After reading the blog post that Chris wrote on Friday about the bounty hunter class and what they are planning for it, I had to take some time to think about it and see how I felt about it. After taking that time, I was able to finally form a pretty good opinion about it. The one part that stuck out to me was that, for the time being, there would be no cross over of classes. If you sign up and decide to play as a bounty hunter, you’re going to be on the Sith side.
Now, a lot of people might not really like that. I remember even Chris mentioning that he wanted to play as a Republic bounty hunter. However, I can see why BioWare is doing this and while it does suck for some people, I think it is something we’ll definitely grow to love because of the result of this.
There are two reasons why I can see the need to create so many separate classes and have them faction oriented. First, you get unique content for each and every class. You don’t have to worry about cross-faction content which makes the game lose a bit of its charm. Sure, some people would disagree with this, but that’s because they come from different games where there is sometimes a lot of cross over. I don’t much like that and that’s why I am looking forward to TOR.
Another reason that this is great is because it actually shortens the time it’ll take to release the game. Because BioWare has made it clear that they do not want content to be cross-faction, they would have to take the extra time to create unique content for the Republic’s bounty hunter and then the Sith’s bounty hunter that the game would take a considerable amount of time on top of what they have already used to create the game. I don’t know about you, but I would love to have this game released already. Come on already!
BioWare has plans to allow the bounty hunter cross over to the Republic one day; however, right now, I think their main concern is to get the game going. We have to agree, though, that this is an important thing. Imagine playing as a Jedi and you suddenly run into a Sith doing the exact same mission that you are. Wouldn’t that make you go, “Uh…We’re on two different sides? Why would you be trying to talk to this person too?” I know it would make me ask that. Chances are, I’d do what these two are doing in the picture and fight each other. I digress…
When the game is released, there are going to be some people upset that they can’t create “good” bounty hunters. However, it’ll be an exciting experience because we’ll get less Boba Fett wannabes and more people who will create good, unique bounty hunters. This could actually make the game have a lot higher quality. Whether or not it does, though, is irrelevant. I think that it is an important thing to do especially since BioWare wants to have so much unique content. Give them some time and we’ll get everything we want. I’m fully confident in BioWare.
