Another One Bites the Dust: SWG Edition!

[Sjofn]

NGE broke everyone, but I was already hurting with the CU (Combat Upgrade), prelude to NGE. 

I thought BW did a nice job with the end of the Tython epic quest where you get a lightsaber, but I don't understand why they didn't keep that uniqueness to crafting sabers throughout the rest of the game.  Lightsabers are just more vending machine, random drops.  In SWG you had to visit shrines (ignoring FS old man unlock, although the randomness was a carrot) and you had to hand craft all future sabers.  I miss that.  I wish BW had put in personal LS and other signature weapon crafting.  As it stands, the quest-for-magic-WoW-pants is getting old already.  "Buy a better saber off the AH"?

I find the "replace the hilt of your saber" to be about all I expect and/or want to do. Of course, I am an artificer, so I'm making my own hilts (and have discovered at 400 that I can make myself a brandy new lightsaber if I wanted to for some reason). I like that I can use my very first lightsaber all the way to cap. 


Lantyssa, you have made me feel a wide range of emotions with one simple post, you are to be commended. 

[HaemishM]

At least someone appreciates my humor.  I should have expected it from someone classy enough to wear a top hat.

Pics or it didn't happen.

[UnSub]

A very special weapon my Inquisitor uses to touch herself with every night.

She uses it as a back scratcher to get to the parts she can't otherwise reach?

[Der Helm]

That sounds like an autoerotic accident waiting to happen.

[Ginaz]

Bah!  It was her saber as an apprentice.  You don't need trumpets, just the knowledge that it is a very special weapon.

A very special weapon my Inquisitor uses to touch herself with every night.

Zash!

[Merusk]

Bah!  It was her saber as an apprentice.  You don't need trumpets, just the knowledge that it is a very special weapon.

A very special weapon my Inquisitor uses to touch herself with every night.

If it weren't such an old joke, you'd see fappydaffy.gif here.

[Der Helm]

Zash!

 

[Ginaz]

Zash!

 

A Darth three way with Zash and Lachris.   One can dream.

[Tarami]

That sounds like an autoerotic accident waiting to happen.

Well, there's that lady who thought it would be a good idea to attach her toys to the live blade of a sabre saw...

[Lantyssa]

Everything is proceeding as I have foreseen.

[Der Helm]

Zash!

 

A Darth three way with Zash and Lachris.   One can dream.

What's the name of the crazy girl from the agent story line again ?   

[Threash]

Zash!

 

A Darth three way with Zash and Lachris.   One can dream.

Meh Lachis is scart, Thana Vexx is way hotter.

[UnSub]

Everything is proceeding as I have foreseen.

When it comes to lesbian pr0n involving fictional characters, we are but fools dancing to your piper's tune.

[sam, an eggplant]

An corp!

Gordon Walton posts the inside story behind the NGE. We actually already knew all this stuff, but it's neat to get confirmation from another source.

http://community.crowfall.com/index.php?/topic/5792-gordon-walton-are-you-the-one-who-brought-us-the-nge/

[Tannhauser]

SWG was a highly innovative game that was probably ahead of its time.  Also the combat sucked before and after the NGE, but at least I could solo after the NGE.  I had some good memories there, me in my small house right outside Anchorhead crafting away, finding the POI's from the movies.  Good times. Game just need a lot of polish that it never got.  Thanks for the rushed product executives.

They should hold their heads high, they made a game lots of people loved, just not enough people.

[Merusk]

An corp!

Gordon Walton posts the inside story behind the NGE. We actually already knew all this stuff, but it's neat to get confirmation from another source.

http://community.crowfall.com/index.php?/topic/5792-gordon-walton-are-you-the-one-who-brought-us-the-nge/

Hey look, exactly what I predicted in the Daybreak thread. A very polished one-sided piece 10 years later.

[Lantyssa]

About what I thought.  If you followed the saga closely enough we had a good idea of what happened, just not the specifics behind the scenes.

At this point it's more about closure than feeling smug about being right though.

[Surlyboi]

SWG was a highly innovative game that was probably ahead of its time.  Also the combat sucked before and after the NGE, but at least I could solo after the NGE.  I had some good memories there, me in my small house right outside Anchorhead crafting away, finding the POI's from the movies.  Good times. Game just need a lot of polish that it never got.  Thanks for the rushed product executives.

They should hold their heads high, they made a game lots of people loved, just not enough people.

How could you not solo before the NGE?

[Sky]

I was a rifleman :( My dumbass rp streak straight up worked against me there. The keystone of the class, dealing 'unhealable' mind damage in pvp...but it also caused mind damage to use. Derp.

[Paelos]

What drives me nuts is that the companies involved looked at 300k subs and agreed that wasn't good enough.

Unless that 300k suddenly couldn't manage the overhead involved to keep it going, and I seriously doubt 3.5-4M a month was too low to do that in terms of revenue, they are all fucking stupid for trying to completely overhaul the game.

But honestly, the problem that killed SWG was that WoW existed. Nothing they could have done would have stopped that.

[Lantyssa]

WoW existed and it was a better put-together game.

Most of what drove people away were bugs and imbalances.  Those still trump almost all other considerations.

[Mandella]

When I first heard about it, NGE sounded like it was meant just for me. I had fallen away from playing SWG, but still hadn't fallen so low as to be playing WoW regularly. But when I logged in opening day, well, I was still young enough to be honestly shocked at just how badly put together and rushed the expansion was. I mean, this was a AAA game right? From a major company, and as mentioned above the servers weren't exactly empty.

Hell, the in game *tutorials* for the new content hadn't even been fully updated the first week...

[Surlyboi]

The NGE was SWG trying to be WoW and capture the, "ooh shiny" demo. It failed because it at its core, it was still SWG with all the bugs and super complex code and the people that tried to change it didn't understand that or the borderline rabid audience that was still there despite all the problems.

[HaemishM]

Unless that 300k suddenly couldn't manage the overhead involved to keep it going, and I seriously doubt 3.5-4M a month was too low to do that in terms of revenue, they are all fucking stupid for trying to completely overhaul the game.

More than likely, it wasn't enough to cover overhead AND the licensing fee to LucasArts - I'd guess it didn't lose money but it didn't do more than break even.

It also wasn't enough money to feed the rapacious Lucas ego.

[Threash]

He said so outright, not being bigger than EQ was a problem.

[Shatter]

WoW existed and it was a better put-together game.

Most of what drove people away were bugs and imbalances.  Those still trump almost all other considerations.

This, but tied into this was the fact that they had those issues and simply launched way too early.  Had they waited 6 months - 1 year to really get it settled they would of had a much better launch and we all know word of mouth will make or break a new game.  The poor unfinished game launch hurt the game right from day 1 and it never recovered from that.  With that in mind, even had they fixed the bugs, etc and waited to launch they still would of had to compete with WOW(and EQ2) soon after which more then likely still would of had a huge impact on their numbers even with a good launch.  In the end, the way I see it was SWG would of never been a 500K sub game or if it was it would of been brief.

[Rendakor]

would have

[Threash]

Wouldn't launching a year later put them after WoW? that couldn't have helped.

[Shatter]

Wouldn't launching a year later put them after WoW? that couldn't have helped.

Not quite, SWG launch June 03, WOW launched Nov 04, 1 year would of meant SWG launched in June 04 so maybe 5 months or so before WOW

[sam, an eggplant]

Anyone surprised by this post really hasn't been paying attention-- which is fine, it was quite a few years ago now, after all. The only real surprise was that Gordon took a principled stand and forced them to fire him over it. I didn't think people did stuff like that in real life. Real people have mortgages to pay.

That's his side of the story, anyway. Unless Smed does the same, which seems somewhat doubtful, we'll never see the flip.

[Threash]

Smed's side isn't hard to figure out either "this cost a shit ton more to make and run than EQ and it doesn't pull enough numbers for either us or Lucas art, we are going with the hail mary because either way we are fucked".

[Lantyssa]

I doubt we'll ever get more from Smed, but he's already given a mea culpa, so I doubt his view of the situation is much different besides being from the More Money Good perspective.

[Ironwood]

The only real surprise was that Gordon took a principled stand and forced them to fire him over it. I didn't think people did stuff like that in real life. Real people have mortgages to pay.

I can assure you that people do that.

I can also assure you that they never really regret it either, no matter how much they miss it.

[Paelos]

I left my old job in part because it was getting to the point where I thought some of the clients I was working on were lying, unprincipled, assholes. And I had no deserve to help them cheat the government.

But the problem with that particular industry is that when you need clients, guys like that are always willing to pay you.

[Surlyboi]

I miss the job and probably the money. Don't miss the assholes I worked with or the person I was. Of course, if I hadn't done it, I wouldn't be the person I am now, so there's that.