As I have recently left World of Warcraft (WoW) I have found myself looking back at all the other MMO's I played and one has stuck out and made me reconsider my view of it. You guessed it, its Star Wars Galaxies (SWG).
SWG and Me
Well I was a lot younger when I first played SWG and my brother had gone out and bought a new computer just so we could play it! It was a big thing for us. It seemed amazing, to go around tatooine and blast some nasties with my pistols was great! So after a few years we parted ways and I think it may have been WoW that I picked up next.
I used to look back with disdain and wonder what on earth kept me and my brothers playing for so very long? Almost at a loss! For instance, the idea of getting a “soloing group” together to go hunt Sharnaff's on Corellia (I think it was on Corellia so do correct me if I am wrong) is madness! If someone had said that is what I would have spent time doing on SWG when I first started playing I wouldn't have believed them.
Well, Sharnaff's to one side, what I wanted to put across today was a more balanced view of my experiences while playing SWG and what I think it did achieve as well as some of the negatives. On a Personal note, SWG was the first real MMORPG I played with a character I controlled (as opposed to my avatar being a ship). So instead of my experiences of Eve:online, I was a character able to dance and jump and do a lot more than click to direct my ship. So it will have a special place in my heart.
That simple point to one side, having a skill based levelling system was good fun! I really enjoyed blending the skills to make a very specialised or jack of all trades character! Every so often my brother and I talk about his pistoleer/Bounty hunter spec which he killed many a nasty with!
Speaking of nasties, I can recall going on several expeditions to the Squill caves on Tatooine and fighting those hideous monkey lizard things! They are still freaky looking! I really didn't want to get left alone in the cave or lose my group in all the excitement of blasting Squill heads off.
I remember with a group of friends in the game building a player city far out in the wilderness of Tatooine. It is something I remember fondly, placing my house amongst all the others and putting bits and bobs on a vendor so others could visit and buy my wares. (Still things I want cleaned up and made more accessible in today’s sandbox mmo's)
However that didn't mean the game was all rainbows and ponies (although you could be an animal trainer :P). The down sides obviously grew as my brothers and I became slowly distanced from it. One of the major downsides was the setting for the game.
As a sandbox style game, we were allowed to go about as we want, however the over arching storyline of Star Wars really just doesn't fit in well. At times there were more Rebels than Imperials and NPC's didn't really make up for it. The Empire being a ruthless force would have not stood for Rebels taking control of cities on planets where it had a substantial force. That was my view anyway, it just didn't feel like the Rebels had to be on the run or hide, they could just openly be Rebels and there seemed little consequence.
That said, there were some people happy to engage in faction pvp which was not too bad. There were some decent battles moving backwards and forwards across towns as more people were told to come and help fight.
Looking back now
Now I know SWG has gone through a lot of changes and it is still going today, so its still doing something right for some people which can only be a good thing. I think my wants just altered as a result of my experiences of SWG so it not something I regret or now look back on with a negative eye, more an evolution of what I am looking for in an MMO.
Although a lot of these things can be found in almost all other MMO's (specifically the movement thankfully) my point is if you have no longer found joy in a certain MMO, take some time to appreciate what it was. It was fun once!
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