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Sony Online Entertainment Purchases Vanguard

Posted by Zonk on from the cue-taps-please dept.

The rumours have been around for months now, but Tuesday Sony Online Entertainment confirmed that they had purchased Vanguard and Sigil Games Online from its investors. Nearly everyone on the Sigil team was laid off with around 50% of the outfit slated to be hired back, so that work can continue on the Massively Multiplayer Online Game. The game will continue running under the auspices of SOE, as announced by company CEO John Smedley in a forum post on Tuesday. Rumours that Brad McQuaid (keeper of the Vision behind Vanguard) has not seen been in Sigil's offices since last year has only exacerbated fan reaction to this announcement. It remains to be seen if SOE can undo the damage that the last five months have done to the Saga of Heroes community, and the game itself.

4 of 77 comments (clear)

  1. Star Wars Galaxies by icthus13 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So now we're looking to SOE to fix an MMO????

  2. Re:Bad Game by 0123456 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The problem with world-changing events in an MMO is that everyone wants to be there when it happens; the players who were at work when the demon army invaded (or whatever) will be pissed that they missed the phat lewt drops when they're paying the same as the people who were home at the time.

    That's one of the reasons why MMOGs have to be limited compared to single-player games. In a single-player game you're one adventurer (or a small party) in a world full of monsters and normal people, in a MMOG you're one of a bazillion adventurers in a world where almost everyone is an adventurer.

    Just imagine, for example, a LOTR MMO where only one person could ever do the 'Ring Quest', or a Star Wars MMO where only one person could ever blow up the Death Star. Don't you think most players would be pissed?

  3. Track record is mixed by thezig2 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Yes, SOE totally screwed up Star Wars. They were, however, able to fix EQ2 so it's actually fun and playable. Hopefully they've learned since the SWG mess and will be able to turn Vanguard into something worthwhile.

    1. Re:Track record is mixed by Todd+Knarr · · Score: 2, Insightful

      SOE learned from SWG:NGE, yes. But they didn't create that mess. If you look at the deal between SOE and LucasArts that resulted in SWG, you find that SOE has no control over the game itself. LucasArts controls game mechanics, artwork creation, content creation, customer-service policies, in-game rules and just about every other aspect of the game. NGE was Lucas' idea, SOE was violently against it but they've no say over that aspect of the game. Essentially they're contractors, providing coders, CS bodies and server hosting to LucasArts and following orders about how Lucas wants the game to be. The blame for NGE rests squarely on Lucas' shoulders. The basic problem seems to be that LucasArts views SWG as nothing more than a nice merchandising tie-in opportunity and occasional source of interesting artwork. The idea that there's people who like the game itself, as opposed to fans of the movies looking for more SW-related material, doesn't seem to have registered.

      SOE's attitude internally, BTW, seems to be very much "Never again.".