美服《星球大战：旧共和国》赏金猎人先见

Mike Bitton（MMORG社区经理）最近有幸参加了星球大战：旧共和国“沉浸日”的发布会。Mike和其他媒介的记者一起先试玩了星球大战的最新篇章。Mike选择试玩赏金猎人，让我们来看看Mike在这一篇章中发现了什么吧！
Michael Bitton受邀前去旧金山参加了《星球大战：旧共和国》“沉浸日”（immersion days）发布会. 鉴于星球大战：旧共和国故事情节的重点，短短几篇视频无法给玩家一个全面系统的游戏印象。因此近几日BioWare公司发布了一些“沉日”（immersion days）的详细信息来让玩家过瘾。
作者Mike选择了试玩赏金猎人。星球大战：旧共和国里的高射炮和其他网络游戏不同，所以作者选用批判的眼光来试玩这一章节。Mike邀请了媒介其他三位记者作为一个小组参加了星球大战赏金猎人的试玩。

首先先看看赏金猎人的一些介绍吧。
赏金猎人使用单个手枪（高级雇佣军使用双手枪），并且在他的位置有一些小工具（但不限于）导弹，火焰喷射器，轨抢和飞镖等等。技能也有大量的相互作用。比如，Rail Shot仅仅只能射击上了膛的目标，或者在群众控制下的目标。用电飞镖来烤焦折磨对手是一个新增的项目，增加赏金猎人游戏的刺激性。赏金猎人战斗资源是热能（Heat）。每个技能都会产生一定的热能，如果过热武器将会被限制使用。游戏中可以使用一种特殊的能力使得武器快速冷却，也可在战斗之外不使用的时候慢慢冷却。在玩的时候，热能的确增加了游戏的乐趣。因为在游戏过程中玩家需要平衡使用各种武器，过热的时候则需一分钟来使战斗能力冷却下来。可以说，这种效果影响一系列的战斗力，迫使我不得不使用基本的快速射击能力（不产生热）。同样，这用想法没有错误，但是BioWare公司可以调整赏金猎人的能力或者减少冷却时间。

回到多人游戏中，BioWare公司曾经提醒我们可以组团，但是我要提醒玩家的是稍后一些再组团要比一上来就组团好的多，游戏开始的部分更多的重点在玩家的故事情节。我们发出邀请组成了各自的小组，选择试玩赏金猎人部分。其他的成员角色是两个帝国特工和一个赏金猎人。

开始的时候故事发展有些令人困惑。由于用户接口的工作依然在进程中，让每个人都集中在同一个地方做同样的事情就显得有些困难。不太容易分辨出迷你地图中自己组员在哪里，每组的组员也没有被标记上不同的颜色以示区分。
作者Mike曾向BioWare公司提出过该问题。其首席设计师保证道：游戏接口问题以及用户页面的问题都在处理中。因为我们在玩游戏的时候都是坐在一起的，我们可以交谈来解决困惑。最终，从开始的不熟悉慢慢的我们找到了游戏的节奏，玩的越来越熟练。
赏金猎人的故事基于一个蛮荒美国西部的传说。玩家开始现身于Hutta接触一些有趣或讨人厌的角色，然后便开始以自己的方式成为一名赏金猎人并参加名为大狩猎（Great Hunt）的竞赛。赏金猎人必须要先找到赞助商并成为Nem'ro帮派的成员才可以有参加竞赛的机会。Mako是赏金猎人的第一个同伴，安排与Nem'ro见面的时间。Nemo'ro不会立即同意赞助玩家去参加大狩猎。玩家要的到赞助必须完成多项任务以证明你的价值。

其中的一些任务相当残酷。一开始，玩家要去杀死Hutt，并且把Hutt的头裹起来寄给他的妻子。完成这项任务不仅仅是一场枪战的问题，割掉那个家伙的头颅得到一项奖励，而是赏金猎人用手枪抵住对手，按住他的膝盖，最后将躺在地上无助可怜的家伙头完完全全的割下来。想想这是多么残酷的场景。虽然没有血，玩家也会被画面所震撼，游戏中这种场景总是令人印象深刻。

这个简单的例子诠释了BioWare公司的意图。他们一直都很注重故事发展的剧场效果,而这种效果确实增加了网游的经验。Mike最终完成了杀人的任务，在其他网游中大都是用文本的方式来讲述妻子看到头颅的反应。但是在本款游戏中，玩家眼睁睁的看着妻子见到丈夫头颅的反应，看着她疯了似的尖叫着跑开。如果玩家觉得自己极度邪恶，则有机会解释自己的无情。

回到多人游戏中来，很多早先给的团队任务没有必要一开始就处理。进入团队阶段时如果不能加入到会谈中来玩家是不会有很多任务要做的。战斗的结果产生很多局面，带着一个朋友在身边很有帮助。但是实现玩家可能在不知道的情况下，朋友就跳着舞等待玩家完成会谈，然后他们才能决定是否紧随。但是玩家不用担心，一开始仅仅是一段小小的旅程，它会帮助玩家建立自己的故事情节，并让玩家熟悉游戏机制。

专业玩家网为游戏工作室提供各类热门美服游戏点卡销售，充值等服务，应用尽有，放心选购。

除了上述问题，Hutta的分组也是很有趣的。多人可参与支线任务对话中，玩家可以和朋友们一起赚取黑道白道的积分，当然如果玩家的朋友们作出决定以及得认可，玩家便要承受后果了。这听起来有些让人气馁，不过实际上这很有趣，加入了社交聚会上所玩游戏的元素。玩家在完成任务时给予决定目标生死的选择。玩家找出一些带着奴隶记号的人。只有玩家放了其他的奴隶，他们拒绝跟着玩家。作者团队中的三人利用了合同的死角，杀死了那个家伙，但是组里的一员决定尊重并释放其他奴隶。猜猜结果如何？我们都输了，但是我们却都笑了起来，觉得结果很有趣。
有些玩家可能不熟悉多人对话的方式，基本上每位玩家都有选择对话的权利（或者跳过）然后每位玩家可以看到一个名册（出现在屏幕左下方）。赢的一方决定谁回答以及说话的内容（包括决定）。像黑暗面和光明面的合作得分都是基于玩家的意图来获取的，而不是在于最后的结果。玩家选择杀死某人（黑暗面），而玩家的朋友选择释放他（光明面），就算最后释放了他玩家也会得到黑暗面的得分。另外参加多人对话可以获取社交分。总之，在本款游戏中社交很重要。

多人会话的特点还是一个是时空转换器，或者称玩家可以加入会话的远程能力。玩家可以以电话形式加入。如果伙伴与远程的人启动会话，便会弹出一个菜单询问玩家是否要加入会谈。选择加入，玩家则会以远程图像的方式显示就如同玩家本身就在那里参加会谈一样，但是不能对跟你谈话的角色动手。玩家可以在远程交谈中射击任何人，但是以后可能会被取消。
分组时，Mike发现了其他的惊喜，比如在全组中，玩家当前仅仅只有一个同伴，这种限制有它自己的因素。玩家在远离自己组员的时候，可能会和其他人组在一起，当别人带走了他的组员时，玩家也有能力带走自己的组员，这在玩家组员承担玩家40%的攻击潜力时显得更加重要。当然玩家的组员都聚在一起时这就不是问题了。另外在大概1-8级时，很多角色是缺失的。

分组的确让事情发展的更快，但是加入了Heroic任务却是最有趣的。Heroic任务是扫清邪恶的角色和怪物，这时候小组间的合作变显得尤为重要。玩家要完成任务，控制敌人和目标的处理的优先次序都尤其重要。最终玩家会碰到一个看守Datacron的迷你机器BOSS。Datacrons分散在整个游戏世界中，并提供提升玩家的统计数据的功能。但是在我们Heroic的任务中，我们发现了不同，读者们可能早就听说过这点。实际上，Datacron仅是一部分，只有全部完成了才能获得巨额奖励！

Last week we were invited out to EA Redwood Shores in San Francisco for the latest “Immersion Days” press event. Given the focus of Star Wars: The Old Republic on storyline, it’s kind of hard to fully get a feel for the game in short play periods, even when given anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour at a show like E3 or PAX, so BioWare has put on a few of these “Immersion Day” events to give us an extended look at the game over a period of a couple of days.
We kicked off our first day by choosing from either the Imperial Agent or the Bounty Hunter, with the goal of completing their starting world of Hutta. The most common flak that Star Wars: The Old Republic gets is that it’s not truly an MMO and so I went in with the objective of putting that criticism to test (regardless of its legitimacy). To that end, I invited three other members of the press to join me in a little experiment in playing Star Wars: The Old Republic as a group the entire time.
Before we get into that, I’m going to give those of you who are unfamiliar with the Bounty Hunter a bit of a primer on how the class actually plays.
The Bounty Hunter wields a single pistol (or dual pistols with the Mercenary Advanced Class) and has a number of gadgets at his disposal which includes (but is not limited to) missiles, flame throwers, rail-shots, and electro-darts.
There is a good deal of interaction between skills as well. For example, Rail Shot can only be fired on targets that are on fire or under the effects of crowd control. Torching an enemy or stunning them with your Electro Dart is a great set up for Rail Shot which packs a significant wallop. The Bounty Hunter’s combat resource is Heat, think of it like the heat mechanic in the original Mass Effect. Each ability generates a certain amount of heat, and if you have too much heat you won’t be able to use certain abilities. Heat can be vented in combat using a special ability on a one minute cooldown, or can be vented while resting outside of combat.
In my time playing, I found heat to be a potentially fun mechanic that needed some balance tweaking as I was overheating a bit too often and with a full minute cooldown on my in-combat vent ability. I can say it definitely impacted the dynamic of a number of fights, forcing me to fall back on my basic Rapid Shots ability (which doesn’t build heat). Again, nothing wrong with the idea of the mechanic, but BioWare could certainly stand to tweak some heat values on the bounty hunter’s abilities or reduce the cooldown of the vent ability.
Getting back to our multiplayer experiment, BioWare did inform us that we could group but noted that it would probably be better to do so a little later on as the early bits of the game are very much focused on your class storyline. Undeterred, we threw around invites and put together our group. I chose the Bounty Hunter for my test, with the remaining members of my group consisting of two Imperial Agents and one other Bounty Hunter.
Things got off to a bit of a confusing start. As the UI is still a work-in-progress, it was a bit of a challenge trying to get everyone in the same places and doing the same things. It wasn’t easy to tell which group member was which on the mini-map and the in-world nameplates weren’t presented in a different color in order to denote group members.
I did mention this to BioWare’s Associate Lead Designer Emmanuel Lusinchi who assured us that a lot of the UI elements were in flux and some of the UI issues I mentioned were already addressed in a later build. Since we were all sitting next to each other, we were able to surmount the confusion by simply talking to each other and coordinating. Eventually, after some initial speed bumps, we got into a rhythm and things were relatively smooth sailing from then on.
The Bounty Hunter story is kind of a Wild West tale. You show up on Hutta and get involved with some interesting individuals and unsavory characters while trying to make your way off-world in order to participate in a bounty hunter competition known as the Great Hunt. In order to gain entry to this competition a hunter must be sponsored and one of the local crimelords, Nem’ro the Hutt, just so happens to be capable of doing so.  Mako, the bounty hunter’s first companion, arranges a meeting with Nem’ro and Nem’ro isn’t immediately convinced that he should sponsor you, which results in being given a number of tasks in order to prove your worth.
Some of these tasks are fairly brutal as well. For one, I was sent to make an example of someone who’d crossed the Hutt.  My task was to kill him and deliver his head to his wife in a sack. Showing up to undertake this gruesome endeavor isn’t a matter of a simple firefight and looting the head off the guy’s corpse, only to return to the some quest NPC and gain an experience reward. Instead, what transpires is actually a fairly brutal cutscene where the bounty hunter clocks the guy over the head with his pistol, presses his knee into the poor guys back while he lays helpless on the floor and pretty much saws his head clean off his neck. While absent of blood, it is still fairly graphic and I was both shocked and impressed to find such a scene in the game.
This simple example really illustrates what BioWare has been trying to emphasize in terms of what their signature cinematic storytelling really adds to the MMO experience. I finished this quest and immediately imagined how it’d play out in any other game, turning in a quest item to a static lifeless NPC giving way to a pop-up text box where the wife screams in horror (via text) and rewards me experience. Instead, I got to watch it all play out as I presented her with the sack and watched her run off screen screaming; I even got a chance to make a callous remark if I were feeling extra evil (and I was!).
Getting back to the multiplayer side of things, it’s true that there isn’t much reason to tag along to many of the class quests given early on. Entering your groupmates’ phases often doesn’t give you much to do as you cannot participate in the conversations. There are a good deal of phases that result in combat and having a friend along can sure be helpful, but without knowing which is which ahead of time your friends are often left basically dancing around waiting for you to finish your conversations should they decide to tag along. If you’re feeling disappointed by this fact, fear not, your starting world is actually a fairly short jaunt that really serves to set up your class storyline and get you used to the game mechanics.
Despite the aforementioned issues, grouping on Hutta was actually still quite fun. Sidequest dialogue can all be done in multiplayer and so you can start earning your Dark Side and Light Side points along with your friends while having to suffer the consequences of their choices if they make a decision you didn’t want to and win the conversation roll.
This may sound like a negative, but it’s actually incredibly social and fun; there’s a kind of “party game” element to it.
One example involved a side-quest bounty where we were given the option of taking the target dead or alive. We found the mark imprisoned along with a few others, all of whom were wearing explosive slave collars. Refusing to come with us unless we freed the other slaves as well, three of us chose to make use of the whole “dead” bit of the contract and kill the guy, however, one member of the group decided to comply and free the other slaves. Guess who won? While we all lost out, we all laughed it up and found the result quite amusing anyways.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the way multiplayer dialogue works, basically each player involved in the scene selects their dialogue choice (or chooses to skip) and then a roll is made for each player (the roll value for each player is shown on the bottom left of the screen). The winning choice determines who responds and what is said (or decided), though alignment points such as Dark Side and Light Side points are awarded based on intentions and not what actually results. If you choose to kill someone (Dark Side points), and your friend chooses to spare them (Light Side points), you’ll still get your Dark Side points if the spare decision wins out. In addition to Dark Side and Light Side points, players earn “Social Points” for participating in multiplayer dialogue. BioWare wouldn’t get into the sort of things one can redeem with social points other than that they’d be of interest to those who are, well, social!
Another neat feature of multiplayer dialogue is the Holocom, or the ability for players to participate in dialogue remotely; you can basically phone it in. If your groupmate initiates dialogue with someone far away from you a menu will pop up asking if you’d like to join the conversation. Choosing to join in will have you show up as a hologram and participate just as if you were physically there yourself, well, with the exception of being able to take physical action against the characters you are speaking to. In the build we played in, you could actually shoot someone in a conversation as a hologram, but this was unintended and will not be possible later on.
While grouping we also discovered a number of other surprises, such as the fact you can (currently) only have one companion out in a full group at a time, though there is a proximity factor to this restriction. If you’re grouped with three other people and someone has their companion out you’ll still be able to bring your companion out as well if you’re a certain distance away from your groupmates, and this is important as your companion makes up a whopping 40% of your damage potential. Of course, this is less of an issue when you’re all grouped up and together. Another thing I noticed is that class roles were mostly absent in the starting world level range (roughly 1-8 or so).
Grouping made things go faster for sure, but what was really interesting was the inclusion of Heroic quest content even on the starting world. We discovered a heroic quest that sent us deep within the bowels of Hutta to wipe out some unsavory characters and creatures in the sewers and found that our group cohesion was quite adequately tested. Crowd controlling enemies, target prioritization, etc., were all important for us to get through the encounter, which ultimately culminated with a fight against a robotic mini-boss who was guarding a glowing Datacron. Datacrons are scattered throughout the game world and offer unique permanent boosts to your statistics, however, the one we found in our Heroic quest was different from the ones some of you may have heard about up to this point. This Datacron was actually part of a set, which when completed would offer even more significant bonuses according to BioWare’s Daniel Erickson. Neat!