I’m sure you’re probably asking yourself, “It’s been two weeks, where is the new show??”. Well, with con season in full swing, the news cycle from Bioware starts to slow down and instead of putting out a show where we only discuss a few topics, we feel it’s better to let the news pile up a bit and then really tackle it with some great, in-depth discussion.

Speaking of discussion, we want to bring back the polls we did for a while in the form of community discussions. So here’s how it’s going to work: The week before each episode we will put up a short audio clip detailing the new topic. This could range anywhere from a piece of news released from Bioware or some ridiculous rumor we heard floating around the web. We then want you to send us your thoughts either through email or, preferably, on the forums. When it comes time to record the episode, we will pull some of your comments and use them as a basis for discussion on the show. Simple enough, right? Here’s the question for this week…

The overall reaction from Bioware’s showing at E3 has been mixed. Some people, like us, were incredibly excited by the Hope trailer, player ships, and the small bits we saw of warzones. On the other hand, a lot of folks were disappointed with the conference. We want to know what your impressions were. Did Bioware do a good job showing off their work or could they have done much more. We’re also curious to know what you are looking forward to hearing at conferences like Comic-Con, GamesCom, and PAX in a couple of months.

Like you, I was excited to see what was shown at E3 and was glued to my TV to see the coverage that G4TV had on the game. Its good to finally get some form of answer on if we get ships and/or housing, though maybe not the ship's some of us were hoping for. You know flying in space blowing up stuff. At least so far as we know. Could they have shown us more? Hellz ya. But exactly what.. well I could list about 100 million things we're all waiting on hearing more about.

I seriously hope that at one of these future con's/shows they finally say, ok here is the list of species in the game. What I don't want them to do is what Blizzard has done with Cataclysm and point out a whole list of features that they later can from game due to it not working or possible abuse, etc etc. Which so far they've done.. but has also been the curse for us all since we want more details. I just hope they don't go dark for much longer like it seems that they have after E3. The last 2 fridays have been somewhat disappointing. The comics ok, but not what we all expected after the huge delay on getting it posted that day. Sadly though I get the impression we're in for a dark time till after show season is done as they'll be saving the juicing stuff for them.

I am genuinely confused at people who thought that BioWare didn't deliver at E3. There was the Hope trailer, game play on 6 of the 8 classes, player ship announcements, explanation of multiplayer dialog and multiplayer combat.....what more did they want? A surprise release of the finished game, like, yesterday...and for free, maybe? Well, I want that too, but I'm not gonna be mad at BioWare when I don't get it.

I think you have to look at any reveal as a double edged-sword. Yes, what Bioware showed us at E3 was good, but in the meantime you have people seeing the amouont of time it took to get this far and they forget the work that goes into it. Alot of games suffer from this kind of expectation, which I lovingly call the Blizzard Effect. Blizzard produced a game that has become so 'streamlined' in the eyes of the MMO community that players automatically want every game to be nearly perfect (being a relative term). What so many people fail to remember, or maybe they weren't playing WoW in the early days, was the amount of blood, sweat, and anger that each new patch brought. Even with the first expansion, things were very rocky.

Personally, I think that Bioware has done a very impressive job with such a massive intellectual property. Ever tidbit we get only increases my excitement for the game. Bioware just needs to do the quality work that they have always done and ignore the trolls, whose job it is to complain and bring everything down.

Of course it did!!!! I would have liked more gameplay footage,but I was happy nonetheless

I'm not disappointed at all! The hope trailer was great, the player ship info was fantastic, and we got a few pretty cool gameplay vids to check out as well! Thats a whole lot more than we got at last year's E3. Granted, the game is much further in development, and therefore there is more content available for BioWare to show us. But lets bear in mind BioWare's stance on showing an unfinished product to the public. "We're not talking about that" How many times did we hear that line? Personally, I think they've split up the reveals for the upcoming events over the next few months, and I'm fine with that.

If anything, E3 has made me more excited, and therefore more impatient. I think that is what's going on with a lot of people. I personally am looking forward to seeing more light side Jedi related content, as the sith warrior has had this whole "teacher's pet" thing going on that has gotten a bit frustrating. But I'm certainly not complaining. There will always be people who will find a reason to bitch, and there's very little anyone can do about it.

I think much of the disappointment that many people were feeling was due to miss communication between Sean Dahlberg and some of the forum goers. Not so much the actual quality, or amount of the released content.

Let me explain; the week before E3, Sean stated we would be getting daily reveals from E3 that would be updated on the site. He then said the week would be wrapped up with a special edition Fan Friday. This did not happen, well, it did after a fashion, and there in lies the crossed communication.

What happened was every major video game media got all of their E3 reveals on Day 1. So, all of us who were expecting something new everyday said; "Wow! That was day one? Can't wait for tomorrow!" Remember, we were told to expect something new everyday. Well, tomorrow came, and they posted more of what released on day 1 on the TOR site. This was not what was expected. Then Friday came and lo and behold, there is no special Fan Friday, you've been getting the Fan Friday all week. Huh? You said, new reveals every day, then a special Fan Friday? Not already revealed info at E3, that is only new to the TOR site, which is the Fan Friday. See the difference?

So, what actually happened and what was promised were two separate things. Which is a shame because, the actual quality of the newly released content(which I agree was exceptional) got lost in the confusion.

Yes, the ships were freakin' cool and I can't wait to see more of them. Yes, it was good to hear anything about PvP and I'm frothing at the mouth for more. Yes, the class videos were very cool. Hell, I even liked the multiplayer demo because it further confirmed healing in the game. (Something that annoyed many but I enjoyed, I'm in the minority who actually enjoys playing a healer.) So, yes in retrospect, BioWare did a great job in presenting new information. They just did a horrible job in setting expectations and communicating schedules.

Which I think is the reason why Sean was giving us almost hourly updates a few Friday's ago and warned us that they were "discussing" something, but we might only get something small, or nothing at all. He wanted to make sure there were no crossed wires again. I think that was commendable on his part. He didn't have to do it, I'm sure he had other things on his plate, but he put the loyal forum warriors first. Bravo.

Very insightful analysis, Xavier. Managing expectations....SO IMPORTANT. I would never want Sean Dahlberg's job, that's for sure.

I wouldn't mind working for him though!

Fictional conversation between Sean and I (if I worked for BioWare)

"Yeah Sean, dealing with the angry mob sucks, have fun with that. I'll play...err...testing the Smuggler on Ord Mantell again." Sean looks at me skeptically and replies; "Haven't you already tested the Smuggler for four hours today?" I smile and retort; 'I'm very thorough...Oh, you meant I should test a different class. Well, I suppose the Consular could use some attention. Great idea, thanks, I guess that's why you're the boss." He shakes his head and walks away.

New listener (jumped on the MER subscriber list a few weeks ago), but I think E3 was a success for everyone but the most tidbit addicted among us. Would I like more game play videos, talent trees, stat explanations, explanation of crafting, guild systems, PVP, a comprehensive list of playable races and what class/faction restrictions they have? Sure who wouldn't? But I also know that the games media has a history of setting up every new MMO as the next WOW killer. Bioware knows that the expectations of what SWTOR will be are very high, and as such want to make sure that when they say blue milk is in the game, post launch I can find blue milk. Managing that kind of message so people don't hold them to unfulfilled promises is very hard. Having seen what poor dev communication with players did to early SWG, and how Blizzard has taken heat on unfulfilled promises on various expansions (Dance Studio for WotLK anyone?), I really can't fault Bioware for being frustratingly tight lipped. In the meantime I'm playing through existing KOTOR games to feed my Star Wars itch.

As for what I would like to see in this Convention season? I'd like them to give us a better picture of how guilds will work. And how factions will interact with each other. If I have a friend who decides to go the opposite faction will I be unable to talk to them and group with them like WoW, or could I still run flashpoints with them like early SWG. Also I'd like to see some crafting options.