents a subscriber from experiencing the new expansion.” That a subscription in a free-to-play game is pretty much the definition of a “pay wall” seems to have been forgotten for a moment.
For more about the game, such as the discussion about the chapter only for permanent subscribers, you can find on our SWTOR topic page.
