i would go as far to say its a combination of all the above, if they would have left the game like it was, it would possibly be the number 1 MMO today? (maybe)

Originally posted by Mathos

You do have a valid point, but it if was not stupidity then it was intentional, and if that's the case then it was done with some malice on there part!.

I should have made clear that “stupidity” “hubris” or “greed” ALONE is unsatisfying to me.  I can definitely see a combination of these factors working together, though I tend to prefer “ignorance” over “stupidity.”

Malice?  Meaning SOE/LA intentionally, out of meanness, set out to hurt their players?  That’s a hard one to swallow.  Sure, they were careless about what they were doing to their existing player base and indifferent about our wishes.  We didn’t matter a nit to them in their greater scheme.  But malice?  SOE means no ill-will to the vets.  They just want us to go away.

I will continue to look at SOE sideways on this, even though LA may have had an equal hand.  It is much like a 15-year-old and a 21-year-old playing with flammables and burning down the garage.  Sure, they both should have known better and both share blame, but the 21-year-old is legally the adult in the scenario and will be dealt with harsher due to that fact.  SOE was the “adult” in the NGE flameout, as they had far more MMO experience than LA.  At minimum, they should have dug their heels in and refused to push the NGE, even at the risk of LA pulling the license.  When that story reached the players, SOE would have been standing tall and much better off than they are today.

The Lucas brand has pretty much lost any of my future dollars for much more than just SWG.
 

Originally posted by Kyleran

You say "greed" like its a bad thing.  As Gorden Gecko taught us, "Greed is good"

Corporations exist for one primary purpose, to make maximize shareholder value.  All other considerations are secondary.

I suspect that "not going to jail" does or should rank a bit higher.  Neither a corporation nor its officers are immune to the law.

I would believe that we pretty much have the answers to these questions now.  Rubinfields blog, and he has really no reason to lie anymore;

"So we were given the directive to make Galaxies better.  Not just make Galaxies better, but make it succesful. Not the 200k subs it had, but really succesful. The idea was that we had the most valuable IP in the entire world, and we ****ed it up to the point of having 200k subs.",  "So, when the NGE push came along, we were asked to reimagine the game."  and "Not just small changes, but rebuild it."  

per Rubinfield, was the motives for the NGE.  (Direction form LA, SOE San Diego, or both?,  he didn't tell us which.)  Greed?

"And it was needed. When we were asked, we were bleeding subscribers.  If I remember correctly, somewhere around 10k a month. LOSING 10,000 subs a month.   WOW was out. SWG was niche and clunky. " 

per Rubinfield, was the desperation.

"However, we made a mistake. 

Somewhere during the discussions it was strongly recommended that we streamline our characters.  People wanted something simpler, more direct, more accessible.  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.  So, we pushed forward."

Looks like what Rubinfield thought was the stupidity.

"It was a misread at an organizational level. Marketing, Production, community. You name it.   Epoch grade ****up."

But, here was the major problem with SWG in it's many incarnations.  Rubinfield finally gets it.

"You cannot change it at runtime.  BUT! The point, the ****up, the mistake that we made, was answering an unasked question.  Can you change an MMO drastically after it launches?  Categorically, NO.  If we were to do it again, and wanted to make those types of changes, you have to make a new game.  Relaunch with a new title.  Or shut down Galaxies and relaunch for real." 

I have to admit that I actually believe Rubinfield in his rants.  He has no reason to spin, lie, or with-hold the truth anylonger (outside of NDAs which he probably violated in telling the world this much).  I think he let his anger at the "vets" telling him he screwed up their game, be the motivation for letting the cat out of the bag.  So to speak.
 
 
 
 

Originally posted by Elwalpo

i would go as far to say its a combination of all the above, if they would have left the game like it was, it would possibly be the number 1 MMO today? (maybe)

Do you remeber the game prior to the NGE?  It had a lot to recover from the CU.  The live team was pushing new patches that looked promising for the professions.  Squad Leader was just bout to get an update when everything went silent for a week.  Thats when the live team was told of the NGE.  All thier work was thrown out the window.  People quit or let go for up holding the views of the vet player base.  That was the point when apathy set in on SWG that it was just another game job and not THE Star Wars MMO.

At no point in SWG's history has it been bug free, directed, polished, stable or complete to the acceptance of the general MMO market.

It was a buggy mess with little content beyond what the players made of it.  Was it good?  Yes, as it had repeatable features that offered challenge.  However, the Jedi Grind culture was destorying the spirit of the game.  The efforts spent on unlocking should have been of equal value to the GCW system to make for a more complete Star Wars game (IMO).  People like a challenge if the reward is good like an Alpha Profession unlock.  Casual players could work towards it at thier own pace while the "Power Gamers" could exibit what the prize was like.  It however got out of control.  The devs didn't see where it would lead.  Fustrated players quit to join the better made WOW.  LA couldn't concieve that SWG was a poorly produced game beyond thier brand.  SOE was trying to keep up with the market with habits that were now obsolete.  Instead of fixing and polishing Koster's premise, they scrapped it for FPS themed WOW want a be in the NGE.

Preaching again, sorry.  End of Wall o' Text.

It could be said that their initial greed was what did them in.  As in, how they made those 350k  subs in the first place.

The 10k a month loss was, I think, due to many players having more than 1 account(remember you could only have one toon per server), and cancelling them all to play WoW with one account.

So yeah, that was the bleed.  Then came the NGE...

Originally posted by Elwalpo

i would go as far to say its a combination of all the above, if they would have left the game like it was, it would possibly be the number 1 MMO today? (maybe)

I REALLY REALLY doubt it.  Most of my guild was on its way out pre-cu.  WoW was offering something that, at the time, was pretty unprecedented.  AND you only needed one account.

The hemorrhage of subs is what made SOE go into panic mode in the first place.

But I agree it would probably be doing better than it is.

Originally posted by JYCowboy

Originally posted by Elwalpo

i would go as far to say its a combination of all the above, if they would have left the game like it was, it would possibly be the number 1 MMO today? (maybe)

 

Do you remeber the game prior to the NGE?  It had a lot to recover from the CU.  The live team was pushing new patches that looked promising for the professions.  Squad Leader was just bout to get an update when everything went silent for a week.  Thats when the live team was told of the NGE.  All thier work was thrown out the window.  People quit or let go for up holding the views of the vet player base.  That was the point when apathy set in on SWG that it was just another game job and not THE Star Wars MMO.

 

At no point in SWG's history has it been bug free, directed, polished, stable or complete to the acceptance of the general MMO market.

 

It was a buggy mess with little content beyond what the players made of it.  Was it good?  Yes, as it had repeatable features that offered challenge.  However, the Jedi Grind culture was destorying the spirit of the game.  The efforts spent on unlocking should have been of equal value to the GCW system to make for a more complete Star Wars game (IMO).  People like a challenge if the reward is good like an Alpha Profession unlock.  Casual players could work towards it at thier own pace while the "Power Gamers" could exibit what the prize was like.  It however got out of control.  The devs didn't see where it would lead.  Fustrated players quit to join the better made WOW.  LA couldn't concieve that SWG was a poorly produced game beyond thier brand.  SOE was trying to keep up with the market with habits that were now obsolete.  Instead of fixing and polishing Koster's premise, they scrapped it for FPS themed WOW want a be in the NGE.

 

Preaching again, sorry.  End of Wall o' Text.

yes sir i actually started playing just after publish 9 (the deletion of the jedi hologrind (the original grind)) and the addition of the orginal village of aurillia.  I was about to finish the village quests then that fatefull day came, NGE.  So techincally all that really didnt bother me cu and all the bugs.  But what i was saying SWG back then was a unique game back then unlike what crap it is now.

Originally posted by Robsolf

Originally posted by Elwalpo

i would go as far to say its a combination of all the above, if they would have left the game like it was, it would possibly be the number 1 MMO today? (maybe)

 

I REALLY REALLY doubt it.  Most of my guild was on its way out pre-cu.  WoW was offering something that, at the time, was pretty unprecedented.  AND you only needed one account.

The hemorrhage of subs is what made SOE go into panic mode in the first place.

But I agree it would probably be doing better than it is.

you do know i did say the word Maybe at then end of the sentece.

Originally posted by Elwalpo

Originally posted by Robsolf

Originally posted by Elwalpo

i would go as far to say its a combination of all the above, if they would have left the game like it was, it would possibly be the number 1 MMO today? (maybe)

 

I REALLY REALLY doubt it.  Most of my guild was on its way out pre-cu.  WoW was offering something that, at the time, was pretty unprecedented.  AND you only needed one account.

The hemorrhage of subs is what made SOE go into panic mode in the first place.

But I agree it would probably be doing better than it is.

 

you do know i did say the word Maybe at then end of the sentece.

Yep... and did you notice I said REALLY REALLY doubt it, rather than, YOU'RE WRONG!!!  ;)

Originally posted by tman5

Originally posted by Mathos

You do have a valid point, but it if was not stupidity then it was intentional, and if that's the case then it was done with some malice on there part!.

 

I should have made clear that “stupidity” “hubris” or “greed” ALONE is unsatisfying to me.  I can definitely see a combination of these factors working together, though I tend to prefer “ignorance” over “stupidity.”

 

Malice?  Meaning SOE/LA intentionally, out of meanness, set out to hurt their players?  That’s a hard one to swallow.  Sure, they were careless about what they were doing to their existing player base and indifferent about our wishes.  We didn’t matter a nit to them in their greater scheme.  But malice?  SOE means no ill-will to the vets.  They just want us to go away.

 

I will continue to look at SOE sideways on this, even though LA may have had an equal hand.  It is much like a 15-year-old and a 21-year-old playing with flammables and burning down the garage.  Sure, they both should have known better and both share blame, but the 21-year-old is legally the adult in the scenario and will be dealt with harsher due to that fact.  SOE was the “adult” in the NGE flameout, as they had far more MMO experience than LA.  At minimum, they should have dug their heels in and refused to push the NGE, even at the risk of LA pulling the license.  When that story reached the players, SOE would have been standing tall and much better off than they are today.

 

The Lucas brand has pretty much lost any of my future dollars for much more than just SWG.
 

Say what you will but they did have to be some what stupid not to see what would happen when they did the bait and switch's,

as for the CUNGE well we can argue this all you want, but some will see it one way and some the other.

As far as the star wars titles go i stopped buying them when this all went down, it will also be a cold day in heck, before i play a $OE title again.

Originally posted by Mathos

Originally posted by tman5

Originally posted by Mathos

You do have a valid point, but it if was not stupidity then it was intentional, and if that's the case then it was done with some malice on there part!.

 

I should have made clear that “stupidity” “hubris” or “greed” ALONE is unsatisfying to me.  I can definitely see a combination of these factors working together, though I tend to prefer “ignorance” over “stupidity.”

 

Malice?  Meaning SOE/LA intentionally, out of meanness, set out to hurt their players?  That’s a hard one to swallow.  Sure, they were careless about what they were doing to their existing player base and indifferent about our wishes.  We didn’t matter a nit to them in their greater scheme.  But malice?  SOE means no ill-will to the vets.  They just want us to go away.

 

I will continue to look at SOE sideways on this, even though LA may have had an equal hand.  It is much like a 15-year-old and a 21-year-old playing with flammables and burning down the garage.  Sure, they both should have known better and both share blame, but the 21-year-old is legally the adult in the scenario and will be dealt with harsher due to that fact.  SOE was the “adult” in the NGE flameout, as they had far more MMO experience than LA.  At minimum, they should have dug their heels in and refused to push the NGE, even at the risk of LA pulling the license.  When that story reached the players, SOE would have been standing tall and much better off than they are today.

 

The Lucas brand has pretty much lost any of my future dollars for much more than just SWG.
 

Say what you will but they did have to be some what stupid not to see what would happen when they did the bait and switch's,

as for the CUNGE well we can argue this all you want, but some will see it one way and some the other.

As far as the star wars titles go i stopped buying them when this all went down, it will also be a cold day in heck, before i play a $OE title again.

What I get from this discussion is that what we often call "stupid" can involve a number of complicated factors that work together, leading people to make bad decisions with disastrous results. 

As for malice.  Do I think SOE/LA set out to injure people in some way?  Hmm, well if they misled people intentionally when they withheld information about the NGE, and they did so to get at people's wallets, then I think I would call that malicious.  However, do I think they redesigned their live game with the express intent of causing injury to their players?  No. 

I do think though that players' interests were thrown out the window in a desperate scheme to increase revenue by appealing to a different, hopefully broader audience.  Current players were viewed, I think, as expendable.  In the end, it was hurtful to players, even if hurting them was not the original intent.

It kind of reminds me of counselling work I've done with people who did something hurtful to a significant other.  Most people who have affairs, for example, don't do so with the express purpose of causing pain to their spouse.  Some do, mind you.  Others are often looking to have various needs or wants met outside the context of their marital contract.  They may not intend to hurt the people that feel betrayed by their actions, but the actions nevertheless do cause pain and a breach of trust. 

Actually I think along a totally different line and in this I give Blizzard credit.

SWG is not the only Star Wars game out there.  When SW TOR comes out it wont be the only Star Wars mmo.  In in about 5 years time another Star Wars mmo will be announced.    Considering that LA holds the rights to the Star Wars franchise they continuously license new games all the time.    Now alot of people have said "Its STAR WARS! How can they mess up with a franchise that big that should have given WoW a run for its money?!"   Easy.   Flood the market with so many games that though the players may be loyal to a franchise they do NOT need to be loyal to a particular game.  And thats what an mmo needs most - a loyal playerbase subscribed to it.    Thats where Blizzard did it right.   Has there been a Warcraft game out on the market for any platform since the release of WoW?  Not to my knowledge.  So now, if you want the Warcraft experience you HAVE to play the mmo or play a game that is older.  Knowing what I do about game systems - they become obsolete and the older games cant be played anymore so the older games isnt really an option. 

  With Star Wars though - even if Star Wars Galaxies had never been released games will only have a certain measure of success before its old - even Knights of the Old Republic (which everyone gives good reviews to has more than likely slowed down in sales a great deal.    And people can move on from them with no real loss  because there is another Star Wars game coming out every year on various platforms.  So you dont HAVE to buy a computer to play in the Star Wars universe.   But imagine what SWG would be like now if LA had said "OK,  this is the very last game we will be giving licensing to for any platform. If you would like to play a game set in the Star Wars universe you have to go there".  

I guess if anyone was greedy it was LA because their Star Wars gamers are scattered all over the place playing different Star Wars games.   That doesn't really inspire me that they are too caring if SWG is healthy or unhealthy when it comes to population.

The other thing that was the downfall of the subscriber base even before the CU was even thought of was what the playerbase wanted in a Star Wars mmo and additionally an mmo in general.   I loved SWG because it was a world.  Unstructured game play, no levels,  open ended content,  freedom to make your character your own through skills taken up and play style.   I got into roleplay and did that for the first few years I played - up until the NGE went live.  Then the community rebuilding on my old (and now closed) server became far more important.  Now notice what I totally left out of the above statements.  I didn't have ANY preconceptions about what I wanted in regards to Star Wars and to be honest,  it wasn't the Star Wars title that drew me to it and its not because its Star Wars that I stay.

I know other people were  though and that dictated to them if they liked it or not.  Some had very definite ideas that are extremely different from my own.  Neither one is right or wrong, just different.    Though I have to admit - its rather ironic.  By some Id be considered a carebear,  and the game to them is supposedly geared to players like me.  But if thats true and really the case why do I often feel that there is no place for me as a non combat player? At any rate it was those differences at times that made people cancel their accounts.   They just couldn't feel the Star Wars experience.   Was SOE wrong  to do the NGE and try to give us that?   No.  I don't think they were.  The delivery was wrong though.   I did think recently perhaps if they had just released the changes slowly it might have been different,  but my husband was telling me that that might not have been possible with the amount of changes.

I think fundamentally it's just a really bad management team.  Greed might have been a motivating factor for their decisions, but their team seemed to be working in alternate universe mode making exactly the wrong decision every time.  Now they have a tarnished reputation and they have no one to blame but themselves.  I think 'self destructive' describes them more aptly than 'greedy'.

Respoding to Yshira without the block quote:

I understand your point about flooding the market with StarWars games.  However, I believe that even if Galaxies was the only StarWars game available, I would have hit cancel.

Why?  Because SWG was actually taking away from my enjoyment of the StarWars story.  The game was broken, incomplete and constantly revised.  I was told that I was getting one thing for my money, and it turned out to be something else.  Tbh, when I quit SWG I had to stay away from StarWars things altogether for a while; it left such a bad taste in my mouth.

My kids got into the new movies, the action figures, the new clone wars animated series etc..  I rediscovered my love for StarWars through all of this, and I'm glad for it.  Honestly, if StarWars was my IP, I wouldn't let SOE anywhere near it at this point.   They really dragged the name through the mud imo, and a lot of the fans went along for the same bumpy ride.

Originally posted by Terranah

I think fundamentally it's just a really bad management team.  Greed might have been a motivating factor for their decisions, but their team seemed to be working in alternate universe mode making exactly the wrong decision every time.  Now they have a tarnished reputation and they have no one to blame but themselves.  I think 'self destructive' describes them more aptly than 'greedy'.

I think they're self-destructive too, but I wasn't sure what the driving force was behind this.
 

I mean, why sell people a new expansion loaded with features for professions that you then up and delete just a couple of weeks later?

Why take a real-time combat system and try to turn it into a first-person shooter?  Why do this when you can't even get collision detection working?

Why change the UI from something that was very user friendly, and make it a broken mess with far fewer customizable options?

Why release something when chat, movement and combat didn't even work, and why do this for the holiday season?

It's just hard to imagine what kind of driving force led people to make such monumental errors that seem so obvious from the outside.  And, it's not like these errors weren't pointed out before the bad decisions were implemented.  There were excellent forum posts, emails, heck even news stories about the bad decisions just begging them not to be so self-destructive, but they went ahead and hit the big red self-destruct button anyways...go figure.

SOE's problem is quite simply their lack of vision, competence and ethics - vision being the KEY word. 

I am confident that if they swtiched their efforts to pleasing their customers instead of screwing them over in the hopes of attracting a new market segment or milking them with rmt lottery or otherwise once they are committed to one of their games their financial returns will be higher in the long run.

no review from any site or their own marketing campaing wil ever be as effective to attracting customers as word of mouth or what people read from their own official forums.

Originally posted by ArcAngel3

Honestly, if StarWars was my IP, I wouldn't let SOE anywhere near it at this point. 

Even if they offered you many millions of dollars for it?

I mean, I understand and admire your love of the IP, but we are living in the real world. Money talks. It shouts.

If you wouldn't take millions from SOE, then you are already rich (and that doesn't stop Lucas) or you are not being responsible to your family.

Originally posted by MMO_Doubter

Originally posted by ArcAngel3

Honestly, if StarWars was my IP, I wouldn't let SOE anywhere near it at this point. 

Even if they offered you many millions of dollars for it?

I mean, I understand and admire your love of the IP, but we are living in the real world. Money talks. It shouts.

If you wouldn't take millions from SOE, then you are already rich (and that doesn't stop Lucas) or you are not being responsible to your family.

Money certainly does talk, and lets not pretend that Star Wars is any more important to the world than Jaws was...it's a fictional tale that has netted Lucas MILLIONS! But as Troneas pointed out above you "SOE's problem is quite simply their lack of vision, competence and ethics" <--- THAT is why you don't reward them with your IP. 

It's not about the money for one simple reason ...Lucas will get it from someone else. What he built (Star Wars) SELLS! What SoE has done to the "Star Wars" AND "Lucas Arts" name DOES damage the long term image of both (IMO). SoE has this fatuous belief that they can do whatever they want and as little as they want because it's Star Wars. As long as it says Star Wars, people will buy it.

Lucas Arts needs to wise up and realize that SoE has a very short term investment in the Star Wars name and they'll do anything they can to milk it for all it's worth, regardless of long term consequence (ie TCG, CoA STEAM offer). This is because Star Wars is nothing more than one of many projects they (SoE) have - which is clearly demonstrated with the way they've moved so much of their senior staff to DC Online. DC is their next cash cow. If/when Star Wars fails, SoE moves on. Conversely, Lucas Arts is ONLY here because of Star Wars. Without Star Wars, there is no Lucas Arts...God knows Indiana Jones games can't support them :P

Originally posted by Yhishara

Actually I think along a totally different line and in this I give Blizzard credit.

SWG is not the only Star Wars game out there.  When SW TOR comes out it wont be the only Star Wars mmo.  In in about 5 years time another Star Wars mmo will be announced.    Considering that LA holds the rights to the Star Wars franchise they continuously license new games all the time.    Now alot of people have said "Its STAR WARS! How can they mess up with a franchise that big that should have given WoW a run for its money?!"   Easy.   Flood the market with so many games that though the players may be loyal to a franchise they do NOT need to be loyal to a particular game.  And thats what an mmo needs most - a loyal playerbase subscribed to it.    Thats where Blizzard did it right.   Has there been a Warcraft game out on the market for any platform since the release of WoW?  Not to my knowledge.  So now, if you want the Warcraft experience you HAVE to play the mmo or play a game that is older.  Knowing what I do about game systems - they become obsolete and the older games cant be played anymore so the older games isnt really an option. 

  With Star Wars though - even if Star Wars Galaxies had never been released games will only have a certain measure of success before its old - even Knights of the Old Republic (which everyone gives good reviews to has more than likely slowed down in sales a great deal.    And people can move on from them with no real loss  because there is another Star Wars game coming out every year on various platforms.  So you dont HAVE to buy a computer to play in the Star Wars universe.   But imagine what SWG would be like now if LA had said "OK,  this is the very last game we will be giving licensing to for any platform. If you would like to play a game set in the Star Wars universe you have to go there".  

I guess if anyone was greedy it was LA because their Star Wars gamers are scattered all over the place playing different Star Wars games.   That doesn't really inspire me that they are too caring if SWG is healthy or unhealthy when it comes to population.

The other thing that was the downfall of the subscriber base even before the CU was even thought of was what the playerbase wanted in a Star Wars mmo and additionally an mmo in general.   I loved SWG because it was a world.  Unstructured game play, no levels,  open ended content,  freedom to make your character your own through skills taken up and play style.   I got into roleplay and did that for the first few years I played - up until the NGE went live.  Then the community rebuilding on my old (and now closed) server became far more important.  Now notice what I totally left out of the above statements.  I didn't have ANY preconceptions about what I wanted in regards to Star Wars and to be honest,  it wasn't the Star Wars title that drew me to it and its not because its Star Wars that I stay.

I know other people were  though and that dictated to them if they liked it or not.  Some had very definite ideas that are extremely different from my own.  Neither one is right or wrong, just different.    Though I have to admit - its rather ironic.  By some Id be considered a carebear,  and the game to them is supposedly geared to players like me.  But if thats true and really the case why do I often feel that there is no place for me as a non combat player? At any rate it was those differences at times that made people cancel their accounts.   They just couldn't feel the Star Wars experience.   Was SOE wrong  to do the NGE and try to give us that?   No.  I don't think they were.  The delivery was wrong though.   I did think recently perhaps if they had just released the changes slowly it might have been different,  but my husband was telling me that that might not have been possible with the amount of changes.

SOE tried that on yet another set of CHANGES, when they decided to CHANGE the game, back.  The Chapter 6 Combat Downgrade thru GU-Whatever was another large CHANGE, just made in smaller patches over a years time.  The delivery was as you state, above, and I believe SOE got the same thing out of NGE that you got out of it.

However, it was the CHANGES and not the delivery.  At C6CD, SOE anounced in a interview with Smedley that SWG had 100K subs.  At the end of that year of CHANGES, some of which were decent (even in my opinion as they also introduced Heroics) the result was the same.  Aprox. 2/3rds of the population unsubed, same as NGE.  This set of CHANGES put the death rattle in SWG as after this the population was no longer able to sustain 25 servers, anylonger.

It's just not the delivery of the CHANGES, it's the CHANGES itself.