And now that you mention it, I would like to see one of the MMORPG.com editors answer this simple question: Is SOE a paid advertiser on this site? I am not wearing a tin-foil hat, but in the interestes of full disclosure, it is a fair question.
They have been. I don't think they are right now, but they have bought ad space from us in the past, just like pretty much every other MMO company out there. Our content office and our business office are not only separate in terms of one not informing the other of its business, but we are also separated by a continent. Content = Nova Scotia Canada, Business = Hawaii.
So, since you can clearly see the ads on the site, if you're asking me if they are a secret advertiser, the answer is no. If SOE is paying us for AD SPACE, you'll know because you'll see an AD.
When a company purchases ad space from us, that's exactly what they get. They get a certain amount of space on the site to advertise their product, they don't get any input at all into content or editorial workings of the site.
I explained, quite rationally, the reason for the change in the words. I know there are a lot of people out there who would love for this to be some giant conspiracy, but it's not. Go back and look through older reviews and see what a 6.5 is worth. That's probably a more worthwile approach than insulting me and everyone else who works for MMORPG.com with these accusations.
Also, while we're at it... In what world is a 6.5 a score worth buying? I mean seriously. 6.5 is NOT A GOOD SCORE, nor is "Acceptable" a good descriptor. I suspect you won't see "Acceptable" - MMORPG.com on any boxes.
If I seem upset about this, it's because I am. Every time something like this comes up, it bothers me just a little bit more. I don't know why people feel like it's ok to insult someone else's integrity without a)any kind of evidence or b) knowing them at all.
Hope that clears things up for you.
Don't know if you were responding specifically to me, but I might have missed the part where I insulted you.
It was as a simple question, the answer to which reviewers in other media outlets routinely disclose. Especially, where a commerical relationship exists separate from products/services being analyzed or reviewed.
Consumer Reports (tm) has a very high degree of credibility, for example, because they take NO money, advertising or otherwise, from the companies whose products they review. It completely removes any perception of bias. You answered truthfully that SOE has been a paid advertiser in the past and may be in the future. That's fine, no one is saying different.
I can accept that reviews and advertising departments may be separate, and that one may not influence the other here, but the same can not be said for other sites (we remember that Gamespot deal, and others).
So, I think a bit of skepticism is both warranted and useful when such information is not disclaimed.
My god, you are comparing consumer reports to mmorpg.com? You expect mmorpg.com to exist outside the realm of online advertising space? Do you even like this site? I personally love this site. I think it to be one of the three sites on the web you can bet I will click on at least once per day.
So, unlike Consumer Reports, MMORPG.COM does not have decades of repuatation, and thousands of paid suscriptions to bloster itself. MMORPG.COM has advertisements to pay the bills. It also has a very good reputation in the gaming community. Sure, the SWG vets have congregated here, and yes, we feel welcome here, but MMO has not for one second either 1) allowed us to break their site rules or 2) kicked us out for having an opinion. MMORPG has been more than welcoming to ANTI-SOE viewpoints. SO MUCH SO THAT PLAYERS ON SWG'S FORUMS TARGET MMORPG FOR BEING ANTI-SOE!!!
Skepticism. Please. They changed a single word. ONE DAMNED WORD. And you are all over them like white on rice. Grow up, or go away, preferably both. They even bothered to explain it.
Played (more than a month): SWG, Second Life, Tabula Rasa, Lineage 2, Everquest 2, EvE, MxO, Ryzom.
What don't you get, SWG is no longer a sandbox, it has classes, no item decay means a dead economy, the crafters nightmare. SWG is just not a sandbox in any sense of the word.
It is still MORE of a sandbox than most MMO's. The "classes" (a/k/a iconic professions) are just some fencing erected to keep you from mixing professions like the old days. You can respec any time you want, and you keep your category XP (combat, trade, ent) when you do respec, which means if you switch back later you don't lose anything. Beast mastery is an option for everyone, and Pilot and Politician are still independent trees. That's still pretty sandbox-y.
I hear you about stuff like item decay, but that's hardly a sandbox issue, and it's purely policy also: if they wanted to turn it back on tomorrow, they could. The reason they don't want to is that they're worried that people on the various ghost servers will have no way to replace decayed stuff. There are lot of "permanent emergency" policies like that - take self destruct in JTL for example.
Part of the problem with all this is that while Vogel wanted a million casual Star Wars fan gamers, Koster built something elegant and complicated and unusual -- that appealed to a market 1/6th that size. Then they left. Brass at SOE/LEC never really "got" their own game, and the new developers found that if you messed with the gears too much, the pretty machine broke spectacularly. So most of the guts are still in there. They put a dunce cap and a strait jacket on it with the NGE, but the strait jacket is wearing thin and the gears are glinting through.
Wow. Strangely. That almost sums it up.
Played (more than a month): SWG, Second Life, Tabula Rasa, Lineage 2, Everquest 2, EvE, MxO, Ryzom.
And now that you mention it, I would like to see one of the MMORPG.com editors answer this simple question: Is SOE a paid advertiser on this site? I am not wearing a tin-foil hat, but in the interestes of full disclosure, it is a fair question.
They have been. I don't think they are right now, but they have bought ad space from us in the past, just like pretty much every other MMO company out there. Our content office and our business office are not only separate in terms of one not informing the other of its business, but we are also separated by a continent. Content = Nova Scotia Canada, Business = Hawaii.
So, since you can clearly see the ads on the site, if you're asking me if they are a secret advertiser, the answer is no. If SOE is paying us for AD SPACE, you'll know because you'll see an AD.
When a company purchases ad space from us, that's exactly what they get. They get a certain amount of space on the site to advertise their product, they don't get any input at all into content or editorial workings of the site.
I explained, quite rationally, the reason for the change in the words. I know there are a lot of people out there who would love for this to be some giant conspiracy, but it's not. Go back and look through older reviews and see what a 6.5 is worth. That's probably a more worthwile approach than insulting me and everyone else who works for MMORPG.com with these accusations.
Also, while we're at it... In what world is a 6.5 a score worth buying? I mean seriously. 6.5 is NOT A GOOD SCORE, nor is "Acceptable" a good descriptor. I suspect you won't see "Acceptable" - MMORPG.com on any boxes.
If I seem upset about this, it's because I am. Every time something like this comes up, it bothers me just a little bit more. I don't know why people feel like it's ok to insult someone else's integrity without a)any kind of evidence or b) knowing them at all.
Hope that clears things up for you.
Don't know if you were responding specifically to me, but I might have missed the part where I insulted you.
It was as a simple question, the answer to which reviewers in other media outlets routinely disclose. Especially, where a commerical relationship exists separate from products/services being analyzed or reviewed.
Consumer Reports (tm) has a very high degree of credibility, for example, because they take NO money, advertising or otherwise, from the companies whose products they review. It completely removes any perception of bias. You answered truthfully that SOE has been a paid advertiser in the past and may be in the future. That's fine, no one is saying different.
I can accept that reviews and advertising departments may be separate, and that one may not influence the other here, but the same can not be said for other sites (we remember that Gamespot deal, and others).
So, I think a bit of skepticism is both warranted and useful when such information is not disclaimed.
Yeah, I now regret quoting your post, as I could totally see what you were saying.
I think my frustrated response is to the people who automatically jump to those conclusions and feel perfectly free to make accusations (see some fo the earlier posts in this thread).
We make no bones about the fact that MMO companies advertise with us. The bottom line is that they are the companies that get the most out of advertising here (no one comes to MMORPG.com if they aren't at least interested in playing MMOs). As a result, we can change more for ad space from them than we could from say, Ford (remember, I'm guessing here. I have nothing to dow ith the business end of this site, thank God or we'd all be in trouble. Business man I am not.)
I'll tell you what: You'll know the first time that anything inappropriate happens. I've always said that I would leave this site if we were EVER to make ANY concessions in terms of reviews and the like for an advertiser. Both morally and in terms of my career, I couldn't afford to stay at a company that engaged in those kinds of activities. fortunately, in the 3+ years I';ve been here, there has never, ever been even a whisper of funny business.
Wood, why should you ever regret replying to a post that questions your ethics while touting the need for a tin-foil hat? I would fare to say most of us accepted the "page 5" explanation. As a complete SWG refugee, I have to say this site has never once banned me, or warned me for balsting SOE.
Let him wear his tin-foil hat.
By the way, MMORPG.COM is owned by Halibuton, and they are receiving 1/2 of the 700B bailout.
Played (more than a month): SWG, Second Life, Tabula Rasa, Lineage 2, Everquest 2, EvE, MxO, Ryzom.
"That said, the game itself remains one of, if not the, most unique endeavors in the short history of the MMORPG genre, and would do well to invest a bit of marketing effort in promoting itself as a thinking man's game rather than a clone of the combat-only orgies that are being churned out by virtually every development studio in the business."
I've been having a good time playing this game again. I re-subscribed at the end of August and rolled a new toon on one of the populated servers, and I gotta tell ya, it has been a real breath of fresh air compared to the gluttony of free to play mmo's that I tried, the WoW clones (AoC included) and the over-hyped failure that Vanguard turned out to be. SWG has a shady past, there's no getting around that point. But if you lay every modern mmo on the table next to each other as they stand now, there simply is no other game that compares to SWG and what it has to offer the player looking for a sandbox style mmo.
What don't you get, SWG is no longer a sandbox, it has classes, no item decay means a dead economy, the crafters nightmare. SWG is just not a sandbox in any sense of the word.
For a "dead economy" I sure do sell alot of crafted armour and weapons...
"That said, the game itself remains one of, if not the, most unique endeavors in the short history of the MMORPG genre, and would do well to invest a bit of marketing effort in promoting itself as a thinking man's game rather than a clone of the combat-only orgies that are being churned out by virtually every development studio in the business."
I've been having a good time playing this game again. I re-subscribed at the end of August and rolled a new toon on one of the populated servers, and I gotta tell ya, it has been a real breath of fresh air compared to the gluttony of free to play mmo's that I tried, the WoW clones (AoC included) and the over-hyped failure that Vanguard turned out to be. SWG has a shady past, there's no getting around that point. But if you lay every modern mmo on the table next to each other as they stand now, there simply is no other game that compares to SWG and what it has to offer the player looking for a sandbox style mmo.
First I must ask, which servers are still populated?
Second, the folks I have seen that still play, normally just bot the whole time, they don't realy play. It is like they are so used to the game and a dedicated fan to the IP that they can't walk away from it, and so jaded by past experiences that they can't actually enjoy playing, so they just let their PC play the game for them.
It is like the game is entirely populated with non-speaking robots, or Chinese gold farmers
"That said, the game itself remains one of, if not the, most unique endeavors in the short history of the MMORPG genre, and would do well to invest a bit of marketing effort in promoting itself as a thinking man's game rather than a clone of the combat-only orgies that are being churned out by virtually every development studio in the business."
I've been having a good time playing this game again. I re-subscribed at the end of August and rolled a new toon on one of the populated servers, and I gotta tell ya, it has been a real breath of fresh air compared to the gluttony of free to play mmo's that I tried, the WoW clones (AoC included) and the over-hyped failure that Vanguard turned out to be. SWG has a shady past, there's no getting around that point. But if you lay every modern mmo on the table next to each other as they stand now, there simply is no other game that compares to SWG and what it has to offer the player looking for a sandbox style mmo.
What don't you get, SWG is no longer a sandbox, it has classes, no item decay means a dead economy, the crafters nightmare. SWG is just not a sandbox in any sense of the word.
For a "dead economy" I sure do sell alot of crafted armour and weapons...
That may only be factual for you. What’s your definition of “alot”??? Is it just your opinion? In other words is it based on your opinion or others who play? You also say there’s “alot” of people still playing, yet what most other players say, and from what I’ve seen, our opinion seems to differ from your opinion substantially. Are you using NGE sales statistics? Are you comparing them to pre-nge sales statistics? And who's? Yours? The entire server? Or the whole game?
See the thing is "alot" for some people is different from person to person, server to server. So what you should have stated is that "my sales seem to be fine for me"
"That said, the game itself remains one of, if not the, most unique endeavors in the short history of the MMORPG genre, and would do well to invest a bit of marketing effort in promoting itself as a thinking man's game rather than a clone of the combat-only orgies that are being churned out by virtually every development studio in the business."
I've been having a good time playing this game again. I re-subscribed at the end of August and rolled a new toon on one of the populated servers, and I gotta tell ya, it has been a real breath of fresh air compared to the gluttony of free to play mmo's that I tried, the WoW clones (AoC included) and the over-hyped failure that Vanguard turned out to be. SWG has a shady past, there's no getting around that point. But if you lay every modern mmo on the table next to each other as they stand now, there simply is no other game that compares to SWG and what it has to offer the player looking for a sandbox style mmo.
What don't you get, SWG is no longer a sandbox, it has classes, no item decay means a dead economy, the crafters nightmare. SWG is just not a sandbox in any sense of the word.
For a "dead economy" I sure do sell alot of crafted armour and weapons...
That may only be factual for you. What’s your definition of “alot”??? Is it just your opinion? In other words is it based on your opinion or others who play? You also say there’s “alot” of people still playing, yet what most other players say, and from what I’ve seen, our opinion seems to differ from your opinion substantially. Are you using NGE sales statistics? Are you comparing them to pre-nge sales statistics? And who's? Yours? The entire server? Or the whole game?
See the thing is "alot" for some people is different from person to person, server to server. So what you should have stated is that "my sales seem to be fine for me"
"Alot" is getting 4 or 5 orders a day for custom armour orders. Considering each order takes about 12 hours or more of factory time, I'm usually backed up by about 10-15 orders so people end up waiting around a week. Ontop of that, I get about 3-4 custom weapon orders a day. Then there's vendor sales...
I don't really talk to the other AS's on the server. I used to talk quite often with one of the other big AS's on the server but sadly, he passed away a month or two ago (was a big memorial held on Chilastra for him). So I can't say how I compare to the other AS's on Chilly.
Compared to pre-nge? Most armour sales were done through the vendors because people didn't want to buy custom layered armour due to it being far too expensive to replace every week. Naturally, with decay there were more sales back then but IMO, they were sales that weren't all that fun to achieve as there wasn't much to them.
"That said, the game itself remains one of, if not the, most unique endeavors in the short history of the MMORPG genre, and would do well to invest a bit of marketing effort in promoting itself as a thinking man's game rather than a clone of the combat-only orgies that are being churned out by virtually every development studio in the business."
I've been having a good time playing this game again. I re-subscribed at the end of August and rolled a new toon on one of the populated servers, and I gotta tell ya, it has been a real breath of fresh air compared to the gluttony of free to play mmo's that I tried, the WoW clones (AoC included) and the over-hyped failure that Vanguard turned out to be. SWG has a shady past, there's no getting around that point. But if you lay every modern mmo on the table next to each other as they stand now, there simply is no other game that compares to SWG and what it has to offer the player looking for a sandbox style mmo.
What don't you get, SWG is no longer a sandbox, it has classes, no item decay means a dead economy, the crafters nightmare. SWG is just not a sandbox in any sense of the word.
Oh, my bad. I guess I was wrong. Here, I'll go ahead and slap my own hand for you. How silly of me to think that I was actually enjoying myself.
Maybe you could give me a little help and let me know which game I should actually be playing right now?
So a writer can start a flamebait thread, but we users can't? Hey...
It's obvious this topic will attract flames and trolling while some sad fans try desperately to defend the game. This thread, as most SWG threads on any forum, and the game itself, is full of fail...bleh...
I can remember doctors having line ups at the starports and waiting around for a buff. When the NGE was released that alone left the starports empty and barren. That is just one of many examples how the NGE acted like a vacuum. Alot of the decisions for swg was made on whim I believe. And I'm sure there was really no concern too the process and effect to the aftermath that the NGE caused. Even if the subs were leaving after the cu that was nothing in comparison to how many jumped ship or commited character suicide when the NGE was forced on us.
When I was working nights and played during the day hours a few months back "ALL" the servers were low population and the only people that happen to be plays was the farmer spammers (BUY CREDITS AT LOW PRICES ORDER NOW) Those are the only people that I saw standing around you can't call them players and how many wardens does it take too silence the spammers. That was the Bloodfin server I transfer from Kuari which is DEAD !!!
I still ask the why can't the have a classic server. If the idea is to generate cash and thats what the NGE was for then the classic server would be the icing on the cake.
Compared to pre-nge? Most armour sales were done through the vendors because people didn't want to buy custom layered armour due to it being far too expensive to replace every week. Naturally, with decay there were more sales back then but IMO, they were sales that weren't all that fun to achieve as there wasn't much to them.
I'm a little confused by this.
Who was going through armour once a week, and what was so expensive about it?
Also, your point about about not having fun because "there wasn't much to them" is an issue relating (again) to buffs. Had buffs been addressed then encumbrance would have become an issue again therefore the crafting of armour would have been greatly affected due to this. And vendors were not neccessarily the problem. a global vender search removed the incentive to talking to an armoursmith and building a relationship with him.
This review would be a good place to send former players so they can get an idea of the game as it is now. I get a lot of old players coming back to the game that just can't adjust to it being a new game and constantly compare it to the old game, a bit like some of the comments in this thread.
Compared to pre-nge? Most armour sales were done through the vendors because people didn't want to buy custom layered armour due to it being far too expensive to replace every week. Naturally, with decay there were more sales back then but IMO, they were sales that weren't all that fun to achieve as there wasn't much to them.
I'm a little confused by this.
Who was going through armour once a week, and what was so expensive about it?
Also, your point about about not having fun because "there wasn't much to them" is an issue relating (again) to buffs. Had buffs been addressed then encumbrance would have become an issue again therefore the crafting of armour would have been greatly affected due to this. And vendors were not neccessarily the problem. a global vender search removed the incentive to talking to an armoursmith and building a relationship with him.
I agree with that! Instead of asking all you had to do was look.
I once thought that i should try to aproach the new SWG as it's own game. But i realized that the SWG as it is now is still much less than it was. SWG is an alright game, the best part being the space side of it. But otherwise it still is just a shadow of what it was. However both the old and the NGE fall way short on any real galaxies type content. There are no "OCRAP!! We have to save the UNIVERSE as we know it!!" missions.
SWG isnt SWG when it comes to travelling, it has a limited number of places to go, once you cap, its a bust to play, There never was any high lvl content in any version of the game. It has the potential to be a really great game, but it always seems to just settle for mediocrity. I would have thought by now it would have 15 or even 20 full sized systems to explore and fight in, but it seems instead to spend it's resources constantly trying to re-invent itself.
As a person who has played all 3 versions of the game, if you put them side by side for comparison, the original version was the best of all 3 overall, but they all fall short when it comes to high level content, real SWG content as seen in the movies. I mean who of us would turn down a chance to fight and possibly defeat Lord Vader, or even the Emperor?
Compared to pre-nge? Most armour sales were done through the vendors because people didn't want to buy custom layered armour due to it being far too expensive to replace every week. Naturally, with decay there were more sales back then but IMO, they were sales that weren't all that fun to achieve as there wasn't much to them.
I'm a little confused by this.
Who was going through armour once a week, and what was so expensive about it?
Also, your point about about not having fun because "there wasn't much to them" is an issue relating (again) to buffs. Had buffs been addressed then encumbrance would have become an issue again therefore the crafting of armour would have been greatly affected due to this. And vendors were not neccessarily the problem. a global vender search removed the incentive to talking to an armoursmith and building a relationship with him.
I'm referring to the CU period. People didn't buy layered armour because it's expensive to make/buy and with the decay rate in the CU, if you were active with combat your armour was pretty much done by the end of a week. Buying layered armour wasn't economical back then. So, people instead went with unlayered armour which is relatively easy to cap. It made little sense to do custom orders in those days (except for those with enough ADK's). Now without decay, people are more likely to invest in a layered suit and have it made specially instead of buying whatever off a vendor - it's where the majority of my armour sales come from.
a good review, it brought back a lot of memories, I too am a swg veterano having mastered the game prior to being nuked. I just did not like the changes that occurred to the combat system then bailed
Good review its a fair and honest review. Though I'd like too see a live interview with some tough questions asked. Maybe a few other people have some questions and Stradden can do a live interview with Smed LOL.
I would like to see this too, not only on this site, but in journalism as a whole. The problem is the marketing types that you have to wade through to get to the people who actually work on the games and have something to say that is worth printing in a responsible article. Smedley and other executives like him have very little to do with the game aspects of SWG; his job is to put a positive face on whatever is going on with the product and ensure that it sells through as much as possible.
The folks that game companies trot out to do 'live interviews' are normally not designers, they are PR men who are highly trained in the art of giving answers that are, at best, evasive and at worst, untrue. Its the same thing you see in political interviews and really any other kind of journalism. The interviewee is normally someone with very little to gain by doing the interview, and a lot to lose (subscribers, credibility, money, whatever). The interviewer is usually hand-cuffed prior to the 'live' interview, and informed, either by the subject or the subject's PR handlers, that certain things are off-limits and any pressing beyond those boundaries will result in the ending of the session. Peter Moore provided lots of great soundbytes to interviewers when he was with Microsoft and now EA, but if you look closely at his many interviews, you'll see very little information actually disclosed, and that which was disclosed was very carefully selected to convey his company's message and present his product in the best possible light, not inform the reader. That's just the way this stuff works, unfortunately.
Even if Smedley were to sit down with myself or anyone else who writes for this site, chances are that you the reader wouldn't get the answers to the hard questions you want, simply because its not in his or his company's best interest to provide them.
Utterly crap review. How much was MMORPG paid by SOE to write this?
First off, there is no sandbox anymore. Any sandbox elements that remain were left by accident, and aren't supported at all. In fact, don't talk about them, they remove sandbox (ie: non loot controlled) stuff on sight!
Also, the author pays no attention to the fact that the populations in the game have completely crashed, outside 2-3 servers you see no one.
Nor does he point out the HUGE glaring bugs that given that many date back to release should have the Dev team hiding thier faces in shame (if they had any pride), such as mobs spawning (and running) in and through objects, shooting through terrain, etc.
And I find it really funny that he pans pvp in SWG, given that the dumbasses who came up with the NGE in the first place spent the first year of it basically inventing pvp systems. Just goes to show you how poor management in this game has been.
And as for the dev teams, it's now on number 4, having once again lost both it's lead dev and producer.
Note: Most of the ex SWGNGE devs have moved on (and through) the DC Online team. Which should be a warning to anyone seriously considering that game.
I believe that people have to be held accountable for there actions. Players who pay for a boxed mmo ($60.00) and a month subscription ($15.00) desever answers when questions are asked. And I understand that it cost alot of money to create and mmo. But there was a time when mmo's had the basics such as (Player Housing) (Crafting) (PVP) (PVE) on release. Today most developers throw promises of game features like it was candy too the mass fanbase and community , without regard too the damage they create. Thus damage control comes into play.
And at time it can be the community who needs to step back as well because they have the power too help or destroy the reputation of an mmo (SWG). Developers at one time used creative ideas too create a mmo instead of building a clone of a shallow game.
I believe that people have to be held accountable for there actions. Players who pay for a boxed mmo ($60.00) and a month subscription ($15.00) desever answers when questions are asked.
While I agree with the spirit of what you're getting at here, the reality in the business world is quite different, in my opinion.
MMO companies, like any other for-profit organization, are under no impetus to be completely transparent to their customers. On the contrary, they would be extremely stupid to do so, as it would negatively affect their bottom line. There is no contract between a player and a game service provider; the only right a player has is the right to stop paying for the service. I understand that people feel invested due to the large amounts of time spent in various game worlds (I feel that way myself), but the reality is that they are renters, not owners, and have no rights whatsoever.
I would love it if devs, and more importantly marketing types, were more forthcoming with their information, but the reality is that telling half-truths on marketing tours and retconning past statements in light of new information is how the game is played, and that will never change. These guys work for a living like most everyone else, and they will do what they have to do to keep the paycheck coming.
Sure its a little bit distasteful, but that's the way the business world works, and for whatever reason, a lot of mmo gamers have trouble grasping this.
The moral of the story is to take what anyone in the entertainment industry (game devs, producers, etc) says with a grain of salt. They are all trying to sell you something. The best you can expect is to get a little bit of enjoyment out of a product while you can.
So did they do this review mostly to get a bunch of hits from pissed off former players that would come here to rant about it?
Let the thing go... there isn't any reason currently to re-review the game.
One thing I saw about people being accountable for their actions etc
Part of the problem is when you work with a 3rd party IP that you do not own. In general on a certain level you are going to have NDA agreements. Thus the people who are really responsible will never take the blame and if you talk about it.. you will end up in court.
Not to mention most likely never work in your chosen field again.
The NGE didn't just destroy a game.. it destroyed a community and by the looks of it.. pretty much took one company down with it.. while the other just walked off to find another developer to make a WoW clone with star wars skins from the start.
yes that's my opinion.
I feel sorry for the people they put on this game now.. as they are taking heat or seeing very little return on their acitons (at least very little positive) for a situation they did not create.
What the hell? Yesterday the one word comment to its 6.5 rating was mediocre . Which I can agree but now it is this - Final Score
6.5
Acceptable The NGE is far cry from Acceptable, at least in the eyes of the over 200,000 fromer SOE customers who quickly made it part of their MMO gaming history. Did SOE squeeze hard after reading the word mediocre because this game is truly mediocre and that is being nice.
Very lame of whoever changed it and proves that SOE's reach to the forum is true.
soe should just pay me to shut up. i need a new cpu anyway.
Comments
They have been. I don't think they are right now, but they have bought ad space from us in the past, just like pretty much every other MMO company out there. Our content office and our business office are not only separate in terms of one not informing the other of its business, but we are also separated by a continent. Content = Nova Scotia Canada, Business = Hawaii.
So, since you can clearly see the ads on the site, if you're asking me if they are a secret advertiser, the answer is no. If SOE is paying us for AD SPACE, you'll know because you'll see an AD.
When a company purchases ad space from us, that's exactly what they get. They get a certain amount of space on the site to advertise their product, they don't get any input at all into content or editorial workings of the site.
I explained, quite rationally, the reason for the change in the words. I know there are a lot of people out there who would love for this to be some giant conspiracy, but it's not. Go back and look through older reviews and see what a 6.5 is worth. That's probably a more worthwile approach than insulting me and everyone else who works for MMORPG.com with these accusations.
Also, while we're at it... In what world is a 6.5 a score worth buying? I mean seriously. 6.5 is NOT A GOOD SCORE, nor is "Acceptable" a good descriptor. I suspect you won't see "Acceptable" - MMORPG.com on any boxes.
If I seem upset about this, it's because I am. Every time something like this comes up, it bothers me just a little bit more. I don't know why people feel like it's ok to insult someone else's integrity without a)any kind of evidence or b) knowing them at all.
Hope that clears things up for you.
Don't know if you were responding specifically to me, but I might have missed the part where I insulted you.
It was as a simple question, the answer to which reviewers in other media outlets routinely disclose. Especially, where a commerical relationship exists separate from products/services being analyzed or reviewed.
Consumer Reports (tm) has a very high degree of credibility, for example, because they take NO money, advertising or otherwise, from the companies whose products they review. It completely removes any perception of bias. You answered truthfully that SOE has been a paid advertiser in the past and may be in the future. That's fine, no one is saying different.
I can accept that reviews and advertising departments may be separate, and that one may not influence the other here, but the same can not be said for other sites (we remember that Gamespot deal, and others).
So, I think a bit of skepticism is both warranted and useful when such information is not disclaimed.
My god, you are comparing consumer reports to mmorpg.com? You expect mmorpg.com to exist outside the realm of online advertising space? Do you even like this site? I personally love this site. I think it to be one of the three sites on the web you can bet I will click on at least once per day.
So, unlike Consumer Reports, MMORPG.COM does not have decades of repuatation, and thousands of paid suscriptions to bloster itself. MMORPG.COM has advertisements to pay the bills. It also has a very good reputation in the gaming community. Sure, the SWG vets have congregated here, and yes, we feel welcome here, but MMO has not for one second either 1) allowed us to break their site rules or 2) kicked us out for having an opinion. MMORPG has been more than welcoming to ANTI-SOE viewpoints. SO MUCH SO THAT PLAYERS ON SWG'S FORUMS TARGET MMORPG FOR BEING ANTI-SOE!!!
Skepticism. Please. They changed a single word. ONE DAMNED WORD. And you are all over them like white on rice. Grow up, or go away, preferably both. They even bothered to explain it.
Played (more than a month): SWG, Second Life, Tabula Rasa, Lineage 2, Everquest 2, EvE, MxO, Ryzom.
Tried: WoW, Shadowbane, Anarchy Online, Everquest, WWII Online, Planetside
Beta: Lotro, Tabula Rasa, WAR.
It is still MORE of a sandbox than most MMO's. The "classes" (a/k/a iconic professions) are just some fencing erected to keep you from mixing professions like the old days. You can respec any time you want, and you keep your category XP (combat, trade, ent) when you do respec, which means if you switch back later you don't lose anything. Beast mastery is an option for everyone, and Pilot and Politician are still independent trees. That's still pretty sandbox-y.
I hear you about stuff like item decay, but that's hardly a sandbox issue, and it's purely policy also: if they wanted to turn it back on tomorrow, they could. The reason they don't want to is that they're worried that people on the various ghost servers will have no way to replace decayed stuff. There are lot of "permanent emergency" policies like that - take self destruct in JTL for example.
Part of the problem with all this is that while Vogel wanted a million casual Star Wars fan gamers, Koster built something elegant and complicated and unusual -- that appealed to a market 1/6th that size. Then they left. Brass at SOE/LEC never really "got" their own game, and the new developers found that if you messed with the gears too much, the pretty machine broke spectacularly. So most of the guts are still in there. They put a dunce cap and a strait jacket on it with the NGE, but the strait jacket is wearing thin and the gears are glinting through.
Wow. Strangely. That almost sums it up.
Played (more than a month): SWG, Second Life, Tabula Rasa, Lineage 2, Everquest 2, EvE, MxO, Ryzom.
Tried: WoW, Shadowbane, Anarchy Online, Everquest, WWII Online, Planetside
Beta: Lotro, Tabula Rasa, WAR.
They have been. I don't think they are right now, but they have bought ad space from us in the past, just like pretty much every other MMO company out there. Our content office and our business office are not only separate in terms of one not informing the other of its business, but we are also separated by a continent. Content = Nova Scotia Canada, Business = Hawaii.
So, since you can clearly see the ads on the site, if you're asking me if they are a secret advertiser, the answer is no. If SOE is paying us for AD SPACE, you'll know because you'll see an AD.
When a company purchases ad space from us, that's exactly what they get. They get a certain amount of space on the site to advertise their product, they don't get any input at all into content or editorial workings of the site.
I explained, quite rationally, the reason for the change in the words. I know there are a lot of people out there who would love for this to be some giant conspiracy, but it's not. Go back and look through older reviews and see what a 6.5 is worth. That's probably a more worthwile approach than insulting me and everyone else who works for MMORPG.com with these accusations.
Also, while we're at it... In what world is a 6.5 a score worth buying? I mean seriously. 6.5 is NOT A GOOD SCORE, nor is "Acceptable" a good descriptor. I suspect you won't see "Acceptable" - MMORPG.com on any boxes.
If I seem upset about this, it's because I am. Every time something like this comes up, it bothers me just a little bit more. I don't know why people feel like it's ok to insult someone else's integrity without a)any kind of evidence or b) knowing them at all.
Hope that clears things up for you.
Don't know if you were responding specifically to me, but I might have missed the part where I insulted you.
It was as a simple question, the answer to which reviewers in other media outlets routinely disclose. Especially, where a commerical relationship exists separate from products/services being analyzed or reviewed.
Consumer Reports (tm) has a very high degree of credibility, for example, because they take NO money, advertising or otherwise, from the companies whose products they review. It completely removes any perception of bias. You answered truthfully that SOE has been a paid advertiser in the past and may be in the future. That's fine, no one is saying different.
I can accept that reviews and advertising departments may be separate, and that one may not influence the other here, but the same can not be said for other sites (we remember that Gamespot deal, and others).
So, I think a bit of skepticism is both warranted and useful when such information is not disclaimed.
Yeah, I now regret quoting your post, as I could totally see what you were saying.
I think my frustrated response is to the people who automatically jump to those conclusions and feel perfectly free to make accusations (see some fo the earlier posts in this thread).
We make no bones about the fact that MMO companies advertise with us. The bottom line is that they are the companies that get the most out of advertising here (no one comes to MMORPG.com if they aren't at least interested in playing MMOs). As a result, we can change more for ad space from them than we could from say, Ford (remember, I'm guessing here. I have nothing to dow ith the business end of this site, thank God or we'd all be in trouble. Business man I am not.)
I'll tell you what: You'll know the first time that anything inappropriate happens. I've always said that I would leave this site if we were EVER to make ANY concessions in terms of reviews and the like for an advertiser. Both morally and in terms of my career, I couldn't afford to stay at a company that engaged in those kinds of activities. fortunately, in the 3+ years I';ve been here, there has never, ever been even a whisper of funny business.
Wood, why should you ever regret replying to a post that questions your ethics while touting the need for a tin-foil hat? I would fare to say most of us accepted the "page 5" explanation. As a complete SWG refugee, I have to say this site has never once banned me, or warned me for balsting SOE.
Let him wear his tin-foil hat.
By the way, MMORPG.COM is owned by Halibuton, and they are receiving 1/2 of the 700B bailout.
Played (more than a month): SWG, Second Life, Tabula Rasa, Lineage 2, Everquest 2, EvE, MxO, Ryzom.
Tried: WoW, Shadowbane, Anarchy Online, Everquest, WWII Online, Planetside
Beta: Lotro, Tabula Rasa, WAR.
What don't you get, SWG is no longer a sandbox, it has classes, no item decay means a dead economy, the crafters nightmare. SWG is just not a sandbox in any sense of the word.
For a "dead economy" I sure do sell alot of crafted armour and weapons...
First I must ask, which servers are still populated?
Second, the folks I have seen that still play, normally just bot the whole time, they don't realy play. It is like they are so used to the game and a dedicated fan to the IP that they can't walk away from it, and so jaded by past experiences that they can't actually enjoy playing, so they just let their PC play the game for them.
It is like the game is entirely populated with non-speaking robots, or Chinese gold farmers
What don't you get, SWG is no longer a sandbox, it has classes, no item decay means a dead economy, the crafters nightmare. SWG is just not a sandbox in any sense of the word.
For a "dead economy" I sure do sell alot of crafted armour and weapons...
That may only be factual for you. What’s your definition of “alot”??? Is it just your opinion? In other words is it based on your opinion or others who play? You also say there’s “alot” of people still playing, yet what most other players say, and from what I’ve seen, our opinion seems to differ from your opinion substantially. Are you using NGE sales statistics? Are you comparing them to pre-nge sales statistics? And who's? Yours? The entire server? Or the whole game?
See the thing is "alot" for some people is different from person to person, server to server. So what you should have stated is that "my sales seem to be fine for me"
What don't you get, SWG is no longer a sandbox, it has classes, no item decay means a dead economy, the crafters nightmare. SWG is just not a sandbox in any sense of the word.
For a "dead economy" I sure do sell alot of crafted armour and weapons...
That may only be factual for you. What’s your definition of “alot”??? Is it just your opinion? In other words is it based on your opinion or others who play? You also say there’s “alot” of people still playing, yet what most other players say, and from what I’ve seen, our opinion seems to differ from your opinion substantially. Are you using NGE sales statistics? Are you comparing them to pre-nge sales statistics? And who's? Yours? The entire server? Or the whole game?
See the thing is "alot" for some people is different from person to person, server to server. So what you should have stated is that "my sales seem to be fine for me"
"Alot" is getting 4 or 5 orders a day for custom armour orders. Considering each order takes about 12 hours or more of factory time, I'm usually backed up by about 10-15 orders so people end up waiting around a week. Ontop of that, I get about 3-4 custom weapon orders a day. Then there's vendor sales...
I don't really talk to the other AS's on the server. I used to talk quite often with one of the other big AS's on the server but sadly, he passed away a month or two ago (was a big memorial held on Chilastra for him). So I can't say how I compare to the other AS's on Chilly.
Compared to pre-nge? Most armour sales were done through the vendors because people didn't want to buy custom layered armour due to it being far too expensive to replace every week. Naturally, with decay there were more sales back then but IMO, they were sales that weren't all that fun to achieve as there wasn't much to them.
What don't you get, SWG is no longer a sandbox, it has classes, no item decay means a dead economy, the crafters nightmare. SWG is just not a sandbox in any sense of the word.
Oh, my bad. I guess I was wrong. Here, I'll go ahead and slap my own hand for you. How silly of me to think that I was actually enjoying myself.
Maybe you could give me a little help and let me know which game I should actually be playing right now?
Angels Online, baby, Angels Online!
Angels Online, baby, Angels Online!
Hahaha, very nice. It has robots, pets, mounts and skills. It's pre-cu all over again! (with much cuter graphics!)
http://ao.igg.com/upload/2008/09/29070632167.jpg
Hey, add eight cutesy Rancors and you have Theed circa 2004.
So a writer can start a flamebait thread, but we users can't? Hey...
It's obvious this topic will attract flames and trolling while some sad fans try desperately to defend the game. This thread, as most SWG threads on any forum, and the game itself, is full of fail...bleh...
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Grammar nazi's. This one is for you.
I don't know JyCowboy
I can remember doctors having line ups at the starports and waiting around for a buff. When the NGE was released that alone left the starports empty and barren. That is just one of many examples how the NGE acted like a vacuum. Alot of the decisions for swg was made on whim I believe. And I'm sure there was really no concern too the process and effect to the aftermath that the NGE caused. Even if the subs were leaving after the cu that was nothing in comparison to how many jumped ship or commited character suicide when the NGE was forced on us.
When I was working nights and played during the day hours a few months back "ALL" the servers were low population and the only people that happen to be plays was the farmer spammers (BUY CREDITS AT LOW PRICES ORDER NOW) Those are the only people that I saw standing around you can't call them players and how many wardens does it take too silence the spammers. That was the Bloodfin server I transfer from Kuari which is DEAD !!!
I still ask the why can't the have a classic server. If the idea is to generate cash and thats what the NGE was for then the classic server would be the icing on the cake.
I'm a little confused by this.
Who was going through armour once a week, and what was so expensive about it?
Also, your point about about not having fun because "there wasn't much to them" is an issue relating (again) to buffs. Had buffs been addressed then encumbrance would have become an issue again therefore the crafting of armour would have been greatly affected due to this. And vendors were not neccessarily the problem. a global vender search removed the incentive to talking to an armoursmith and building a relationship with him.
Overall a good review of the current game.
This review would be a good place to send former players so they can get an idea of the game as it is now. I get a lot of old players coming back to the game that just can't adjust to it being a new game and constantly compare it to the old game, a bit like some of the comments in this thread.
I'm a little confused by this.
Who was going through armour once a week, and what was so expensive about it?
Also, your point about about not having fun because "there wasn't much to them" is an issue relating (again) to buffs. Had buffs been addressed then encumbrance would have become an issue again therefore the crafting of armour would have been greatly affected due to this. And vendors were not neccessarily the problem. a global vender search removed the incentive to talking to an armoursmith and building a relationship with him.
I agree with that! Instead of asking all you had to do was look.
I once thought that i should try to aproach the new SWG as it's own game. But i realized that the SWG as it is now is still much less than it was. SWG is an alright game, the best part being the space side of it. But otherwise it still is just a shadow of what it was. However both the old and the NGE fall way short on any real galaxies type content. There are no "OCRAP!! We have to save the UNIVERSE as we know it!!" missions.
SWG isnt SWG when it comes to travelling, it has a limited number of places to go, once you cap, its a bust to play, There never was any high lvl content in any version of the game. It has the potential to be a really great game, but it always seems to just settle for mediocrity. I would have thought by now it would have 15 or even 20 full sized systems to explore and fight in, but it seems instead to spend it's resources constantly trying to re-invent itself.
As a person who has played all 3 versions of the game, if you put them side by side for comparison, the original version was the best of all 3 overall, but they all fall short when it comes to high level content, real SWG content as seen in the movies. I mean who of us would turn down a chance to fight and possibly defeat Lord Vader, or even the Emperor?
I'm a little confused by this.
Who was going through armour once a week, and what was so expensive about it?
Also, your point about about not having fun because "there wasn't much to them" is an issue relating (again) to buffs. Had buffs been addressed then encumbrance would have become an issue again therefore the crafting of armour would have been greatly affected due to this. And vendors were not neccessarily the problem. a global vender search removed the incentive to talking to an armoursmith and building a relationship with him.
I'm referring to the CU period. People didn't buy layered armour because it's expensive to make/buy and with the decay rate in the CU, if you were active with combat your armour was pretty much done by the end of a week. Buying layered armour wasn't economical back then. So, people instead went with unlayered armour which is relatively easy to cap. It made little sense to do custom orders in those days (except for those with enough ADK's). Now without decay, people are more likely to invest in a layered suit and have it made specially instead of buying whatever off a vendor - it's where the majority of my armour sales come from.
a good review, it brought back a lot of memories, I too am a swg veterano having mastered the game prior to being nuked. I just did not like the changes that occurred to the combat system then bailed
I would like to see this too, not only on this site, but in journalism as a whole. The problem is the marketing types that you have to wade through to get to the people who actually work on the games and have something to say that is worth printing in a responsible article. Smedley and other executives like him have very little to do with the game aspects of SWG; his job is to put a positive face on whatever is going on with the product and ensure that it sells through as much as possible.
The folks that game companies trot out to do 'live interviews' are normally not designers, they are PR men who are highly trained in the art of giving answers that are, at best, evasive and at worst, untrue. Its the same thing you see in political interviews and really any other kind of journalism. The interviewee is normally someone with very little to gain by doing the interview, and a lot to lose (subscribers, credibility, money, whatever). The interviewer is usually hand-cuffed prior to the 'live' interview, and informed, either by the subject or the subject's PR handlers, that certain things are off-limits and any pressing beyond those boundaries will result in the ending of the session. Peter Moore provided lots of great soundbytes to interviewers when he was with Microsoft and now EA, but if you look closely at his many interviews, you'll see very little information actually disclosed, and that which was disclosed was very carefully selected to convey his company's message and present his product in the best possible light, not inform the reader. That's just the way this stuff works, unfortunately.
Even if Smedley were to sit down with myself or anyone else who writes for this site, chances are that you the reader wouldn't get the answers to the hard questions you want, simply because its not in his or his company's best interest to provide them.
Utterly crap review. How much was MMORPG paid by SOE to write this?
First off, there is no sandbox anymore. Any sandbox elements that remain were left by accident, and aren't supported at all. In fact, don't talk about them, they remove sandbox (ie: non loot controlled) stuff on sight!
Also, the author pays no attention to the fact that the populations in the game have completely crashed, outside 2-3 servers you see no one.
Nor does he point out the HUGE glaring bugs that given that many date back to release should have the Dev team hiding thier faces in shame (if they had any pride), such as mobs spawning (and running) in and through objects, shooting through terrain, etc.
And I find it really funny that he pans pvp in SWG, given that the dumbasses who came up with the NGE in the first place spent the first year of it basically inventing pvp systems. Just goes to show you how poor management in this game has been.
And as for the dev teams, it's now on number 4, having once again lost both it's lead dev and producer.
Note: Most of the ex SWGNGE devs have moved on (and through) the DC Online team. Which should be a warning to anyone seriously considering that game.
I believe that people have to be held accountable for there actions. Players who pay for a boxed mmo ($60.00) and a month subscription ($15.00) desever answers when questions are asked. And I understand that it cost alot of money to create and mmo. But there was a time when mmo's had the basics such as (Player Housing) (Crafting) (PVP) (PVE) on release. Today most developers throw promises of game features like it was candy too the mass fanbase and community , without regard too the damage they create. Thus damage control comes into play.
And at time it can be the community who needs to step back as well because they have the power too help or destroy the reputation of an mmo (SWG). Developers at one time used creative ideas too create a mmo instead of building a clone of a shallow game.
While I agree with the spirit of what you're getting at here, the reality in the business world is quite different, in my opinion.
MMO companies, like any other for-profit organization, are under no impetus to be completely transparent to their customers. On the contrary, they would be extremely stupid to do so, as it would negatively affect their bottom line. There is no contract between a player and a game service provider; the only right a player has is the right to stop paying for the service. I understand that people feel invested due to the large amounts of time spent in various game worlds (I feel that way myself), but the reality is that they are renters, not owners, and have no rights whatsoever.
I would love it if devs, and more importantly marketing types, were more forthcoming with their information, but the reality is that telling half-truths on marketing tours and retconning past statements in light of new information is how the game is played, and that will never change. These guys work for a living like most everyone else, and they will do what they have to do to keep the paycheck coming.
Sure its a little bit distasteful, but that's the way the business world works, and for whatever reason, a lot of mmo gamers have trouble grasping this.
The moral of the story is to take what anyone in the entertainment industry (game devs, producers, etc) says with a grain of salt. They are all trying to sell you something. The best you can expect is to get a little bit of enjoyment out of a product while you can.
So did they do this review mostly to get a bunch of hits from pissed off former players that would come here to rant about it?
Let the thing go... there isn't any reason currently to re-review the game.
One thing I saw about people being accountable for their actions etc
Part of the problem is when you work with a 3rd party IP that you do not own. In general on a certain level you are going to have NDA agreements. Thus the people who are really responsible will never take the blame and if you talk about it.. you will end up in court.
Not to mention most likely never work in your chosen field again.
The NGE didn't just destroy a game.. it destroyed a community and by the looks of it.. pretty much took one company down with it.. while the other just walked off to find another developer to make a WoW clone with star wars skins from the start.
yes that's my opinion.
I feel sorry for the people they put on this game now.. as they are taking heat or seeing very little return on their acitons (at least very little positive) for a situation they did not create.
Oh and I mis my game.. that's my review.
soe should just pay me to shut up. i need a new cpu anyway.