Before Star Wars there was...Star Wars
Updated Mon, Nov 10, 2008 by Coyote
Star Wars Galaxies is a controversial game.
Not because of content or because of the normal things that would make a game controversial in this day and age, (Namely: Violence, sex, musical passages from a religious book, or an alien cat chick with huge alien cat chick boobs.)
- but because of what is known as the "NGE". The NGE or "New Game Enhancement" was introduced to Star Wars Galaxies well after the online game had already been established, and changed the game and its play dramatically. And when THAT happened, 99.9% of the Star Wars fans out there...
...lost their god damn MINDS.
It wasn't that the change was bad, or good, or even needed or not. It was the fact that they massively changed an already established game, and a lot of the people who were playing since launch logged in to find themselves no longer playing the game that they already loved. It was a different game, a shade of its original form, and it broke one of the primary laws of geekdom.
"Change is BAD."
Which is why so many 30-something geeks still live at home, have never kissed a girl, and refuse to watch anything new lest it change their visions of the old. Why would they watch the NEW Battle Star Galactica when the OLD one was the best EVER? So when Lucas Arts announced that it will be launching a NEW Star Wars Online game, it was met with mixed reactions.
Some cried out in joy at the chance to "Start over", some grumbled angrily and waved their plastic lightsaber wielding fists at the Padawans on their lawn, and others screamed about the NGE, how it ruined Star Wars and refused to let it go. Ever.
The new Star Wars game however, is already treading on thin ice and it isn't even RELEASED yet. The new game, Star Wars: The Old Republic takes place 3,600 years before Luke Skywalker was even a power converter whining twinkle in his mother's senate ruling eye.
So why do I consider this "thin ice"?
How about "The nobody who has ever had SEX will care" factor?
We're a culture of unimaginative automatons who latch onto the teat of the familiar and refuse to ever let it go. Setting the new Star Wars game 3,600 years in the past robs the average player of all of the things that they found familiar about the genre, and takes away their chances to become part of it. A genre set in its past might be appealing to the die hard Star Wars fans who can tell you the name of Darth Vader's grandfather, or what Han Solo named his kids with Leia, but to the rest of the world who doesn't care past what the movies have shown them...
It means that they can't run into C3P0. It means that they'll never be able to jump aboard the Aluminum Falcon, (What? What? What in the hell is an Aluminum Falcon!?!) that they'll never be able to save the galaxy from the asthma suffering death cough of Darth Vader, and that they'll never be able to follow in the footsteps of Luke Skywalker.
It ALSO means, that everyone and their non-creative semi-retarded brother will be making "ancestor" characters in game because they think that they are clever.
"I'm the great-great-great, add about 50 more greats, grand father of DARTH VADER! Eh? Eh? You impressed now? Eh? Pretty clever eh? Without ME, Darth Vader would have never been born!"
Really? Since we're seeing 3,600 years into the future and bragging, I'm the great-ancestor of a little boy who lived on Alderaan. Thanks for indirectly blowing up my future grandkid as he played with a toy landspeeder in his sandbox.
You dick.
While hardcore, or even medium-core fans of Star Wars might be interested to once again wield a lightsaber, (Even if it IS the 3,600 year younger predecessor that occasionally melted off fingers because it was new technology) the lure for the average "Hey, I have a sex life" player just isn't there.
Still, with the ass pain from the NGE refusing to ever heal, and the Star Wars genre stronger and more profitable than ever, I could be completely wrong and this game could take over the online universe. Until they patch in the great-great-great, add about 50 more greats, grandfather to the NGE...
...then there will be hell to pay.
-Coyote
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He glossed over the fact they CANCELLED KOTOR 3 entirely... gone! For SWG 2. I hope it's good, I really do. I'm a HUGE closet Star Wars fan and I don't talk about it much because...well having weaknesses gives Coyote ammunition. Bioware is a decent company that usually puts out good products but they DO have to work with LucasArts.
Hell toupe.
The one needle I'll poke in your argument Coy is that the time period of 3,600 years ago is the same time period that the KOTOR games for the consoles have been set in. So if you liked KOTOR on the console, you'll still feel familiar with KOTOR the MMO.
But otherwise yeah.
Besides. Who the hell needs more Star Wars? It's a world setting that's been done to death. Think up a new space knights thingy why don't you?
I'm kind of with you. I'm excited to play a game set in this universe that I love. But then, SWTOR (by the way, how are we supposed to pronounce this? swih-tohr?) is not the universe I know. If we based this on our own timeline, it would be like playing on Earth with rock throwing cavemen.
IMO setting the game this far back just gives them the space to completely change everything you thought you knew about Star Wars, with the excuse, "but that's how it was back in the day!"
In any case, the screenshots are pretty good looking, and the company making it has a really good reputation.
Yes, but the question is.... are the ceramic horses and lighthouses safe?
SOE screwed SWG up way before the NGE. In fact I thought the NGE was a good thing tbh.
However, I remember me and my mate skipping gaily through some greenery and we suddenly stopped as something hit us. We'd been skipping for like 5 mins, and we hadnt seen a single creature or other person. No other players. No NPCs. Nothing.
Personally I just took my hatred of SOE and squeezed it into a small burning ball of a range which I have buried deep inside me.
The took me and my mates dream of running a small outa the way taverna, whilst smuggling stuff around the galaxy and taking the occiasional side trip to punch C3P0in the mouth and kiss Hans and / or Lord Vader. Hey its a fantasy game!
erm *They took away
Sweater will rock.
Yup, all hail sweater rocks.
I'm sure we can ALL agree on that, NGE or not?
Kudos on the Robot Chicken quote :)
# Shipwreck Says:
October 23rd, 2008 at 10:51 am
Hell toupe.
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Amazing Stories, 1986. Season 1, Episode 21.
S
Coy, were you aiming for the trolls from EQ2 forums to come here and tell you how wonderful SWG was before the NGE. To all the people who still cry about this at night, while holding a blow-up doll in one hand and a blanket that we don't want to know what's on it in another, I say..Give it a break. All your crying hasn't made it go back so STFU!
Morv.... That's Blasphemy. Pure and simple. There can NEVER BE ENOUGH STAR WARS! And you can't have another "space knights thingy" because they all suck EXCEPT STAR WARS!
... and maybe Ice Pirates, but I'm not sure that qualifies as Space Knighty.
Anywhoo, I have faith that BioWare will make a kick ass game. Based on what they've already released about it I am freaking STOKED! BioWare has yet to release a game that just wasn't damn awesome in my opinion.
It's gonna be liquid awesome in a bottle people, and no, I'm not talking Jagermeister you lushes!
A Rom mmrpg? Moon Knight? The Herculoids?
Brokain Says:
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:30 pm
"Get your insurance from Geico"
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What's up, Brok? Miss you, big man.
Woo hoo! I'm a blasphemer!
@Morv.. ah, no, see, they're being very crafty and setting Sweater(tm) 600yrs after the KOTOR games so that, while you won't see the characters from the console games their 'legacy' might still be around, or somesuch.
It's all semantics, like not have 'knights' in the title so that there's a glimmer of hope for the jebi haters that there might be something other than jedi/sith action going on. But c'mon, it's Star Wars, it's all about the jedi really. *everything* else is just supplemental filler...
;)
End of the day the important question is 'Will it have Conan-like boobage or be just, well, meh..'?