I played weekends in Beta and made it to the space station - I enjoyed how I was drawn in to the story (as opposed to WOW) - like, if I killed someone when I had a choice, I actually kinda felt bad...and yet, it did seem as if the gameplay might become repetitive....run here, kill x of y...run there, kill a of b...and so on.

Is that how it is? for you?

As for Empire or Republic....YES! I'm sure my daughter and wife would want to be goody little Jedi's....I, on my own, would like nothing better than to burn someone to the ground with lightning from my finger tips, or a rocket from my backpack....heh heh...

I play and i love it. I used to play wow and still play lotro occasionally. I prefer swtor to the others. If you like star wars and mmos, its a no brainer imho.

Trooth -- you don't feel like it's just a re-skin of WoW?

I love playing as Empire. I think it's much better then the Jedi side, but I've always been biased toward the darker side of things in a game.

And yes that's exactly how the story line is played. And yes it can get kinda repetitive, but then I'll just go run a flashpoint or do some pvp.

Also, the decisions that you make will then change the choices you can make later on. Your alignment does matter when it comes to gear. I love all the little details they've put into this game. Only other MMORPG that's put this much effort into the details (that I've played at least) is LOTRO.

No way SWTOR is just s re-skin of WoW.

Seems to be a consistent feeling from this (admittedly small) sampling. But I confess I really did the enjoy my Beta, and would probably enjoy playing with my kid and wife...thanks for the feedback.

No problem and have fun with it :) I do recommend the Sith Inquistor.. it's a great storyline.

I played Sith in Beta and enjoyed it.

Oh you should be warned, since you have a kiddo, you can have you character romance select companions. Not sure how old your kiddo is, but there are certain implications that happen when certain choices are made. Not sure if that would change your mind or not in regards to playing.

Daughters are 12 and 13...they are....er...aware of certain facts of life. Between Mom talking with them, school, life, etc, they've got the basics down. <sigh....>

Well at that age they should be fine. I know someone who played SWTOR with his younger son (like 9 or 10) and ended up having to give the talk. I thought it was funny, him not so much.

SWTOR is my main online life when I'm not here, krellin. But be warned, if you go dark said, you will *kill* people. I'm a bounty hunter and I think I kill more Republic "humans" than anything else.

Romancing, though, is usually done with a cut away. They try to keep it PG like the movies.

Yeah but that doesn't stop kids from asking questions.

If you are into Star Trek, there is Star Trek Online. It's more like playing episodes of the TV show, but the away missions get repetitive too. I mostly play it when I'm in the mood for a good online space flight/combat sim. While not fully 3 , you do completely control your ship, inlike SWTOR, where it's combat on rails. Yuo also group up in space combat and take on Borg and such. No grouping yet in SWTOR for space missions.

Not so big on space missions I suck at those. But I have thought about trying STO cause it's free now.

STO also has ground combat, but I think that is better in WoW and SWTOR.

I played WoW for years and am so done with it. I've played City of Heroes some and like that. What I like best about SWTOR is that even as a healer I can still do some damage. It is a nice change.

I started with Everquest about...er....12 years ago or something...WoW...City of Heroes...tried Conan, D&D Online...WoW was certainly the star of them all so far. Tried a bunch of free wannabees....will have to try SWTOR now that it's live. You guys actually have me looking forward to it.

ooo I stayed away from Evercrack cause of time restraints. Playing a simple MUD was my first adventure into online gaming.

With your experience you should ease right into SWTOR, especially since you played during the Beta. I hope you enjoy it.

In Everquest, I still vividly remember the Night Elf homeland (or whatever they were called)....dark city in a cave structure - their were room that literally looked like they were lit with black light and had glowing runes on the walls. It was very impressive for the time.

Its got the best combat system of any of the MMO's I've played, also the game as a whole is very polished and well done, especially the voice acting. The problem I've had with it though is that as much as I like Star Wars, I don't love it they way I love Tolkien's work so I get bored and stop playing. I'm going to put my account on stand-by as I just don't enjoy playing too much. If I feel the itch to play an MMO again I'll probably just reactivate my Lotro account, I love that world more.

I like Lotro, but I like SWTOR better. But I enjoy the stories of Tolkien far more than Lucas. In answer to earlier comments, I dont think its just a reskin. The acting, the 8 different stories, the companions, the 'bombing runs' in space combat, I like all the small differences. The sound effects of light sabers and blaster fire is really enjoyable to me for sentimental reasons, I dont usually spend much time thinking of the way a game sounds.

I agree with the comment about game sounds. With WoW and LOTRO I always turned off game music and turned on itunes, but with SWTOR I actually listen to the game. And the voice acting is amazing. I believe there's 2 hours worth of cut scenes in the game per class.

Yeah, the SWTOR music that is new still feels like John Williams and the voice talent is top notch, even having some familiar folks like Lacy Chabert. But I also like that your chosen gender makes a difference. The male toons have romantic relationships with some of the NPCs like the male Empire can have an intimate relationship (off screen of course) with one of the hot female Sith's.

I believe they're implementing if haven't already same sex romancing as well. Not my cup of tea but it's a nice gesture. I also like the pvp, love it actually.

I heard the same sex rumor as well. Don't know when, but I like running female toons (don't wanna l.ook at a dude's ass for 4 or 5 hours at a time) and girl on girl is *hot*! :-)

Haven't really tried the PVP yet. I just upgraded my laptop to 8 Meg and am finally getting some decent frame rates. My BH hit 32 last night, so I might try some PVP this weekend.

Nice. I have a 49 sith inquistor but I still get decent pvp scores from healing. I love it. Only 2 tiers, 1-49 and 50. They buff the lower levels up to balance it all. It's really well done.

An old friend (who introduced me to WoW) plays as well and just hit 50 Thursday night. So he's going to pull me through some of the grinds so I can get the quests done quicker, then I'll drag his new alt through. We did that with WoW as well.

One of the things I like about STO is the focus is on getting newer, more capable ships, but the play is all cooperative unless you choose to take a group into the Klingon v. Federation battles, and you can spend all day hitting random encounters in sector space and joining with groups (the more the merrier) knowing that even your starting level scout can still serve a purpose. Taking a couple Galaxy or Excaliber class ships in with a couple of smaller Defiant class ships up against a Borg cube or Several Romulan Warbirds and Klingon Birds of Prey can be a fun challenge. It's something about your ship being your toon for half or more of the story that I like. I also like the fact that all away missions are 5 man runs. You either use your crew or, if teamed up, up to 5 captains can form the away team, so you can play that part of the game solo if you keep your crew trained up. Trying a four man heroic in SWTOR solo ain't happening unless you are way above level for it.

Yeah not happening. But in comparison to where WoW or any number of other MMOs were in relation to release time I'd say they've done very well with balancing and bugs.

I played the game for about 3 weeks and couldn't stop comparing to the other MMO I have experience with, Eve Online (4 years playing now).

Compared to Eve, SWTOR requires a lot of attention during PvE and its PvP is kind of limited. I played some matches of Huttball, one of the possible venues for PvP, and it was all very frantic and messy, with very little tactics. I believe some people may like it, but it does not fit my taste.

That's what I like about STO and SWTOR. I like that frantic shifting tactics combat. It's more realistic having to react to the turn of the tide. In fact, the lack of direct interaction was why I hated EVE Online.

@luke and Draug: if you're not frantically managing your ship in EVE (overheating, course corrections, changing ammo, drones, etc...), you're not fighting tough enough enemies.

Sweet -- Downloaded and tried STO -- Like ship to ship combat...like that it's FREEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeEEeeeeeEeEEEeEEeeee!!!

@krellin - Told ya. Sometime, we'll have to do a battle together.