Raph Koster On Star Wars Galaxies

Thanks to UGO.com for their interview with Raph Koster, creative director of Star Wars Galaxies, discussing the launch period for the much-discussed PC MMORPG. He suggests that: "The launch was a little rockier than we'd like, so we've tried to be really proactive.... We're making a real concerted effort to constantly improve the game", and talks about new features: "Another big thing that's going in is gambling. So we're working up to Sabbac [the game in which Han Solo wins the Millenium Falcon from Lando]... We're gonna be adding slot machines and roulette." Also touched on are the mission diversity complaints: "The missions were never intended to be rich and complex and deep... they're intended to only take a little while, not be incredibly complex. But, of course, players have found them to be a great way of making money."

Comments

Online RPGs

[Henry V .009]

My impression of the MMOs is that gameplay is rarely the strong point. EverQuest has little gameplay-wise to distinguish itself from Statbuilder. I do not know why that has to be. Multi-Player FPS gameplay is awesome. But it has yet to translate to online RPG-style games. So if that is true, story and plot seem to be the kind of things that make playing these games fun. They provide all of the variation. So why the hell does he say this in the interview:

You know, that's one of the things that's been an interesting balancing act. The missions were never intended to be rich and complex and deep. The whole point of them was, "Hey, I've got an hour to play. I want to jump in. Give me something to do now." So they're intended to only take a little while, not be incredibly complex. But, of course, players have found them to be a great way of making money. Literally, 80% of the money in the game is made out of missions. That's a huge number. We'd really rather people...you know, the NPC's have quests! And they're like multi-leg things.

What exactly is the point of money in a game that is no fun to play? Would the ability to become a millionare have made Dai-Katana more fun? (Yes, because anything would have made that piece of shit more fun, but that's not my point.) There is innovation going into these games in some areas; but it is not going into the right areas.

Re:Online RPGs

[Psychochild]

My impression of the MMOs is that gameplay is rarely the strong point.

It depends on the game. Meridian 59, for example, strives hard to have engaging gameplay. The game focuses on PvP combat, so we have to have engaging gameplay or people will get bored. True, this gameplay is a bit different than what you might expect if you've played a lot of single-player games.

The real draw of these games is the community. You meet other people, you make friends (and sometimes enemies), you have fun chatting with people while you're playing the game. These games foster cooperation and competition between the players; becoming a millionaire isn't fun by itself in a game, it's fun because you can compare yourself to other people. (I'm not saying this is what I like or encourange in my own game, just explaining what some players think.) This interaction is what online RPGs offer above and beyond traditional single-player RPGs.

Of course, this also limits the game somewhat. The traditional gameplay of single-player RPGs isn't directly applicable to online RPGs. You can't simply go save the princess and bring peace back to the land forever more, because that would interfere with the hundreds or thousands of other people playing the game. Story and plot take on very different meanings, and it's been a challenge for people used to the traditional linear forms of storytelling to get used to the new structures needed for online games, given that you have multiple people all playing at once and the story's pace continues with or without a single individual's participation.

Some insight from a designer,

Best Game

[Chasuk]

Star Wars Galaxies is the best MMORPG I have ever played. Period. It is still buggier than I would like, but its depth and innovation astound me.

Aspects I love about the game:

1. The skill-based economy. This eliminates what I hated about EQ: the camping and the farmers. No more reading Harry Potter or Robert Jordan over the weekend while I wait for Something Special to drop.

2. The player houses and PA Halls. The player-vendors whose places of business appear on the planetary map.

3. The HUD. Waypoints. The well-designed and attractive cities, and the efficient/easy-to-use shutte/starship transportation system.

4. The mission terminals, the spendable faction points, the bazaar.

5. The amazing variety of Professions, and the ability to mix-and-match Professions, and even the ability to change my mind and surrender my skills to take up Professions that hadn't seemed attractive initially.

6. The loving attention to detail evident in the way NPC's even fidget convincingly.

7. The slightly Political Incorrectness ot the game: some of those dancers are hot almost to PG-13 standards, and a Slicer will sell you designer narcotics. George didn't succumb to any Disneyfication, which was startling to me, considering that this man was also responsible for Gungans and Ewoks.

8. Creature Handler. They can give creatures they've tamed to their friends, and one day those creatures will (probably) be available as mounts. Cool stuff!

9. Percentage-wise, I've encountered fewer griefers in this game than I have in the other MMORPG's. In other words, fewer losers, despite what one might think based on the lack of imagination in character naming.

Aspects I dislike about the game:

1. The lousy chat system that still stops working periodically.

2. The defective mission system, with missions that mysteriously vanish, and move too frequently.

3. The bazaar isn't as easy to use as it should be.

4. Trading items between players is still prone to malfunction.

Aspects I hate about the game:

Nothing here to list.

Anyway, my congratulations to Raph and his team, who have done a great job despite the impression you might get reading messages from anonymous whiners on the forums.

Thanks, Raph!

Re:Best Game

[Anonymous Coward]

Star Wars Galaxies is the best MMORPG I have ever played. Period. It is still buggier than I would like, but its depth and innovation astound me.

How many MMORGs have you played other than EQ?

Aspects I love about the game:

1. The skill-based economy. This eliminates what I hated about EQ: the camping and the farmers. No more reading Harry Potter or Robert Jordan over the weekend while I wait for Something Special to drop.

Reminds me of UO and since there are UO people making this game I'm not surprised a bit.

2. The player houses and PA Halls. The player-vendors whose places of business appear on the planetary map.

Not the first game to offer player housing, Asherons Call even added it at one point. I'm not sure about the faction halls, but I believe they are in shadow bane if not others.

3. The HUD. Waypoints. The well-designed and attractive cities, and the efficient/easy-to-use shutte/starship transportation system.

The game is pretty, the HUD is nice, but has a steep learning curve, and I'm not really sure what they gain over other interfaces if anything at all. The transportation system again is not unique. It could be compared to the portals in AC or the shuttles in AO.

4. The mission terminals, the spendable faction points, the bazaar.

Again, all things we have seen in other MMOGS.

5. The amazing variety of Professions, and the ability to mix-and-match Professions, and even the ability to change my mind and surrender my skills to take up Professions that hadn't seemed attractive initially.

This is a good point. I haven't seen any other games with this much diversity. The problem is that many of the character classes are flawed or not working as intended.

6. The loving attention to detail evident in the way NPC's even fidget convincingly.

Good NPCs for the first two days, then they seem all the same. Do deliver missions for an house and you'll never car about an NPC again unless it has to do with the plot.

7. The slightly Political Incorrectness ot the game: some of those dancers are hot almost to PG-13 standards, and a Slicer will sell you designer narcotics. George didn't succumb to any Disneyfication, which was startling to me, considering that this man was also responsible for Gungans and Ewoks.

Nothing differant from what you see in the movies except you can actually partake in the various vices such as drugs. Remember episode two when Kenobe turns down some death sticks and convinces the guy he doesn't want to sell them anymore.

8. Creature Handler. They can give creatures they've tamed to their friends, and one day those creatures will (probably) be available as mounts. Cool stuff!

You are very limited in what creatures you can have if you are not a creature handler, and it remains to be seen what skill is required for mounts. Initially there was a bug where you could get just about any creature from your friends, but this has been fixed.

9. Percentage-wise, I've encountered fewer griefers in this game than I have in the other MMORPG's. In other words, fewer losers, despite what one might think based on the lack of imagination in character naming.

It is early, give it time. There are already plenty of griefers and there will be more later as the game grows.

Aspects I dislike about the game:

1. The lousy chat system that still stops working periodically.

This is a bug I haven't seen reoccur in over two weeks, but then again that is probably server specific.

2. The defective mission system, with missions that mysteriously vanish, and move too frequently.

The missions for the most part aren't disappearing. Some do, but for the most part you are seeing other people destroy your mission while you are enroute. Read the official forums and you will see people saying it's great, others that hate it etc. Also, wh

Re:Best Game

[Chasuk]

How many MMORGs have you played other than EQ?

EQ, UO, AO, AC, AC2, DAoC,The Realm, Meridian 59.

Reminds me of UO and since there are UO people making this game I'm not surprised a bit.

Not the first game to offer player housing...

...all things we have seen in other MMOGS

The transportation system again is not unique.

Whether they appear in other games or not does not deprecate their appearance here.

The game is pretty, the HUD is nice, but has a steep learning curve...

I've heard this complaint before, but I did not find it so. Truthfully, I found it one of the most intuitive and easily-learned games I've ever played. Maybe if I'd never played an MMORPG before, this wouldn't be the case, but that is impossible for me to judge, at least at this point.

Remember episode two when Kenobe turns down some death sticks and convinces the guy he doesn't want to sell them anymore.

No, sadly, I don't remember. This isn't a troll, but I've never liked any of the Star Wars films. I found episode II tolerable, in an eye-candy sort of way. I watched episode IV for the first time in 26 years just yesterday, to re-acquaint myself with some of the mythos.

I will amend my complaint about the chat system: it seems absurd to me that, when I am conversing with several players simultaneously, that it is so difficult to switch between them. No easy toggle as in EQ, which is the game by which this one will be judged, rightly or wrongly.

Anyway, it's good to read a constructive difference of opinion. Thanks.

much better info

[joe094287523459087]

much better reviews here - http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/08/05/ 1847238

As much as I've bashed SWG

[sweetooth]

If they can get thier shit together and get Asherons Call style monthly updates rolling (better than this months which is absolutely worthless so far) I'll stick around for a long time. I played AC for 3 years and stuck around for the people I met and the monthly updates. Not every month was a great update, but there were always updates. For $10 bucks a month I felt I got my monies worth and played two accounts for much of that time. Unfortunatly the end for me was when the problems with the community that remained in the game over shadowed the updates Turbine was creating. Running around with hundreds of other people that were all maxed out in levels and having every quest solved within a couple of hours of the monthly patch sucked.

Heading in the Right Direction...

[Ka0s23]

While I do think that SWG was rushed out to say the least, it seems to me now to be headed in the right direction, despite the large volume of "whiners". As I've experienced so far, SWG really challenges its players to adapt to the ever changing world, whether intended or not. I started as a rifleman, working my way up through master marksman and master rifleman. Then as all riflemen know came the T-21 nerf, and my character was needless to say pretty hosed. Rather then bitch and moan I simply took my character in a new direction and tried out becomming an architect. I submitted my opinion to the devs that the T-21 nerf was extreme and now severly hurt the rifleman class, and went on my merry was building houses. As any other riflemen out there know the T-21 nerf was recently lifted and I can go about happily hunting again. My advice, don't bother with SWG if your just gonna cry and quit if your perfect character gets slighted during one patch. This is one of the few cases I have seen in any online game where the developers listened to the gameing community and reversed a nerfing. So enjoy the game and be constructive with you suggestions for the devs, they just might listen. Flooding the forums with "This game sucks now, I can't have 3 rancors" really doesnt help.

Commando comments will stir up flames

[jafuser]

RK: [...] So architects is one of the commonly advanced Masters. Weaponsmith, because the market for weaponsmiths is huge. But when you're talking Squad Leaders or Commandos, there is one Master Commando in the entire game right now. One!

UGO: Isn't Master Commando the class where you get to wield flame throwers and rocket lauchers?

RK: Yeah.

UGO: You'd think more people would be interested in that.

RK: [laughs] Well, it's hard, is what it is.


Wow.

Anyone who knows the true nature of the Commando profession knows that it's time to "let the flames begin".

There are not a lack of Master Commandos by choice. People can't get Master because of bugs preventing Commando characters from advancing... And there's some *very* angry players due to this. I'm sure comments like this will definitely will not help.

It's a lot like a local government official going on the news stating "Nobody ever uses the park! Even after we've added all kinds of fun facilities! Isn't that odd!" while at the same time neglecting to mention that they never assigned anyone the job to unlock the gate into it.

I don't have any interest in the commando profession myself, but I can see this stirring things up a bit...