I'm not sure about the Bioware MMO, to me it would make far more sense that it is based on the Mass Effect universe they've been cultivating for a long time. Bioware have already stated that Mass Effect is only for the 360, this may change now EA are involved, so if you don't see a multi-platform version of the single player game within 6 months of the 360 version going live, I'd be pretty sure that whats in the pipeline for the MMO.
As for the BS spouted out by the LA employee, I think he must of ran that past Allister Campbell before his replies went out. I also totally agree with the reporting too, if thats ment to be an indepth interview, then SWGNGE is the by far and away the best game on the MMO market today.
Given the lad jake whatshisname works for LA he's hardly going to say the games crap is he?
My gripe isn't with what Jake Nerdy Kid said. It's with the interviewer, how once again does not ask any questions worth asking. It would seem that LA/SOE once again set this interview up as more PR for a game that isn't going anywhere. Since when has anything LA/SOE said been the truth? It's standard pre-prepared answers that were given. The interviewer might have been Jake Nerdy Kid him self. This is just another pointless interview that answers nothing about what is going on with SWG. Looking at SOE's track record, since when has a game that is doing well, not received CONSTANT expansion packs? When SWG was in its hay day, how many expansion packs did it receive? Then CUNGE hit and how many expansion packs since? That about sums it up.
EA is just as money grubbing and cold hearted as SOE. That alone will make me say that no matter what the secret MMO Bioware was making, EA will MAKE them switch it over to Star Wars. And EA could give a rats ass about what Bioware thinks about working with other IP's, so that's a moot point.
Not disagreeing with you but they are the buisness to make money and somehow they still are no emplyee would answer any questions other than "good" questions it doesnt make good buisness sense so you wont ever see anything but the company line on any game related to the star wars franchise.
As for EA they are much worse than SOE could ever be mainly becuase of its sheer size they'll strip any game of its soul and spit out yearly updates,so even if bioware are going to do a star wars MMO it'll be WOW set in space to say otherwise is delusional.
LOL that is the biggest load of crap since $medly last had an interview. Does that guy think gamers were born under the spazz tree?
That interviewer sucks, why not take him to the cleaners with a few simple follow up questions? Like how can SWG we going strong after the NGE if 200,000+ subscribers quit over the NGE disgrace? Thousands of former vets are crying for pre-nge servers and current players also, so wouldn't it make sense to make classic severs?
A bullshit interview as alway with SWG-NGE. just an LA tool coming out with the same shit $OE usually come out with. Listening to players feedback blah blah, games strong blah blah.
Just a PR interview for $OE,LA with no follow up questions for interviewer, interviewer you suck!
It was 350,000+ that quit- thats 5,250,000 a month..gone..like the skill system. I did have hopes after chapter 6. Gone...like the skill system.
I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but the NGE never made 325K people quit. At the time of the NGE, we were already rattling around on the servers, because so many people (especially casual gamers and non-combat ones) had quit due to the CU. Right before the CU, I think there were 240K or so subs. I'm inclined to believe the statistics on
For those of you impugning the author of the article, Steve Crews, you should know that he has explained the outcome of his interview. He prepared a list of questions and they were sent to Lucas Arts for answers. The article was then deemed complete. He did not get a chance to ask any follow up questions. Steve seems to be a gamer and a reasonably investigative reporter/interviewer. You can read his comments about the "interview" at:
It was 350,000+ that quit- thats 5,250,000 a month..gone..like the skill system. I did have hopes after chapter 6. Gone...like the skill system.
I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but the NGE never made 325K people quit. At the time of the NGE, we were already rattling around on the servers, because so many people (especially casual gamers and non-combat ones) had quit due to the CU. Right before the CU, I think there were 240K or so subs. I'm inclined to believe the statistics on
Hate too burst your bubble but the only statistics released were copies sold and the population at the start. SWG sold 1 million copies. Soe released they had over 500k active players after the first month of release. Most games retain less than copies sold. After that No OFFICIAL numbers have ever been released by either SoE or La. All this population numbers is guess work on our parts, and those sites as well. Im sure someone goes to every server of every hour of the day and counts players.. We will never know the true active player base numbers. It would be less than 50k based on guesses and estimates. Why worry about that anyway. either you play the crapfest or you dont..
Don't know why some of you are so disappointed with the interviewer. He tried, but sometimes his questions were not answered. Here an example:
The MMO Gamer: Every game has its ups and downs, but SWG, in particular, has been through some particularly tough times in its history. What would you say was the toughest of them all, and how did you go about recovering from it?
Jake Neri: When you look at any game in the history of MMOs, they have all had their ups and downs. I think that this is because there is no handbook on how to make these games. Our toughest challenge is adjusting to the changing needs of our players while still maintaining a living, breathing game with a live community filled with people that have all different needs and desires. Overall, we are proud of SWG, where we’ve come from, and where we’re going.
Don't know why some of you are so disappointed with the interviewer. He tried, but sometimes his questions were not answered. Here an example:
The MMO Gamer: Every game has its ups and downs, but SWG, in particular, has been through some particularly tough times in its history. What would you say was the toughest of them all, and how did you go about recovering from it? Jake Neri: When you look at any game in the history of MMOs, they have all had their ups and downs. I think that this is because there is no handbook on how to make these games. Our toughest challenge is adjusting to the changing needs of our players while still maintaining a living, breathing game with a live community filled with people that have all different needs and desires. Overall, we are proud of SWG, where we’ve come from, and where we’re going.
Jake Neri really sounds like a politician.
The sad thing is, Mr. Neri is not experienced enough and LA is not professional enough to understand how bad, dishonest and generally contemptuous of the consumer such answers make them seem. They think they are being smooth and confident but, in reality, come across as clumsy and amateurish.
Don't know why some of you are so disappointed with the interviewer. He tried, but sometimes his questions were not answered. Here an example:
The MMO Gamer: Every game has its ups and downs, but SWG, in particular, has been through some particularly tough times in its history. What would you say was the toughest of them all, and how did you go about recovering from it? Jake Neri: When you look at any game in the history of MMOs, they have all had their ups and downs. I think that this is because there is no handbook on how to make these games. Our toughest challenge is adjusting to the changing needs of our players while still maintaining a living, breathing game with a live community filled with people that have all different needs and desires. Overall, we are proud of SWG, where we’ve come from, and where we’re going.
Jake Neri really sounds like a politician.
The sad thing is, Mr. Neri is not experienced enough and LA is not professional enough to understand how bad, dishonest and generally contemptuous of the consumer such answers make them seem. They think they are being smooth and confident but, in reality, come across as clumsy and amateurish.
...yes, and dishonest and/or misinformed regarding all that has taken place. Seriously it's that kind of split from reality spin-doctoring that has kept me away from games made by these people. You know the old saying about the first step to fixing a problem is admitting you have one. Well it seems like LA is now a step behind SOE--Mr. Smedly admitted making a mistake. The answers from this guy seem like the crazy spin interviews that SOE was pumping out immediately after the NGE. Now 2 years later, they've finally admitted it was a mistake and a nightmare. Come on Mr. Neri, please try to keep up.
It was 350,000+ that quit- thats 5,250,000 a month..gone..like the skill system. I did have hopes after chapter 6. Gone...like the skill system.
I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but the NGE never made 325K people quit. At the time of the NGE, we were already rattling around on the servers, because so many people (especially casual gamers and non-combat ones) had quit due to the CU. Right before the CU, I think there were 240K or so subs. I'm inclined to believe the statistics on
Hate too burst your bubble but the only statistics released were copies sold and the population at the start. SWG sold 1 million copies. Soe released they had over 500k active players after the first month of release. Most games retain less than copies sold. After that No OFFICIAL numbers have ever been released by either SoE or La. All this population numbers is guess work on our parts, and those sites as well. Im sure someone goes to every server of every hour of the day and counts players.. We will never know the true active player base numbers. It would be less than 50k based on guesses and estimates. Why worry about that anyway. either you play the crapfest or you dont..
The numbers on those statistics sites were actually quoted by LA / SOE as being correct (link anyone?). I'm pretty sure they would have been hollering 'those data are false' if they had been lower than the actual number of active subs.
I'd link the actual SOE press release, but SOE tends to wipe their website, and I can't find it. In 2004, however, LA claimed SOE had 700K+ subs for ALL it's titles
This INCLUDES the - at that time - still hugely popular original Everquest, good for at some 450k subs (as SOE actually mentioned in a press release). Simple math shows that even if you mostly discount the other IPs in SOE's stable, the numbers for SWG would have been in the 250K range at most in 2004. When WoW was released, quite a few of those subs left. New players came in, old returned, but I do believe the new stable subscription level was below the old one.
So I suggest everyone please cut the crap about the 350k+ quitters-due-to-NGE, there never were that many simultaneous subs in the first place. 1 million copies sold really doesn't mean all that much. EQ had sold over 2 million copies by 2004, and they had 450K actives at that point.
The CU caused a VERY noticeable drop in subscription numbers. I played on Bloodfin, and even there the server was feeling emptier by the month. My guild lost 80% of it's active membership during the CU, and new players were in short supply. So while I have no hard figures on what was left just before the NGE, it looked like the subscription base had already taken a BAD beating. Just goes to show SOE is a bunch of incompetents who didn't know what their players wanted.
It was 350,000+ that quit- thats 5,250,000 a month..gone..like the skill system. I did have hopes after chapter 6. Gone...like the skill system.
I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but the NGE never made 325K people quit. At the time of the NGE, we were already rattling around on the servers, because so many people (especially casual gamers and non-combat ones) had quit due to the CU. Right before the CU, I think there were 240K or so subs. I'm inclined to believe the statistics on
Hate too burst your bubble but the only statistics released were copies sold and the population at the start. SWG sold 1 million copies. Soe released they had over 500k active players after the first month of release. Most games retain less than copies sold. After that No OFFICIAL numbers have ever been released by either SoE or La. All this population numbers is guess work on our parts, and those sites as well. Im sure someone goes to every server of every hour of the day and counts players.. We will never know the true active player base numbers. It would be less than 50k based on guesses and estimates. Why worry about that anyway. either you play the crapfest or you dont..
The numbers on those statistics sites were actually quoted by LA / SOE as being correct (link anyone?). I'm pretty sure they would have been hollering 'those data are false' if they had been lower than the actual number of active subs.
I'd link the actual SOE press release, but SOE tends to wipe their website, and I can't find it. In 2004, however, LA claimed SOE had 700K+ subs for ALL it's titles
This INCLUDES the - at that time - still hugely popular original Everquest, good for at some 450k subs (as SOE actually mentioned in a press release). Simple math shows that even if you mostly discount the other IPs in SOE's stable, the numbers for SWG would have been in the 250K range at most in 2004. When WoW was released, quite a few of those subs left. New players came in, old returned, but I do believe the new stable subscription level was below the old one.
So I suggest everyone please cut the crap about the 350k+ quitters-due-to-NGE, there never were that many simultaneous subs in the first place. 1 million copies sold really doesn't mean all that much. EQ had sold over 2 million copies by 2004, and they had 450K actives at that point.
The CU caused a VERY noticeable drop in subscription numbers. I played on Bloodfin, and even there the server was feeling emptier by the month. My guild lost 80% of it's active membership during the CU, and new players were in short supply. So while I have no hard figures on what was left just before the NGE, it looked like the subscription base had already taken a BAD beating. Just goes to show SOE is a bunch of incompetents who didn't know what their players wanted.
Linna
we were 100+ active members in guild. After CU still 80+. After NGE 3 remained. Do the math !
Btw 4 -5 resubed again in 2 years to play space jtl part. That makes them now 7-8 lol
-----MY-TERMS-OF-USE-------------------------------------------------- $OE - eternal enemy of online gaming -We finally WON !!!! 2011 $OE accepted that they have been fired 2005 by the playerbase and closed down ridiculous NGE !!
"There was suppression of speech and all kinds of things between disturbing and fascistic." Raph Koster (parted $OE)
we were 100+ active members in guild. After CU still 80+. After NGE 3 remained. Do the math !
Although the guild I was in didn't quite have those numbers the percentages were about the same. As a matter of fact there was only one person online from my friends list last time I had an account re-activation trial.
We had 122 accounts in Fated, owned by approximately 100 players. About 40% never logged in anymore after the CU. A few more played for a few weeks, then left. During the CU, the numbers dwindled further from month to month, and right before the NGE we only had about 15-20 actives left, some 25 accounts. I think 3 or 4 of them stayed to play the NGE.
Before the CU, the suburbs of especially Coronet and Theed and the Dantooine hotspots were full of vendors. During the CU, those places became ghost towns. The number of 'elite' crafters dropped very significantly as most of the major names in crafting quit (usually very publically) and there weren't really any replacements of note. Coronet, Theed and Dantooine (mining?) cantina's were always full of entertainers before the CU. After the CU, there were none in Coronet, and only a handful in Theed and Dantooine. Where before, we had nightly PVP battles involving over 100 players (especially in Valley of Death), now we were happy if we could muster two 8-man groups each side. We had entire guilds make new toons on Bloodfin or transfer toons, because their own servers were pretty much dead.
Your guilds may have fared relatively well during the CU, but no one can tell me we didn't lose a LOT of people in that period.
Originally posted by Dvol Hate too burst your bubble but the only statistics released were copies sold and the population at the start. SWG sold 1 million copies. Soe released they had over 500k active players after the first month of release. Most games retain less than copies sold. After that No OFFICIAL numbers have ever been released by either SoE or La. All this population numbers is guess work on our parts, and those sites as well. Im sure someone goes to every server of every hour of the day and counts players.. We will never know the true active player base numbers. It would be less than 50k based on guesses and estimates. Why worry about that anyway. either you play the crapfest or you dont..
SWG and all of its expansions have sold over 1 million copies combined.
SWG released they had around 350k subscribers a few months after launch. The 500k number was for an EQ milestone.
I doubt very much SOE printed more/as many copies of SWG the first month of release than they had total EQ subscribers. That would rival Atari's mistake of E.T.
There is no doubt that SWG took a good knock population wise when the CU went live....but it seriously pales in comaprison to the population killing NGE. My old guild lost some folks with the CU, maybe about 20%, but the NGE caused massive account cancellations which propmted our old leader to disband the guild. The NGE was, and contiues to be, the most devastating version of SWG when it comes to game population. The NGE easily wiped out 75-85% of the player population...CU couldn't hold a candle to a disaster of that magnitude!
The MMO Gamer: Every game has its ups and downs, but SWG, in particular, has been through some particularly tough times in its history. What would you say was the toughest of them all, and how did you go about recovering from it? Jake Neri: When you look at any game in the history of MMOs, they have all had their ups and downs. I think that this is because there is no handbook on how to make these games. Our toughest challenge is adjusting to the changing needs of our players while still maintaining a living, breathing game with a live community filled with people that have all different needs and desires. Overall, we are proud of SWG, where we’ve come from, and where we’re going.
Why evade the answer Jake? You didn't answer the frigging question! You didn't even dodge it very well.
Originally posted by Relluc Originally posted by Apache_ The MMO Gamer: Every game has its ups and downs, but SWG, in particular, has been through some particularly tough times in its history. What would you say was the toughest of them all, and how did you go about recovering from it? Jake Neri: When you look at any game in the history of MMOs, they have all had their ups and downs. I think that this is because there is no handbook on how to make these games. Our toughest challenge is adjusting to the changing needs of our players while still maintaining a living, breathing game with a live community filled with people that have all different needs and desires. Overall, we are proud of SWG, where weve come from, and where were going.
Why evade the answer Jake? You didn't answer the frigging question! You didn't even dodge it very well. BAH! He must not be a defense stacker.
I believe those "1 million copies sold" has to do with JTL expansion and ROTW expansion as well, not to mention many players ran more than one account- an old friend of mine ran 3 accounts, he bought expansions for all 3 of them and that's a chunk of monthly fee for 3 accounts, there are some that ran up as many as 10 accounts (don't ask me why).
Even though they made up a small portion of the population, credit farmers were very common back then as well and on a regular basis we had to notify our city mayor to ban new batches of farmers using our terminals.
I said in another post before, I was in a very active guild that once hit 200+ members but regularily 120+ members before the CU, it dropped down a bit but in the NGE it dropped sharpy and eventually disbanded with the remaining members spread out to other guilds. My friends list had 70+ members on it with about 20-25 online a night but when I logged on during the vet trial, 0 was online.
Comments
I'm not sure about the Bioware MMO, to me it would make far more sense that it is based on the Mass Effect universe they've been cultivating for a long time. Bioware have already stated that Mass Effect is only for the 360, this may change now EA are involved, so if you don't see a multi-platform version of the single player game within 6 months of the 360 version going live, I'd be pretty sure that whats in the pipeline for the MMO.
As for the BS spouted out by the LA employee, I think he must of ran that past Allister Campbell before his replies went out. I also totally agree with the reporting too, if thats ment to be an indepth interview, then SWGNGE is the by far and away the best game on the MMO market today.
edit
BIG FAT LOLZ!
All together now... /point /laugh ...at $OE & LA
Who do they think there kidding!?
Who do they hire for this PR spin!?
They are completely delusional if they think ANY SINGLE person would belive a word of this BS
or any other future statements from $OE or LA in regard to this game or any other,
they have lost all customer trust over this game.
They just won't let go, they just cant help themselves, But there good for a laugh!!!
Even if they come out & held their hands up & said "OK WE F**KED UP WERE REALLY SORRY"
It will never heal the rift between the customers & $OE / LA
I said that back in late 2005 that they will never get a SINGLE PENNY off me or my family or anyone
i can pursued to boycott them & i stand by it!!!
I refuse to let any member of my family or friends own any of thier inferior products be it TV's, Games,
Films etc... They don't deserve a PENNY, all they care about is profit so i will deny them as much as i can!!!
The ban lives on JAKEY LAD so tough titty's
www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi
The Deathstar destroyed planets...SOE destroyed Galaxies
¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯
SWG | EVE | WOW | VG | LOTRO | WAR | FML | STO | APB | AOC | MORTAL | WOT
Glad this cleared up rumours about swg2 and a bioware MMO.
"Don't hold breath about another KOTOR game coming from Bioware" - Chris Preistly
"Bioware is more intrested in pursueing development of it's own Intellectual properties"
- James Henly
My gripe isn't with what Jake Nerdy Kid said. It's with the interviewer, how once again does not ask any questions worth asking. It would seem that LA/SOE once again set this interview up as more PR for a game that isn't going anywhere. Since when has anything LA/SOE said been the truth? It's standard pre-prepared answers that were given. The interviewer might have been Jake Nerdy Kid him self. This is just another pointless interview that answers nothing about what is going on with SWG. Looking at SOE's track record, since when has a game that is doing well, not received CONSTANT expansion packs? When SWG was in its hay day, how many expansion packs did it receive? Then CUNGE hit and how many expansion packs since? That about sums it up.EA is just as money grubbing and cold hearted as SOE. That alone will make me say that no matter what the secret MMO Bioware was making, EA will MAKE them switch it over to Star Wars. And EA could give a rats ass about what Bioware thinks about working with other IP's, so that's a moot point.
Not disagreeing with you but they are the buisness to make money and somehow they still are no emplyee would answer any questions other than "good" questions it doesnt make good buisness sense so you wont ever see anything but the company line on any game related to the star wars franchise.
As for EA they are much worse than SOE could ever be mainly becuase of its sheer size they'll strip any game of its soul and spit out yearly updates,so even if bioware are going to do a star wars MMO it'll be WOW set in space to say otherwise is delusional.
LOL that is the biggest load of crap since $medly last had an interview. Does that guy think gamers were born under the spazz tree?
That interviewer sucks, why not take him to the cleaners with a few simple follow up questions? Like how can SWG we going strong after the NGE if 200,000+ subscribers quit over the NGE disgrace? Thousands of former vets are crying for pre-nge servers and current players also, so wouldn't it make sense to make classic severs?
A bullshit interview as alway with SWG-NGE. just an LA tool coming out with the same shit $OE usually come out with. Listening to players feedback blah blah, games strong blah blah.
Just a PR interview for $OE,LA with no follow up questions for interviewer, interviewer you suck!
It was 350,000+ that quit- thats 5,250,000 a month..gone..like the skill system. I did have hopes after chapter 6. Gone...like the skill system.
www.MMOGCHART.com
and
www.MMOGDATA.VOIG.com
Linna
Why does everyone think this cancels out any chance of a Bioware MMO? If they were to do a KOTOR era game, it wouldn't be sequel.
What was the point in that generic interview? It didn't tell us anything and just has no point to it :S
http://www.rlmmo.com
They are under the Star Wars Galaxies topic.
Akevv Ostone
No Longer SWG Free
now on a more serious note... steve seems like a respectable guy.
www.rlmmo.com/viewtopic.php
www.MMOGCHART.com
and
www.MMOGDATA.VOIG.com
Linna
Hate too burst your bubble but the only statistics released were copies sold and the population at the start. SWG sold 1 million copies. Soe released they had over 500k active players after the first month of release. Most games retain less than copies sold. After that No OFFICIAL numbers have ever been released by either SoE or La. All this population numbers is guess work on our parts, and those sites as well. Im sure someone goes to every server of every hour of the day and counts players.. We will never know the true active player base numbers. It would be less than 50k based on guesses and estimates. Why worry about that anyway. either you play the crapfest or you dont..
Yeah, I wish all mmorpgs were as transparent as EQ was long ago (prior to SoL iirc) and DAOC still is today with posting running server populations.
Wouldn't it be nice if every mmorpg out there had a graph like this? Would take some of the question out of what is going on in SWG and others.
Don't know why some of you are so disappointed with the interviewer. He tried, but sometimes his questions were not answered. Here an example:
Jake Neri really sounds like a politician.
Jake Neri really sounds like a politician.
The sad thing is, Mr. Neri is not experienced enough and LA is not professional enough to understand how bad, dishonest and generally contemptuous of the consumer such answers make them seem. They think they are being smooth and confident but, in reality, come across as clumsy and amateurish.
Jake Neri really sounds like a politician.
The sad thing is, Mr. Neri is not experienced enough and LA is not professional enough to understand how bad, dishonest and generally contemptuous of the consumer such answers make them seem. They think they are being smooth and confident but, in reality, come across as clumsy and amateurish.
...yes, and dishonest and/or misinformed regarding all that has taken place. Seriously it's that kind of split from reality spin-doctoring that has kept me away from games made by these people. You know the old saying about the first step to fixing a problem is admitting you have one. Well it seems like LA is now a step behind SOE--Mr. Smedly admitted making a mistake. The answers from this guy seem like the crazy spin interviews that SOE was pumping out immediately after the NGE. Now 2 years later, they've finally admitted it was a mistake and a nightmare. Come on Mr. Neri, please try to keep up.
www.MMOGCHART.com
and
www.MMOGDATA.VOIG.com
Linna
Hate too burst your bubble but the only statistics released were copies sold and the population at the start. SWG sold 1 million copies. Soe released they had over 500k active players after the first month of release. Most games retain less than copies sold. After that No OFFICIAL numbers have ever been released by either SoE or La. All this population numbers is guess work on our parts, and those sites as well. Im sure someone goes to every server of every hour of the day and counts players.. We will never know the true active player base numbers. It would be less than 50k based on guesses and estimates. Why worry about that anyway. either you play the crapfest or you dont..
The numbers on those statistics sites were actually quoted by LA / SOE as being correct (link anyone?). I'm pretty sure they would have been hollering 'those data are false' if they had been lower than the actual number of active subs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Wars_Galaxies
Just after release, in 2003, SOE claimed to have 275K subs.
http://archive.gamespy.com/amdmmog/week4/
I'd link the actual SOE press release, but SOE tends to wipe their website, and I can't find it. In 2004, however, LA claimed SOE had 700K+ subs for ALL it's titles
http://www.lucasarts.com/company/release/news20040628.html
This INCLUDES the - at that time - still hugely popular original Everquest, good for at some 450k subs (as SOE actually mentioned in a press release). Simple math shows that even if you mostly discount the other IPs in SOE's stable, the numbers for SWG would have been in the 250K range at most in 2004. When WoW was released, quite a few of those subs left. New players came in, old returned, but I do believe the new stable subscription level was below the old one.
So I suggest everyone please cut the crap about the 350k+ quitters-due-to-NGE, there never were that many simultaneous subs in the first place. 1 million copies sold really doesn't mean all that much. EQ had sold over 2 million copies by 2004, and they had 450K actives at that point.
The CU caused a VERY noticeable drop in subscription numbers. I played on Bloodfin, and even there the server was feeling emptier by the month. My guild lost 80% of it's active membership during the CU, and new players were in short supply. So while I have no hard figures on what was left just before the NGE, it looked like the subscription base had already taken a BAD beating. Just goes to show SOE is a bunch of incompetents who didn't know what their players wanted.
Linna
I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but the NGE never made 325K people quit. At the time of the NGE, we were already rattling around on the servers, because so many people (especially casual gamers and non-combat ones) had quit due to the CU. Right before the CU, I think there were 240K or so subs. I'm inclined to believe the statistics onwww.MMOGCHART.com
and
www.MMOGDATA.VOIG.com
Linna
Hate too burst your bubble but the only statistics released were copies sold and the population at the start. SWG sold 1 million copies. Soe released they had over 500k active players after the first month of release. Most games retain less than copies sold. After that No OFFICIAL numbers have ever been released by either SoE or La. All this population numbers is guess work on our parts, and those sites as well. Im sure someone goes to every server of every hour of the day and counts players.. We will never know the true active player base numbers. It would be less than 50k based on guesses and estimates. Why worry about that anyway. either you play the crapfest or you dont..
The numbers on those statistics sites were actually quoted by LA / SOE as being correct (link anyone?). I'm pretty sure they would have been hollering 'those data are false' if they had been lower than the actual number of active subs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Wars_Galaxies
Just after release, in 2003, SOE claimed to have 275K subs.
http://archive.gamespy.com/amdmmog/week4/
I'd link the actual SOE press release, but SOE tends to wipe their website, and I can't find it. In 2004, however, LA claimed SOE had 700K+ subs for ALL it's titles
http://www.lucasarts.com/company/release/news20040628.html
This INCLUDES the - at that time - still hugely popular original Everquest, good for at some 450k subs (as SOE actually mentioned in a press release). Simple math shows that even if you mostly discount the other IPs in SOE's stable, the numbers for SWG would have been in the 250K range at most in 2004. When WoW was released, quite a few of those subs left. New players came in, old returned, but I do believe the new stable subscription level was below the old one.
So I suggest everyone please cut the crap about the 350k+ quitters-due-to-NGE, there never were that many simultaneous subs in the first place. 1 million copies sold really doesn't mean all that much. EQ had sold over 2 million copies by 2004, and they had 450K actives at that point.
The CU caused a VERY noticeable drop in subscription numbers. I played on Bloodfin, and even there the server was feeling emptier by the month. My guild lost 80% of it's active membership during the CU, and new players were in short supply. So while I have no hard figures on what was left just before the NGE, it looked like the subscription base had already taken a BAD beating. Just goes to show SOE is a bunch of incompetents who didn't know what their players wanted.
Linna
we were 100+ active members in guild. After CU still 80+. After NGE 3 remained. Do the math !
Btw 4 -5 resubed again in 2 years to play space jtl part. That makes them now 7-8 lol
-----MY-TERMS-OF-USE--------------------------------------------------
$OE - eternal enemy of online gaming
-We finally WON !!!! 2011 $OE accepted that they have been fired 2005 by the playerbase and closed down ridiculous NGE !!
"There was suppression of speech and all kinds of things between disturbing and fascistic." Raph Koster (parted $OE)
Although the guild I was in didn't quite have those numbers the percentages were about the same. As a matter of fact there was only one person online from my friends list last time I had an account re-activation trial.
We had 122 accounts in Fated, owned by approximately 100 players. About 40% never logged in anymore after the CU. A few more played for a few weeks, then left. During the CU, the numbers dwindled further from month to month, and right before the NGE we only had about 15-20 actives left, some 25 accounts. I think 3 or 4 of them stayed to play the NGE.
Before the CU, the suburbs of especially Coronet and Theed and the Dantooine hotspots were full of vendors. During the CU, those places became ghost towns. The number of 'elite' crafters dropped very significantly as most of the major names in crafting quit (usually very publically) and there weren't really any replacements of note. Coronet, Theed and Dantooine (mining?) cantina's were always full of entertainers before the CU. After the CU, there were none in Coronet, and only a handful in Theed and Dantooine. Where before, we had nightly PVP battles involving over 100 players (especially in Valley of Death), now we were happy if we could muster two 8-man groups each side. We had entire guilds make new toons on Bloodfin or transfer toons, because their own servers were pretty much dead.
Your guilds may have fared relatively well during the CU, but no one can tell me we didn't lose a LOT of people in that period.
Linna
SWG and all of its expansions have sold over 1 million copies combined.
SWG released they had around 350k subscribers a few months after launch. The 500k number was for an EQ milestone.
I doubt very much SOE printed more/as many copies of SWG the first month of release than they had total EQ subscribers. That would rival Atari's mistake of E.T.
There is no doubt that SWG took a good knock population wise when the CU went live....but it seriously pales in comaprison to the population killing NGE. My old guild lost some folks with the CU, maybe about 20%, but the NGE caused massive account cancellations which propmted our old leader to disband the guild. The NGE was, and contiues to be, the most devastating version of SWG when it comes to game population. The NGE easily wiped out 75-85% of the player population...CU couldn't hold a candle to a disaster of that magnitude!
BAH!
BAH!
He must not be a defense stacker.
I believe those "1 million copies sold" has to do with JTL expansion and ROTW expansion as well, not to mention many players ran more than one account- an old friend of mine ran 3 accounts, he bought expansions for all 3 of them and that's a chunk of monthly fee for 3 accounts, there are some that ran up as many as 10 accounts (don't ask me why).
Even though they made up a small portion of the population, credit farmers were very common back then as well and on a regular basis we had to notify our city mayor to ban new batches of farmers using our terminals.
I said in another post before, I was in a very active guild that once hit 200+ members but regularily 120+ members before the CU, it dropped down a bit but in the NGE it dropped sharpy and eventually disbanded with the remaining members spread out to other guilds. My friends list had 70+ members on it with about 20-25 online a night but when I logged on during the vet trial, 0 was online.