CBS News has a ten-page mailbag this week, devoted to their reader's opinions on Star Wars: Galaxies.The MMOG has been undergoing some changes recently, with Sony Online Entertainment rolling out a series of "enhancements" to make the gameplay experience more true to the Star Wars films and fiction. SOE president John Smedley recently said the game was more of an "Uncle Owen" experience than an epic Luke Skywalker experience, and the new wave of enhancements aim to address that.
The enhancements haven't gone down well with the SWG userbase however - CBS' mailbag is basically ten pages of complaints from subscribers saying that the enhancements have made the game "crap":
It ISN'T enjoyable. It isn't playable. It lacks imagination and inhibits any sense of personal engagement. It is shallow and uninspired. In short, it is the least enjoyable game I have ever tried to play. I have cancelled my subscription to this game. But I still feel unsatisfied. I am actually angry. Still. I feel that my loyalty and investment in your vision has been betrayed. This leaves a stain on the way I view the legacy of Star Wars.
This isn't the first time SOE's changes have upset the SWG gamers - back in May, a patch to the game caused 16,000 players to sign a petition demanding it be rolled back.Making your paying customers angry looks like a recipe for disaster, but SOE have a grand strategy at the end of it - to eventually compete with World of Warcraft. WoW currently has a massive 4 million+ worldwide userbase compared to upwards of 200,000 for SWG, suggesting even more tweaks and changes are in the pipeline:
[John Smedley, SOE]: People within the company feel so much pride in this game that they want it to beat the crap out of World of Warcraft. That's something we feel very passionate about. We know we are capable of making the best stuff out there, and I'm proud to say that with the changes we're making in Galaxies, I think we're headed in the right direction.
CBS MailBag: Star Wars Galaxies
Q&A: SOE's John Smedley on Galaxies' outer limits
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