The targetting system required to use the door to get into the event was bugged. SOE later stated that the bugged entry point was 'working as intended'.
With a bugged door, any angry, hostile, or negative feedback was prevented by keeping ALL players out. While several actual fans were also unable to attend due to the issue, the fact that additional negative feedback would not be voiced was simply too important and considered 'critical'... and so the door remained bugged.
The SWG fans who did make it into the event went through a short pre-req line. They located the line after accidentally finding some clues as to it's whereabouts.
SOE can find enough positive feedback for SWG. They simply have someone over at LA generate computer generated/animated fans.
The targetting system required to use the door to get into the event was bugged. SOE later stated that the bugged entry point was 'working as intended'. With a bugged door, any angry, hostile, or negative feedback was prevented by keeping ALL players out. While several actual fans were also unable to attend due to the issue, the fact that additional negative feedback would not be voiced was simply too important and considered 'critical'... and so the door remained bugged. The SWG fans who did make it into the event went through a short pre-req line. They located the line after accidentally finding some clues as to it's whereabouts. SOE can find enough positive feedback for SWG. They simply have someone over at LA generate computer generated/animated fans.
Maybe the event wasnt finished yet, so the bug keeping people out was just a stall tactic until they made enough money off of tickets to pay for the event, then hurried up and threw some crap together. Later they can blame the original design of the event when no one comes to the next one and people complain about how bad the last one was.
See you in the dream.. The Fires from heaven, now as cold as ice. A rapid ascension tolls a heavy price.
lol, Obraik just fess up on this one, look over the previous meet & greets, none have been as small as this one and they doubtless had the same problem with cancellations even at the first one, shit it's no wonder SOE forgot to lay a table for the SWG attendees at the fan faire last year.
I'm not sure I'm reading this right, SOE forgot to include the fans of one of their own games at the fan faire?
Yep last year, they forgot to lay a table for the SWG contingent so the players and senators that attended were left standing around like they didn't belong lol
Every other SOE game had representation that was catered for apart from SWG.
...The spread of secondary and latterly of tertiary education has created a large population of people, often with well developed literary and scholarly tastes, who have been educated far beyond their capacity to undertake analytical thought.
Hmm, who has the bigger issues here? The person that supports a game they play and enjoy or the person that trolls forums for a game they no longer have any connection with, harrassing those that do currently play?
Regardless of the accusations being thrown around about who is or who isn't a paid employee of SoE your original comment here was regarding the full booking of this event. Do you not see how these pictures inply a poor showing regardless of the full booking - and what was the capacity for that booking anyway?
Your comment appeared to be very misleading IMO as you never awknowledged the capacity nor had you awknowledged the lack of people in those pictures - expecially compared to past events.
Obraik lives in New Zealand, it's not hard to think that he would not want to travel half way around the world to attend a 3 hour meeting with SOE devs in San Francisco. One of my guildmates was actually there, there were about 40 players at the meeting.
I ask you how honestly how many people would drive for hours, or fly to San Francisco for a 3 hour meeting for any game?
There were a lot of people at the Fan Fest in 2005. Quite a few attendees from countries not in the western hemisphere. I flew around 1100 miles to attend.
Obraik does need to come clean. I think it's nothing more then a cry to be acknowledged by someone who could give him a job as a PR spin director. There's really no other benefit from being as deceptive and misleading as he is in some of his posts. None the less, you have to respect his abillity to spin any negative address with an off topic responce. I'm sure he's a good person who's bound to be a polotician some day.
Hmm, who has the bigger issues here? The person that supports a game they play and enjoy or the person that trolls forums for a game they no longer have any connection with, harrassing those that do currently play?
Regardless of the accusations being thrown around about who is or who isn't a paid employee of SoE your original comment here was regarding the full booking of this event. Do you not see how these pictures inply a poor showing regardless of the full booking - and what was the capacity for that booking anyway?
Your comment appeared to be very misleading IMO as you never awknowledged the capacity nor had you awknowledged the lack of people in those pictures - expecially compared to past events.
Few things to point out.
First things first, remember right now money is kinda tight for alot of people. I mean I don't have the money to fly or drive to Cali so I can talk about SWG for two days or so. I know tons of friends both real life and online who don't have the money to do things like that right now.
Also remember that they did this at not the best time, when they did it alot of people (and many SWG Players) just started to study or do finals. Hey you tell me, pass your class or go talk about a game you play online? I think you would most likely have your head in a textbook.
And lastly the big thing to point out is why go to that Event when there is the Fanfest in Vegas! I mean look if I had to pick to go to the Summit in San Francisco or the Fanfest in Vegas... Well Vegas has much more in terms of Entertainment in my eyes then San Francisco. And yes I have been to San Francisco, sorry I just see it as their is more to do in Vegas. Besides that Vegas doesn't have a "hippy" part of town....
So yeah it's a smaller turn out for the Summit, but still School for alot of people wasn't out yet. Money is kinda tight for people right now, and you do have alot more people who see there is "more to do" in Vegas at the fanfest.
Hmm, who has the bigger issues here? The person that supports a game they play and enjoy or the person that trolls forums for a game they no longer have any connection with, harrassing those that do currently play?
Regardless of the accusations being thrown around about who is or who isn't a paid employee of SoE your original comment here was regarding the full booking of this event. Do you not see how these pictures inply a poor showing regardless of the full booking - and what was the capacity for that booking anyway?
Your comment appeared to be very misleading IMO as you never awknowledged the capacity nor had you awknowledged the lack of people in those pictures - expecially compared to past events.
Few things to point out.
First things first, remember right now money is kinda tight for alot of people. I mean I don't have the money to fly or drive to Cali so I can talk about SWG for two days or so. I know tons of friends both real life and online who don't have the money to do things like that right now.
Also remember that they did this at not the best time, when they did it alot of people (and many SWG Players) just started to study or do finals. Hey you tell me, pass your class or go talk about a game you play online? I think you would most likely have your head in a textbook.
And lastly the big thing to point out is why go to that Event when there is the Fanfest in Vegas! I mean look if I had to pick to go to the Summit in San Francisco or the Fanfest in Vegas... Well Vegas has much more in terms of Entertainment in my eyes then San Francisco. And yes I have been to San Francisco, sorry I just see it as their is more to do in Vegas. Besides that Vegas doesn't have a "hippy" part of town....
So yeah it's a smaller turn out for the Summit, but still School for alot of people wasn't out yet. Money is kinda tight for people right now, and you do have alot more people who see there is "more to do" in Vegas at the fanfest.
There were TONS of fans there. You just couldn't see them all in those pics because most of them were out running instances at the food court or doing collections in other parts of the convention center.
A few days after they opened registration on the website, they announced that the booking was full. From what I understand though from reports of people who attended, as is usually the case there were people that booked and never showed up.
There were huge halls packed with cheering fans before all the lies and b.s.. People aren't nearly as stupid as SOE and LA management seem to think. Treat people like garbage and they stop coming to your parties.
Hmm, who has the bigger issues here? The person that supports a game they play and enjoy or the person that trolls forums for a game they no longer have any connection with, harrassing those that do currently play?
Regardless of the accusations being thrown around about who is or who isn't a paid employee of SoE your original comment here was regarding the full booking of this event. Do you not see how these pictures inply a poor showing regardless of the full booking - and what was the capacity for that booking anyway?
Your comment appeared to be very misleading IMO as you never awknowledged the capacity nor had you awknowledged the lack of people in those pictures - expecially compared to past events.
Few things to point out.
First things first, remember right now money is kinda tight for alot of people. I mean I don't have the money to fly or drive to Cali so I can talk about SWG for two days or so. I know tons of friends both real life and online who don't have the money to do things like that right now.
Also remember that they did this at not the best time, when they did it alot of people (and many SWG Players) just started to study or do finals. Hey you tell me, pass your class or go talk about a game you play online? I think you would most likely have your head in a textbook.
And lastly the big thing to point out is why go to that Event when there is the Fanfest in Vegas! I mean look if I had to pick to go to the Summit in San Francisco or the Fanfest in Vegas... Well Vegas has much more in terms of Entertainment in my eyes then San Francisco. And yes I have been to San Francisco, sorry I just see it as their is more to do in Vegas. Besides that Vegas doesn't have a "hippy" part of town....
So yeah it's a smaller turn out for the Summit, but still School for alot of people wasn't out yet. Money is kinda tight for people right now, and you do have alot more people who see there is "more to do" in Vegas at the fanfest.
Again it was 2006 back then, and it wasn't in San Francisco.
Now I've been to San Francisco and I know for a fact it's not really the cheapest place to stay in. Airfare, Hotel, Food, in my case Cigarettes if I run out (and in 2000/2001 when I went a pack of Cigarettes was something like $6.50, I'd hate to see what it is now.) And if you want to do something outside the Summit, and I don't know about you but I would you spending more money.
And let me just kinda throw a question out here, just ignore the whole SWG thing here for a minute. Right now would you pay a good amount of money to go to a weekend summit for a game you play? Be truthful here, I will be. Right now there is no way I could really do it, mostly due to the fact that I am trying to save money myself and lord knows with the whole rumor of gas prices going up to $4 bucks I'm not even going out that much.
Now I'll give you this much, yes there are less people there from the pics we have seen. But I'm not going to jump up and down screaming "omg! no one is there cuz the game sucks!!!!!" I'm going to look at it from this stand point.
The game is 5 years old, SOE has pissed off a ton of people, and chances are many other people and players just do not have the money to be going to San Francisco to talk about a game we play.
Again it was 2006 back then, and it wasn't in San Francisco.
Now I've been to San Francisco and I know for a fact it's not really the cheapest place to stay in. Airfare, Hotel, Food, in my case Cigarettes if I run out (and in 2000/2001 when I went a pack of Cigarettes was something like $6.50, I'd hate to see what it is now.) And if you want to do something outside the Summit, and I don't know about you but I would you spending more money. And let me just kinda throw a question out here, just ignore the whole SWG thing here for a minute. Right now would you pay a good amount of money to go to a weekend summit for a game you play? Be truthful here, I will be. Right now there is no way I could really do it, mostly due to the fact that I am trying to save money myself and lord knows with the whole rumor of gas prices going up to $4 bucks I'm not even going out that much. Now I'll give you this much, yes there are less people there from the pics we have seen. But I'm not going to jump up and down screaming "omg! no one is there cuz the game sucks!!!!!" I'm going to look at it from this stand point. The game is 5 years old, SOE has pissed off a ton of people, and chances are many other people and players just do not have the money to be going to San Francisco to talk about a game we play.
They would all be very fine, valid arguments if it wasn't for the fact that this event was held in one of the most densely populated cities in the US. As lightly populated as SWG may be, surely you'd expect there to be enough people that play within the local vacinity to fill a hall that size?
...The spread of secondary and latterly of tertiary education has created a large population of people, often with well developed literary and scholarly tastes, who have been educated far beyond their capacity to undertake analytical thought.
Umm.. i was raised and still work in San Francisco. (the only smokes that sold for 6.50 EVER in the city are the ones at the tourist traps.. go to 7-11, walgreens, ect.. and pay normal price).
i didn't go to Summit, as i figured they would not let in any.. "BRING BACK THE OLD SWG" people. i did go by though.. there was alot more people there then in those pictures. Hell.. there were more people (clearly there as wearing badges) hanging outside smoking and talking then shown in most of those pictures combined. Man.. i almost forgot how out of place yet completly unaware diehard gamers can be. Too tight pants, tucked in shirt when have a big gut.. yet thinking they look fly. tisk.. is a shame we all can't look like our avatars.. o wait.. in swg.. you can..
And let me just kinda throw a question out here, just ignore the whole SWG thing here for a minute. Right now would you pay a good amount of money to go to a weekend summit for a game you play? Be truthful here, I will be. Right now there is no way I could really do it, mostly due to the fact that I am trying to save money myself and lord knows with the whole rumor of gas prices going up to $4 bucks I'm not even going out that much. Now I'll give you this much, yes there are less people there from the pics we have seen. But I'm not going to jump up and down screaming "omg! no one is there cuz the game sucks!!!!!" I'm going to look at it from this stand point. The game is 5 years old, SOE has pissed off a ton of people, and chances are many other people and players just do not have the money to be going to San Francisco to talk about a game we play.
No, I wouldn't go to a weekend summit right now. I wouldn't go at anytime TBH, it's just not my cup of tea. But I have driven several hours to go to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice (once was to see the John Lennon exhibit - it was awsome!), and I would go again this summer but I'm personally boycotting it cause I don't think REM or Maddona should be in it when KISS is not.
But I digress. My point wasn't to claim that SWG is dieing as I actually think there are probably slightly more people playing at the moment then there was in '06. My point has always been that when SWG was made to be an "easy to jump into" game the result was also an easy to jump out of game. In other words I think they lost the passion that the game foster in it's original form. I believe we're starting to see that reflected in the turn out for these summits.
From my own personal experience I found that when SWG was in it's earliest form it encouraged strong social ties with other players. That translated into a desire to meet those other players in person. Without that strong social development in game the desire to meet those people in person decreases IMO.
The 2008 summit was sold out (correct me if I am wrong)
San Fran has access to far more population that Indianapolis and should draw a bigger crowd.
The room sizes tell the whole story. SOE set the size and you can see they expected far more in 2006 than 2008 based on space. Speculating WHY people didn't show up has no effect on SOE estimating the capacity.
The summit didn't even have enough draw to fill that small place. Blame whatever economics you want, it is what it is, unless you absolutely must have something else to blame for the way things are.
The 2008 summit was sold out (correct me if I am wrong) San Fran has access to far more population that Indianapolis and should draw a bigger crowd.
Note: I am not defending the game or the amount of people that were or weren't at the summit.
Anyway, that's an incorrect assessment. 2/3rds of the country's population is much closer to Indy than to Frisco. Frisco has a higher population density than Indy, yes, but Indy is surrounded by much higher pop density than Frisco is.
Until you cancel your subscription, you are only helping to continue the cycle of mediocrity.
I've played a lot of games and never gone to a single one of those fan things as I dont like them. I'm interested in the game not listening to a bunch of people drone on about things that I dont care about or whatever. I would rather read it at my leisure then pay money and drive till I drop. I don't know how many people take interest in these things but to be honest I know of no one that I play games with that would spend that kind of money to go to listen to a bunch of people say stuff that they can read on a website. Hotels expenses, travelling expenses, food and to find the time to get off work do to it. I have no idea what low numbers at a summit mean other then a lot of people weren't able and/or willing to get time out to fork over that amount of cash to sit and listen to a bunch of coprotate eggheads .. lol
You can argue about the the numbers but IMHO its more important to note that the "vets" made no organized showing to make a case for what they want.
Really? No 20k + petitions that Smed said he's seen. No mass cancelations. No emulators. No blockade on soe marketing. No summits that people told them face to face what they want. No qoutes from smed saying soe should have stuck with the original version and it was a mistake stating that he knows exactly what the vets wantted and still want.
They knew all along. But R&D is too expensive and focus groups are too unrelyable. And selling it is lucrative. Just kidding of coarse. SWG's best interest were always SOE's main priorities:)
See you in the dream.. The Fires from heaven, now as cold as ice. A rapid ascension tolls a heavy price.
The 2008 summit was sold out (correct me if I am wrong) San Fran has access to far more population that Indianapolis and should draw a bigger crowd.
Note: I am not defending the game or the amount of people that were or weren't at the summit.
Anyway, that's an incorrect assessment. 2/3rds of the country's population is much closer to Indy than to Frisco. Frisco has a higher population density than Indy, yes, but Indy is surrounded by much higher pop density than Frisco is.
You are correct in terms of overall country size. I was trying to draw a comparison based on short ranges as some have made relation to gas prices, travel time, etc for a 3 hour event or whatever it was.
They would all be very fine, valid arguments if it wasn't for the fact that this event was held in one of the most densely populated cities in the US. As lightly populated as SWG may be, surely you'd expect there to be enough people that play within the local vacinity to fill a hall that size?
I can only opine based on my own experiences, but I live 10 minutes from San Francisco and wouldn't drive for a 3 hr face-to-face with game devs even for a game I play daily. It's not like they were giving anything away or offering any information that wouldn't be shared soon afterwards. With gas near $4 a gallon here and the general crappy-ness of driving and parking in SF, anyway... why the hell would I want to see a bunch of geeks and game developers so I can get some sneak peeks a day before everyone else? A populous location doesn't really fit into the equation. The people who live and play within the local vicinity are probably busy working so they can continue living and playing in the high-cost-of-living local vicinity.
Not that SWG sucks any less because of these reasons, but I find the original argument is quite valid. Hopefully some sci fi type stuff will get into the hands of a company that isn't pathetic.
They would all be very fine, valid arguments if it wasn't for the fact that this event was held in one of the most densely populated cities in the US. As lightly populated as SWG may be, surely you'd expect there to be enough people that play within the local vacinity to fill a hall that size?
I can only opine based on my own experiences, but I live 10 minutes from San Francisco and wouldn't drive for a 3 hr face-to-face with game devs even for a game I play daily. It's not like they were giving anything away or offering any information that wouldn't be shared soon afterwards. With gas near $4 a gallon here and the general crappy-ness of driving and parking in SF, anyway... why the hell would I want to see a bunch of geeks and game developers so I can get some sneak peeks a day before everyone else? A populous location doesn't really fit into the equation. The people who live and play within the local vicinity are probably busy working so they can continue living and playing in the high-cost-of-living local vicinity.
Not that SWG sucks any less because of these reasons, but I find the original argument is quite valid. Hopefully some sci fi type stuff will get into the hands of a company that isn't pathetic.
That's you personally and that's fine but it's not like SWG players only just started getting jobs, worrying about gas prices and making time, those were all considerations for people that attended the summits going back even before the game was launched and yet they always had far better attendence levels than this one. There really is no logical explanation other than the obvious decline in interest in the game.
...The spread of secondary and latterly of tertiary education has created a large population of people, often with well developed literary and scholarly tastes, who have been educated far beyond their capacity to undertake analytical thought.
Comments
The targetting system required to use the door to get into the event was bugged. SOE later stated that the bugged entry point was 'working as intended'.
With a bugged door, any angry, hostile, or negative feedback was prevented by keeping ALL players out. While several actual fans were also unable to attend due to the issue, the fact that additional negative feedback would not be voiced was simply too important and considered 'critical'... and so the door remained bugged.
The SWG fans who did make it into the event went through a short pre-req line. They located the line after accidentally finding some clues as to it's whereabouts.
SOE can find enough positive feedback for SWG. They simply have someone over at LA generate computer generated/animated fans.
Maybe the event wasnt finished yet, so the bug keeping people out was just a stall tactic until they made enough money off of tickets to pay for the event, then hurried up and threw some crap together. Later they can blame the original design of the event when no one comes to the next one and people complain about how bad the last one was.
See you in the dream..
The Fires from heaven, now as cold as ice. A rapid ascension tolls a heavy price.
Yep last year, they forgot to lay a table for the SWG contingent so the players and senators that attended were left standing around like they didn't belong lol
Every other SOE game had representation that was catered for apart from SWG.
...The spread of secondary and latterly of tertiary education has created a large population of people, often with well developed literary and scholarly tastes, who have been educated far beyond their capacity to undertake analytical thought.
Regardless of the accusations being thrown around about who is or who isn't a paid employee of SoE your original comment here was regarding the full booking of this event. Do you not see how these pictures inply a poor showing regardless of the full booking - and what was the capacity for that booking anyway?
Your comment appeared to be very misleading IMO as you never awknowledged the capacity nor had you awknowledged the lack of people in those pictures - expecially compared to past events.
__________________________________________________________________________________Obraik lives in New Zealand, it's not hard to think that he would not want to travel half way around the world to attend a 3 hour meeting with SOE devs in San Francisco. One of my guildmates was actually there, there were about 40 players at the meeting.
I ask you how honestly how many people would drive for hours, or fly to San Francisco for a 3 hour meeting for any game?
There were a lot of people at the Fan Fest in 2005. Quite a few attendees from countries not in the western hemisphere. I flew around 1100 miles to attend.
Obraik does need to come clean. I think it's nothing more then a cry to be acknowledged by someone who could give him a job as a PR spin director. There's really no other benefit from being as deceptive and misleading as he is in some of his posts. None the less, you have to respect his abillity to spin any negative address with an off topic responce. I'm sure he's a good person who's bound to be a polotician some day.
Regardless of the accusations being thrown around about who is or who isn't a paid employee of SoE your original comment here was regarding the full booking of this event. Do you not see how these pictures inply a poor showing regardless of the full booking - and what was the capacity for that booking anyway?
Your comment appeared to be very misleading IMO as you never awknowledged the capacity nor had you awknowledged the lack of people in those pictures - expecially compared to past events.
Few things to point out.First things first, remember right now money is kinda tight for alot of people. I mean I don't have the money to fly or drive to Cali so I can talk about SWG for two days or so. I know tons of friends both real life and online who don't have the money to do things like that right now.
Also remember that they did this at not the best time, when they did it alot of people (and many SWG Players) just started to study or do finals. Hey you tell me, pass your class or go talk about a game you play online? I think you would most likely have your head in a textbook.
And lastly the big thing to point out is why go to that Event when there is the Fanfest in Vegas! I mean look if I had to pick to go to the Summit in San Francisco or the Fanfest in Vegas... Well Vegas has much more in terms of Entertainment in my eyes then San Francisco. And yes I have been to San Francisco, sorry I just see it as their is more to do in Vegas. Besides that Vegas doesn't have a "hippy" part of town....
So yeah it's a smaller turn out for the Summit, but still School for alot of people wasn't out yet. Money is kinda tight for people right now, and you do have alot more people who see there is "more to do" in Vegas at the fanfest.
Again this was NOT a fanfest that went on for a few days, it was 3 hours. Huge difference.
Regardless of the accusations being thrown around about who is or who isn't a paid employee of SoE your original comment here was regarding the full booking of this event. Do you not see how these pictures inply a poor showing regardless of the full booking - and what was the capacity for that booking anyway?
Your comment appeared to be very misleading IMO as you never awknowledged the capacity nor had you awknowledged the lack of people in those pictures - expecially compared to past events.
Few things to point out.First things first, remember right now money is kinda tight for alot of people. I mean I don't have the money to fly or drive to Cali so I can talk about SWG for two days or so. I know tons of friends both real life and online who don't have the money to do things like that right now.
Also remember that they did this at not the best time, when they did it alot of people (and many SWG Players) just started to study or do finals. Hey you tell me, pass your class or go talk about a game you play online? I think you would most likely have your head in a textbook.
And lastly the big thing to point out is why go to that Event when there is the Fanfest in Vegas! I mean look if I had to pick to go to the Summit in San Francisco or the Fanfest in Vegas... Well Vegas has much more in terms of Entertainment in my eyes then San Francisco. And yes I have been to San Francisco, sorry I just see it as their is more to do in Vegas. Besides that Vegas doesn't have a "hippy" part of town....
So yeah it's a smaller turn out for the Summit, but still School for alot of people wasn't out yet. Money is kinda tight for people right now, and you do have alot more people who see there is "more to do" in Vegas at the fanfest.
You make some good points MikeMB.
But consider this for comparision.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2037464082030581634
Naw, Chuck E. Cheese's
2 points:
1.) Suvroc just pwned you all in this debate by showing the 2006 Summit which easily had 100 or more people in attendance.
2.) As usual, Obraik dodged my question. I don't need his answer, I know it already.
Tecmo Bowl.
There were TONS of fans there. You just couldn't see them all in those pics because most of them were out running instances at the food court or doing collections in other parts of the convention center.
http://mmo-hell.blogspot.com/
http://www.mmorpg.com/blogs/rejad
There were huge halls packed with cheering fans before all the lies and b.s.. People aren't nearly as stupid as SOE and LA management seem to think. Treat people like garbage and they stop coming to your parties.
Regardless of the accusations being thrown around about who is or who isn't a paid employee of SoE your original comment here was regarding the full booking of this event. Do you not see how these pictures inply a poor showing regardless of the full booking - and what was the capacity for that booking anyway?
Your comment appeared to be very misleading IMO as you never awknowledged the capacity nor had you awknowledged the lack of people in those pictures - expecially compared to past events.
Few things to point out.First things first, remember right now money is kinda tight for alot of people. I mean I don't have the money to fly or drive to Cali so I can talk about SWG for two days or so. I know tons of friends both real life and online who don't have the money to do things like that right now.
Also remember that they did this at not the best time, when they did it alot of people (and many SWG Players) just started to study or do finals. Hey you tell me, pass your class or go talk about a game you play online? I think you would most likely have your head in a textbook.
And lastly the big thing to point out is why go to that Event when there is the Fanfest in Vegas! I mean look if I had to pick to go to the Summit in San Francisco or the Fanfest in Vegas... Well Vegas has much more in terms of Entertainment in my eyes then San Francisco. And yes I have been to San Francisco, sorry I just see it as their is more to do in Vegas. Besides that Vegas doesn't have a "hippy" part of town....
So yeah it's a smaller turn out for the Summit, but still School for alot of people wasn't out yet. Money is kinda tight for people right now, and you do have alot more people who see there is "more to do" in Vegas at the fanfest.
You make some good points MikeMB.
But consider this for comparision.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2037464082030581634
Now I've been to San Francisco and I know for a fact it's not really the cheapest place to stay in. Airfare, Hotel, Food, in my case Cigarettes if I run out (and in 2000/2001 when I went a pack of Cigarettes was something like $6.50, I'd hate to see what it is now.) And if you want to do something outside the Summit, and I don't know about you but I would you spending more money.
And let me just kinda throw a question out here, just ignore the whole SWG thing here for a minute. Right now would you pay a good amount of money to go to a weekend summit for a game you play? Be truthful here, I will be. Right now there is no way I could really do it, mostly due to the fact that I am trying to save money myself and lord knows with the whole rumor of gas prices going up to $4 bucks I'm not even going out that much.
Now I'll give you this much, yes there are less people there from the pics we have seen. But I'm not going to jump up and down screaming "omg! no one is there cuz the game sucks!!!!!" I'm going to look at it from this stand point.
The game is 5 years old, SOE has pissed off a ton of people, and chances are many other people and players just do not have the money to be going to San Francisco to talk about a game we play.
They would all be very fine, valid arguments if it wasn't for the fact that this event was held in one of the most densely populated cities in the US. As lightly populated as SWG may be, surely you'd expect there to be enough people that play within the local vacinity to fill a hall that size?
...The spread of secondary and latterly of tertiary education has created a large population of people, often with well developed literary and scholarly tastes, who have been educated far beyond their capacity to undertake analytical thought.
Umm.. i was raised and still work in San Francisco. (the only smokes that sold for 6.50 EVER in the city are the ones at the tourist traps.. go to 7-11, walgreens, ect.. and pay normal price).
i didn't go to Summit, as i figured they would not let in any.. "BRING BACK THE OLD SWG" people. i did go by though.. there was alot more people there then in those pictures. Hell.. there were more people (clearly there as wearing badges) hanging outside smoking and talking then shown in most of those pictures combined. Man.. i almost forgot how out of place yet completly unaware diehard gamers can be. Too tight pants, tucked in shirt when have a big gut.. yet thinking they look fly. tisk.. is a shame we all can't look like our avatars.. o wait.. in swg.. you can..
But I digress. My point wasn't to claim that SWG is dieing as I actually think there are probably slightly more people playing at the moment then there was in '06. My point has always been that when SWG was made to be an "easy to jump into" game the result was also an easy to jump out of game. In other words I think they lost the passion that the game foster in it's original form. I believe we're starting to see that reflected in the turn out for these summits.
From my own personal experience I found that when SWG was in it's earliest form it encouraged strong social ties with other players. That translated into a desire to meet those other players in person. Without that strong social development in game the desire to meet those people in person decreases IMO.
The 2008 summit was sold out (correct me if I am wrong)
San Fran has access to far more population that Indianapolis and should draw a bigger crowd.
The room sizes tell the whole story. SOE set the size and you can see they expected far more in 2006 than 2008 based on space. Speculating WHY people didn't show up has no effect on SOE estimating the capacity.
The summit didn't even have enough draw to fill that small place. Blame whatever economics you want, it is what it is, unless you absolutely must have something else to blame for the way things are.
Note: I am not defending the game or the amount of people that were or weren't at the summit.
Anyway, that's an incorrect assessment. 2/3rds of the country's population is much closer to Indy than to Frisco. Frisco has a higher population density than Indy, yes, but Indy is surrounded by much higher pop density than Frisco is.
Until you cancel your subscription, you are only helping to continue the cycle of mediocrity.
I've played a lot of games and never gone to a single one of those fan things as I dont like them. I'm interested in the game not listening to a bunch of people drone on about things that I dont care about or whatever. I would rather read it at my leisure then pay money and drive till I drop. I don't know how many people take interest in these things but to be honest I know of no one that I play games with that would spend that kind of money to go to listen to a bunch of people say stuff that they can read on a website. Hotels expenses, travelling expenses, food and to find the time to get off work do to it. I have no idea what low numbers at a summit mean other then a lot of people weren't able and/or willing to get time out to fork over that amount of cash to sit and listen to a bunch of coprotate eggheads .. lol
meh..
You can argue about the the numbers but IMHO its more important to note that the "vets" made no organized showing to make a case for what they want.
I beleive the vets spoke, during, before and after the crap changes took place.
And have been demanding for years now to change it for what the fans want.
They ignored all of this, and basically said "screw you" to the entire fan base.
They know what we want, they just don't do it, or don't care... either way, good riddance.
They knew all along. But R&D is too expensive and focus groups are too unrelyable. And selling it is lucrative. Just kidding of coarse. SWG's best interest were always SOE's main priorities:)
See you in the dream..
The Fires from heaven, now as cold as ice. A rapid ascension tolls a heavy price.
**For many vets, not giving SOE any money is an organized event. Even so, it isn't like the vets case has never been presented**
Note: I am not defending the game or the amount of people that were or weren't at the summit.
Anyway, that's an incorrect assessment. 2/3rds of the country's population is much closer to Indy than to Frisco. Frisco has a higher population density than Indy, yes, but Indy is surrounded by much higher pop density than Frisco is.
You are correct in terms of overall country size. I was trying to draw a comparison based on short ranges as some have made relation to gas prices, travel time, etc for a 3 hour event or whatever it was.I can only opine based on my own experiences, but I live 10 minutes from San Francisco and wouldn't drive for a 3 hr face-to-face with game devs even for a game I play daily. It's not like they were giving anything away or offering any information that wouldn't be shared soon afterwards. With gas near $4 a gallon here and the general crappy-ness of driving and parking in SF, anyway... why the hell would I want to see a bunch of geeks and game developers so I can get some sneak peeks a day before everyone else? A populous location doesn't really fit into the equation. The people who live and play within the local vicinity are probably busy working so they can continue living and playing in the high-cost-of-living local vicinity.
Not that SWG sucks any less because of these reasons, but I find the original argument is quite valid. Hopefully some sci fi type stuff will get into the hands of a company that isn't pathetic.
I can only opine based on my own experiences, but I live 10 minutes from San Francisco and wouldn't drive for a 3 hr face-to-face with game devs even for a game I play daily. It's not like they were giving anything away or offering any information that wouldn't be shared soon afterwards. With gas near $4 a gallon here and the general crappy-ness of driving and parking in SF, anyway... why the hell would I want to see a bunch of geeks and game developers so I can get some sneak peeks a day before everyone else? A populous location doesn't really fit into the equation. The people who live and play within the local vicinity are probably busy working so they can continue living and playing in the high-cost-of-living local vicinity.
Not that SWG sucks any less because of these reasons, but I find the original argument is quite valid. Hopefully some sci fi type stuff will get into the hands of a company that isn't pathetic.
That's you personally and that's fine but it's not like SWG players only just started getting jobs, worrying about gas prices and making time, those were all considerations for people that attended the summits going back even before the game was launched and yet they always had far better attendence levels than this one. There really is no logical explanation other than the obvious decline in interest in the game.
...The spread of secondary and latterly of tertiary education has created a large population of people, often with well developed literary and scholarly tastes, who have been educated far beyond their capacity to undertake analytical thought.