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Galaxies Christmas Special, numerous class updates coming soon
A brand-new Producer's Letter from Chris Fields brightened this week for Star Wars Galaxies players. Coming sometime in the middle of the month is the newly revamped Life Day event. This year they've taken heavy cues from the Star Wars Christmas Special, that horrifying cultural relic from the 80s. You may wonder about the wisdom of doing so, but keep in mind that the special (despite its many flaws) is 100% canon content. The event will see players smashing presents, decorating trees, and getting awesome presents like a pocket aquarium, a holographic table, a proton chair, an in-home wroshyr tree ... and perhaps even a Kowakian monkey-lizard!The letter also contains a lot of previews for upcoming patches, great-sounding content for players of all stripes. Game Update 6 will see the addition of an appearance tab, expanding the roleplaying-friendly game feature seen in other games like EverQuest II and Lord of the Rings Online. Make sure to thank AdeptStain if you like it! Update 7 will see the long awaited updates for Spies, and Update 8 will see major changes to Player Associations and Cities. There are a ton more holidays and goodies coming down the pipe ... check out the full letter for the details.
Star Wars Galaxies' new producer hints at future content
Just yesterday we noted that Star Wars Galaxies has a new producer, as long-time friend of the game Lorin Jameson moves into a directorship position for SOE-Austin. The new producer, Christopher "Dotanuki" Field, sat in with the forum-goers last night to answer a number of their resulting questions. Here are some highlights: They are aware of player concerns over server population, and have something in the works right now to address it. Hoth (coming in Chapter 11) is planned as a strictly PvE experience, and at the moment they don't plan on space combat to be a part of the instance. More on Hoth: It will be both indoors/outdoors, and "There are going to be things in Hoth that you've not seen before in Star Wars Galaxies." Droid Commander is right now slated for Chapter 12. They're already at work on a new holiday for the year, something we haven't seen before. A fan asks if the Hoth battle means they're advancing the gameworld's timeline, to which Field responds: "We're not changing the timeline. It's going to be very self-contained and not linked to the game world like our other Heroics." Spy additions/changes are planned for Game Update 6, as are issues with the City system. Five year veteran rewards will be coming with Game Update 5 (coming next week to TC). They're working on some more new weapon models for the game, especially welcome given the new Weaponsmithing system coming in GU5. Before signing off, Field answers a fan who asks what SWG should offer players: "SWG should offer players compelling Star Wars content that makes them feel like they're part of the Star Wars universe. Most of all, it should be a fun game to play. I would hope that SWG has something to offer for all play styles. Whether you enjoy leveling up, Heroics, crafting, casual play, etc... it should always be enjoyable."
Star Wars Galaxies producer DeadMeat moving to SOE-Austin director position
Lorin "DeadMeat" Jameson has been a big part of the new wave of communication between the players of Star Wars Galaxies and the folks at SOE who make it. It's therefore very much worth noting that Jameson is moving out of his production role on the project, to a development directorship at the Sony Online Entertainment - Austin studio. This announcement comes in Jameson's semi-regular producer's letter, which otherwise recaps the last few weeks since Chapter 10 hit the live servers.Christopher Field is stepping into his position as Producer on the game, and generally notes his enthusiasm for the Star Wars IP in his first address to the players. Aside from his new position Jameson also notes that while Game Update 5 will be on the Test Server next week, Update 6 is going to be delayed. "The team is now pretty much focused on the Battle for Echo Base and I have to say that this is one of the most ambitious chapters we have attempted to date. The Hoth terrain and battlespace is huge and the features that are being added to support this classic Star Wars moment are incredibly exciting. In fact it is such a large undertaking that we will be delaying Update 6 until we have more of the pieces in place to ensure that we truly deliver on this encounter. Once we have broken up some of the larger development rocks for this chapter we will be able to pick up on the update tracks again."
