Today, June 12, 2009, is a momentous day, at least for me.  Today is the day that Bioware, in all of their glory, let us know officially of the Smuggler as a playable class in their upcoming MMO, The Old Republic.

For me, this news is most fantastic, as is the slew of details that emerged with the announcement.  Based on the details announced, it would appear as if the Smuggler will play similar to the ones from Star Wars Galaxies, in that they combine the usage of some dirty fighting along with the lethal speed and cunning of an old western desperado.

In addition to their masterful control over the blaster pistol, the Smuggler also specializes in using his/her cunning and wit to pull them through virtually any situation.  That and their ability to quickly think on their feet make Smugglers very dangerous.  Though they are strong offensive characters, in the field of defense, Smugglers are lacking.  They wear light, flexible clothing to aid their agile nature, however, this also makes removes much of the damage absorption that would come with standard Trooper armor.

The Smuggler class will be aligned with the Republic, though their allegiance does not go very deep.  They are simply allied with the Republic because they deemed them the lesser of the two evils.

Along with a great number of details found on the Smuggler’s info page, Bioware also treated us with eight new images, four screen shots, and four bits of concept art, in addition to three short clips showing a bit of how the Smuggler does combat.  In the short clips, it shows the Smugglers taking cover behind crates and firing with dual blaster pistols at their target.  In one of the clips, it also shows a Smuggler throwing some sort of object (perhaps a flashbang) to distract his foe while he lines up a head shot.  It sounds like what Bioware is cooking up for smuggler will translate into some very interesting combat mechanics, and with their unofficial announcement of PVP in their game during E3 2009 (click here for the Gamespot.com stage demo) I am very curious to see how all of this will translate into PVP.

What does this announcement mean to me?  Well, lets just say that when the game is released, Smuggler is certainly going to be the class for me, and I cannot wait at all…PLEASE BIOWARE, GIVE US A BETA OR A RELEASE DATE OR SOMETHING!  WE LOVE YOU!

Be sure to check out our galleries for the rest of the Smuggler images, and hopefully we’ll have more details to give you soon.

What do you think about this announcement?  Write us a comment and let us know!