Star Wars: The Old Republic

Genre:

MMORPG

Status:

Released

Release date:

12/20/2011

Developer:

BioWare Austin

Publisher:

Electronic Arts

Overview

Star Wars: The Old Republic is an MMORPG from famed developer BioWare based in large part on their highly acclaimed Knights of the Old Republic franchise. The Old Republic takes place approximately three hundred years after the events of the first two Knights of the Old Republic games. The Old Republic aims to maintain the core gameplay and principles of the previous Knights of the Old Republic games in a new large online environment.

You will be able to join either the Sith Empire or the Galactic Republic at the beginning of the game. The player can make choices throughout the game will influence and determine their alignment towards good or evil, otherwise known as the light and dark sides of the force. BioWare has mentioned that they hope The Old Republic will be structured in a more story driven fashion than most MMORPGs, allowing players to carve "their own epic stories" within the galactic turmoil of the game's setting. The Old Republic will feature many common MMO aspects such as crafting, guilds and PVP.

The art direction of The Old Republic will be a blend of realistic and more animated styles, without leaning to the extreme in either direction. The reasoning behind this choice is to give the game a unique appearance without making the system requirements too extreme, allowing it to run on as many computer systems as possible. It should also be noted that the lightsaber size in-game will be smaller than what current screenshots show, but the size decrease will be minimal.

Star Wars: The Old Republic was officially announced in a live press conference held at LucasArts headquarters in San Francisco, California, on October 21st 2008. The game is only confirmed to be in development for the PC. The game is set to be released on the 20th of December in North America and Europe.

The game features full voice acting including the player character, companions and other NPCs (Non-player characters). With notable voice actors such as Lance Henriksen who will voice the Jedi "Master Gnost-Dural", BioWare claims the amount of voice work is 10 times the size of KoToR or 40 novels worth of content. Currently its budget sits at an estimated 180 million dollars making The Old Republic not only BioWare's most expensive venture to date, but also the most expensive video game ever made.