Originally posted by nratnam

I actually like the new stargate actually. Reminds me of battlestar galactica. Its more real and gritty to me. Less sci fi for sure imo though.

Good for you.  There's certainly nothing WRONG with soap operas, or the people who love them.

It's just that there're like two dozen new episodes of them made per day.  Yes, they are popular, but there's no reason that one type of show has to squeeze out every other genre.

The average cable viewer has hundreds of channels these days.  There should be room for a science fiction series or two that isn't "less" science fiction.

The trend is getting worse with all these so-called "reality" shows.  They could make a show about bass fishing, and have every character in it be a sociopathic homosexual.  And it would be popular as heck, just like they all are - for a little while.  Until the same mob of viewers flock to the next big melodrama.

Sure, it takes a LOT more talent to make a plot-driven story interesting than it does a character-driven melodrama.  But there is an audience out there for sort that sort of thing too.  And lately we're always getting shafted.

The show is "Lost" on a ship instead of an island.  The first season all about getting the stuff they need to survive, one item at a time, and learning a very little about the ship/island.  Season two more about learning the ship/island.  Season three attempts to get off ships/island that are closer to successful.  Season four some peopel get off ship/island.  It is practically story for story of Lost with a BSG flare for episodes that could be done in 15 minutes, but they turn it into an hour with 'dramatic" camera scenes that really add nothing to the plot.

Well, it's a 'SyFy' show. Got to tone down all that uncomfortable science that makes some people feel dumb.

SF for the Jerry Springer demographic.

Originally posted by MMO_Doubter

Rush would be interesting if he wasn't throwing tantrums all the time. It's like Harold Zoid is directing him. "Emote!"

I hated BSG, and any similarity is a negative in my books.

The show would be better if Harold Zoid was directing. Aleast there would be people dancing and throwing pies in the background. ANYTHING to distract from the depressing attitude of every single character on the show.

I also hated BSG and I can't understand why this show is so obviously trying to copy it. Depressing characters, bizzare plots and sex were never what the Stargate shows were about.

If you want to watch a soap opera then go watch one. But don't try to turn every other show on television into one.

Originally posted by aleos

 i think we can expect a paid to play beta test in the form of a one time fee to participate in beta.

They would actually have to produce code for that.

Originally posted by ariccaron

Originally posted by aleos

 i think we can expect a paid to play beta test in the form of a one time fee to participate in beta.

 They would actually have to produce code for that.

Yeah... I don't think we should expect ANYTHING at this point. The story here has reached its end or something very close to it.

I suspect this game will be the next Duke Nukem Forever. The devs will continue to tell us they are working on it but it will never be released. And slowly, quietly, over the course of the next several years, we will all forget this game ever existed.

If and when beta resumes I can honestly say that it will not be a paid for beta, the reasons for this is when you pay for something you expect something in return.

Beta is just the opposite of stable product, the servers will and maybe only operational at certain times, and the people paying would expect that they are listened to, and anything they say should be heard.

Imagine you pay for beta, but the server times are not ideal for you, do you really think they would give you your money back.  The test servers go down for 2 weeks, do you demand the servers are made available to you because you paid for them.

In short its a concept that if it was even considered I would have serious doubts about that company... very serious doubts, as you are literally paying for a service that could be down 99-99.99999% of the time.

Originally posted by yellowperil

If and when beta resumes I can honestly say that it will not be a paid for beta...

Beta is just the opposite of stable product, the servers will and maybe only operational at certain times, and the people paying would expect that they are listened to, and anything they say should be heard.

While its true that paid betas are bad things and they tend to piss off the people who paid for them only to discover they got a broken and worthless product, that doesn't mean it can't happen.

Plenty of the other games have done paid betas. Mortal Online is doing some kind of paid beta thing right now. Dark and Light also had a paid beta test but attempted to disguise it by calling it a "pre-release" of the actual game, however it was undeniably a beta test since only about 10% of the game was open, most of the content was unfinished and it was buggy as hell. I still have doubts that Shaowbane ever left beta testing, despite being on the market for something like six years (and being in development for nearly ten years before that). More and more companies are also doing those deals where you have to pre-order the game from Gamestop and/or sign up for some other crazy online service to get into their supposedly "open" beta test.

So yeah, paid betas are bad, but there are plenty of shady developers out there who won't hesitate to resort to that kind of dirty tactic in an attempt to earn a profit on a game they know will never be truly finished. And do you really think Gary and his crew are more honest than those other guys? REALLY?

So yeah, paid betas are bad, but there are plenty of shady developers out there who won't hesitate to resort to that kind of dirty tactic in an attempt to earn a profit on a game they know will never be truly finished. And do you really think Gary and his crew are more honest than those other guys? REALLY?

I think you mean shady publishers or development houses, I'm sure you don't mean the actual developer staff, these people are just like you and me, and make no such decisions on what management do or say.

But really I think not even CME or FIRESKY would stoop to the level of paid beta, i think they have run our of toes nevermind shooting themselves in the foot.

Originally posted by yellowperil

I think you mean shady publishers or development houses, I'm sure you don't mean the actual developer staff, these people are just like you and me, and make no such decisions on what management do or say.

Well I don't know you well enough to speak for you but I can assure you that they are NOTHING like me. Mainly because I don't choose to work for a giant, evil, greedy, international corporation.

The whole "I was just following orders" excuse doesn't fly with me. I know this is a worn out example but its still the perferct example: The NGE. When Smedly came down to my cubicle and said: "The 200,000 customers we have now isn't good enough anymore. Change the game to make more people join, even if it means all our current custoemrs quit." I would have quit working for SoE right there on the spot. We know for a fact that was what happened because of Dan Rubenfield's infamous 'go eat a <censored> rant' where he directly said:

We told them. "If you do this, you will lose all 200k subscribers. It is that significant."

It was explained that we would gain more due to the marketing push and relaunch.

Now, if I was a developer at SoE and my boss gave me an order to do something which would cause all 200,000 of our current customers to become very angry and quit the game I WOULD NOT DO IT! And that is why these game developers are nothing like me. The publishers and other people you balme for making these decisions only get away with it because the developers are willing to do what they ask. In my mind, that makes them just as bad as the people making the decisions.

If someone asked you to murder another human being and you did it, would the person who asked you to do it go to jail? Maybe. But so would you.

Originally posted by Raltar 

Well I don't know you well enough to speak for you but I can assure you that they are NOTHING like me. Mainly because I don't choose to work for a giant, evil, greedy, international corporation.

The whole "I was just following orders" excuse doesn't fly with me. I know this is a worn out example but its still the perferct example: The NGE. When Smedly came down to my cubicle and said: "The 200,000 customers we have now isn't good enough anymore. Change the game to make more people join, even if it means all our current custoemrs quit." I would have quit working for SoE right there on the spot. We know for a fact that was what happened because of Dan Rubenfield's infamous 'go eat a <censored> rant' where he directly said:

We told them. "If you do this, you will lose all 200k subscribers. It is that significant."

It was explained that we would gain more due to the marketing push and relaunch.

Now, if I was a developer at SoE and my boss gave me an order to do something which would cause all 200,000 of our current customers to become very angry and quit the game I WOULD NOT DO IT! And that is why these game developers are nothing like me. The publishers and other people you balme for making these decisions only get away with it because the developers are willing to do what they ask. In my mind, that makes them just as bad as the people making the decisions.

If someone asked you to murder another human being and you did it, would the person who asked you to do it go to jail? Maybe. But so would you.

Excellent post.

Some of us have standards. Some do not.

You just work for your employer, you dont decide what business decisions to make, thats not your job.

Its all fair and good having standards, but sticking to these will basically end you up looking for work for the rest of your life.  Do you honestly think that whatever you say to your boss will change his mind if it has been made up, refusing to do it will just get you fired.

Now putting this into perspective, your married, the sole income earner and have several kids (just like me), and you are telling me that you would refuse to do a job your employed to do and be fired for your principles.  Life doesnt work that way in the real world.  Sticking to your principles will just get you unemployed and unhirable.

No one is going to change there mind because some low level employee tells main managerment how they should be running there company, in the real world you paid for doing what they tell you to do.  Not what you decide is best.  You maybe absolutely 110% correct in your statement to the management, it doesnt mean they will do it, or even listen to you, if anything in the real world you are seen as the trouble maker, you dont do what your told and you get fired.

Sticking by your principles is a great thing to do, but in the real world it just gets you fired, and if you have a family to support you 'JUST DO YOUR JOB'.  Now if you dont understand that basic principle I would suggest you get a family and be the sole earner, have a mortgage, have your bills and have all the responsability, now tell me, would you still walk out of that job because you think they are making a bad decision, especially in this working climate. If you said yes, you are a FOOL, and would put something in front of your families health and security.

Originally posted by yellowperil

Sticking by your principles is a great thing to do, but in the real world it just gets you fired, and if you have a family to support you 'JUST DO YOUR JOB'.  Now if you dont understand that basic principle I would suggest you get a family and be the sole earner, have a mortgage, have your bills and have all the responsability, now tell me, would you still walk out of that job because you think they are making a bad decision, especially in this working climate. If you said yes, you are a FOOL, and would put something in front of your families health and security.

I must say that I for once agree with Yellowperil here, it's definately best to do whatever the boss says to keep your job than stand up for what you believe in and show some moral character. I spoke to a CME developer on this very subject last weekend and he allowed me to pass on this message,

Principles or not, if what your boss is suggesting is going to end up with a 99% loss in subscribers or the game not launching. Then it is time to get off your butt and find another job which I think is the point being made, the people that thought "If I say nothing and keep my head down I'll still have a job" all ended up like this chump. The others said "I'll get a job with a real company that's going somewhere as this moron will get all the developers fired eventually anyhow!".

I'd have given my opinion once, after it was ignored I'd do what I was told until I had a job working for a company that had a chance of launching a half decent product. Then when I had that job I'd hand in my notice and say goodbye to CME/SOE/Farlan/whoever. CME were never going launch SGW or any of the games from the cash sink studios anyway, the only product Gary got off the ground was MMOGULS. The smart people had jobs lined up with other studios when they saw the writing on the wall. Tell the boss about the problems you see? It's like telling a manic depressive kamikazie pilot that's just been told he has 2 weeks to live that flying into that American carrier is a bad idea!

Yellowperil, it sounds like you are talking about a CORPORATE enviroment. Do what we say or you are fired. Again, this is why I'm different from game developers. I choose NOT to even work for a giant, evil, faceless corporation in the first place.

You know, this actually causes me to think of that most recent "TRUTH" commecrical I saw on TV. you know the ones I'm talking about, the anti-smoking ads where they ask "do you have what it takes to be a tobacco executive?" I saw one just recently where they were asking a bunch of students questions like "do you want to work in a multi-billion dollar industry" and they were all raising their hand. I couldn't figure out why they were all raising their hands. Who wants to work for these giant corporations in the first place? You don't need to kill half your customers to be evil. Just stealing from them and putting malware on their computers is bad enough in my book.

You know, there are some employeers out there (military, police, goverment, ect.) where just "following orders" so you don't get fired isn't always the end all be all of every situation. In these types of enviroments you are actually legally required NOT to follow an order if it is illegal or contrary to the ture purpose of your orginazation and you are expected to report issues of that nature to the proper authorities. As MMO Doubter said: Some of us have standards... and some apparently don't.

Secondly, I could expound in great detail my opinions on marrage, children, morgages, why its in your best interest not to have any of these things, ect but you sound like the kind of guy who wouldn't listen anyway so I'll make it simple: If you are in a situation in your life where every decision you make must be made exculsively on the basis of how much money it will net you in the end then you have already made some serious mistakes somewhere along the way.

Plus, Agricola makes a good point. You think the CME devs are feeling secure in their ability to support their famlies right now? Think their morgages are being paid every month? Think their retirement plans are going well? How about the guys who did the NGE, think they are at the top of the list of people to hire? Being successful is what pays the bills, not running your company into the ground and pissing off your customers. Not everyone on the gaming industry learns this the hard way but some of them do.

A little perspective here guys...this is a GAME we are talking about not food shipments to some country of starving kids. Keeping a roof over your families heads and putting even one kid through college is WAY more important then mucking up some MMO.

A person who hasn't learned to make compromises or live with poor decisions probably has never spent much time working in an organization larger then one (Profit or Non-Profit).

I work in the Tech industry... though not in the gaming industry....  Have I gone ahead and implemented decisions that I knew were lousy for the Product/Company ??  More times then I care to remember.

Here is how my proffesional ethics work. I am paid to fulfill certain responsibilies in my company. As a proffesional it's encumbant on me to fulfill that duty to the best of my abilities and judgement. However, I am NOT the ultimate decision maker in all areas of responsibilty. There are other people in the company who can override me, including the owners (it's thier dime after-all).

When I see some-one making a decision that I belive excercizes poor judgement or will be harmfull to the company/product. It IS encumbant upon me to comment upon that course of action, inform those individuals and others in the chain of command exactly what I believe to be the consequences of that course of action and provide my best reccomendations based upon my knowledge and experience. I've done this a ton of times, MANY times in writing, formaly documented.

However,  once I've provided the appropriate decision-makers with the full set of information that they need on the subject.... that's where my proffesional responsibility ends. It's upto THEM to make the call... that's what THEY get paid for. If, after having all the benefit of the information I've provided, they still over-ride me ... that's just the way it goes. It's not fun...but you suck it up and carry out your marching orders to the best of your abilities. THAT, IMO, is how proffesionals conduct themselves.

Throwing a tantrum and quiting when you get overriden is, IMO, arrogant, immature and unproffesional.

Now, what I WONT do, regardless of the situation are things that fall into the category of  UNETHICAL, DISHONEST or violate my proffesional ethics. I won't steal, cheat, commit fraud .....disrupt some-one elses Network, etc.  THAT's the line that a proffesional will draw in the SAND.

There is a huge difference between an epicly stupid decision....and an immoral one.

First of all Mel, Nice NECRO post...

Originally posted by GrumpyMel2

A: A little perspective here guys...this is a GAME we are talking about not food shipments to some country of starving kids. Keeping a roof over your families heads and putting even one kid through college is WAY more important then mucking up some MMO.

B: There is a huge difference between an epicly stupid decision....and an immoral one. 

A: One person's opinion. But as I said before, if you have gotten to a point in your life where every decision you make must be based on if it will net you enough money to feed your children then I have to assume you have already made several major mistakes in your life up to this point. Considering that our planet is already choked with over population and every major enviromental problem can be traced back to that fact, my opinion is that you should probably do the entire human race a favor by not having children in the first place. We seem to have quite enough of them already. So maybe developing a half-way decent MMO is more important after all?

Plus, its one thing if you or your children are literally STARVING in the street. If thats the case, fine, steal a loaf of bread. But if you are a game developer wondering if you should lie to your customers just so little Jhonny can go to Harvard, don't expect me to cut you any slack.

B: And its the immoral ones I'm talking about here, Mel. If you screw up an MMO because you are a bad programmer or just an idiot, I can forgive that. When you knowingly wreck an MMO, screw over your fellow employees and lie to your customers just to make a quick buck, I think that falls into the category of an immoral decision and should be punished. When SoE released the NGE on SWG, that was an immoral decision because they were told in advance that they would be ruining the experience for 200,000+ of their paying customers, yet they went ahead with the move anyway. When EA games decided to inculde the SecuROM rootkit in their games, knowing it wouldn't prevent piracy and knowing that their customers would not want illegal software installed on their computers without premission, that was an immoral decision. These sorts of immoral decisions are quickly becoming common place in the gaming industry. Game developers and publishers seem to think that everything is legitimate in the quest for the almighty dollar. And I'll bet a lot of them are just like you: "I have to put food on my table! Its not my job to decide whats right or wrong!"

All I'm saying is, the world would be a better place if more people were concerned about having a clean conscience rather than having a full stomach.

A)

I won't get into the meta-arguement about life-styles. I'll simply say that your beliefs are very different then mine.

On the list of things that are truely important in this world, MMO's (as much as I enjoy them) have to be down pretty near the absolute bottom. They rank somewhere in with;  Who won the World Series, What Paris Hilton is wearing these days and What's being featured on the Home Shopping Network.

Too many people take such things WAY TOO SERIOUSLY.

B)

I'm pretty sure that no MMO has ever promised customers that they wouldn't change the mechanics of the game (even dramaticly) you are subscribing to. In fact, I think it's pretty standard to put the fact that such changes may occur right in the EULA that you have to agree to before you sign-up for the game.

That isn't like selling you a Porsche and delivering a Yugo.  It's more like a magazine that you are subscribed to changing it's format or style of writing in a way that isn't appealing to you any more. You know very well that's what COULD happen when you buy the product because it tells you so right in black & white when you sign up for it. The nice thing about subscription based services is that  you can always cancel your subscription if the Product changes in ways that you don't like. No one is riping anyone off  there.

The scenerio you described with SWG may be epochly dumb. Possibly even rude and jerkish.... but it's NOT actually immoral or unethical. It's basicaly a gaming version of  "New Coke".

Now there ARE things that some game companies do pull sometimes which DO cross the line. That'd be stuff like charging a person even after they canceled, double-charging, hiding spyware/adware/malware in the product, charging for a product that you never intend to deliver, raising money from investors for a product you never intend to bring to market.

THOSE things are unethical...... but making mechanics changes to a game that PO's the existing fan-base.... Royaly Stupid, Yes.... Immoral, No.

Originally posted by MMO_Doubter

Originally posted by Zhiroc

That's a pretty simple one, though muddied with all their talk about dialing home when they first got there. How could it not be clear to them all that the power they need is immense, given how they needed that planet to even try to begin with?

The ship may be charged enough to operate, or maybe even charged as fully as it can be in its condition, but is no where near healthy enough to have that kind of power. Just like Atlantis was operating quite well eventually, but lacked the power to dial Earth.

That's quite a leap there. What is your evidence that the ship hasn't been FULLY recharged? If one dip in the sun wasn't enough, why would the ship not go back for another? Perhaps the ships IS too damaged to dial home, but I have seen nothing to suggest that that is the case, and Rush hasn't given any indication of it, either. Don't cover plot holes with the 'ship is too damaged' blanket.

Atlantis used ZPMs - not solar dips. That red dwarf wasn't going to run out of power.

The episode entitled EARTH brought this out for viewers to understand.  They drained the power back down so the ship would recharge and attempted to dial home during the recharge process.  FAILED - either because the ship is truly as damaged as Rush is stating or he isn't ready to go home and this is quickly become Star Gate Voyager.
 

Originally posted by GrumpyMel2

A: On the list of things that are truely important in this world, MMO's (as much as I enjoy them) have to be down pretty near the absolute bottom. They rank somewhere in with;  Who won the World Series, What Paris Hilton is wearing these days and What's being featured on the Home Shopping Network. 

B: I'm pretty sure that no MMO has ever promised customers that they wouldn't change the mechanics of the game (even dramaticly) you are subscribing to. In fact, I think it's pretty standard to put the fact that such changes may occur right in the EULA that you have to agree to before you sign-up for the game... The scenerio you described with SWG may be epochly dumb. Possibly even rude and jerkish.... but it's NOT actually immoral or unethical. It's basicaly a gaming version of  "New Coke".

A: Oh yeah, none of thst stuff matters. Which is why we allow people to cheat in the World Series, Paris Hilton walks down the street naked and the Home Shopping Network sells biological weapons.

No matter how "important" or "unimportant" something may seem to YOU, doesn't give you the right to decide for everyone else. And when someone breaks the rules or shows a total distain for the other people they share this planet with, no matter how minor it may seem to you, they need to be held accountable for that.

B: You obviously have NO CLUE about what really happened with the NGE, do you?

What you don't know, or aren't willing to admit, is that the creators of the NGE weren't just dumb and making a mistake. They knew in advance EXACTLY what the consequences of their actions would be. They knew the changes they were making to the game would ruin the experience for ALL 200,000+ of their current customers. They decided to make the changes anyway, even knowing it would cause 200,000 people to stop using their service and probably cause a lot of anger for those 200,000 people. In my opinion, that sort of total disreguard for your own customers who have kept you in business for years is the worst form of evil any company can ever commit without directly causing someone to die.

And before you go off on another ignorant rant about how they were just following orders and it was dumb but okay, let me refer you to Dan Rubenfield's Infamous 'Go eat a <censored> rant':

We told them. "If you do this, you will lose all 200k subscribers. It is that significant."

It was explained that we would gain more due to the marketing push and relaunch.

Dan was one of the developers who worked on the NGE. He has explained multiple times (in a less than friendly manner) why LA and SoE decided to go with the NGE. They KNEW (because they were told by their employees) that it would cause ALL 200,000+ customer to quit the game. They knew and they DID NOT CARE. They just wanted a game which could compete with WoW. That is utterly immoral on every possible level. Thats them saying "we don't care about our customers or the quality of our product, we just want to be rich." There is no possible way you can defend that kind of thinking.

And comapring the NGE to New Coke? Are you serious? When everyone hated New Coke they brought back Coke Classic. When everyone hated the NGE they told us to go <censored> ourselves because they weren't ever going to admit they were wrong. Coke cared if their cusomters were happy or not. Sony clearly is not interested.

A)  C'mon.... tell me you are pulling my leg about this stuff?

 - Cheating in the World series (e.g. using a "corked bat") will get you penalized according to the rules of that game. Might lose you a whole bunch of fans as well. However, it's level of importance pretty much ends there. However there was nothing about the scenerio you described with NGE that equates to cheating.

There is nothing, that you described, that violates the EULA.... which are the published rules of that game and the agreement between you and the company. Now there are things that CAN trump an EULA, like consumer law.... but nothing that you desribed would remotely fall under any of those categories.

-   Some-one walking around naked in a public street violates others rights to use that public resource. Completely different scenerio here. You have no particular RIGHT to play SWG (or any other MMO). It's a privately held resource, not a publicly held one. The only "rights" to it you have are the ones that the company publishes in it's agreement with you. The equivalent would be some-one walking around naked in the privacy of thier own home.... and you trying to tell them they have no right to do so... because you WANT to be a GUEST in thier home.

- The third example you mentioned is so off-base, I'm not going to even comment on it.

B) I understand the level of "Nerd Rage" about the NGE. I'd be PO'd if a company did that to a product I liked to.... but that still doesn't make it immoral or unethical. There is a VERY big difference there.

I fully understand that the company was informed that they would loose ALL thier active subscribers. There is nothing IMMORALE or UNETHICAL about a company choosing to loose thier products current audience in hopes of gaining a wider or audience. It's a BLINDINGLY STUPID decision (IMO).... but it's not actualy immoral or unethical.  A company has every right to change it's product offering in a manner it see's fit. The only thing that impinges upon that right is where it has contractual obligations that constrain it from doing so. The only other thing that might impinge on that is what it states in it's public advertising.  However,  it's well known that MMO's (and basicaly any other subscription based service) make changes to thier formats and mechanics from time to time (even dramatic ones) and they publish that fact right in thier licensing agreements.

So the only thing a subscriber can reasonably expect is that the service is as advertised AT THE TIME they purchased it. They can't expect that it will not change in future....UNLESS that was part of the stipulation in the purchasing/license agreement they have with the provider.

What they did was the equivalent of pulling your favorate TV show because it wasn't getting the ratings THEY wanted and replace it with a different type of show in the same time-slot.... a show which turned out to be less popular. There is nothing particularly immoral or unethical about that. STUPID, I'll grant that...but nothing beyond that.

I'd have no problem working for a company that did that and sleeping at night. Wouldn't trouble me in the least. Though I certainly would have some real concerns about the LONGEVITY a company who made such blindingly stupid decisions might enjoy in the market-place..... so I certainly would think about looking for another job for those reason.... but nothing about that scenerio would violate my code of personal or proffesional ethics. Though I would probably be frustrated as all heck with management for ignoring my reccomendations and being so jugheaded in thier judgement.