Star Wars: The Old Republic E3 Preview

Eurogamer has finally gotten around to posting their E3 preview of BioWare’s upcoming addiction-inducing MMORPG, Star Wars: The Old Republic.

Much more dramatic and intriguing was a scene later in the demonstration, showcasing a critical choice in the story of a Sith player who was grouped with a Bounty Hunter for the episode. The Sith had to decide whether or not to kill or spare the captain of a warship, which had ramifications not just for what happened next in this instanced set-piece, but for the Sith player’s whole story arc, as well as both players’ alignment towards the light or dark side of the Force.

Crucially, the scene showcased a multiplayer dialogue system, where both players took turns to choose conversational options. BioWare’s hazy on how exactly this will work, but it’s a fascinating prospect, and reassuring to know that cut-scenes are being engineered to involve all players in a given group. A bigger unanswered question is how the development of a separate branching story thread for each player in the game can result in a game world with any consistency at all for the population at large. But then, if The Old Republic essentially allows players to jump between and enjoy each other’s divergent bubbles of story, would that necessarily be a bad thing?