Kenti's Wookie Treats
SWG-Wookie Treats!
Many things are going on in the world of Star Wars Galaxies… so much that its hard to keep up with it all. For those of you who don’t have time to peruse the hundreds, (yes I said hundreds) of sites that are out there to get all the info you could want, I’ve tried to do that for you and summarize it here.PC Gamer Article and pics!
From Star Wars Galaxies :: Database we have some incredible screenshots from the January Issue of PC Gamer of the game, also included is the article published. Very informative stuff there, as well as some incredible eye candy… should get your game mouth drooling to start ya off! Thanks to SWG Database for bringing these together!Star Wars Galaxies :: Database PC Gamer Sneak Peek!
SWG Official Radio
It appears that some fans have put together a radio show for SWG! The show requires you to use Winamp to listen to the show, and have detailed instructions on the site on how to tune in. I’ve tried it a few times and haven’t been able to hit them when they’re on the air, but it might be interesting to see what they’ve got going on. Here’s a piece of the site that explains how to chat with them on IRC :~'~Hyper Chat~'~ If you would like to join us and other Hyperfans then you can join our IRC channel useing mIRC on server irc.stratics.com, room #Hyperdriveradio OR use our now N00b friendly Hyperchat here: http://www.foreignkey.net/talceti/hyperdrive/jirc/hyperchat.htmlAnyways, thought you all might find this interesting. The site looks really well done, so props to the designer. Check it out here:
Hyperdrive Radio Website
SWG and Concerning GM's...
Next from the Official SWG Dev Forums we have a series of Dev posts by Kevin “Q-3PO” O’Hara, Community Relations Manager and overall swell guy. He’s really the one giving us all the info about the game. The good stuff and the bad. Here’s a post that he’s made concerning SWG and the player base that has brought up much discussion in the community in reference to “GM’s”:I know there are people out there who are skeptical of computer gaming customer service departments. We’ve read the rant sites. We’ve read your posts about it here on the discussion forum. We’ve seen it first hand at several different companies.Factually, we know that the vast majority of players don’t ever deal with customer service and most companies get tagged with a bad reputation from a relatively small percentage of dissatisfied customers (most satisfied customers go back to playing the game instead of going off to post their good experience on the rant sites ). We also know however that there have been real problems with CS departments themselves in the past and that you can always work harder to bring make the “small percentage” even smaller.
We feel that the CSR system being designed specifically for Star Wars Galaxies will decrease wait times and improve the overall quality of the service. We’ve got Sony and LucasArts committed to providing first-rate customer service.
To those jaded individuals who think I’m just trying to spin the situation, I understand where you are coming from. All I ask is that you give us a chance. The people on this project really do believe that this is a service orient industry and have thought long and hard of how to design the game to minimize customer service calls and give CSRs the functionality they need to efficiently deal with problems.
-Kevin O'Hara
Community Relations Manager
You can read the addition made to the FAQ here. Basically, what this means is while Everquest used volunteers to deal with the masses of people with problems as to not have to take massive internal resources to do so, SWG will not use them. Everything is going to be made internal, and this suggests that an incredible sum of money is being channeled into this CSR system as the game is expected to be as big as EQ, if not bigger in some ways.
You can still add your thoughts on the subject here.
Weekly Wednesday Beta Update
Q-3PO Graced theOfficial SWG Dev Forums and left us this little tidbit. I’m not going to post his entire post here, but something that caught my eye was this:It is our philosophy that public beta needs to have a stable and virtually complete gaming experience. We’ve seen too many products lose out on potential customers who didn’t quite understand the process of beta testing, tried the game in beta and decided not to buy the game based on an incomplete experience. Whether we like it or not, many people treat Beta 3 more as an opportunity to try before they buy as opposed to a chance to help make it a better product for release.Basically, Q is worried about the people not wanting to help make the game better before release. It seems that he thinks people will take the Beta 3 product as what the game will be when it goes Gold in April. I suppose over time this idea has proven true, otherwise why make such a point about it? It’s a hard point that players will have to face, as game testing will be much more internal if this trend continues. You can read the entire post and give your thoughts here.
-Posted by Q-3PO
Q’s Query #18 – Public Forums…
Kevin really poses some tough questions for us to consider on the Official SWG Dev Forums. Should the SWG forums stay alive? Who should be allowed to post? Here’s a small bit from Q-3PO’s post Thursday:When the game goes live, it is our intention to keep the forums active (we will be developing expansions and updates after all) but limit them to actual customers. We feel this will keep the customer engaged (and accountable for their words) and cut down on “grief” posting. We will continue to encourage constructive criticism and we will continue to have strong moderation. (This means we do want to hear what you like or don’t like, but flaming will never be tolerated).This enflamed immediate responses from the community, and while you can’t add your own thoughts at this time, you should definitely see what the community had to say on this subject here. Q definitely understands the need for the online community, and is really looking out for all of our best interests here.
-Posted by Q-3PO
I hope this wasn’t too extensive. There was lots of catching up to do! Thanks for enduring through it all!!
-Kenti