Inside The Old Republic

GameSpy gives us a nice inside look at Bioware's upcoming MMO, Star Wars: The Old Republic. From all I've read, I think someone has finally nailed the perfect formula for an MMO. It's a single player game that allows for grouping with others for groups quests. I realize that sounds basically obvious, but the point I'm getting to is that MMOs do not have coherent storylines. They are made up of a bujillion quests that may or may not be loosely linked to a story arc. 

Lord of the Rings Online comes the closest I've seen to presenting a strong storyline through it's Epic Chapter quests, which are linear in design, and laid out like a book (hence the Book, Chapter naming convention). Unfortunately, the majority of those quests require a group. And a lot of times, I just want to jump in and do the next chapter and I can't find anyone online who can/will do it with me. I hate that. I have limited time to play and I can't stand the idea of blowing my hour or two of gameplay time begging for someone to do a quest with me.

Nothing kills fun for me faster than forcing me to search for a group ( in a lot of cases, it's been days before I find one) to the point where I actually just give up and go in another direction in the game. That should never happen. The Epic Chapter quests are part of the best of what LotRO offers, yet... I can't experience a lot of them.

By now, you're probably wondering what the hell happened to the Star Wars story. Well, so am I, dammit (sorry, the subject of MMO group quests torques me to no end). Go read it! Why are you wasting time listening to me whine? Focus!

You have to look at these classes not as small parts of a successful party, but as well-rounded, standalone characters that can handle any situation without the support of a healer and tank. Star Wars: The Old Republic can be played, after all, like a single-player game -- effectively an online sequel to the beloved Knights of the Old Republic role-playing games.