Sony Online's next game 'dedicated' to Star Wars Galaxies

"SWG PLAYERS - OUR NEXT GAME (not announced yet) IS DEDICATED TO YOU. Once we launch it... you can come home now."

January 27, 2014 1:30 PM

With the upcoming closure of Clone Wars Adventures, Sony Online Entertainment has no more Star Wars-related MMOs in its stable. It closed long-running MMO Star Wars Galaxies more than two years ago. However, SOE president John Smedley is teasing a new project from the company--one that will appeal to fans of now-dead MMO.

"SWG PLAYERS - OUR NEXT GAME (not announced yet) IS DEDICATED TO YOU. Once we launch it... you can come home now," he said in a Reddit AMA. He noted that he would "do everything differently" if given an opportunity to go back to the series.

However, Smedley is not referring to another Star Wars MMO. BioWare's Star Wars: The Old Republic is still active, and EA is the exclusive publisher of the license. He also tweeted: "just to clarify a point I made in my AMAA - we have a new game that I think SWG vets will like. It's not a new Star Wars game at all."

Andrew Yoon

Andrew Yoon was previously a games journalist creating content at Shacknews.

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January 27, 2014 1:30 PM

Andrew Yoon posted a new article, Sony Online's next game 'dedicated' to Star Wars Galaxies.

"SWG PLAYERS - OUR NEXT GAME (not announced yet) IS DEDICATED TO YOU. Once we launch it... you can come home now."
- r_picmip 5
  
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  January 27, 2014 1:32 PM
  
  wat. Someone better not be toying with my hearstrings here.
- Zatric
  
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  January 27, 2014 1:39 PM
  
  I loved SWG, I played some on the free version that some people were reverse engineering but it was still missing a lot of functionality.
  - beastrabban
    
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    January 27, 2014 4:43 PM
    
    yeah, that's swgemu - www.swgemu.com you need your source CDs and to create an account on their forum page to gain access. it's slowly getting more complete as they go along.
    - Zatric
      
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      January 27, 2014 5:13 PM
      
      yeah, I had to bust out my old cd's to get it up and running.
- Lickuright
  
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  January 27, 2014 2:14 PM
  
  It's a game like SWG but not Starwars universe. So like every other mmo out there?
  - BeowolfSchaefer
    
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    January 27, 2014 2:31 PM
    
    Are you thinking of SWTOR maybe because SWG wasn't really much like other modern MMOs. Swotor on the other hand is basically WoW with a SW skin.
- waxthirteen
  
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  January 27, 2014 2:24 PM
  
  what an awful, awful.... awful game Galaxies was.
  - node
    
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    January 27, 2014 2:55 PM
    
    Some people liked it for the social/crafting/building shit.
    
    To me it felt like Raph Koster overlaid his dream social gaming experiment onto the Star Wars license where it totally didn't fit at all.
  - ColoradoCNC
    
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    January 27, 2014 3:08 PM
    
    Galaxies was amazing up until they nerfed it and let people insta-Jedi.
    - Zatric
      
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      January 27, 2014 4:02 PM
      
      Agreed, I had a ton of fun with that game.
    - Ziz
      
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      January 27, 2014 4:36 PM
      
      I was trying everything to unlock Jedi, for awhile I thought it was the mission listings. And how when you refreshed them one mission would be highlighted, figured if ya did enough of those missions ya'd unlock it. I never did unlock it from just grinding skills, but I did have fun trying, the dancer etc being the most fun.
  - vertdang
    
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    January 27, 2014 4:07 PM
    
    to be fair, it was okay before the NGE
    - Sailor of Fortune
      
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      January 27, 2014 8:16 PM
      
      When I saw the changes my mouth fell off.
- daggot
  
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  January 27, 2014 2:24 PM
  
  So, what, a SW-ish game, but not SW? So, just a space game on a grand scale with .. umm.. NOT light sabers? And maybe some super powers, but not the force? Yeah, sounds half-baked already.
  - BeowolfSchaefer
    
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    January 27, 2014 2:35 PM
    
    SWG wasn't aboutlight sabers. From what I understad (I wasn't a player) when they added Jedis and light sabers into the game was when the hard core crew all left or started to hate the game. Originally it was fa more about a hugely complex job system, emergent player interactions and player housing, things like that.
    - walker270
      
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      January 27, 2014 2:45 PM
      
      I thought Jedis were in from the beginning, but it required a huge amount of work to unlock and was a perma-death character that kept them incredibly rare.
      - Number 0666
        
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        January 27, 2014 2:52 PM
        
        Correct, but then they took out that aspect and cloned wow.
      - Zatric
        
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        January 27, 2014 2:56 PM
        
        Yeah they were really hard to get. Your character was basically secretly assigned 4 (at one point it was 7) classes that you had to master in order to become force sensitive. You could get hints at which professions you might need to max with a holocron which were.
      - ColoradoCNC
        
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        January 27, 2014 3:12 PM
        
        Pretty much this. People left once anyone could be a Jedi with no work. I remember going into battle in a PvP area when my guild had the second Jedi on our server, and the second he pulled out his lightsaber the Imps started running away in droves; I've never seen anything like that in an MMO. No matter how powerful a dwarf wizard in WoW is, they're still just one of hundreds of thousands; Jedi in SWG were actually something to be feared before the patch.
        
        the_burd
        
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        January 27, 2014 3:33 PM
        
        That sounds so badass.
        
        Zatric
        
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        January 27, 2014 4:02 PM
        
        It was really badass. I remember how it would take pretty big groups of people to take out jedi's. Even the jedi npc's which would rarely drop holocrons were pretty tough.
        
        ColoradoCNC
        
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        January 27, 2014 5:24 PM
        
        It is probably one of the most memorable gaming experiences I have ever had.
        
        damageundone
        
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        January 27, 2014 8:14 PM
        
        It was the best, standing in town, then seeing a fight with a Jedi run by, and thinking WOW HOLY SHIT DUDE A FUCKIN JEDI. One of the better video game moments I remember.
  - LoioshDwaggie
    
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    January 27, 2014 2:44 PM
    
    Star Trek: The Next Online
  - Volatus32x
    
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    January 27, 2014 2:53 PM
    
    I never wanted to play as a Jedi or with light sabers. I wanted to smuggle cargo and visit seedy worlds and make money. Basically Privateer but as a MMO.
    - ColoradoCNC
      
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      January 27, 2014 3:14 PM
      
      I spent my time as a Mon Calmari creature handler training Rancors and building a bitchin' house. RIP Squishface Iscool :-(
    - vertdang
      
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      January 27, 2014 4:08 PM
      
      Sooooo Star Citizen then?
      
      http://robertsspaceindustries.com
      
      http://robertsspaceindustries.com/orgs/3305
      - Volatus32x
        
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        January 27, 2014 5:32 PM
        
        Yup. Already have wayyyy too much money spent on it, too.
        
        vertdang
        
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        January 28, 2014 7:43 AM
        
        nice :D
    - Ziz
      
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      January 27, 2014 5:44 PM
      
      I wanted to be a scavenger on Tatoonie.
- [deleted] 1327416746
  
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  January 27, 2014 3:05 PM
  
  [deleted]
  - mordaken
    
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    January 27, 2014 3:16 PM
    
    EQNext is Terraria and this new IP (dedicated to SWGalxies) is Starbound?
- jonin
  
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  January 27, 2014 5:30 PM
  
  no, no we can't come home. home was ruined
- Jiven
  
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  January 27, 2014 5:47 PM
  
  Good'ol SWG. I did my concept art internship there. Created 500+ icons for that expansion where they added their achievement system. Fun times! Also a number of insect and fish concepts that are up on wookipedia now. I always wonder if they'll make it into official cannon.
  - Home Nugget
    
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    January 27, 2014 6:05 PM
    
    That's pretty cool!
    - Jiven
      
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      January 27, 2014 8:16 PM
      
      Thanks man.
  - jane911
    
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    January 27, 2014 6:26 PM
    
    ah cool what do you do now? do you make art for games?
    - Jiven
      
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      January 27, 2014 6:36 PM
      
      Ish? Kinda embarrassing but I do silly art for slot machine company in Chicago.
      - wunderbred
        
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        January 27, 2014 6:49 PM
        
        That's not embarrassing to somebody who works in an cubicle doing high-fallutin' clerical work and wishes they were doing ANYTHING even slightly creative.
        
        Jiven
        
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        January 27, 2014 8:12 PM
        
        Yea, relative to that it's a fun job. :)
      - jane911
        
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        January 27, 2014 6:50 PM
        
        not embarrassing at all. getting paid to do what you love! however, being around slot machines for over 13 years some of the art on those machines were atrocious. lol. every default filter that ships in photoshop used excessively!
        
        Jiven
        
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        January 27, 2014 8:11 PM
        
        Yep. When I go home I sometimes just want to paint with mud. Silly games have every saturated color in the book. I guess I just still feel strange about the work. Was telling myself for a long time I'd be making video games and sort had to settle for this at the time.
        
        I'm back at the portfolio so we'll see. What brought you around slot games?
        
        jane911
        
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        January 27, 2014 8:18 PM
        
        I was the director of security/surveillance for a few casinos, for about 13 years. I can still hear them when I try to sleep (true story).
        
        Jiven
        
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        January 27, 2014 8:42 PM
        
        haha yea. They're going off constantly all over as we're developing them. Songs/noises get stuck in your head for better and worse. mostly worse >.<
- [deleted] 1474657234
  
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  January 27, 2014 6:13 PM
  
  [deleted]
- [deleted] 244187895
  
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  January 27, 2014 6:25 PM
  
  [deleted]
- Ride-My-Rocket
  
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  January 27, 2014 6:45 PM
  
  Riiiiiight.
- jedi_27
  
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  January 27, 2014 6:46 PM
  
  lol.... ok
- limpossible
  
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  January 27, 2014 9:49 PM
  
  Pre-NGE SWG was alright, once you got past the idea that you were supposed to be playing a Star Wars game. I have many fond memories of the game (and some not so fond as well). Exploration, trading/crafting, and city building was the tits.