The Old Republic Customer Service Center

If you thought that, with Mass Effect 3 set to release early next year, BioWare wasn’t giving The Old Republic the full attention it needs, think again, as the developer has just positioned a 400-employee studio as the customer service center for the MMO. Located in Ireland (the first overseas location for BioWare) this service center was acquired over a year ago, but never had its true intentions revealed.

But now that The Old Republic has a firm release date — a.k.a. gamers know it isn’t just a pipe dream — BioWare can begin talking about the nitty gritty of the MMO experience. What exactly this customer service center will be responsible for, whether it be simply a call center for subscribers or a monitoring center for bugs and glitches, we can’t say, but 400 employees are clearly going to be might busy over the holidays.

Dr. Ray Muzyka, one of the co-founders of BioWare, also talked a little bit about the new customer service center, and its importance to making The Old Republic a standout MMO experience.

"MMO launches are complex, and we are determined to set a new standard for a high quality, stable, smooth launch for our fans. Our new BioWare facility and team in Galway is critical to ensuring we deliver on that goal. We’ve got a solid base of people here already in Galway."

It’s definitely been a long time coming for The Old Republic and it’s good to finally begin to talk about the important nuts and bolts that keep an MMO going. We’ve spent so much time wondering whether or not the title would hit its promised 2011 release date that thoughts of how BioWare plans to deal with a huge install base never really crossed our minds.

But now we know that BioWare is taking huge steps to ensure that subscribers’ questions are answered and their issues are resolved. There's nothing we want to see more than The Old Republic come out of the gate as a huge success.

How do you feel about BioWare opening a 400-employee customer service center for The Old Republic? Do you think that BioWare will be able to create the type of MMO experience the fans’ anticipation deserves?

Star Wars: The Old Republic releases December 20, 2011 for the PC.

Source: GamaSutra