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Does there need to be Jedi for SWG to be fun?
kain-iii
Member Posts: 146
With SWG in the cannon that it was in (Approx Episode 4 and 5) would it not be more fun without Jedi?
That is not to say that there would be no force abilities at all. I mean what is SWG without the force?
What got me thinking about this is if they do go with a KOTOR MMO we will never see the richness and diversity that we once had. Everyone would go jedi.
I would much rather prefer Pre-CU without Jedi. That is not to say you could not become force sensitive with time and hard work.
Force sensitive skills could vary greatly as well but very limited to what u could choose.
Force throw, lightning, Run etc You would have to choose one.
More or less just the village and gaining a skill.
Smugglers would most likely be interested in mind tricks. You are not interested in the cargo I am carrying.. move along.. move along.
Doctors with improved healing (force sensitivity)
KOTOR really scares me that the SWG that we once loved will not be coming back ever.
The only way i support Jedi is as it was in Pre-CU PERMA DEATH.
But if i could choose it would be no jedi but only force sensitive abilitiies.
Kotor also sounds like it will be a game and not a community. What was good about pre-cu is you could just be a regular Joe making your way through the star wars universe. The socialization aspect was great. Entertainers at the cantina, crafters, doctors, merchants, architects. So much socialization.
Comments
If a KOTOR MMO were to come out, I'd want the devs to view Jedi as the endgame, the Holy Grail. I'd want to make the road to Jedi initiate, much less Knight or Master, to be as bumpy, rough, tough, and nigh impossible to obtain, with a 1 year dedicated "grind" at minimum.
However, an intriguing storyline could be built around the KOTOR universe without player Jedi. Would take some creativity, for sure, but doable. And probably would be a BLAST.
I would like to also add that I don't think it was neccessary to streamline 32 proffesisions into 9 in order to provide role playing content.
Role playing could have been achieved through participation in faction.
E.G. Accepting a position in the Imperial Army as either a spy, officer, etc
Choosing a position would allow you to role play and earn abilities as you gain rank.
So you could be any number of mix and match proffessions and through faction and rank earning additional abilities that would allow you to role play anyhow you want.
When I started playing Galaxies, Jedi was not mentioned and was not on my radar at all. I just wanted to be a Bounty Hunter and that's what I did. Of course I veered off course and did many different things along the way but I always came back to BH.
Then one day I was visited by some old geezer and I persued it.
I guess my point is, Jedi made no difference to me one way or the other. The game was a blast before and after Jedi. Just not after NGE.
Altre Monserrat - MBH/MP
Aaden Monserrat - Elder Jedi
Starsider - <DFC> - Dark Force Clan
well i love the game system but you always want to be the special class (pre everyone having one)
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Don't click here...no2
"If we don't attack them, they will attack us first. So we'd better retaliate before they have a chance to strike"
"If we don't attack them, they will attack us first. So we'd better retaliate before they have a chance to strike"
Sure, a lot of people wanted to ultimately get Jedi, but that wasn't the question, the question was whether the game could be FUN without them. It could. It was.
I don't give a frack what NGE Jedi want, I didn't buy the NGE, I bought a completely different game where Jedi would be powerful but rare, appropriate to the time frame the game was set in. There might be Jedi in that universe but it did NOT revolve around them. In an ideal Galaxies, the one they sold me, my CH/Rifleman/resource merchant would get his ass thoroughly kicked by any Jedi he met, but he'd have to be damned unlucky to run into one of these rare and elusive characters who should have much bigger fish to fry than ME.
Sure, a lot of people wanted to ultimately get Jedi, but that wasn't the question, the question was whether the game could be FUN without them. It could. It was.
I don't give a frack what NGE Jedi want, I didn't buy the NGE, I bought a completely different game where Jedi would be powerful but rare, appropriate to the time frame the game was set in. There might be Jedi in that universe but it did NOT revolve around them. In an ideal Galaxies, the one they sold me, my CH/Rifleman/resource merchant would get his ass thoroughly kicked by any Jedi he met, but he'd have to be damned unlucky to run into one of these rare and elusive characters who should have much bigger fish to fry than ME.
No denying SWG was fun w/out having to do Jedi, I was a 3-year Smuggler. If you want a setting without Jedi all over then it can't be in the KOTOR, they were powerful but were all over the place. Maybe a post-Ep.6 setting?
Honestly I would love to see a KOTOR setting, that would justify numerous Jedi, you have an advancement system in place from the stories in the EU written about them. They were powerful, but not god-like and still relied on other comabt professions to get things done. There is also a rich history of other professions (Smuggler, BH, Crafter/businessman, politicians, etc) written that you could base the setting on. Give folks the option of Jedi but also lay the works down for a multitude of other things to do.
"If we don't attack them, they will attack us first. So we'd better retaliate before they have a chance to strike"
No denying SWG was fun w/out having to do Jedi, I was a 3-year Smuggler. If you want a setting without Jedi all over then it can't be in the KOTOR, they were powerful but were all over the place. Maybe a post-Ep.6 setting?
Honestly I would love to see a KOTOR setting, that would justify numerous Jedi, you have an advancement system in place from the stories in the EU written about them. They were powerful, but not god-like and still relied on other comabt professions to get things done. There is also a rich history of other professions (Smuggler, BH, Crafter/businessman, politicians, etc) written that you could base the setting on. Give folks the option of Jedi but also lay the works down for a multitude of other things to do.
I think if SWG expansions had been something besides marketing fluff for LucasFilm products, this would have been the area to explore with the first expansion after JtoLS.
By the time enough people had probably completed the tasks you wanted to 'unlock', give them a 2nd slot that can be used in the Jedi expansion universe, with an almost entirely separate PvP/PvE track of Jedi development ... it would almost be a separate game, where only the rare Masters could travel back to the non-Jedi universe and interact with those they used to know.
Eh, but that's in the fantasyland where expansions were actually meant to expand core game functionality, not sell me a DVD.
Kai
"If we don't attack them, they will attack us first. So we'd better retaliate before they have a chance to strike"
And we could probably see even more numbers if there hadnt been jedi.
Fact is, once holos started dropping and the grind started, people bolted. They came back for JTL (wow no jedi go figure) but left after about a month. Ironically one month is how long it took to master a pilot profession casually.
Since then the numbers kept dropping. I used to ask former players, in other games, that I met just why they left. Almost all of them said holos or jedi.
Heck at C3, SWG was the inside joke. The main fanbase of Star Wars mocked anyone even admitting to playing SWG. And why? Because of the jedi in the game. Now they mock it even more thanks to the NGE.
If there had been no jedi then developers wouldnt have wasted 2 publishes on them and could have done things to fix the game or add content. Also alot of programming time spent on them would never have happened. Meaning more time to fix issues with other professions.
Jedi became the advertising mules for SWG. The Star Wars Amway Project. The tactic was simple enough. Attract a new plywer to the game with images of jedi scattered amongst other images. Then when the poor sod is in the game he sees saber swinging yahoos all over owning near everything. So he tries to go jedi also. BAM! A 6 month sub of monthly payments almost guarunteed. But it backfired on them. For every sub gained from glowstick facination they lost 3 or 4 more tired of seeing the jedi or tired of trying to play in a MMO full of mindless grinding.
Kai
This topic seems to come up once every full moon or so.
My thoughts are thus. From the frist worldcon that i saw a booth about swg the shill there said "oh yes, jedi will be in the game, rare and hard to play one but they will be there." Then a few months later I was able to attend a q and a from the then creators of the up coming SWG game, we were told "what we would like to do is have jedi be a VERY long term goal. one that takes into your game play." someone asked them to explain that, "well, lets say your goal was to one day be a jedi knight, then your actions in game woudl have to be "good." at the time they could not see how a person that played a bounty hunter could ever aspire to be a jedi."
Once i got the game I was too busy tryign to help actually beta test to even think about such things as jedi. then came release and wow, still more things to deal with that never had me lookign down that road to jedi. A friend of mine was/is a huge fan of the mythos of star wars. He asked a few of us to run all over the place helping him figure out the "secret code" to unlocking a baby jed. We are tallking here 2 or 4 moths post release. We went (and died) to such places as dant and endor. man it was frightening, fun and a good time.
By the time the holocon solution was found, I have tasted some of the professions, had about all of the poi badges (befroe there was the list of where they were). I had settled into a master doctor/master rifleman, not for the pvp stuff, but because i loved sneaking and creaping up on a GDK and sniping it down (sometimes i won others i lost). What was missing? simple a nice long term goal. somethign that I kinew woudl take me a long time (year or two) to complete. soooo.....why not? I did the profession grinding, but i did it they way i wanted too, at the keyboard. no macros, no drivign and playing 10 hours a day, just playing the game and learning the ins and out of my professions. even made a few good credits along the way!
Then that day came were i hit master Armorsmith, and the music started to play. that took a year, i was very satisfied, i felt i had done something special (it was to me), it did not matter that i was slow, casually working to a goal. Most of my guild had no clue that I actually hit jedi in fact, it was something i shared with my above friend (who had decided the profession grind was a cheap way to make jedi) and one other very special friend.
I realized that once i hit jedi, i had another very long road to go now, sadly it was a lonely one thanks to tef, perma-death, all that jazz.
the point is that working to jedi was a long term goal, then my template was another. the problem to me was that no other profession had the same one to two year goal. IF any master profession was the same long term goal i would have gone that way just as easily.
should jedi have been an alpha class? in the begining i would say yes. Post village? no, especially when i attended an in game wedding and over half of the guestsd were in robes and had a glowstick on thier hip.
would i have stayed playing the game with no jedi? that is questionable, if there was a long range goal to work on slowly probably. imagine if you will that you had to solo kill a list of "end game" animals and npc for you to earn your master rifleman badge? that is what i am talking about. not spending hours in a mindless spin group, but "earning" that master badge in your field, so that when someone saw that master x over your head they KNEW you were at the apex of yoru craft and had done something special, face it we play these game to get a special feeling. just what is that special feeling differs from player to player.
This is exactly the Marketing belief that led them to trash everything about the original Jedi system, and I couldn't disagree more .... if they'd continued to make gameplay fun by focusing on fixing bugs and expanding content in their original design, the subscription numbers would have been fine. There are plenty of games with Jedi out there, this didn't have to be one of them to be far more successful than NGE with Jedi was.
NGE was the proof -- Jedi doesn't make you a success, only good, enjoyable game design makes you a success.
And we could probably see even more numbers if there hadnt been jedi.
Fact is, once holos started dropping and the grind started, people bolted. They came back for JTL (wow no jedi go figure) but left after about a month. Ironically one month is how long it took to master a pilot profession casually.
Since then the numbers kept dropping. I used to ask former players, in other games, that I met just why they left. Almost all of them said holos or jedi.
Heck at C3, SWG was the inside joke. The main fanbase of Star Wars mocked anyone even admitting to playing SWG. And why? Because of the jedi in the game. Now they mock it even more thanks to the NGE.
If there had been no jedi then developers wouldnt have wasted 2 publishes on them and could have done things to fix the game or add content. Also alot of programming time spent on them would never have happened. Meaning more time to fix issues with other professions.
Jedi became the advertising mules for SWG. The Star Wars Amway Project. The tactic was simple enough. Attract a new plywer to the game with images of jedi scattered amongst other images. Then when the poor sod is in the game he sees saber swinging yahoos all over owning near everything. So he tries to go jedi also. BAM! A 6 month sub of monthly payments almost guarunteed. But it backfired on them. For every sub gained from glowstick facination they lost 3 or 4 more tired of seeing the jedi or tired of trying to play in a MMO full of mindless grinding.
Kai
SWG was leaking subs since launch. No getting around that. Hologrind helped push out folks faster nothing more. Launch ratings were mediocre at best. So I'm sure in an effort to try to lure folks back in they intoduced the hologrind. Except it did more harm then good (seems to be a standard trend for this MMO, intro something new and more folks leave rather than join). SWG has been the joke of the MMO business since it launched, nothing new there.
Star Wars = Jedi. No getting around that. A Star Wars MMO without them is just a standard run of the mill Sci-Fi MMO. Jedi are the central players in the SW universe. Thems the facts. Do they bring in the money? Absolutely and thats exactly why you won't see an MMO without it. Some folks do want to be Boba, other Han or Leia, hell even uncle owen, but most wanted Jedi. They wanted to be the Hero class of the entire SW lore.
They also tried to effectively change the time line between episode 4-5 by trying to convince loyal fans that Jedi where actually out there, when the lore strictly states otherwise. That and the "Alpha status" given to Jedi, a big no-no in MMO worlds. All that does is focus a large percentage of folks to doing nothing other than attaining that status and it disrupts the "flow" of the game.
$20 says if you would have started SWG in a KOTOR setting and made them a standard class , you would here a lot less whining from folks.
"If we don't attack them, they will attack us first. So we'd better retaliate before they have a chance to strike"
Plenty of Star Wars games without Jedi? ALL of there biiggest hits centered on the theme of Jedi:
1. KOTOR 1&2 (Jedi centric)
2. Empire at War (Jedi are the "Alpha" class)
3. Jedi Knight series
4. SW Legos 1 & 2
They never hid the fact that SWG was going to at some point have Jedi. They just rushed it because the game was leaking players, nothing more. preCU, CU and NGE couldn't change any of that.
All NGE showed was that you don't radically change the core of a game to a player base without getting there approval first. That and the fact that you have to have this new edition ready PRIOR to launch. Jedi had nothing to do with it. The only reason folks were mad about Jedi was that it was relegated to a standard class from their norm of having it as an "Aplha". Again the whole changing the core of the game thing.
"If we don't attack them, they will attack us first. So we'd better retaliate before they have a chance to strike"
Plenty of Star Wars games without Jedi? ALL of there biiggest hits centered on the theme of Jedi:
1. KOTOR 1&2 (Jedi centric)
2. Empire at War (Jedi are the "Alpha" class)
3. Jedi Knight series
4. SW Legos 1 & 2
They never hid the fact that SWG was going to at some point have Jedi. They just rushed it because the game was leaking players, nothing more. preCU, CU and NGE couldn't change any of that.
All NGE showed was that you don't radically change the core of a game to a player base without getting there approval first. That and the fact that you have to have this new edition ready PRIOR to launch. Jedi had nothing to do with it. The only reason folks were mad about Jedi was that it was relegated to a standard class from their norm of having it as an "Aplha". Again the whole changing the core of the game thing.
Re-read what I said ... which is that there are plenty of games with Jedi ... it shouldn't be a cookie-cutter requirement of every game with the LA label, people who are jonesing to swing a lightsabre have plenty of opportunity.
The original design of SWG acknowledged that a real Jedi would be powerful, vastly moreso than any other legitimate class in an MMO ... so the only balance for that would be making their attainment difficult and their numbers small. Abandoning that reality was abandoning any hope of good MMO game design, it was one kludge after another after that, to make Jedi special but not *too* special, meaning that basically everybody would hate them -- the people who played them and found them pretty non-Jedi, and the people who didn't play them and found them overpowered anyway.
I agree that jedi should not have to be in every game out there that LA makes, BUT when it comes to MMO's its a must have.
I also agree about the jedi. Hell, when I first read about Jedi in July '03 I was actually tempted to try for it myself and unlock the secret to being this class. For me, it lost its glamour when permadeath disappeared. A friend and I talked about that and realized they just made a serious mistake and that would open the arena for many, many more folks that otherwise wouldn't have dreamed of it (Less risk and more reward). They also rushed Jedi out way, way too soon in my opinion. I was not really expecting to see a Jedi for at least a year or more. That would have given them time to advance the storyline, fix bugs, add content and get folks to a level where they would be ready to handle Jedi better.
I just hope whoever makes a new Star Wars MMO develops a strong tier of professions(even Jedi), gets away from the "known" storyline (EP 1-6) and give the tools and resources for players to really make their mark in the online Star Wars Universe. Also need to avoid the "Alpha" class with any profession, even Jedi.
"If we don't attack them, they will attack us first. So we'd better retaliate before they have a chance to strike"
I agree that jedi should not have to be in every game out there that LA makes, BUT when it comes to MMO's its a must have.
Whenever people say that Jedi is a "must", they say it without any support, as if it's self-proving.
It's not. They're not. The only "must" in an MMO is good gameplay design. SWG was fun and people liked it without one stinking Jedi. It was not a must. Quality was a must. They delivered Jedi, but not quality, and people left. They delivered even MORE Jedi as a starting profession, and even less quality, and MORE people left.
There's no evidence that Jedi are a must as a playable class in a Star Wars MMO. People say it as if saying it makes it true ... but it's not only not true intuitively, all the actual evidence suggests it's not true -- the game was never more popular in retrospect than when there wasn't a single Jedi around.
I agree that jedi should not have to be in every game out there that LA makes, BUT when it comes to MMO's its a must have.
Whenever people say that Jedi is a "must", they say it without any support, as if it's self-proving.
It's not. They're not. The only "must" in an MMO is good gameplay design. SWG was fun and people liked it without one stinking Jedi. It was not a must. Quality was a must. They delivered Jedi, but not quality, and people left. They delivered even MORE Jedi as a starting profession, and even less quality, and MORE people left.
There's no evidence that Jedi are a must as a playable class in a Star Wars MMO. People say it as if saying it makes it true ... but it's not only not true intuitively, all the actual evidence suggests it's not true -- the game was never more popular in retrospect than when there wasn't a single Jedi around.
Absolute truth!
--From a day 1, err 2 vet
--When you resubscribe to SWG, an 18 yearold Stripper finds Jesus, gives up stripping, and moves with a rolex reverend to Hawaii.
--In MMORPG's l007 is the opiate of the masses.
--The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence!
--CCP could cut off an Eve player's fun bits, and that player would say that it was good CCP did that.
I agree that jedi should not have to be in every game out there that LA makes, BUT when it comes to MMO's its a must have.
Whenever people say that Jedi is a "must", they say it without any support, as if it's self-proving.
It's not. They're not. The only "must" in an MMO is good gameplay design. SWG was fun and people liked it without one stinking Jedi. It was not a must. Quality was a must. They delivered Jedi, but not quality, and people left. They delivered even MORE Jedi as a starting profession, and even less quality, and MORE people left.
There's no evidence that Jedi are a must as a playable class in a Star Wars MMO. People say it as if saying it makes it true ... but it's not only not true intuitively, all the actual evidence suggests it's not true -- the game was never more popular in retrospect than when there wasn't a single Jedi around.
Jedi = $$$$ and Jedi are the core of the SW universe, there is the support. Go out there to 9/10th's of the material on SW and it centers around Jedi or a planetary/galactic struggle involving Jedi. You do not have that and in my opinion, you will not succeed in any new SW MMO. You cannot take the core entity out of a IP, give it to the masses and expect that they will be happy. Thats like making an LOTR MMO and saying there are no hobbits, just play the rest and have fun. Folks won't do it.
Good gameplay design is a must but that is very subjective. What may be good to one isn't to another. Look at EVE. I think that is a great gameplay design, one of the best sandboxes I have seen. Yet , it still has a very low subscriber base. Yes current players are loyal and its growing, but very slowly. Big name companies like SOE, Blizzrd cannot have a growth rate after 3 years of up to 150k like EVE is now, its not cost effective. Look what happen to Earth and Beyond (God I miss that game
)
Quality in the current SWG was always an issue, even from launch. Never more popular then when there was no Jedi? That because it was a new MMO and a big name IP to boot. We were without Jedi for only four months after launch, so of course its going to still be popular. But remember in that time they also knew that jedi was attainable, so Jedi was still there in thought and desire.
Jedi was also brought in half assed and as an undying "Alpha class". You remove permadeath, and keep them at the same powerlevel to boot and most non Jedi of course are going to be pissed. That and you end the Storyline which was a major theme of the game at launch, you have professions that had no purpose (Smuggler), bugs galore, credit dupes that inflated the economy massively (rememeber that lovely bug), no new content being added, broken quests/loot and shoddy game play and yeah, folks are going to leave.
Hell, in 2004 and into 2005 fixes seemed to center around the Jedi/BH disputes of who is more powerful. Other professions paid for it and more folks left. Folks screamed to end the Jedi status and what do we get? The village and even easier way to get Jedi, so more folks flock to Jedi and even more die hard non-Jedi quit and move on.
Realise Killer, I am not trying to argue with you, just see things differently in this case. Feel free to comment. I am off to get some sleep and will continue this discussion a bit later.
"If we don't attack them, they will attack us first. So we'd better retaliate before they have a chance to strike"
I think Republic Commando answered this question--it was a blast of a game, literally and figuratively. It all depends on how the game is designed. Anything, properly done, can be fun.
But, without Jedi, is it still Star Wars? Without hobbits, is it LotR? Without Hogwarts, is it Harry Potter? It can be, but that leaves large shoes to fill.
Apply lemon juice and candle flame here to reveal secret message.
And we could probably see even more numbers if there hadnt been jedi.
Fact is, once holos started dropping and the grind started, people bolted. They came back for JTL (wow no jedi go figure) but left after about a month. Ironically one month is how long it took to master a pilot profession casually.
Since then the numbers kept dropping. I used to ask former players, in other games, that I met just why they left. Almost all of them said holos or jedi.
Heck at C3, SWG was the inside joke. The main fanbase of Star Wars mocked anyone even admitting to playing SWG. And why? Because of the jedi in the game. Now they mock it even more thanks to the NGE.
If there had been no jedi then developers wouldnt have wasted 2 publishes on them and could have done things to fix the game or add content. Also alot of programming time spent on them would never have happened. Meaning more time to fix issues with other professions.
Jedi became the advertising mules for SWG. The Star Wars Amway Project. The tactic was simple enough. Attract a new plywer to the game with images of jedi scattered amongst other images. Then when the poor sod is in the game he sees saber swinging yahoos all over owning near everything. So he tries to go jedi also. BAM! A 6 month sub of monthly payments almost guarunteed. But it backfired on them. For every sub gained from glowstick facination they lost 3 or 4 more tired of seeing the jedi or tired of trying to play in a MMO full of mindless grinding.
Kai
SWG was leaking subs since launch. No getting around that. Hologrind helped push out folks faster nothing more. Launch ratings were mediocre at best. So I'm sure in an effort to try to lure folks back in they intoduced the hologrind. Except it did more harm then good (seems to be a standard trend for this MMO, intro something new and more folks leave rather than join). SWG has been the joke of the MMO business since it launched, nothing new there.
All MMOs leak subs from the get go. All games leak players from the beginning. Its the nature of consumers. But if they had stuck close to continuity and worked on the original design without jedi they could have helped the situation with new blood. That is how it was supposed to work. For every person that leaves, one or two come in to replace them. You think the 5 million playing WoW all have been in since the beginning? Definately not. I saw people leave all the time but the population kept growing anyway.
Star Wars = Jedi. No getting around that. A Star Wars MMO without them is just a standard run of the mill Sci-Fi MMO. Jedi are the central players in the SW universe. Thems the facts. Do they bring in the money? Absolutely and thats exactly why you won't see an MMO without it. Some folks do want to be Boba, other Han or Leia, hell even uncle owen, but most wanted Jedi. They wanted to be the Hero class of the entire SW lore.
In Ep. IV to VI Star Wars was NOT about jedi. Anyone who saw only jedi in those three movies need to get their eyes and ears checked. The whole thing said very clearly that jedi were near to extinct. That was what made the jedi such a special thing. The most popular character from those movies had only 11 minutes of screen time in the original release. That was Boba Fett and he wasnt a jedi. The second most popular was R2-D2 and he was definately not a jedi either. In fact if you want to know what Star Wars, the entire series, was about it was the tale of two droids. Straight from Lucas himself.
They also tried to effectively change the time line between episode 4-5 by trying to convince loyal fans that Jedi where actually out there, when the lore strictly states otherwise. That and the "Alpha status" given to Jedi, a big no-no in MMO worlds. All that does is focus a large percentage of folks to doing nothing other than attaining that status and it disrupts the "flow" of the game.
$20 says if you would have started SWG in a KOTOR setting and made them a standard class , you would here a lot less whining from folks.
With these last two paragraphs you just proved my point. Thanks to the developers putting in Jedi it turned everything on its ear. Because people are not stupid. They knew jedi werent supposed to be in the game so prevelantly. That is what made Ep IV-VI so special. And Episode III showed everyone very clearly just how extinct jedi were. Having jedi even available pushed alot of players to leave. Hence leaking subs. And people who werent playing wouldnt even try it out because of jedi. Hence not enough to replace the ones that left.Kai