Originally posted by Vesavius

Originally posted by superniceguy
 "We're not cold-hearted," he said. "We treat customers like we treat families."

 

Anyone here want to join Smed's family?

 

"Dad, can I get some OJ like you said I could if I behaved?"

"Sure son"

*Gets OJ from fridge*

"Just leave your dollar on the side, and one more if you want a glass... you DO want a glass, right? It's optional, you can drink from cupped hands just fine. Oh and you owe me a dollar for fridge running costs already don't forget."

"Dad, your a ****"

He would have probably taken the galss when his son was halfway done, dumped it out, filled it with milk and called it an upgrade.

Originally posted by ktanner3

Of course LA called the shots with SWG. It was their IP and they set the standards by which the IP is used. That's the way it works for any company that controls such a popular IP. However, from what I 've seen, SOE was given complete control in the beginning in the development of the game and they blew it. They released a game that wasn't very popular with the fans and was completely boring. 

SWGs biggest problem was it released before it was ready.  The release date was LA's call.  Not sure how much SoE could have fought it.

Originally posted by superniceguy

The Game Archaeologist chats with John Smedley about EQMac's salvation

Basically EQmac was going to be sunsetted but in the end was not, and made complete free to play - no sub fee and no marketplace - completely free.  In it mentions SWG and closure:

It was something that SOE could say "yes" to a couple of months after it had to say "no" to pleading Star Wars Galaxies fans. So why did EQMac get saved while SWG was not? It came down to licensing, and with LucasArts calling the shots with SWG, SOE didn't have the flexibility that it did with EQMac. SOE's reticent to shut anything down, Smedley said, although sometimes the higher-ups have to make the call to do so.

The decision to save Al'Kabor was attributed 100% to the fan response, especially the pleas from Mac gamers to a Mac-loving president. "We left it running because we cared about the fans," Smedley confessed. "I was so personally moved by 600 emails on the subjects by rabid fans on that server; it was really touching to me."

"We're not cold-hearted," he said. "We treat customers like we treat families." Those who want to make a conspiracy out of the issue or read into it miss the simple truth of the personal angle. SOE, Smedley assured me, is not a faceless bureaucracy but a group of like-minded gamers who care about the same things that its customers do.

 

Basically SOE cares about the players and its fans, but it is Lucasarts who do not. If they did they would have seen to keep SWG active. Any crap that SOE put out with SWG, was because of Lucasarts calling the shots.

 

Sorry but LA involvement does not explain the long history of all their other broken and abandoned non Star Wars titles they still expect customers to pay for.

Originally posted by Tardcore

Originally posted by superniceguy

The Game Archaeologist chats with John Smedley about EQMac's salvation

Basically EQmac was going to be sunsetted but in the end was not, and made complete free to play - no sub fee and no marketplace - completely free.  In it mentions SWG and closure:

It was something that SOE could say "yes" to a couple of months after it had to say "no" to pleading Star Wars Galaxies fans. So why did EQMac get saved while SWG was not? It came down to licensing, and with LucasArts calling the shots with SWG, SOE didn't have the flexibility that it did with EQMac. SOE's reticent to shut anything down, Smedley said, although sometimes the higher-ups have to make the call to do so.

The decision to save Al'Kabor was attributed 100% to the fan response, especially the pleas from Mac gamers to a Mac-loving president. "We left it running because we cared about the fans," Smedley confessed. "I was so personally moved by 600 emails on the subjects by rabid fans on that server; it was really touching to me."

"We're not cold-hearted," he said. "We treat customers like we treat families." Those who want to make a conspiracy out of the issue or read into it miss the simple truth of the personal angle. SOE, Smedley assured me, is not a faceless bureaucracy but a group of like-minded gamers who care about the same things that its customers do.

 

Basically SOE cares about the players and its fans, but it is Lucasarts who do not. If they did they would have seen to keep SWG active. Any crap that SOE put out with SWG, was because of Lucasarts calling the shots.

 

Sorry but LA involvement does not explain the long history of all their other broken and abandoned non Star Wars titles they still expect customers to pay for.

 

I have not experienced anything wrong with their other games,. as that is not wrong with other non-SOE games. STO is just as buggy in places, you get anomolies in places you can't even scan.

There was definately a lot of restrictions in place and unwillingingness when it came down to SWG

eg character slots. If SOE was in charge they would have happily given more via Station Access like they did with Vanguard and EQ2.

If a game is not giving you pleaseure then quit - simples. If SOE abandoned SWG and provided no more cointent, it would not have bothered me, the game world and systems was enough to keep playing it. Since SWG closure announcement , I did spot they they were working on Vanguard more again. They only have enough resoures to do stuff, and have to concentrate on their more popular games, but at least Vanguard did not get shut down.  By pulling resources from one area to focus on an another could end up being financial suicide, and if they go bankrupt could end up losing all games. Either Vanguard gets ignored, or they ignore EQ2 and then lose even more customers, putting their company as a whole to risk, so not only would Vanguard get shut down, but so would EQ2 and the whole kit n kaboodle

Originally posted by Bama1267

Originally posted by Vesavius

Originally posted by superniceguy
 "We're not cold-hearted," he said. "We treat customers like we treat families."

 

Anyone here want to join Smed's family?

 

"Dad, can I get some OJ like you said I could if I behaved?"

"Sure son"

*Gets OJ from fridge*

"Just leave your dollar on the side, and one more if you want a glass... you DO want a glass, right? It's optional, you can drink from cupped hands just fine. Oh and you owe me a dollar for fridge running costs already don't forget."

"Dad, your a ****"

He would have probably taken the galss when his son was halfway done, dumped it out, filled it with milk and called it an upgrade.

hehe quite.

But more like salty water then milk ;)

LA was calling the shot but saying SOE cares about it's customers made me choke on my Bacon, Egg and Chesse sandwhich. That game was bleeding money and the bottom line is now it's not. Stop trusting everything you read. 

Originally posted by xr00t3dx

LA was calling the shot but saying SOE cares about it's customers made me choke on my Bacon, Egg and Chesse sandwhich. That game was bleeding money and the bottom line is now it's not. Stop trusting everything you read. 

I do not trust everything I read, I trust my experineces with SOE directly, and also had personal commucation with Smedly himself.

I have yet to get to communicate with the president of any other MMO company. It is just blocked by customer support, and they do not want to to speak to customers.

Originally posted by superniceguy

Originally posted by xr00t3dx

LA was calling the shot but saying SOE cares about it's customers made me choke on my Bacon, Egg and Chesse sandwhich. That game was bleeding money and the bottom line is now it's not. Stop trusting everything you read. 

I do not trust everything I read, I trust my experineces with SOE directly, and also had personal commucation with Smedly himself.

I have yet to get to communicate with the president of any other MMO company. It is just blocked by customer support, and they do not want to to speak to customers.

 

 

Maybe it depends on how many customers they have?

Originally posted by Sandbox

Originally posted by superniceguy

Originally posted by xr00t3dx

LA was calling the shot but saying SOE cares about it's customers made me choke on my Bacon, Egg and Chesse sandwhich. That game was bleeding money and the bottom line is now it's not. Stop trusting everything you read. 

I do not trust everything I read, I trust my experineces with SOE directly, and also had personal commucation with Smedly himself.

I have yet to get to communicate with the president of any other MMO company. It is just blocked by customer support, and they do not want to to speak to customers.

 

 

Maybe it depends on how many customers they have?

That is just finding conspiracy where there is none, and you are basing it off information that is only publicly viewable, and as they can not reveal the whole truth due to confidentiality. If you knew the whole truth you would see that SOE cares, more so than any other company, as Raph Koster says also

SOE always responds with a direct response to the question you ask customer support. When I contacted EA support regarding SWTOR, about tryting to get to play the game as wanted to use Time Cards instead of paypal or credit card, about 4 times. they just sent me a copy and paste of instructions of what needed to be done., as listed in a stickied forum post, 3 times, and the 4th one was just ignored.

SOE would have responded directly and said basically "sorry, rules are rules". At least you knew they saw what you were asking, but EA/Bioware it just seemed they did not, and needed to ask them again, and SOE never ignored my tickets even after replying to them for loads more times.

Originally posted by superniceguy

Originally posted by Sandbox

Originally posted by superniceguy

Originally posted by xr00t3dx

LA was calling the shot but saying SOE cares about it's customers made me choke on my Bacon, Egg and Chesse sandwhich. That game was bleeding money and the bottom line is now it's not. Stop trusting everything you read. 

I do not trust everything I read, I trust my experineces with SOE directly, and also had personal commucation with Smedly himself.

I have yet to get to communicate with the president of any other MMO company. It is just blocked by customer support, and they do not want to to speak to customers.

 

 

Maybe it depends on how many customers they have?

That is just finding conspiracy where there is none, and you are basing it off information that is only publicly viewable, and as they can not reveal the whole truth due to confidentiality. If you knew the whole truth you would see that SOE cares, more so than any other company, as Raph Koster says also

SOE always responds with a direct response to the question you ask customer support. When I contacted EA support regarding SWTOR, about tryting to get to play the game as wanted to use Time Cards instead of paypal or credit card, about 4 times. they just sent me a copy and paste of instructions of what needed to be done., as listed in a stickied forum post, 3 times, and the 4th one was just ignored.

SOE would have responded directly and said basically "sorry, rules are rules". At least you knew they saw what you were asking, but EA/Bioware it just seemed they did not, and needed to ask them again, and SOE never ignored my tickets even after replying to them for loads more times.

 

Same here, SOE always answered my tickets within 48 hours, a couple of times even within the hour. The answers were not always to my liking but I was never ignored.

Originally posted by Tardcore

Originally posted by superniceguy

The Game Archaeologist chats with John Smedley about EQMac's salvation

Basically EQmac was going to be sunsetted but in the end was not, and made complete free to play - no sub fee and no marketplace - completely free.  In it mentions SWG and closure:

It was something that SOE could say "yes" to a couple of months after it had to say "no" to pleading Star Wars Galaxies fans. So why did EQMac get saved while SWG was not? It came down to licensing, and with LucasArts calling the shots with SWG, SOE didn't have the flexibility that it did with EQMac. SOE's reticent to shut anything down, Smedley said, although sometimes the higher-ups have to make the call to do so.

The decision to save Al'Kabor was attributed 100% to the fan response, especially the pleas from Mac gamers to a Mac-loving president. "We left it running because we cared about the fans," Smedley confessed. "I was so personally moved by 600 emails on the subjects by rabid fans on that server; it was really touching to me."

"We're not cold-hearted," he said. "We treat customers like we treat families." Those who want to make a conspiracy out of the issue or read into it miss the simple truth of the personal angle. SOE, Smedley assured me, is not a faceless bureaucracy but a group of like-minded gamers who care about the same things that its customers do.

 

Basically SOE cares about the players and its fans, but it is Lucasarts who do not. If they did they would have seen to keep SWG active. Any crap that SOE put out with SWG, was because of Lucasarts calling the shots.

 

Sorry but LA involvement does not explain the long history of all their other broken and abandoned non Star Wars titles they still expect customers to pay for.

 

And what long history is this?

Is it better to ask someone to pay for Vanguard than it is to shut it down?  because that is EXACTLY what you are saying.  That they should just go close products that arent profitable to develop for.

AS a matter of fact they recently did try to close down a product that was costing them money, even with people paying for it. Smedley listened to the customers and EQMac remains open, even at a loss for SoE.

Just to provide further proof that SOE doesn't care about their customers, I offer evidence from their latest debacle...the ProSiebenSat.1 deal :)

http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/posts/list.m?&topic_id=515195 <--- SOE's own forums even!

And here for player reaction

http://eq2wire.com/2012/02/23/soe-eq2-community-team-deletes-100s-of-posts-bans-dozens-over-prosieben-feedback/

Yet...there will always be the fools who follow and defend them, despite everything they do.

Do any of you LA fan  boys really believe SOE could design and code and implement the NGE without lucas arts wanting them to ?   

I hope some of you realize how a license deal works for games because like SWTOR any and all changes that effect the star wars lore/game go through or from Lucas Arts a company that over the years has proven they care about money first.   LA gets to hide in the backround and let SOE take all the heat for years just like bioware now is taking all the heat for swtor yet LA is responsible for everything in that game including releasing it 6 months early.

    Anyone that believes Sony cares about their fans is totally ignoring the LONG history of crap games Sony has put out and security measures that Sony has put in place for their customers.  Going on to blame LA for the NGE and CU is just delusional when you look at all the other crap they have done as well.  Sorry folks, but Sony will not be getting any more of my money.  Smedley and his money grubbing company can go down the drain for all I care.

Originally posted by teakbois

Is it better to ask someone to pay for Vanguard than it is to shut it down?  because that is EXACTLY what you are saying.  That they should just go close products that arent profitable to develop for.

 

AS a matter of fact they recently did try to close down a product that was costing them money, even with people paying for it. Smedley listened to the customers and EQMac remains open, even at a loss for SoE.

 

I'm sure I missed something more to this, but I want to comment on this...

From what I read above, you seem to think that that SOE is almost doing you a favor by charging you a sub fee and allowing a game to limp along on life support?! That's so wrong...so wrong. Teakbois...you're the CUSTOMER! Value your $ and time more than you seem to.

Charging top dollar, for an unsupported game, isn't reasonable...not imo. If a company gets away with it, fine, there's nobody to blame but the people paying the fee - I just feel it's a very shady practice. I'm not naive to how the market works, so I understand companies following this pattern for easy $ - What I do NOT understand is the mentality of the players who pay for it willingly and support it. I feel that a  $15 sub fee demands a game that has continued development and dedicated staff capable of fixing bugs and adding new content.

Originally posted by TUX426

Originally posted by teakbois

Is it better to ask someone to pay for Vanguard than it is to shut it down?  because that is EXACTLY what you are saying.  That they should just go close products that arent profitable to develop for.

 

AS a matter of fact they recently did try to close down a product that was costing them money, even with people paying for it. Smedley listened to the customers and EQMac remains open, even at a loss for SoE.

 

I'm sure I missed something more to this, but I want to comment on this...

From what I read above, you seem to think that that SOE is almost doing you a favor by charging you a sub fee and allowing a game to limp along on life support?! That's so wrong...so wrong. Teakbois...you're the CUSTOMER! Value your $ and time more than you seem to.

Charging top dollar, for an unsupported game, isn't reasonable...not imo. If a company gets away with it, fine, there's nobody to blame but the people paying the fee - I just feel it's a very shady practice. I'm not naive to how the market works, so I understand companies following this pattern for easy $ - What I do NOT understand is the mentality of the players who pay for it willingly and support it. I feel that a  $15 sub fee demands a game that has continued development and dedicated staff capable of fixing bugs and adding new content.

SOE saved vanguard simple as that .  Stop blamming them for Sigils stupid mistakes.  SOE has shareholders/investors and they have a obligation to them.   Why not blame every other company who passed on vanguard  ?  SOE kept a game that would be dead alive so the fans can enjoy it but you blame them for not taking a huge risk and investing more money into a game that already ate up 40 + mil of Microsofts money ?  

[mod edit] even at 15$ a month do you think SOE is making money from Vanguard ?  Ill guarantee they're losing money on the game and have been for years yet still keep it going for people who enjoy it.

Btw Vanguard is going Free 2 Play.

Originally posted by William12

Do any of you LA fan  boys really believe SOE could design and code and implement the NGE without lucas arts wanting them to ?   

I hope some of you realize how a license deal works for games because like SWTOR any and all changes that effect the star wars lore/game go through or from Lucas Arts a company that over the years has proven they care about money first.   LA gets to hide in the backround and let SOE take all the heat for years just like bioware now is taking all the heat for swtor yet LA is responsible for everything in that game including releasing it 6 months early.

Jeff Freeman, an SOE employee VERY actively involved in the NGE, even called the "father" of the NGE, confirmed long ago that the NGE was SOE's idea, LA simply approved it. Any other theory you may have on it is false.

I urge you to read this link if you haven't.

Originally posted by William12

 

SOE saved vanguard simple as that .  Stop blamming them for Sigils stupid mistakes.  SOE has shareholders/investors and they have a obligation to them.   Why not blame every other company who passed on vanguard  ?  SOE kept a game that would be dead alive so the fans can enjoy it but you blame them for not taking a huge risk and investing more money into a game that already ate up 40 + mil of Microsofts money ?  

[mod edit] even at 15$ a month do you think SOE is making money from Vanguard ?  Ill guarantee they're losing money on the game and have been for years yet still keep it going for people who enjoy it.

 

Btw Vanguard is going Free 2 Play.

Calling me names doesn't help your case.

You're one of those people who feels like SOE is doing you a fucking favor by taking your money...my god man...I don't even know what to say to you. Good luck! Enjoy the game and accept whatever they deem worthy to give you.

Originally posted by TUX426

Originally posted by William12

 

SOE saved vanguard simple as that .  Stop blamming them for Sigils stupid mistakes.  SOE has shareholders/investors and they have a obligation to them.   Why not blame every other company who passed on vanguard  ?  SOE kept a game that would be dead alive so the fans can enjoy it but you blame them for not taking a huge risk and investing more money into a game that already ate up 40 + mil of Microsofts money ?  

[mod edit] even at 15$ a month do you think SOE is making money from Vanguard ?  Ill guarantee they're losing money on the game and have been for years yet still keep it going for people who enjoy it.

 

Btw Vanguard is going Free 2 Play.

Calling me names doesn't help your case.

You're one of those people who feels like SOE is doing you a fucking favor by taking your money...my god man...I don't even know what to say to you. Good luck! Enjoy the game and accept whatever they deem worthy to give you.

Obviously people believe its worth it because people still play it.  You dont ok we get it but that isnt SOEs fault thats your fault go spend your 15$ a month somewhere else.   You believe a game is better off dead then have a small playerbase that enjoys it and that is ignorant and greedy by you.   Fact is if SOE didnt SAVE Vanguard thousands of people wouldnt of enjoyed it and had fun playing it over the years and there would be 0 chance of even more enjoying it when it goes F2P.  There would be no Vanguard F2P if SOE didnt accept that the game would lose money for 5 straight years.   You call SOE a money grubbing company but fact is they have LOST money on vanguard since the day they bailed sigil out and they kept the game going for people who want to play it while LOSING money.

Originally posted by TUX426

Originally posted by teakbois

Is it better to ask someone to pay for Vanguard than it is to shut it down?  because that is EXACTLY what you are saying.  That they should just go close products that arent profitable to develop for.

 

AS a matter of fact they recently did try to close down a product that was costing them money, even with people paying for it. Smedley listened to the customers and EQMac remains open, even at a loss for SoE.

 

I'm sure I missed something more to this, but I want to comment on this...

From what I read above, you seem to think that that SOE is almost doing you a favor by charging you a sub fee and allowing a game to limp along on life support?! That's so wrong...so wrong. Teakbois...you're the CUSTOMER! Value your $ and time more than you seem to.

Charging top dollar, for an unsupported game, isn't reasonable...not imo. If a company gets away with it, fine, there's nobody to blame but the people paying the fee - I just feel it's a very shady practice. I'm not naive to how the market works, so I understand companies following this pattern for easy $ - What I do NOT understand is the mentality of the players who pay for it willingly and support it. I feel that a  $15 sub fee demands a game that has continued development and dedicated staff capable of fixing bugs and adding new content.

I would rather play (as in constanty sub to) a game like Vanguard, than SWTOR. It is fun to go out and find/harvest your resources. It is not fun when your companions do the work for you. The crafting system in Vanguard is far better than what it is SWTOR, although not as good as SWG.

It is the systems that make people keep subscribing, not the quality of the product. The quality of the product will attract more to a game, but if there is not many systems in it, then people will just lose interest