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What happened to SWTOR? Some insight by Jeff Nyman (game tester)


Lhancelot

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  • 4 weeks later...
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Welp, now that Anthem is on life support it makes you wonder if they're going to bother reinvesting in SWTOR. The Force knows it would be a lot cheaper than trying to resuscitate that dumpster fire.

 

Too bad they didn't listen to the casual know-nothing gamers who been screaming for 5+ years for resources to be put into SWTOR and not Anthem. I didn't want to see Anthem fail, but, wow. Surprised, not one bit.

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Every word out of nymans mouth on this subject was nonsense. Read it again, he makes multiple contradictory statements. One minute its 'EA was pretty much hands off so you can't blame them for bioware screwing up' then its 'bioware didn't really want to make an mmo and was forced to by EA.' That is the very opposite of hands off. Then he tries to claim The game flopped after release because bioware had no plan to release major content/story updates at the time....then shortly after goes on about how supposedly all of the content up to the end of the zakuul stuff was planned and intended to be essentially what was released as far back as launch. Following that up with only the ossus and everything after it is 'uncharted territory' in that it wasn't planned for at or shortly after launch. So which is it? and claiming that the game was originally supposed to be just jedi and sith? Yeah....No. Nobody spends hundreds of millions of dollars to make a commercial mmo based on one of the largest IPs on the planet, with two entire factions and then only includes two classes. That doesn't even remotely pass the common sense test

 

Agreed. To put this in further context -- and I do realize I can be coming off very negative here -- consider: BioWare has a five day schedule with your generally standard eight hour work day. That means 40 hours per week.

 

LOLwut? 40 hour week...in game development? Anyone who says something like that has no experience with game development. The hours in such a job are horrible and the industry is famous for it

 

If BioWare legal felt threatened by what Jeff posted and I knew it to be provably incorrect, they would have issued a much stronger statement.

 

That isn't true at all. Jeff is making things up, as i've already pointed out he can't even keep his bs consistent to the point he directly contradicts himself multiple times. You're making excuses for him and coming dangerously close to making it sound like some kind of paranoid conspiracy theory that its been pointed out that this guy has nothing and has had nothing to do with the game, and therefore no basis to make any of his claims

 

It occurs to me that "he tested for SWTOR" is compatible with "he was not an employee of EA or BioWare". He might have been a contractor / consultant / prestataire (choose according to your linguistic preferences), employed by another company that provides QA people who work on-site at the customer site (i.e. in this case, on-site at BioWare).

 

That is grasping at straws. He did not work on this game in any capacity, as has been explicitly stated

 

I think a good way to sum up those of us who believe Jeff is telling the truth from his own point of view

 

Truth is truth, there is no 'truth from his point of view' He is outright making things up

 

And instead we find out that's the game never was going to reach the potential we all saw in it because BioWare didn't want all eight classes stories in the first place

 

Which is a completely nonsensical claim, based on literally nothing, made by a guy who can't keep his claims consistent. It is not a rational design decision to not want multiple classes in a large scale mmo, let alone one with two entire factions

 

BioWare never really wanted to make an MMO and it shows in every single decision since launch up until Keith took over

 

If they did not want to make an mmo they wouldn't have made one. I'll say it again, which is it? First its 'EA was totally hands off guys its not their fault' then its 'EA made bioware build a game they didn't want to, and add a bunch of classes they didn't want to, and stories they didn't want to, and totally didn't have any content planned for after release....except for all the content they supposedly had planned out up to zakuul guys'

 

Nyman just explained the facts. I guess the truth hurts. Moving this to Off-Topic proves that, too

 

No he didn't. He made claims and accusations based entirely on literally nothing

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The Kotaku article did have the feel though of trying to go after BioWare. Jeff's blog really has a lot about a lot going on it and the BioWare section was very matter-of-fact without any sort of the hand-wringing or blame game or pointing fingers.

 

Between the two, Jeff's blog just feels more objective.

 

Yes, but I will take first hand experience from a disgruntled employee over.... whatever Nyman's blog post is. Conjecture? He said she said?

 

At least with an ex-employee you know where they stand -- and you know their perspective will be skewed as such.

Edited by Rion_Starkiller
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Yes, but I will take first hand experience from a disgruntled employee over.... whatever Nyman's blog post is. Conjecture? He said she said?

 

At least with an ex-employee you know where they stand -- and you know their perspective will be skewed as such.

 

You have to be careful here. Musco only said that nyman was not ever a BioWare employee.

 

Technically speaking, when game companies contract out beta testers to test their games, those people although they are testing a game for that company are not employees of that company.

 

So what Eric said could still hold true, even with Nyman having first-hand knowledge.

Edited by ZionHalcyon
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You have to be careful here. Musco only said that nyman was not ever a BioWare employee.

 

Technically speaking, when game companies contract out beta testers to test their games, those people although they are testing a game for that company are not employees of that company.

 

So what Eric said could still hold true, even with Nyman having first-hand knowledge.

 

And until there's actual proof, Nyman's post is hearsay.

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You have to be careful here. Musco only said that nyman was not ever a BioWare employee.

 

Technically speaking, when game companies contract out beta testers to test their games, those people although they are testing a game for that company are not employees of that company.

 

So what Eric said could still hold true, even with Nyman having first-hand knowledge.

 

Yeah, Nyman was not an employee, but the anonymous guy in the Kotaku article was an employee. That's why I don't understand why everyone loves Nyman's blog. He's literally just making **** up.

Edited by Rion_Starkiller
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  • 4 months later...
I think the 3.0 route was the right way to go, some story quests+new MMO content.

 

They need to do some cleaning up though. There are so many loose ends now they couldn't just create content and plop it into the game at this point.

 

They still need to make crafting an actual working part of the game right now it's garbage. Otherwise I'd agree.

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  • 4 months later...
Hey Jeff, hope you are well! Bumping this because someone asked about Jeff Nyman, so maybe some new readers can check out what he had to say.

 

I think this is super important, especially with the influx of players oh, they have a history lesson and understand why the game was the way it was before Keith took over.

 

I also want to remind everyone that just because Eric Musco said that Jeff nyman was never a BioWare employee, that does not mean he never worked on the game as a game tester. If we're going by the strictest legal sense, Jeff is someone who contracts out his services, therefore he is either employed to himself or if he was part of a contracting agency he was an employee of that agency. However companies like BioWare will sub contract people to come work on various aspects of their games in short-term time periods. So it's entirely possible that Jeff, not as a BioWare employee but as an employee of his contracting company or himself if he were representing himself, worked on the game.

 

given that he is in that industry it is also possible he knew people who worked on the game and is relaying their input.

 

The bottom line is that while the history lesson is interesting and puts a lot of pieces together for us veterans, the key takeaway is that until otherwise stated, BioWare philosophically has zero interest in player retention which is why the game has suffered the most. It's actually their business philosophy to have people leave and come back when stuff is done, thus taking the pressure off of them to put out content that keeps people engaged and continuing to subscribe.

 

Now maybe it's just been a slow ship to get turned around since Keith took over, as the return to continuity with a vanilla story is a really big deal which happened when Keith took over, and none of us thought this game would ever be on steam. So there could be a lot of ground work being done to change this business philosophy. and because of the current resources it could be that this is just happening at a glacially slow pace, but it still is happening. Speculation on my part as time will tell but it's not rocket science to see what's been done and the potential for what it could mean.

 

Just wanted to put all of that out there. For as screwed up as things have been, there have been some signs that this is getting turned around. Not just from within the game yes, but also with EA's public statements of recommitment to the game..

 

They just need to figure out how to change the culture and develop content that encourages player retention. If they can solve that and be willing to commit to it, this game could blow up really big.

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Yeah, Nyman was not an employee, but the anonymous guy in the Kotaku article was an employee. That's why I don't understand why everyone loves Nyman's blog. He's literally just making **** up.

 

I know it's almost nine months later. but this response makes it look like you literally did not read what I had just typed at the time. Subcontractors work on games all the time. they technically aren't the employees of the companies whose games they are working on. This really isn't hard. Jeff could be one hundred percent correct.

 

Saying that Jeff wasn't a BioWare employee doesn't change anything. if Eric wants to come out and say Jeff never worked on the game and didn't know anyone who did, then I would believe it. But I don't think legal will let him do that, for obvious reasons which tie in directly to what I stated.

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It's actually their business philosophy to have people leave and come back when stuff is done, thus taking the pressure off of them to put out content that keeps people engaged and continuing to subscribe.

 

Do you remember where they said that? I remember them saying the same thing, but can't recall where I saw it. Maybe when they did that under the hood infographic a few years ago explaining player percentages for different classes etc, but idk where that went either.

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I have zero interest in PVP and haen't been the guild I used to do ops in collapsed. I'm in SWTOR for the story. Trying to appeal to PVP and raiders at the expense of the story is what will kill it. Sorry but you guys are not the majority.

 

Well I agree....

PVP can be made on many games... But SW Story only on SW games...

Trying to pander to all types of MMO Gaming is what screw this game up...

This sould allway be focused as a RPG Story Focus, with a multiplayer component (to do Optional Flashpoints, Operations and Heroics).

 

The ppl demanded a KOTOR 3, but instead we got the SWTOR... well it was better then nothing, but i hopefull believe that moving forward this is the way it must go... Scap PVP, StarFighter crap alltogether, and focus on a more SP Experience with a MP component.

 

If Needed implement a 6 updates per year cicle (1 per 2 month) and a full expansion per year (even paid like Rothc).

 

Best Regards,

 

LPC

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When Bioware burns you over and over for 7 years, it will cloud your impression. Eric’s hot and cold forum attendance during important debates or problems hasn’t helped his rep that much. He is better than he was, but I feel there is still room for improvement in two way communication and conversations, instead of single forum bombs he drops and usually walks away from to let fester. Those bombs have had the appearance of trolling in the past.

His current PTS posting is vastly different and refreshing. I’m just waiting for the other shoe to drop if there are problems (not technical) after 6.0 launches. We’ve all seen him disappear and leave us in the dark during those periods and it undoes any good will or rep he builds before hand.

I want to be optimistic, I really do, but how many times can you get burnt and not have your judgment clouded. How do we know the winds have really shifted until we see 6.0 delivered and follow up communication support to follow?

 

Rereading this thread and seeing this makes me sad because I remember wanting to be optimistic too.

Totem correctly predicted Musco would AFK on us “again” when problems arised after launch. Which is exactly what he did and has mostly done since December.

Edited by TrixxieTriss
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Do you remember where they said that? I remember them saying the same thing, but can't recall where I saw it. Maybe when they did that under the hood infographic a few years ago explaining player percentages for different classes etc, but idk where that went either.

 

They’ve said it few times in live streams or during influencer interviews.

 

I remember one where they said the pvp players were the most stable subscribers in the game because they didn’t unsub and resub based on the latest content.

 

Then 6 months later, they blew up the pvp player base with all the changes around 5,0

Edited by TrixxieTriss
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I know it's almost nine months later. but this response makes it look like you literally did not read what I had just typed at the time. Subcontractors work on games all the time. they technically aren't the employees of the companies whose games they are working on. This really isn't hard. Jeff could be one hundred percent correct.

 

Saying that Jeff wasn't a BioWare employee doesn't change anything. if Eric wants to come out and say Jeff never worked on the game and didn't know anyone who did, then I would believe it. But I don't think legal will let him do that, for obvious reasons which tie in directly to what I stated.

 

IDK what our points were -- and I am certainly not reading through everything again, heh.

 

I recall Eric saying specifically in some thread somewhere that Nyman was never a BW employee, so that's probably why our posts might seem crossed. Other than that, no clue.

Edited by Rion_Starkiller
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