For some reason i think smed may be right. he must have planned on going with SWG he had GCW2 coming and if he really thought LA wont renew he would have not made that plan before the next contract renew. I'm getting from this intervew that LA did it because of TOR. Bet ya all the credits in the world he wasn't allowed to make the game better after the NGE since LA knew that BW had started on TOR. it makes sense to let SWG fail so the cash cow that will be TOR is what they always wanted.
Wow all these years I blamed smed and it was Chicken George.
The Pach Attack show on GameTrailers mentioned that LucasArts has had a lot of management change in recent years. I'm betting that it mainly had to do with a change in management leading to a new opinion on the matter. I don't think they were lying when they said TOR and SWG would run side by side initially. And I don't think BioWare or LA is worried about SWG players subbing to their game to make up for the cost of development. Because I don't think there's enough SWG players to really warrant that as a huge factor.
I think it was a mixture of all the reasons you've heard that led to it's closure.
Heh , so I'm reading this word for word , and if I'm getting this straight , what will happen if let's say 5 years from now they release Star Wars : The NEW republic (lame example) ? Are they just going to close Old republic as if nothing ever hapenned? Lineage 1 and 2 have no problems running along with Aion , so I fail to understand why Galaxies can't run along with ToR? And another thing that raises questions , if every MMO is under contract and a contract ends , does it simply mean they turn off the game and run away with all the profit they made out of us?
I don't know , that's just my way of seeing things , which is way out the box.
I don't know where you read that SW:ToR has a 5 year licence? I did read that SWG originaly had a 5 year licence that was renewed twice.
He then goes on about business reasons which he didn't explain but that can be many reasons which can open up a can of more speculations among one I think of is what is making more money SWG or Star Wars Clone Adventure's and he must have needed to choose which one to keep alive, he also talkes about how the game performad which I expect below expectations probebly for both SOE and LA. (speculation)
But then he say's something about the talented team working on SW:ToR and how much it costs and how much they need in subscribers which (speculation) could mean that LA might feel that those who currently play SWG would move over to SW:ToR so it raises the subs for SW:ToR? again speculation as I don't think that current SWG players will be that heavy to support 2 millions subs for SW:ToR.
Will we ever know the true reason?, yeah perhaps if one would be a close friend of Smedley or perhaps a higher-up at LA.
I am sure there will be plenty of speculated geusses all over the net about the why.....
I'm not trying to beat a dead horse here. Really, I'm not. But it's been said before, and I'll say it again. If they knew what was good for them, back when this whole debacle hit the fan back in 2004-2005, even if it was after a year or two, they should have rolled back the servers, back to Pre-NGE. IF Smedley had come out and publically apologized to the fanbase, then MAYBE the game would have been saved. I remember when we unwashed massed loved SWG for what it was. Not what it became. But be that as it may, what's done is done.
A great 5 years, yada, we are also sad, yada yada, financial reasons, license, yada yada yada.
How about releasing the game to public domain and let those that want to play and update it do so. It clearly is not a financial issue anymore or is it?
Now make it happen Smedley!
"Give players systems and tools instead of rails and rules"
Here's the thing. It is no secret that SOE has been hurting financially for some time. The whole hacking spree recently I'm sure made their company hemorage a whole ton more money that they didn't have. So I feel the whole "It was all LA's decsion" is just so much horse pucky from a man long associated to jiggling the details to make himself exempt from any blame. What I really feel happend is the cost to renew the license was more than the profit that SWG brought in, and considering SWG has been pretty much an albatross to both SOE and LA for years they decided not to bother to try to negotiate a more reasonable price. So in Smeds mind that makes it all LA's fault.
For the people saying that LA doesn't want two SW games running makes no sense. They just get payed for the license, and maybe a percentage of the profits. The MMO company handles all the overhead. Creating and maintaining the game should cost LA nothing. So financially it would make sense to get payed twice, even if one companies product is substandard. So either LA felt SWG was such a black mark on the SW name they didn't want it around any more, or SOE just couldn't cough up the cash, or made such a ridiculous low ball renegotiation offer that LA told them to go "bleep" themselves.
I look at this from a completely different perspective, I first don't see how it benefits TOR to have another Star Wars MMO available. WIth SWG out of the way, those playing it for a Star Wars fix, will have only one option at their disposal, TOR. I'd suggest the *** but if they wanted to play that they would be.
I also don't see how it benefits SOE to drop galaxies from their stable, as that's even less of a reason to have a full station account. Which shows with them redoing the plan around the same time as this sunsetting annoucment. I can't help but feel if SOE could they'd continue to milk SWG for as long as they could.
I fail to see how this deal benefits SOE in any shape or form, they gain nothing. If anything they lose something that may have swayed some tendancy to sign up for everything.
I can't imagine the license fee would be that much to offset any profitability, I really can't.
Just to give you an idea. Locally where I live there use to be a little amusement park called "Flintstones Bedrock City" the owners paid $200,000.00 a year for the license. When the movies came out, Paramount or who ever it was that owned the rights (can't remember) raised the licensing fee to $5,000,000.00 a year.
Now I can only imagine what a "Star Wars" license would cost, but I could imagine you would need a lot of subscribers to be in the black which I believe Galaxies would not be able to achieve.
I look at this from a completely different perspective, I first don't see how it benefits TOR to have another Star Wars MMO available. WIth SWG out of the way, those playing it for a Star Wars fix, will have only one option at their disposal, TOR. I'd suggest the *** but if they wanted to play that they would be.
I also don't see how it benefits SOE to drop galaxies from their stable, as that's even less of a reason to have a full station account. Which shows with them redoing the plan around the same time as this sunsetting annoucment. I can't help but feel if SOE could they'd continue to milk SWG for as long as they could.
I fail to see how this deal benefits SOE in any shape or form, they gain nothing. If anything they lose something that may have swayed some tendancy to sign up for everything.
I can't imagine the license fee would be that much to offset any profitability, I really can't.
Just to give you an idea. Locally where I live there use to be a little amusement park called "Flintstones Bedrock City" the owners paid $200,000.00 a year for the license. When the movies came out, Paramount or who ever it was that owned the rights (can't remember) raised the licensing fee to $5,000,000.00 a year.
Now I can only imagine what a "Star Wars" license would cost, but I could imagine you would need a lot of subscribers to be in the black which I believe Galaxies would not be able to achieve.
It doesn't matter. SOE never even TRIED to renew the license.
Please read the following statement from Smed, made on Monday:
I look at this from a completely different perspective, I first don't see how it benefits TOR to have another Star Wars MMO available. WIth SWG out of the way, those playing it for a Star Wars fix, will have only one option at their disposal, TOR. I'd suggest the *** but if they wanted to play that they would be.
I also don't see how it benefits SOE to drop galaxies from their stable, as that's even less of a reason to have a full station account. Which shows with them redoing the plan around the same time as this sunsetting annoucment. I can't help but feel if SOE could they'd continue to milk SWG for as long as they could.
I fail to see how this deal benefits SOE in any shape or form, they gain nothing. If anything they lose something that may have swayed some tendancy to sign up for everything.
I can't imagine the license fee would be that much to offset any profitability, I really can't.
Just to give you an idea. Locally where I live there use to be a little amusement park called "Flintstones Bedrock City" the owners paid $200,000.00 a year for the license. When the movies came out, Paramount or who ever it was that owned the rights (can't remember) raised the licensing fee to $5,000,000.00 a year.
Now I can only imagine what a "Star Wars" license would cost, but I could imagine you would need a lot of subscribers to be in the black which I believe Galaxies would not be able to achieve.
It doesn't matter. SOE never even TRIED to renew the license.
Please read the following statement from Smed, made on Monday:
It wasn't even worth the effort to TRY to save SWG - not for either company.
Maybe the subscriber base is so low and dropping it's not worth the effort. There comes a time in business be it in mfg. entertainment ect. when its time to pull the plug on a product, tv show or what ever.
A lot of good thoughts, good writing, in this thread.
SWG had a number of problems. The principle one was that the outlier bomb that is WoW dropped right after SWG launched, under the old theory of MMO design and launch...send it out half baked and the crowd would still go for it. WoW smashed that particular way of publishing an MMO, and SOE was very slow to catch on to that aspect of it. In fact, I don't think they have yet.
So LA sees WoW taking off and asks "how come this totally non galaxy dominating IP is kicking our ass?" Make the game more fast and exciting...they didn't like Koster's design that much in the first place, I don' t think. Koster was going for this huge RP sandbox thing, and LA was thinking FPS with glowsticks. The entire Jedi thing was all about how successful the various Dark Forces sequels, which featured flashlights and glowsticks left and right, and LA was thinking that what the game needed was more Kyle Katarn and less Uncle Owen. The success of KOTOR around the same time, compared with SWG, pretty much sealed the deal. The market wants lightsabers.
The fact that JK III and IV, and KOTOR were fully developed games, not half baked alphas, was lost on both LA and SOE as one of the principle reasons SWG was struggling. Flashlights do not a game make. If SWG had a lot fewer bugs and a lot more content, and was better tested before going live for play balance issues, might have been the WoW. But SOE doesn't do polish. They just don't. They shove stuff out the door and let the base MMORPG audience lap it up. Which they did at first. Despite all the problems, SWG was the fastest growing game in MMO history...untill the 800 pound gorilla showed up a year later.
WoW was something totally different...a game that hugely expanded the MMO market, because it WORKED. It was accessible from the getgo, and while had its own set of problems at launch, it was pretty obvious that more work had gone into it before it was launched. The combat system worked, specials fired, there were things for the players to do in the form of highly directed content. People who would give up on an MMO heard about this (positive word of mouth), found it was easy to get into and play, and of course like any game like this, was highly addicting. SWG was (at least for me) highly addticting, but many people just don't have my patience because they see the potential...they want instant gratification, and WoW delivered that.
So WoW went and broke the million mark first, and LA is fuming, demands SOE make SWG more like an FPS, and so SOE comes up with the NGE as the solution.
And sends it out in half-alpha state, wipes out SWGs playerbase, and sends a lot of them packing off to WoW.
CH, Jedi, Commando, Smuggler, BH, Scout, Doctor, Chef, BE...yeah, lots of SWG time invested.
I don't think it had as much to do with WOW as much as the game was so horrible at launch and needed a year or more in Dev (combat/SW wise, even with buffs and armor how out of control they became).
Afew months after launch TH and the Devs talking about the combat revamp - What game launches and has to revamp their whole combat system within 3-6 months?.
The the whole Jedi unlock mystery: The mystery Jedi patch on a Friday and wow the next day someone is a jedi. - It wasn't even in the game until they patched it.
Creatures/Creature Handler nuked in preparation for the Combat Revamp. - the next 3-6 months every single answer from CR is wait for the combat revamp.
JTL announced - Should have been in launch, community outrage because SOE tells customers who have been waiting for Combat Revamp learn that team from combat revamp is pulled for JTL
WOW/JTL launch - SOE flys in secret group to preview Combat Revamp. SOE shutdown on any real info from Community Reps seems to begin.
Gordan Walton takes over SWG - Combat Upgrade is announced (completely different from the combat upgrade and many fixes/game enhancements seem to be made.
Gordon Walton leaves SWG before Rage of the Wookies expansion is released (which includes the Combat Upgrade bearing a striking similarity to WOW) - Many players quit and presumably during this time according to Jeff Freeman and others work on the NGE has started
Combat Upgrade/ROW still kept bleeding 10k a month according to SOE devs, Trials of Obi-Wan expansion is announced - This is while the the NGE was being worked on as a tutorial
SOE flies in smal group of Gaming Press to demo the NGE - Free drinks and exclusive demos have the select few raving and praising "Did someone say twitch?"
Subs are not up to standards - SOE decides to revamp game into the NGE and revoke all announced content for Creature Handlers etc. as a deperate move to retain and attract more subs. What they don't realize is that WOW is a polished game with plenty of conent, easy entrance experience and low system req, that is why people stay. The NGE seemed to be something that someone threw together in thier basement.
TOOW - Julio Torres goes on national TV to defend the NGE and cannot get Obi-Wan to spwan.
2011 Game dies - A sandbox game IMO was totally the wrong approach to make a SW MMO.
Originally posted by Gravez I don't think it had as much to do with WOW as much as the game was so horrible at launch and needed a year or more in Dev (combat/SW wise, even with buffs and armor how out of control they became).
Afew months after launch TH and the Devs talking about the combat revamp - What game launches and has to revamp their whole combat system within 3-6 months?.
The the whole Jedi unlock mystery: The mystery Jedi patch on a Friday and wow the next day someone is a jedi. - It wasn't even in the game until they patched it.
Creatures/Creature Handler nuked in preparation for the Combat Revamp. - the next 3-6 months every single answer from CR is wait for the combat revamp.
JTL announced - Should have been in launch, community outrage because SOE tells customers who have been waiting for Combat Revamp learn that team from combat revamp is pulled for JTL
WOW/JTL launch - SOE flys in secret group to preview Combat Revamp. SOE shutdown on any real info from Community Reps seems to begin.
Gordan Walton takes over SWG - Combat Upgrade is announced (completely different from the combat upgrade and many fixes/game enhancements seem to be made.
Gordon Walton leaves SWG before Rage of the Wookies expansion is released (which includes the Combat Upgrade bearing a striking similarity to WOW) - Many players quit and presumably during this time according to Jeff Freeman and others work on the NGE has started
Combat Upgrade/ROW still kept bleeding 10k a month according to SOE devs, Trials of Obi-Wan expansion is announced - This is while the the NGE was being worked on as a tutorial
SOE flies in smal group of Gaming Press to demo the NGE - Free drinks and exclusive demos have the select few raving and praising "Did someone say twitch?"
Subs are not up to standards - SOE decides to revamp game into the NGE and revoke all announced content for Creature Handlers etc. as a deperate move to retain and attract more subs. What they don't realize is that WOW is a polished game with plenty of conent, easy entrance experience and low system req, that is why people stay. The NGE seemed to be something that someone threw together in thier basement.
TOOW - Julio Torres goes on national TV to defend the NGE and cannot get Obi-Wan to spwan.
2011 Game dies - A sandbox game IMO was totally the wrong approach to make a SW MMO.
This all sounds about right, I was there for most of the time until a few weeks after the NGE. Devs started talking about the CU in the spring of 2004 and originally said the CU would come before JTL but JTL came out first, it annoyed lots of people- another thing is the CU turned out NOTHING like what the devs had talked about a year before it, they even said during publish 9 that Jedi would be balanced for the CU but when the CU came out Jedi was completely revamped again (and broken in many ways).
Afew months after launch TH and the Devs talking about the combat revamp - What game launches and has to revamp their whole combat system within 3-6 months?.
Everquest 2
Free Realms
The Matrix Online (within 6 months of SOE buying it)
All had combat revamps within the first year of release, just to point out which company has a habit of making such changes.
DCU is almost due for its first attempt at correct redeign of its gameplay.
What people seem to forget quite often, is that way back in those heady, early-2000's, MMOs were still quite a new media concept. Even the big development houses were still learning, especially when it came to the actual logistics and planning of something so massive and expensive.
Of course, any company that had already been developing successful games for many years was already in a better state to exploit this new gaming medium, but I don't think any designer or project manager had the full expertise with regards to MMOs. It was all still a learning process. I won't say that Blizzard didn't have their shit together, because hey obviously did, but they were still stepping on the shoulders of others to become the giant they are today.
I'm no expert, but it seems reasonable to me to assume that it must be somewhat easier to road-plan a single-player game that it is to map out a MMO. You know that a single-player game will start at point A, and end at point B, with options for expanding into sequels (and now DLCs). But for a MMO, you have to be able to map a course of progression that will not only see you from point A to B, but will allow for massive, potential changes: upgrades, hardware changes, continuous updates to content, balancing, and other stuff that I can't even think of.
What I'm saying is, that I believe games were often released in an incomplete state because developers were simply still inexperienced with MMO-design, and planning them with regards to investment capital, shareholders, and deadlines, must have been a monumental undertaking.
I sincerely doubt that WoW would have been so polished had it been released before EQ1.
Afew months after launch TH and the Devs talking about the combat revamp - What game launches and has to revamp their whole combat system within 3-6 months?.
Everquest 2
Free Realms
The Matrix Online (within 6 months of SOE buying it)
All had combat revamps within the first year of release, just to point out which company has a habit of making such changes.
DCU is almost due for its first attempt at correct redeign of its gameplay.
Ouch lol.
I actually had no idea they had such a habbit of doing this. Great info (as usual) Daffid.
Afew months after launch TH and the Devs talking about the combat revamp - What game launches and has to revamp their whole combat system within 3-6 months?.
Everquest 2
Free Realms
The Matrix Online (within 6 months of SOE buying it)
All had combat revamps within the first year of release, just to point out which company has a habit of making such changes.
DCU is almost due for its first attempt at correct redeign of its gameplay.
Ouch lol.
I actually had no idea they had such a habbit of doing this. Great info (as usual) Daffid.
SOE has alot of bad habits, they like to release games, make them on the cheap. Thiers always alot of hype with new games people will buy them and try them out, SOE doesnt care about what happens after a games release. Release is where SOE is making thier money, they more than likely make 5 times what they spend on any games cost.
The problem with so many releases is they spread thier teams thin and what always happens is low quality developement. They put money into expansions since they know people bored to death will buy them cause thiers hardly any live development at all with SOE. I hope people wake up to the fact SOE is a terrible gaming company.
it was a well spread rumor between the CU and NGE that Lucas himself didnt feel the game was 'star warsy' enough. SWTOR will be, at least in the eyes of Lucas i would imagine.
true? or false?
after what Lucas did in his 'upgrade' of the movies, his influence on a move towards the NGE makes more sense now, than it ever did.
still a rumor, still hearsay, i know, but as time rolls on it becomes a more plausible rumor than ever.
"There are at least two kinds of games. One could be called finite, the other infinite. A finite game is played for the purpose of winning, an infinite game for the purpose of continuing play." Finite and Infinite Games, James Carse
I'm not sure of the point of that such rumor, the first bad movie (Phantom Menace) was 4 years before SWG came out and SWG was initially based around episode 5(?) with a lot of EU content eventually added and by the time the NGE came around with Mustafar it was more around episode 3. I don't think Lucas had direct control of the content that went into this game, I remember he even complained to SOE about the lack of vehicles (when there were no speederbikes at the start) and convinced them to patch it in.
Originally posted by BullseyeArc1 Originally posted by TUX426
Originally posted by Daffid011
Originally posted by Gravez
Afew months after launch TH and the Devs talking about the combat revamp - What game launches and has to revamp their whole combat system within 3-6 months?.
Everquest 2
Free RealmsThe Matrix Online (within 6 months of SOE buying it)
All had combat revamps within the first year of release, just to point out which company has a habit of making such changes.
DCU is almost due for its first attempt at correct redeign of its gameplay. Ouch lol. I actually had no idea they had such a habbit of doing this. Great info (as usual) Daffid. SOE has alot of bad habits, they like to release games, make them on the cheap. Thiers always alot of hype with new games people will buy them and try them out, SOE doesnt care about what happens after a games release. Release is where SOE is making thier money, they more than likely make 5 times what they spend on any games cost. The problem with so many releases is they spread thier teams thin and what always happens is low quality developement. They put money into expansions since they know people bored to death will buy them cause thiers hardly any live development at all with SOE. I hope people wake up to the fact SOE is a terrible gaming company. SWG wasn't even half baked, it was 1/4 baked, lol regardless it was a fun ass game because of the sandbox environment. They basically torched the Matrix once they bought it, what a horrible experience that game was. EQ2 had its share of problems at the start, so did Pirates of the Burning Sea and Vanguard (barely ran on many PCs due to high spec hardware demand), and Planetside... oh god, once Core Combat came out, devs started mucking with everything.
Of course DCU is next, it's going down fast and it's SOE's fault and they'll do something crazy and wild to it that it'll kill off the remaining subs guaranteed.
This has been both a funny and informitive thread.
Many here have echoed what I have speculated while others put blinders on to the parties involved on thier favorite (unreleased) game.
Let me add this. Search for Jim Ward of Lucas Arts (1997-2008) and read his interviews.
Think about the companies involved with the making of both SWG & TOR. SOE, Lucas Arts, EA and BioWare
Now think about the past business actions of these companies and what they can bring good or bad to the market.
SOE has done its best when it did not have a second party involved. No splitting of interest. Generally, LA has done better dealing with smaller studios that fell under thier control... a long time ago. EA has a rep for killing compition on thier EA Sports devision and pulled games that didn't meet thier expectation even if there was a solid following. BioWare is not the same company that developed KOTOR or Baldur's Gate since EA purchased them. Further, is it a positive situation to have three companies communicating for consistancy on one game? If SOE and LA couldn't agree on SWG and its direction how does that compare to TOR?
You all know that many developers of SWG from Lucas Arts jumped over to work on TOR, right?
I am a Star Wars fanboi ... since 1977. But even my eyes have opened to slack quality in favor of the easier buck. I salute LA for commiting to making better games in the future... but the future is unwritten and by who's standards of "better"?
I like many of you want TOR to be great and change the market. I haven't seen reported anything that assures that. My wish is for a new Original Saga Star Wars MMO to be developed... yes a SWG2. But I won't hold my breath.
If Sony had made a better game maybe they'd be able to afford the license.
SOE is a MMO killer, literally.
SWG/SOE/Smedley has done nothing then get bad press for LA, as some articles point out, SWG management is a perfect guide how NOT to run a business and treat your customers.
LA saw that and took their business to a company with a much better record.
Add to that the SOE drama with the hacked databases I think LA made the right choice there.
"going into arguments with idiots is a lost cause, it requires you to stoop down to their level and you can't win"
This has been both a funny and informitive thread.
Many here have echoed what I have speculated while others put blinders on to the parties involved on thier favorite (unreleased) game.
Let me add this. Search for Jim Ward of Lucas Arts (1997-2008) and read his interviews.
Think about the companies involved with the making of both SWG & TOR. SOE, Lucas Arts, EA and BioWare
Now think about the past business actions of these companies and what they can bring good or bad to the market.
SOE has done its best when it did not have a second party involved. No splitting of interest. Generally, LA has done better dealing with smaller studios that fell under thier control... a long time ago. EA has a rep for killing compition on thier EA Sports devision and pulled games that didn't meet thier expectation even if there was a solid following. BioWare is not the same company that developed KOTOR or Baldur's Gate since EA purchased them. Further, is it a positive situation to have three companies communicating for consistancy on one game? If SOE and LA couldn't agree on SWG and its direction how does that compare to TOR?
You all know that many developers of SWG from Lucas Arts jumped over to work on TOR, right?
I am a Star Wars fanboi ... since 1977. But even my eyes have opened to slack quality in favor of the easier buck. I salute LA for commiting to making better games in the future... but the future is unwritten and by who's standards of "better"?
I like many of you want TOR to be great and change the market. I haven't seen reported anything that assures that. My wish is for a new Original Saga Star Wars MMO to be developed... yes a SWG2. But I won't hold my breath.
Do what??? Who moved from swg to SWTOR they are two different companies.
Comments
i think there is enough blame to go around to both SOE & LA for what has happened with swg.
The Pach Attack show on GameTrailers mentioned that LucasArts has had a lot of management change in recent years. I'm betting that it mainly had to do with a change in management leading to a new opinion on the matter. I don't think they were lying when they said TOR and SWG would run side by side initially. And I don't think BioWare or LA is worried about SWG players subbing to their game to make up for the cost of development. Because I don't think there's enough SWG players to really warrant that as a huge factor.
I think it was a mixture of all the reasons you've heard that led to it's closure.
I don't know where you read that SW:ToR has a 5 year licence? I did read that SWG originaly had a 5 year licence that was renewed twice.
He then goes on about business reasons which he didn't explain but that can be many reasons which can open up a can of more speculations among one I think of is what is making more money SWG or Star Wars Clone Adventure's and he must have needed to choose which one to keep alive, he also talkes about how the game performad which I expect below expectations probebly for both SOE and LA. (speculation)
But then he say's something about the talented team working on SW:ToR and how much it costs and how much they need in subscribers which (speculation) could mean that LA might feel that those who currently play SWG would move over to SW:ToR so it raises the subs for SW:ToR? again speculation as I don't think that current SWG players will be that heavy to support 2 millions subs for SW:ToR.
Will we ever know the true reason?, yeah perhaps if one would be a close friend of Smedley or perhaps a higher-up at LA.
I am sure there will be plenty of speculated geusses all over the net about the why.....
As bad as SWG ended up being, it was nowhere near as bad as the recent trilogy of films. Lucas did more damage to SW than Smedley/SOE could ever do.
No, you're "stuck" with the love child of Mass Effect and KOTOR, but on a much larger scale.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tim5nU3DwIE
I'm not trying to beat a dead horse here. Really, I'm not. But it's been said before, and I'll say it again. If they knew what was good for them, back when this whole debacle hit the fan back in 2004-2005, even if it was after a year or two, they should have rolled back the servers, back to Pre-NGE. IF Smedley had come out and publically apologized to the fanbase, then MAYBE the game would have been saved. I remember when we unwashed massed loved SWG for what it was. Not what it became. But be that as it may, what's done is done.
A great 5 years, yada, we are also sad, yada yada, financial reasons, license, yada yada yada.
How about releasing the game to public domain and let those that want to play and update it do so. It clearly is not a financial issue anymore or is it?
Now make it happen Smedley!
"Be water my friend" - Bruce Lee
It doesn't matter. SOE never even TRIED to renew the license.
Please read the following statement from Smed, made on Monday:
Could we have renegotiated? Maybe, but I don't think that would be the right thing for the company
It wasn't even worth the effort to TRY to save SWG - not for either company.
Maybe the subscriber base is so low and dropping it's not worth the effort. There comes a time in business be it in mfg. entertainment ect. when its time to pull the plug on a product, tv show or what ever.
"Be water my friend" - Bruce Lee
A lot of good thoughts, good writing, in this thread.
SWG had a number of problems. The principle one was that the outlier bomb that is WoW dropped right after SWG launched, under the old theory of MMO design and launch...send it out half baked and the crowd would still go for it. WoW smashed that particular way of publishing an MMO, and SOE was very slow to catch on to that aspect of it. In fact, I don't think they have yet.
So LA sees WoW taking off and asks "how come this totally non galaxy dominating IP is kicking our ass?" Make the game more fast and exciting...they didn't like Koster's design that much in the first place, I don' t think. Koster was going for this huge RP sandbox thing, and LA was thinking FPS with glowsticks. The entire Jedi thing was all about how successful the various Dark Forces sequels, which featured flashlights and glowsticks left and right, and LA was thinking that what the game needed was more Kyle Katarn and less Uncle Owen. The success of KOTOR around the same time, compared with SWG, pretty much sealed the deal. The market wants lightsabers.
The fact that JK III and IV, and KOTOR were fully developed games, not half baked alphas, was lost on both LA and SOE as one of the principle reasons SWG was struggling. Flashlights do not a game make. If SWG had a lot fewer bugs and a lot more content, and was better tested before going live for play balance issues, might have been the WoW. But SOE doesn't do polish. They just don't. They shove stuff out the door and let the base MMORPG audience lap it up. Which they did at first. Despite all the problems, SWG was the fastest growing game in MMO history...untill the 800 pound gorilla showed up a year later.
WoW was something totally different...a game that hugely expanded the MMO market, because it WORKED. It was accessible from the getgo, and while had its own set of problems at launch, it was pretty obvious that more work had gone into it before it was launched. The combat system worked, specials fired, there were things for the players to do in the form of highly directed content. People who would give up on an MMO heard about this (positive word of mouth), found it was easy to get into and play, and of course like any game like this, was highly addicting. SWG was (at least for me) highly addticting, but many people just don't have my patience because they see the potential...they want instant gratification, and WoW delivered that.
So WoW went and broke the million mark first, and LA is fuming, demands SOE make SWG more like an FPS, and so SOE comes up with the NGE as the solution.
And sends it out in half-alpha state, wipes out SWGs playerbase, and sends a lot of them packing off to WoW.
CH, Jedi, Commando, Smuggler, BH, Scout, Doctor, Chef, BE...yeah, lots of SWG time invested.
Once a denizen of Ahazi
I don't think it had as much to do with WOW as much as the game was so horrible at launch and needed a year or more in Dev (combat/SW wise, even with buffs and armor how out of control they became).
Afew months after launch TH and the Devs talking about the combat revamp - What game launches and has to revamp their whole combat system within 3-6 months?.
The the whole Jedi unlock mystery: The mystery Jedi patch on a Friday and wow the next day someone is a jedi. - It wasn't even in the game until they patched it.
Creatures/Creature Handler nuked in preparation for the Combat Revamp. - the next 3-6 months every single answer from CR is wait for the combat revamp.
JTL announced - Should have been in launch, community outrage because SOE tells customers who have been waiting for Combat Revamp learn that team from combat revamp is pulled for JTL
WOW/JTL launch - SOE flys in secret group to preview Combat Revamp. SOE shutdown on any real info from Community Reps seems to begin.
Gordan Walton takes over SWG - Combat Upgrade is announced (completely different from the combat upgrade and many fixes/game enhancements seem to be made.
Gordon Walton leaves SWG before Rage of the Wookies expansion is released (which includes the Combat Upgrade bearing a striking similarity to WOW) - Many players quit and presumably during this time according to Jeff Freeman and others work on the NGE has started
Combat Upgrade/ROW still kept bleeding 10k a month according to SOE devs, Trials of Obi-Wan expansion is announced - This is while the the NGE was being worked on as a tutorial
SOE flies in smal group of Gaming Press to demo the NGE - Free drinks and exclusive demos have the select few raving and praising "Did someone say twitch?"
Subs are not up to standards - SOE decides to revamp game into the NGE and revoke all announced content for Creature Handlers etc. as a deperate move to retain and attract more subs. What they don't realize is that WOW is a polished game with plenty of conent, easy entrance experience and low system req, that is why people stay. The NGE seemed to be something that someone threw together in thier basement.
TOOW - Julio Torres goes on national TV to defend the NGE and cannot get Obi-Wan to spwan.
2011 Game dies - A sandbox game IMO was totally the wrong approach to make a SW MMO.
Everquest 2
Free Realms
The Matrix Online (within 6 months of SOE buying it)
All had combat revamps within the first year of release, just to point out which company has a habit of making such changes.
DCU is almost due for its first attempt at correct redeign of its gameplay.
What people seem to forget quite often, is that way back in those heady, early-2000's, MMOs were still quite a new media concept. Even the big development houses were still learning, especially when it came to the actual logistics and planning of something so massive and expensive.
Of course, any company that had already been developing successful games for many years was already in a better state to exploit this new gaming medium, but I don't think any designer or project manager had the full expertise with regards to MMOs. It was all still a learning process. I won't say that Blizzard didn't have their shit together, because hey obviously did, but they were still stepping on the shoulders of others to become the giant they are today.
I'm no expert, but it seems reasonable to me to assume that it must be somewhat easier to road-plan a single-player game that it is to map out a MMO. You know that a single-player game will start at point A, and end at point B, with options for expanding into sequels (and now DLCs). But for a MMO, you have to be able to map a course of progression that will not only see you from point A to B, but will allow for massive, potential changes: upgrades, hardware changes, continuous updates to content, balancing, and other stuff that I can't even think of.
What I'm saying is, that I believe games were often released in an incomplete state because developers were simply still inexperienced with MMO-design, and planning them with regards to investment capital, shareholders, and deadlines, must have been a monumental undertaking.
I sincerely doubt that WoW would have been so polished had it been released before EQ1.
Ouch lol.
I actually had no idea they had such a habbit of doing this. Great info (as usual) Daffid.
SOE has alot of bad habits, they like to release games, make them on the cheap. Thiers always alot of hype with new games people will buy them and try them out, SOE doesnt care about what happens after a games release. Release is where SOE is making thier money, they more than likely make 5 times what they spend on any games cost.
The problem with so many releases is they spread thier teams thin and what always happens is low quality developement. They put money into expansions since they know people bored to death will buy them cause thiers hardly any live development at all with SOE. I hope people wake up to the fact SOE is a terrible gaming company.
it was a well spread rumor between the CU and NGE that Lucas himself didnt feel the game was 'star warsy' enough. SWTOR will be, at least in the eyes of Lucas i would imagine.
true? or false?
after what Lucas did in his 'upgrade' of the movies, his influence on a move towards the NGE makes more sense now, than it ever did.
still a rumor, still hearsay, i know, but as time rolls on it becomes a more plausible rumor than ever.
"There are at least two kinds of games.
One could be called finite, the other infinite.
A finite game is played for the purpose of winning,
an infinite game for the purpose of continuing play."
Finite and Infinite Games, James Carse
I'm not sure of the point of that such rumor, the first bad movie (Phantom Menace) was 4 years before SWG came out and SWG was initially based around episode 5(?) with a lot of EU content eventually added and by the time the NGE came around with Mustafar it was more around episode 3. I don't think Lucas had direct control of the content that went into this game, I remember he even complained to SOE about the lack of vehicles (when there were no speederbikes at the start) and convinced them to patch it in.
All had combat revamps within the first year of release, just to point out which company has a habit of making such changes.
DCU is almost due for its first attempt at correct redeign of its gameplay.
Ouch lol.
I actually had no idea they had such a habbit of doing this. Great info (as usual) Daffid.
SOE has alot of bad habits, they like to release games, make them on the cheap. Thiers always alot of hype with new games people will buy them and try them out, SOE doesnt care about what happens after a games release. Release is where SOE is making thier money, they more than likely make 5 times what they spend on any games cost.
The problem with so many releases is they spread thier teams thin and what always happens is low quality developement. They put money into expansions since they know people bored to death will buy them cause thiers hardly any live development at all with SOE. I hope people wake up to the fact SOE is a terrible gaming company.
SWG wasn't even half baked, it was 1/4 baked, lol regardless it was a fun ass game because of the sandbox environment. They basically torched the Matrix once they bought it, what a horrible experience that game was. EQ2 had its share of problems at the start, so did Pirates of the Burning Sea and Vanguard (barely ran on many PCs due to high spec hardware demand), and Planetside... oh god, once Core Combat came out, devs started mucking with everything.
Of course DCU is next, it's going down fast and it's SOE's fault and they'll do something crazy and wild to it that it'll kill off the remaining subs guaranteed.
This has been both a funny and informitive thread.
Many here have echoed what I have speculated while others put blinders on to the parties involved on thier favorite (unreleased) game.
Let me add this. Search for Jim Ward of Lucas Arts (1997-2008) and read his interviews.
Think about the companies involved with the making of both SWG & TOR. SOE, Lucas Arts, EA and BioWare
Now think about the past business actions of these companies and what they can bring good or bad to the market.
SOE has done its best when it did not have a second party involved. No splitting of interest. Generally, LA has done better dealing with smaller studios that fell under thier control... a long time ago. EA has a rep for killing compition on thier EA Sports devision and pulled games that didn't meet thier expectation even if there was a solid following. BioWare is not the same company that developed KOTOR or Baldur's Gate since EA purchased them. Further, is it a positive situation to have three companies communicating for consistancy on one game? If SOE and LA couldn't agree on SWG and its direction how does that compare to TOR?
You all know that many developers of SWG from Lucas Arts jumped over to work on TOR, right?
I am a Star Wars fanboi ... since 1977. But even my eyes have opened to slack quality in favor of the easier buck. I salute LA for commiting to making better games in the future... but the future is unwritten and by who's standards of "better"?
I like many of you want TOR to be great and change the market. I haven't seen reported anything that assures that. My wish is for a new Original Saga Star Wars MMO to be developed... yes a SWG2. But I won't hold my breath.
SOE is a MMO killer, literally.
SWG/SOE/Smedley has done nothing then get bad press for LA, as some articles point out, SWG management is a perfect guide how NOT to run a business and treat your customers.
LA saw that and took their business to a company with a much better record.
Add to that the SOE drama with the hacked databases I think LA made the right choice there.
"going into arguments with idiots is a lost cause, it requires you to stoop down to their level and you can't win"
one thing that will be good ,it will send dev to other game and will stenghten other game team!might actually be a good thing!
Do what??? Who moved from swg to SWTOR they are two different companies.