1- NGE was bad because it tried to get new players. No that is an incorrect premise, the NGE is an abomination because it did not care about the 200K players it already had. The 200K existing players were marked as an exceptable loss and SOE figuratively rubbed their dagely parts in our collective faces. That is where the NGE failed.
2- That WoW killed MMORPGs and SWG specifically. Name the other MMORPGs WoW killed besides SWG? I can't think of one, WoW did not kill SWG. What killed SWG was visionless development that prolonged adding content, fixing bugs, and generally screwed community relations with the "It will be done in a few months" line.
Where I disagree with you ideas on the Pre-NGE and the NGE.
1- The Pre-NGE was a complex system. Where is the complexity in the old system? The complexity was in the planning. You had to have the right buffs, the right skill set, the right weapons, and you had to counter your enemy's template. Sure actual combat was basically broken down into a few buttons, but the planning for combat and the required pre-reqs made combat more about preparation and planning.
2- Jedi, no Star Wars fans believe the NGE is good. What is the target of this game? Star Wars fans. Star Wars fans want jedi to be special, they don't want jedi to be a cheap marketing gimmick the way this game has always done.
Your conclusion that the sandbox is dead. Because WoW brought people who never played a MMORPG before to MMORPGs, that means the sandbox is dead? I think your hypothesis is flawed. WoW did not steal veteran MMORPG players, WoW has only brought new MMORPG players to the genre. If WoW stole 3 Million American players, 1 million EU players, and 4 million Asian players from the various regional markets, then a lot more MMORPGs would be dead than just SWG. That is a fallacy, WoW is successful becuase it made a MMORPG that Diablo 2 lovers who were Blizzard fans solely would love.
Eve is a sandbox game and guess what? It continues to grow. Why does Eve grow, because CCP unlike most major MMORPG developers stayed with its clear vision and that is the exact reason why SWG, which is about as old Eve, is dying. SWG switched visions shortly after it was released, *cough* jedi changes *cough*, that is where SWG started to die. Remember "SCREW THE JEDI CARROT FIX THE GOD DAMMED BUGS!" I remember that mantra well.
--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.
Not only are you clueless, you think you actually can reframe the past & the truth.
The REAL truth is that the NGE was THE worst decision in the history of MMO's, and the way it was handled was disgusting. Even SOE has agreed it was the wrong path & handled poorly, so why don't you call up them and try to convince them of this BS.
I'll start my own SWG... with Black Jack... and Hookers!!!
First off, I think numbers, wether many or few, never proof quality. WOW isnt a great game because it has 8 million subscribers, and SWG IMVHO would have not more players today without the NGE.
I can accept when you say, you personally liked it better before the NGE. I never questioned anyones personal taste. I like vanilla, someone else strawberry, so what.
I do question however the entire myth behind the NGE, as I said. NGE had some fatal flaws. But the direction was correct. Most vets already had dwindled out of the game. Be honest here. How many of you REALLY suddenly left when NGE came, and had played regularly until one day before NGE? I have seen it, the constant drop in players. Most of you already were on the move out of the game, and NGE was only like a final nail on the coffin to finally leave.
But instead of leave quiet and leave it to a new generation you had to start a war. SWG even today is SO much better than 90% of all the current MMOs out there. Cutting the endless sea of possibilites did hurt, me included. But I dont let my personal loss overshadow my judgement to realize the necessity and reason behind it. They overdid many simplifications, no doubt here. But there was just no choice as the situation was. SWG would not be a single bit in better shape now without the NGE today. I lost my professions, which sucked. But so what? It was a game. Combat was different now, so what? I understand we all have our preferences, but I dont understand ppl who view a game as it were their personal religion. A lot of complains surely were understandable, some justified, but the entire emotional frenzy was and is FAR beyond anything justified and reasonable.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
i could respond to this dribble in a well thought out post citing examples of how every assumption you make is just that, an assumption. and any one of us could go on for days with it....
but in my opinion the whole thing can be summed up like this:
I do question however the entire myth behind the NGE, as I said. NGE had some fatal flaws. But the direction was correct. Most vets already had dwindled out of the game. Be honest here. How many of you REALLY suddenly left when NGE came, and had played regularly until one day before NGE? I have seen it, the constant drop in players. Most of you already were on the move out of the game, and NGE was only like a final nail on the coffin to finally leave. But instead of leave quiet and leave it to a new generation you had to start a war. SWG even today is SO much better than 90% of all the current MMOs out there.
I played from 1 month after release up until a couple weeks after the NGE, so your 'old vets had already left' arguement is out the window. My old server Scylla, while it was never as large as say Bria... was very much alive and running prior to the NGE debacle.
And no, SWG is in no way better shape than it was. The population is gone compared to pre-NGE and with the exception of those friendly AFK bots that sit around Mos Eisley the major cities are empty and lifeless. Your 90% comparison is a bit vague, my comment to that is....SWG is now IDENTICAL to 90% of the MMOs out there rather than being better than them.
Complexity was better than simplicity as far as SWG goes, if people were put off from the combat system because they had more than 5 attacks then maybe they should stick with operating a bicycle rather than an automobile.
First off, I think numbers, wether many or few, proof quality. WOW isnt a great game because it has 8 million subscribers, and SWG IMVHO would have not more players today without the NGE. I can accept when you say, you personally liked it better before the NGE. I never questioned anyones personal taste. I like vanilla, someone else strawberry, so what. I do question however the entire myth behind the NGE, as I said. NGE had some fatal flaws. But the direction was correct. Most vets already had dwindled out of the game. Be honest here. How many of you REALLY suddenly left when NGE came, and had played regularly until one day before NGE? I have seen it, the constant drop in players. Most of you already were on the move out of the game, and NGE was only like a final nail on the coffin to finally leave. I left around a month after NGE hits... I played since July 5th, 2003, and continued to play the game daily. I only took a break from the game when some in-game issues (with players, not the game) arise and I just had to take a small break, and that was about a length of 2 months (I payed yearly, so I know I'll return)... After I returned, I continue to play. Of course I saw the number of people been drawn away by games such as FFXI, WoW, and others, but that doesn't mean the game wasn't great. As I remembered it, SOE/LA didn't even do much of publicity for SWG until they released it, so there were only the SW fans that knew about the game and pass the information to their peers/family. The company was at fault here, not the player. Also, when the holocrons were introduced, the whole community was destoryed and most of the nice people I know in game went searching for the holocron and grind out the profession. It quickly burned them out, and they either unlocked Jedi, and grinding jedi; or they just left since they are burned out from the grind. So that's part of the problem of why people leaving...
I bought JTL, and had my fun with it, and continue to just enjoy the SW universe when one day I found out that they are going to fix up some of the things with the CU (I thought finally some bugs will be fixed and it'll be even better). To my disappointment, the CU was a bust, and stir a lot of things up. Some people got fed up and left, but since I payed for the game, I continue to play it and I bough the RoTW and find myself adapt to the slight-changed SWG. It wasn't much, but I thought I can take it... And I was still just play around when I heard the new expansion ToOW that will have unique stuffs for some of the profession, and I thought: Cool, this might add contents that I can play. So I did pre-ordered it. So while I got the digital download of ToOW, the Forum had the news of the NGE... I was like: WTF??? So I tried and log on around 11/5/05 to TC to check the damn thing out... IT isn't that bad, but it totally changed the game, and even then I like: Maybe they'll come to their senses since those who tested it posted many threads on the forum telling SOE that the NGE is NOT READY FOR RELEASE, and NOT FOR SWG. Still, 11/15, they changed it all.
You said that the direction of NGE was correct. Well, you are wrong. The outraged vets that left the game can tell you why you are wrong. The direction SHOULD be fixing the bugs, adding contents, and make the system you have WORKS, not CHANGING A NEW SYSTEM HOPING IT'LL WORK OUT, AND EVEN THE NEW SYSTEM WAS BUGGY.
But instead of leave quiet and leave it to a new generation you had to start a war. SWG even today is SO much better than 90% of all the current MMOs out there. Cutting the endless see of possibilites did hurt, me included. But I dont let my personal loss overshadow my judgement to realize the necessity and reason behind it. They overdid many simplifications, no doubt here. But there was just no choice as the situation was. SWG would not be a single bit in better shape now without the NGE today. I lost my professions, which sucked. But so what? It was a game. Combat was different now, so what? I understand we all have our preferences, but I dont understand ppl who view a game as it were their personal religion. A lot of complains surely were understandable, some justified, but the entire emotional frenzy was and is FAR beyond anything justified and reasonable. Why shall the ones who were wronged by a corporation silently take their beating? We are the customer, and we pay money to play a game that we WANTED, and they threw something that we DON'T WANT at us. Why can't we say something about it? Necessity? hardly, they can fix the old system, they just want to draw in the new crowd that was attracted to the MMO world with WoW. Don't tell me that you haven't notice the similarities between NGE and WoW? IF you can't tell, too bad, but those of us who knows both game, can tell you that many of the ideas with the profession, controls, quests, and such was what WoW had, and SOE just used it on NGE and hope that NGE would attract the Jedi-wannabes and WoW players to check it out.
If you had a pet, that you raised and took care and build relationship for a long time, and one day got ran over by a Car. Will you morn for your pet? or just go out and get another one since you can? Human are emotional, and they will be hurt when something that they put their heart in (may it be pets, cars, hobbies, games, and whatever you can think of) was taken away wrongfully.
You said that SWG today is "SO much better than 90% of all the current MMOs out there." That just tells me that you don't play many MMOs. If you would play other MMOs, and know the system, you wouldn't say SWG was better.
There was a choice, they are just incompetent at fixing what was wrong. They made a wrong decision solely on the idea that by copying a successful game out there, and slap a Star Wars name on it, they can get more customer. They forgot that who was still playing the game, and they went ahead with NGE hoping that the easier gameplay, with Jedi as starting profession, and the simplified "iconic" profession (I hate that word... iconic..), they can replace what was lost.
Well, the fact is this: They lost even more than they gained.
Yes, it is a game, and no it is not "just a game". It was a Star Wars universe that people lived in as themselves, not as Luke, Leia, Han Solo, and whoever is on that damned list of "iconic" profession.
First off, I think numbers, wether many or few, never proof quality. WOW isnt a great game because it has 8 million subscribers, and SWG IMVHO would have not more players today without the NGE. I can accept when you say, you personally liked it better before the NGE. I never questioned anyones personal taste. I like vanilla, someone else strawberry, so what. I do question however the entire myth behind the NGE, as I said. NGE had some fatal flaws. But the direction was correct. Most vets already had dwindled out of the game. Be honest here. How many of you REALLY suddenly left when NGE came, and had played regularly until one day before NGE? I have seen it, the constant drop in players. Most of you already were on the move out of the game, and NGE was only like a final nail on the coffin to finally leave. But instead of leave quiet and leave it to a new generation you had to start a war. SWG even today is SO much better than 90% of all the current MMOs out there. Cutting the endless sea of possibilites did hurt, me included. But I dont let my personal loss overshadow my judgement to realize the necessity and reason behind it. They overdid many simplifications, no doubt here. But there was just no choice as the situation was. SWG would not be a single bit in better shape now without the NGE today. I lost my professions, which sucked. But so what? It was a game. Combat was different now, so what? I understand we all have our preferences, but I dont understand ppl who view a game as it were their personal religion. A lot of complains surely were understandable, some justified, but the entire emotional frenzy was and is FAR beyond anything justified and reasonable.
There was nothing necessary about the NGE, they could have continued with the CU and have gotten a better result. Hell them slowly adding things demanded back to the game with the CU would have been less painful and a lot more effective. The NGE was an attempt to switch playerbases and SWG got screwed by that.
And in honesty, I left SWG around JTL, because bugs where not fixed, professions where in a mess, and content was not expanded upon. I came back for the CU because it sorted out most professions and it seemed like a vision to move forward. I and the people who left wanted the game fixed, not the game changed.
--As to why we are so vigorous in our debates, MMORPGs are a different animal. Nick Yee does a good job on exploring the psychological complexity in a MMORPG community. Basically it comes down to this, in a MMORPG you are part of a community and when Devs do things that harm the community you belong to, well you have a negative reaction.
--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.
First off, I think numbers, wether many or few, never proof quality. WOW isnt a great game because it has 8 million subscribers, and SWG IMVHO would have not more players today without the NGE. I can accept when you say, you personally liked it better before the NGE. I never questioned anyones personal taste. I like vanilla, someone else strawberry, so what. I do question however the entire myth behind the NGE, as I said. NGE had some fatal flaws. But the direction was correct. Most vets already had dwindled out of the game. Be honest here. How many of you REALLY suddenly left when NGE came, and had played regularly until one day before NGE? I have seen it, the constant drop in players. Most of you already were on the move out of the game, and NGE was only like a final nail on the coffin to finally leave. But instead of leave quiet and leave it to a new generation you had to start a war. SWG even today is SO much better than 90% of all the current MMOs out there. Cutting the endless sea of possibilites did hurt, me included. But I dont let my personal loss overshadow my judgement to realize the necessity and reason behind it. They overdid many simplifications, no doubt here. But there was just no choice as the situation was. SWG would not be a single bit in better shape now without the NGE today. I lost my professions, which sucked. But so what? It was a game. Combat was different now, so what? I understand we all have our preferences, but I dont understand ppl who view a game as it were their personal religion. A lot of complains surely were understandable, some justified, but the entire emotional frenzy was and is FAR beyond anything justified and reasonable.
I left with the CU. I only came back prior to the NGE for a month because I was willing at that time to give it another shot due to people saying it improved. I left for good with the NGE and have no plans to log in to swg until a pre-cu server is released. I have no plans to purchase an SOE MMO because I know that they don't value the energy and time you spend to develop a character/avatar.
Even if everyone here is going to concede to a single playstyle being the only viable MMO game, which I doubt anyone is, no one is going to agree with you that its implimentation was even remotely satisfactory to any player even the biggest NGE fans cannot argue it was released with 3 busted professions. On top of that alot of us will argue that if the fixes to combat that where in alpha prior to the cu along with content where added that SWG probably would have grown in subscribers.
Especially with over 1 million unit sales. The issue was never getting people prior to the NGE to try the game. It was having content for them to engage in that is enjoyable or fun.
On your emotional point. If you kill someones avatar that is 3 years old in any RPG, whether its table top, ingame, some saved computer game, a MUD you damn well better expect emotional rage over it. I am not saying its "justified". Its just reality. And the reality of all video games that even the dumbest game makers adhere to is that while a character may be killed in game it always has a chance for resurrection, cloning, spirital rebirth or whatever they choose as the method for not having permadeath.
By SOE's own arrogance they thought they could elimanate a whole slew of professions, essentially wiping out characters without so much as a passing thought about what kind of anger that would cause and the support among the other classes it would generate against the changes. You simply cannot in any game take profession out after they have been in game especially 3 year old professions. Ontop of the stupidity of the NGE doing that they thought, we can invalidate months of "hard" work people invested to unlock a special profession as iconic and cultural as Jedi and survive that backlash?
I mean come on. You cannot do those 2 activities to peoples avatars and then ask people to reinvest in your new version. You blew all the trust players have that you care about there avatars and characters.
Again you cannot perma death any character in a video game that players control. Look to the left and name 1 game that has perma death. The NGE permadeathed alot of toons. It was a stupid decision.
Let me put this in plain english others have said it:
The NGE destroyed 3 of my 4 avatars avatars I had since the 2nd week of release of the game. My 4th Avatar was a Jedi and even though I still had him he sucks now all the time I put into getting to Jedi Knight lost in one patch the NGE.
When you destroy a persons avatar as SOE didi with the NGE guess what customers don't like that and most every one left.
Dead Avatar = Dead NGE
Enough Said please OP post in the other Fourm, thanks.
First off, I think numbers, wether many or few, never proof quality. WOW isnt a great game because it has 8 million subscribers, and SWG IMVHO would have not more players today without the NGE. I can accept when you say, you personally liked it better before the NGE. I never questioned anyones personal taste. I like vanilla, someone else strawberry, so what. I do question however the entire myth behind the NGE, as I said. NGE had some fatal flaws. But the direction was correct. Most vets already had dwindled out of the game. Be honest here. How many of you REALLY suddenly left when NGE came, and had played regularly until one day before NGE? I have seen it, the constant drop in players. Most of you already were on the move out of the game, and NGE was only like a final nail on the coffin to finally leave. You show right here that you dont have a clue, my guild was in an upswing. we had over 300 members and were growing everyday. The nge Killed that. I was by no means on the way out, and the general mood within my guild was "I love this game" and "I'll probably play this game forever" But instead of leave quiet and leave it to a new generation you had to start a war. Why should I quietly leave, when I got screwed. SWG even today is SO much better than 90% of all the current MMOs out there. This is why the subcription numbers are at an all time low, people dont like to play the best MMO /sarcasm offCutting the endless sea of possibilites did hurt, me included. But I dont let my personal loss overshadow my judgement to realize the necessity and reason behind it. They overdid many simplifications, no doubt here. But there was just no choice as the situation was. SWG would not be a single bit in better shape now without the NGE today. I lost my professions, which sucked. But so what? It was a game. Combat was different now, so what? I understand we all have our preferences, but I dont understand ppl who view a game as it were their personal religion. A lot of complains surely were understandable, some justified, but the entire emotional frenzy was and is FAR beyond anything justified and reasonable. Its nice to know you dont care when you get ripped off, lets do some bu$ine$$. Yeah I admit I got emotional, When they stole 2.5 years worth of hard work spread across 4 accounts from me.. What was I thinking.
Now to finish this off, you are an idiot, and deserve to be screwed. You seem to lack the intestinal fortitude to stand up for what is right. You will no doubt at some time in your life get screwed again, and will find a way to justify it. All of this, so you can sleep at night without being angry those who screwed you.
I was a late-comer to SWG, buying the game a few months after release and fell in love with it. Sure, there were times that I would get frustrated, such as trying to find someone to train you as you advanced in the higher Profession trees. But, guess what? I found that it was a great way to meet new players. The biggest problems SWG had were the performance issues that simply didn't get addressed. Even after Jump To Lightspeed, they were still there.
I had one character. One! I was a Master Creature Handler / Ranger / Pikeman and damned proud of it. Right before the NGE was announced, our Profession Lead came to the official boards and asked for suggestions about mounts since the devs had given indication that CHs were in line for an overhaul. A lot of good ideas were presented. Weeks later, the NGE was announced along with the end of the Creature Handlers. Now all I have are memories of taming a savage humbaba, making the dangerous trek to Dathomir (the planet where my character was born) to find a brackaset to train, the day we finally got to train banthas and my great Bull Bantha who, after I had fallen, continued to chase raiders on Tatooine until he had killed the last one. I remember my home in the swamps south of Moenia where I would allow Rebels to hide from Imperial troops. I remember giving Imperial troops sneaking up on a small settlement something to think about when I appeared with a my pair of bio-engineered rancors. I remember the sense of belonging I felt by providing meat, milk, and hides to Chefs, Medics, and Armormakers.
I did not convert my character to NGE as Sony wanted. Instead, I packed up my houses and the 18 beasts in my datapad, hopped into my new Hutt starship and headed for deep space. Corben Draen would survive, but not in Star Wars Galaxies.
That said, you can take the NGE AND your ignorant crusade and shove 'em!
"Soloists and those who prefer small groups should never have to feel like they''re the ones getting the proverbial table scraps, as it were." - Scott Hartsman, Senior Producer, Everquest II "People love groups. Its a fallacy that people want to play solo all the time." - Scott Hartsman, Executive Producer, Rift
SOE developers are now saying the NGE was a bad idea and totally the wrong thing to do. Some have even apologized wholeheartedly. Even the big names in MMOs are saying it was wrong. A couple have even said it was "border-line criminal". Other game companies now use the fiasco of the NGE as learning tool of what not to do in an MMO. So with that knowledge how can you sit there and tell us that the NGE was the right thing to do when even SOE is saying they shouldnt have done it and the MMO developer community is saying it shouldnt have been done?
You say it was right and justified. So are you trying to tell us that is was justified to take 200k players and consider them acceptable losses for just the possibility of an easier demographic to deal with? One that would complain less? These are the loyal players that left after the NGE. These were the players who stuck through all that bugged content and software, you yourself made sure we knew was there, to keep playing in hopes it would get better. Only to get shafted. This is how SOE treats its players by the way. They dont care how loyal you are or how much of a fanboi and promoter you are. Once they decide to do something your feelings or designs will not be taken into consideration.
You see I dont mind the NGE actually that much. If they made a few changes to it I would enjoy it.
The thing that gets me more then anything else is the way they treated us. I cant really play the game anymore because I know at anytime they could announce another sweeping massive change to it all, that will mess everything up all over. And I feel that isnt far off before they do that again. And it wont be several months notice. It will be a week at most.
Your sitting there reading this. So let us imagine together. You love the NGE right? So lets say for example that they are putting out a new expansion. Whatever your fondest dreams for an expansion if you want. Maybe a new planet and hey maybe they put in instances of Bestine and Coruscent. You got that in your mind now? Ok you got the expansion. Your playing it. It has quests for commandos, medics, bounty hunters, etc. All the professions have something in it. And hey just last week they announced an even bigger crafter work up and even said in the next few months they are going to give us 2 new professions. So things are looking up right? Your happy as a clam.
Then the next day the bomb drops. I mean the very next day AFTER the expansion has been released. They make a post on the forums. Starting next week a new build is going up on the test centers. This new build will get rid of all professions save one. Jedi. And that jedi will be spread out into 5 "sub-professions". A tanker, a healer, a buffer, a DPS, and a special consular. BH, commandos, medics, officers, crafters, spies, smugglers, and entertainers are all getting the boot. Along with this sweeping change they are going to change combat to a very simple point and click system where you click on the special you want to use and click on the target. Crafting will be completely removed from the game and it will be a loot only situation. And the best part about all this is they tell you they used focus groups to make this decision including people who have never even heard of the game.
Now imagine how that would make you feel. Sucks dont it? That was how we feeled. Now to the rub. I know your sitting there now saying well that wouldnt happen. It would be impossible for them to do that because it would create havoc. It would damage the game seriously. Well let me tell you a secret. Up until the NGE was actually released live we vets thought the same thing.
That is the reality of the NGE. Most of us vets really dont have a problem with the NGE. Yes we look at the bad things in it as another way to attack it but that is how you attack something. You dont go after one weakness. You go after all of them. The thing that gets most of us is how it was brought to us. None of us were consulted. None of us were even asked about it. One day everything is fine and next day BAM! "We dont care if you stay or go, we got bigger fish to fry."
If we had at least been given some notice we could have voiced concerns. We could have given them other options. Hell we could have embraced the NGE and given them ideas to improve it before it was released thereby giving us a reason to stay. But no we werent given any of that.
That is the truth of it. That was why the NGE was totally wrong and all your arguments are moot.
when will the fanbois realize that soe is thier enemy and not us? it isn't our fault for quitting a crappy game it is soe's fault for pulling the rug out from under us all.
*sigh* I've read through this entire thread, so here's my perspective.
I joined in the phenomenon at EU release. After near three years, I had a thriving spice operation, my name was known amongst crafters who wanted a quality slice, I roleplayed my ass off everyday, creating a character and living her life to he point where I didn't need to think how to play her anymore, she was more like an extension of myself. Hell, I have a lot of rights to bitching and whining about SOE's lack of support: I played a smuggler!
In that old system, with it's shoddy balance, annoying - bet generally not game-breaking - bugs, I could be what I wanted to be. That's the whole point here: in Pre-NGE you could be who ever you wanted to be, you could exist, a virtual extension of your mind's eye. If you wanted to be a porculent chef with a fast trigger finger and a knack for dead-eyeing banthas at a thousand paces, you could. If you wanted to be a dancer by day time and an imperial agent by night, you could. If you wanted to just hang out in the cantina all day and night, eyeing up twi'leks (plenty of those), chewing the fat with your buds, you could. If you wanted to do that 'speshul' grind to Jedi, you could. If you wanted to roam the stars, battle the Empire, PvP your backside off and be leet, you could.
You could - within the finite confines of the coding - do any-gorram-thing you wanted to.
OP - you tell me that the NGE was necessary?! Are you fully functional?
The NGE was so not necessary, I can't even begin to fathom how you come up with that opinion. The problem with Pre-CU is that there was simply (read carefully here) nothing left to do anymore; no content! What the game really needed, was the following:
1. Content, reworkings of old content.
2. Thorough bug fixing and profession passes.
3. Combat balancing, PvE and PvP.
4. An underworld system for smugglers, bounty hunters and the like.
5. Less folding to commercial minorities (re: Jedi whiners - don't like vets, there were thousands of those!).
That's a small list of what was needed, but by no means is any of that unnatainable.
The NGE, however, only took away from the game. It stripped away, skinned it, brought it down to a featureless mass. Now, I've played the NGE, tried to keep going on with old friends for a while, but one can only look at tumbleweeds for so long. So what did they do? I'm guessing that some bright accountant/management team saw WoW's subscriber numbers, did some one-sided math, and decided that, "we want this!". A perfect example of why accountants should never be allowed to make decisions.
So now, I was being told to conform to what SOE said I wanted. I couldn't be a smuggler pistoleer anymore. I couldn't be a dancer/pikeman, a rebel chef, a dancing doctor. I had to be one very limited thing, which (again read carefully): was, stripped down to it's component parts, not really different from any other class at all. Oh, and don't feed me the lines about tale-er I mean expertise points, it doesn't fly. Expertise does not make me any different from any other smuggler. If I want talent builds, I'll go play WoW.
There's little point to me going on and on. You want to know what SOE's only real problem has ever been?
Here it comes....
Their complete lack of ability to finish anything they do in SWG!
That's right, kids! You look at anything SOE have ever done for SWG, and it's been half-complete, and half-assed. They released a half-finished game. They half-bothered to do balance and update passes for professions. How many times did Jedi get revamped, while other profs got left in the dust? One of the last smuggler revamps they ever did only removed abilities!!! Rage of the Wookiees: half-completed, limited, buggy pile of junk with a high number of broken quests. You know what? They've still not finished fixing that clunker!!
Trials of Obi-Wan: less limited but still buggy, incomplete, fubar'd quests. And...oh yeh!! Still not working 100%. Look at the NGE.. they couldn't even finish that right before throwing it out to live, two days after the ToOW expansion release....
So please don't tell me the NGE was necessary. It wasn't then and it isn't now. What was needed, was for SOE to support the sandbox they'd made. To stick true to the selling points they plastered all over that initial release box. To not have a knee-jerk reaction to WoW's subscription numbers.
Edit: oh, and you know what? There still isn't anything to do in the game!!!!
First off, I think numbers, wether many or few, never proof quality. WOW isnt a great game because it has 8 million subscribers, and SWG IMVHO would have not more players today without the NGE. It has been proven that the subs during the CU were far, and away, more than what's in NGE. This is relevant in how populated the servers were, compared to today. And, the only reason you all have an influx in subs is due to the 14 day free sub... majority of them will see how craptastic this game is and leave (maybe even before their 14 days are up). If $OE would've actually listened to the players, and given more content and fixed existing bugs, instead of deleting a lot of the professions to attempt, albeit an extremely horrible attempt, to make the game into a WoW-based clone, then the game would be a lot better off than it is currently. So... NGE failed horribly, and even Smedley has admitted that. However, their pride is too much to actually admit they were wrong... just that it wasn't the best way to implement the NGE, which is quite a bit of an understatement.
I can accept when you say, you personally liked it better before the NGE. I never questioned anyones personal taste. I like vanilla, someone else strawberry, so what.
I do question however the entire myth behind the NGE, as I said. NGE had some fatal flaws. Yes... especially when they basically put it in live, when it was really pre-Beta. But the direction was correct. Killing off majority of the "non-combat professions" for a class based game was the correct direction? Not to mention they promised these professions stuff in Trials of Obiwan, only to destroy those professions right after the expansion... yeah, right direction indeed. Most vets already had dwindled out of the game. Be honest here. How many of you REALLY suddenly left when NGE came, and had played regularly until one day before NGE? I have seen it, the constant drop in players. There's a simple solution to that, that majority of MMORPG developers can't get through their thick skulls... fix the damn bugs. I left pre-CU, because I was sick and tired of massively annoying bugs that were still in at launch. And, with my character being CH, those bugs were a lot worse. Most of you already were on the move out of the game, and NGE was only like a final nail on the coffin to finally leave. But instead of leave quiet and leave it to a new generation you had to start a war. Technically, $OE started it when they decided to implement their horrible "revamp" of the game. The vets just voiced their dislike of how they were treated, which ended up being massive cancellations. Not to mention they wished to voice their opinions and warn others on how horrible this game had become... hence the massively negative game review when NGE came out. SWG even today is SO much better than 90% of all the current MMOs out there. This phrase has shown me that you are a clueless troll. I can name about 10 MMORPG's that have more subs than SWG. Of course, we truly don't know what the true amount of subs are with SWG. However, it is enough proof that it is really low due to the posts of barren servers. Cutting the endless sea of possibilites did hurt, me included. But I dont let my personal loss overshadow my judgement to realize the necessity and reason behind it. They overdid many simplifications, no doubt here. But there was just no choice as the situation was. SWG would not be a single bit in better shape now without the NGE today. I lost my professions, which sucked. But so what? It was a game. Combat was different now, so what? I understand we all have our preferences, but I dont understand ppl who view a game as it were their personal religion. A lot of complains surely were understandable, some justified, but the entire emotional frenzy was and is FAR beyond anything justified and reasonable. How they implemented it is why I still don't trust $OE today. Anyways, the NGE was nowhere justifiable... it was an attempt for $OE to take away subs from WoW. And, I also give as much blame to LA as I do to $OE. The game would still be so much better off if they got it through their thick skulls to fix the bugs and provide content rather than hack apart the game and make it into a shell of it's former self. NGE should have been SWG2.
I have no desire to rehash facts and reality to the fanbois that constantly feel the need to come into this forum on their 'crusades' to argue by making delusional, unfounded, and often insulting statements aimed at veterans. No matter how many facts are given to the fanbois...no matter how reality slaps them in the face every time they log in to SWG, they cling to their beliefs. Sadly, 'Believers' will always feel the need to convert others - and the means of doing so doesn't matter, so this will be an on going event.
I am wondering if the Fanboi 'Believers' that frequent this forum maybe going through a crisis of faith.....that the NGE reality is starting to chink away at thier firm beliefs of NGE greatness.....that some words of reality and reqason may be reaching their closed minds. Coming here to spout NGEisms, no matter how insane and/or ridiculous, maybe a method of convincing THEMSELVES. Players that are truly comfortable with the NGE usually do not have the need to prove anything to ex-players......they are happy talking with other LIKE-MINDED players in game or on thier own forums. <------(hint)
Though I feel the NGE may have dealt the final blow to SWG, its not entirely to blame for its death. Problem was the constant balancing and revamping they did through out the game. This game was overbalanced and over scutinized. Soe and wanting to listen to its cutomers by molding it to what the players wanted it to be. La in wanting the game to be more star warsy and as action packed as Battlefront. Between the two of them they basically pissed off every one. Professions were deleted, weapons and armor were made useless content added then deleted. This crap happened all of the time. Not just the NGE and CU They took a sandbox/complex mmo and turned into a linear/guided mmo. Maybe this was a defining point in mmo gaming when they realized there was different styles off players out there. And lets hope that they realized something else. That you can not alter a game that dramatically without repercussion. Player aren't going to just sit there and take it. An Empire Divided more so than it ever was. Vets, playerss, newbies, and devs all in a vicious circle with swg made to suffer in the middle.
Originally posted by Elikal Most vets already had dwindled out of the game. Be honest here. How many of you REALLY suddenly left when NGE came, and had played regularly until one day before NGE? I have seen it, the constant drop in players. Most of you already were on the move out of the game, and NGE was only like a final nail on the coffin to finally leave.
That'd blatantly false.
My friends list of over 200.. 3 still play. My online community of over 1000 SWG players... there's only about 7 who still play. WE ALL PLAYED BEFORE THE NGE. As a matter of fact, the CU brought a few back into the fold (for some odd reason).
My friends aren't the abberation, they're the norm. SWG has a fraction of the players it once had and it has nothing to do with the slow decline it had, and everything to do with the freefall in subscriptions the nge brought.
Shayde - SWG (dead) Proud member of the Cabal.
It sounds great, so great in fact, I pitty those who canceled - Some deluded SWG fanboi who pities me. I don't like it when you say things. - A Vanguard fan who does too. 09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
Well I was gonna post some stuff but Shayde basically said what I wanted to say, twice. So I will just say +1 for Shayde's comments here. I totally agree with him.
Yes I am playing the game now- yes I am actually having fun. It is changing for the better. But the NGE was wrong based on how they lied to 350,000 subscribers that all quit. Am I over it? No. But do I play and have fun?
I came back. I started over from lvl 1 under the legacy quests system. Under the NGE it works very well. I do miss the Pre CU era but I am actually having a good time. WTF happened? It used to be worse than Trunk Federations 2nd CD after the little guy quit. In fact I messed with Beast Master in Test Center and it was really good. I have to admit the expertise system works. I still miss the skill system. The loot system works although I feel crafters are shafted. But there seems to be a new change in the air. I quit doing PVP so I can embrace PVE- which was a good decision.
This game is getting better since Jules T is gone. Ok------- go ahead and flame me I can only write what I seeplayand feel. I do love you all and expect a good kick in the head because I was so anti SWG post CU- but its weird. I am actually having fun again. I hate this but its true......
Yes I am playing the game now- yes I am actually having fun. It is changing for the better. But the NGE was wrong based on how they lied to 350,000 subscribers that all quit. Am I over it? No. But do I play and have fun?
I came back. I started over from lvl 1 under the legacy quests system. Under the NGE it works very well. I do miss the Pre CU era but I am actually having a good time. WTF happened? It used to be worse than Trunk Federations 2nd CD after the little guy quit. In fact I messed with Beast Master in Test Center and it was really good. I have to admit the expertise system works. I still miss the skill system. The loot system works although I feel crafters are shafted. But there seems to be a new change in the air. I quit doing PVP so I can embrace PVE- which was a good decision.
This game is getting better since Jules T is gone. Ok------- go ahead and flame me I can only write what I seeplayand feel. I do love you all and expect a good kick in the head because I was so anti SWG post CU- but its weird. I am actually having fun again. I hate this but its true......
The NGE was wrong,
Well since its hit rock bottom it can only get better..My thing is i just dont like the benny hill combat engine nore the horrid GUI..If your having fun then i envy you..But unlike some i never quit through all the changes till the NGE..Even after that i resubbed each pub in hopes it was all a bad dream..Nothing has improved if you compare it to what it once was..You can compare it to other games but its still a really bad WoW wanna be...
Yes I am playing the game now- yes I am actually having fun. It is changing for the better. But the NGE was wrong based on how they lied to 350,000 subscribers that all quit. Am I over it? No. But do I play and have fun?
I came back. I started over from lvl 1 under the legacy quests system. Under the NGE it works very well. I do miss the Pre CU era but I am actually having a good time. WTF happened? It used to be worse than Trunk Federations 2nd CD after the little guy quit. In fact I messed with Beast Master in Test Center and it was really good. I have to admit the expertise system works. I still miss the skill system. The loot system works although I feel crafters are shafted. But there seems to be a new change in the air. I quit doing PVP so I can embrace PVE- which was a good decision.
This game is getting better since Jules T is gone. Ok------- go ahead and flame me I can only write what I seeplayand feel. I do love you all and expect a good kick in the head because I was so anti SWG post CU- but its weird. I am actually having fun again. I hate this but its true......
The NGE was wrong,
I have much more respect for someone like yourself who says that it's not the same, not quite as good, but you still have fun. I can respect that. You've learned to deal with the hand you were dealt.
It's the ones who say it is better and we all should be playing it, and we're all just crying over a lost game instead of embracing the game in its current condition... those I just want to shake until their hair falls out. Especially when they always say it's "better" than it was when the nge hit, but don't have the balls to say the nge is a better game. It's because they know they can't. That our "hate" is what is making the game look like a pale comparison to what we loved and we should "let it go".
Look, if the NFL suddenly decided they were gonna play Flag Football instead.. I'd stop watching. Sure, some might like watching, but I'm out and I'm not going to learn to love it. If someone tried to tell me the NFFL was better and that everyone loves it, even though nobody is watching and it has been regulated to 2am on ESPN8 (The Ocho!!!)... well you get the picture.
But Lateris.. more power to you. You know the nge was wrong, but you found your fun. I didn't, I haven't with every new addition and trial, and I sincerely doubt I ever will.
Shayde - SWG (dead) Proud member of the Cabal.
It sounds great, so great in fact, I pitty those who canceled - Some deluded SWG fanboi who pities me. I don't like it when you say things. - A Vanguard fan who does too. 09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
This is the veteran forum.... Don't post this crap here unless you want us to come out of this hole that MMORPG shoved us in and start commenting in the regular forums on a regular basis. This is called segregation and we are already the 2nd class citizens so don't come in here and flaunt your opinion in a place where it is not welcome. This is a 2 way divide, stay on your privileged side and leave us to our ghetto.
There is only us, there is only this. Forget regret, or life is yours to miss. No other road, no other way. No day but today.
See kids this is what school is not teaching...... consumer, product, marketing.... common sense and logic.
Yep.... all gone on this one.
I mean a year and a half of failing, prior to all the missleading not to mention all the issues and false statements from the dev team alone would be enough for a normal class action law suit if they did not cover thier ass with--
"Gameplay may change while online" ----- OH yeah it can...
It's like the line from the start of the NGE ----- "GET ON BOARD THE FALCON KID THIS PLACE IS GONNA BLOW!"
That can mean two things...I know which one the NGE ended up being...
Comments
1- NGE was bad because it tried to get new players. No that is an incorrect premise, the NGE is an abomination because it did not care about the 200K players it already had. The 200K existing players were marked as an exceptable loss and SOE figuratively rubbed their dagely parts in our collective faces. That is where the NGE failed.
2- That WoW killed MMORPGs and SWG specifically. Name the other MMORPGs WoW killed besides SWG? I can't think of one, WoW did not kill SWG. What killed SWG was visionless development that prolonged adding content, fixing bugs, and generally screwed community relations with the "It will be done in a few months" line.
Where I disagree with you ideas on the Pre-NGE and the NGE.
1- The Pre-NGE was a complex system. Where is the complexity in the old system? The complexity was in the planning. You had to have the right buffs, the right skill set, the right weapons, and you had to counter your enemy's template. Sure actual combat was basically broken down into a few buttons, but the planning for combat and the required pre-reqs made combat more about preparation and planning.
2- Jedi, no Star Wars fans believe the NGE is good. What is the target of this game? Star Wars fans. Star Wars fans want jedi to be special, they don't want jedi to be a cheap marketing gimmick the way this game has always done.
Your conclusion that the sandbox is dead. Because WoW brought people who never played a MMORPG before to MMORPGs, that means the sandbox is dead? I think your hypothesis is flawed. WoW did not steal veteran MMORPG players, WoW has only brought new MMORPG players to the genre. If WoW stole 3 Million American players, 1 million EU players, and 4 million Asian players from the various regional markets, then a lot more MMORPGs would be dead than just SWG. That is a fallacy, WoW is successful becuase it made a MMORPG that Diablo 2 lovers who were Blizzard fans solely would love.
Eve is a sandbox game and guess what? It continues to grow. Why does Eve grow, because CCP unlike most major MMORPG developers stayed with its clear vision and that is the exact reason why SWG, which is about as old Eve, is dying. SWG switched visions shortly after it was released, *cough* jedi changes *cough*, that is where SWG started to die. Remember "SCREW THE JEDI CARROT FIX THE GOD DAMMED BUGS!" I remember that mantra well.
--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.
Not only are you clueless, you think you actually can reframe the past & the truth.
The REAL truth is that the NGE was THE worst decision in the history of MMO's, and the way it was handled was disgusting. Even SOE has agreed it was the wrong path & handled poorly, so why don't you call up them and try to convince them of this BS.
I'll start my own SWG... with Black Jack... and Hookers!!!
In fact, forget the SWG!!!!
First off, I think numbers, wether many or few, never proof quality. WOW isnt a great game because it has 8 million subscribers, and SWG IMVHO would have not more players today without the NGE.
I can accept when you say, you personally liked it better before the NGE. I never questioned anyones personal taste. I like vanilla, someone else strawberry, so what.
I do question however the entire myth behind the NGE, as I said. NGE had some fatal flaws. But the direction was correct. Most vets already had dwindled out of the game. Be honest here. How many of you REALLY suddenly left when NGE came, and had played regularly until one day before NGE? I have seen it, the constant drop in players. Most of you already were on the move out of the game, and NGE was only like a final nail on the coffin to finally leave.
But instead of leave quiet and leave it to a new generation you had to start a war. SWG even today is SO much better than 90% of all the current MMOs out there. Cutting the endless sea of possibilites did hurt, me included. But I dont let my personal loss overshadow my judgement to realize the necessity and reason behind it. They overdid many simplifications, no doubt here. But there was just no choice as the situation was. SWG would not be a single bit in better shape now without the NGE today. I lost my professions, which sucked. But so what? It was a game. Combat was different now, so what? I understand we all have our preferences, but I dont understand ppl who view a game as it were their personal religion. A lot of complains surely were understandable, some justified, but the entire emotional frenzy was and is FAR beyond anything justified and reasonable.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
but in my opinion the whole thing can be summed up like this:
PreNGE was a system worth building on.
NGE is not.
SWG ADDICT...clean since the NGE
I played from 1 month after release up until a couple weeks after the NGE, so your 'old vets had already left' arguement is out the window. My old server Scylla, while it was never as large as say Bria... was very much alive and running prior to the NGE debacle.
And no, SWG is in no way better shape than it was. The population is gone compared to pre-NGE and with the exception of those friendly AFK bots that sit around Mos Eisley the major cities are empty and lifeless. Your 90% comparison is a bit vague, my comment to that is....SWG is now IDENTICAL to 90% of the MMOs out there rather than being better than them.
Complexity was better than simplicity as far as SWG goes, if people were put off from the combat system because they had more than 5 attacks then maybe they should stick with operating a bicycle rather than an automobile.
You said that SWG today is "SO much better than 90% of all the current MMOs out there." That just tells me that you don't play many MMOs. If you would play other MMOs, and know the system, you wouldn't say SWG was better.
There was a choice, they are just incompetent at fixing what was wrong. They made a wrong decision solely on the idea that by copying a successful game out there, and slap a Star Wars name on it, they can get more customer. They forgot that who was still playing the game, and they went ahead with NGE hoping that the easier gameplay, with Jedi as starting profession, and the simplified "iconic" profession (I hate that word... iconic..), they can replace what was lost.
Well, the fact is this: They lost even more than they gained.
Yes, it is a game, and no it is not "just a game". It was a Star Wars universe that people lived in as themselves, not as Luke, Leia, Han Solo, and whoever is on that damned list of "iconic" profession.
Current MMO: FFXIV:ARR
Past MMO: Way too many (P2P and F2P)
There was nothing necessary about the NGE, they could have continued with the CU and have gotten a better result. Hell them slowly adding things demanded back to the game with the CU would have been less painful and a lot more effective. The NGE was an attempt to switch playerbases and SWG got screwed by that.
And in honesty, I left SWG around JTL, because bugs where not fixed, professions where in a mess, and content was not expanded upon. I came back for the CU because it sorted out most professions and it seemed like a vision to move forward. I and the people who left wanted the game fixed, not the game changed.
--As to why we are so vigorous in our debates, MMORPGs are a different animal. Nick Yee does a good job on exploring the psychological complexity in a MMORPG community. Basically it comes down to this, in a MMORPG you are part of a community and when Devs do things that harm the community you belong to, well you have a negative reaction.
--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 left with the CU. I only came back prior to the NGE for a month because I was willing at that time to give it another shot due to people saying it improved. I left for good with the NGE and have no plans to log in to swg until a pre-cu server is released. I have no plans to purchase an SOE MMO because I know that they don't value the energy and time you spend to develop a character/avatar.
Even if everyone here is going to concede to a single playstyle being the only viable MMO game, which I doubt anyone is, no one is going to agree with you that its implimentation was even remotely satisfactory to any player even the biggest NGE fans cannot argue it was released with 3 busted professions. On top of that alot of us will argue that if the fixes to combat that where in alpha prior to the cu along with content where added that SWG probably would have grown in subscribers.
Especially with over 1 million unit sales. The issue was never getting people prior to the NGE to try the game. It was having content for them to engage in that is enjoyable or fun.
On your emotional point. If you kill someones avatar that is 3 years old in any RPG, whether its table top, ingame, some saved computer game, a MUD you damn well better expect emotional rage over it. I am not saying its "justified". Its just reality. And the reality of all video games that even the dumbest game makers adhere to is that while a character may be killed in game it always has a chance for resurrection, cloning, spirital rebirth or whatever they choose as the method for not having permadeath.
By SOE's own arrogance they thought they could elimanate a whole slew of professions, essentially wiping out characters without so much as a passing thought about what kind of anger that would cause and the support among the other classes it would generate against the changes. You simply cannot in any game take profession out after they have been in game especially 3 year old professions. Ontop of the stupidity of the NGE doing that they thought, we can invalidate months of "hard" work people invested to unlock a special profession as iconic and cultural as Jedi and survive that backlash?
I mean come on. You cannot do those 2 activities to peoples avatars and then ask people to reinvest in your new version. You blew all the trust players have that you care about there avatars and characters.
Again you cannot perma death any character in a video game that players control. Look to the left and name 1 game that has perma death. The NGE permadeathed alot of toons. It was a stupid decision.
Let me put this in plain english others have said it:
The NGE destroyed 3 of my 4 avatars avatars I had since the 2nd week of release of the game. My 4th Avatar was a Jedi and even though I still had him he sucks now all the time I put into getting to Jedi Knight lost in one patch the NGE.
When you destroy a persons avatar as SOE didi with the NGE guess what customers don't like that and most every one left.
Dead Avatar = Dead NGE
Enough Said please OP post in the other Fourm, thanks.
Ajax
I was a late-comer to SWG, buying the game a few months after release and fell in love with it. Sure, there were times that I would get frustrated, such as trying to find someone to train you as you advanced in the higher Profession trees. But, guess what? I found that it was a great way to meet new players. The biggest problems SWG had were the performance issues that simply didn't get addressed. Even after Jump To Lightspeed, they were still there.
I had one character. One! I was a Master Creature Handler / Ranger / Pikeman and damned proud of it. Right before the NGE was announced, our Profession Lead came to the official boards and asked for suggestions about mounts since the devs had given indication that CHs were in line for an overhaul. A lot of good ideas were presented. Weeks later, the NGE was announced along with the end of the Creature Handlers. Now all I have are memories of taming a savage humbaba, making the dangerous trek to Dathomir (the planet where my character was born) to find a brackaset to train, the day we finally got to train banthas and my great Bull Bantha who, after I had fallen, continued to chase raiders on Tatooine until he had killed the last one. I remember my home in the swamps south of Moenia where I would allow Rebels to hide from Imperial troops. I remember giving Imperial troops sneaking up on a small settlement something to think about when I appeared with a my pair of bio-engineered rancors. I remember the sense of belonging I felt by providing meat, milk, and hides to Chefs, Medics, and Armormakers.
I did not convert my character to NGE as Sony wanted. Instead, I packed up my houses and the 18 beasts in my datapad, hopped into my new Hutt starship and headed for deep space. Corben Draen would survive, but not in Star Wars Galaxies.
That said, you can take the NGE AND your ignorant crusade and shove 'em!
"Soloists and those who prefer small groups should never have to feel like they''re the ones getting the proverbial table scraps, as it were." - Scott Hartsman, Senior Producer, Everquest II
"People love groups. Its a fallacy that people want to play solo all the time." - Scott Hartsman, Executive Producer, Rift
Just a few quick questions.
SOE developers are now saying the NGE was a bad idea and totally the wrong thing to do. Some have even apologized wholeheartedly. Even the big names in MMOs are saying it was wrong. A couple have even said it was "border-line criminal". Other game companies now use the fiasco of the NGE as learning tool of what not to do in an MMO. So with that knowledge how can you sit there and tell us that the NGE was the right thing to do when even SOE is saying they shouldnt have done it and the MMO developer community is saying it shouldnt have been done?
You say it was right and justified. So are you trying to tell us that is was justified to take 200k players and consider them acceptable losses for just the possibility of an easier demographic to deal with? One that would complain less? These are the loyal players that left after the NGE. These were the players who stuck through all that bugged content and software, you yourself made sure we knew was there, to keep playing in hopes it would get better. Only to get shafted. This is how SOE treats its players by the way. They dont care how loyal you are or how much of a fanboi and promoter you are. Once they decide to do something your feelings or designs will not be taken into consideration.
You see I dont mind the NGE actually that much. If they made a few changes to it I would enjoy it.
The thing that gets me more then anything else is the way they treated us. I cant really play the game anymore because I know at anytime they could announce another sweeping massive change to it all, that will mess everything up all over. And I feel that isnt far off before they do that again. And it wont be several months notice. It will be a week at most.
Your sitting there reading this. So let us imagine together. You love the NGE right? So lets say for example that they are putting out a new expansion. Whatever your fondest dreams for an expansion if you want. Maybe a new planet and hey maybe they put in instances of Bestine and Coruscent. You got that in your mind now? Ok you got the expansion. Your playing it. It has quests for commandos, medics, bounty hunters, etc. All the professions have something in it. And hey just last week they announced an even bigger crafter work up and even said in the next few months they are going to give us 2 new professions. So things are looking up right? Your happy as a clam.
Then the next day the bomb drops. I mean the very next day AFTER the expansion has been released. They make a post on the forums. Starting next week a new build is going up on the test centers. This new build will get rid of all professions save one. Jedi. And that jedi will be spread out into 5 "sub-professions". A tanker, a healer, a buffer, a DPS, and a special consular. BH, commandos, medics, officers, crafters, spies, smugglers, and entertainers are all getting the boot. Along with this sweeping change they are going to change combat to a very simple point and click system where you click on the special you want to use and click on the target. Crafting will be completely removed from the game and it will be a loot only situation. And the best part about all this is they tell you they used focus groups to make this decision including people who have never even heard of the game.
Now imagine how that would make you feel. Sucks dont it? That was how we feeled. Now to the rub. I know your sitting there now saying well that wouldnt happen. It would be impossible for them to do that because it would create havoc. It would damage the game seriously. Well let me tell you a secret. Up until the NGE was actually released live we vets thought the same thing.
That is the reality of the NGE. Most of us vets really dont have a problem with the NGE. Yes we look at the bad things in it as another way to attack it but that is how you attack something. You dont go after one weakness. You go after all of them. The thing that gets most of us is how it was brought to us. None of us were consulted. None of us were even asked about it. One day everything is fine and next day BAM! "We dont care if you stay or go, we got bigger fish to fry."
If we had at least been given some notice we could have voiced concerns. We could have given them other options. Hell we could have embraced the NGE and given them ideas to improve it before it was released thereby giving us a reason to stay. But no we werent given any of that.
That is the truth of it. That was why the NGE was totally wrong and all your arguments are moot.
Kai
I joined in the phenomenon at EU release. After near three years, I had a thriving spice operation, my name was known amongst crafters who wanted a quality slice, I roleplayed my ass off everyday, creating a character and living her life to he point where I didn't need to think how to play her anymore, she was more like an extension of myself. Hell, I have a lot of rights to bitching and whining about SOE's lack of support: I played a smuggler!
In that old system, with it's shoddy balance, annoying - bet generally not game-breaking - bugs, I could be what I wanted to be. That's the whole point here: in Pre-NGE you could be who ever you wanted to be, you could exist, a virtual extension of your mind's eye. If you wanted to be a porculent chef with a fast trigger finger and a knack for dead-eyeing banthas at a thousand paces, you could. If you wanted to be a dancer by day time and an imperial agent by night, you could. If you wanted to just hang out in the cantina all day and night, eyeing up twi'leks (plenty of those), chewing the fat with your buds, you could. If you wanted to do that 'speshul' grind to Jedi, you could. If you wanted to roam the stars, battle the Empire, PvP your backside off and be leet, you could.
You could - within the finite confines of the coding - do any-gorram-thing you wanted to.
OP - you tell me that the NGE was necessary?! Are you fully functional?
The NGE was so not necessary, I can't even begin to fathom how you come up with that opinion. The problem with Pre-CU is that there was simply (read carefully here) nothing left to do anymore; no content! What the game really needed, was the following:
1. Content, reworkings of old content.
2. Thorough bug fixing and profession passes.
3. Combat balancing, PvE and PvP.
4. An underworld system for smugglers, bounty hunters and the like.
5. Less folding to commercial minorities (re: Jedi whiners - don't like vets, there were thousands of those!).
That's a small list of what was needed, but by no means is any of that unnatainable.
The NGE, however, only took away from the game. It stripped away, skinned it, brought it down to a featureless mass. Now, I've played the NGE, tried to keep going on with old friends for a while, but one can only look at tumbleweeds for so long. So what did they do? I'm guessing that some bright accountant/management team saw WoW's subscriber numbers, did some one-sided math, and decided that, "we want this!". A perfect example of why accountants should never be allowed to make decisions.
So now, I was being told to conform to what SOE said I wanted. I couldn't be a smuggler pistoleer anymore. I couldn't be a dancer/pikeman, a rebel chef, a dancing doctor. I had to be one very limited thing, which (again read carefully): was, stripped down to it's component parts, not really different from any other class at all. Oh, and don't feed me the lines about tale-er I mean expertise points, it doesn't fly. Expertise does not make me any different from any other smuggler. If I want talent builds, I'll go play WoW.
There's little point to me going on and on. You want to know what SOE's only real problem has ever been?
Here it comes....
Their complete lack of ability to finish anything they do in SWG!
That's right, kids! You look at anything SOE have ever done for SWG, and it's been half-complete, and half-assed. They released a half-finished game. They half-bothered to do balance and update passes for professions. How many times did Jedi get revamped, while other profs got left in the dust? One of the last smuggler revamps they ever did only removed abilities!!! Rage of the Wookiees: half-completed, limited, buggy pile of junk with a high number of broken quests. You know what? They've still not finished fixing that clunker!!
Trials of Obi-Wan: less limited but still buggy, incomplete, fubar'd quests. And...oh yeh!! Still not working 100%. Look at the NGE.. they couldn't even finish that right before throwing it out to live, two days after the ToOW expansion release....
So please don't tell me the NGE was necessary. It wasn't then and it isn't now. What was needed, was for SOE to support the sandbox they'd made. To stick true to the selling points they plastered all over that initial release box. To not have a knee-jerk reaction to WoW's subscription numbers.
Edit: oh, and you know what? There still isn't anything to do in the game!!!!
I have no desire to rehash facts and reality to the fanbois that constantly feel the need to come into this forum on their 'crusades' to argue by making delusional, unfounded, and often insulting statements aimed at veterans. No matter how many facts are given to the fanbois...no matter how reality slaps them in the face every time they log in to SWG, they cling to their beliefs. Sadly, 'Believers' will always feel the need to convert others - and the means of doing so doesn't matter, so this will be an on going event.
I am wondering if the Fanboi 'Believers' that frequent this forum maybe going through a crisis of faith.....that the NGE reality is starting to chink away at thier firm beliefs of NGE greatness.....that some words of reality and reqason may be reaching their closed minds. Coming here to spout NGEisms, no matter how insane and/or ridiculous, maybe a method of convincing THEMSELVES. Players that are truly comfortable with the NGE usually do not have the need to prove anything to ex-players......they are happy talking with other LIKE-MINDED players in game or on thier own forums. <------(hint)
Though I feel the NGE may have dealt the final blow to SWG, its not entirely to blame for its death. Problem was the constant balancing and revamping they did through out the game. This game was overbalanced and over scutinized. Soe and wanting to listen to its cutomers by molding it to what the players wanted it to be. La in wanting the game to be more star warsy and as action packed as Battlefront. Between the two of them they basically pissed off every one. Professions were deleted, weapons and armor were made useless content added then deleted. This crap happened all of the time. Not just the NGE and CU They took a sandbox/complex mmo and turned into a linear/guided mmo. Maybe this was a defining point in mmo gaming when they realized there was different styles off players out there. And lets hope that they realized something else. That you can not alter a game that dramatically without repercussion. Player aren't going to just sit there and take it. An Empire Divided more so than it ever was. Vets, playerss, newbies, and devs all in a vicious circle with swg made to suffer in the middle.
My friends list of over 200.. 3 still play. My online community of over 1000 SWG players... there's only about 7 who still play. WE ALL PLAYED BEFORE THE NGE. As a matter of fact, the CU brought a few back into the fold (for some odd reason).
My friends aren't the abberation, they're the norm. SWG has a fraction of the players it once had and it has nothing to do with the slow decline it had, and everything to do with the freefall in subscriptions the nge brought.
Shayde - SWG (dead)
Proud member of the Cabal.
It sounds great, so great in fact, I pitty those who canceled
I don't like it when you say things. - A Vanguard fan who does too.
09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
C
Was the game underperforming before the NGE? Probably.
Was it a good idea to screw over the people who had been loyal and stuck with the game? No.
Is the population now lower than it was before the NGE? Yes.
Therefore, the NGE was not "right".
I came back. I started over from lvl 1 under the legacy quests system. Under the NGE it works very well. I do miss the Pre CU era but I am actually having a good time. WTF happened? It used to be worse than Trunk Federations 2nd CD after the little guy quit. In fact I messed with Beast Master in Test Center and it was really good. I have to admit the expertise system works. I still miss the skill system. The loot system works although I feel crafters are shafted. But there seems to be a new change in the air. I quit doing PVP so I can embrace PVE- which was a good decision.
This game is getting better since Jules T is gone. Ok------- go ahead and flame me
The NGE was wrong,
Well since its hit rock bottom it can only get better..My thing is i just dont like the benny hill combat engine nore the horrid GUI..If your having fun then i envy you..But unlike some i never quit through all the changes till the NGE..Even after that i resubbed each pub in hopes it was all a bad dream..Nothing has improved if you compare it to what it once was..You can compare it to other games but its still a really bad WoW wanna be...
It's the ones who say it is better and we all should be playing it, and we're all just crying over a lost game instead of embracing the game in its current condition... those I just want to shake until their hair falls out. Especially when they always say it's "better" than it was when the nge hit, but don't have the balls to say the nge is a better game. It's because they know they can't. That our "hate" is what is making the game look like a pale comparison to what we loved and we should "let it go".
Look, if the NFL suddenly decided they were gonna play Flag Football instead.. I'd stop watching. Sure, some might like watching, but I'm out and I'm not going to learn to love it. If someone tried to tell me the NFFL was better and that everyone loves it, even though nobody is watching and it has been regulated to 2am on ESPN8 (The Ocho!!!)... well you get the picture.
But Lateris.. more power to you. You know the nge was wrong, but you found your fun. I didn't, I haven't with every new addition and trial, and I sincerely doubt I ever will.
Shayde - SWG (dead)
Proud member of the Cabal.
It sounds great, so great in fact, I pitty those who canceled
I don't like it when you say things. - A Vanguard fan who does too.
09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
There is only us, there is only this.
Forget regret, or life is yours to miss.
No other road, no other way.
No day but today.
At this point all you can do is
LOL @ THE OP....
See kids this is what school is not teaching...... consumer, product, marketing.... common sense and logic.
Yep.... all gone on this one.
I mean a year and a half of failing, prior to all the missleading not to mention all the issues and false statements from the dev team alone would be enough for a normal class action law suit if they did not cover thier ass with--
"Gameplay may change while online" ----- OH yeah it can...
It's like the line from the start of the NGE ----- "GET ON BOARD THE FALCON KID THIS PLACE IS GONNA BLOW!"
That can mean two things...I know which one the NGE ended up being...