General Discussion

MMORPG.com's Jef Reahard writes this re-review of SOE's Star Wars Galaxies. Using our new review system, Reahard has kept the controversey of the game's past in mind while focusing his review on the game as it stands today.

Perhaps no game in the short history of MMORPGs has generated as much controversy as Star Wars Galaxies. Since the title's debut in June of 2003, it has constantly evolved (even more so than is normal for this notoriously fickle genre), going through two combat engine changes and three development teams, as well as quite a lot of player turnover. While it’s tempting to offer up yet another summary of where the game went wrong, and how great it used to be (through those rose-colored collector's edition goggles, no doubt), this re-review will instead attempt to approach the title with a fresh perspective, ostensibly that of someone playing the game for the first time (an admittedly tall order for a launch day/beta veteran, so bear with me). Say what you will about Galaxies' meandering path to its present incarnation, but what you can't say is that there is a deeper game on the market, as it consistently accommodates a range of play styles by offering diverse options that the 'give me pew pew or give me death' mentality of the rest of the industry chooses to ignore.

Read the review here.

Nice review

It's good that you go back to the games from time to time, with the new contents most have today, it's good to keep the reviews up to date.

Not sure it isn't a little overrated though ;)

Well first off, let's get one thing clear here, the game is no longer a sandbox.  The elements that defined it as a sandbox were removed when they introduced the NGE patch.  You cannot discuss SWG without at least mentioning what was changed in the NGE patch.  Essentially, the two most important things that were changed. 

One, they converted from a skill based character system to a class based one.  You used to be able to change your skillset if you so desired.  Now once a medic, always a medic.  When they did the conversion, most top level characters immediately became mid level characters.  As an example my creature master with top end skills, became a level 45 medic.  High end crafters that were essential to the game pre-NGE became fluff after the change.

Secondly, the original game had the best crafting system in the genre, bar none.  The NGE change reduced that drastically by removing item degradation and introducing high end loot much better than you can craft.  Without items degrading and the new loot drops the market for new crafted  items dried up.  The crafters went from being the richest in the game to being the poorest.

Granted that is all past history.  The game has to stand as it is today.  Most of the servers are pretty much ghost towns now.  There are a few active servers and new players should find out which ones they are and choose to play on them.  Avoid the empty ones, no sense playing on a server with no one to play with.  

Me, I loved the sandbox aspects of the pre-NGE game and although I have tried many times to go back and play this game it is just a shadow of it's old self.   The role-play city I once lived in is gone, the role players have all left.   While I tried the new Beastmaster class, there is a huge grind ahead to actually use the creatures still in my inventory and with literally no one on starsider any more, it is just too hard to do it.

Nice review, even I think there are a few key elements that are missing :

1) Empty servers.
Apart one or maybe two servers rests are empty. They should merge the servers and allow free character transfers for the "vets"

2) Pseudo FPS combat system.
Doesn't work as there is no 3d movement, no collision detection, no aiming. Even it feels weird as you can't "miss" your opponent.

3) Lack of socialization
CU and NGE removing the need to go to a med center and a cantina killed the players interaction.

4) Classes (for vets)
SWG is no where anymore near the sandbox it was. You can't anymore choose who you are and what kind of character you want to play.

5) Crafting (for vets)
For a newcomer it's good, regarding others MMO. For a vet it's a huge draw back. At a time a dedicated crafter made a real difference in the items being made, not anymore.

6) Lack of content
Five years later and well the content is at 90% the same it was after the last expansion.

7) Lack of PVE AI
Well the difference between mobs is about only the low or insane amount of HP. Don't look for tactics, interesting mechanics, behavior...

8) Space system worse than X-wing
It is just a bad copy of Origin WC system, no way as good as X-Wing series. Bad UI, poor flight dynamics, low ship energy management. You can do most combats staying in the same position only rotating your ship.

9) Players cities = mess
As you can't level the ground and there are many objects that doesn't let you to build on top of them. No roads, no streets, no grass, no walls, no fences... so 99% of the cities looks like a messy gathering of non matching structures. And they are mostly ghost towns.

10) FUN, SW feeling?
I can say I had much more fun and StarWarsy feeling playing Battlefield and Kotor.
Battlefield has a working combat system and in Kotor you feel like you're in SW world
 

SWG used to be good, but due to each development team wanting to go another direction, the game has suffered greatly. Only thing left to do is wait for KoTOR Online.

Greetings everyone...

I played SWG for over 2 years, at least until the first C.U. was launched.

There's not much to say about this, imo SOE and SWG lost a lot of "clients" when the CU was launched. Most of the ppl playing SWG loved the gameplay, crafting and all the boring Grinding hours.

I still remember the fun that was farming Imperial bases for the reputation points, striking over Imperial Cities, doing some Corvettes, checking all the POI's for badges, trying all the proffs and choosing one to be main and other to complement...omg that was fun...1 day you were Teras Kasi and on the next day you were grinding over Rifleman or even Medic...you had 100% liberty on choosing your "class".

Those were the good old days of SWG making it an unique MMO were the Player choose whatever he decided to do without regreting the class chosen a few months later...and if u ever get bored just change it for crafting or even Musician / Dancer...

Those were great times and now it's just memories that you wanna keep from a nice MMO that once was "The MMO" for me.

Very good and fair review,

I thought there should have been more explaination about Restuus.  There are rewards there though mudflation has effected thier usefulness and its the center of PVP action for a given server.

Collection System should have been better featured as its now a main focus for reward.

All in all, good job.

Now lets see if Lucas Arts will advertise again.

The sanbox is gone (other than the huge sandbox called Tatooine )

Many of the features that made galaxies a unique game have been thrown out the window, there are very few entertainer groups, so no huge bands playing in the cantinas roleplaying and socializing. Crafters got the shaft and the class has never recovered, medics are still needed but not on the same scale they once were

Most cities are empty, the static cities are empty because no one needs them, and player cities since there are only a handfull of players on most servers (and most of those are bots), this is a galaxy wide ghost town. When you do see a player, half the time it is a Jedi showing off.

Sure, there was a few problems with the game pre-CU and NGE, but those problems were repairable, but there isn't a fix for the reputation  the game now has, once the developers chose the path of ignoring their customers and pushing a completely unwanted gameplay experience on them they lost the battle, no matter how many trading card games they program in...

I cancelled 3 days after the CU, I also joined MMORPG the same day, and it is unlikely that I will try another SOE game even though I have had an account with them since 1999