Another One Bites the Dust: SWG Edition!

[Crumbs]

It would hit beta and we'd hear that pistol damage didn't stack with rifle damage, that there were no Jedi, that there were fencers and animal tamers and other "I ported these over from UO because I'm Raph Koster and I don't know what Star Wars is durr durr" bullshit character types, and we'd laugh at it.

No, I didn't say that SWG.  I said a Star Wars game with those features.  Tell me that thread wouldn't get as many pages as the on rails single player that is SWTOR.  

You didn't notice that I put "jedi day one" in there too.  Did your rage even allow you to read my post?

[Malakili]

No, SWG failed because Smed and a couple of douchebags at Lucasarts thought they could make it like WoW when it was never meant to be.

Depends on the defnition of failed.  Certainly failed to be the market dominating force it wanted to be. NGE was an attempt to try and salvage that goal.  Had they stayed with the original, they'd probably be something closer to what EVE is today.  Niche, but solid enough a popiulation to continue development.

Speculation, of course.

[Sky]

I was five when Star Wars was released, lightsabers aren't actually a massive part of that story but they were still awesome enough for me to register them at five as 'better than blasters and speeders'.

I spent more time playing with my han solo pistol than the lightsaber, but that might be because original toy lightsabers were total garbage.

[Merusk]

I was five when Star Wars was released, lightsabers aren't actually a massive part of that story but they were still awesome enough for me to register them at five as 'better than blasters and speeders'.

I spent more time playing with my han solo pistol than the lightsaber, but that might be because original toy lightsabers were total garbage.

You couldn't hit shit with them, true, but goddamn did they make an awesome noise.   I wish they'd remake them with modern plastics & molding techs.

This thread is drifting from the original intent pretty badly. We've had the SWG discussion so often it's auto-denned these days. How about letting it go, admitting the flop and moving on.  Seriously, you're as bad as the Trammel-haters and denned for the same reasons.

On that note: Companion death.  Yes, I expect it'll cause some people angst, but I also expect it to be a low, low number, particularly with the pop-ups.  The question at hand is really how loudly will they bitch and how will Bioware handle that noise.  So far they're taking a "Well, tough for those guys," position on a lot of issues.  You can't maintain that front when a game is live because of the ill will it generates.

[Rendakor]

This thread is drifting from the original intent pretty badly. We've had the SWG discussion so often it's auto-denned these days. How about letting it go, admitting the flop and moving on.  Seriously, you're as bad as the Trammel-haters and denned for the same reasons.

On that note: Companion death.  Yes, I expect it'll cause some people angst, but I also expect it to be a low, low number, particularly with the pop-ups.  The question at hand is really how loudly will they bitch and how will Bioware handle that noise.  So far they're taking a "Well, tough for those guys," position on a lot of issues.  You can't maintain that front when a game is live because of the ill will it generates.

Um, this thread IS the SWG thread, not the SWTOR thread.

[Threash]

This thread is about SWG discussion, your companion death stuff is whats out of topic :P

[Rasix]

I was five when Star Wars was released, lightsabers aren't actually a massive part of that story but they were still awesome enough for me to register them at five as 'better than blasters and speeders'.

I spent more time playing with my han solo pistol than the lightsaber, but that might be because original toy lightsabers were total garbage.

You couldn't hit shit with them, true, but goddamn did they make an awesome noise.   I wish they'd remake them with modern plastics & molding techs.

This thread is drifting from the original intent pretty badly. We've had the SWG discussion so often it's auto-denned these days. How about letting it go, admitting the flop and moving on.  Seriously, you're as bad as the Trammel-haters and denned for the same reasons.

On that note: Companion death.  Yes, I expect it'll cause some people angst, but I also expect it to be a low, low number, particularly with the pop-ups.  The question at hand is really how loudly will they bitch and how will Bioware handle that noise.  So far they're taking a "Well, tough for those guys," position on a lot of issues.  You can't maintain that front when a game is live because of the ill will it generates.

[Merusk]

Fooook. I fail.

[Sir T]

You know, I'm playing though Oblivion right now with a Jedi custom class - Blade, Block, Armorer, Acrobatics, Alteration, Mysticism, Illusion. It pretty much rocks. It does lack a range capability but that's why I have a bow and arrows.   Besides who needs range when they are all fighting one another?  

I'll stop being off topic...

[Crumbs]

Had they stayed with the original, they'd probably be something closer to what EVE is today.  Niche, but solid enough a popiulation to continue development.

Speculation, of course.

I think that's absolutely true.  SWGemu is proof.  

[Surlyboi]

I was five when Star Wars was released, lightsabers aren't actually a massive part of that story but they were still awesome enough for me to register them at five as 'better than blasters and speeders'.

I spent more time playing with my han solo pistol than the lightsaber, but that might be because original toy lightsabers were total garbage.

You couldn't hit shit with them, true, but goddamn did they make an awesome noise.   I wish they'd remake them with modern plastics & molding techs.

Oh, but they did. Not as nice as the ones I make, but not bad either.

[Amaron]

Well, if they had stuck in a good combat system would that have really made the difference though?  I mean, maybe, but I'm betting people still wouldn't have liked the sandbox direction even with snappy combat, at least in the long run.

I guess I didn't really word it correctly.   I was saying that a good combat experience with accessible PvE should of been the core of the game content INSTEAD of the sandbox stuff.    They could of put sandbox in everywhere else as long as people could kill stuff 90% of the time and reap rewards for it.   EQ proved that's where the money was.   SWG just needed to swoop up all the casuals who didn't like the way EQ nutstomped them.

That and the Jedi.   Really the license was just a complete handicap without the Jedi.

Oh, but they did. Not as nice as the ones I make, but not bad either.

Shit I'm a sad person.   When I looked at those I just thought how awesome it would be to buy one and take it to midnight release for SWTOR.

[WindupAtheist]

You could do a sandbox game and have it make money, easy. You just couldn't blow $80 million on production in vain hopes of getting Warcraft numbers. You could even do it in a Star Wars setting, but the game would have to be... not a "Well I can't be a Jedi but my pikeman sure is good at milking banthas, and isn't that was Star Wars is really all about?" goddamn abomination.

I mean I play UO. Still. I enjoy the sandboxiness of it, but I don't craft or grow plants or any of that shit. I kill things and socialize, mostly. Why don't I just go do that in any old game? Because when I do it in UO I can make up any sort of character I want, not one of ten classes, I can dress him however I want and still be combat effective, and the game isn't trying to feed my life story to me. "You are a noble warrior of the Alliance and you are concerned about the Murlocs in Redshire or whatever the fuck. No? Fine, fuck you, don't level then!" It's also not screaming "GROUP WITH 24 OTHER ASSHOLES OR YOU'RE A SECOND-CLASS FAGGOT!"

I mean, forget about building virtual farms for a minute. Can't I just have an actual MMO where you don't just play one of ten varieties of useless assholes that have to either team up to accomplish anything or else live as Untermenschen?

[Malakili]

I mean, forget about building virtual farms for a minute. Can't I just have an actual MMO where you don't just play one of ten varieties of useless assholes that have to either team up to accomplish anything or else live as Untermenschen?

Fallen Earth maybe? Its going free to play, so you could check it out.   I agree with what you've said though, I think choosing to play a combat oriented character in a game like UO is a fine choice, and I think its a more interesting choice because you don't have to do that.  I'm not saying everyone needs to be a Bantha milker, but I think having people who don't fight or fight minimally is a good thing for a game.

Incidentally, the thing that came to mind when I read your post was something like a multiplayer/persistent world Morrowind.  I'd buy that.

[stu]

I liked my Ranger. He harvested animal resources for all sorts of crafters on the server. That shit was fun. :/

[Crumbs]

Well I can't be a Jedi but my pikeman sure is good at milking banthas,

LOL

Incidentally, the best player I knew in SWG was a pikeman and he won a duel with 3 jedis at the same time.  I know this statement invites all sorts of bashing but it was one of the most memorable things I've seen in all my years of online games.

Also, SWGemu forums are hot, and many of the twitter "SWG" comments mention SWGemu.  #justsayin

[Merusk]

I was five when Star Wars was released, lightsabers aren't actually a massive part of that story but they were still awesome enough for me to register them at five as 'better than blasters and speeders'.

I spent more time playing with my han solo pistol than the lightsaber, but that might be because original toy lightsabers were total garbage.

You couldn't hit shit with them, true, but goddamn did they make an awesome noise.   I wish they'd remake them with modern plastics & molding techs.

Oh, but they did. Not as nice as the ones I make, but not bad either.

Yeah, but you still can't hit shit with them, don't make the awesome wind-powered noise and require batteries.   I was thinking just fix the "can't hit things" problem and keep the rest of the old toy.

[Venkman]

LORE LORE LORE

DON'T CARE. STAR WARS. NEED LIGHTSABER.

Regardless, set aside the holocron mess for a sec. I don't think Jedi would have felt right in SWF. And personally I don't think people needed to play Jedi as much as the lens of history (and SWTOR) makes some believe. A better combat system that made sense to the combat fan would have done a lot more for SWG than having everyone running around with a light saber.

You are wrong. Also, remember this when Star Wars: Half Our Classes Have Lightsabers comes out in a box with a guy triple-wielding lightsabers on the front of it and outsells the entire history of SWG in like a month.

That's a foregone conclusion. My point wasn't about the lore for the sake of lore though. It was about the license. I have no idea what the licensing agreement was. But, licensing isn't just signing on the dotted line either. It's that plus someone looking over your shoulder forever while you make decisions outside of their area of expertise and compromise to close the gap. Therefore, I'd bet large that given the period during which this was greenlit, and the setting of the game, the edict was "rare/no Jedi". The rest was just details on how to make them "rare". For SWG, there wasn't going to be a good answer.

That was nowhere near the biggest problem with the game either.  But the actual problems have been discussed more often than why WoW was successful.

And as I said on page one: this was my UO 2. It just happened to be called "Star Wars". So I personally didn't care about the lore.

[Fordel]

Yeah, but you still can't hit shit with them, don't make the awesome wind-powered noise and require batteries.   I was thinking just fix the "can't hit things" problem and keep the rest of the old toy.

My nephew has the latest in actual toy lightsabers, they telescope into the handle and you can extend them out with a button press and a swing of the saber. You can also smack things with them without much issue, as my bruises from his last visit will attest to. They aren't that expensive either, got them on sale for like 5 bucks each.

They don't make any noises though. 

[Margalis]

That's a foregone conclusion. My point wasn't about the lore for the sake of lore though. It was about the license. I have no idea what the licensing agreement was. But, licensing isn't just signing on the dotted line either. It's that plus someone looking over your shoulder forever while you make decisions outside of their area of expertise and compromise to close the gap. Therefore, I'd bet large that given the period during which this was greenlit, and the setting of the game, the edict was "rare/no Jedi". The rest was just details on how to make them "rare". For SWG, there wasn't going to be a good answer.

Why in the world would you sign an agreement to make a Star Wars MMO if the agreement doesn't allow for Jedis?

That's like signing an agreement to make a Warhammer 40K MMO but you aren't allowed to include Orks and Space Marines. If what you say is true then all that does is transform "it's stupid to make a Star Wars game without lightsabers" into "it's stupid to agree to make a Star Wars game without lightsabers then go ahead and make it despite the fact that that's a terrible fucking idea."

This smacks of over thinking to me. Too many Jedi doesn't jive with the fiction that only 30 extended universe super nerds in the world care about - yay. Balancing a Jedi against other classes is hard because Jedi are supposed to be awesome - whatever. People like laser swords. That's like THE ONLY GOOD THING about Star Wars. FFS find a way to make it work!

If you take laser swords out of Star Wars you have complete shit. What is Star Wars at that point? CGI dinosaurs?

[Merusk]

If you take laser swords out of Star Wars you have complete shit. What is Star Wars at that point? CGI dinosaurs?

Apparently milking banthas and a universe where it's possible to cross the galaxy in a few days but impossible to haul water for less money than sucking it out of the arid air of a desert.

[Malakili]

This smacks of over thinking to me. Too many Jedi doesn't jive with the fiction that only 30 extended universe super nerds in the world care about - yay. Balancing a Jedi against other classes is hard because Jedi are supposed to be awesome - whatever. People like laser swords. That's like THE ONLY GOOD THING about Star Wars. FFS find a way to make it work!

Thats kind of non-trivial, Jedi in the original series BECAUSE they are awesome, rare, and way more powerful than non-Jedi.  Make them prentiful and balanced and they aren't really all that special, hell, Bounty Hunters and Smugglers (if we had to call them classes), are "cooler" than Jedi if everything is balanced.

SWTOR is doing it full on, and thats fine we will see what happens, but I still think SWG made a fine approach.  But hey, with an argument like "wollolololololol only nerds care about lore" nothing is going to make you care, so whatever.

[MournelitheCalix]

Well, my first proposal was not to have Jedi as PCs at all, but that lasted for mere seconds after I proposed it. :)

 

Raph first off thank you for SWG, I loved the game (pre-CU) from start to finish and really would love to play another one.  I would though like to ask you two questions about SWG if I could.  There was a random encounter on Tatooine where a slave girl gets killed before you and gives you a disk before dying.  

Just Two Questions:

1.  Why didn't the devs make more meaningful random content like that, that would have rewarded exploration?  I ask because I thought it was so obvious with your spawning algorithms seemingly set to do this anyway (ie: actual NPC bases, not the little boxes spawning in the middle of nowhere).

2.  Was this encounter ever solveable?  I thought and my memory on this is not so fresh as it once was but I thought we were supposed to give this disk to someone.  I was never able to give it to anyone.

[Venkman]

If you take laser swords out of Star Wars you have complete shit. What is Star Wars at that point? CGI dinosaurs?

I sorta agree. However, that's through a lens of hindsight. Not having been in the early negotiations, I'm totally guessing about the topics and the timing. I think SWG took 3-4 years to develop, so am adding in another year from the moment someone said "that EQ1 thing looks like moneyhats, let's make one of them there new fangled "MMORPG" things".

That puts us right around when Episode 1 came out, maybe even before it. Were we thinkiing Star Wars was all about lightsabers in the late 90s? I don't know. I was really into the EU stuff at that point, and to me the IP was about a bunch of crap that either got retconned or nixed altogether. Already had a thick skin at that point, even midichlorians didn't bother me (ok, not as much as others maybe).

In any case, if all I knew about SW was the first three movies, there was exactly one Jedi that mattered. If all I knew about SW was the movies and some Lucasarts SW games, that doesn't increase the amount of Jedi. All the Jedi I knew about were whoever Luke was picking up years after RotJ as he was rebuilding the academy on Yavin IV under the watchful gaze of Exar Kun. But from a game play standpoint, I wasn't expecting Jedi as much as I was really aggravated by the lack of space combat. If we could resurrect Slow News Day or old LtM before it, I'm sure there's a bunch of posts in there with me saying "how the eff do you launch a SW game without space combat.".

We'll never know for sure probably, since all the people involved are too professional to talk about this kind of stuff, or to take chances confirming or denying. And besides, it doesn't truly matter because TOR has been skinned enough like Clone Wars to give us what we think we really wanted in 2003 anyway. :)

And before anyone states the obvious, yes, I'm totally overthinking this. SWG topics is my own personal "mechs vs tanks". 

[Tannhauser]

SWG wasn't a failure, it generated revenue for eight years.  But, yeah, it wasn't very good.  I did enjoy the crafting and living near Anchorhead.  But the combat was bad (OMG HAM), no Jedi and no spaceflight (at first) made it seem like the game was designed by someone who had heard of Star Wars but had never seen it.  

It was half-baked and poorly designed, but the sandbox did feel good.  

For the record, I loved UO and have many great memories of it. My iconic MMO.  I can't think of a single great memory of SWG.

[UnSub]

Had they stayed with the original, they'd probably be something closer to what EVE is today.  Niche, but solid enough a popiulation to continue development.

Speculation, of course.

I think that's absolutely true.  SWGemu is proof.  

How many people play SWGemu? And what does it cost to play?

[Margalis]

I have nothing against EU nerds but you guys have to remember you are a small niche. Yes, only SW nerds care about SW lore.

MMOs already have the problem where everyone is the chosen hero, Jedi don't change that. Sure, it's kind of silly if Jedi are supposed to be rare and there are 100,000 running around. Then against it's kind of silly when you are given a quest to rescue the princess from the dungeon because you are the only guy strong enough and 2 seconds later someone else is given the same quest to rescue the same princess from the same dungeon because they are also the only guy strong enough.

[Crumbs]

Had they stayed with the original, they'd probably be something closer to what EVE is today.  Niche, but solid enough a popiulation to continue development.

Speculation, of course.

I think that's absolutely true.  SWGemu is proof.  

How many people play SWGemu? And what does it cost to play?

 

"solid enough a population to continue development"

[Raph]

Well, my first proposal was not to have Jedi as PCs at all, but that lasted for mere seconds after I proposed it. :)

 

Raph first off thank you for SWG, I loved the game (pre-CU) from start to finish and really would love to play another one.  I would though like to ask you two questions about SWG if I could.  There was a random encounter on Tatooine where a slave girl gets killed before you and gives you a disk before dying.  

Just Two Questions:

1.  Why didn't the devs make more meaningful random content like that, that would have rewarded exploration?  I ask because I thought it was so obvious with your spawning algorithms seemingly set to do this anyway (ie: actual NPC bases, not the little boxes spawning in the middle of nowhere).

2.  Was this encounter ever solveable?  I thought and my memory on this is not so fresh as it once was but I thought we were supposed to give this disk to someone.  I was never able to give it to anyone.

The answer to this is in a post on my blog:

http://www.raphkoster.com/2010/04/30/dynamic-pois/

[Raph]

Yeah, I can't really speak to most of the stuff in the thread; there are many more moving parts that are not public knowledge.

Some things I think it is safe to say: the requirement to have Jedi, make them be like in the movies, make them rare, plus the time period being mandated... Yes, it was basically all required, and yeah, kind of impossible. I did suggest using the post-movie period -- there's a lot of stuff in the EU that is really great and would have been fresh and new to more casual fans. And many more Jedi start popping up.

There was also a desire to not cannibalize EQ, and make the game different. Despite that, SWG WAS intended to have tons of content. There are a lot of reasons why it didn't.

[Lum]

Too many Jedi doesn't jive with the fiction that only 30 extended universe super nerds in the world care about - yay.

Actually, if you don't count the EU (which you shouldn't because it's horrible), in the time period of the game (the first 3 movies) there were three living Jedi. Five if you count the Sith. This was kind of the entire plot of the movies. It's a bit more to overlook than "30 EU nerds" and is an excellent argument why setting an MMO in the time frame of the movies is a bad idea.

[Amaron]

There was also a desire to not cannibalize EQ, and make the game different.

I kind of figured on this.   Did you guys feel at the time that SWG should of tried to be the first mass market MMO?    What I mean is, was there a conscious decision (due to risk/whatever) to give up on the idea of making SWG much bigger than EQ?   Or did it just not really occur to anyone inside SOE at that point?

I feel that WoW caught everyone by surprise of course but I still felt it was clear that the market was ready for a big game anyways.   It's feels like the worst problem was that Lucas didn't have many options besides SoE to work with.

[Montague]

Well, my first proposal was not to have Jedi as PCs at all, but that lasted for mere seconds after I proposed it. :)

 

Raph first off thank you for SWG, I loved the game (pre-CU) from start to finish and really would love to play another one.  I would though like to ask you two questions about SWG if I could.  There was a random encounter on Tatooine where a slave girl gets killed before you and gives you a disk before dying.  

Just Two Questions:

1.  Why didn't the devs make more meaningful random content like that, that would have rewarded exploration?  I ask because I thought it was so obvious with your spawning algorithms seemingly set to do this anyway (ie: actual NPC bases, not the little boxes spawning in the middle of nowhere).

2.  Was this encounter ever solveable?  I thought and my memory on this is not so fresh as it once was but I thought we were supposed to give this disk to someone.  I was never able to give it to anyone.

The answer to this is in a post on my blog:

http://www.raphkoster.com/2010/04/30/dynamic-pois/

I designed and implemented the slave girl POI and a couple others.
Dynamic POIs were a failure and reflected larger failures in how we built content on SWG.
Dynamic POI spawning was problematic for a long time. One algorithm used would spawn content in areas near players…every player was given an allotment of POIs. The spawning system would try to place the POI in the path of the player, so that as they explored they would run into some interesting even unfolding in the world. This was incredibly naive. Most players congregated in cities, so you’d get a crust of POI content around the edges of the city — just beyond the radius where they weren’t allowed to spawn. The player’s content allotment would then be met. The result was a thick ring of creatures and events and then the rest of the world being mostly barren.
The idea generation / content creation / idea validation process on SWG was broken. There _was no methodological idea validation_. We would have weeks of content creation and no one was actually playing that content. Designers would implement dynamic pois without really knowing if they were fun, if they would function correctly, etc. When playtests did happen they were overwhelmed by fundamental problems in the game design (broken combat, broken professions, etc). Getting a clear evaluation of secondary systems like dynamic content spawning was extremely difficult. As a result the system shipped in a broken state.
Another failure of dynamic POIs were the cost. They were expensive to implement, but only interesting the first time they were encountered. Once the player had played them they became more annoying than useful. They are, essentially, quests pushed to the player. The system doesn’t care (or even know) if the player had seen that content before. The dynamic POIs often involved complex branching dialog trees, multiple characters interacting on unknown terrain, etc. This involved a lot of implementation time for a payoff that didn’t scale to the investment.
Another failure was the fragility of any complex scenario when spawned in a random world location. A dynamic POI might break if it spawned an Imperial soldier near a rebel base — the two would start to fight interrupting the scenario. The designer had no idea where the scenario would be spawning or even if it was a appropriate location for the story they were trying to tell or the npc actors involved.
I better stop now before I have flashbacks.

 

That post on Raph's blog is very enlightening. Dynamic content sounds awesome on the surface but yeah, I can see being on my way to a raid/instance/whatever and then some random quest that I didnt ask for pops up in my face. Goes to show that the road to Hell is paved with good ideas and crap project management.

[Bzalthek]

Well make it require a voluntary commitment by the player.  Like a golden cock appears and starts spinning in your UI.  CLICK for your POI wankery!  And you can say "hellz yeah, it's time to slay the bantha!" or "bros before hos, chucklefuck!" and decline.  And later, if you feel like it, you can go back and start your golden wang adventure.

[Raph]

And yet Jedi appearing is what started the downward spiral. I wish we'd kept them out altogether! 

You think adding easier to get Jedi before NGE started a downward spiral? 

Not think, know. Holocron drops that first Xmas, specifically.