Another One Bites The Dust

Posted by Stropp on June 25, 2011

The sad news has come through that Star Wars Galaxies will be shutting down on December 15, 2011.

To be honest, I’m a little surprised. SOE don’t have the habit of shutting down their MMO games like NCSoft do. (NCSoft close a MMO at the drop of a hat.) With the exception of the Matrix Online, SOE haven’t dumped any of their lineup, and the Matrix was killed because they lost the IP rights to keep it going.

I wonder if that is the reason for SWG’s demise. There have been rumors for a while that Lucasarts may pull the plug on the licence. Perhaps with SW:TOR upcoming, Lucasarts feels it is time to let SWG die.

On the other hand, there was speculation during the great SOE/PSN hackattack that the dollar losses may force SOE to shut down some less profitable games. Sony as a company isn’t doing all that well, so this might well be a cause.

Still, it’s a little surprising that SWG is being shutdown without an attempt to bring it into the F2P arena. That has saved a few less well performing games. I’d think that going F2P would bring quite a few new players in. And frankly for Star Wars a cash shop could provide all sorts of marvellous cosmetic items, perhaps even including monacles. Lot’s of cash could be made. So perhaps it was a Lucasarts decision after all.

In anycase, I don’t like to see any game close down. There’s always a bunch of dedicated players who, despite the changes and trials of the MMORPG lifestyle, stick with their game year after year. It’s a sad day.