Welcome and What's Next

With Early Game Access started, in a very real way pretty much the launch of the game, BioWare just posted two posts on the website. One to bid players welcome and the other to give an idea of what they're working on next.

Here is the welcome post:

This is a big day for us; we are launching Star Wars™: The Old Republic™, BioWare’s largest and most ambitious project to date, and we’re very proud that you’ve been able to join us. It’s an honor to be able to share this game with you.

A huge team of talented, passionate people at BioWare, Electronic Arts, Lucas Arts as well as many other partners all over the world poured their hearts and souls into this game. We want to thank every single one of them for being part of the team that developed this game; it’s a monumental accomplishment.

Another group of people that we depended upon was you, the players. We had hundreds of thousands of players spend millions upon millions of hours beta testing this game. Without you we never would have been able to build it; thank you for your contribution. This game is yours just as much as it is ours.

And finally we want to emphasize that this is just the beginning of a very long journey together. The game is launched, but it’s not done; it will probably never be done as we’re committed to working on Star Wars: The Old Republic in order to keep improving it and delivering exemplary service to you, the customer. It’s going to be a great ride.

Finally, we can only think of one appropriate way to sign off on this auspicious occasion:

May the Force be With You!

 

Ray Muzyka & Greg Zeschuk
Co-Founders, BioWare

Personally I was thinking of "here goes nothing", but I guess "may the Force be with you" works as well.

Read on after the break for the future plans.

Of course, as the BioWare founders noted, the launch is just the beginning. As such they've already got a list of things that they're working on next for the game. James Ohlen made a post about that:

Welcome to Star Wars™: The Old Republic™. It’s been many years in the making and the team is very proud of what we’ve achieved. Since we’re an online game we are going to continue building on the game for years to come. You can count on us to diligently expand the game and service to surprise and delight you. We’re going to not only respond to your feedback, but also hopefully exceed your expectations on how Star Wars: The Old Republic will evolve over time.

Many of you helped make the game what it is today by participating in our testing programs. You’ve watched the game grow over the past year and have been very vocal about things you’d like to see in the game in the future.

A team is never finished building a massively multiplayer game, so we’d like to take this opportunity to reveal a little information on what the team is working on for patches coming in the near future. Our priorities have been, and will continue to be, based off of the feedback we receive from our players.

• New Content – We will be adding new content to the galaxy on an ongoing basis. These worlds will include Operations, Flashpoints and solo content.
• Guild Functionality – Guilds are important to the long term health of any MMORPG. We have a huge list of guild centric features. This will be an ongoing effort that will probably never end. Guild banks are the first thing we’ll be delivering in our plans for increased guild functionality. Eventually we even want to deliver on the promise of the long hinted at “Guild Capital Ships”.
• UI customization – You like choice. We hear you! SWTOR is all about choice. Being able to choose how you interact with an online game is something we feel is very important. We are going to be giving more control over the UI as an ongoing effort. This is a very big priority for us.
• PvP – We have an entire team dedicated to adding content and features to player vs. player. We have some of the most experienced PvP developers in the world on this team. So far very few people have seen, or know much about the stunning Open World PVP on Ilum; when you get to the high levels prepare to be blown away! In addition to that high level PVP content, expect new Warzones and new PvP features on a regular basis.
• Space Combat – We will continue to add missions to the space game. We also have a special project going on right now that will expand space gameplay in a significant way... for now the details will have to remain under wraps.
• Legacy System – The ability to select a surname for your character is just the start of something much bigger. Soon, the Legacy experience and levels you earn will grant your characters access to powers, objects and other cool benefits.
• And more – We have an entire team of developers working on future content. Right now we are focused on nothing else but Star Wars: The Old Republic, so expect new and cool things.

It is fair to say that we’re just as excited as you are about the launch of Star Wars: The Old Republic. Not only are we launching one of the largest and most impressive games ever created, but we’re also excited about the prospect of continuing to work on the game so that you, the fans, will always have something heroic and amazing to enjoy. Thanks for playing.

James Ohlen
Game Director

Sounding good. I'm eager to see what they come up with.

I'm more eager to get home and play though.