Star Wars Galaxies

[Sigurd]

Any players here?
I just bought a month worth of this game to test it out.
At first it seemed as a fun little RPG and I enjoyed my first evening doing the tutorial. However leaving the space station for Tatooine I realized that this game is just vastly immense.
I am wondering if I am up to it.

I built a character with the Jedi profession hoping to get to the light-saber wielding fast as in KOTOR 2. Reading through the guides I realize that it will take a long time just to become force sensitive.. or what have you.
Getting stuck on some of the missions I decided to try out for the Imperial Navy (I love those TIE fighters). But I am only allowed a trainer ship, which is far from a TIE. Ok maybe if I succeed in some imperial missions I’ll get a TIE… Nothing. Back to the manuals. It seems you’ll have to buy your own ship which involves getting blueprints from somewhere and go to a shipwright and make him build it for you. I am looking at the watch and thinking; what have I got my self into here?
I am not an experienced player of these kinds of online games… any experienced players that could give a few pointers?

[Voigtkampf]

I was considering Galaxies for a while, well, sometimes I still do, but my experience with WoW has made me aware just how much time I wasted there…And what for? To level up and get a new item that gets me +2 DPS or 1% better criticals? If Galaxies has more content and more individual, interesting missions, then I might reconsider…

[Grey_Fox]

It's buggy as hell.

[discovery1]

My bro used to play it. They are changing it to be more friendly to xbrick owners, which he doesn't like at all. Apparenly many long time players agree. So many that they apparently have to hide the unsubscribe button......

[Mongoose]

All i heard was that alot of players were quitting because of the constant changes(I think that when they pudate a stat, all the items that you bought before the update vanish). not very encouraging

[Microwavegerbil]

Also, I believe that as far as time-consuming MMO's go, SWG is the worst. Though I hear FFXI is rediculous as well.

[Zalmoxis]

Most MMO's just seem to drain away your life. If there was one that was not repetitive, I would try it.

[Microwavegerbil]

WoW is also heading further and further in that direction. Just pvping can be great fun when you don't have hours to play, but all the new stuff takes literally days of 6 hour nights.

[Sigurd]

Alright, 4 sessions of roughly 5 hours each into the game now... (I can easily see that this game could get quite addictive).
My character has reached level 18 as a JEDI (out of 90) and is currently employed as a Flight Officer in the Imperial navy (2nd tier).
I wasted my money on a TIE light fighter (which is currently for sale BTW). I purchased a TIE/In which should be better than my TRAINER ship… but with first test runs seems too easily shot down (even with force shields)… I guess the next certification on a better ship will outdo the TRAINER. Damn…
I am Sigurdir Fafnesbane in SWG, based on Tatooine and stays mostly in the Empire controlled city of Bestine (on the Scylla server) if anyone plays.

Since I started this thread I’ll throw in some replies:

I was considering Galaxies for a while

I would love to see you there m8… I can’t compare Galaxies to WoW since Galaxies is my first experience with MMO games.

It's buggy as hell.

I haven’t noticed…

@ discovery1 and mongoose;
Yes, reading the forums there is a lot of angry long time players… I don’t know.. there is still a lot of 80+ level characters around which are kind of annoying for a low level like me. I don’t know how this game was before but I imagine this NGE release has made significant updates to the game. For the better I wouldn’t know… the comments from developers imply that the old game was too complicated and slow… hopefully this new version has faster pace, better interface which brings many new players to the game. Reading the forums is realization enough that this game needs new blood.
When it comes to updates I think it was the NGE that made the community pissed. It was this universal update that screwed them over… I don’t think they lost a bunch of stuff. I think it was more in the stuff becoming obsolete and of no worth. E.g. an anti-corruption pack reward for 1 year subscribers worth 20 mill credits that is obsolete because they took away the corruption feature from the game altogether. I have survived 2 updates already without me loosing anything. I think the updates are more the “fixing bugs” kind of updates.

Also, I believe that as far as time-consuming MMO's go, SWG is the worst. Though I hear FFXI is rediculous as well.

I take it you are a SWG player?

Most MMO's just seem to drain away your life. If there was one that was not repetitive, I would try it.

Yes, I guess if you have played one MMO the others would be the same…

[edit]: reading through my post, I sound soo geeky.

[Zalmoxis]

Played the trial, some things should not be in Star Wars (I haven't seen all the movies and I know this) making this game feel awkward.

[Major Robert Dump]

Shame on you for buying that game.

I played it for 2 years, it was quite immersive. Unlocked Jedi ( a mystery that took 1000 hours to solve) and did 1000+ hours of grinding on my jedi. Even had a doc/buffer alt I ran AFK in busy starports using a macro where people payed me and I could make money AFK because of my uber macro writing skills...then

Combat Upgrade 1: It sucked, put timers on stuff and -- most importantly -- changed every freaking icon on the game so now you had to look for new buttons for the same old moves. In CU1s defense, it did add interesting content between Jedi vs Bounty Hunter, whereas I rarely saw BHs before now I got quadra-ganked every time I walked into a starport or cantina. Oh, and they nerfed by faction pets so AT-STs were easy to kill. Yay for saving up all those faction points I coulda used for bases and turrets instead of a uselss pet

Combat Upgrade 2 (november 2005, 10 months after first CU): First, let me preface this by saying news of CU2 (also knows as NGE) was INTENTIONALLY WITHHELD UNTIL 3 DAYS AFTER THE TOOW EXPANSION WENT LIVE. Thats right, with all the TOOW pre-order hype, all the new equipment and new vehicle hype, all the hype about new content and somehow the game producers failed to mention even once that 25 PROFESSIONS WERE BEING ELIMINATED AND JEDI WOULD BECOME A STARTING PROFESSION AND BH VS. JEDI PVP WAS BEING KILLED.
Also, in the past, a reward for unlocking jedi was to get an extra toon slot on the server, since the only way to have more than one per server was have more than one account. They took that away too

Do you see how one could become upset about that? So you have all these people who preorder the expansion without being told the game was going to be broken 3 weeks later. then, 3 days after TOOW goes live, they announce the NGE.

Major ethics violation on the part of SOE. Major, major. In fact, they knew they FKed up becuase of all the negative feedback from magazines and the gaming business that they offered full refunds for TOOW for people who were not going to renew their accounts. Still, its obvious they were witholding info for the sake of getting people to buy TOOW before they quit, so.....

I see Julio Torres of g4 a couple weeks ago and not only is he a smug jerk who is saying that the NGE changes were "tiny", but he says he playes WOW and wanted SWG to be more like WOW, and when he tried to demo something from the game live on television it was broken LMAO they coudlnt open the container so the spirit of Obi Wan would come out and talk to you....

I still have one active account, my jedi. I try to log on and play, just for a little while. Its not even the same game. And I'm sorry, but the tutorials with sound is just ridiculous, and every time i want to bring up my skill sheet to look at it I have to see Luke staring at me. Please.

The game used to be massive. It used to be a big mystery, with 100s vs 100s Imperial vs Rebel PVP. I had 300 million credits, 100s of untuned perals and crystals, was a master pilot with a cruiser class ship and had the most unique jedi template on the server (I didnt use a saber). TXF was the largest Imperial Guild on Ahazi, SWG was one of those games that never ever got old. And then they torpedoed it. I mean, they don't even have a force ranking system anymore, where Jedis can gain ranks by killing other jedis and lose rank by getting killed by non-jedis. Whats the point of PVP now? I also heard they disabled player bases

HEres something to consider: SOE last year spent a lot of effort trying to recruit people into "focus groups" from the forums, focus groups that would obviously have a lot to do with the coming NGE. 100s of people I know signed up. 3 of them got in. All 3 were players under age 16 at the time. After checking with others on the forums, this was the case throughout. They wanted kids in the focus groups, not adults. Can you say SWG XBOX?

One thing that really tickles me is how bad this has been for SOE. They had no idea how many of us "gamers" had multiple accounts, so when u made one guy mad you actually lost 3 accounts instead of 1. I knew of people who had 6 or more accounts, all of those nerds quit for sure. theres just no point in having more than one account anymore. I also find it amusing that the original cost $50, Jump to Lightspeed cost 40, Rage of the wookies cost 40, Trials of Obu Wan cost 40, and I had to buy all those twice for both my accounts. And now you can get all of the above for 19.95. ROFLMAO....Guess it aint selling so hot is it?

I heard some rumors that when SOEs contract runs out another company is gonna buy it and combine the servers to consolidate them, then have one pre-CU, one Post CU and one NGE server. but this is just a rumor, and one that is hard to believe at that. I dont think it would happen due to the coding issues involved and the high risk of old timers not coming back.

That being said, Quit dude. Quit now. The game is dying, SOE is the worst customer service on the face of the earth, your just gonna have your heart broken. I got a level 81 elder Jedi, I'm still rich, I still have more pearls than I could ever use, I got the nicest house on the server with furniture and loot no one will EVER be able to get, my guild is still the biggest and our town the nicest, I got factional armor and loot to support an army, we got a guild vent server so you can always find people to team with ----------------all this, and i still dont want to play. Why? Because if i'm going to have to learn a new game then I'm gonna buy a new game. Now I play COV.

Sorry about the long post, I'm not done yet either lol

[Sartaq]

Shame on you for buying that game.

Kids, stay off MMORPGs seriously.

and did 1000+ hours of grinding on my jedi.

That just sounds wierd

[Kekvit Irae]

The only MMORPG I'll ever consider playing is both Ultima Online and Dark Age of Camelot.

[Sartaq]

The only MMORPG I'll ever consider playing is both Ultima Online and Dark Age of Camelot.

Ultima is the only one I regret not having played. Many people have told me it was(is) the best. A creative old-school RPG with freedom.

[Major Robert Dump]

Actually, 1000 hours of grinding isnt wierd at all because, as I said before, the game had looping macros. Which means I could actually go AFK and still kill stuff by setting up a string of /commands that looped. Of course the danger here being that, as a jedi, players could take bounty missions on me and there was always the chance someone would come kill me while I was AFK, which did happen on occasion. The solution was to go somewhere where it was impossible for someone to get to me wihtout putting themselves in harms way from NPCs, or go somewhere that tracking droids couldnt find me, like the jungles of Kashyyk.

Most of my grinding wasn't done AFK, though, more less semi-afk. Which meant I could surf the net or clean house while "grinding" and just check back on occasion.

Now, with the NGE, you only get XP from missions, not from just running around killing stuff. I hate that. Why do I hate it? Because missions means teammates, and often teammates get you killed because of teaming with asshats or because more people in instanced missions=more npcs. I would rather solo, thats just how I roll.

[Kekvit Irae]

Ultima is the only one I regret not having played. Many people have told me it was(is) the best. A creative old-school RPG with freedom.

It's not too late to get into UO. It's still going strong, and most of the FLOWERS have upped and left for WoW and other PK-happy games. When UO was first in place, it was a PK paradise. I was basicly afraid to even walk outside of town. Now, the "old" world is split into two facets that are (almost) completely equal to each other except for the fact that one is PvP happy and the other is PvM happy. All the expansions are PvM (I believe). UO is now more fun than ever, since I'm able to stroll into a dungeon on the PvM side and not worry about any other FLOWERS trying to gank me.

Whereas EQ has more expansions than players, UO has but a few official expansions, and what they do have, they do wonderfully. Age of Shadows brings Chivalry and Necromancy to bare, Samurai Empires gives you Bushido and Ninjitsu, and Mondain's Legacy gives you elves and entirely new crafting and quest options. Unlike EQ, Ultima Online's expansions are more than just another land to explore for high level characters only. They bring a new flavor to an old game.

[Sartaq]

I'm going to google up some info about UO. Any suggested reading for learning more about the game mechanics, community, history etc..?

About the character advancement. How time consuming is it? Could I be expected to accomplish anything in say a month?

[Kekvit Irae]

Stratics has always been the best thing to UO: http://uo.stratics.com
The official site has a LOT of info (similar to the Camelot Herald of DAoC): http://www.uo.com
If you want a cheatsheet on how to best train skills or whatnot, try this link: http://www.uotreasurehunters.com/cadre_training.html

Character advancement is extremely quick to extremely slow, depending on what skill you are training, how often you train it, your level in that skill, and other factors. With the GSG (Garuanteed Skill Gain) system, you will automatically gain in the skill you are training in after a set time has passed. This is VERY good for people who are close to grandmastering a skill, but a job in RL requires them to play casually, as they can log in, practice the skill and gain the garuanteed point, log off, and wait the determined time before they can gain the next garuanteed point. Of course, if they just mindlessly skill train over and over again, they will gain more, but this is so that casual gamers can compete with macro monkeys.
Usually, you can complete more in a month on UO than you ever could in a year in games like EQ. This can either go in your favor (if you are a more casual gamer), or not (if you powergame a lot). Even if you powergame, there are PLENTY of things that will frustrate you (in a good way), such as trying to go through Dungeon Doom solo.

With UO, there is no set "class". Even if you choose Paladin at character creation, you can drop all the skills you start with and try something new like a Necromancer or Tailor or whatever. Nothing is set in stone, unlike EQ and the rest. Your character's skills are 100% up to you.

[Geoffrey S]

I've heard a lot about this screwy upgrade business. It sounds completely disgusting, with an utter lack of respect for the customer. There will be a day when game developers stop screwing their customers more than most industry; after all, which other industry often requires consumers to upgrade things to achieve the quality which should have been available from the start (and even then, sometimes not completely), or change the product entirely after people have spent good money and time using it, rendering it an entirely different (and in the case of Galaxies, inferior) product altogether?

Actually, 1000 hours of grinding isnt wierd at all because, as I said before, the game had looping macros. Which means I could actually go AFK and still kill stuff by setting up a string of /commands that looped. Of course the danger here being that, as a jedi, players could take bounty missions on me and there was always the chance someone would come kill me while I was AFK, which did happen on occasion. The solution was to go somewhere where it was impossible for someone to get to me wihtout putting themselves in harms way from NPCs, or go somewhere that tracking droids couldnt find me, like the jungles of Kashyyk.

Most of my grinding wasn't done AFK, though, more less semi-afk. Which meant I could surf the net or clean house while "grinding" and just check back on occasion.

Not quite what Sartaq meant, I think.

[ShadesWolf]

This is a very indepth game.

I purchased the game, and while I waited for it to arrive, I downloaded the demo to get my months free play in (as I couldnt wait)

I really enjoyed it and played it for a month non-stop. Averaging 20 hours per week.

At this point I realised - to get my monies worth I was going to have to continue else why pay $15 per month if I was only playing 1 hr per night and maybe weekends. This I felt was a lot of money and imho was going to get in the way of other things. So after the free month I decided to sell my copy as I had never installed the purchased version.

If it had been $5 a month maybe, but at $15 I think its way over priced. But the game itself I really lived. I just did not want to commit all that time to one game all the time.

[Major Robert Dump]

Well, for now I've gone back. Although I hate the new game engine and detest that they made me a cookie cutter jedi, the game isnt nearly as immersive, i transferred over to a level 83 and all the things I have in game that will never again be obtainable give me a subtle edge, and now I'm filthy rich.

The main reason I went back is because jedi can transfer servers now (b4 anyone but jedi could) and I can head over to a server with all my RL friends and take 140 items and my 400 million credits with me. (Most of my friends in RL unlocked their jedi on other servers or got rich on other servers, with each of us gradually playing on a different one, now we will all meet on Corbantis in about a month....too bad i really wanted them to come to Ahazi and join my 250 member guild, but oh well things change

I don't plan to play anymore than one or two hours a week, during which I will PVP and blow peoples bases. The immersion is gone, but its better than playing DDO or WOW, so I'll pass the time witht this until I find something new.

[Lehesu]

More of a Guild Wars guy m'self.

[Zalmoxis]

Maybe the best thing would be to scrap the game and make a new one with an engine based on next gen graphics. I would also like it to be based in the time from Knights of the Old Republic, that'd be great.

[Major Robert Dump]

I'm still debating guild wars. Got a friend who will take the plunge with me if i decide to join, but the game is still 50 dollars here and I understand i'll need to buy an expansion soon, so perhaps I need to tip toe away from massively multiplayer and just stick to RTS so I stop spending ridiculous amounts of money on games and pay fees that i'm only going to play for a month

[Crazed Rabbit]

I thought Guild Wars didn't have the monthly fee? That makes it the only one I'd consider, if my comp wasn't so crappy.

But I'm turned off by all RPGs with swords that just have you click once to attack. Like the TW games and standard RTS's, I've played M&B, and there's no going back.

Crazed RAbbit

[Major Robert Dump]

yeah, its free. but im starting to think RPGs are bad, especially fantasy ones.

[Lehesu]

I honestly haven't played Guild Wars in several months, which reiterates the value of a non-subscription game.