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The way it WAS and the way it IS and why it happend
SmurfMagic
Member Posts: 664
For all those people who still come here and ask for a PRE NGE or PRE CU game or all those people who defend the NGE and have never known it to be anything else let me, a former beta tester and long time player give and overview of what it was and why it changed.
Not like this topic hasnt been beaten to death already but here it goes.
I have had a trip down memory lane, my old account was re-activated for some reason, ive no idea, I was actualy trying to get a free trial of the Matrix when I found my SOE account had a pending live sub to SWG. Its funny how they didnt e-mail me about this.
As I recall, in the beggining as with many games, there were bugs and balance issues. For example, a person could control 3 AT-ST's and complelty dominate an entire rebel group in PVP.
An AT-ST would bleed if injured, it was really funny.
Then came the secret to unlocking the jedi and everyone began to focus on that. It was a major goal and it took alot of work. People began to focus on grinding like mad but, it gave everyone comon goals and there was still interaction and people helped each other.
I had alot of fun going on group hunts on Dathomir, although the TKA people always dominated and as long as they didnt steal too much XP from the group we had fun. Then there were ninja looters, those were always annoying but we managed.
There were exploits, the slicing exploit. If you sliced a weapon between zones you could double or tripple slice it and make it really over powering.
There was always the templete of the month, you used to be able to stack templete abilities and become invincable with defences.
Swords and un armed TKA was very powerful and hard to beat for a long time.
Then we discoved the weakness of mind. You had alot more trouble getting a mind buff, people needed the entertainers to buff your mind and even with full buffs, a Combat Medic would come along and wipe out everyone.
The template of choice for me was Rifleman and Combat medic. I made the best poision with rancor bile and then finished them off with head shots. It wasnt really fair to all the others who worked hard on another proffesion.
Alot of things were not fair to players. We wanted a real PVP experince and all they really offered was the ablity to put up a base and find out when its defences are weak and take it down.
Destroy the others base was really the only orginzed PVP events that had purpose.
There was also Jedi Ganking. That was fun too. The bounty hunters could track down a jedi and bring some friends and cause some grief. A smart jedi would grind his skills with some friends for protection.
Crafting was cool too, you could really make some nice powerful stuff.
The point here is that WE PLAYERS made the game have purpose and had fun buy figuring out what was fun for us to do. Hunt, gather, craft, grind together. There was a sense of mystery and a sense of achievment.
There was also imbalance and un finished work on the game. Jedi was obtainable but their skills were not even written into the game.
When the first Jedi appeared they had no power and really sucked.
There were major problems with implementation of alot of things.
The game was really not completed or properly tested and should not have been released.
We players made it fun for what it was but alot of complaints were made too.
The people who never played the game said fix it, fix it now, fix it fast. Someone took a lightsaber to the code and messed it up. They hacked and slashed all day and night and when the wounds were open and festering they injected DNA from Everquest 2 and put some band aids on hoping for the best.
The game as it is now is very much like any other game and thats why old players dont like it. Its not what they remember and even if they really try hard to enjoy it, the game is still not the fun we remember.
Biggest reason I see is the population. If there were a reason for people to log on, then more people would play and it would be more fun. We play games for fun and I did not see any sign of fun.
The european server had the highest population but they dont know how to play like we did in the old days. I spent a good deal of time trying to get a hunting group together, or even just to find someone who could do a quest with me but my level was too low for them. It was really frustrating. I even joind a guild and there was never any meetings or anything to do. No PVP, there was no reason for it. No fun.
SO, why did it happen?
I would have to say money. I think maybe they were being threated to loose money or licence or somthing like that. Money is the main shaping force of any corporation. So, why did it happen this way? and what would have been a better way?
Well, I don;t really know the answer to those questions but we former players have been asking them for quite some time.
At this point in time I would sum up by saying that SWG is 5 years old but in reality its not. SWG as we former pre NGE and pre CU players remember it is LONG GONE. GAME OVER.
But for those people who enjoy the current NGE then do not pay attention to the nay sayers, just enjoy what you have. It is your money after all and if you did not enjoy it then would not be giving it to SOE.
Comments
The old pre-CU game was the best. But I still enjoy playing the game today though pvp still needs work.
Crafting is still fun and they recently fixed weapon smith.
Yes the new game the NGE is just a place I'm passing time till Bio-Ware's game arrives though I know it will be different and new hopefully with some real good quests or missions.
Only 5 servers have population today the others are really empty.
Ajax
Playing: World of Warcraft.
Played: Lord of the Rings Online, Starwars Galaxies.
Tried: Starwars the Old Republic, Everquest 2, Guild Wars, Vanguard, Age of Conan, Aion.
Crafting in SWG today is pointless and nerfed. Like I have said, others have said, and a lot of people feel, everyone who pays money to log onto these servers is slapping the entire Pre-CU playerbase in the face.
Not only is this game simply awful to play, it was developed in secret using our subscription money and the expansions were sold using illegal tactics.
I will be happily griefing any player whose name I recognize from the current NGE when we get over to the Bioware MMO.
Tecmo Bowl.
Crafting in SWG today is pointless and nerfed. Like I have said, others have said, and a lot of people feel, everyone who pays money to log onto these servers is slapping the entire Pre-CU playerbase in the face.
Not only is this game simply awful to play, it was developed in secret using our subscription money and the expansions were sold using illegal tactics.
I will be happily griefing any player whose name I recognize from the current NGE when we get over to the Bioware MMO.
{ Mod Edit }
Crafting is still good in SWG and items sell just fine those that take the time to harvest the good resources make the best goods still.
Get over issue with your game no one is forcing you to play please go to the AoC fourm you'll have more fun there!
Ajax
crafting became dumb with the CU when they capped the numbers and simplified the stats. I doubt the NGE made it any better.
Crafting in SWG today is pointless and nerfed. Like I have said, others have said, and a lot of people feel, everyone who pays money to log onto these servers is slapping the entire Pre-CU playerbase in the face.
Not only is this game simply awful to play, it was developed in secret using our subscription money and the expansions were sold using illegal tactics.
I will be happily griefing any player whose name I recognize from the current NGE when we get over to the Bioware MMO.
{ Mod Edit }
Crafting is still good in SWG and items sell just fine those that take the time to harvest the good resources make the best goods still.
Get over issue with your game no one is forcing you to play please go to the AoC fourm you'll have more fun there!
Crafting (and the crafting professions) were just about wiped out with the NGE and SOE is now doing its best to finish killing them off with things like the TCG.
Crafting is doing just fine, with GU5 weaponsmiths are in huge demand, and chef is doing great (it's products still have decay you know).
So the devs can't even kill off decay properly?
Decay in the NGE?
BUWAHAHAHAHAHAH!!1!!!
You implement equipment decay in the NGE, people wouldn' t know what to do with themselves these days.
I've mentioned to other players in other MMOs how the older version of SWG used to have item decay, and that *all* gear would eventually break for good. That the whole game economy revolved around that and actually worked, and that crafters and merchants were just as important to the game as any blaster using player.
The majority of them were simpy boggled and couldn't figure out how players could play with their gear *gasp* BREAKING FOR GOOD!
"I have only two out of my company and 20 out of some other company. We need support, but it is almost suicide to try to get it here as we are swept by machine gun fire and a constant barrage is on us. I have no one on my left and only a few on my right. I will hold." (First Lieutenant Clifton B. Cates, US Marine Corps, Soissons, 19 July 1918)
Well that was the beauty of a fully-functional player run economy...you didn't get a piece of gear by running an instance over and over again you just went and bought what you needed and there were other players who enjoyed crafting and selling so much that it was their sole focus in-game. It's so sad that SOE killed off that unique aspect of SWG.
The Way it was = Best Star Wars experience ever.
The way it is = Worst Star Wars ever.
how its happened = greed and unethical and immoral Company decided to scam and ignore their customers.
-----MY-TERMS-OF-USE--------------------------------------------------
$OE - eternal enemy of online gaming
-We finally WON !!!! 2011 $OE accepted that they have been fired 2005 by the playerbase and closed down ridiculous NGE !!
"There was suppression of speech and all kinds of things between disturbing and fascistic." Raph Koster (parted $OE)
I maintain that it was the introduction of Doc buffs and jedi that ruined the game long before any CU or NGE. The buffs made everyone invincible and able to wear the heaviest armors with no penalties. The jedi were nigh unto invincible and that meant everyone wanted to be one. These 2 factors turned everyone who was enjoying a virtual world star wars style into a bunch of solo hunting jedi grinders. The community fell apart and the economy went in the toilet.
R.I.P early SWG
Critical thinking is a desire to seek, patience to doubt, fondness to meditate, slowness to assert, readiness to consider, carefulness to dispose and set in order; and hatred for every kind of imposture.
The doc buffs were a bug that was never fixed (the resources spawned with stats much higher than intended, which made the buffs basically god mode). The problem with Jedi wasn't so much the Jedi system itself (though it was crap), it was that the devs got antsy about not enough people unlocking and gave out holocrons for Christmas which began the hologrind and killed the pre-CU game.
Pre-CU, the game was fixable. CU, the game was fixable, but to a lesser extent. With the current game, there is nothing that could be done to fix the core game, it needs a complete overhaul.
Decay was the major player in the credit sink, now with the NGE there's practically no credit sink and there's tons and tons of players racking up BILLIONS of credits on more than one character, when 3+ years ago 20 million credit was almost unheard of.
The GU5 weapon revamp may be in huge demand, for about a month until everyone gets the weapon they want, then they won't need any new ones because they won't decay.
As for Ajax suggesting to go to AoC forums to have fun, well there's a new guy in town on the AoC section of mmorpg.com named ILOVEFUNCON and has no idea what he's talking about and he reminds me of Gutboy, so go make fun of him when you're bored.
The doc buffs were a bug that was never fixed (the resources spawned with stats much higher than intended, which made the buffs basically god mode). The problem with Jedi wasn't so much the Jedi system itself (though it was crap), it was that the devs got antsy about not enough people unlocking and gave out holocrons for Christmas which began the hologrind and killed the pre-CU game.
Pre-CU, the game was fixable. CU, the game was fixable, but to a lesser extent. With the current game, there is nothing that could be done to fix the core game, it needs a complete overhaul.
Jedi weren't invincible, fencer and TKM's beat them to a pulp easily most of the time.
The doctor buffs were one of the biggest issues of the game when 2004 came around, I played a swordsman/doctor and always said that the doc pack B or C's would be better than the powerful D's and Janta packs + medical center (facility or city specialist) made it worse. Hell I even mass produced pack A's for myself for when I hunted on Endor and Dath.
Unless they changed it in the last year, Dark Age of Camelot also had item decay with eventual permanent breakage (with no exceptions for fancy quest gear). The big difference there was that repairs were absolutely reliable. You could mathematically calculate the max condition of an item (crafted, NPC-vendor, or quested), the condition-loss from repairs, and determine exactly how many repairs any item could sustain before breaking.
Crafting in SWG today is pointless and nerfed. Like I have said, others have said, and a lot of people feel, everyone who pays money to log onto these servers is slapping the entire Pre-CU playerbase in the face.
Not only is this game simply awful to play, it was developed in secret using our subscription money and the expansions were sold using illegal tactics.
I will be happily griefing any player whose name I recognize from the current NGE when we get over to the Bioware MMO.
hmmmm i sense me and you have alot of things in common!!
even with all those flaws...i would have played swg till it shut down if it wasnt for the nge. I managed to make it through a year of the NGE...but just couldn't do it anymore. It was, and still is, my favorite game of all time.