Super Nerd Sundays Presents: Star Wars Chores!

In the past, MMO lategames have always stood as anathema to me. Not because I don’t enjoy big time investments. I LOVE big time investments, that’s part of why I’m a gamer. If you don’t like spending a lot of time doing one thing reading books and playing video games aren’t really activities for you. No, I hate the lategame of MMOs because they usually, almost always, take the form of work. It’s essentially a set of time commitments or daily activities you need, absolutely need, to participate in. You’ll get a schedule from your manager (guildmaster) and pound away at your tasks until they’re done. Granted, your tasks might be things like “kill everything in this magical fantasy valley” instead of “alphabetize these files before 5 PM” but it’s still essentially a job. Best case scenario, it’s a set of chores that you’re asked to do and, should you choose to avoid them, do not experience any adverse consequences for choosing to do so. Though you will feel like you’ve achieved less and your character, which is an analogy for your apartment in this situation I guess, will be kind of a mess.

I’ve just started investing myself in Star Wars: The Old Republic’s lategame content, and they do this in spades. With Daily Quests that you’re asked to engage in time and time again, end-game instances that insist on being run multiple times so that each and every member of your party can get their absolute best gear, it can get out of hand quickly. I’ve spent three hours a day every day of my vacation doing my SWTOR chores over the last two weeks, and it’s been fucking killing me. I finish my daily quests feeling exhausted rather than refreshed. Instead of feeling ready to attack the day I think about what else I could play to recharge my batteries a little and get ready to plan that lesson or rework that poem. It’s kind of a nightmare. So why am I still doing it?

There are three answers to this. One is that Star Wars: The Old Republic is just fun to play. Add lightsabers to a game and holy shit, you got me. I will do whatever you ask me to do to get me a little bit of that glowing stick action. I will play fucking Cooking Mama if she has a lightsaber. As repetitive as this late game content is, it’s still SWTOR and I’m still a destructive whirlwind of dark side energy, ripping up everything around me as quick as I can. It’s tough to be annoyed during SWTOR’s admittedly rote combat gameplay, by sheer merit of its inherent specatacle.

The second, more honest answer is that SWTOR paces its late-game content quite well, rewarding players consistently and providing them with some pretty nice carrots for enduring effort. In just over a week of playing daily-quest content I’ve got from having 12,000 hit points (putting me at the low end of being able to engage with late-game content) to having 15,000 hit points. Instead of struggling through fights I tear them down. I’ve got from thinking my Powertech was like playing the game on easy-mode to relishing my time with my marauder, stacking up rage and unleashing it in torrents that drop enemy health like it’s hot. My character has improved dramatically in a very short period of time, arguably more than she did when she was leveling up normally, and she’s looking to get a lot stronger in the next few weeks. I’ve still got two major pieces of daily equipment to get my hands on, and then there are the crafting recipes that you can grab with daily commendations. I can see myself doing daily quests and getting a lot out of it for at least two more months, maybe more if Bioware continues expanding daily content the way they have been with the Legacy updates. And it’s tough to see any other future for SWTOR: their subscription fees seem to be paying into little mini-expansions that stick around and really do make the game…better!

Which leads into the last reason I’m still playing: all of the lategame content is gated behind this daily system of repetition, and all of this lategame content still has story material in it. And this story material is still driving me to play. I’ve finished up every ounce of class and companion story available to the Sith Warrior at this point. I’m still working on cracking the Bounty Hunter. I plan on playing through every class story in due time, though I’m not invested in it right now, given the combination of my SWTOR chores and work in general. But the story, even the promise of additional story, is still a big draw for me. I really, really want to see new parts of this world, even if they look a lot like parts I’ve already experienced. SWTOR tells a damn good story, and its Flashpoints are a stroke of genius. I’m already chomping at the bit to piss off my party mates by actually taking the time to listen to the story when I play end-game content (another problem with SWTOR being the disconnect between a largely more civil than usual MMO player base and an min-maxing end-game player base every bit as douchey as any other game’s).

I don’t expect it to be anywhere as involved as the wonderful storytelling that populates any of the class storylines. But I do think it’ll be enjoyable. I want more bite-sized SWTOR story chunks in my life, and thanks to the late-game repetition engine, I’m going to get them.

That said, it would be lovely if there was a way to avoid making the entire game feel like one big chore. I understand why the Daily Quests are Daily Quests, why mechanics are in place to prevent players from grinding the game until it eats itself or to keep them from ruining the economy of play. But it still feels odd to reluctantly play a game just to make sure I’ve done what I can with it for a given day. Today’s the first day I’ve taken off of my SWTOR chores in a week, and it feels liberating to do so. But I’m still lamenting the daily commendations I’m giving up by not playing right now. Maybe I can still get them tonight, after I’ve done everything else I want to do today. I don’t know, I’m just thinking out loud here.