BioWare announced that Star Wars The Old Republic’s 10th anniversary expansion Legacy of the Sith release date is delayed to February 15 2022!
IMPORTANT: There will be more updates later tonight and tomorrow, including a FAQ from BioWare. The article has been updated with more information from BioWare including FAQ.
The official announcement of SWTOR 7.0’s delay
Today BioWare made an announcement many of us have been expecting, but were afraid to even think of it. The 7.0 expansion will not be released on December 14 as originally announced.
The new release date is February 15th 2022.
Below you can read the full and official announcement message from project director Keith Kanneg:
“We have made the difficult decision to delay the release of Legacy of the Sith to February 15, 2022.
Like many of you reading this, I personally cannot wait for the launch of our next expansion. I’ve greatly enjoyed my time exploring the depths of Manaan, testing out new story and ability combinations with Combat Styles, and more during internal playtests.
Legacy of the Sith is something the team has been hard at work on for quite a while but as we get ever closer to launch, it is clear that we need a bit more time. We’re focusing additional testing on the many areas we have changed throughout the game to deliver the experience we want, and one that you deserve.
In addition, during our public test server (PTS) your feedback was invaluable in helping us to shape this expansion. Outside of story content (to avoid spoilers) the majority of the expansion and its features will be returning to the PTS for all subscribers this week.
We’re thrilled to celebrate the tenth anniversary of Star Wars: The Old Republic with all of you over the next year with Legacy of the Sith and more!
Thank you,
Keith Kanneg
Project Director”
“Big deal, we’ve seen this happen many times”
We have seen delays to big updates in SWTOR’s ten years of life. Even the previous expansion 6.0 Onslaught was delayed. But this is the biggest one.
This is the tenth anniversary of the game and BioWare seemingly desperately wanted to celebrate it with an expansion. I have a feeling that someone from the higher levels of EA pushed for the December release, while the dev team was screaming at them that they will not be ready.
The delay announcement comes only a few weeks after we learned the original release date. I’ve been shaking my brain trying to find a memory of a longer delay than this one. I can’t think of one.
I think I can safely say that this delay is the most impactful for the game’s future. In a positive way. More in that later
If this news comes as a total shock to you, take a breath and join me in an analysis of what really forced the dev team to make this decision.
Digging for the real reason to delay
BioWare chose the most epic title for the 7.0 story update – “Legacy of the Sith”. This title is a double-edged knife, though. Just by using these iconic Star Wars words in one phrase demands a lot and rises expectations.
Was the story the real reason why the expansion is being delayed? I don’t think so.
Keith’s message confirms that at least part of the reason is the community. He mentions the valuable feedback provided based on the several PTS phases we got to test the new expansion features and content.
The new Combat Styles brought a great confusion and anger into the community and as much as we tried to bring clarity, it was visible (or so I thought) that in some cases even the developers have not settled on a desicion firmly and are not certain how to approach some things.
Thanks to Endonae’s extensive testing and research you got to read detailed analysis of the state of every single Combat Style that was available on PTS, including initial releases and follow-up patches.
At the end, before PTS shut down, some of the classes were still a bit of a mess. I’d like to think that our feedback (the whole community) really did lead BioWare to reconsider some of the gameplay mechanics, features and class setups they had on PTS.
It scares me to even think how many things on the last PTS built were missing, incomplete or broken. From Combat Styles, to Legendary Items, to new UI – there was a ton of work needed to be done.
Why is this delayed release a bad thing?
It’s the Holiday season. Everybody wants some Star Wars in this time of the year. The release of The Book of Boba Fett could be enough for the regular fan, but we are Star Wars junkies and we want more. More is always better.
The delay to February is a let-down, because February is not a great month for video games. Everybody is a bit tired from gaming during the Holiday season, because many of us also get vacations, days off work and other good reasons to stay at home (not that we need more reasons to stay home in today’s crazy world).
If you look at it from a more paranoid point of view, two years ago Anthem was released in February and ended up as a disaster for BioWare and EA. The two games shared more than just developer and publisher.
I had not thought of this delay from the perspective of someone, who had just subscribed to get access to the new narrative and will now miss it. Thanks to Jedi Master Ashïa Sature for bringing it up.
I’ve been a subscriber since the very first day and never dropped my status. It didn’t even cross my mind, but what Ashïa brought up in a conversation on Twitter is incredibly important. What do you think?+
Last but not least, this delay means that we will be left without new story content in SWTOR for eight months. This is likely the biggest content draught the game has experienced to date. Working from home affects productivity, there is no doubt in that. The gap is still way too big.
Why is the 7.0 new release date great news?
We analyzed the negative aspect of the announcement. Now let’s check out the positives from this two months delay.
When you initially hear the news, the first natural reaction would be of “doom and gloom” all over. But this delay happens for a reason. Few reasons! Let me share them with you.
With the original release of December 14 BioWare was probably trying to meet their ultimate goal to deliver the expansion in time for the tenth anniversary of the game. SWTOR launched on December 20 (21 for some of us) 2011.
This original release date for 7.0 was way too close to the dev team’s holiday. From past experience I know that most of the staff working on the game seemingly go on Holiday around the end of the third week of December and based on forum activity (among other things) they come back mid-January.
The new release date will allow BioWare to complete more parts of the new UI. The new R-4 Anomaly Operation will also be delayed. This means that we will not get 7.0 and 7.1 bundled together, as you will read below in the FAQ section.
And this delay is not a week or two like it often happens with regular patches. This is a two-months delay. How broken the 7.0 version of the game must be if they need so much more time to fix it. Or they could be truly taking the feedback and making significant changes to the originally planned and proposed Combat Styles? Really? That would be great.
This is the game’s tenth anniversary (how many times I said that in this post alone already?), It has to be memorable and it has to be a good memory. The fewer bugs and glitches we have, the better.
I am excited to hear what new updates and features we will get to test on the returning PTS. Endonae is too! He is already working hard on a number of new 7.0 class guides. This news of more PTS with more updates is very good for us indeed!
BioWare’s official FAQ regarding the SWTOR 7.0 release date delay
Basically, the timeline for everything was just pushed back. This means everything will be roughly the same as it is now on the live server until 7.0 is released and we won’t be getting anything early as a result of the delay, so we’ll still have to wait until 7.1 for the new operation.
You could think of it as if BioWare just never announced the December release date to begin with. Galactic Season 2 will still be released with 7.0. Ranked PvP season 14 will continue until the launch of 7.0. Conquest will still only require 50k points per toon until the week prior to the expansion.
The PTS will be reinstated sometime this week and remain active until mid-January.
BioWare also provided slightly more detail as to why there was such a significant delay and why they waited so long to announce it. Part of the delay is caused by the holiday break; the devs aren’t going to be working on the game for all of these next couple months.
The following is a full blockquote from BioWare’s post explaining their reasoning for the delayed release date of the Legacy of the Sith expansion. If or when they add more, I will update this article as well. Keep checking in the next day or two for new details.
Why make this change so close to the original launch date?
As a team, we take our date commitments very seriously, and everyone who works on SWTOR has been working extremely hard to deliver as we’d originally planned. This being our anniversary, we really wanted to share the awesome updates in LotS with all of you to celebrate, so we kept moving forward toward that goal as long as possible; but in the end the most important thing is quality, not the calendar.
Why delay for two months?
There isn’t any significant bug or single issue that brought this decision about. Ultimately, we want to give the team more time to add polish and to find and fix bugs to ensure we release 7.0 at maximum quality. We also want to do more to include all of you in that process – we’re very excited to have this chance to share more on the PTS, so that we can get your feedback and show you some of the changes that have already been implemented based on your past feedback.
As mentioned, the team has been working really hard to create Legacy of the Sith, and they deserve a chance to rest and recharge. Our chosen timeframe will allow the team to take a meaningful holiday break, and still have significant polish time before release.
How does this affect Conquest?
Total Galactic War will be included in the rotation and will run:
- December 21, 2021
- January 4, 2022
- January 18, 2022.
- Note: The biggest relevant change is Personal Conquest requiring 100k points instead of 50k. Keep that in mind for the Conquest starting February 8th.
What’s happening with Ranked PvP Season 14?
As season 14 rewards are tied to 7.0, the current season will continue as-is, ending with the release of 7.0 on February 15, and rewards will be distributed normally when 7.0 launches in February.
Are the R-4 Anomaly Operation and the daily area for Manaan still launching after Legacy of the Sith?
Yes. We will want to give players time to be able to gear accordingly so these will be launching post Legacy of the Sith as originally intended. These are intended to be available for testing in a 7.1 PTS cycle. Exact date TBD.
What’s happening with events and their rewards? Any chance for double XP or something extra?
All of the planned new rewards will not be released as they are tied into 7.0. With that in mind here is the plan for each event:
- Life Day will run from December 14, 2021 to January 11, 2022 with current rewards.
- The 10-Year Anniversary event will be running for a full year! From December 14, 2021 to January, 2023.
- All existing anniversary rewards will be available on the vendor.
- The new planned rewards will be added to the vendor in February with 7.0, including the contest winning decos!
- We will inform players when new rewards will be added.
Additional events?!
- Our Double XP event (which also includes Renown, Requisition, and Valor) will return from December 20, 2021 – January 4, 2022.
- All 3 weeks of Feast of Prosperity will return at the following cadence:
- Week 1: January 11, 2022 – January 18, 2022
- Week 2: January 18, 2022 – January 25, 2022
- Week 3: January 25, 2022 – February 1, 2022
What’s happening with PTS?
We’re opening PTS back up this week! 7.0’s features will be present to test during this PTS cycle, with the exception of any that would spoil the story content, of course. This upcoming phase will include Loadouts and Character Creation and also all recent updates we have made since the close of the previous phase.
What’s the PTS schedule?
We will be updating our Public Test Server forum with updates as they happen. PTS will remain open until approximately mid-January as needed.
What does this mean for Galactic Seasons 2?
As Galactic Season 2 is tied to 7.0, it will not be available until Legacy of the Sith launches. However, it will be available on the PTS in the coming weeks.
Source for this FAQ: swtor.com. Thanks to Endonae for helping with the FAQ section.
UPDATE: BioWare has now released the official SWTOR Game Update 7.0 Patch Notes. Alongside that, we are beginning publishing new class and other guides for this expansion! Check back regularly for new content.
