Though Massively-Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game Star Wars: The Old Republic was one of the biggest projects that game developer BioWare ever tackled, both in the scope of lore and the variety of gameplay content, it was put aside into the Star Wars Legends banner along with virtually everything else released before 2014 – even though the era the game took place in would have had little impact on the movies themselves. However, word on the street is that there are plans to not only refit the game snugly into the new continuity, but to possibly create a sequel. Possible plot spoilers for the MMORPG inside.

While BioWare’s MMORPG did not meet their expectations in terms of sales – they were hoping the title would be popular enough to dethrone the ever-popular World Of Warcraft as top MMORPG – the game was still a success, and sits comfortably in the top five most profitable MMORPGs. Nonetheless, Disney decided it would work better as a Legends title, but they still allowed BioWare to make additional content for the game (such as the recent Tatooine Homestead feature), contrary to what was happening with previous Expanded Universe works that were in development. That alone would raise suspicion of any Legends fan, but even stranger was the credits for the Galactic Starfighter expansion – the entire Lucasfilm Story Group, the people responsible for the new canon, was credited as creative consultants (shown below). Some began to wonder about this; why would LSG work on a game that was decidedly non-canon?

That’s where the rumors kick in. A reader of ours by the name of Rory Lustermans brought our attention to a Reddit post detailing an outline of a possible sequel and what BioWare allegedly wants to implement. A user named swtorthr0w claimed to be an inside source working on the game, and that BioWare wanted to stay quiet for a while before revealing new information on the title. Believing this to be counterproductive, swtorthr0w, revealed information under the guise of a Reddit account (which will be detailed in due time). While this is all innocuous by itself (as supposed “insider” information leaks are common), one note of interest from fellow user swtor_miner mentioned that Manaan, which appeared in the original Knights Of The Old Republic, would be in a future expansion.

Major spoilers from the upcoming Manaan Flashpoint. How does the Infinite Army, that’s being created on by Manaan by Revanites: Colonel Darok and Darth Arkous, factor into this “future content”?

At this point, a number of users expressed disbelief at both swtor_miner’s speculation and swtorthr0w’s original post. Then along came a post from someone in the dev team, talking about – you guessed it – Manaan (albiet through an in-character lore post). Because of this, both swtor_miner and swtorthr0w’s posts both became that much more likely. Further confirmation that Manaan would be in the game was found in yet another Reddit thread, which saw evidence of a “Manaan Flashpoint” during a stream (click the picture below for a close-up on this info).

With the potential confirmation that swtorthr0w’s post is legitimate, an outline of what’s to come is as follows (wall of text alert):

Gameplay/Marketing: The story of the game is expected to go on for another three and half years, though servers are still expected to stay up as long as the game has an active audience. Focus will gradually shift to the sequel (which is already in early development) as time goes on. In the meantime, funding for the game is expected to go up once following the new expansion, and continue to stay at a higher rate.

A “New Game Plus” feature will be added to The Old Republic once the story has been completed. The mode will tweak the leveling function and alter the experience of early planets. Certain characters introduced later in the story will appear earlier in the campaign if certain requirements are met. An abundance of items that will make certain aspects of gameplay less repetitive are to be added.

A console port of the game will eventually hit the market.

The Togruta species will join the list of playable races, along with “some ugly thing” that the writer didn’t recognize.

Same-sex romantic options will be implemented into the game.

Cross-faction cooperation can occur on some planets, usually justified by story reasons.

An engine-revamp will occur over time through the expansions. Controls will be slightly modified in the process.

The “Sith Inquisitor” class/character will return for the sequel.

The Frostbite Engine 3 – which publisher Electronic Arts is using for several of its titles (including Star Wars Battlefront) – will be used for the sequel.

Player characters from The Old Republic will reappear in the sequel; that is to say, a player’s character from the original game will appear in the specific story arc of the player’s new character in the next game (albeit in the form of Holocron messages or something to that effect). A similar feature was included in the sequels to BioWare’s Mass Effect, where moral choices from previous installments would carry over in the sequels. Story: The forthcoming Galactic Stronghold expansion will have ties to (you guessed it) Episode VII, and that a plot-important planet from the movie will make their way into the game. Presumably, said planet will also be important in-story. The primary antagonist of the game, the Sith Emperor Vitiate, will also be an influential figure to the antagonist of the Episode VII, although he may not be mentioned by name.

The “Forged Alliances” quest will feature a plot point that will be crucial to the ending of the overarching story arc of the game.

The story arcs of player characters will (of course) be continued and concluded with the coming expansions.

The final arc of the story will revolve around Vitiate’s power being completely restored, and all eight of the classes (Sith included) play some part in defeating him once and for all. The story will end with a cataclysm that shakes the foundations of both the Galactic Republic and the Sith Empire, setting the stage for the sequel.

Again, keep in mind that this is all of this is still just coming from a rumor, albeit a very extensive and detailed one. Nonetheless, it appears that if you believed that Disney was just going to forget about the biggest ongoing video game project being published under their name, then – as Darth Malgus said – you were deceived.

UPDATE!

While this rumor about the game is still up in the air, another reader (Jason Hamilton from Far Far Away Radio, a fellow Star Wars fansite) sent us another interesting bit of information. He apparently got into contact with Jennifer Heddle, the Senior Editor of LucasBooks, and apparently certain pieces of the canon are still being discussed – most notably, the Old Republic Era. Of particular interest is a Tweet that she wrote (that has since then disappeared mysteriously).

@drunknleprechan I honestly don’t know b/c that wouldn’t be my decision, but I would guess anything is possible. EU is a valued resource. – @JenHeddle

While this is still not a direct confirmation on whether or not the game will be canonized, the fact that there seems to be uncertainty at Lucasfilm Licensing on whether or not the game can work as a canon part of the Star Wars universe at least de-confirms the notion that the game absolutely cannot and will not become canon at all.