Five years later, despite server closures and merges and a minimal population, the game is still going and content has still been added to the game including, amongst other additions, the planet of Hoth which went live on November 20th 2008. The latest patch, Game Update 18, was released last month.

SWG was the first MMO I devoted a lot of time but I, along with the rest of my guild, ended up leaving shortly after the NGE hit. Even though I’ve now spent considerably more time not playing it than I did playing it, I still have fond memories of the game. I’m under no illusion that the game itself was lacking in several areas but it was different at the time and it could be a lot of fun and extremely social. A glance at the Player Cities list on the official website and I still recognise a couple of cities that still exist after all this time on our old server and that’s nice to see. Our old city, unfortunately, is not one of them.

A new Star Wars MMO is coming out next year – EA Bioware’s Star Wars: Knights of The Old Republic Online, which, it seems to me, is eagerly anticipated and derided by MMO players in equal measure. Sony could do worse things than take advantage of this by making SWG free-to-play as there may well be a fair few players – like me – who would be tempted to go back and see what’s changed. And if SWTOR ends up being delayed at all then SOE could end up being quids in by attracting some of those who can’t wait for their Star Wars MMO fix and may be willing to shell some hard earned cash on some Mandalorian armour from the SWG shop.

SWG’s ancient graphics and hokey systems are no match for a modern game engine and I’m not sure that anyone could have forseen that it would have lasted another five years but, like the Jedi, it’s fire has not yet gone out of the universe².

¹ If I’d got my act together, I would have posted this last week. I didn’t manage either.
² I am truly sorry for this sentence.

A long time ago… is a post from: Kill Ten Rats

This is the case with the epic jewelry rewards for the “Heroic” instances in Star Wars Galaxies. But tomorrow’s patch for Star Wars Galaxies will remove the no-trade tag from all new heroic jewelry.

The goal it seems is to remove the no-trade tag from the game entirely. Auctions for full sets of all the end-game rewards will run a player about 50 million credits. All the best armor in the game, the best rewards for instances, and one of the best weapons can be purchased for real life dollars. Some players buy SWG virtual trading cards which are commonly traded for in-game credits and some send the cash to Chinese credit farmers directly.

The effect of making end-game trade-able is to remove the last bit of theme-park elements from the mess that is Star Wars Galaxies. While some took the change well, my friends referred to this newest patch as the “New NGE”

Buying jewelry makes sense, but that epic jewelry isn’t really just jewelry… it’s a set of stats and skill modifiers related to your class as a reward for completing all the content the game has to offer. If end game items are trade-able, then character advancement is trade-able. Put away that lightsaber, it’s time to swipe your credit card instead.

Removal of No-Trade in SWG is a post from: Kill Ten Rats

So now that I’ve had a chance actually try this system, I can say that SOE didn’t make anything worth bragging about. The reason an individual would create thousands of quests in a month is because everyone who wants to make cool quests has to grind for hours before they’re allowed to make anything worth doing. Almost all of the quests I’ve made have been made using a mouse recording program while I was asleep. Anyone that made six thousand quests in four weeks probably did the same thing. Every single one of those quests is as engaging as you imagine.

Why is that developers put in massive grinds into these things? I know they want me to play longer, but the ability to find well written player content would keep me playing a lot longer than a massive grind.

Mission Maker is a post from: Kill Ten Rats

Anyone who’s been intently following Star Trek Online already knows how Cryptic’s game compares to pre-NGE Star Wars Galaxies.

From STO’s use of skill-based leveling to their use of a the “genesis system” to generate random content, Star Trek Online is following in the footsteps of Star Wars Galaxies.

Back then, Star Wars fans were asking, “Why can’t I start as a Jedi?”, “Are there smuggling missions?” and “When can we play in space?”. These days, Star Trek fans are asking, “Why can’t I start as a Klingon?”, “Are there diplomatic missions?” and “When can I have my friends on the same ship as me?”

The way Cryptic answers these questions is similar to how SOE handled questions about SWG. Like SWG’s pre-launch developer chats, the STO dev-chats have phrases like, “You can’t start as one, but…”, “Not at launch, but…”, and “Some day you may be able to…”, . They find themselves in the uncomfortable position of having to both hype their game and curtail unrealistic expectations.

But maybe I’m being too hard on Star Trek Online. SWG launched with far less going for it. The lack of space-combat in SWG was probably harder to swallow than the lack of multi-player ships in STO. The grind-heavy process to unlock a Jedi is probably more frustrating than the grind-light process to unlock a Klingon. The robust character creation system of Star Wars Galaxies actually looks primitive compared to what we’ve seen in leaked footage of STO’s character creation process. And honestly, it was the lack of content, randomly generated or not, that made SWG’s dynamic spawn system such a boring way to fill empty areas.

At the end of the day, I expect a lot of the people who are extremely hyped for STO to be disappointed. But I also expect a lot of people who are not MMO fans will be drawn to STO, and fall in love. Like SWG, people will look back years from now at the early days of STO and say, “Remember playing before the Next Generation Expansion? That was cool.”

STO: The real SWG2 is a post from: Kill Ten Rats

Greetings, readers! My name is Moormur. Some of you may know me from LOTROCast or the Galactic Holofeed, podcasts I co-host both with a very able crew. I am also an avid reader of all the stuff here at Kill Ten Rats. I refrain from posting commentary on my podcast websites for whatever reason, so I have asked Ethic here at Kill Ten Rats if he didn’t mind a guest column.

I’ve been thinking lately of a trend of sorts in the MMO developing community…player designed content. I’m not talking about sandbox MMOs…those are really a topic for another time and place. I’m talking about when developers release a set of tools in a theme park style MMO that allows players to create missions. City of Heroes, as far as I know, was really the first to do this. Now, my former MMO Star Wars: Galaxies has put out their own set of tools with the Chronicle Master.

As I sit here pondering all this, I start looking at other MMOs with a somewhat analytical eye. I am thinking specifically of Lord of the Rings Online, my MMO of choice. As far as I know, Turbine has no plans of implementing any sort of custom content into LOTRO. Or are they? Maybe it’s the conspiracy theorist peeking out of me, but for some reason I suddenly got suspicious of the Skirmishes coming out with Siege of Mirkwood. For those unfamiliar with Skirmishes, they are basically instances that scale up according level and group size. The idea behind them is that they will be quick, fun (hopefully), and repeatable instances that you can do at any time from any place. I’m excited for the possibilities this opens up…with every new content update, Turbine can release a handful of new skirmishes, too.

But is there a deeper motive? Turbine has created a framework for quick and scaleable content. The instances don’t seem to be too big…as far as I know, they use locations already in the game. They are designed to take 30 to 45 minutes. They are compartmentalized ‘popcorn’ instances, as the devs put it.

So is Turbine setting the stage for Custom Content?

What’s to say they aren’t? What’s to stop them from releasing a set of tools that allow players to design skirmishes?

This, frankly, makes me a little wary. I have mixed feelings on integrated user content in general. Not unintegrated content, like back in the days when we made user maps for Medal of Honor or Jedi Outcast using Radiant that were never actually supported by the dev team. I mean integrated content…where the content that users make becomes an ‘official’ part of the game. I haven’t experienced integrated content, like that of CoH or SWG firsthand, so I don’t know from actual experience how ‘fun’ it is. But it does raise some concerns for me, nonetheless.

First is the amount of ‘good’ content to total amount of content ration. I know from my Jedi Outcast days, where I would head to pcgamemods.com and download 20 or 30 maps at a time to try them out that for every good map, there are a dozen bad ones. And that was back when we had to jump through enough hoops to even download the design tools (let alone use them) that the number of people developing custom content was miniscule. What happens when anyone out there can design stuff? I’m sure that some of the user generated content is actually pretty good. Some people, when given the chance to express themselves like this, generate some pretty neat stuff. But you have to wade through a lot of crap before you get to the good stuff. Will devs use this user-created time sink to become lazy?

That is the crux of my second, and much more major, concern. Will user generated content make developers become complacent? If the devs know we players have a mountain of content to go through, regardless of quality, how does that affect their outlook on developing? LOTRO is a very, very solid game. Even if Turbine has slowed down lately in the amount of content they release per year, what they do release is, in my opinions, of high quality. Would that standard degrade if they released user tools?

What are your thoughts? Would widespread custom content make developers more complacent? If you play an MMO with these tools, what do you think of them? Do they improve your play experience? Or are they just another time sink between real updates?

Custom Design is a post from: Kill Ten Rats

I can’t say people didn’t see it coming. Yivvits and Mr Bubble pondered what else could come of a free-character-transfer service which only allowed people to transfer from empty servers to high population servers.

As empty as the low-population servers are, there are those that will be sad to see them go. A lot of the player-created content in SWG is in the player cities. The characters can always still transfer off, but the real estate goes down with the server.

SWG’s Overwhelming Success is a post from: Kill Ten Rats

Really cool characters like IG-88 shouldn’t be crammed into a raid-mold that was invented for dragons.

It’s not just the dragons either. We’re still doing everything we’ve been doing. Stimpacks are just a health potions. Your armor and heroic jewelry has magic enchantments that makes you stronger and faster. Your medic is effectively just tossing out healing spells. After all these years, we’re still playing the same game with slight changes to avoid copy-right infringement.

Still Killing Dragons is a post from: Kill Ten Rats

Somehow, this person actually thinks that putting in a massive grind and tying it to a massive reward is a good idea.

It remind me of how people talked about Jedi when I first played SWG. People expected Jedi to be ridiculously powerful when compared to other professions. Many people were asking for Jedi to be kept rare, either for balance reasons or to stay true to the cannon. They wanted becoming a Jedi to be something that only the most dedicated of players would achieve. Some called for as little as one Jedi per server.

Later on, the developers revealed the method to becoming a Jedi involved massive amounts of grinding. Players would have to master unrelated and boring professions like cook, merchant, dancer, image designer, and fencer just to get a chance to start grinding Jedi. This is how they expected to keep the Jedi population down.

Jedi are so much cooler than a “Pistoleer” ever could be. More than half the server was either working on becoming a Jedi or a Bounty Hunter. Even people who weren’t particularly interested in swinging a lightsaber around wanted to be Jedi so they could have the strongest character. Yet somehow, people had expected that a massive grind would be enough to make the average player say, “No, I don’t want to be a big powerful Jedi. I’m happy being a weakling henchman.”

Massive power is a massive carrot. Super rarity is a super carrot. And awesome coolness is an awesome carrot. Putting these great carrots at the end of a longer stick just makes the game more grindy and boring, it doesn’t dissuade people from chasing their goals.

The rest of the server isn’t going to sit back and let you achieve “elite status”. If they have to, they’ll run macro programs or hire Chinese pro-gamers to kill their orcs for them. If you want something to stay rare, it has to be a challenge that gives almost no reward.

A nice title will do that just fine.

Elite status is a post from: Kill Ten Rats

Grab a pint of blue milk and raise your glass to the sky as we celebrate the 6-Year Anniversary of Star Wars Galaxies™!

The Annual Empire Day celebration is back, and this year it is bigger and better than ever. Join Princess Leia and Lord Vader along with your favorite Star Wars® characters for awards, rewards, fireworks, events and elaborate ceremonies!

Join with our community and the Star Wars Galaxies Development Team in sharing your Star Wars Galaxies 6-Year Anniversary wishes by having your character sign the 6-Year Anniversary DataPad!

Gather your friends and join the celebration in-game between June 23rd and July 21st, 2009:

Empire Day Ceremony: Participate in an elaborate Imperial or Rebel ceremony featuring Lord Vader or Princess Leia in which you could be hand picked to receive a special badge.

Special Events: Locate all of the Imperial Recruitment and Anti-Propaganda kiosks and the Rebel Alliance Resistance and Vandalism Kiosks spread throughout Theed and Coronet to earn points and tokens redeemable for prizes.

Profession Quests: Traders, Entertainers and Combat professions will be able to participate in special Empire Day themed quests sure to deliver action and adventure.

Collections Complete special collections tied to the events and quests and earn tokens, GCW points, and in some cases, new titles for your diligence!

Special Items Use your hard earned tokens at special vendors to purchase Empire Day specific items such as a Tantive-IV Landspeeder, house decorations, and other Empire Day items.

Don’t miss out on this special occasion, it’s not everyday that Star Wars Galaxies celebrates 6 years of online adventure, intrigue, and excitement.

- Ethic

Happy 6th, Star Wars: Galaxies is a post from: Kill Ten Rats

I felt so overwhelmed the first time. Now I know not just my own role, but what everyone else should be doing as well. Tonight was the second night in the row of attempting the 16th hall. We got to the end, and this time, our guardian was lack-luster. He was anonymous, which I immediately take to mean, “Don’t look at me, my equipment sucks”. Sure enough, his equipment and traits sucked. Every time we went into the boss fight, he was dead within 30 seconds and I ended up tanking the boss every time we went in. In my head a voice was nagging, “I wear light armor, I’m a lore-master, I shouldn’t be tanking this boss every time.”

It reminds me of Exar Kun in Star Wars Galaxies. Yes, the Exar Kun instance. It’s the toughest instance in the game. I knew every strategy in every room in that place. But I needed tanks who could do their job, and commandos who could run the elements successfully. One day, in the last room of Exar Kun, there was this commando guy and I needed him to tank something

When the fight started, the commando was nowhere near his assigned position. So where did the boss he was supposed to be tanking go? To me, the medic. This left me doing several people’s jobs at once. With each of the four bosses, I was involved in some way. I was attacking the Promised with everything I had, while ping-pong tanking both the Lingering and the Embraced. And while all of this was going on, I was hovering my mouse over the Unquenchable every 3 seconds to see which element that boss was vulnerable to and calling it out over voice chat. All of this I was doing while spamming my group-heals.

Again, a voice in my head was saying, “I’m the medic… I shouldn’t be tanking anything. I shouldn’t have to call the elements for the person who’s job it is to run them.”

I can learn an instance well, given enough times in it. But you know what? I’m only going to see an instance that many times if it’s incredibly difficult to get together a team capable of doing it successfully. It’s the same in 16th hall. Our hunter was fantastic. Our minstrel was great. And I like to think that I performed admirably. But that’s only half a team. So we were destined to fail. Three hours down the drain.

The funny thing is… the more I compare this to Exar Kun, the better I feel about it. I have fond memories of the journey from being one of the people who sucked at instances to one of the most popular group leaders on our server. When I think of it like that, the idea of dying in this instance over and over doesn’t feel so bad. Eventually, we found the people we needed to do a competent job, befriended them, and got them into the instances.

When our failed run had ended and the group broke up, our minstrel sent me a tell. He wanted to know if he could add me and my alts to his friend’s list so that he could call on me for future runs….

Ahh…. good times.

Exar Kun vs 16th Hall is a post from: Kill Ten Rats