Star Wars Galaxies Falls In Sarlacc Pit
- Thread starter Tom Goldman
- Start date
Really? Even though people explain what went wrong (and they hardly scratched the surface) you refuse to trust them because they must be blowing it out of proportion? That's ridiculous manufactured cynicism. There's a reason the NGE is still such a huge deal, you can't just blindly throw out the fanboy label and call it a day.canadamus_prime said:
Like people already said, a big part was taking a very open skill system and changing it into a restricted class system that didn't fit with the rest of the game. SWG was a sandbox game, and the NGE was an attempt to make it more similar to theme park MMORPGs without any thought to how the pieces would fit together.
Here's a minor example of something that'll let you see what mindset the devs were in. SWG had no physics to speak of, yet with the NGE they made the space bar the jump button. Having no physics, the most they could do in this situation was literally bind the /jump emote to the space bar, with emote flavor text and everything. Extrapolate from that and imagine how these were the devs designing the entire NGE with that mindset. It was a ridiculously sloppy and desperate attempt to follow WoW using a game whose infrastructure simply wasn't designed for that to be possible.
Can you name a single game update that so dramatically altered the game in such a negative way? I'm guessing they're rare, because I can't think of one worse than the NGE.
I am still angry at that stupid NGE. SWG was so incredibly unique. You could build cities, entertain at cantinas, fly in spaceships, hunt down Jedis, fly across the landscape in speeders. There was so much to do and so much fun to be had. It was glitchy at times, sure. But the process of becoming a Jedi was absolutely brilliant, involving a lot of work and training, AS IT SHOULD BE. You could wake up one day and say, "Hey, let's drop the Commando class and become a cook" or fly into deep space with a Millennium Falcon. RIP Star Wars Galaxies 
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It did, people are either too young or forget that WoW was not the first MMO and that it ''borrows'' many good elements from other MMOs before it.Azmael Silverlance said:
That said Ill miss swg when its gone it was not a perfect game and had many flaws but it was FUN. Can't ask for more than that really. Plus the community was amazing.
SWG seems to be a textbook case on what to avoid when building an MMO or expansion.
The delays in getting the game out, announcing an expansion before the game is even available to players, setting the game in a time period already flooded with too many characters and information, then not having much content at launch which thankfully the players generated on their own, not smoothing out the glitches after years of being in operations, trying to change the game with the NGE to compete with WoW when the original player based loved the sandbox structure of the game, allowing force sensitive characters to do as they pleased with no consequences, and now simply shutting down the game.
LucasArts and GL keeping it classy, and keeping their bank accounts well padded.
The delays in getting the game out, announcing an expansion before the game is even available to players, setting the game in a time period already flooded with too many characters and information, then not having much content at launch which thankfully the players generated on their own, not smoothing out the glitches after years of being in operations, trying to change the game with the NGE to compete with WoW when the original player based loved the sandbox structure of the game, allowing force sensitive characters to do as they pleased with no consequences, and now simply shutting down the game.
LucasArts and GL keeping it classy, and keeping their bank accounts well padded.
Hobonicus said:
Yeah ok, that does sounds like the absolute worst idea ever. But in an age when the average fandom reacts to something as simple as changing a character's outfit from red to orange as if it's the END OF THE FUCKING WORLD, you'll have to forgive my skepticism.Gasaraki said:
I picked up the game shortly after launch, and cancelled my subscription around the time Jump to Lightspeed came out (hardware wasn't cutting, and therefore undermining enjoyment). A few years ago, I picked up one of Lucasarts' "Best Of" PC game sets, which included a free fourteen day trial. I'd missed the game, so I installed it and fired it up.Lagao said:
And. It. SUCKED.
If you seriously believe NGE was the best thing to happen to SWG, I have serious reason to question your taste. It streamlined the game to the point of ridiculousness. Instead of living in the Star Wars universe, the game became your average MMO with a coat of "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away" paint. There's no point in even trying to detail it. At launch, Galaxies said, "Here's a galaxy you guys love. Go make your way in it." After NGE, it became a simple case of "Do quests, loot, repeat". it was all about instant gratification.
I loved SWG because it was the only game that was different from the standard DaoC and later WoW formula.
Too bad that didn't work out long-term. Back to formula it is.
Too bad that didn't work out long-term. Back to formula it is.
I've laid down my opinion on SWG many times since November of 2005. Was actually on a developers panel this summer with a former member of the SOE SWG team who had a lot to say about it. Taught me a lot, really, looking at it from a gamers perspective in 2005, then looking at it from a developers perspective in 2011.
Can't say it looks any better with what I know now, as compared to what I knew then.
As a developer I have to say the most concerning thing in the loss of SWG is the loss of the only structured sandbox MMO game left on the market.
Everything else has switched to the quest led dynamic, whats more players have literally come to expect that in MMO's now and if an MMO doesn't hold their hand and lead them from level 1 to level 9000 with a quest for every minute, the game is somehow at fault.
I'm pretty sure the next "big thing" in MMO technology is going to be an MMO that plays itself for you, so you can just sit there and eat your favorite snack and cheer at the sparkly graphics and live vicariously without having to even lift a finger. It really seems to be the way the industry is going.
One can talk all day about the blunders SOE made with SWG and what not, but, in the end, the money swings behind what the market is demanding, and obviously the market is demanding MMO's that don't require much thought.
So regardless of contracts and corporate thievery and John Smedley being a gigantic tool, SWG would have never survived WoW in the long term anyways, because the MMO genre hasn't survived WoW.
Can't say it looks any better with what I know now, as compared to what I knew then.
As a developer I have to say the most concerning thing in the loss of SWG is the loss of the only structured sandbox MMO game left on the market.
Everything else has switched to the quest led dynamic, whats more players have literally come to expect that in MMO's now and if an MMO doesn't hold their hand and lead them from level 1 to level 9000 with a quest for every minute, the game is somehow at fault.
I'm pretty sure the next "big thing" in MMO technology is going to be an MMO that plays itself for you, so you can just sit there and eat your favorite snack and cheer at the sparkly graphics and live vicariously without having to even lift a finger. It really seems to be the way the industry is going.
One can talk all day about the blunders SOE made with SWG and what not, but, in the end, the money swings behind what the market is demanding, and obviously the market is demanding MMO's that don't require much thought.
So regardless of contracts and corporate thievery and John Smedley being a gigantic tool, SWG would have never survived WoW in the long term anyways, because the MMO genre hasn't survived WoW.
I still play on occasion.canadamus_prime said:
NGE pretty much took away everything that made SWG amazing. for instance, it used to take MONTHS to be a jedi and jedi were rare and powerful. NGE came out, storytelling turned sour, everyone was a jedi, and the vast majority of players left. it was bad. There's still fun to be had, but yes, it's pretty much dead now.