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Players, Accountants and Lucas Arts were the downfall of SWG
Jatwhal
Member Posts: 162
Well let's blame it on the players, Lucas Arts and accountants.
I honestly have to say that somewhere someone or a group of "non designers" were calling the shots.
Anyone who knows George Lucas' history of his tight grip on everything "Star Wars" (rightly so) can easily understand that he was more than likely "at the helm" of SWG.
SWG started off with some of the greatest MMORPG "minds and talent" in the industry. If anyone ever read some of their original plans/goals they can see where they completely compromised or had their design compromised after they left.
The leaving of these devs and the continual in and out of others makes one think of the possible conflicts that were ongoing with LA.
I've played since launch and I could probably find some of the posts from Devs about how rare Jedi were going to be and how hard it was going to be to play them.
Can anyone say character perma-death!!
I think some bean counters went onto the SWG forums and without MMORPG game forum experience saw all the "whiners" posts.
Anyone who has been around knows game forums attract the whiny people who have more forum time than game time.
I honestly believe that SWG attracted a large portion of Star Wars fans that weren't "gamers".
These gamers came to SWG to play Jedi and yes other professions but let's face it the "Master Replicas" is in the lightsaber memorabilia business, WalMart sold tons of lightsabers with the new movies, not blasters and power hammers.
Everyone remember "I want Jedi to be rare ,except for my account?" Sure you do, you all claim to be glorious SWG vets.
That post held so true for the SW fans and even some of the gamer "elitists" who relish accomplishments over other players.
That was the first pressure from the players base....
Most of those posts were about how hard it was to figure out how to become a Jedi.
Even though all the press had told them it would be hard they still complained and wanted it "rare, except for their account" while the rest of us were ingame working on it.
Shoot, the game population(me included) was so slow that the devs had to give us hints. That was my first clue they were giving into the whiners.
Then when those people got their Jedi they whined about the finality of their characters life. So there went perma death, then visibility, then open pvp!
Now who's to blame for that? Think rationally now. It started with the player base. " I want Jedi, Jedi is too hard, stop the forced pvp." While we "gamers" were in game trying to avoid perma death, visibility, loving the rarity and hardcoreness of our profession those others were the very vocal populace on the SOE forums getting listened to by ???? The devs? Lucas Arts? SOE?
All the press told us what it was going to be like to play a Jedi yet those types got into the game and then flooded the forums till Jedi got nerfed to crap.
Imagine what this game would be like if just those things had stayed in place with Jedi.
Jedi was designed for the "hardcore" and only the hardcore would have stuck with it.
As for the arguement of timeline- give me a break. First off lose your console mentality. This is an MMORPG there is no "end game" there is no time "lock". It's a forward moving world.
I once posted to those same whiners, then delete your Jedi if you are so thoroughly convicted to "canon".
Guess how many did?
Well somewhere some non gamer geek said all our models from Everquest and Everquest2 show that players like to have things handed to them. WoW's success proves these theories to be true so we need to change SWG to those styles.
Well we all know how wrong they were now.
It sure did drive subscriptions....away
I recently read somewhere on a forum about someone complaining about some game's interface and the reply was "it's the basic WoW interface, the industry standard. It's what all MMORPG's will use.
How boring is that?
Well I tried to play WoW at launch and 2 more times since. I never lasted more than a couple of weeks.
I'm an mmorpg player, not a "console player online"
I've played Ultima online since launch and the only other mmorpg that I've kept playing in 10 years is SWG. *EQ2 doesn't count since I only play that because my wife likes it* rolleyes:
I would like to state that in no way shape or form that anything I receive from SOE influences my opinion about SWG or their company. Im pretty much a typical average player enjoying the game.
Comments
Let's see now players, accountants, LucasArts. Whose missing from this equation? Oh yeah, SOE. It must be everyone's fault but theirs, even though their development team came up with the NGE. Yes, I think I see where you're coming from -_^. I think most of the people that read these forums will also get your drift.
remove players and insert soe. you cant blame people whos only job is to show up and pay money. sure i ridicule nge players some but even i understand it's their choice to play what they like. it's the nature of star wars. in a way it's a cursed I.P. in movies and books it translates easier than in a mmo. some players want nothing more than a game where they can swing their glowbat, others point out that 5000 jedi running around breaks immersion and that there is much more to star wars than force users. truth is niether is wrong.
you can either make a virtual world sandbox and capture the old-school gamer or go more linear and get the younger market but you cant have both. and you really shouldn't switch on the fly (see soe).
I completely agree. The player base had a lot more to do with the undesirable changes than the supposed "schemers" at SOE and LA. I'll even go one step further - I blame the players of every cookie-cutter MMO out there for the madness of the NGE. Why in the hell would SOE/LA make such steep changes to the game? They anticipated higher sub numbers if the game was overly-simplified to a level seen in WoW. If MMO gamers weren't satisfied with the **** that these developers push out nowadays, we wouldn't be talking about the NGE, and we wouldn't have a SWG Veteran Refuge. Too bad that they are.
SWG's downfall was due to complete and utter mismanagement by SOE. LEC was little more than an enabler. The CU and NGE were a direct result of SOE not listening to what their existing customers, and the folks who quit the game, were asking for. The main reason people gave for wuitting the game was the lack of directed content. When players complained that the game didn't feel like Star Wars, they were complaining that there was little to do in the game that seemd like what we saw in the films or read about in the books and comics. What was the response by the developers? They decided to tweak the core game mechanics with a sledgehammer. It takes a special kind of incompetence to interpret "We want content!" as "We hate the game systems!". That was the kind of incompetence running things at SOE.
When the folks at LEC asked why the game wasn't doing as well as expected, the folks at SOE blamed the core game systems. The core game was never the problem until the CU (and the NGE compounded it a hundred fold). Had the developers focused on fixing the original game, and adding content (the game was always intended to include directd content and user generated contenent, such as the Storyteller System, in the initial design), SWG would have gotten much closer to the million sub number than it did.
Anyone who blames anybody except the folks at SOe for SWG's ignoble history hasn't been paying attention.
The CU and NGE were not created for the folks who played the game. They were made to make the game appeal to people who didn't play the game. In fact, with the NGE, SOE knew they would lose most of the current (at the time) players, but they were arrogant enough to believe that they would replace the existing players with many times more new players.
You know, in another thread you just tried to convice us that players really have no influence over MMO's. Of course, that thread was talking about player feedback having a postive impact. Now, you blame players for negative changes in the MMO industry.
I think I understand your bias.
Do you blame the players of WoW for enjoying a fun, functional and highly populated game? What's to blame?
Is it the players' fault that companies like SOE see WoW's success, and try to take from their slice of the pie by coming up with a busted ass copy, and pushing it on an unsuspecting playerbase, after advertising something completely different? Players didn't ask them to do this. Dan Rubenfield and Jeff Freeman et al. came up with these plans within SOE when they were told to make the game better, and make it successful. Their solution was crap, and they are responsible for their own work and decisions, not the players that were then cursed by it.
Interesting list, I guess that's why I play City of Heroes and WoW. Me and a few million other happy customers.
You know, in another thread you just tried to convice us that players really have no influence over MMO's. Of course, that thread was talking about player feedback having a postive impact. Now, you blame players for negative changes in the MMO industry.
I think I understand your bias.
Do you blame the players of WoW for enjoying a fun, functional and highly populated game? What's to blame?
Is it the players' fault that companies like SOE see WoW's success, and try to take from their slice of the pie by coming up with a busted ass copy, and pushing it on an unsuspecting playerbase, after advertising something completely different? Players didn't ask them to do this. Dan Rubenfield and Jeff Freeman et al. came up with these plans within SOE when they were told to make the game better, and make it successful. Their solution was crap, and they are responsible for their own work and decisions, not the players that were then cursed by it.
You have a habit for seeking me out - that you do. I applaud your efforts, but you fail to see the big picture. In the meantime, I'm sorry if my postulating is too complicated for you. I enjoy the fact that you can over-simplify my argument - good for you. I guess that makes things all the more simpler. My previous post was in regard to how the profit-margin is king - a group of disgruntled gamers cannot persuade any change in a profitable company if they do just that, make profits. This last post was in regard to profit-motive. If you have a large player base that is satisfied with the mediocre, then why bother trying to surpass that mediocrity and make something new and exciting? There's no insurance on how much profit you'll make if you use an entirely new system, not a system that is tried and true. This is why WoW, however good and popular you say it is right now, is ultimately a stigma to the MMO market. This is also the reason why the NGE was made.
Click, Click, Pull!
This topic is dead.
You know, in another thread you just tried to convice us that players really have no influence over MMO's. Of course, that thread was talking about player feedback having a postive impact. Now, you blame players for negative changes in the MMO industry.
I think I understand your bias.
Do you blame the players of WoW for enjoying a fun, functional and highly populated game? What's to blame?
Is it the players' fault that companies like SOE see WoW's success, and try to take from their slice of the pie by coming up with a busted ass copy, and pushing it on an unsuspecting playerbase, after advertising something completely different? Players didn't ask them to do this. Dan Rubenfield and Jeff Freeman et al. came up with these plans within SOE when they were told to make the game better, and make it successful. Their solution was crap, and they are responsible for their own work and decisions, not the players that were then cursed by it.
You have a habit for seeking me out - that you do. I applaud your efforts, but you fail to see the big picture. In the meantime, I'm sorry if my postulating is too complicated for you. I enjoy the fact that you can over-simplify my argument - good for you. I guess that makes things all the more simpler. My previous post was in regard to how the profit-margin is king - a group of disgruntled gamers cannot persuade any change in a profitable company if they do just that, make profits. This last post was in regard to profit-motive. If you have a large player base that is satisfied with the mediocre, then why bother trying to surpass that mediocrity and make something new and exciting? There's no insurance on how much profit you'll make if you use an entirely new system, not a system that is tried and true. This is why WoW, however good and popular you say it is right now, is ultimately a stigma to the MMO market. This is also the reason why the NGE was made.
Lol, your postulating isn't too complicated for me. Was that intentionally insulting, or do you just come across that way?
And, the NGE was made because SOE added 1 and 1 and came up with eleven, not because WoW was successful. If SOE learned anything from Bizzard, truly, the NGE would not have been their solution to their subscription decline.
Also, if your company suddenly experiences a massive subscription drop off, do you really think that player feedback won't be considered? If it isn't, it should be. Maybe you're right though, maybe SOE doesn't look at things like that. They've surprised me time and again with how they do things. It's like they have a very unique sort of spurious logic that guides their decisions.
Also, just so you know, I'm not seeking you out. Apparently the same topics interest us albeit for different reasons.
And, I didn't mean to oversimplify your postion on anything. It seemed to me in one post that you said players have virtually no influence, and then in another, you seemed to give them an awful lot of power. That came across as contradictory, and made me wonder if you have some kind of agenda.
You know, in another thread you just tried to convice us that players really have no influence over MMO's. Of course, that thread was talking about player feedback having a postive impact. Now, you blame players for negative changes in the MMO industry.
I think I understand your bias.
Do you blame the players of WoW for enjoying a fun, functional and highly populated game? What's to blame?
Is it the players' fault that companies like SOE see WoW's success, and try to take from their slice of the pie by coming up with a busted ass copy, and pushing it on an unsuspecting playerbase, after advertising something completely different? Players didn't ask them to do this. Dan Rubenfield and Jeff Freeman et al. came up with these plans within SOE when they were told to make the game better, and make it successful. Their solution was crap, and they are responsible for their own work and decisions, not the players that were then cursed by it.
You have a habit for seeking me out - that you do. I applaud your efforts, but you fail to see the big picture. In the meantime, I'm sorry if my postulating is too complicated for you. I enjoy the fact that you can over-simplify my argument - good for you. I guess that makes things all the more simpler. My previous post was in regard to how the profit-margin is king - a group of disgruntled gamers cannot persuade any change in a profitable company if they do just that, make profits. This last post was in regard to profit-motive. If you have a large player base that is satisfied with the mediocre, then why bother trying to surpass that mediocrity and make something new and exciting? There's no insurance on how much profit you'll make if you use an entirely new system, not a system that is tried and true. This is why WoW, however good and popular you say it is right now, is ultimately a stigma to the MMO market. This is also the reason why the NGE was made.
Lol, your postulating isn't too complicated for me. Was that intentionally insulting, or do you just come across that way?
That was intentional, my friend. I'm sorry for it, but I tend to respond in kind when insults are made against me. I'll scoot along now - I'm not interested in proving how right I am anymore. "Move along."
You know, in another thread you just tried to convice us that players really have no influence over MMO's. Of course, that thread was talking about player feedback having a postive impact. Now, you blame players for negative changes in the MMO industry.
I think I understand your bias.
Do you blame the players of WoW for enjoying a fun, functional and highly populated game? What's to blame?
Is it the players' fault that companies like SOE see WoW's success, and try to take from their slice of the pie by coming up with a busted ass copy, and pushing it on an unsuspecting playerbase, after advertising something completely different? Players didn't ask them to do this. Dan Rubenfield and Jeff Freeman et al. came up with these plans within SOE when they were told to make the game better, and make it successful. Their solution was crap, and they are responsible for their own work and decisions, not the players that were then cursed by it.
You have a habit for seeking me out - that you do. I applaud your efforts, but you fail to see the big picture. In the meantime, I'm sorry if my postulating is too complicated for you. I enjoy the fact that you can over-simplify my argument - good for you. I guess that makes things all the more simpler. My previous post was in regard to how the profit-margin is king - a group of disgruntled gamers cannot persuade any change in a profitable company if they do just that, make profits. This last post was in regard to profit-motive. If you have a large player base that is satisfied with the mediocre, then why bother trying to surpass that mediocrity and make something new and exciting? There's no insurance on how much profit you'll make if you use an entirely new system, not a system that is tried and true. This is why WoW, however good and popular you say it is right now, is ultimately a stigma to the MMO market. This is also the reason why the NGE was made.
Lol, your postulating isn't too complicated for me. Was that intentionally insulting, or do you just come across that way?
That was intentional, my friend. I'm sorry for it, but I tend to respond in kind when insults are made against me. I'll scoot along now - I'm not interested in proving how right I am anymore. "Move along."
Feel free to scroll up for further clarifications if you're interested in further dialogue. As for being intentionally insulting, yeah I kind of figured you were. It doesn't really help your argument, or your credibility in my view. As for responding to insults you claim were made against you, will I certainly didn't intentionally insult you at any point, so I think your so-called retalition was unnecessary.
If you found something I said insulting, I don't mind you pointing that out. If I can see it coming across that way, I'd gladly express myself differently. For the record, I respect you as a person, even though I disagree with your views at times, perhaps strongly.
Something else I've noticed. The more people talk about what actually happened regarding SWG, the more SOE defenders seem to resort to insults. It usually starts with some kind of p.r. spin--like players are to blame for the NGE--but quickly degenerates to name-calling or more clever insults when embarassing facts come to light.
You're very articulate, and clearly very intelligent, but I see them same old routine here, just with bigger words. Lol, at least I was insulted cleverly
I would like to state that in no way shape or form that anything I receive from SOE influences my opinion about SWG or their company. Im pretty much a typical average player enjoying the game.
SWG's downfall was caused by being a lackluster niche game in all its incarnations. It was never able to attract and hold the masses that a game made with one of the worlds most popular intellectual properties deserved.
Had they made Everquest lite on space, they would of had a freakish success, but instead they chose to try and fix something that was not broken and ended up with a niche game that did not attract the masses and had trouble keeping the people who did choose to try the game.
And this is ignoring the fact that the game was build on a very limited budget and has a very unstable engine and the database cannot handle any stress what so ever.
People highlighted some very real problems with the original game (bugs, incomplete quests, lack of content, buff lines, mind pool attacks that couldn't be countered effectively). SOE's answers to these problems were the CU and the NGE. Both of these answers were extremely unwanted by the players. In fact work done in consultation with players was scrapped when WoW envy took hold.
One of the devs for the NGE explained clearly that it was designed in part based on input from focus groups that contained ZERO current players of the game. It was designed to cater to the wants of some other target group, not the current players of SWG. So, to blame the players is really off-base in light of what people know about the history of the game.
Yeah I can see what you're saying, Immunity for the player base. They had 'nothing' to do with it.
afterall it wasn't them on the forums whining for nerfs to everything that made them not win in pvp,pve or make millions for their crafters.
I would like to state that in no way shape or form that anything I receive from SOE influences my opinion about SWG or their company. Im pretty much a typical average player enjoying the game.
Yes players whined. But it wasn't any of the then current players that motivated their decision. It was the players of other games that motivated their decisions, namely WOW.
Nothing SOE did for the NGE was based on complaints about pve, pvp, or crafters wanting to earn more credits. They wanted WOW's subs. They thought they could get it by copying WOW on to a SW skin, and did so poorly.
Again as others have pointed out, SOE made promises about what they were doing to the game. Promises they never intended to keep. They promised revamps to the players for professions they were planning to remove. They sold an expansion to the then current players touting new items that were useless two weeks later. The players responded to the promises. They bought the expansions and prepaid sub time. The players were ready to go. SOE lied to those players and churned out a buggy mess to the new players they wanted. The new players didn't want to leave their relatively bug free game for the horrendously bugged NGE. It was SOE's fault.
If SOE took their time producing the NGE and released it then in the state it is in now in addition to leaving up pre-NGE servers, this disscussion wouldn't be happening.
Oh by the way when SOE blames the players for the mess they created, it's like the Captain of the Exxon Valdez blaming the Alaskan coastline for the environmental disaster. It's not my fault the ducks and fish are covered in oil. If they didn't to be, they shouldn't of been there.
"Suddenly, thousands of Trekies whose heads are full of facts of things like the stardate when the Cardassians farted on Deep Space nine are irrlelevant." - hardcoremoviecritic
"If you don't take care of your customers somebody else will."
QFE.
"Obi-Wan Kenobi: We were decieved by a lie; we all were. It appears that SOE is behind everything, including the NGE! After the death of CU, the NGE became their new apprentice."
Little story for alot of you...
Back when Ultima Online came out after it's first year, and after Everquest came out something had to be done. See UO much like SWG was having Players leave in droves for Everquest, now some UO Players claimed it was due to EQ being the first 3d MMO. BS on that as when UO came out another MMO was out on the market 3D0's Meridian 59, a game that was 3d (tho at the time it was still the "ugly" 3d) still it had a very small Player Base. Other's claimed people flocked to EQ due to the game being much more easy, I can believe that a bit more, as UO took FOREVER to gain skills unless you macro'ed.
What really gave EQ a ton of Players was the fact that EQ put in a PvP Switch. The fact is most people didn't want to deal with Player Killers. Meridian 59 was a game that had Player Killers in it and it didn't get too big. Diablo tho not an MMO had many Players just make Password Protected games as they didn't want to deal with PK's.
Anyway EA ended up putting in a mirror world called "Trammel" in 2000. And UO had for the most part the same screaming and coments that SWG has gotten. "The game will be shut down on (date here)! Roll UO back or put up Classic Servers! The game sucks!" Still no one asked or even looked at why this happen.
There's an old saying that I remember "It only takes one person to ruin a good thing."
The fault that UO had was a good chunk of the Player Killers rather then act like Adults, or RP with those they went after acted like aholes. Granted you did get some Player Killers like Adam Ant who RP'ed and did fight with some form of Honor. The rest? Many of them acted like they where E-Thugs and did things that made those that did act Adult look bad.
Posting pics and insulting those they killed both in and off game? You'd see that every day.
Emoting things that lord knows would add another 10 years of prison time if they did it in real life? A good chunk did those.
Crashing any and every Event, RP or Non-RP? Hell this happen a ton.
Cheating? Yep some of them used any Program or Exploit they could find in order to "win".
That was what was at fault with the game, you had people doing all of that not all of them but a damn good chunk of them. And when EA called it quits to that System and put in Trammel who do you think those Players blamed?
Not themselfs oh hell no! They didn't do anything wrong! Why I remember a well known Grief Player Killer from my Server posting after Trammel came out, about how him and his guild are Angels who respected their fellow Player. A week before Trammel came out this same Player posted a lovely little rant telling Role Players to get off "his" server along with posting some lovely pics of him acting like a jackass.
No who was really at fault was EA for doing something like this, never mind that many of those same people claiming it had sites showing the in game GM staff as Nazi's. And some how they where heroes for going out and killing newbies and talking about how everyone who is not them sucks.
To take a line from a song by Radiohead "You did it to yourself!" And rather then those Players say "Gee maybe we did go a little too far with the BS we pulled." It turned into how it was EA's fault, and how anyone supporting EA was supporting the downfall of UO.
Kinda reminds me of SWG...
Now maybe I'm the only one that remembers some of this but... How many posts do you remember of people screaming that Jedi had to be put in right then and there? How many posts do you remember of people screaming about things like the CURP? Anyone besides me remember the posts of Jedi Players begging SOE to remove Player Bounty Hunting as "It's unfair that someone can hunt me down!" Hell I remember when some of the Jedi Players came over to the Pilot Forums demanding SOE put Jedi Powers in Space, as one I remember saying "I'm powerful on the ground I should be more powerful in Space!"
And the funny thing look at how some of them turned with the NGE. I remember a good deal of those Jedi Players who a week before the news broke about the NGE screamed about Bounty Hunters. Then those same Players claimed it was "Unfair" that SOE took away Player Bounty Hunting... Hell remember the whole thing with Tiggs? People when news broke about the NGE screamed for her to be fired and she was! Then the same people claimed "Oh she was sticking up for us Players! Hire her back SOE!!!!"
Granted it was SOE who put the NGE on the servers. Granted it was SOE who came up with the NGE in the first place. But us Players did have a helping hand in it... The point I am getting at here is, SOE shouldn't be blamed for everything. Maybe if people acted a bit better and rather then just throw their hands up in the air and scream "Oh my god this sucks!" and insult everyone and anyone who doesn't feel the same way, things may have turned out better.
Methinks you are crazy.
Seriously though..the players?
To OP:
you kinda teem up with SOE here. Remember what they told us on NGE launch? Existing player base doesn't suit us, we will find new, younger and bigger one, goodbye.
We know the result.
So no. They just failed to provide marketable, playable product, they made all the bad decisions, ruined their own existing subscription base. You won't put shit in your ice-cream, if certain number of customers complained its bad. You either don't give a shit or make improvements. They put the shit in an ice-cream.
The CU and NGE were not created for the folks who played the game. They were made to make the game appeal to people who didn't play the game. In fact, with the NGE, SOE knew they would lose most of the current (at the time) players, but they were arrogant enough to believe that they would replace the existing players with many times more new players.
For once we agree on something , SOE was more worried about gamers who enjoyed games like WOW than they were about their own paying customers. I really don't know how it's hard to see this, It's one of the more obvious aspects of this whole debacle.
Sure they have every right to go after the market share they want . Part of doing buisness in a free market , Means you're free to make any idiotic decision you feel like making. You just have to lie in the bed you make for yourself or your buisness after all is said and done.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson