More Unmaking
Posted by Stropp on March 11, 2008As I mentioned in my last post, Is it Heartless to Unmake Everquest? there is a bit of a blog meme going on at the moment. Originally started by Paul Barnett over at his blog, it’s a mind game asking what game you’d remove from history and why.
For me it’s reasonably simple. My choice for MMO unmaking is Star Wars Galaxies.
The developers picked an almost impossible part of the Star Wars IP to use. The period that SWG was set, the first trilogy (or is that the second trilogy?) had a number of difficulties associated with it.
The biggest of these was that after the deaths of Obiwan and Yoda, Luke was the only Jedi, and likewise there were only two Sith Lords. This meant that to be true to the lore, no players could become Jedi. Technically, players couldn’t even be Dark Jedi.
This left the developers with a huge problem, compromise the lore and have their Star Wars upset, or not allow Jedi at all and disappoint the other half of their fanbase. Oh boy, I can remember the passionate discussions in the SWG forums on that one.
It would have been far better for Galaxies to have been made in the New Republic era, or the KOTOR era (which hopefully is being done now.) I’d probably have picked the New Republic since there is so much scope there. The Jedi order is being reformed under Skywalker, there are remnants of the Empire still around, and there is scope for players to be either light or dark Jedi.
Whatever, that’s just Womprats under the speeder.
The developers also made other decisions that didn’t work so well, at least for me.
- One character slot per server. Sucks to be an altaholic.
- When Jedi were implemented, it was a terrible life sucking grind to unlock them.
- No vendors to sell to. Not a problem if players were willing to buy your low level salvage. Big problem if they weren’t.
- The civil war PvP was never really implemented.
- Multiple major changes to gameplay, with the last set destroying whole classes and playstyles.
Overall Star Wars Galaxies was a disappointment. It was a great idea, and to my mind a Star Wars MMO is still a great idea, but the implementation of Galaxies was sub par.
If that was all I wouldn’t really care if Star Wars Galaxies was unmade or not. The biggest problem with SWG is that it has blocked any further development of Star Wars MMO games. Regardless who is to blame for the poor decisions in SWG, SOE or Lucasarts, the failure of SWG would have certainly left a sour taste in Lucasarts mouth.
That experience has undoubtedly caused them to look negatively on any proposals for Star Wars based MMOs. There have been a bunch of Star Wars games released since Galaxies was released, but not a whisper of any MMOs, except for the KOTORO rumors. If Galaxies was erased from memory, Lucasarts may be more entertaining of a new Star Wars MMO.
So, I’d definitely unmake Star Wars Galaxies if I could. I’d like to see what Star Wars game would have eventually taken its place.
What about you? Have your say.
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Bingo on the timeline that SWG chose to use. I always felt that they should of set the game right at the end of the movies, when the Empire is in retreat, the Rebels are surging, and Luke is just starting to set up the New Jedi Academy. This would have allowed for Jedi to be an integral part of the game, with proper lore to explain why they weren’t as powerful as the old Jedi.
That’s a good point about using the timeline to allow Jedi to be less powerful. I hadn’t thought of it that way before.
When I first heard the SWG announcement, with the news that I could be a Jedi and construct my own lightsaber, I was quite excited. I even emailed my gaming friends with the news. Excitement turned to disappointment later.
Nowadays, I’m just as excited with the news that Stargate Worlds will let me be an evil Goa’uld and even be able to switch hosts.
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