An Awesome Old Republic Avatar Feature Every MMO Needs

Iris Ophelia's ongoing review of virtual world and MMO fashion

I've spent a fair amount of time playing Bioware's Star Wars: The Old Republic since its launch last December, far more than I expected to in fact. I'm not a Star Wars fan at all, but I still gave the game a chance because I love Bioware's design and writing style so much, and because the character customization options are so diverse and interesting (which I wrote about shortly before the game's launch). But there's one feature in this game that I've come to appreciate above all others-- one that gives me almost complete control over my character's clothing so I won't ever outlevel my favorite piece, or be stuck with something hideous that I hate just because it's level appropriate. As far as I'm concerned, this feature belongs in every other MMORPG. Let me explain:

In SWTOR there are different kinds of equipment: Green pieces are common, blue and purple pieces are rarer, but orange pieces are the most interesting. All orange pieces on their own have the same basic stats. A level 10 piece of orange gear will have the same stats as a level 50 piece. The difference is only in the modifications that you put in them. The picture on the left shows the modification slots on an orange hat, along with the mods I've put in it. If I get an orange hat that I like better than this one, all I have to do is pull out the mods and install them in the new hat and voila, it's just as good as my previous hat was.

It may seem like a trivial thing to even worry about, but the ultimate result is that you have much finer control over how your avatar looks (and lets not pretend that that doesn't matter to anyone). It's a great way to make your character stand out from the crowd, but there's more to it than that.

Because this game that makes you think so much about who your character is, this allows you to dress your character to suit who they are and what they may like with far more care than any other MMORPG I've seen. You can make an evil and intimidating looking Jedi or a sage and noble looking Sith. Beyond that, you can also customize your gear to suit your character's stats and build more closely. If you want to focus on critical damage instead of health, all you need to do is find the right balance of mods, then you can essentially tailor your equipment to suit your technical needs and your personal taste with next to no compromising.

This system isn't perfect, unfortunately. Orange pieces are still labelled as Light, Medium, or Heavy armor, meaning that a light armor wearer won't be able to wear a heavy armor piece no matter what, and a heavy armor wearer will be weaker if they wear light gear-- including any of the social costume gear like my main character's fluffy fur coat (pictured in the topmost image), which is all classified as light armour. It seems a little unfair that only light armor wearers can take advantage of these special costume sets without penalty, while medium and heavy armor users would have to sacrifice significant armor protection for these unique outfits.

In spite of all that, I have to admit that there's nothing quite like the feeling of finding that one perfect piece of equipment... and knowing that you'll be able to keep it for more than a couple of levels!

Iris Ophelia (Janine Hawkins IRL) has been featured in the New York Times and has spoken about SL-based design at the Fashion Institute of Technology in Manhattan and with pop culture/fashion maven Johanna Blakley.

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Comments

[Pussycat Catnap]

A feature like this was recently added to WoW: the ability there to make one item look like another.

It has always been part of Everquest 2 according to the marketing material of such.

And in City of Heroes your appearance has no bearing on your abilities at all. When you gain advancement through "loot" it is in the form of components used to build up the potency of your powers - with no cosmestic effect. You can still customize your look constantly - but this is not connected to game advancement other than higher level characters being able to save more preconfigured 'costumes' to switch between.

Champions and other similar MMOs have followed the City of Heroes model to one degree or another.

So, nothing new here with Star Wars - already a common feature.

[Adeon Writer]

YES. This feature is known as "costume" slots in the few MMO's I play. You put armor there, it doesn't effect your stats, but it overrides whatever REAL armor you have equipped. I'm very thankful when games allow this.

[Iris Ophelia]

Well this particular slotting system is a novel approach. There was also Aion which, with higher level equipment, you could pay to skin one piece of armour with the appearance of another. It's definitely more prevalent now than ever, but I particularly like the finer control SWTOR's system allows you to have over your gears stats.

[Arcadia Codesmith]

One of my favorites is Ultima Online's Enchanting system. Despite being a blatant (read: effective) money sink, it allows you to customize armor and weapons to suit your play style and taste.

SWTOR has a good design, but it's not a strikingly original one. Their approach in general seems to be the same as WoW: take bits and pieces of other MMOs, fit them together with loving care, and polish the result until it gleams.

The innovators doing actual risk-taking and creativity often don't have the millions in marketing and production to make it shine, while the people investing millions have a strong aversion to any sort of risk. So we have a proving ground where the smaller titles make things work, the bigger titles emulate them and rake in the bucks, and in compensation, the bigger titles give the smaller titles jack all.

[Iris Ophelia]

To be fair, Arcadia, I think Ultima Online was also a Bioware game. :)

[Pussycat Catnap]

"It's definitely more prevalent now than ever, but I particularly like the finer control SWTOR's system allows you to have over your gears stats."

Yes, it sounds like an exact duplicate of the enhancement and recipe system in City of Heroes since about 2006 or 2007. :)

- Except in that you apply these mods to powers, not to equipment. But they are otherwise the same in concept and execution.

[Arcadia Codesmith]

Ultima Online is... complicated. It was originally developed by Origin, which had been acquired by Electronic Arts. In 2006, EA bought out Mythic, which produced Dark Age of Camelot. In 2007, they acquired BioWare. Then in 2009, EA announced that they were restructuring all their MMORPG efforts under the BioWare banner, and the Mythic studio (which had taken over UO development) was renamed BioWare Mythic in 2010.

The imbuing system was also added in 2009, with the Stygian Abyss expansion, but was therefore developed before UO fell under the BioWare banner.

It's a weirdly incestuous business.

[Daniel]

Where did you get the fabulous fur Iris? I would like it for my characters :)

[Frans Charming]

Lotro has a costume feature too, where you drop clothing items in that you just want the visuals off. It allows you to have several outfits in there, ready for different occasions, while still wearing your armour underneath.

Though what you describe here in swtor does sound more immeresive.

[Iris Ophelia]

@Daniel Hoth, of course!