Star Wars Galaxies - The BEST and WORST MMO Ever - a SWG Retrospective
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- Опубликовано: 3 дек 2024
- In this SWG retrospective video we discussed the good times and the times that Star Wars Galaxies sucked. We discuss the fall of SWG and all of the mismanagement by SOE but why I loved it anyways.
From the SWG Jedi grind at the beginning, to the Combat Upgrade all the way to the NGE I would always come back and find a home at Star Wars Galaxies. From Jump to Lightspeed to The Trials of Obi Wan, Star Wars Galaxies was the best and most unique MMO ever.
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Star Wars Galaxies lives on with (the most popular servers):
SWGEmu- Finalizer
Restoration - CU
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I love when people explain what made past games good, bc it's almost always void of real things or in the case of classic MMO's, a complaint that they ruined the game by fixing it the wrong way.
The irony though, is a lot of the time players cannot explain why it was good, cant admit the bad parts were severe and ruining the game for almost everyone, unaware the problems that would occur which we later see in private servers, and clueless as to how to actually fix the severe problems without ruining the game.
Not that anyone is wrong. It sounds like NGE sucked bigtime and adding Trammel to UO did seem to ruin it too. Ironically both probably saved these MMO's though, as at least UO saw its subscriber numbers double after the game was "ruined". I imagine playable Jedi at the start and FPS shooting was hugely popular too.
I love these classic games more than their updated variants, but I am factual about history, pragmatic, and a game designer myself. The main problem with SWG & UO being ruined (not quite as sure about DAoC & EQ) is that while fixing the severe issues that ruined the game and saving the game financially, they ALSO ruined other parts of the game in the process.
In SWG, that was all the fault of the devs. SOE & Smedley were notorious for being the worst game company ever. Horrible decisions in everything they did. UO arguably saves themselves by "ruining the game" but also arguably couldve done it better - either way the FFA PvP had to go & the bitter ex-players are wrong to say it ruined the game. It saves the game for 90% of players and ruines it for the jerks who loved griefing PvErs. Let's just be honest, if you werent big into PvP then the game was saves not ruined.
SWG's problem, however, was never the Jedi. And the Jedi never ruined SWG. In fact making Jedi more common saved the game AND made it better. How do we know this as a matter of fact? Look at the arguments and then look at the reality: Pre-CU servers.
The argument: SWG was special because Jedi was rare and difficulty to get. Jedi were OP though and awesome to play as to compensate. They felt real.
The reality: Pre-CU servers, after being open for awhile, result in every player having a Jedi. They become more common than if you could be one at the start, if they are OP. Pre-CU servers then prove you have to not make them as OP. Pre-NGE servers all over show Jedi being "difficult" doesnt do anything but cause ppl to have a long quest they do anyway. Which takes away from the REAL best parts of SWG. As we see in arguments that Jedi ruined SWG by becoming a possibility. Everyone wanted to just unlock Jedi. Not play the game. Even the core designer Raph Koster said no Jedi for a reason. He was right. But Jedi didnt ruin SWG. Their existence as a starting class solves all the same problems that not having them solves, except ppl wont play if they cant be a Jedi so it hurts the health of the game. Thats subjective to have them or not, but objective that they should be freely available if they are in.
SWG was ruined bc of one and only one part of the NGE: the class system. Gone were 30 skill choices (Professions) and deep & unique character creation. Now you had WoW classes, like a Smuggler who could only use Pistols.
CU from the sound of it saved the game from being total garbage, bc there were only 2 combat professions (Powerhammer? & Unarmed? I forget the names, bjt remember everyone said it was 2 so OP you couldnt play anything else, it was so bad) CU brought balance to the fighting styles.
The problem with CU is it deleted all the progression from the game that was already there. Almost like a partial server wipe. That would make anyone who invested a lot, to instantly rage quit or be so angry.
But everything elese about the NGE and everything else about the CU seem to actually make the game better.
Bc SWG Pre-CU was actually total garbage bc of the balance issues, the Jedi obsession (bc you could be them but not easily, which was the problem!).
The solution was to either
1.) Do a balance update instead pf the CU, THUS NOT ruining progression. But this was more minor since NGE killed it not CU.
2.) Do everything in the NGE except the class system. So CU & NGE changes from a skill based system to a Profession system shouldve never happened.
3. Either remove Jedi entirely from the game so NO ONE could be them OR add them so anyone could be them as a Profession. However that would work. (It could be as light as making Force Sensitivity have a higher xp requires to rank up, or as heavy as making them weak until they get their saber at end game. Whatever.)
If I were lead designer, I know what I wouldve done. And it wouldve been the best idea. An idea they ALREADY had, but better. Permadeath for Jedi, BUT better bc you can always start as a Padawan. This means anyone can always be a weak Jedi without a Saber. And whenever they finally level up to a certain grind, they can do a hard quest for their saber. At this point they're either just as strong as anyone else or a little bit stronger. Then when they get their saber? They become extremely OP. However, the entire time there is permadeath.
I have also heard arguments for 3 lives instead of 1. I kindof like this, but only with the devs saying "Okay, we actually will tell you that you only get 1 life. That's it. 1 death and youre done. However due to disconnects and latency issues, we are going to go ahead and give you 3 chances so you dont need to file a report that you disconnected or lagged to death. So remember, you should only get 1 life. The other 2 are just so we are fair bc the internet outages and poeer outages suck sometimes."
Either that, or think of some other way. Like if someone files a report saying they went linkdead, Customer Support can restore their characters if their account is in good standing, or just to be nice.
Also due to today's P2W bullshit, it would please investors significant AND satisfy players I think, if they could pay to skip a Jedi from start to the saber quest. But that being the ONLY thing in the p2w shop and telling players, WITH FINANCIAL TRANSPARENCY, that 100% of the funds raises by Jedi purchases will go towards hiring more employees to implement the top 10 voted content/feature requests by the entire community - with a server voting system to vote for what you want next in the MMO. I think everyone would accept that in 2023. But ofc you know capitalist corps will just pocket the money, so this would only happen if I had full control of such a company. IMO a fair way to raise funds to make everyone's game better.
And of course everyone else could just get there the normal way, for free (or just their sub cost, obviously) and the cost of the Jedi is minimum wage * hours average to completely become a Jedi Knight (real Jedi w/ OP saber).
Also allow Jedi's to pick ANY color of saber they want during the quest. No cosmetic purchases. As I said, Jedi skip is the only purchase and is expensive.
Imagine, though. A birthday gift IRL to give someone a free Jedi (with permadeath). Funds (likely MILLIONS) hiring entire teams going towards COMMUNITY voted content/features. Come on, that sounds okay. And maybe I pocket 20% in secret bc I am a gamedev and despite the fact I hate capitalism I live in a capitalist societu and hehehehehe YOINK!
Thank you so much for this incredibly thought out comment. A must read for everyone. Pinned
@@AdventureGameHotspot wow, thank you. I have done a lot of research as a MMO historian on SWG. However I never played it. So correct me anywhere I am wrong if you would like.
I am honored you pinned my comment.
Thank you, my friend, for the wonderful video.
I agree with most of what U said but there is one mistake about pre-cu server population etc
Pre-cu servers arent really finished
They all running the swgemu code which isnt 1.0 yet
And many of us vets are waiting for the real 1.0 launch (and jtl), since most of us dont want to play on testservers(finalizer will get wiped), wierd hybrid or even nge servers...
I want to start fresh and not burnd out
I agree with most, but not player voting. The majority of gaming communities ruin games.
Perfectly written and absolutely on point thank you for this analysis.
My wife and I met in 2004 playing SWG, marriedsince 2006. We both loved the unique crafting system but had fighters so we could join our guild mates. We played so much that we each had 2 accounts.
NGE really did it in for us. We tried to hang on, but it just didn't have the same flavor and feel. Our guild dwindled until we were an empty city and ultimately disbanded. 2 accounts went to one. She quit playing near the End but kept the account and we were able to join each other one last time at our house outside of Theed as the game died for good.
We played SWTOR, LOTRO, Guild Wars 1 and 2. I occasionally get on swgemu to play. And that music still fills me with so much emotion nostalgia. Emu scratches that itch, but it's never the same as it used to be.
What server were you guys on?
Radiant, if memory serves me correctly.
How nerdy lol
@@CaptainRockoBD"Finding a woman and marrying her so you can live a happy life doing what you both love and have sex all the time is super nerdy!"
Wtf...? This is how it sounded. But hopefully you meant nerdy, as in good, bc nerd uses to be the best thing to be bc it meant you had above room temp IQ and were interesting.
You're right, there was something truly amazing about those first couple of years. Everyone depended on everyone else. The economy was player-driven, and worked well. Any of the new servers can't compete unless they reach a level of population that those SoE servers had. I've tried many of them, EMU, Stardust, Legends, Empire in Flames, and Restoration, and you're right, they're just not same. Mostly because they usually only have a few hundred people at most. Eisley has a few people running around, but other cities like Coronet and Theed are ghost towns. I played on Intrepid back in the day, and yep, I was so addicted that I had 3 accounts. Since how addicted many of us were, paying $20 a month/account was nothing compared to the number of hours we put in!
It's too bad we'll never get an MMO like SWG again; In the early aughts the expected returns on games were much more modest so building a virtual world around the most die-hard fans was a great business proposition. Anymore, IPs are shallow marketing gimmics wrapped around shallow, accessible, grind fests.
There is another coming 😊Galaxies of Eden.
You are so right.
We have Restoration 3!
Should come give SWGBeyond a try while legends is down. really good community and they managed to fix the security issue and defended against the DDOS with only 1 Dev...
They have some decent content such as 3 legendary instances , Hardmodes and Other nice content including dozens of QOL the community requested.
And a lot of the more skilled PvPers have started to move over to beyond it would seem rebel side...imps need numbers lmao.
Heres a channel someone runs with a lot video's www.youtube.com/@RPD-Entertainment. great way to play atm
@@Gaming4Lyfe4208 what is the population like?
"you want to pretend to be a girl and call other players hun, be a dancer" lmao
@9:32 I was there!!! Svare Kilone. What an incredible emotional experience the live server shutdown was🤧🤠
Great rundown of SWG’s history with some humor along the way, nice work Josh! And I honestly agree that we‘ll probably never see anything like SWG or have the number of active players ever again, that magic has all but disappeared and the “Good old days” are just that, old. Honestly people whom may be returning to any of the emulators shouldn’t have the idea in mind that’ll it’ll be like old times, but instead look at it as a new experience altogether.
Thanks Tosteto. The servers are good fun and they are free but they are all missing a few ingredients 😀
Just started playing after o er a decade and now have all my siblings playing it too! So awesome!
started playing this game this week, theres a server online avg player count is btw 500 and 1200, people are so helpful man its fun and clunky
Legends?
Shawkorrr - Elder Jedi - SancTuarY - Wanderhome
SWG was, is, and will always be the best MMO ever.
You said it Brad. 😀
I agree. Almost everything else has been attempted WoW clones.... oddly enough, no one has attempted to clone SWG....
Agree, said it to myself daily
Seriously I've tried many other MMO's but there is nothing like SWG. I just tried playing new world from Amazon and was soo bored. How did we evolve with tech yet games became so linear. The width and depth of SWG just doesn't compare.
Not the best.. Dark Age of Camelot is the best MMORPG ever… But, SWG is a close second.. lol
Star Wars Galaxies: A Community Divided.
Ha. So true
yeah, back then between preCU and CU fans, and now between all these different servers that barely have more than 200 ppl on.
best mmo ever created. im so happy i experienced it pre-cu. I was the only light jedi knight in my guild and we defended our home town with honor
Heck yeah Cody. What server were you on?
Entertaining and accurate overview of the SWG lifespan. I too purchased the game at release. I was totally mesmerized & immersed. It was the most janky and broken game, that was somehow absolutely amazing and ahead of its time. I cannot express how disheartening it was that it was destroyed. So much potential. Sandbox MMO's to me are the BEST. Use YOUR creativity to be successful doing what YOU want to do...not these theme park, hand-holding clones of WoW. Trying to copy WoW was the death of SWG as you mentioned. SOE saw the money Blizzard was making and in true modern day lazy fashion attempted to copy/steal the success. I was a Wookie master rifleman/creature handler and had everything I wanted in the game because of networking, selling animals/hides/bones. Not the never ending grinds that all new MMO's put you through to get what you want. A total shame this game was destroyed. I truly miss it. The death of SWG is testament of patterns in the video game industry still ruining games to this day. Greed fuels the beasts, innovation is left by the wayside.
Great post II. What server were you on?
@@AdventureGameHotspot If I remember correctly it was "Bloodfin". Been so long, but that seems right!
I played SWG way back. I still miss it. When I joined, it was just before the CU, and I absolutely loved the game. I joined a guild and became the mayor of the player city we had on Dantooine (Shadow's Ashes,) then eventually got the respect of the guild to become the guild leader for Rising Phoenix Order (RPO.) We were in the top 5 largest guilds on the server before the NGE was dropped on everyone. The Trials of Obi-Wan expansion was literally amazing and we were just digging into it when the announcement came. I was on my way to becoming Jedi and had completed all but the experience grind portion of that journey. Literally, overnight, the game died.
I hung on to the subscription for the sake of nostalgia until they closed the game and my inherent need to collect things had made me the single richest person on my server by the end. I had Sunrider's Destiny, the full Mando armor set (with jetpack,) the AV-21, all the paintings, all the holos, all the rugs, all the... You get the idea. I ended up just setting up a museum to the history of the game and let people come in and see what they had missed.
The profession system is still unrivaled to this day. Being able to build a custom set of skills to accomplish things in just the right way for how you play the game as an individual was revolutionary. Then, allowing you to simply drop skills and earn xp to learn different ones without re-rolling a new character was incredibly liberating. You didn't have to stress about making the right choice at the very start because you could just change it, without having to worry about losing all your houses, extractors, collectible items, etc.. SWG truly was the greatest MMORPG, ever. The NGE destroyed the community and the game, and it really was a very long and painful death. I have never been willing to seriously try any MMORPG since; except SWTOR, which was a huge disappointment.
Thanks for sharing. What server were you on in the games heyday?
@@AdventureGameHotspot If memory serves me correctly, it was Starsider. I also had a character on Gorath that I didn't play too much.
I'm a year late to the party, but forgive me this video just came up in my feed. I cannot express how much SWG ment to me. I've played many mmos but have NEVER had experiences like I have in SWG. In a way, I've been searching this whole time, trying to find something, anything that comes close to SWG. I've come to the realization, it's probably never going to happen. It's hard to explain why SWG was different. I think something that often gets over looked is the timing of SWG. When it came out, mmos were new, WoW wasn't out yet, hadn't set the template that mmos would forever follow. We were all discovering what it was like to play together on a "massive level". It was was exciting. A real feeling of wonder.
I was on the shadowfire server. I was a master merchant. I set up a whole shopping center outside of Mos Eisley. I used advertising droids at the spaceport and decorated very intricately. Before long I was rich! My shopping mall always had people coming by. I'd usually be decorating and chat with the adventurers about their next adventure. One time I was at my Mall and this guy came in and I welcomed him and introduced myself. The guy said "yeah I know you, you're like a celebrity on tattooine"... my life was complete!!!
Thanks so much for sharing. Have you tried any of the private servers?
@@AdventureGameHotspot I did. Doesn't have the same magic because of the lack of players. But it's not completely over, those emulators get more refined every year. Someday, full on remake? I'm dreaming ✨️
@@mediaondisplay3089 SWG 2. Who says no?
5:14 the music right here was perfection for what you are talking about
I played through each era - from 6 months after launch. By the time NGE had been well developed with heroic instances, expertise trees, more decisions and customisations (say, 2008-2010) I thought it was a thoroughly better game than Pre NGE/CU. Sure, there were a bunch of Jedi, but actually Jedi over time became less and less viable + relevant and so sensible players picked something else. Jedi remained fun and funny to hunt/kill, but weren't too cookie cutter and overwhelming. As NGE went on the devs did a great job of updating, adding content, and keeping people engaged. New PvP arenas, new instances, new quest lines and items. The TCG was a rare blemish in their steering of the game. Overall I was happy with how they took it - but it just couldn't build an audience due to the skeletons in the closet. Lessons learned.
While I agree that NGE after all the expertise and content patches was a decent game with alot more to do, it still was worse than the CU, because the combat was just a spammy mess that felt completely stuttery and TOO FAST for the engine itself. Running around buildings would lag you out like a mfer to a degree that even when you were already back around the corner, you still could not hit a target for 3-4 seconds because the collision detection and pathing was so slow to update. Benny Hill speed animations etc, all of that really broke a solid system and they never really fixed that part about it. I guess it was just a barebones devteam with very few skilled coders and mostly just content devs who could use the inhouse tools to work on some quest scripts and move around items or place spawners etc, but not really change much that needed big code changes...
God I love this game.
I'd say best and worst is spot on. SWG had/has a lot of unique systems, unfortunately all those systems only appeal to niche crowds, not the masses. It does have staying power though, Legends is still going strong nearly seven years later, among other emulators. Eleven years ago was bittersweet, the game was shutting down, but there were other MMO's on the horizon. Good video.
Thank you Mac. Have you heard of Galaxies of Eden?
@@AdventureGameHotspot Not until the comment below. lol I googled it, looks good.
Thank you for properly explaining the difference between Combat Upgrade (CU) and New Game Engine (NGE). Most people blame the demise of SWG on CU but it was actually NGE and you explained why very well. I actually forgot that NGE got dropped on us two days after Trials or Obi-wan. I hated the pre-CU combat rolls and slow boring speed of combat in PVE and PVP. CU sped everything up and made combat more realistic. We were still able to have very "unique" character builds. Selling spice was still a thing along with selling faction. Becoming a Bounty Hunter was a grueling long leveling experience as was also the Commando profession. Once NGE hit, it was a total slap in the face to all of us that put in some type of work whether it was profession and/or skill tree grinding. During and before CU it was the era where you'd be hard pressed to find cookie cutter copy-cat professions. This was "before the dark times" before NGE.
After NGE hit, I hated it because we lost so much and as you put it "to dumb down" the game. Because that is actually what the NGE did to attract younger players that found previous versions of CU too complicated. Anyway, I was one of the few that stuck around for years later until the last day and shutdown. I will say, that the game did come a long way from NGE to closing. We finally got to do atmosphere flight towards the end and we did have some of the best PVP ever over those years as well. It was a sad day for all of us that were around when the server finally shutdown which I think that I was on Starsider at the time. Then me and my guild switched over to the highly touted replacement, Star Wars The Old Republic (SWTOR). SWTOR fulfilled a need, "by force" for Star Wars junkies like me but it never came close to that true Star Wars feeling like SWG. SWTOR was prettier and that's about it. The PVP sucked and was forced instead of natural and SWTOR too had an exodous of players after a nerf bat to some of the PVP. That's another long story.
What a great comment Solo. Thanks for going down memory lane with me my friend.
I had forgotten NGE dropped right after Trials of Obi-wan as well. I had taken a break from SWG and came back for Trials of Obi-wan. When I logged in on my creature handler it was asking me to choose 1 of 9 classes. I was so confused. Then I saw all my creatures were gone. I was so disgusted. I knew right then, SWG was doomed and dead.
I miss SWG soo much especially JTLS
You and me both my friend.
OMG, this was a great game. There was no quests and no storyline, and I never, EVER ran out of things to do.
My guild had a weapon smith who was named "Child Labor", so if he made a blaster, it would be "Mark IV Blaster made by Child Labor". I liked it so much I bought a lot of blasters off of his vendor and hung them up on my wall lol.
He literally could not keep his vendor stocked even though the guild was going out getting him mats, his stuff sold so well.
Lol. That is such a cool story. I love how we could personalize the weapons during creation
SWG was amazing until the Combat Update and the Class Change. Once upon a time, being a Jedi was a hidden questline that was ridiculously difficult to do and so incredibly rare, and then they made it so you could just spawn in as one. After that point, the game just slowly went downhill, but man... playing this as a kid, was some of the best memories I ever had.
Jedi popping up everywhere even in precu, ruined the game
@@jonc2914 I agree, it was much better before anyone ever became a jedi. After the mystery was solved, everyone wanted to do the holocron grind, and the game quickly fell apart.
@@tipigi3570 and the proof is in SWGemu as well... everyone grinded out jedi and then the server died
Spot on Analysis!!! If you never played it, ya just...don't...know...!
Haha. Thanks Ed
Loved decorating my house and having friends come over to chill out.
Also 'Hunting party forming on the bridge' (in Anchorhead)
So you were a rebel? What server?
@@AdventureGameHotspot Great video. I myself was on Eclipse. I started playing swgemu some time after NGE hit in 2007ish even though it was very early development and nothing to do, I stuck with it. Recently went back to check my toons and homes and saw Basilisk went bye-bye. Their goes 4000 days of time lol (yep, days played). I'm not sure I can focus again on this game but the temptation is there. Best MMO ever hands down.
@@SonOfTamriel thanks for sharing man. 😀
Awesome your videos are the best 🐻👍 Iam SWGing Legends and SWGL Resto all 12d of Holidays 🎅🌎
Thanks Bobo. You were in the video
I had no idea what I was doing on this game when I played for a few weeks. All I remember was selling items for random volumes of credits (such as 35m) and actually seeing them sell and wonder what on earth they were
Anybody making retro SWG content is gaining our sub. Look at what we do. I swear to god I ended up making a RL flora farm from SWG. 😂
Thanks buddy. I appreciate.
great video. GOOSE BUMBS during the orchestra
Thanks my friend
Forever be my fondest memory from my young days in the army station in Korea. BRIA Server Guild KTD! Our guild war switch has still not been switch off. Lol
I just miss this and my childhood so much... we will never have this game and those days again and it hurts. I love my life and am very grateful for where i am now. But i will never fortet this age and the memories... makes me want to cry man.
Have you tried the private servers?
@AdventureGameHotspot I have.. just don't have the time for it anymore unfortunately :/
Jedi definitely killed the game, the original developers knew it would and that it was the wrong time period to have too many jedi running around.. But they caved and gave in to LucasArts and SOE higher ups.. The game started dying early on in the CU in my opinion, all because of Jedi.. All anyone did in the CU did was do the insane Jedi grind, newer players were turned off on the idea, either grind a jedi or always be uncompetitive in PvP when facing a Jedi.. I was there on Chilastra, for the PreCU, CU and NGE.. In my opinion the CU had the best combat, but the NGE in end was actually a more polished once Alpha Jedi was no longer a thing, a game with a lot of content. I still play SWG Legends today, the community reminds me so much of my original server in the PreCU, before the Jedi issue started to kill the game!!
There should not have been Jedi. Force Sensitive, sure. Crafting lightsabers, okay, using them with Fencer Swordsman and Pikeman specials, plus some unique saber specials. Using the Force for healing, enhancement and crafting, fine. (I thought the Village was a great idea.) These all could have been done, without seriously fracturing the timeline. But not "Jedi".
Win mentalities killed alot of it as well. I was a master rifle/master creature handler. I could hold my own, but never expected to be able to beat a Jedi. I remember people crying "Jedi are OP!!" and thinking... "well yea, they are Jedi...." Ultimately I agree with you though, they should have just left them out or done something along the lines of what Kayl456 is saying. But Jedi running around at that time period was both lore and game breaking.
@@kayl456jenna they should’ve just kept it insanely hard to become a Jedi.
The fact that we didn't know all langages and had to learn it to communicate with aliens is hilarious to think about it.
This kind of game would be impossible nowadays because the publisher would shot any dev coming with this idea 😅
But that's what made SWG great and legendary
I remember the white wookiee protests after the NGE...good times. Well, bad times, but good times.
The 2 major changes to the game divided the community up. You even see that in the emulation and private server scene for this game. It's divided up sharply between the original style of SWG, another for the CU era, and another for the NGE changes.
I've tried them all last year. It was especially funny noting what I was experiencing because my tastes in MMORPGs have changed so much since I quit months after the NGE went live. Pre-NGE SWG was brutal. Especially Pre-CU. MMORPGs have allowed more player self sufficiency for their characters. SWG was an old school MMORPG style where player characters were not as self sufficient and needed to be with other players to function best.
Pre-CU era of the game was very brutal and gave you no hand in learning even basic stuff like healing wounds, fatigue. I started out all alone when I chose Doerba Goefel (?) in the hills of Corellia. Nobody else was there but I was out doing terminal missions getting owned by the local critters. I was having trouble at some lair when some random guy in composite armor and a swoop bike passed by, stopped, and returned to help me. He asked me about my wounds, etc. because most of my HAM was blacked out by wounds. Fatigue was high. He gave me some tips on how to fix all that, some credits to take a shuttle to Coronet, Corellia where more players were at, and handed me a solid DL-44 since I said I wanted Pistoleer eventually.
Once I got to Coronet the game took off for me and I loved it.
The players and the community helped make the game. When I saw the community gutted post-NGE, it was heartbreaking to see so many people gone.
Dude... I was also a corellian, i bought the game at release, the 3 disc box, with that fat manual, i was 12 and didnt know english well, but well enough to somehow make friends, it was my first mmorpg, i didnt understand anything about armor rating or weapon dmg, i was rocking the bone armor just because it seemed cool to me, i think i had the tusken rifle... But with all that, i managed to become a creature handler, join a guild, have a house in the corellia fields, marry some chick, hunt couple of kryak dragons on tatooine with a hugeee group of people, go to tatooine cantina to be treated by a white wookie chick, falling inlove with her, forming a group to hunt rancors at yavin 4, and seeing the first jedi on the server, i remember the road to become a jedi was a long one almost impossible back then, all that as a 12 year old not a native to engliah playing on american server, i wish i could remember what server i was on.... Now im 35,no game ever gave me that feeling as swg, but, maybe also it was mesmerizing because i was soo young? Im glad people still remember that game.
👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾 Bravo you summed up what made the game great in the early stages. Good times.
we need to realize what is community based and what isn't, those group of people playing could have made any MMO feel amazing. we really need ro put more respect on the community
I still miss my guild Nepal, on the Ahazi server. I still miss my guildmates, whose names I still remember. That early game was like nothing on the market, and they changed it to be like everything else. Dr. Pogab here. I miss you guys.
What server were you on?
@@AdventureGameHotspot Ahazi. My guild NEPAL was kinda small, but tightly knit. I was a M. doctor/pikeman name Pogab Lightingdark. That was my combat character.
I also had a separate account, and played a M. dancer/musician named Needa (for some reason that name wasn't taken ha); I was co-founder of the entertainer guild FUNKY--short for Funkytown.
And I did call people "hon." :)
@@ncwordman haha. I was going to ask you that 😝
@@AdventureGameHotspot Oh yeah, you nailed the entertainer. haha! Everyone in the comments agrees. Good job. I loved your video, as you really seemed to have loved the game.
Funny, after all these years, the SWG players are still a community at heart. May the Force be with you, homie.
I could never find another sandbox mmorpg that like SWG, everyone has some sort of quest line or class scheme. I can’t be a chief that’s super good at karate in other rpg like I could in swg.
Haha. I giggled at the karate reference
SWG: Restoration my beloved
It came out at the perfect time. The social factor was so critical but wasn't a nuisance, it was novel. The cantina was basically a chat room with avatars.. as someone who skipped EQ in high school, that alone blew me away.
I graduated college during JTL and was literally days away from coming back when NGE dropped. Can't play my Bounty Hunter Creature Handler who dabbles in bio-engineering? Welp, that's how I wound up playing WoW.
Much love to the emu community but you can't recapture this magic.
Good point about the cantina. It really was a chat room. What server were you on?
@@AdventureGameHotspot Lord help me if I could remember that far back 😂. I wanna say Bloodfin but I've had an entire lifetime pass since then.
Great video!
Much appreciated 😀
I remember playing this back when it came out, I was a smuggler
I enjoyed smuggling.
Where do I get this game from?
SWG Legends (NGE community server - all expansions RotW, ToOB, and JTL), but you need the original game files to play. There ways to get them. It has the largest player base.
SWG Evolve (CU/NGE hybrid community server, all expansions RotW, ToOB, and JTL). My personal favorite at least right now. You do not need the original game to play. Just download/install the launcher, wait for it to patch, and click play.
SWG Restoration (CU community server - technically it has elements from pre-CU, CU, and NGE - all expansions).
SWGemu Finalist (pre-CU community server - not sure it has JTL) Have not played that one, but I played there previous version and it had a large player base.
Many, many more. Best bet is to just google SWG servers. Check out youtube videos related to those servers. Find one that sounds interesting to you.
This is your best video
TIL The CU wasn't the WoWification update that I thought it was. Might go and give the post-CU fan servers a shot when I eventually decide to return
Star Citizen is shaping up to fill this void.
I have old memories as a kid of bugging my dad to take to band practice at his buddies house who was a super swg gamer. Hed set me up on his maxed out characters and let me run around and kill random shit. Good times :)
Reminds me of my parents taking me to my uncles. I’d play his games while they played cards. Memories
Countless hours spent in mos eisley and theed cantinas
I joined after the NGE was put in and loved it. I don’t see the hate. Tried playing EMU and couldn’t stand it.
It was layered. First, it was the lack of notice. They, literally, changed the entire game, without telling anyone, days after releasing their best expansion. It was a complete betrayal and a gunshot to the community that had been playing (and building) the game since release. Second, it was how drastically they changed things... It would be like playing Gran Turismo today, then logging in tomorrow to find it had become Need for Speed. Sure, they're both racing games, but they have nothing else in common. It's not that the system itself was "bad," it's that it wasn't what was needed or wanted. WoW already existed and we didn't want to play WoW.
Very well put together piece. I miss the good old days.
Thanks FP. I appreciate you.
It was such a tragedy that way too many ppl were so egoistical and shortsighted that they complained like little divas about some item changes and how their ultima stone knife of 1k mindfire or legendary t21 with 1shot damage was adjusted to be balanced in the CU. People quit in droves over something that was actually the best gameplay that the game had, because the NGE even after all these patches later, it never even got close to how good the CU combat system actually worked.
The biggest issue with the CU was jedi inflation. Everything else was pretty good, except for the lack of endgame stuff, which the NGE patches later brought, so it would have happened with CU combat just the same. But man... 90% of ppl in pvp ran around as jedi. I was one of the bountyhunters on our server who hunted day and night in that summer of 2005 and made it to 150+ screened jedi kills and I also never went on the jedi path, purely because I did not want to be everyone else. It was pretty hilarious being a unicorn in pvp among all these saber wielders. Especially close to the end with the Squadleader revamp, that only was live for 2 or 3 weeks before the NGE happened. Most shits and giggles I ever had in the game with a MSL, Rifle4004 Novice Medic spec or something along those lines. Basically one shotting people with paint target and snipes, but not having any proper healing, so I had to be escorted by a jedi or two but was pretty much a glascannon that only needed 2 hits in a meta that otherwise barely saw anyone dying when it was almost all jedi with thousands of heals.
Ah yeah good times... wish somebody would create a modern version of the game with a better engine, but the same robust mechanics, but fixed endgame content.
I didn't like CU at first. But the combat was better, and they added a lot of content in a short time span. Kashyyyk, Bounty Hunter armor, they made almost all armor viable, multi-passenger vehicles +++ Then Trials of Obi Wan came, added tons of new quests which was great. Except the Mustafar bunker that didn't fit the theme or the environment. And shortly after NGE was released, all unique professions were removed and the new combat was terrible. No more GCW, a lot of random loot with teddybear backpack, angel wings + over saturated colour palettes on clothing/armor. I rather have pre-cu composite clone army than a silly carnival. Pre-cu gave you the best Star Wars feel, you made your own journey. Aesthetically CU was the most authentic to Star Wars. NGE turned the game for children with no real star wars vibes or theme. Everyone was following the same story line/path. It was no longer about your journey.
Before NGE Tatooine was mostly covered with Tatooine house and a few generic houses. In NGE Tatooine was covered with tons of gray buildings and it was no longer Tatooine...
music gave me goosebumps
i miss this game so much
Doesn’t it?
Personally, I thought that the CU was the best time. Even though it only lasted, like, 7 months or so, my fondest memories of the game were from that period. I felt like it was a good balance of combat that you actually had to be engaged in, with a better looking UI, and you could still kit out your character however you liked. To this day, I have not found a game that has a more in depth character creator (meaning the skills you could mash together to make your toon unique, with the exact skills you wanted), or a more robust crafting system. Were there flaws? Obviously. But the game was so unique, and the scale so grand (the planets were truly huge) ...I've not found any other game that I was as passionate about playing and being a part of (with the exception of Eve Online) than Star Wars Galaxies.
As far as people being thrilled to be able to start as a Jedi from the beginning, as someone else commented... I'm gonna say no. I remember logging in on that fateful day... I was in the Jedi grind already, and when I suddenly found myself with a whole bunch of force powers and a light saber, I absolutely didn't feel happy... I felt cheated. Rather than this thing that I had earned, I felt like it was just given to me like some sort of bastardized participation trophy. It cheapened the whole thing, and like many others, it made me angry. I tried to make it work, but it just wasn't fun anymore. I quit about a month later, and never went back to the live game.
Fast forward many years, and the emulator projects started coming online. I've previously played on Swgemu Basilisk (yes, I still have my original cd's in their boxes), but I was never a huge fan of the pre-cu days. I'm currently playing on the R3 server, which is based on the CU, and I'm having a blast. Are there flaws? Of course. Do I wish there were more people? Of course. Will it ever be like the old days? Nope. But that's ok. I applaud all the people involved in these projects that make it possible for me, and others like me, to once again play what I consider one of the greatest MMOs ever created... the beautiful, flawed mess that is SWG. Without them, all we'd have is memories.
I agree with you regarding the CU era.
I wish Halo would take his server back. Acolyte has destroyed every server he’s touched and he did it again with R3. He admits that he didn’t play SWG and doesn’t play now. The devs that left have shared with me the screenshots of their conversations with him. Uggh 😩
SWG EMU Infinity is alive and thriving! Come play!! 😊
What’s the population?
@@AdventureGameHotspot about 350 unique accounts, but a massive surge is happening right now. It's super active!
@@_ashenwolf_ looking into it now!!
@@AdventureGameHotspot Full templated Jedi in less than 3 weeks too! EXP dramatically increased, lots of quality of life changes too.
I heard pilavpowa the famous wow player is playing on legends now? Is that true?
It’s been a while since I played Legends so I’m not sure
A few weeks ago I told my gf the story of swg devs shitting the bed and it made me wonder where they are now.
PS: A guy I worked with at the time explained the only logical way to unlock jedi and was correct.
Your work mate figured out the pre- holocron unlock? I need to hire that guy 😀
what was her reaction, i bet she didnt care. poinltess ass comment just to bring up he has a gf lol
@@Synrgiii LMAO.
"Pretend to be a girl and call others 'hun'"
Now aint that the reality of MMOs... lmao.
There was a very popular player on our server who would flirt for stuff. Their friend ended up putting “her” on Faces of SWG”. Well, HE ended up being shamed off the server and his real life girlfriend dumped him (allegedly).
@@AdventureGameHotspot Oh dear...
Sounds about right, lol.
Still the best game to date. The crap made these days is hilarious
What about SWG Emu? It's based on classic, pre-CU SWG in all its glory.
Also there is an MMO called Saga of Ryzom that resembles classic, pre-CU SWG.
Ooh. I’ll check on this game
Kauri Server - 2003 to 2006
Zandor Felok (Ranger/Rifleman)
Jedi questing wounded the game
CU broke the games spine
NGE dealt the killing blow
Raph Koster is a visionary
John Smedley is the devil
YO I LOVE GAME OF THRONES
DR WHAT? DR WHEN? RIGHT HERE!
Amazing game! SO much potential.
If it only had more time in development and support from Lucas Arts …instead tyranny.
SWG is THE metaphor for corporate greed.
Was this game an early look into what 'Star Citizen' the game is trying to accomplish?
SC had a grander idea for space. I’m not sure about land
@@AdventureGameHotspot I looked up SWG because a Tweet(X) by @Grummz(Mark Kern) asked the public (today this morning) "I can't think of a good game that failed because they didn't monetize the player enough.
Can you?"
Many replied to the post, but one stood out to me. By @joenorton He said..."Star Wars Galaxies was the best game ever.
I believe it died mostly from WOW launching and unforced errors on their own part, bad updates.
But I do sometimes wonder. If they had sold crap in a shop like every game does today, would they have lasted much longer?"
I was looking for SWG videos when yours caught my eye. Halfway through, a Star Citizen comparison poped into my head, so I had to ask. I didn't expect a fast response. Thanks, by the way.
@@edwin4625 there was so much internal strife, bad business between SOE and Lucas that I don’t believe it would have lived. It became very clear that SWG was not in their future plans. That’s just my opinion
Good video +1 sub
Thanks Seif. I appreciate you my friend
Agreed. I subbed after watching this video as well.
I never played swg, didn't have good internet in those days but I did play planetside 2 pre and post SOE and Its hard to say if it was burn out but the game got old pretty fast for me
It was missing a few Ingredients back then.
I pre ordered this game and was a forum rat for a year b4 release and after Trials of Obi and that shit they pulled I unistalled and got my refound for that Expansion. Idk what they where thinking with that move.
difficulty (like ife) makes a good game...og runescape, vanilla wow...all the struggle. they removed it from gaming for "story" and u see how it has fallen. fear not young one. struggly will return to the galaxy and gaming with it.
you ever heard the tragedy of SOE the dumb?
I wish they would remaster this game on a new engine. I've tried private servers, but they all have performance issues due to the crappy engine.
Have you heard of Galaxies of Eden?
@@AdventureGameHotspot Funnily enough I saw a video for it after this lol
Yup... it was a horrible game... but the best MMO Ive ever played. Period. Very hard to explain.
Kettemoor4life!! for life mfr!!
Hmm finalizer is pretty close
I was 12 when this came out and it was absolutely the coolest thing in the world to me at the time and I have a nostalgic feeling toward this game that hurts my soul sometimes. I really loved this game and didn't even really get to experience it fully because I was so young. Went back to SWGemu a few times but not the same but hey maybe one day. Maybe in my old age I will just become a deranged hermit who plays SWG
You've lost your marbles....
We left by the 1000's with the CU, a lot of us ended up in WoW, myself because i have played the Warcraft games and liked them. Although Star Wars universe, is my forever beloved theme, the game lost it's flavor. And what for ? Cause SOE wanted to imitate WoW's success and in the process, adding more players to the WoW game and losing theirs.Whoever said that executives in suits are bright ? Like that stupid financial advisor that caused my boss to lose a ton of money, despite my warnings. Just because some idiot gets through college and wears a suit, doesn't meat shit, not without field experience. And you learn by doing with your hands, not just theory and a suit to make you look presentable.
Well said
Restoration 3 seems so dead.
"I just want to be like Luke Skywanker :'("
NO you don't, you idiot!
Best game ever made.
To claim it was the worst MMO ever (even at it's worst).... you haven't played many MMO's, have you?
Best and the worst SWGEMU edition
Star wars galaxy was the best MMO to date. It was first to have housing and space. It was set in the original star wars 3 movies so very few Jedi. The fact that all the kids wanted Jedi ruined it. They had 500k subscriptions before WOW, at 20 a pop. Jedi were supposed to be rare. So Sonny screwed up by forcing Jedi. Then the cu then the nge, which killed the 32;classes to 9. To be like wow. Old school gamers didn't want another dumbed down game, sorry.
Your passion really comes across in this video and the core is informative for someone who doesn't know anything about the topic (me), but God damn it's so confusing wtf you're talking about half the time and the overall tone is super ADHD and annoying. I recommend not trying to be so wacky all the time and focusing on being informative instead. Try not to shout so much; it's annoying. Then I'd recommend having someone read over your script to be sure it's clear what you're talking about, because I got lost several times.
Jedi ruined swg... nge was just a knee jerk reactiom to everyome crying like babies about wanting to be jedi. But precu was already dying when everyone and their mom was a jedi.
My mom was an entertainer 🤪 Kidding of course
Had to stop at about 2 minutes. Skip your meds? Tone it down.
Throw the meds out. Tone it up. You can't handle the heat? take your own meds or shit up
You must be a very sensitive person. Probably have meds of your own?
the cringe is strong with this video
Wigger in 2023… cool shit dude
Im not sure what you are attempting to get at.