A Thread I found

Leviathen · Post by **Leviathen** » Sun May 07, 2006 6:11 am

I love what this guy wrote and feel very strongly to everything he said. It is regarding the wastelands planets have become and how very few are useful.

http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=swggpdiscussion&message.id=764680

Kurke_Aumea · Post by **Kurke_Aumea** » Sun May 07, 2006 9:27 am

It's quite a good read and the author makes many valid points. However, I think that is only the tip of the iceburg for where SWG went wrong. What I find interesting is how everyone keeps telling me that I should give SWG a try since it has changed for the better. Yet, after reading the article, I have no more desire to play than I did when I quit playing. I mean, from the sound of it combat may be better now, but everything else in the game got screwed over. What a waste of a game SWG has become.

What I found interesting after reading the article is that I suddenly have the urge to go play MMOs again, just not SWG... The article made me remember how much fun SWG used to be and how much I want to experience it again. The problem is that SWG is not the game I left behind and it will never be the game I wanted it to be.

Edit:
I found this post a couple posts down in the thread that Lev posted. To me, this is exactly why SWG has become the way it is. The poster goes by the name Arll.

they don't care about community, they changed their target demographic.

its all about competing with WoW by trying to become WoW, but with a broken FPS style system.

what we considered fun is irrelevant, what THEY consider fun is all that matters.

Waucod Meesman · Post by **Waucod Meesman** » Sun May 07, 2006 10:49 am

I read most of it and what he said sounds good if they made all of those changes I can bet you that the number of players would double.

Leviathen · Post by **Leviathen** » Sun May 07, 2006 12:48 pm

That quote is interesting Kurke, but more of, it wasn't so much the customers that didn't matter, it was the money that mattered, and I think they were losing it way too damn fast.

As much as I disagree with a lot of the changes, it's their game, and they have the right to change it. I enjoy what I do play right now, though I do wish it were the old game I joined up once.

Kurke_Aumea · Post by **Kurke_Aumea** » Sun May 07, 2006 4:39 pm

I understand they have the right to change it, but the devs never asked themselves if they should.

In my opinion, the whole reason SWG never attained the level of success that WoW did was because SWG was too complex. From character customization to the professions to the combat and crafting. All of it was too complex for the average gamer to pick up. When they tried to turn SWG into a WoW clone, they only succeeded in alienating the player base that loved SWG for the unique game that it was.

Apium · Post by **Apium** » Sun May 07, 2006 4:45 pm

Kurke_Aumea wrote:I understand they have the right to change it, but the devs never asked themselves if they should.

In my opinion, the whole reason SWG never attained the level of success that WoW did was because SWG was too complex. From character customization to the professions to the combat and crafting. All of it was too complex for the average gamer to pick up. When they tried to turn SWG into a WoW clone, they only succeeded in alienating the player base that loved SWG for the unique game that it was.

SWG does need pick a player base and stay there. Either hardcore players or noobs. EQ2 picked hardcore and WoW picked noobs, they each stay within their respective player bases and b/c of that they are both sucessful. SWG needs to find its place and stay there. At first the game was complex favoring hardcores and then they dumbed it down with the nge. Now they have the bad halves of both worlds.

I'm not using noob as an insult its just that category. It's the people that don't have the attention span to play a game like EQ2. Or people who want instant rewards such as fps players.

Apium · Post by **Apium** » Sun May 07, 2006 4:45 pm

Kurke_Aumea wrote:I understand they have the right to change it, but the devs never asked themselves if they should.

In my opinion, the whole reason SWG never attained the level of success that WoW did was because SWG was too complex. From character customization to the professions to the combat and crafting. All of it was too complex for the average gamer to pick up. When they tried to turn SWG into a WoW clone, they only succeeded in alienating the player base that loved SWG for the unique game that it was.

SWG does need pick a player base and stay there. Either hardcore players or noobs. EQ2 picked hardcore and WoW picked noobs, they each stay within their respective player bases and b/c of that they are both sucessful. SWG needs to find its place and stay there. At first the game was complex favoring hardcores and then they dumbed it down with the nge. Now they have the bad halves of both worlds.

I'm not using noob as an insult its just that category. It's the people that don't have the attention span to play a game like EQ2. Or people who want instant rewards such as fps players.

Leviathen · Post by **Leviathen** » Sun May 07, 2006 7:03 pm

I agree completely, and I like how that was phrased. I wish they had chosen hardcore players. Honestly, half the fun was the couple of months that I spelt learning the ropes. Yeah months, I took it slow because I never did devote much time to it. But honestly, that exploration and discovering everything that was out there was so much fun.

As for being too complex, I have to agree and disagree in two senses. First, I agree since they were unable to manage it whent hey continuously added content and the bugs just kept piling up. Disgree because the diversity was half the fun of the game.

Kurke_Aumea · Post by **Kurke_Aumea** » Sun May 07, 2006 7:15 pm

I have no qualms with the diversity that SWG originally offered. In fact, I loved it. I do think some original professions could have been eliminated because some of them were useless. On the other hand, I do think some of the various systems could have been simplified. For instance, crafting is basically pretty simple, but it begins to get complex as you start to look at it more closely. Take resources for instance. How many different types of steel were there that would spawn? And how many could you actually pronounce? Wouldn't it have been easier to just have "Steel", "Aluminum", "Iron", etc.???

To me, that is what I think of when I say "too complex." Don't get me wrong, the devs have made many, many mistakes over the eyars that haven't helped. But, I think a big reason why SWG never acheived WoW's popularity was simply that it was too complex for average Joe gamer.

Now, as Apium pointed out, the devs are trying to cater to the hardcore and the casual and you can't do both at the same time.

Leviathen · Post by **Leviathen** » Sun May 07, 2006 7:26 pm

I would have combined some. For example:

Combine Bio-Engineer and Creature Handler
Combine Armoursmith and Tailor
and so on.

Kurke_Aumea · Post by **Kurke_Aumea** » Sun May 07, 2006 7:36 pm

Leviathen wrote:I would have combined some. For example:

Combine Bio-Engineer and Creature Handler
Combine Armoursmith and Tailor
and so on.

I could have lived with that quite easily.

Leviathen · Post by **Leviathen** » Sun May 07, 2006 10:08 pm

I'd take skill boxes over levels any day.