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What Would You Have Changed in SWG?

124

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  • FrodoFraginsFrodoFragins Member EpicPosts: 5,898
    Konfess said:

    I would have bought it if it incorporated XWing vs. Tie Fighter style space combat at launch.  They missed the boat big time there

    I heard that Lucas wasn't happy with one player on the tail of another just shooting until the one in front blew up.  He imagined space combat more like a bullfight or Jousting.  where the two combatants approached head on and fired. then circled around to face one another then jousted again.


    The Empire shot the enemy from behind.  The Rebels shot ties head on, face to face.

    I promise this is the last one tonight.

  • cameltosiscameltosis Member LegendaryPosts: 3,703
    I never really had an issue with Jedi's at the start of the game. 

    It took ages to unlock (average 25-30 professions mastered), you unlocked a new character slot with an unleveled jedi. It then took ages to level the jedi to the point where it could hold its own in pvp or pve. During that leveling period, anytime anyone saw you with a lightsaber, you became a valid target for bounty hunters and pvpers. Then, if you died, that was it, perma death and you had to restart another jedi. 


    Sure, it was an alpha class, so a maxed out jedi was brutal, but they were so rare that they still fit within the game and the IP. It was only when they removed perma death that it became an issue (too many jedi). I was also annoyed when they removed the hologrind and replaced it with an even more tedious force-sensitive-village grind. 



    Bringing it back to more positive things: how I used to spend my SWG days  =)

    My average session in SWG was 3-4 hours and usually spent doing one of three things. 


    1) Leveling.

    If I was leveling a new combat profession, I'd head to Anchorhead on Tattooine and look for a squill farming group. If one was forming, I'd join it, otherwise I'd form my own. Once we had 15-20 people in the group, we'd go to the mission terminal, then everyone would look for squill missions less than 2k away from the terminal. Each player could only get two missions (paying 10k credit per) then we'd head out. When you approached the quest marker, the mission would spawn the squill nest. The group would then nuke the squills, nuke the nest, then move on. 30-40 nests later, we'd head back to Anchorhead to recruit and grab new missions. 

    Leveling was always group based (for me), always profitable, social and fun. Sure, tattooine got a bit dull, but the social aspect kept it fun and the xp flowed very fast. 

    2) Grinding Money

    As weapons and armour degraded, you needed a constant intake of cash to replace armour. To grind money, I would typically join a "solo group", which meant 20 people in a group but not near one another. Being in a group allowed you to access higher level missions from the mission terminals, so everyone did this. 

    So, I'd find the group, then head to a doctor to get buffed. Once buffed, I'd fly to Dathomir, put on my armour (max kinetic resistance), then start grabbing missions. On Dath, in a group, this meant rancors! Fully buffed and templated, I could complete 2 missions in about 10mins, earning iirc 30k per mission. Buffs lasted 2-3 hours, so could earn 500k - 1mil in an evening session grinding out missions in this way. As I loved the creatures on Dath, this never got boring. I was never a trader or crafter so this was my way of earning cash.

    3) Rare Bits

    SWG was my first MMO, I was young and didn't care about min-maxing. I just enjoyed the game. However, I still enjoyed finding decent loot and being able to make money, so there were two places I'd farm regularly, both for enjoyment and rare loot. 

    The first was Night Sister camps on Dathomir. There were some badass witches here that I could never kill, but most were doable when fully templated and buffed. Loot was skill tapes (armour attachments), rare weapons (especially pikes that did insane mind damage over time) and on occasion, a holocron. 

    The second was my favourite: the Geonosian Labs on Yavin. Essentially an open dungeon, you had to clear various sections, collecting door codes to progress through. I started doing this place with my guild, but once fully templated I could solo it. It was full of interesting creatures, culminating with Acklay (six legged insect from The Clone Wars) who, when looted, gave you a rare crafting ingredient. I used to spend a lot of time here, mostly for the enjoyment, but the Acklay bone was required for a lot of high-end crafted gear so was very valuable. 



    Those three things were how I spent my SWG evenings back in 2003/2004. I'd occasionally join in with PvP (tho i was crap back then) and we'd do the occasional guild PvE stuff (corellian corvette or death watch bunker), but mostly I was either leveling, grinding cash or fighting high end stuff for loot. I eventually decided to go for the holocron grind, made it to 13 or 14 professions mastered, but then they removed that grind and replaced it with a new one that sucked even more.
  • grimalgrimal Member UncommonPosts: 2,935
    The bugs.  There were so many of them.
  • AmatheAmathe Member LegendaryPosts: 7,630
    I liked: 

    1. The crafting system;
    2. Player cities;
    3. Being able to combine classes from among an impressive array of options;
    4. The stories;
    5. The "mind bar" and the combat options it created;
    6. The healing of the "mind bar" and the social options it provided; 
    7. The mystery of how to become a Jedi, and the fact that everyone was trying to solve that mystery; and
    8. Awesome pets that were actually useful.

    I disliked:

    1.The craptastic way they came up with to become a Jedi, and its attendant holo-grind nonsense. 
    2. Star Wars without space kind of sucked. 

    EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests

  • rodarinrodarin Member EpicPosts: 2,611
    The best thing to happen to SWG reputation was what happened to it.

    It ws in a death spiral before they made the changes. THATS why they made the changes.

    People somehow have this revisionist history when they look at that game.

    I also think maybe 10% of the people who claim to have played it (pre) actually played it. But since its the cool thing to say everyone tries to make the claim.
  • BurntvetBurntvet Member RarePosts: 3,465
    rodarin said:
    The best thing to happen to SWG reputation was what happened to it.

    It ws in a death spiral before they made the changes. THATS why they made the changes.

    People somehow have this revisionist history when they look at that game.

    I also think maybe 10% of the people who claim to have played it (pre) actually played it. But since its the cool thing to say everyone tries to make the claim.
    While the numbers were declining, it was far from a "death spiral". They had close to 200k subs when they inflicted the NGE on everyone.

    And why were the numbers declining?

    Because SOE mismanaged the game into the ground.

    Not because SWG was a bad game, in many ways it was a very good game. But because SOE refused to spend money on fixing bugs and incomplete systems, in favor of nerfing and re-balancing professions and screwing around with the jedi system for the last 12 months before the NGE.

    Pre-NGE SWG players wanted 2 things: more content, and fewer bugs. Instead SOE did whatever they hell it was doing.

    The NGE was just the final bad decision in a long line of bad management decisions.

    That is the real history.
  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775
    Burntvet said:



    And why were the numbers declining?

    Because SOE mismanaged the game into the ground.

    Not because SWG was a bad game, in many ways it was a very good game. But because SOE refused to spend money on fixing bugs and incomplete systems, in favor of nerfing and re-balancing professions and screwing around with the jedi system for the last 12 months before the NGE.


    Wait .. it is not a bad game but it has a lot of bugs, and incomplete systems?

    What is a bad game then? One without any bugs, and all the systems are complete?
  • BurntvetBurntvet Member RarePosts: 3,465
    edited November 2015
    Pre-NGE SWG had the best resource and crafting systems in any MMO released so far. Many/most critics of SWG admit that.

    SWG also had the best non-combat professions ever offered in any MMO.

    The mix and match 32+2 profession system was also revolutionary and probably the best seen so far.

    The space side of SWG was also beloved for the customization options and variable stats on equipment allowed for very deep gameplay. The space game allowed for multiple players to operate systems on the same ship, 10+ years ago, a thing which others (Crytpic in STO, CIG in SC) say they couldn't do.

    Not that everything was great, there was a lot that needed work, too.

    Yes, there were a lot of bugs (but very few were game breaking), and even incomplete systems (I'm looking at you smuggler) but the game was so much bigger in scope of what you could do, that there was still an absolute ton of stuff that was good to great. Lot of people played the game in spite of the "warts" that SOE chose (and they did choose) to not fix.

    Unless you were there, you wouldn't and couldn't understand why people liked it.

    So don't bother.

  • ThourneThourne Member RarePosts: 757
    Burntvet said:
    Pre-NGE SWG had the best resource and crafting systems in any MMO released so far. Many/most critics of SWG admit that.

    SWG also had the best non-combat professions ever offered in any MMO.

    ......
    Unless you were there, you wouldn't and couldn't understand why people liked it.

    So don't bother.

    This is the part most people have trouble understanding -->The game wasn't just for combat types.

    Today games seem to be made for PVEers or PVPers (or claim to be made for both), while convincing themselves those are the only 2 classifications of players. They aren't.
    SWG had been designed from the ground up to fully incorporate the Builders and Socializers. There were important roles for these kinds of people to fufill, not the bare nod to these play styles that most games tack on, if they even bother to include them.
  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775
    Thourne said:


    This is the part most people have trouble understanding -->The game wasn't just for combat types.


    Oh, i don't think anyone would have trouble understanding it .. after all, they have classes such as entertainers.

    But it is one thing to understand it, it is another to like it.


  • cameltosiscameltosis Member LegendaryPosts: 3,703
    Burntvet said:


    Wait .. it is not a bad game but it has a lot of bugs, and incomplete systems?

    What is a bad game then? One without any bugs, and all the systems are complete?

    In my cynical middle-age, I've found life is generally filled with the following:

    1) Good ideas implemented badly

    2) Bad ideas implemented well


    SWG is definitely a good idea that was implemented badly. The goals, the underlying design, the whole philosophy of the game was great. But, they implemented it badly, resulting in incomplete systems, lots of imbalance, dodgy UI, tons of bugs. 

    This is compared to something like SWTOR, which is a bad idea implemented well. The MMO world was crying out for an awesome new star wars game, many just wanting swg 2.0, but certainly not another wow-style themepark. Bioware did their job in building a polished game, compared to most it was relatively bug free, the presentation was good and they delivered on most of their timescales. But it was still a bad idea, resulting is massive loss of players in first few months and minimal return on investment compared to expectations. 



    For me, I'll always pick the good idea implemented badly. This is primarily a principles thing: I'd rather support the good idea, even if the product is bad, in the hopes that it encourages further investment in similar ideas in the future. Within gaming, I go this route to keep games interesting. I can more easily overlook bugs if the core ideas are good, whereas I will quickly dump a game if it turns out to just be a polished version of something already on the market.
  • ScotScot Member LegendaryPosts: 22,824

    The people who were awful, Ok it is one of those days, just kidding.  :)

    Killing the large scale arena pvp with small scale side game pvp meant that the PvP never really took of for me.

  • GardavsshadeGardavsshade Member UncommonPosts: 907
    edited November 2015
    NorseGod said:
    Hatefull said:
    All I would really do is fix bugs.  No expansions until as many bugs as possible had been squashed.

    Speaking to what someone said earlier, there were bounty missions to get other players.  If you had actually played you would know that.

    I would have made becoming a Jedi harder, yet once you were a Jedi you only get one death but would be hard as a raid boss to kill.  Those that say no jedi are soulless creatures that have no place in SWG.

    And mostly, I would not have listened to anyone on the forums as it was their whining and crying that ultimately killed that game.
    I think those who advocate for no jedi where just people that couldn't do what it took to become one. In my experience those same people become BH out of jealousy.

    Jedi was really fun to play.
    I had no interest in playing Jedi, still don't... I play non-force sensitives in TOR for instance. Not a L2P issue. No desire at all for that type of gameplay.

    I had no interest in playing a Bounty Hunter at the time. None what so ever. Not a jealousy issue. No desire at all for that type of gameplay.

    I was perfectly content/happy/enthralled with playing as a Crafter or a Scout/"animal hunter"/resource gatherer archetype. I enjoyed that gameplay immensely.

    So if you want to kid yourself and narrowmindedly believe what you wrote I won't stop you. You will eventually need some good gear for your gameplay style and my characters loved making that for players just like you. ;)

    I think Jedi were the worst thing ever added to SWG because it created a huge distraction to what the game was about initially. Jedi didn't fit the time period nor the game itself with the 33 professions. SWTOR does a much better job catering to the desire of some players to seek the force sensitive experience than SWG ever could have in my opinion. If the Devs wanted to give the players the "Jedi/Sith/Bounty Hunter" experience they should have designed the game for THAT from the beginning and complete abandoned the "Star Wars virtual world" experience. I don't think it's possible for any Dev Team to do both any justice at the same time.
  • HabitualFrogStompHabitualFrogStomp Member UncommonPosts: 370
    My favorite thing to do in game was go overt (I played both IMP and Reb at one time or another) and go where I knew the opposite faction liked to run NPC missions. Back in the day when they attacked a faction aligned NPC they got a temporary enemy flag that made them open to attack from PVPers.

    I used to walk all the way from Dearic, Talus to the Imperial Base on Talus, obviously before speeders were released, just to do this to certain enemies. For those who aren't familiar, that's a good 45 minutes or so.

    For the first month of the game, I didn't even leave the planet of Talus. We had our own little personal community there on that planet. And it was cool because I had built quite a name for myself from my exploits, so when I did decide to see what the rest of the galaxy had to offer, people who I had never seen on Talus had heard of me. I challenged one person to a duel and they said "no way I heard you have a 450 dmg scatter pistol" which was no where near being true. I just thought it was awesome that great players I had heard of, had heard of me.

     It literally felt like you were in the wild west, the way legends of certain players would grow and rumors would start, rivalries would erupt and fizzle out on a daily basis. Players running out of the cantina engaged in a random gun fight. And it was such a social game. It was my first MMO and it was everything I ever though an online game should and could be. And nothing has touched it since, and sadly probably never will.

    As for the one thing I would change. I'd change the day they revealed to the community holocrons. It killed all the magic. Suddenly people weren't in the cities doing their thing and contributing to a vibrant community. The cat was out of the bag, and every body wanted on the Jedi train. Jedi being in the game I was fine with, but telling people the way to achieve this power was the critical mistake.
  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775


    SWG is definitely a good idea that was implemented badly. The goals, the underlying design, the whole philosophy of the game was great. But, they implemented it badly, resulting in incomplete systems, lots of imbalance, dodgy UI, tons of bugs. 


    i.e. a bad game. 
  • khanstructkhanstruct Member UncommonPosts: 756
    This is all very good. I'm getting a very full picture of the game and the overall mistakes that caused it's decline. Very helpful info.

  • CecropiaCecropia Member RarePosts: 3,985
    edited November 2015


    SWG is definitely a good idea that was implemented badly. The goals, the underlying design, the whole philosophy of the game was great. But, they implemented it badly, resulting in incomplete systems, lots of imbalance, dodgy UI, tons of bugs. 


    i.e. a bad game. 
    nah ... after reading countless posts and opinions about this game for many years it's more likely: "imperfect awesome game". Never had the pleasure of playing it, but "bad game" is not congruent with the vast majority of opinions of this title. You no likey does not equal "bad game". 

    "Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb

  • Stuka1000Stuka1000 Member UncommonPosts: 955
    It seems to be a fair assumption that many here think SWG (pre-NGE) was the pinnacle of what they want in an MMO. Personally, I never got to play it (may check out the swgemu), but I've researched it a lot. Assuming it wasn't absolutely perfect, I'm curious as to what you would have liked to see done differently.

    Also, please tell me your favorite aspect of the game? What did you do most often in it?

    I would post this in the actual SWG forum, but considering there hasn't been a post in there for the last 3 years, I don't suspect I'd get much of a response.


    Main thing I would have changed:  The guy in charge, Smedley.

    Crafting system was second to none.  SWG had a lot of excellent ideas but they were badly implemented for the most part which led to many bugs at release.

  • rodingorodingo Member RarePosts: 2,870
    Scot said:

    The people who were awful, Ok it is one of those days, just kidding.  :)

    Killing the large scale arena pvp with small scale side game pvp meant that the PvP never really took of for me.

    Were you referring to PVP in SWG?

    "If I offended you, you needed it" -Corey Taylor

  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775
    Cecropia said:


    SWG is definitely a good idea that was implemented badly. The goals, the underlying design, the whole philosophy of the game was great. But, they implemented it badly, resulting in incomplete systems, lots of imbalance, dodgy UI, tons of bugs. 


    i.e. a bad game. 
    nah ... after reading countless posts and opinions about this game for many years it's more likely: "imperfect awesome game". Never had the pleasure of playing it, but "bad game" is not congruent with the vast majority of opinions of this title. You no likey does not equal "bad game". 
    a badly implemented game (not my words) does not make a bad game? What .. a well implemented game makes a bad game?
  • cameltosiscameltosis Member LegendaryPosts: 3,703
    Cecropia said:


    SWG is definitely a good idea that was implemented badly. The goals, the underlying design, the whole philosophy of the game was great. But, they implemented it badly, resulting in incomplete systems, lots of imbalance, dodgy UI, tons of bugs. 


    i.e. a bad game. 
    nah ... after reading countless posts and opinions about this game for many years it's more likely: "imperfect awesome game". Never had the pleasure of playing it, but "bad game" is not congruent with the vast majority of opinions of this title. You no likey does not equal "bad game". 
    a badly implemented game (not my words) does not make a bad game? What .. a well implemented game makes a bad game?
    Good or bad is subjective and is about the enjoyment you get out of a game. The implementation can have a big bearing on enjoyment, but its not the be-all-and-end-all.

    So with SWG, I got a hell of a lot of enjoyment out of it and consider it a good game despite its bad implementation. The design, the systems etc were all still fun, they were just buggy.


    An example of a game I consider to be a bad game but was implemented well is SW:TOR. The presentation was great, the worlds well built, it was relatively bug free, but it was just a bad game. Combat was too easy,  the classes too homogeneous, the quests too generic and linear, the crafting and companions too bland etc. The experience wasn't fun and it wasn't designed well, resulting in it only fulfilling a a small niche for those interested in solo storytelling.

  • nariusseldonnariusseldon Member EpicPosts: 27,775
    Cecropia said:


    SWG is definitely a good idea that was implemented badly. The goals, the underlying design, the whole philosophy of the game was great. But, they implemented it badly, resulting in incomplete systems, lots of imbalance, dodgy UI, tons of bugs. 


    i.e. a bad game. 
    nah ... after reading countless posts and opinions about this game for many years it's more likely: "imperfect awesome game". Never had the pleasure of playing it, but "bad game" is not congruent with the vast majority of opinions of this title. You no likey does not equal "bad game". 
    a badly implemented game (not my words) does not make a bad game? What .. a well implemented game makes a bad game?
    Good or bad is subjective and is about the enjoyment you get out of a game. The implementation can have a big bearing on enjoyment, but its not the be-all-and-end-all.



    Yes, it is subjective. You are the one who said it was implemented BADLY .. your words, not mine. So you think games that are implemented badly (subjective judgment by you) can be a good game?

    Personally, good games to me are the ones which have good ideas *and* implemented well (both judged subjectively of course).
  • ThourneThourne Member RarePosts: 757
    Cecropia said:


    SWG is definitely a good idea that was implemented badly. The goals, the underlying design, the whole philosophy of the game was great. But, they implemented it badly, resulting in incomplete systems, lots of imbalance, dodgy UI, tons of bugs. 


    i.e. a bad game. 
    nah ... after reading countless posts and opinions about this game for many years it's more likely: "imperfect awesome game". Never had the pleasure of playing it, but "bad game" is not congruent with the vast majority of opinions of this title. You no likey does not equal "bad game". 
    a badly implemented game (not my words) does not make a bad game? What .. a well implemented game makes a bad game?
    Good or bad is subjective and is about the enjoyment you get out of a game. The implementation can have a big bearing on enjoyment, but its not the be-all-and-end-all.



    Yes, it is subjective. You are the one who said it was implemented BADLY .. your words, not mine. So you think games that are implemented badly (subjective judgment by you) can be a good game?

    Personally, good games to me are the ones which have good ideas *and* implemented well (both judged subjectively of course).
    And yet so many times, in so many games, something the audience has found fun was the result of an error in the developers goal. Crossed communications from team members leading to odd outcomes or literally a bug that changed the way something was supposed to work completely.
    Then we complain when they fix it cuz it was more fun broken.
    Just offering this explanation for how bad implementation can actually be great gameplay.
  • SovrathSovrath Member LegendaryPosts: 31,937
    edited November 2015
    Cecropia said:


    SWG is definitely a good idea that was implemented badly. The goals, the underlying design, the whole philosophy of the game was great. But, they implemented it badly, resulting in incomplete systems, lots of imbalance, dodgy UI, tons of bugs. 


    i.e. a bad game. 
    nah ... after reading countless posts and opinions about this game for many years it's more likely: "imperfect awesome game". Never had the pleasure of playing it, but "bad game" is not congruent with the vast majority of opinions of this title. You no likey does not equal "bad game". 
    a badly implemented game (not my words) does not make a bad game? What .. a well implemented game makes a bad game?
    Actually, no it doesn't.

    If a game is designed well as far as it's "game play" but crashes all the time and perhaps has an awkward interface (just examples) but besides those things is considered brilliant then it's implementation is bad.

    Because, by your logic, a very well implemented game, no bugs, great interface, etc, but has horrible game design is a good game? Doesn't make sense.

    Therefore how something is implemented, though it could turn people off of a game, is independent of the game itself.

    A perfect saying would be "throwing the baby out with the bath water".


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  • NeblessNebless Member RarePosts: 1,835
    From what I understand, the negative aspect of having Jedi was that people then stopped fulfilling all of the other roles in the game that made it great. No one wanted to be an entertainer when they could be a JEDI! No one wanted to be a Medic when they could be a JEDI!!

    Am I correct on this?
    Yes.  Players would burn through those profession's just to check off the box so to speak, but not PLAY them.

    SWG (pre-cu) - AoC (pre-f2p) - PotBS (pre-boarder) - DDO - LotRO (pre-f2p) - STO (pre-f2p) - GnH (beta tester) - SWTOR - Neverwinter

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