What direction would have been the best route for SWG back in early 2004 when SWG had been out for a few months already? What are some of things they did wrong that could have made a game that would still be playable for vets today?
for me, the single biggest mistake they made back at the time was to introduce the hologrind.
that patch began the transformation of the game's idea and principle to what later on became the CU and the NGE.
Also when I think of SWG, there really wasnt all that much content to jump into dungeon wise. Sure there was imperial base/rebel and the warren, nightsisters and tuskin fort( I think I Went to tuskin for one to many times as well as every other SWG player)deathwatch bunker, sith lords on yavin4 and the jedi temple.
the corvette mission and later they introduced the bio-lab in yavin.
but the game's essence wasn't about doing dungeons over and over again. they just supplemented the free-playing style of the game.
Other then those places, where were we supose to go. I remember after CU I had been to all of them so many times, and since everyone was bitching so much about cu it wasnt even fun going to those places. What could have SOE added that would have given players something to sink there teeth into in the form of dungeons? Was there enough in the first place to keep everyone happy untill this day?
there were tons to do - but perhaps not in the form that you are used to or expect (repeating dungeons).
all professions were interlinked, offering constant services and goods to everyone. hunting parties were the norm, where lowbies and higher levels would be able to group together and go hunting or adventuring to one of the huge dangerous planets to explore or loot (lok, dathomir, yavin, etc.) they were "huge" then because at the time there were no ITVs, speeders were much slower, an interstellar travel ticket cost weight in your pocket, shuttles times were high... you could easily spend an hour just organising a party to take off.
rangers would be out setting up camps for the wounded, smugglers in some dark table in the cantina slicing a player's weapon, tailors being stopped on every corner to take an order or working on their shop; doctors healing or buffing around; BH hunting jedi or getting missions from the spynet clan; combat professions grinding faction points or going after a player factional base to shift the balance power in a planet...
the content was there, but unlike current MMOs it did not entail repeating dungeons over and over again.
Bleh, I still carry a grudge for what they did to a once incredible gaming experience. If they would have stuck with the original concept, expanded and fixed what they had, then it would still be a rockin' MMO today.
WoW? What's that?
Bunch of fools. Oh well, there's always SWGEmu...
"Censorship is never over for those who have experienced it. It is a brand on the imagination that affects the individual who has suffered it, forever." - Noam Chomsky
UGH!!! The Warren!!!...Good times in there huh? It was pretty cool...I remember getting SO lost in there My 1st time in...
I agree with you...And I'm sure there would have been more of those Theme parks as well had they simply continued to improve upon the CU or Pre-CU...But l do think there would have eventually been some Instances and Dungeons as well...I think there would have been more of everything eventually...
I hated that place when I had dial up. Laggiest place in SWG. I died many horrible deaths in there.
The best direction would have been to finish adding all the things they promised to after launch. Asheron's Call style story lines (a brief 'Cries of Alderaan' partial story arc and the idea was dropped), directed content (quests and such were intended to be in the game from the start), and tools for players to add content (the Storyteller system was intended fom the start and was supposed to be much more in depth, think the Chronicle system without the mind numbing grind). They did add vehicles, mounts, and player cities along with the Jedi system before giving up on doing much beyond constant game mechanics sledgehammering.
We were told were were getting a sandbox filled with toys. We got a sandbox that was only half filled with sand instead. A few years ago, former SWG developer Greenmarine posted on the Broken Toy's blog that the reason was SOE's producers (he specifically posted that it was the SOE producers, not LEC's) thinking they knew better than the playerbase what the playerbase wanted (lack of content was the most prominent reason given for cancelling, yet content was ignored in favor of game mechanics sledgehammering) and a dev team comprised of primarily systems designers (hence a dev team more comfortable tinkering with the mechanics of the game instead of constructing content, and a good insication of why the content that was added was not particularly very good).
SWG was a game loaded with potential at launch that consistently had its potential stripped from it with every update.
Bleh, I still carry a grudge for what they did to a once incredible gaming experience. If they would have stuck with the original concept, expanded and fixed what they had, then it would still be a rockin' MMO today.
The best things about the game pre-NGE was the complexity and the community. They should have left those elements alone and worked on the other aspects of the game. I agree with the other poster that some of the devs were clueless and couldn't understand how people enjoyed non-combat aspects of the game (I am talking about you, Chris Cao). One of my favorite memories of the game was popping a Ranger camp and sitting around chatting with other people.
Yes the community was all this game had back then, the sandbox was and is the best idea they had. But the problems of not having a story or lack of content was the major flaw, they should have tried to please combat and noncombat players. They have done this but thiers a terrible lack of people on most servers to enjoy it now.
Time line, alot of us hated the time line or story, or lack of any story. They should have started the game after Vader, came up with a story; thier are a few Jedi still running around, and then created a story for Dark Jedi being around, maybe the Emperor trained up a Dark Jedi army.
Game mechanics, the old animations looked good, I do like the faster NGE paced combat though, but their needs to be a balance between looks and mechanics. Keep the old skill system, and new expertise system, build layers, they should have made it three tier.
Beginner, Master and then Legendary, each layer would add extra skill points and a few expertise points. And not make it based on grinding, base the elder percs on time, year two; you get master titles, year 3 legendary titles and access to extra skill points. That would have given everyone a chance to have a Uber toon without grind burnout.
They should have gone sandbox with space, copyied more of EVE, they did a little bit then stopped, we wanted capital ships and personal stations and system control like they have in EVE. Thier never was enough player planets, not enough citey openings for all the people to build a town.
Smedly was right about saying the NGE was what they should have started with, it has a good pvp combat system, thier are more things to do for other types of players, collections, instances, pvp It was just to late, the goose cooked itself with the lies and lack of content. SOE and LEC launched with half a game like AOC, the present lack of any support from LEC is apparent, the problem is George wont let SOE do anything drastic to save the game. You can see that he said let it die after NGE; slowly so the last players will not get mad with the brand, and then he called up Bioware and contracted a new MMO.
Everyone wanted to be a Jedi, and thats why SWTOR is based around a story line that will allow 70% of thier playerbase to be Jedi without making everyone else mad. . Its just to bad they cant make a MMO to fit the time line we all want.
I don't know if it's been said, but the best approach IMO would have been. Create the game they wanted to make before actually releasing it.
QFT
Longer and more massive beta testing, IMHO the IP could have weathered an amount of NDA leakage that might have been feared as long as they were actually fixing the probs and polishing the game before charging us for a "release game that was still in an alpha phase"..
I don't know if it's been said, but the best approach IMO would have been. Create the game they wanted to make before actually releasing it.
QFT
Longer and more massive beta testing, IMHO the IP could have weathered an amount of NDA leakage that might have been feared as long as they were actually fixing the probs and polishing the game before charging us for a "release game that was still in an alpha phase"..
I heard they might be entering open beta soon, lol.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
I don't know if it's been said, but the best approach IMO would have been. Create the game they wanted to make before actually releasing it.
QFT
Longer and more massive beta testing, IMHO the IP could have weathered an amount of NDA leakage that might have been feared as long as they were actually fixing the probs and polishing the game before charging us for a "release game that was still in an alpha phase"..
I heard they might be entering open beta soon, lol.
Haha, I propose to the next company that's releasing an MMO...
When you think you are at "beta finish", the very next thing you do is allow the next million people that sign up, log in and do a "release beta" for the next 3-6 months.
THEN, if all things go well, release the game for real and actually earn the money we pay for the game and subs.
I don't know if it's been said, but the best approach IMO would have been. Create the game they wanted to make before actually releasing it.
QFT
Longer and more massive beta testing, IMHO the IP could have weathered an amount of NDA leakage that might have been feared as long as they were actually fixing the probs and polishing the game before charging us for a "release game that was still in an alpha phase"..
I heard they might be entering open beta soon, lol.
Haha, I propose to the next company that's releasing an MMO...
When you think you are at "beta finish", the very next thing you do is allow the next million people that sign up, log in and do a "release beta" for the next 3-6 months.
THEN, if all things go well, release the game for real and actually earn the money we pay for the game and subs.
Only in the land of the MMO does the saying "they don't make them like they used to" not apply lol. Well they do and they don't, but that's mostly because they still fail while trying to offer less.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
The best things about the game pre-NGE was the complexity and the community. They should have left those elements alone and worked on the other aspects of the game. I agree with the other poster that some of the devs were clueless and couldn't understand how people enjoyed non-combat aspects of the game (I am talking about you, Chris Cao). One of my favorite memories of the game was popping a Ranger camp and sitting around chatting with other people.
Yes the community was all this game had back then, the sandbox was and is the best idea they had. But the problems of not having a story or lack of content was the major flaw, they should have tried to please combat and noncombat players. They have done this but thiers a terrible lack of people on most servers to enjoy it now.
Time line, alot of us hated the time line or story, or lack of any story. They should have started the game after Vader, came up with a story; thier are a few Jedi still running around, and then created a story for Dark Jedi being around, maybe the Emperor trained up a Dark Jedi army.
Game mechanics, the old animations looked good, I do like the faster NGE paced combat though, but their needs to be a balance between looks and mechanics. Keep the old skill system, and new expertise system, build layers, they should have made it three tier.
Beginner, Master and then Legendary, each layer would add extra skill points and a few expertise points. And not make it based on grinding, base the elder percs on time, year two; you get master titles, year 3 legendary titles and access to extra skill points. That would have given everyone a chance to have a Uber toon without grind burnout.
They should have gone sandbox with space, copyied more of EVE, they did a little bit then stopped, we wanted capital ships and personal stations and system control like they have in EVE. Thier never was enough player planets, not enough citey openings for all the people to build a town.
Smedly was right about saying the NGE was what they should have started with, it has a good pvp combat system, thier are more things to do for other types of players, collections, instances, pvp It was just to late, the goose cooked itself with the lies and lack of content. SOE and LEC launched with half a game like AOC, the present lack of any support from LEC is apparent, the problem is George wont let SOE do anything drastic to save the game. You can see that he said let it die after NGE; slowly so the last players will not get mad with the brand, and then he called up Bioware and contracted a new MMO.
Everyone wanted to be a Jedi, and thats why SWTOR is based around a story line that will allow 70% of thier playerbase to be Jedi without making everyone else mad. . Its just to bad they cant make a MMO to fit the time line we all want.
I don't agree that Smed was right in saying they should have started with the NGE...I don't agree with that at all...I do think they should have started with the CU...The CU addressed many of the issues players had, yet got no time to grow because they were already cooking up the NGE...From what I can tell from reading a TON about it over the years one of the main issues was the fact that most of the Devs did not like the CU...So when a couple bosses way up said do something different they were on-board pretty quick because they did not like the Game as is...Many of them did not even like playing the game...That was a HUGE mistake...
Why? Because as far as I could tell, and I played Pre-CU and the CU, I knew a crap-load of folks who were adjusting to the CU just fine...Pretty much my whole Guild...Sure we lost a few that simply could not handle the change to the CU...But WAY more stayed than left...Way, way, way more stayed...I can't necessarily speak for other players and Guilds but all I saw was toons everywhere...Dant Mining Outpost so packed it caused me to upgrade my Comp...Forget about Mos Newbsly...It was insane...Plus we all knew something was coming during Pre-CU anyway...A lot of players were unhappy with the Game and lack of content...The Hologrind was horrible for the Game...Pre-CU felt more like Beta to me...Not that I did not like quite a few aspects of the Game...The foundation was there no question...But it was also archaic in a lot of ways...I cringe every time I see those old toolbar icons...The Combat was brutally slow...I think almost every MMO that anyone has played since proves that folks don't mind levels that much...They just want a good game with great content...The CU was at least the 1st step in that direction for me and almost all of my Guild...Most of the players I knew felt like the CU was really the launch of what SWG should have been...And I can only speak from My own experience but my Guild was absolutely hopping during the CU Months...We had such a flood of new folks constantly coming in that it was honestly hard to keep up with at times...3-4 full Hunting Groups every night around our City...It was crazy...I can honestly say that during the 5 or so Months of the CU I never once remember anyone crying for Pre-Cu in my Guild...And it was a HUGE Guild...I realize there were and still are quite a few VERY vocal Pre-CU supporters...I'm not trying to deny them their voice either...But the people I knew were moving on with little resistance and having a lot of fun too...We were having a blast...I think that's the dirty little secret of all this...There have been a ton of fibs told about the CU period...And I'm not the only one who thought/thinks that either...
Then the NGE hit and within 3 Months we lost over 75% of Our Guild...It was a terrible mistake...All they needed to do was be patient with the CU but it was the Devs who disliked it, who did not even like playing the game, who helped cost us that opportunity...I'm not saying they were solely responsible, I'm not saying I know much of anything...I am saying if there had been more internal support for the CU things may have turned out quite differently...It could have been one hell of a niche Game by now...That much I do know...
First off, they should never have implemented the CU or the NGE. You cannot give customers something and then take it away and say "tough Doodoo" and expect it to end well. That is just plain stupid farking marketing.
IMO what the PreCU desperately needed was polish. For example the reason Rifleman / Medic or Rifleman / Swordsman was so OP'd is that it was one of the few profs that had cert'd weapons with Heavy AP (Armor Piercing). All other profs, except jedi, had Medium AP at best. This is not to say the combat system was broken, it just was never completely finished.
Decay should never have been removed from the game. Decay caused constant crafted product consuption, kept the market open for new crafters, and kept prices under control. Removal of decay is the one thing that has hurt the player based economy and crafters the most by far.
Jedi as an alpha class was great and was in line with the SW saga. To have made a game with out jedi would not a Star Wars game, IMHO, and would have resulted in a total fail. SW fans want jedi, period. To resolve this all they had to do was provide a content path that would allow other professions to reach a similar alpha status and this could have been done with out actually nerfing jedi into a starting class.
Smeds statements have nothing to do with being a gamer and everything to do with being a richard in a suit. IE, the NGE is easier for them to maintiain and thus has a much lower fixed cost. Smed only thinks about money and he is a Toydarian, not a gamer.
I also think that their was something going on with Ralph and Smed butting heads. I would be money that when Ralph said FU to SOE he also reminded them that he had IP rights to parts of the game and that forced SOE to rewrite so that they could tell Ralph to take a flying Fark. Seen stuff like this happen in the corporate world many times and is always a fail effort in the end.
Fact is that LA / SOE had a gem and they got greedy and farked it up. Just another example among many where people start counting money before they make it.
Favourite content for me was the Corvette Mission, Death watch Bunker and Genosian Lab. I also liked places like Fort Tusken and the Krayt Graveyard. Spent a lot of time whackin' Nightsisters too, and looting crystals.
More of that would have been nice, but tbh, it was the game's profession/skill system and how this created community ties that I liked the best. It was important to find a good weaponsmith, tailor, armoursmith, entertainers etc.. Living in the StarWars universe, playing in the cantina, secretly joining the rebellion etc. was the best. If they added more Corevette-type content, that would have been gravy. I like gravy, but the meat was there. I also loved participating in the Civil War.
Having said that, some of the basic game mechanics needed fixes. When it was released, some of the professions hadn't had much time at all in test.
For me, the game would have been great if they ironed out the issues from release, and slowly but surely added some more content to an excellent skill/profession system that really gave us variety and helped us build community.
I really think they went wrong when they removed the skill system and just deleted so many people's professions. What a burn. Burning creature handlers was really bad, and so was torching all the effort it took people to unlock and develop a jedi. Whatever you think of the jedi system(s), wiping out months or years of progress on a character with a single revamp is a bad decision imo.
I also think they really screwed things up when they gutted the ToOW expansion just two weeks or so after it was released. A lot of that content was borked by the NGE. ToOW was made for the CU version of the game. NGE really wrecked it for a lot of people--hence the massive refunds. They also, of course, shouldn't have surprised people with the NGE the way they did. My two cents.
Comments
Bleh, I still carry a grudge for what they did to a once incredible gaming experience. If they would have stuck with the original concept, expanded and fixed what they had, then it would still be a rockin' MMO today.
WoW? What's that?
Bunch of fools. Oh well, there's always SWGEmu...
"Censorship is never over for those who have experienced it. It is a brand on the imagination that affects the individual who has suffered it, forever." - Noam Chomsky
I hated that place when I had dial up. Laggiest place in SWG. I died many horrible deaths in there.
The best direction would have been to finish adding all the things they promised to after launch. Asheron's Call style story lines (a brief 'Cries of Alderaan' partial story arc and the idea was dropped), directed content (quests and such were intended to be in the game from the start), and tools for players to add content (the Storyteller system was intended fom the start and was supposed to be much more in depth, think the Chronicle system without the mind numbing grind). They did add vehicles, mounts, and player cities along with the Jedi system before giving up on doing much beyond constant game mechanics sledgehammering.
We were told were were getting a sandbox filled with toys. We got a sandbox that was only half filled with sand instead. A few years ago, former SWG developer Greenmarine posted on the Broken Toy's blog that the reason was SOE's producers (he specifically posted that it was the SOE producers, not LEC's) thinking they knew better than the playerbase what the playerbase wanted (lack of content was the most prominent reason given for cancelling, yet content was ignored in favor of game mechanics sledgehammering) and a dev team comprised of primarily systems designers (hence a dev team more comfortable tinkering with the mechanics of the game instead of constructing content, and a good insication of why the content that was added was not particularly very good).
SWG was a game loaded with potential at launch that consistently had its potential stripped from it with every update.
Im very much in agreeance with this.
Yes the community was all this game had back then, the sandbox was and is the best idea they had. But the problems of not having a story or lack of content was the major flaw, they should have tried to please combat and noncombat players. They have done this but thiers a terrible lack of people on most servers to enjoy it now.
Time line, alot of us hated the time line or story, or lack of any story. They should have started the game after Vader, came up with a story; thier are a few Jedi still running around, and then created a story for Dark Jedi being around, maybe the Emperor trained up a Dark Jedi army.
Game mechanics, the old animations looked good, I do like the faster NGE paced combat though, but their needs to be a balance between looks and mechanics. Keep the old skill system, and new expertise system, build layers, they should have made it three tier.
Beginner, Master and then Legendary, each layer would add extra skill points and a few expertise points. And not make it based on grinding, base the elder percs on time, year two; you get master titles, year 3 legendary titles and access to extra skill points. That would have given everyone a chance to have a Uber toon without grind burnout.
They should have gone sandbox with space, copyied more of EVE, they did a little bit then stopped, we wanted capital ships and personal stations and system control like they have in EVE. Thier never was enough player planets, not enough citey openings for all the people to build a town.
Smedly was right about saying the NGE was what they should have started with, it has a good pvp combat system, thier are more things to do for other types of players, collections, instances, pvp It was just to late, the goose cooked itself with the lies and lack of content. SOE and LEC launched with half a game like AOC, the present lack of any support from LEC is apparent, the problem is George wont let SOE do anything drastic to save the game. You can see that he said let it die after NGE; slowly so the last players will not get mad with the brand, and then he called up Bioware and contracted a new MMO.
Everyone wanted to be a Jedi, and thats why SWTOR is based around a story line that will allow 70% of thier playerbase to be Jedi without making everyone else mad. . Its just to bad they cant make a MMO to fit the time line we all want.
I don't know if it's been said, but the best approach IMO would have been. Create the game they wanted to make before actually releasing it.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
QFT
Longer and more massive beta testing, IMHO the IP could have weathered an amount of NDA leakage that might have been feared as long as they were actually fixing the probs and polishing the game before charging us for a "release game that was still in an alpha phase"..
PIRATE LORDS
I heard they might be entering open beta soon, lol.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Haha, I propose to the next company that's releasing an MMO...
When you think you are at "beta finish", the very next thing you do is allow the next million people that sign up, log in and do a "release beta" for the next 3-6 months.
THEN, if all things go well, release the game for real and actually earn the money we pay for the game and subs.
PIRATE LORDS
Only in the land of the MMO does the saying "they don't make them like they used to" not apply lol. Well they do and they don't, but that's mostly because they still fail while trying to offer less.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
I don't agree that Smed was right in saying they should have started with the NGE...I don't agree with that at all...I do think they should have started with the CU...The CU addressed many of the issues players had, yet got no time to grow because they were already cooking up the NGE...From what I can tell from reading a TON about it over the years one of the main issues was the fact that most of the Devs did not like the CU...So when a couple bosses way up said do something different they were on-board pretty quick because they did not like the Game as is...Many of them did not even like playing the game...That was a HUGE mistake...
Why? Because as far as I could tell, and I played Pre-CU and the CU, I knew a crap-load of folks who were adjusting to the CU just fine...Pretty much my whole Guild...Sure we lost a few that simply could not handle the change to the CU...But WAY more stayed than left...Way, way, way more stayed...I can't necessarily speak for other players and Guilds but all I saw was toons everywhere...Dant Mining Outpost so packed it caused me to upgrade my Comp...Forget about Mos Newbsly...It was insane...Plus we all knew something was coming during Pre-CU anyway...A lot of players were unhappy with the Game and lack of content...The Hologrind was horrible for the Game...Pre-CU felt more like Beta to me...Not that I did not like quite a few aspects of the Game...The foundation was there no question...But it was also archaic in a lot of ways...I cringe every time I see those old toolbar icons...The Combat was brutally slow...I think almost every MMO that anyone has played since proves that folks don't mind levels that much...They just want a good game with great content...The CU was at least the 1st step in that direction for me and almost all of my Guild...Most of the players I knew felt like the CU was really the launch of what SWG should have been...And I can only speak from My own experience but my Guild was absolutely hopping during the CU Months...We had such a flood of new folks constantly coming in that it was honestly hard to keep up with at times...3-4 full Hunting Groups every night around our City...It was crazy...I can honestly say that during the 5 or so Months of the CU I never once remember anyone crying for Pre-Cu in my Guild...And it was a HUGE Guild...I realize there were and still are quite a few VERY vocal Pre-CU supporters...I'm not trying to deny them their voice either...But the people I knew were moving on with little resistance and having a lot of fun too...We were having a blast...I think that's the dirty little secret of all this...There have been a ton of fibs told about the CU period...And I'm not the only one who thought/thinks that either...
http://www.massively.com/2008/06/26/a-star-wars-galaxies-history-lesson-from-launch-to-the-nge-4
Then the NGE hit and within 3 Months we lost over 75% of Our Guild...It was a terrible mistake...All they needed to do was be patient with the CU but it was the Devs who disliked it, who did not even like playing the game, who helped cost us that opportunity...I'm not saying they were solely responsible, I'm not saying I know much of anything...I am saying if there had been more internal support for the CU things may have turned out quite differently...It could have been one hell of a niche Game by now...That much I do know...
First off, they should never have implemented the CU or the NGE. You cannot give customers something and then take it away and say "tough Doodoo" and expect it to end well. That is just plain stupid farking marketing.
IMO what the PreCU desperately needed was polish. For example the reason Rifleman / Medic or Rifleman / Swordsman was so OP'd is that it was one of the few profs that had cert'd weapons with Heavy AP (Armor Piercing). All other profs, except jedi, had Medium AP at best. This is not to say the combat system was broken, it just was never completely finished.
Decay should never have been removed from the game. Decay caused constant crafted product consuption, kept the market open for new crafters, and kept prices under control. Removal of decay is the one thing that has hurt the player based economy and crafters the most by far.
Jedi as an alpha class was great and was in line with the SW saga. To have made a game with out jedi would not a Star Wars game, IMHO, and would have resulted in a total fail. SW fans want jedi, period. To resolve this all they had to do was provide a content path that would allow other professions to reach a similar alpha status and this could have been done with out actually nerfing jedi into a starting class.
Smeds statements have nothing to do with being a gamer and everything to do with being a richard in a suit. IE, the NGE is easier for them to maintiain and thus has a much lower fixed cost. Smed only thinks about money and he is a Toydarian, not a gamer.
I also think that their was something going on with Ralph and Smed butting heads. I would be money that when Ralph said FU to SOE he also reminded them that he had IP rights to parts of the game and that forced SOE to rewrite so that they could tell Ralph to take a flying Fark. Seen stuff like this happen in the corporate world many times and is always a fail effort in the end.
Fact is that LA / SOE had a gem and they got greedy and farked it up. Just another example among many where people start counting money before they make it.
Favourite content for me was the Corvette Mission, Death watch Bunker and Genosian Lab. I also liked places like Fort Tusken and the Krayt Graveyard. Spent a lot of time whackin' Nightsisters too, and looting crystals.
More of that would have been nice, but tbh, it was the game's profession/skill system and how this created community ties that I liked the best. It was important to find a good weaponsmith, tailor, armoursmith, entertainers etc.. Living in the StarWars universe, playing in the cantina, secretly joining the rebellion etc. was the best. If they added more Corevette-type content, that would have been gravy. I like gravy, but the meat was there. I also loved participating in the Civil War.
Having said that, some of the basic game mechanics needed fixes. When it was released, some of the professions hadn't had much time at all in test.
For me, the game would have been great if they ironed out the issues from release, and slowly but surely added some more content to an excellent skill/profession system that really gave us variety and helped us build community.
I really think they went wrong when they removed the skill system and just deleted so many people's professions. What a burn. Burning creature handlers was really bad, and so was torching all the effort it took people to unlock and develop a jedi. Whatever you think of the jedi system(s), wiping out months or years of progress on a character with a single revamp is a bad decision imo.
I also think they really screwed things up when they gutted the ToOW expansion just two weeks or so after it was released. A lot of that content was borked by the NGE. ToOW was made for the CU version of the game. NGE really wrecked it for a lot of people--hence the massive refunds. They also, of course, shouldn't have surprised people with the NGE the way they did. My two cents.