While I'm guessing that Lucas Arts has the final say, I'd imagine that SOE won't pull the plug unless they're specifically forced to do so, and while I never believe anything stated by SOE until the statement actually becomes reality, I don't see SWG going anywhere immediately following the release of TOR.

I hope that they don't "pull the plug," personally, since SWG and TOR will be such different games.

Edit:

And, yeah, I'm intentionally ignoring everything except the OP.

Originally posted by Cypt1

And, yeah, I'm intentionally ignoring everything except the OP.

Ignorance is bliss isn't it?

Originally posted by Bob_Blawblaw

Originally posted by Cypt1

And, yeah, I'm intentionally ignoring everything except the OP.

 

Ignorance is bliss isn't it?

In this situation, that remark is symbolic of intelligence, no matter how paradoxical it may seem. =P

Originally posted by Cypt1

Originally posted by Bob_Blawblaw

Originally posted by Cypt1

And, yeah, I'm intentionally ignoring everything except the OP.

 

Ignorance is bliss isn't it?

 

In this situation, that remark is symbolic of intelligence, no matter how paradoxical it may seem. =P

A symbol of intelligence would be to display the ability to see all sides of an arguement where concrete fact is disputable, and form a logical opinion based on what information is available. Purposefully ignoring information which might be contrary to ones established opinion is quite the opposite of intelligence.

But thanks for bringing it up.

Originally posted by Ginaz

So Badgersmacker, care to saying anything now that the link to your comment has been found?

www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/2650223#2650223

My "more players than ever" quote was in reply to a statistic plucked out of thin air regarding subscription losses due to the NGE.

My comment still holds true, SWG is attracting more players than ever since the NGE thanks to some amazing improvments over the last four years.

Originally posted by BadgerSmaker

Originally posted by Ginaz

So Badgersmacker, care to saying anything now that the link to your comment has been found?

www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/2650223#2650223

 

My "more players than ever" quote was in reply to a statistic plucked out of thin air regarding subscription losses due to the NGE.

My comment still holds true, SWG is attracting more players than ever since the NGE thanks to some amazing improvments over the last four years.

Well you couldn't get much worse than the NGE lol. When 90% of the game was broken like commandos not being able to use their own weapons... gotta wonder what the hell were they thinking.

Just a shame that they havn't fixed the things I want to be fixed like the poor animations and the crap NGE UI.

Originally posted by BadgerSmaker

Originally posted by Ginaz

So Badgersmacker, care to saying anything now that the link to your comment has been found?

www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/post/2650223#2650223

 

My "more players than ever" quote was in reply to a statistic plucked out of thin air regarding subscription losses due to the NGE.

My comment still holds true, SWG is attracting more players than ever since the NGE thanks to some amazing improvments over the last four years.

Oh are we doing this again?

Once again Badger, the word 'ever' implicitly means 'from the beginning until now'. You're smart enough to know this (I think).

I also think you're not correct even if you DID mean since the NGE, as I have in my frequent Vet Trials (post NGE) seen small spikes in population across other servers than Starsider, but it hasn't happened in quite some time. So no, even now, there are not 'more players than ever *'

*since the NGE

Originally posted by Bob_Blawblaw

Once again Badger, the word 'ever' implicitly means 'from the beginning until now'. You're smart enough to know this (I think).

If I ever post something that confuses you, or you are not sure of, please let me know and I will be happy to explain.

Originally posted by BadgerSmaker

Originally posted by Bob_Blawblaw

Once again Badger, the word 'ever' implicitly means 'from the beginning until now'. You're smart enough to know this (I think).

 

If I ever post something that confuses you, or you are not sure of, please let me know and I will be happy to explain.

There's a difference between saying something that's confusing, and flat out saying something that's opposite to the truth.

If I say the sky is green, while really it's blue, and then go back and say 'yeah, what I meant was it is blue' I'd still be wrong. Even if my definition of blue, was green. To the rest of the world, blue is blue. 'Ever' means 'ever'.  Who's the one who's confused here?

This is preschool stuff Badger. You're really disappointing me here.

Originally posted by Bob_Blawblaw

Who's the one who's confused here?

/shrug

Originally posted by BadgerSmaker

Originally posted by Bob_Blawblaw

Who's the one who's confused here?

 

/shrug

Thought so. 

Quoting Valeran in another board here:

"I'd have more respect for you if you simply stated that you were a little over zealous in trying to keep a positive outlook on this title...you are seeing a couple servers grow due to FCTS but still down compared to preNGE...very few new players are joining.

Wow...just wow. "

Some times you need to simply man up and say you were off.  You blew a chance for people to have any respect for you next round (TOR).

Originally posted by Bob_Blawblaw

Some times you need to simply man up and say you were off.

SWG is a growing game, it has sucessfully shaken off the horrors of the NGE and developed into a fun game set in the Original Star Wars Trilogy.

Veterans are coming back, new players are starting the game and active subscribers are enjoying themselves.

I'm not sure why you have such a problem with this?

 yep swg is triving saw that on this week-end everybody expected an empty room whan soe went there to annouce their futur war expension and room war 2/3 full wich is isanelly popular for a supposedly dying game i heard a lot 

about !so all you nge hater ,get over it soe has got over it and so most of the one that play swg 

i dont play sc-fi yet but it has nothing to do with swg,its just me i dont yet play sci-fi

i tried the anarchy online thing ouch

maybe if i went back now that i gamed a few years i would be ok 

but back then i felt no game was harder then ao

ok with the knowledge today EQ1is probably way harder lol

Originally posted by drbaltazar

 yep swg is triving saw that on this week-end everybody expected an empty room whan soe went there to annouce their futur war expension and room war 2/3 full wich is isanelly popular for a supposedly dying game i heard a lot 

about !so all you nge hater ,get over it soe has got over it and so most of the one that play swg 

i dont play sc-fi yet but it has nothing to do with swg,its just me i dont yet play sci-fi

i tried the anarchy online thing ouch

maybe if i went back now that i gamed a few years i would be ok 

but back then i felt no game was harder then ao

ok with the knowledge today EQ1is probably way harder lol

No offense DrBaltazar, but you are the guy who was asking what the NGE was just last week.  You were also seen in the EQ forums last week talking about how much EQ was like Wow as if EQ had taken its look from blizzards game.

I think you are a bit out of your league in telling people what to do in this realm since you really have not gotten a full understanding of what is going on yet. 

A whole room full of people at some fan gathering doesn't make swg thriving.  Sorry

Originally posted by BadgerSmaker

Originally posted by Bob_Blawblaw

Some times you need to simply man up and say you were off.

 

SWG is a growing game, it has sucessfully shaken off the horrors of the NGE and developed into a fun game set in the Original Star Wars Trilogy.

Veterans are coming back, new players are starting the game and active subscribers are enjoying themselves.

I'm not sure why you have such a problem with this?

Growing games do not merge servers. 

Growing games do not extend free character transfers for over a year to condense population.

Growing games do not have players begging to move off of servers that had benefited from being a destination server due to lack of population.

SWG has not shaken its reputation.  It is a game that has limped along for four years with minimal updates that have not attracted back players.  Doom and gloom posts are still commonplace on the official forums where only paying members can post.  There is a high level of disbelief that the devs can or will fix the game and you can see this also on the official forums.  Even the president of the company has admitted sunsetting the game is a possibility when the new star wars mmo releases and this is a man who will let an mmo run without any developers. 

I'm sorry badger, but nothing is showing this game has recovered or is growing.  As I have often said in the past, if a few new players joining your server has such an impact on your play experience that you notice "the growth" then your server is already dead.  

Honestly if 100 new players joined my server in wow I would not even notice.  Even if I was hanging out in the newbie area all day as it seems you do.  If you only see 3 new players a day that is over 1,000 new people joining the server each year and that would swell your server up to noticeable population levels.  Seeing the FCTS is still in full effect and there are servers devoid of any population then it is easy to see this is not happening. 

You have been saying SWG is growing every day for over a year now.  If that were the case then populations would have rebounded.  Games cannot grow for over a year and need server mergers, I'm sorry but that contradicts itself on so many levels.  

The fact that the developers and players alike have been talking about low populations and server mergers for longer than that proves you without a doubt are wrong.  In fact you are the only person who seems to think the game is growing and have not really shown why you think this.

Has swg really shaken the reputation for screwing up the game and not fixing problems?  Let me ask you a question:  have the developers fixed the double slotted item bug yet?  How long ago did they introduce that and still have no plan on how to fix it?

Sorry, but that is a developement team that has no idea how to fix a game.

Can someone please get them to change the UI, targetting system and combat speed so they can make animations look nice again? Also can you please get them to add a proper melee class like TKM, Swordsman, Fencer and Pikeman.

Originally posted by drbaltazar

 yep swg is triving saw that on this week-end everybody expected an empty room whan soe went there to annouce their futur war expension and room war 2/3 full wich is isanelly popular for a supposedly dying game i heard a lot 

about !so all you nge hater ,get over it soe has got over it and so most of the one that play swg 

i dont play sc-fi yet but it has nothing to do with swg,its just me i dont yet play sci-fi

i tried the anarchy online thing ouch

maybe if i went back now that i gamed a few years i would be ok 

but back then i felt no game was harder then ao

ok with the knowledge today EQ1is probably way harder lol

What forum do you think you're on? This is the Star Wars Galaxies forum...Your comments don't seem to be about THIS game...are they?! 

Dude...I played almost every day until 2 months ago...this game is DYING!!! I know what I saw, I know what FCTS did, I know what bugged/glitched battle fields have done, I know what the lack of any feel of a "war" has done, I know how much the TCG has killed crafting/collecting, I know what YEARS of neglect have done to the playerbase. This game is NOT rebounding, it's NOT growing. Some Vets returned for their free 30 days, but far fewer than I've seen in past trials mate...and I've been around for an ass load of them!

Do you even play SWG or are you simply going by a 2/3 full room of people? 

Sorry bud, but if you think SWG is growing, you're greatly mistaken.

And my comments don't come as an NGE hater...I accepted it for what it was...but any dolt with half an ounce of intelligence can see SoE has spent the last 4 years adding back in things they removed. They gutted a damn good game...they realized their mistake far too late.

As always...SoE is more concerned about the players they DON'T have than the ones they DO have.

Originally posted by Daffid011

Growing games do not merge servers. 

Growing games do not extend free character transfers for over a year to condense population.

Growing games do not have players begging to move off of servers that had benefited from being a destination server due to lack of population.

SWG has suffered for some time with a server population imbalance.  In the absence of some of the community tools that most modern MMORPGs have as default, players gravitate towards each other in order to find groups required for much of the high end content.

This all started back in Chapter 6 when PvE difficulty was increased to address the fact that the entire game as soloable, people started moving servers with the paid CTS in order to find groups.  This started a snowball effect until we now see one server having over five times the average server population.

The destination servers that didn't benefit from a large portion of transfers are currently marked as "Recommended" servers on the character select screen and see a higher rate of new starters because of this.  Community leaders on these servers are able to capitalise on this and help these new players find their feet, a place to live and people to play with.

It is testimony to the current quality of SWG that it has survived the NGE, it survives the spiteful hate campaigns of the relentlessly vindictive vocal minority that seek to destroy it and its players, and it not only survives, but it flourishes.

MMORPG players are making up their own mind about SWG, they are playing the trial and they are subbing.  They won't be put off by the SoE haters with their own personal crusade against all things Sony.

Originally posted by BadgerSmaker

Originally posted by Daffid011

Growing games do not merge servers. 

Growing games do not extend free character transfers for over a year to condense population.

Growing games do not have players begging to move off of servers that had benefited from being a destination server due to lack of population.

 

SWG has suffered for some time with a server population imbalance.  In the absence of some of the community tools that most modern MMORPGs have as default, players gravitate towards each other in order to find groups required for much of the high end content.

This all started back in Chapter 6 when PvE difficulty was increased to address the fact that the entire game as soloable, people started moving servers with the paid CTS in order to find groups.  This started a snowball effect until we now see one server having over five times the average server population.

The destination servers that didn't benefit from a large portion of transfers are currently marked as "Recommended" servers on the character select screen and see a higher rate of new starters because of this.  Community leaders on these servers are able to capitalise on this and help these new players find their feet, a place to live and people to play with.

It is testimony to the current quality of SWG that it has survived the NGE, it survives the spiteful hate campaigns of the relentlessly vindictive vocal minority that seek to destroy it and its players, and it not only survives, but it flourishes.

MMORPG players are making up their own mind about SWG, they are playing the trial and they are subbing.  They won't be put off by the SoE haters with their own personal crusade against all things Sony.

You seem to gauge the game as growing by comparing it to itself.  So what if a destination server has a higher ratio of players compared to a dead server, because that is the intended goal.  That doesn't mean the game is growing.  Likewise with a recommended server seeing a higher ratio of new players compared to other servers.  File that under the category of things that are supposed to happen.

Everything you just posted above can be said in the exact same context about Warhammer online and it is obvious that game is not growing.  Server mergers and character transfers create the situation you are describing and they are the direct result of decline in population.

You have been saying the game is growing for well over a year now.  Games that see the amount of growth that you claim would not require server mergers.  It is just impossible to for a game to grow over the last year at the rates you claim and then be forced to consolidate players/servers due to low population issues. 

SOE has been working on ways to deal with the games low population for more than a year.  You are right in the middle of massive server mergers that still have not resolved the issues.

Please don't devolve into the "haters trying to ruin the game" argument.  Stick to the facts at hand.  Show some evidence to back up your claims, because right now the actions of soe and the developers clearly show the game is not growing. 

What can you point to that shows growth?

Originally posted by BadgerSmaker 

It is testimony to the current quality of SWG that it has survived the NGE, it survives the spiteful hate campaigns of the relentlessly vindictive vocal minority that seek to destroy it and its players, and it not only survives, but it flourishes.

Mind defining "flourishes"? If you define that as "still has players", you're correct. But "flourish" is defined as:

1. To grow well or luxuriantly; thrive: The crops flourished in the rich soil.
2. To do or fare well; prosper: "No village on the railroad failed to flourish" (John Kenneth Galbraith).
3. To be in a period of highest productivity, excellence, or influence: a poet who flourished in the tenth century.
4. To make bold, sweeping movements: The banner flourished in the wind.

Badger, not to be difficult, but SWG is none of those...Given those definitions, I don't see how you can claim that SWG is even close to "flourishing" mate. Can I ask what you base that on? Even your own posted numbers counter your claim (which was again, an unreal chart!!! Well done!). 2 months ago there were 12,000 officers (2007)...last month, 9,000. The game low was 8,000 in 2008 and that was during the height of Heroics, as they were new and being introduced to the game. What do you attribute that drastic decline in Officers to? 

Dotanuki's reign has taken its toll on the playerbase Badger. The last meaningful update was Hoth...almost a year ago. And it took them 8+ months to develop Hoth. Before Hoth was Exar Kun...an 18+ month old Heroic now. SWG didn't have 18+ months to add in 2 "meh" Heroics. Hoth was old the 1st week it was out. After 3-4 "flawless runs", it was no challenge at all. 

And since Hoth's release, they've been working on their "next big thing"...an update to the Storyteller system...that will not sustain the game. Over a year in "development" and it'll be released without most of the features players are asking for like Space, GCW, actual "interaction" with the iconic characters (just a head in a pop-up window), cross server "sharing". 12 months and it's missing KEY elements to make it successful...that's just sad Badger.

Doubt it

Originally posted by TUX426

Can I ask what you base that on? 

From playing the game on various different servers over the last... almost six years... the stats I put together and from what I hear from players in game and on the forums.  This is what I base my perceptions on, I know you may have a very different perception, due to your recent departure from SWG under unpleasent circumstances.

TOR isn't going to spell the end of SWG.

The games are polar opposites (at least from what I can gather based on Bioware's hype campaign).

SWG has non-combat gameplay that no other mmo on the market has, and for that reason alone will subsist on a very small subset of mmo fans that prefer worlds to games. 

It's also costing SOE next to nothing to keep it going: there's a skeleton dev crew, no costly new expansions or added features to speak of, and the server overhead is likely very low.  In short, it can turn a profit with very few players.

It's also probably something of a training ground for SOE devs, which is why it churns through them regularly as they get experience and move on to other projects.

The bottom line is that it's making money, or at the very least, not losing it, and seeing as how it serves a very different niche than TOR despite the Star Wars connection, it will likely continue.

Originally posted by BadgerSmaker

Originally posted by TUX426

Can I ask what you base that on? 

 

From playing the game on various different servers over the last... almost six years... the stats I put together and from what I hear from players in game and on the forums.  This is what I base my perceptions on, I know you may have a very different perception, due to your recent departure from SWG under unpleasent circumstances.

It really has nothing to do with how I left or what happened to me - my view on this would be the same either way.

Again...I want to point out that your own numbers (posted last Friday) don't even corroborate your stance. How do you explain that? 3000 less Officers in just 30 days is HUGE mate. We're only 1k off the game low and GCW is easier than EVER to get and maintain (decay is lower now).

Are you assuming these new/returning masses just have no interest in PvP or the GCW?

Originally posted by Bob_Blawblaw

Originally posted by Cypt1

Originally posted by Bob_Blawblaw

Originally posted by Cypt1

And, yeah, I'm intentionally ignoring everything except the OP.

 

Ignorance is bliss isn't it?

 

In this situation, that remark is symbolic of intelligence, no matter how paradoxical it may seem. =P

 

A symbol of intelligence would be to display the ability to see all sides of an arguement where concrete fact is disputable, and form a logical opinion based on what information is available. Purposefully ignoring information which might be contrary to ones established opinion is quite the opposite of intelligence.

But thanks for bringing it up.

Well, if you like involving yourself in childish forum drama --and based upon your statement and the content of your posts in this thread I'm making the assumption that you do-- then, yes,you may have a point. But it IS intelligent to refrain from commenting in response to a spate of worthless posts. (Not that all threads involving debates consist of childish drama, but this particular one seems to exude that general vibe to a degree. If the majority of the posts contained within this thread had been worth the time it would take to form a well-constructed, logical response, I would have done so.)

However, I only wanted to reply to the original post --if you can actually fathom that-- without embroiling myself in the rest of the whining inundating this thread. But it seems that even something as innocuous as that has sparked yet another instance of drama. The irony. As far as I'm aware, there is no obscure forum rule stating that you MUST reply to each and every post in a thread in order to make a valid point or state an opinion --especially when those other posts are related to the colloquial-term known as a "flame-war" taking place between a small group of posters.

Not to mention that any fact that is actually "concrete" as you say would not be "disputable." That's a logically fallacious statement. So the referenced fact, in truth, would not be "concrete" at all. It was merely assumed to be as much. Yes, what a fine display of profound, unadulterated intelligence. *sardonic applause*

Also, it's spelled "argument." And the third-person possessive pronoun "ones" should have an aprostrophe. You can thank me later.

Lastly, the only time you ever see me conclude a sentence with an emoticon such as "=P" is when I'm making an attempt to be facetious, no matter how it comes across in the end. Ostensibly, that was lost on you, however. (Why am I not surprised?)