Newsletter Issue 1: Off the Boards

Stradden · November 2005

This week, "Off the Boards" takes a brief look at the feelings of our players, where the controversial NGE from Star Wars: Galaxies is concerned. The response thus far seems to be overwhelmingly against SOE and their decision. Do you agree? Disagree? Talk about it here.

methane47 · November 2005

YAY i'm the first
<DING>
posting+ 1 ::::20::

anwyays... Yeah i really dont think SWG should have done this... it's too drastic a change.. and the week worth of testing is just sad from any stand point... I'm studying Computer Science And It can take me a week to iron out all the errors from a medium sized program.. And SWGs just takes a week to debug something as huge as a game? I think its very disrespectful, I'm tired of stupid companies just wanting to release something because they know it's on PC and the can just patch it later....

SWGs should have just had NGE installed on a couple servers so people could go test.. and if found positive then brought over to all of them... Bad Idea... Another case of big Corporation saying, "we dont need the customers"

Good job...

Foxly · November 2005

My husband has been a Star Wars freak most of his life. He loved SWG despite its problems. So when I cancelled my account for the second time, he loyally followed me (pre-Combat Upgrade). The people acted juvenile and I felt it was about as Star Wars as Disney World's Magic Kingdom was a real fairy tale kingdom. Of course there was no discipline enacted usually and the word, and I hesitate to use this, misspelled of course "fagget" or "faggit" was spouted frequently and usually by jedi. Leetspeaking, 12 yr-olds, etc. and other people with way too much time to dedicate to such a boring grind for digital prestige, which is not what I would call being a jedi there. I used to host the jedi arena events, so I saw the best of them there and there was perhaps a dozen that weren't complete jerks to anyone outside their tiny sphere of friendships.

So I left, no sweat. Last August my husband's two brothers signed up again and they live pretty far away, so he wants to play his old fav MMO with them once more. Great, so I get him Rage of the Wookiees, & pre-order Trials of Obi-Wan expansions for his birthday, he now has the full kit. Excitedly, he played his Bounty Hunter, one of the two characters he's had since he started playing the game, this one being the one he stuck with off and on for two years. He had his character transferred from Bria to Tarquinas server free because SOE had a limited time offer to transfer characters for free off Bria server, because it was so loaded. We think the Bria hamster had choked arteries or something and was finally beyond any help a pacemaker could provide.

So he loves Tarquinas, falls in with a group of role players, waxes jedi (and gets griefed as usual with such colorful words as "f4ggi+", etc.) I just wish he did it in his hot pants. But no, he had his beautiful full set of R.I.S. and played his BH like it should be done. Some times he would take a bribe when walking into a group of jedi. He'd be there for the grinding padawan, but automatically the Master thinks he's there for him. He pays him 200k and sometimes even a mil to back off him. The BH does and then shoots the padawan, whom he was really there for, then goes off, even richer. The quintessential cold-blooded Bounty Hunter. However, it's not very Jedi to offer bribes, last I checked.

He really gets into playing with his new group, too. Then comes the NGE. All over. Some of them didn't like the Everquest 2 style applied to SWG just before it, but they were willing to accept it over the NGE. I really feel bad for him, because he invested a lot of time and money into the game. He got a lot of joy from it, unlike me. It was his favorite game and the only one he played. He has an Everquest 2 and Guild Wars account he hadn't touched until the NGE. His entire crew on Tarquinas and the people he has talked to all quit. He told me the forums there are filled with reproachful players that feel betrayed.
If you couldn't see SOE was a sell-out commercial machine from the beginning, I'm sorry. It was there and there were signs. Taking on the new design team earlier in the year, new programmers, new President or something like that. too. Lucas Arts suddenly has their logo prominently displayed...

Here's the deal kids, I think SOE was bought by Sony and by Microsoft. Why, today I even saw that SOE is going to display ADS IN THE GAME for Matrix Online. How bad is that? Awful! I don't pay for games to see people's fricken ads. If there's an optional demo, I'll try it, otherwise, I don't want to see it. I always say it will ruin a game on forums and on polls. Advertising has no place in video games, but ANYthing a corporation calls a "market" gets ads! SOE have sold out officially, folks. That's all there is to it.

They are catering to a new audience just in time for Christmas XBox 360 and Playstation 2, etc. console releases in my humble estimation. I suspect Sony Online Entertainment would sell its first born child to anyone where the price is right. Well, here you have it. Star Wars Galaxies is no more. It's just a game marketed toward a target audience with a Star Warsish theme. I understand now it is like a 1st-person shooter. My husband hates it and says combat is hard to control. So he cancelled his account two or three days ago and got a refund for Trials of Obi-Wan in the works (4 to 6 weeks for the refund?! It took me 1 instantaneous online transaction!). He's been playing Guild Wars with the old Tarquinas crew and on pay day will be playing his Everquest 2 character again.

I look forward to sampling the trial of World of Warcraft personally, it cannot POSSIBLY be as bad as SWG. When D&D Online finally decides it wants to come to life, I'll try it, criticize it, and probably leave it too (I hate 3rd Ed D&D, but I'm willing to see if it's a decent game or fun to play). Likely the husband will be checking them out, too.

I will not be buying the Xbox 360. I might get a PS3 if it's ever released and I'm inclined to, but it's practically pointless when Britain gets scrappy titles mostly aimed at WW II, soccer, & dance. At least Rockstar Games releases here. I miss America! We don't get Final Fantasy: Advent Children or any InuYasha games. Keh!

One thing you could bet on, I won't be playing SWG on any console -ever. It was bad enough on the pc.

ih8modem · November 2005

I've been a loyal player for the two years since SWG was launched in the EU. I absolutely loved the game and I actually eventually had 5 accounts. I loved all aspects of the game, and was really able to immerse myself in various aspects. Sure with 5 accounts I got to experience more than most people would, but so be it.

One of my most loved proffessions, BioEngineer, has been completely removed. Not replaced, not moved into one of the 'iconic' professions , just deleted. Jedi has been turned into the weakest class (probably due to all the whining from everyone, including 5/6 Jedi). I had fun with my Jedi, I never used him to PvP as I had no desire to be part of the 1337sp34k club. I kept his head down, and once or twice evaded the BH that was hunting me. Sure I got my fair share of suxxors and various other type comments, but to me that just indicated that I had in fact won the encounter.

Nowdays you are forced to have the new expansion if you are to have any hope of levelling up. Classis missions are giving out missions worth around 5000 experience. That includes killing 10 targets and the lair itself. On the new planet Mustafar you can get a repeatable quest to kill 15 'lava fleas' for a whopping 53k experience.

Missions or quests from the previous Rage of the Wookiees expansion, are worth 0 points. Other than the fleas, you can get numerous quests on Mustafar worth 100k exp, some for as little as 5 mins work (Miner supplies / air filters...)

The new combat is very twitchy, and very buggy. You can shoot at the target for 15 seconds, with no noticable effect. Suddenly the cumulative damage spams all over your screen, but to no avail. Sure the Mob dies, but unfortunately what you were not seeing (no combat log to alert you anymore) is his two buddies out of your view pounding on you from behind. 10900 to 0 health in 0.1 seconds.

Unfortunately , as much as I am a SW freak (well games freak anyway) I have hit the cancel button 5 times. I wish SOE all the best, but would strongly urge them to reconsider this nonsense they have created.

gambunta · November 2005

An easy way to put this. Me and my girlfriend had 6 accounts between us and now they are all cancelled. SWG was the best game ever untill they made these changes, If by some means they revert the game back to atleast the Cu im gonna be right back in the game but if I want to play a SW game on my console ill just fire up KOTOR or something like that. 2 bad to see my favorit game wich i acctually was a bit addicted to go to ruin. but i must say if they change it back... ill be right there hitting my subscribe button again.

Hellraizser
Chimera vet

asianQT · November 2005

I agree with everything Ive read to this post...I had three accounts just of my own, enjoyed building Vilas Retreat on Corellia, pvp, crafting, the vast clothing options and character customizations, but after a year of gameplay my biggest question I have is "WHY ADD NEW CONTENT BEFORE FIXING THE ISSUES ALREADY AT HAND"

rdrpappy · November 2005

I'm done with SWG as of the 25th, the NGE was not the fix this game needed and there were so many other ways they could have tried to improve it.

SOE used focus groups to stagger into the conclusion they ended up with and now the base is leaving in far greater numbers than the cu ever prompted.

I understand the game was built on the old EQ craftcentric foundation, but they should have added to what they had, not tried to morph it into a console game under the radar.

Djwildcat · November 2005

Typical SOE. People didn't like the CU when they launched that either. I know at the time I left but ended up going back and started getting used to the post CU game. When the news hit about the NGE you saw the same thing on TC and also on Tempest, people standing in the streets protesting. But none of that mattered during the CU why did they think it was going to matter with the NGE. I logged on the day of the change, went and got my robes, fought a couple of things, saw that the combat was clunky at best, went back to my guild hall, logged off, and canceled my accounts and requested a refund which is going to take 4-6 weeks to process. Just goes back to the old saying, burn me once, shame on you, burn me twice, shame on me. The thing is, this time I don't even care about trying to fight it because resistance is futile. I saw it, saw that it wasn't the type of game I was interested in, and canceled my accounts. Simple.

To that end, mostly all of the people in my guild have canceled their accounts as well. We've all moved over to the Wildhammer server on WoW and started a new guild named Forsaken Tempest (lol...yeah, we're horde). But we're having a blast on that game. Of course, it actually works instead of being the bug ridden monstrosity that SWG is. There is absolutely no way I would even ever consider buying another SOE product again. If I see SOE on the box, I'll be putting it back on the shelf. The only way I'd even give a slight consideration to returning to SWG, and I mean SLIGHT, would be if they went back to the PRECU game but we know that's not going to happen so my Jedi will be a blue glowy from here to eternity.

Niksen · November 2005

For me, its hard to see any game beeing better than swg was back then.

The complexity and great business of beeing a bio engineer was fantastic and ive never seen such nice made crafting system before or after.

i want my BE back...:(

furtur · November 2005

there will always be winers and criers in every game. alpha class you say? yeah!? jedi are elite 1.5x was pretty good balance IMO. the game is now a FPS with crappy collision detection. the timers for attacks don't exist, everyone does the same damage its about how jerky you run now not how skilled your understanding of the game is. they should repackage the game and call it something else becasue the one thing it isn't anymore is SWG. 2 pre-cu accounts canceled and veteran 'rewards' destroyed with the promise and lies of the development team including SOE. i'll never play another SOE game

Falconise · November 2005

I played SWG up until shortly after vehicles came out. I left because of the inconsiderate knee-jerk reaction changes they kept making to the game.

I was a master BM with no income source other than the faction farming I did. I PvP'd only casually, and there was little goal-wise to keep me interested. I had no desire to become a Jedi, I was quite happy as a BM.

Then came the player mounts. I finally had a source of income for my chosen craft, and enjoied going into the wild to tame pets that I would sell as mounts. I finally had money, enough to buy decent player made armor and weapons, although only average quality.

I was extremely irritated when they disallowed droids to hold more than only a few pets, but accepted the fact, and managed as best I could (this was before the mounts came out).

However, after only a short period, my source of income was destroyed, when they brought in player vehicles. The market dried up, as people wanted vehicles, not mounts.

I can understand that the vehicles were probably planned from the getgo, and it had nothing to do with lack of consideration that the addition crippled a market for a single class. I realise that if I really wanted lots of money, I should have chosen a different craft/careen path. But I still think that things could have been done differently, allowing for mounts to be more desirable compared to vehicles.

The newfound enjoyment I got in the last weeks of play was ripped from my hands with one small patch.

It was the straw that broke the camels back. Many other changes through the first 6-10 months the game was out, almost always affected my class in a detrimental way. I was sick of it, and I saw NO indication that future changes would go differently.

I cancelled.

I kept up to date with SWG and changes to the game since then, and I still know people (my guild for eg) that play. Nothing temped me to return.

I have absolutely no confidence that this total revamp would change anything for me, for the better, for the game. SOE has consistantly proven to me that no matter how much care they take in balancing and adjusting the game, they repeatedly introduce more problems than solutions.

I was sick of the cookie-cutter stamped buildings, crappy artwork and textures, poor performing 3D engine, item decay that was rediculous (end eventually reduced, but still caused me to stop PvPing even casually), constant limitations that were added to the game that restricted just about everything that WAS fun, and the list goes on.

I played WoW for the last year, and NONE of this sort of thing has happened. The only thing I don't like about WoW is the rediculous faction requirements for most high level encounters or quests. And yes, I've left WoW too, if only for a break. I still enjoy and have goals in WoW, but many of these goals require me to grind out faction for weeks in order to progress further.

No MMO can be perfect, they are far too complex for the developers to forsee all the cosequences of anything they change. It is my opinion, that the worst of the lot if SWG.

K, thx, bye.

Sagahawi · November 2005

I didn't play swg for two years to be beatin by some noob that has been playing the game for two weeks. I wasn't an alpha class jedi i used stradegy to win battles as a bounty hunter. I don't want them to make jedi weak i felt good when i took one down. Yes jedi did make pvp unbalanced and hard sometimes but after you play long enough you learn to deal with it.

The game took time to learn but now you can start beating people as soon as you get to lvl 80 or 90. Now a little 10 year old kid can come and play and have a pretty flashlight. This is just another way for SOE to make more money they dont care about the players. Also to get to level 90 you have to buy the expansion packs to get the experience unless you want to grind for 2 months. I think SOE has gone too far this time.

The first CU was good and lots of people came back but I don't think that will happen this time. The ruined the game for good and no matter what they do the vets aren't gonna come back.

Sagahawi · November 2005

Netherwulf · November 2005

I had only been playing SWG for a little over 4 months, but I loved the game! I was having tremendous fun as a Master Scout / Novice Creature Handler / Novice Ranger. I enjoyed the freedom I had in choosing how I wanted to play. If I had been following a particular profession and then desided that it wasn't for me, I could simply can it and start over with something else. If I didn't want to spend my time online fighting random creatures, I didn't have to. In fact, I could spend my time just camping and fishing on the shores of Endor if I wanted. I have played many other MMOs, but never had I felt that my character was so unique or so unrestrained as I did in SWG. But, as it is said, all good things must come to an end...

For now the NGE comes along and everyone of the professions I loved are completely destroyed. With the new, dumbed-down iconic professions, my character went from being a unique individual in the game world to being 1 of 9. No longer did I have the freedom or individuality that I once enjoyed. Now, all that is left to do is go fight something using the new, arcade-styled, highly-buggy, rapid mouse-clicking, combat system. If I wanted nothing but combat, I would go play Halo!

Sure, the game had its problems, but what game doesn't? But, now the game has even more numerous and more serious problems! Personally, I feel that SOE is nothing but a lazy and greedy company that cares only about the almight dollar, and nothing about creating a quallity product.

I, along with my sister, who also loved the game, have since canceled our accounts and have both requested refunds of our TOW preorder. It's a shame too: I really loved the game, and I have yet to find another MMO that offers as much as SWG did.

Netherwulf · November 2005

Stedfast · November 2005

I too enjoyed SWG, had two accounts, was a gulidleader, had a city on Talus, grinded through 30 professions before I got Jedi, played for two years(from opening day) until all the changes basicly drove me away.

edgehead · November 2005

No point even discussing this game anymore. Good luck and good bye SOE. I've moved on.

josslyn · November 2005

I think many of the veteran SWG players can agree that the NGE was *NOT* what we needed. But alas SOE doesn't and never has cared about what their player base thinks or says. I expect nothing more from this company at this point. After 2.5yrs of playing it was clear to me that it was time to hit the cancel button for the first time. Sad days for us vet players...

Oh well... 3 accounts cancelled and onto CoV/WoW.

Ithi · November 2005

I absolutely agree. I have left SWG with my three accounts after playing for almost two years obsessively.

What is being passed off as SWG is no longer the game I loved. When I began playing, SWG was a textured, complicated, engrossing adult-oriented game full of choices and MIND-occupying content. Over the time I played, it was continually dumbed-down to the present state of a kiddie twitch-game. This last "fix" was MY last straw. I can no longer bear to log in.

The characters I spent months and loving care building and sculpting--the pets I invested so much time into--my homes--my professions that were killed out from under me--became too painful for me. I have finally left the devs to it. They have no care for their player base, obviously. They have made it clear that it is THEIR game and they are doing us the favor of taking our money and giving us the privilege of playing THEIR game.

I have decided to take my money to someone who appreciates it more and will be a bit more responsive to the sort of game I would like to play, for a change. SOE and LA can take their blue glowies and their light sabers and go home.

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Newsletter Issue 1: Off the Boards

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Newsletter Issue 1: Off the Boards

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