1. SWTOR is gunning for a Guiness World Record of longest game name + expansion name combo here. And KotFE? No quick and easy way to abbreviate and/or say that!
2. Slightly wondering if the “Knights” part of the title is intended to make a connection in gamers’ minds to Knights of the Old Republic. They do sound similar, do they not? Milk that franchise nostalgia!
3. The trailer is… dark, disturbing, and really cool. I don’t think I envisioned the emperor looking like a well-groomed whisky spokesman. I like how much of a story it tells without dialogue, and that final bit where the emperor looks down with those yellow eyes — chills. Although what kills the black-clad brother? I didn’t quite get that.
4. For the record, I’m incredibly thrilled at this announcement. It’s not a smallish expansion pack that we’ve had in the past, but a full-blown one that’s making a big deal out of “returning to storytelling” and starting a new saga that will have multiple chapters.
5. At first, it seemed weird that BioWare’s not going to sell the expansion and make a good chunk of up-front money on it the way it did with Shadow of Revan, Hutt Cartel, etc. However, the business strategy here quickly becomes apparent — to get subscriptions and keep subscriptions. There are huge incentives to subbing now and staying subbed after the expansion launches, and of course that will be on top of all of the other cartel market offerings. It’s a different move that could actually pay off handsomely.
6. Not subbing right now is a viable F2P option, but one will need to sub at least for a month to get the initial 9 chapters of the expansion. The question for me is what I’m going to do. All I want to do is continue on with my Agent, not bring up a new character, so the 12x thing isn’t a huge deal to me. And the new companion and his gear… eh. I’ve got HK-51, that’s all I need.
7. It really looks like BioWare’s trying to blur/eliminate faction lines to make the most of its development dollars. Two faction stories is more expensive than just one, after all.
8. I love, love the look of the twins, the sky troopers, and all of the ships. It’s sharp and threatening and should make for a worthy challenge.
9. Getting a major SWTOR expansion out a couple of months prior to The Force Awakens is really smart, too. Gonna be high tide for Star Wars enthusiasm, and BioWare will want to make the most of that, I’m sure.
10. The option/gift to get an instant level 60 character has me feeling as though BioWare is in effect doing a soft reboot of the game. This is SWTOR 2.0, with the old Revan storyline wrapped up and a new storyline and episodic format to come. Not the worst idea, I guess, but I have mixed feelings about casting everything that came before aside.
11. Little disappointed that there won’t be any new classes or advanced classes. Would’ve liked to have seen that.
Bio Break 
A new class would be amazing, however, this new direction may allow it to happen. A 1-50 3 chapter class story is out of reach I’m afraid. But now with the ability to start at 60, they could do it.
The black clad man was killed by a saber strike from his brother. Here’s how I understood the story: two brothers are very close but have an emotionally distant father which infuriates the white clad son. The other son is far more loyal yet neither ever receive approval.
The white clad son loses so much more from the fathers indifference- he is disfigured in battle- and this fuels his rage. Eventually he is so angered by his father’s disinterest that he lashes out, only to be stopped by the black clad brother. This leads to their duel in which the white clad man delivers a death blow to his brother.
And that is the moment when the father finally acknowledges him as “son.” The emperor wanted one of them to kill the other in a bid for being made heir. Until that moment, he refused to acknowledge either as anything more than another soldier. This all makes me wonder, is this back story? Will we live through this in game, or will we experience the aftermath of the white clad son being named heir?
One more thing, this trailer and storyline looks far more compeling than anything I’ve seen on Episode VII. I’m anticipating SW:TOR:KotFE (Swo-Tork-Otfee I’m pretty sure is the official pronunciation) more than I am the new movie. Let’s hope that BioWare can deliver the amazing story they just teased!
#2 – quiet! Brianna will slap you silly for using the N word – nostalgia.
#9 – a SW CCG, then SWTOR in Oct and SW Battlefront in Nov and VII in Dec. I think EA and Disney should do all right this year.
#1 – a t looks like an f so for me SW:TOR:KotFE is SWTOR KofFe pronounced like coffee.
If you have to buy one month’s sub to get the expansion then surely the expansion is just priced at the cost of one month’s sub. You can say the purchaser subscribing to the game for a month and getting the xpack “free” or you can say they are buying the xpack and getting a month’s subscription “free”. It’s a semantically meaningless distinction. Either way you pay the same amount and get the same thing.
I agree with Iron Weakness, watching this trailer felt so much more compelling than a Mark Hamill voiceover, and a cameo of Han So-old and his furry sidekick. (Though of course my butt will be in the theater seat.) It does seem like I picked the perfect time to return.
Interesting, I have been kicking around the idea of giving SWTOR another go, I was not at all impressed by the game when I first tried it about 3 years ago and have not logged in since, but I am getting bored with the other games I play and I thought of doing a rotation of games I gave up on and giving them second chances.
Not that EA/BW really cares but with the shift forward in the timeline this potentially kills off all the RP guilds that are taking part in the current conflict. We’re still waiting on full details of course but this has the potential to futz the RP of their MMORPG.
It might take some planning, but I don’t see why RP guilds couldn’t jump their timelines ahead, as well.
My first thought on them announcing a chaptered story like this is they’ll dish it out free to subs and probably sell the chapters like DLC to the F2Pers. It will be interesting to see how long they can keep regular content going like this. No MMO that I recall has managed it on a long term basis.
No quick way to say it? Just say the name of the NBC Kathie Lee Gifford co-anchor. SWtoR KotFE and her drink wine tout le temps.
I say drop the ‘t’ and just say it like “coffee.” KoFE?
Did you guys notice the Dad’s face when the white-clad son is leaping at him in anger? He actually smiles! I didn’t notice that the first time I watched and was so impressed with the visual detail they put in that trailer. No doubt that was Blur Studios that did that animation?
Well the expansion has given me reason to sub again at least for a few months. I have a BH at cap on a PvE server and a Shadow half way there but didn’t have much incentive. New story means more challenges.
Merging the Rep and Imps to fight a common enemy also will be good for population numbers.
WRT the trailer after watching it a few times you do get those emtional nuances from their facial expressions they put in. It’s great. Like when the kid in white has to be saved by his brother in training and you see the disappointment on his face (which later becomes anger) as their father turns away and you realise when you watch it again his father was dissappointed with the kid in black because he stepped in to help. It’s the whole start to the dark side thing done much better in a trailer than all 3 prequels.
The black clad brother dies from a horizontal slice across the stomach.