KOTOR MMORPG?

[Spino]

I tend to think MMORPGs to be the antithesis of Bioware games - ie devoid of much story, dialogue or vivid characters. So it does seem a strange pairing.

But then again, if the MMORPG is to evolve, adding these quintessential Bioware aspects would make sense and who better to make it work?

The time requirement and fees of the typical MMORPG mean I won't be picking this one up, though.

It all depends how Bioware executes their design but I have faith that they'll inject the genre with a breath of fresh air.

The bad thing about MMOs is that there's an amazing lack of originality in the current generation. Games like World of Warcraft, City of Heroes/Villains, Lord of the Rings & Vanguard are really just evolutionary rehashes of the basic PvE grind, free-for-all PvP systems of the previous generation (i.e. Everquest & Ultima Online). Only Guild Wars and Dark Age of Camelot seemed to push the envelope by deviating a fair bit from the established equation.

Excellent storytelling and MMOs are not mutually exclusive things, it's just a question of how much risk a developer & publisher is willing to take. Keep in mind MMOs are even costlier to develop and run than your average single player game.

I must say I am really keen on Mythic's upcoming MMO 'Warhammer: Age of Reckoning'. WAR looks to take faction based PvP (or, as they call it, RvR or Realm vs Realm) combat to a whole new level while minimizing the grind and banal crap that plagues most MMOs.