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Star Wars: The Old Republic awakens on Steam today

Origin's jump to Steam is not limited to premium games, as free-to-play MMORPG Star Wars: The Old Republic is now available on Valve's storefront.

Ozzie Mejia

July 21, 2020 11:20 AM

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A majority of the Electronic Arts catalog has been making its way to Steam over the past several months. But the move does not appear to be limited to Origin's premium games. One of the service's biggest free-to-play offerings is now making its way to Valve's storefront. On Tuesday, EA and BioWare Austin announced that Star Wars: The Old Republic would now be playable on Steam.

Downloading Star Wars: The Old Republic via Steam means that players can receive automatic updates through Valve's service. They'll also find a number of Steam features available to them, including trading cards, profile backgrounds, emoticons, and over 100 Steam achievements. Yes, over 100 achievements, because... well... The Old Republic has been around for quite a while. In fact, it's set to celebrate its 10th anniversary near the end of 2021. The team at BioWare Austin most recently released the game's big Onslaught expansion late last year.

The biggest reservations some players may have involve their current progress. Those fears should be put to rest, because fear is a path to the Dark Side. Anybody who picks up SWTOR on Steam can carry all of their progress back and forth between the Steam version and the direct SWTOR launcher version. Crossplay is available available, so the galaxy will remain as populated as ever. Monthly subscriptions (starting at $14.99 a month) can also be purchased directly from Steam, so if your Steam Wallet is bursting with funds, there's one place to use it.

If you're jumping into SWTOR this month, you'll find a handful of returning events. The Nar Shaddaa Nightlife event is currently underway, taking players into some of the galaxy's seediest casinos. (Stop! This is not a segue or a launching pad for yet another argument about The Last Jedi.) And the return of the All Worlds Ultimate Swoop Rally is just says away. It's not Podracing, but it's close.

For more on this long-running MMORPG's launch on Steam, be sure to check out the Star Wars: The Old Republic website.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?