Star Wars Galaxies Players Start Petition to Stop Closure

[Logan Westbrook]

Star Wars Galaxies Players Start Petition to Stop Closure

Players implore LucasArts and SOE to make the game free-to-play, rather than shut it down for good.

Following the announcement that Sony Online Entertainment and LucasArts were pulling the plug on Star Wars Galaxies, some of its players have started a petition asking reconsider their decision. SWG launched in 2003, and has had a turbulent history ever since, with player numbers reportedly falling to just a few thousand.

The petition [http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/saveswg/], which at time of writing had amassed more than 2,500 signatures, offers a number of solutions on how SWG might be saved, including making it a free-to-play game, monetizing the trading card game, and consolidating servers with free transfers. The petition acknowledges that there's another Star Wars MMO in the works - in the form of BioWare's The Old Republic - but says that the two can co-exist, especially as SWG is set closer to the movies, and thus represents a much more familiar Star Wars experience.

Taking the game F2P might not be such a bad idea: Many developers have found that MMOs are much more profitable under the F2P model. While SWG's player base may be small, going F2P could give it the boost it needs to get it going again. Unfortunately, while the petitioners might think that Star Wars Galaxies and The Old Republic can co-exist, LucasArts will probably be a lot less keen. It's going to be tough enough for The Old Republic to compete against the likes of World of Warcraft, without having to contend with another Star Wars MMO as well.

Source: Venture Beat [http://venturebeat.com/2011/06/28/star-wars-galaxies-f2p/]




Permalink

 

[Arachon]

Players petitioned SOE to cancel the NGE as well... Look how well that went...

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

We've seen how SOE deals with protests on SW:G before. It involves teleporting them into space.

 

[Woodsey]

Can't see it happening - the issue as far as I'm aware is that they need to renew their ability to use the Star Wars license.

On a side-note: if TOR is F2P I will be fucking pissed.

 

[rsvp42]

Yeah, but it's not going to do any good.

It's an unfortunate state of affairs, but it's irreversible as well. I don't think they made this decision lightly.

 

[Citizen Snips]

A Haiku from my experiences...
Galaxies is lame
Butterflies killed my Wookie
I'm not buying this

I'm always amazed at the determination of a game's fan base when a company decides it's time to move on. It's like the guys who kept playing after they shut down the Halo 2 server so it could stay alive for a few more days.

 

[Krantos]

In the end, this is the problem I have with MMOs. A serious player has paid hundreds of dollars in subscription costs, and now? They'll have nothing. Zip. Zero. Zilch. Not a single bit of content will be available to these people once the servers close.

I just can't justify spending that much money when I know I will have nothing in the end.

 

[KeyMaster45]

I have to admire their loyalty to the game after all the crap Sony has put them through. Hell if I were them I'd be so stoked that someone that's not Sony was putting out a new SW MMO that in the months leading to the game's closure I would actively start trying to find out how little a crap the GM's could give about player behavior.

 

[uppitycracker]

Players petitioned SOE to cancel the NGE as well... Look how well that went...

I was gonna say.... I remember the petition to reverse the combat upgrade..... then I remember actually signing the petition for the NGE, which got signatures from practically every player of the game.

And did it change a thing? Not at all.


All in all, this game has been dead for a VERY LONG TIME. Let it rest in peace, before it mutates any more than it already has.

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

Good luck to them. Not sure why they want to rscue that game, but if they'd rather it stayed then who knows? I can't understand why making it F2P could potentially rescue an only barely-alive game but with successfull F2P games out there, maybe it could work. Perhaps it'll just end up running on some private servers.

 

[TheRealGoochman]

If people dig playing the game, let them keep playing. I personally never got that into it, but if peeps dig it that's cool.

 

[Bretty]

Already a bit late on this. Sony has already come back and stated that the closing down of the game is already happening behind the scenes. It is dead.

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

I'm always amazed at the determination of a game's fan base when a company decides it's time to move on.

Cool username dude, and avatar. Futurama fan?

Yeah, but it's not going to do any good.

It's an unfortunate state of affairs, but it's irreversible as well. I don't think they made this decision lightly.

Well spotted sir. Both the article posted here at The Escapist and the one you linked are today's date. It's amusing that the petition is both reported and shot down simultaneously.

Change of topic then...has anyone been subbed to an MMO when you found out it was going to close? Did you stay till the end? Do you miss it? What did you think of "the end"?

 

[Mister Benoit]

In the end, this is the problem I have with MMOs. A serious player has paid hundreds of dollars in subscription costs, and now? They'll have nothing. Zip. Zero. Zilch. Not a single bit of content will be available to these people once the servers close.

I just can't justify spending that much money when I know I will have nothing in the end.

Pretty much this, it's just a very scary thought.

Although i've spent an absurd amount of money in FFXI i've stopped playing, so should the servers ever come down it wouldn't hit me as hard as someone who still plays regularly. It's the fans that get screwed in the end every time.

 

[Dastardly]

Star Wars Galaxies Players Start Petition to Stop Closure

You're right. LucasArts wouldn't have gone for it. If they can't wring any more cash out of SWG, they want to be sure that all those adoring fans have nowhere to go but TOR. And everyone will cheer, because "at least it's not Sony," but then they'll realize, in time, that LucasArts has really been the problem all along.

And Zombie-Lucas will continue his rampage, feeding off the corpse of his former greatness.

 

[StriderShinryu]

In the end, this is the problem I have with MMOs. A serious player has paid hundreds of dollars in subscription costs, and now? They'll have nothing. Zip. Zero. Zilch. Not a single bit of content will be available to these people once the servers close.

I just can't justify spending that much money when I know I will have nothing in the end.

That's not really any different than with any other game though. It may be a bigger investment all focused on a single title but, other than memories, do you really have any permanent lasting reward from, say, Super Mario?

 

[Quaxar]

You mean ... all five of them? *gasp*

I'm kidding, I'm kidding.
Why would they still want to play Galaxies when they could play Old Republic in a short time?

 

[Flying Dagger]

In the end, this is the problem I have with MMOs. A serious player has paid hundreds of dollars in subscription costs, and now? They'll have nothing. Zip. Zero. Zilch. Not a single bit of content will be available to these people once the servers close.

I just can't justify spending that much money when I know I will have nothing in the end.

Do you feel the same way about steam?

 

[deth2munkies]

Better yet, tell them to support the EMU communities and give them their damn code that they "lost" so we can have our pre-CU servers.