Ice INTERIOR BLIXTEV'S THRONE ROOM                                     

The converted control room is dimly lit, except for a pool of light at the far end. There Blixtev sits in an elaborate control chair before a large monitor which displays the half-completed Star Wars Galaxies code. SWG-Tunso, standing with other members of the SWG development team, cautiously approaches his master. The ruler's back is to SWG-Tunso .After several tense moments, Blixtev's chair rotates around to face him.

SWG-TUNSO
What is thy bidding, my Master?

BLIXTEV
Get the team to start looking at species bonuses. Make sure that you make this really, really cool except for a few random stats that will dramatically impact the gameplay of a significant portion of the community.

SWG-TUNSO
What if the players suddenly get angry on the forums?

BLIXTEV
It is of no concern. Soon the community will be so divided they won’t notice that we haven’t actually added any real content for well over a year! Your work here is finished, my friend. Go take a look at the Spy profession and see if you can nerf that too.

SWG-TUNSO
Yes, my Master.

SWG-Tunso bows then turns an exits the throne room as Blixtev returns to his task of deleting the very last Pre-CU code repository.

 

Blixtev holds another SWG Development meeting

 

A long time ago, players in SWG used to receive bonuses specific to their species in game. In fact, I deleted my old Zabrak toon and created SuperFurry the Rodian purely because of these bonuses. Yes, believe it or not but I didn’t go Rodian to impress the chicks. It’s truly fantastic to see this coming back and I applaud the dev team doing so.

Of course, any changes made these days must comply with the four laws of Blixtev:-

Any changes made to the game have to be really good in theory
The change must split the community in half
The change must never be 100% thought out
Changes must nerf a profession, make a profession too powerful, or both

Species bonuses meet all of the above criteria. A really cool idea is now getting panned in the forums and once again I imagine the Deadmeat and Blixtev are scratching their heads and muttering ‘You can’t please everyone, you can’t please everyone’ over and over again.

The points of controversy with the latest changes are – the 3% space damage for Ithorians, Shipwrights having their bonuses spread out across multiple species and the fact that the dev team never considered that people might actually want to change their species to get the most out of the bonuses.

What? You didn’t consider that people would want to change species Blixtev? As I was reading the announcement, I was expecting to find a note at the end saying ‘Folks can now visit a scantily clad Twi’lek in the major starports to get a change in species’. As it happens, a vast number of people expected the same thing. SWG-Tunso responded in clear bemusement. It’s not the first time that SOE have been shocked to discover that people might want to change sex/species.  Apparently, this sort of thing is not a walk in the park and will take a lot of work to do – Dev speak for saying – we aren’t going to add this –roll a new toon you lazy bums.

The SWG player base is divided into two clear cut sections. Those who created characters knowing full well what the species bonuses were and those who created characters when species bonuses were a thing of the past. Nobody has had bonuses thrust upon them while other players might have more desirable stats. Besides, lately I have been getting strong urges to become a female Twi’lek dancer.

Of course, SOE developers aren’t really Sith Lords hell bent of ruining our fun. They aren’t Jedi Masters either and it’s totally understandable that they might be a bit off the mark with their proposed species bonuses. The only beef I have with the guys in Austin is that they rarely take the suggestions of the community on board. Is it any wonder why people go ballistic on the forums? It truly seems that screaming the only successful method that people can take to halt an unpopular change to the game.

Friday marked the start of the great Galactic House purge. I logged in late that evening and Euro-Tumbleweed was teeming with people hopping from shuttleport to shuttleport looking to turn empty buildings into rubble. The queue to the Lucky Despot went right back to the starport and the guy dishing out the rewards sprang one of his lower vertebrae from bowing so much. Great fun!

South Coronet – Still a filthy mess

 

It’s now been 30 hours since the purge began and the server is still jammed with people I’ve never seen before. Only today, they are scurrying around the planets desperately trying to find another house to blow up. Since I’m banned from most player cities, my house is tucked away in the hills and even I have problems finding it. Today I’ve seen no fewer than six people stop by to try and blow up the place. Of course, it doesn’t help that I’ve changed my house name to SuperFurry’s house (Abandoned).

Will anyone actually get the badge for bringing down 50 houses? I keep reading that Star Wars has less than 50 thousand paid up subscribers. Unless the vast majority of these people play on my beloved Euro-Tumbleweed server, I say that this number has been greatly exaggerated. Cruising through Corellia, I still see thousands of houses and the shanty town to the south of Coronet is still there.

Someone is lying to us. Either this game is more popular than people will lead us to believe or SOE haven’t flagged all the houses. I did some investigation and the results were alarming:-

Ben Kenobi’s house – NOT FLAGGED (The dude has been dead for ages)
Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru’s homestead – NOT FLAGGED (I know for a fact that these two now live in an urn)
Temple of Exar Kun – NOT FLAGGED (Exar hasn’t been around for millennia)
Abandoned Rebel Base on Dantooine – FLAGGED, BUT YOU CAN’T BLOW THE THING UP
Abandoned Escape Pod on Dathomir – FLAGGED, BUT YOU CAN’T BLOW THE THING UP

 

Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru: Not coming back to SWG anytime soon

It’s one rule for us and another rule for the Points of Interest. The Lars’ live on some prime real estate right between Anchorhead and Mos Eisley too.

Forum Quote of the Week

SWG is like smoking. With every patch, you get that much closer to quitting.

Kobie_173

 

That’s all until next week. By then I hope to have repsec’ed to a Twi’lek dancer called Angela and I’ll be doing a hot exposé on Image Design.

Take care of yourselves readers, I guess that’s what you’re best at.
SuperFurry – 25th June 2007
Email me: SuperFurryGalaxies@hotmail.com

June 25th edition