2. Star Wars: The Old Republic (2011)

Players can all join online with their unique characters to experience an epic story and battles.

The Old Republic, and MMO title created by BioWare, is the only Star Wars game that's still going and updating, with lots of players and new things to do. You can create a character in the Star Wars universe, and decide what you want to do with 8 classes and 8 races offering tons of customization for how you encounter the epic story set thousands of years before the movies. Because it's Bioware, there's lots of great story writing and dialogue with other characters, letting you make choices that impact how things play out. In a unique twist on the MMO genre, you can actually play through these stories with friends, making choices together, and having everyone's character participate in scenes. It's really enjoyable to have your calm Jedi try to negotiate while a friend's hot-headed bounty hunter causes trouble.

As an RPG, the game has all the interesting RPG class progression, skill trees, and equipment upgrading and looting that you would expect. The classes all balance pretty well with each other, making running around with a group an interesting experience. The Old Republic is great if you enjoy MMOs like World of Warcraft, with good matchmaking and social tools for meeting new players of your level and interests, but the game's story content can also be played solo thanks to some recent updates, and the story content ties into other Star Wars properties and history from other games and novels.

As you level up and get stronger, your Force powers and abilities get better and better.

In addition to the main story, there's also fun competetive events called Flashpoints, which offer arena control point combat that hearkens back to massive battle games like Battlefront.

Did I mention the game is 100% free to play? You can go through the entire story without ever paying, although monthly subscribers get a whole host of cool benefits for those who want to dig deeper into the game and do more with their time online. But if all you want is some fun Star Wars RPG time online with other people, The Old Republic is a great, great experience. It's still not my #1 recommended Star Wars game though...