Who will play SWTOR in 2022 and why

I’ve been gathering insights on who will play SWTOR in 2022 and why since the 7.0 announcement and the prevailing answers surprise me!

It’s the early afternoon of December 31st, 2021. I know that for many of you it will already be 2022 when you read this, but I thought I’d send off 2021 with an article sharing some interesting insights and discoveries I made with the help of the SWTOR community recently.

Yesterday I posted on Twitter and Facebook a two-question message asking my followers for how long have they been playing the game and if they plan to play SWTOR in 2022 and why. I’ve been taking notes of who talks about 7.0 on Reddit and the SWTOR Forums as well for the past few months.

I did not expect the prevailing answers to be “I play since 2011/2 and will continue to until they shut it off or a successor is released”.

Being with this game since before its launch in 2011 I have made it a mission to remain loyal and continue to enjoy it until it shuts off. I didn’t think that this would be the prevailing opinion in the whole community.

I’ve seen friends of mine come and go, bored with the lack of content and diversity in the game. SWTOR struggles with new content for many years now. I think the decline started shortly after the release of Shadow of Revan, the 3.0 expansion.

I am not the most active person on Twitter or Facebook and the excerpt that I got with opinions is too small, yet it was astounding to hear from so many veterans, who have been, like me, with the game since Day One or even from Betas.

Some told me about short breaks they took here and there, others stuck with the game throughout all of its good and bad moments over the years. And, of course, there were players, who shared their disappointment with the 7.0 Combat Styles and/or previous big changes that put them off SWTOR for good.

SWTOR is not a normal MMO. It doesn’t have a normal MMO playerbase and population.

This game, from its launch, to this date, struggles to be a unique patch between Single Player Role-Playing Games and Massively Multiplayer Online Games, with a Star Wars logo on top of all that. Officially Star Wars Legends, since 2013.

And it’s fully voiced. Every last bit of dialogue. Not all of the cinematics are equally well made, of course. BioWare is cheeping out (is that a word or did I make it up?) lately with the “KOTOR Style” animations.

But SWTOR is now a ten-year-old game. It struggles to produce fresh new content on regular basis with 2020 and 2021 being the worse and slowest years in that regard. To some extend it was expected, knowing what happened to the whole world around us… The game also has an awful and dated game engine. Why do/did people stick with it?

SWTOR has absolutely no alternative in what it offers.

Leaving the Star Wars factor and the enjoyable narrative, a big reason for me to continue to play SWTOR is that I am incredibly accustomed to it by now.

It’s not easy to start a new game and learn its new mechanics, develop your army of alts, and build yourself a stable character for the EndGame.

And after you have been doing something for ten year and still find ways to enjoy it, it simply doesn’t make sense to quit.

A new expansion is coming in February 2022. It is always a reason to be excited. The Legacy of the Sith will likely offer little more than what The Jedi Under Siege did in 2018 in terms of story. If 7.0 is at least half as good as 5.10 was, I think everyone will be happy. I know I will. You?

If not the new narrative, at least there will be a number of big changes to game mechanics and new systems added to learn and play around with. I’ve already mentioned the Combat Styles, which BioWare failed to communicate to us properly and angered the community by confusing players with what the Combat Styles actually are going to offer.

The results of the answers I got and the general impression I built over the past few months since the announcement of 7.0 – checking the SWTOR Forums, Reddit, Twitter and Facebook – were not what I expected from a ten-years old game.

I see mostly veteran players proclaiming their love for the game. Whether sticking with SWTOR for ten years, coming later, or returning after a very long break – the community is excited for 7.0 and 2022. And rightfully so.

Not many people who leave a game would decide to stick with the game’s platform and continue to be active in that community. So there’s that fact when trying to find out who will play the game next year and why. It’s very likely that if I had a 5-million followers social accounts, the outcome of this would be different as I would get replies from guys who follow for general gaming news content.

Could it be that SWTOR’s population today is of mostly veteran players? According to the reactions I got, it seems so. But the answer is “definitely not”.

First, because this was a very small part of the game’s community and secondly because veteran players of any game usually tend to be more vocal on forums and social media.

Third, because I see how popular the New Player SWTOR Guides are even today. The game continues to draw new players. Some are coming inspired by Boba Fett or fresh Star Wars content pouring on the small and big screen in recent years. Others are probably long-gone veterans, returning to find the game more entertaining than when they last left it.

The question still stands! If you do not use Social Media and have not seen my posts there, I urge you to share your thoughts in the comments below the article:

How long have you been playing SWTOR? Will you play it in 2022 and why?

VULKK.com started as a passion dream project of mine. From the early first steps of creating a website for myself in Fall of 2014 to the real website launch in the Summer of 2015, I’ve never stopped chasing my dream. At the time I was only playing SWTOR with a slight mix of a few other titles that I spend more time on than “just checking the game out”.

Today VULKK.com covers a variety of video game titles and Star Wars news. I have two guys – Ruby and Endonae – who help me create the highest quality content possible and keep it up-to-date at all times as developers introduce changes to the games we cover.

If you haven’t checked it out yet, I suggest you read Endonae’s first leveling experience memories. It’s a great read, full of nostalgia that most veteran players would enjoy going through, I think.

There’s a reason why VULKK.com doesn’t cover a wide variety of games and isn’t striving to be a mass-media portal. All of us here love the games we play and we stick with them for a long long time. We learn everything there is to know about the game and this allows us to be more thorough in the guides we write.

I will still be playing a number of other games in 2022, but SWTOR will remain a constant on my PC. It has been there since 2011 and will continue to keep me engaged and entertained until it exists.

After all… the 2020 and 2021 content draught did not put me off. What else could?

This article was supposed to be very short. I think I failed at that. And there were so many more things I wanted to share on that topic, but… let’s leave them for 2022. The quotes I included from Facebook and Twitter were public responses and were chosen on a random basis to best match and support the purpose of this article.

I wish you a very happy and joyous 2022!

This article was not supposed to explain why it is worth subscribing to SWTOR in 2022 or why it’s even worth playing a ten-year-old MMORPG in 2022. I do have a guide for that: SWTOR Subscription Benefits in 2021 – is it worth it.

Now, join us for the long journey as we explore 10 years of SWTOR in Retrispect. This one is a bit of a monster. It encompasses every update, change and memorable event for the game in its ten years since launch. Enjoy!