Daily Elysium: Raph Koster's Busy Day
It's kind of a spectator sport, the launching of a new MMORPG. You could grab a big tub of popcorn, put your feet up, and watch from afar as servers, developers, and customers all stand briefly to be counted and then topple to the shifting ground flailing about in a desperate wriggle to stand tall again. It's just not a good MMORPG launch unless a few thousand disillusioned gamers threaten to take legal action. So, it was with a morbid sense of curiosity that I kept an eye on the goings on with the Star Wars Galaxies team yesterday.
Understand, it's not that I wish them any particular ill will. In fact, had you asked me Monday, I'd have said I expected a fairly smooth launch. This is yet another indication that I don't have any latent prescient ability. As of now, nearly 24 hours since the 'launch' of Galaxies, no one can play.I'll give Raph, or Holocron as he's known in the Galaxies milieu, the first word. Here's his synopsis from last night
So here's the less dressed-up version of what happened today. Short form, we're jinxed. I say it that was because I am not exactly a hardware or database guru, so I can't give you actual hard details on what's going on.
First there was a hardware failure. We had not only installed more hardware than we had budgeted for any other launch, but we had dark hardware ready to go in the event of overload on the registration servers. As we saw that you were having trouble registering, we lit up the dark hardware. But it turns out that wasn't the problem--the problem was a silent hardware failure in the device that manages the load across the web servers.
That issue should now be resolved, and we apologize that it took so long to identify. If you're still having registration problems, there's some threads on the Tech Support forum for you to post on with reports.
Now, we have a separate problem. We are getting internal Oracle errors of some sort with Oracle 9i. It not only takes servers down, it keeps them from coming back up. This is what you're seeing if you see "Loading..." -- a server failing to come back up. We have Oracle on the phone. We are trying to find out what's up. I don't have more specific details because I do not want to disturb the guys working on this too much while they work on a resolution for you.
This clarification came at around 8:00 CST last night. Mind you, if the forums are to be believed, this was an explanation delivered after some people had been trying to register with Galaxies for ten consecutive hours. I'm not certain of the specifics, because, as I said, I was happy to sit out this inning, but from what I gather the registration system had all the stability of a newborn giraffe with an Edsel strapped to its back. People would begin registration and time out at various stages forced to back up or start over entirely, with the Terms of Service acting as a kind of impenetrable fortress through which almost no one could pass to reach the holy land of entering your credit card info. Of course, should you be worthy to reach that storied stage, if the credit card processing timed out you slid the long chute back down to step 1. People spent hours doing this.
Now, I don't want to let SOE off the hook too much for their myriad of issues, but really, if you've got ten hours to sit futzing about with a registration process, then probably you're a candidate for a new hobby. I mean its fine to be enthusiastic for a game, but this is the kind of obsession that crosses that unfortunate line into the realm of OCD.
What was interesting was watching Raph Koster put his Community Management Theories into practice, and seeing him get the results he wanted. He stepped up, admitted mistakes which made him seem human (see slide 11), and bought himself some goodwill with the trust he's fostered over the past few months. All part of the plan.
After a day's worth of angry cries for a multitude of heads on as many platters, Holocron's honest mea culpa netted intriguing results. A quick look at the thread shows that every single initial responder, and the vast majority of all responders, instantly forgave and forgot. A great cry of Hang in There Baby was issued forth, and those who called the Galaxies team on their faults became instant pariahs. Some even began to call it a successful launch, certainly not the worst.
The thing is, thinking about Raph's perhaps cynical power point approach to PR, and considering how transitory frustration can be, I think it doesn't matter when people know they are being manipulated. Largely, I think it's what they're craving, a little twist of their reality that makes everything seem ok again. People beg to be lied to, to be told that it's all going to be just fine. Tell us that tomorrow will be better. Just be human, and be funny, and keep us in the loop even if you have to make it all up.
So what is the definition of a successful launch? Is it strictly technical, a measure of how quickly people get the game out of the box and onto the screen? Well, yeah, by and large, that's the bulk of it. But, on those regular occurances when the proverbial solid waste hits the rotary air conditioning system, the difference lies in community relations, in how much the people have come to trust your ability to handle the situation and soothe their frustrations. In the long run, Raph's power point presentation is on the right track. In the long run, Star Wars Galaxies' frustrated customers wanted, if not to play the game, at least to be handled, coddled, soothed, and reassured. If yesterday proved anything, it's that a sympathetic character as your online presence can turn almost any angry mob of gamers back to enthusiastic fans, and that's invaluable if you're the kind of company that's gearing up for a MMORPG launch, because the other thing yesterday taught us is that something will always go wrong.
Raph bought himself some time. Today we get to see what he does with it.
- Elysium
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stability of a newborn giraffe with an Edsel strapped to its backPure Genius. I think that this whole incident is proof positive that die-hard Star Wars fans really *want* anything to do with their beloved movie-turned-lifestyle to come out "right," regardless of whether it's really a train wreck. Episode I was released, and they still flocked to theaters to see Episode II. Just about every LucasArts game has sucked, yet they continue to sell well. It's really a testament to the success of the original Star Wars franchise.
I generated a virtual world in the toilet bowl this morning.
-- Podunk on the PS3's mystical, magical abilities
Hold it right there youngin. Maybe LucasArts has sucked since Episode I, but I take offense at the suggestion that they sucked beforehand. Tie Fighter anyone? Day of the Tentacle? Cmon now, seriously.
That said, it seems like hes handling things very well, despite the fact that everything is f*cked up in reality, there is no fountain of rage spewing from every orifice of the community. Good job, Ralph, everyone else needs to be paying attention.
"If I was Obama I'd have made a joke about that. Then again, if I was Obama I'd have f*cked up my own campaign long ago by making c*ck jokes." - 1Dgaf
"Poor Achmed, only three days away from retirement ... from Jihad." - Mike Nelson
Youngin!? I wish. Notice I said *most* LucasArts games sucked. Yes, Tie Fighter ruled the school, but there have been gobs of games just dropped from LucasArts' bowels, and to me they've stained the porcelain so much that it's hard to see the glimmer in the bowl from the few good ones.
I generated a virtual world in the toilet bowl this morning.
-- Podunk on the PS3's mystical, magical abilities
Was I the only one who knew that this would happen?
"Men like sex, thus boobies! Oogaba!" - dejanzie
"If ads put your sanity to the test
come on down to Rat Boy's nest!
light up a stogie, and soon you'll see
how rock can be commercial-free!
'I'd hit it!'" - HP Lovesauce
Then you must have a very short memory. Almost anything released by LucasArts before the Episode I era began was pure gold. I dont understand how a flood of crap for 3 years can hide a decade of classics.
"If I was Obama I'd have made a joke about that. Then again, if I was Obama I'd have f*cked up my own campaign long ago by making c*ck jokes." - 1Dgaf
"Poor Achmed, only three days away from retirement ... from Jihad." - Mike Nelson
I disagree, but am too lazy to go into it. It's all opinion, anyway.
I generated a virtual world in the toilet bowl this morning.
-- Podunk on the PS3's mystical, magical abilities
True, I would say lets go have a beer, but were on the internet, so Ill just go have a beer.
"If I was Obama I'd have made a joke about that. Then again, if I was Obama I'd have f*cked up my own campaign long ago by making c*ck jokes." - 1Dgaf
"Poor Achmed, only three days away from retirement ... from Jihad." - Mike Nelson
Its deja vu all over again.Im waiting for the reports of the UO 2 step (lag induced 2 steps forward and 1 step back)And tales of taking 45 minutes to get out of Brittania (15 second trip when lag free)
Being fangoriously devoured by a gelatinous monster.
I just wanted to say to everyone who wasn't in Beta that this is what we saw whenever there was a problem. The Dev's working their butts off getting it fixed. It might not be the way we all wanted it to start, but it's a **bleep** fine example of just how much these folks care about us and the game, and how hard they are willing to work to solve these sorts of issuesQuoted from the SWG message boards.I'm sorry but this poor deluded fool must be a raving SW geekazoid...If they really did care about "us and the game" would they have released it in this form at all??
Aint nothing new about the world order..it's been playing since the day they put George Washington on a quarter
85's face the truth you're too dumb.
http://www.myspace.com/armyofthepharaohs
Seriuosly, LucasArts is one of the few companies that I'm willing to cut some slack simply because of how good they've been to me over the years. As well as X-Wing, Tie Fighter, and that whole slew of expansion packs, and some of the really early adventure games and even Secret Weapons of the Wafflehouse ... I'm still feeling some of the leftover gaming goodness provided by The Dig, Full Throttle, and Grim Fandango.Back to the topic at hand, if the customers aren't raging at the machine after being denied the opportunity to trade money for goods and/or services, then Mr. Koster is certainly doing one hell of a something right. And, really, I don't see anything wrong with that. It's not so easy as just looking pathetic; there's a fine line he had to tread. He couldn't whine extensively, but he also couldn't say, "Well, I'm a moron!" Instead, he dramatically drew in a big breath, slowly let it out and said, "We're responsible people, we'll take the blame... even though it's not really our fault. No, no, that's ok...really." And it worked, so kudos to him.
But they do care about them and the game, so far as it makes them profits. Also, the publisher is a factor here as well. Don't get me wrong, I have no delusions that the dev team is staffed by puppies and butterflies, but the release state of the game isn't something that is really under the dev team's control, usually.
"If I was Obama I'd have made a joke about that. Then again, if I was Obama I'd have f*cked up my own campaign long ago by making c*ck jokes." - 1Dgaf
"Poor Achmed, only three days away from retirement ... from Jihad." - Mike Nelson
First off, let me say that I admire the potential and the development of the working parts of SWG.The dozen guild members that have already started SWG with me have run into the same problems that I have, so it has nothing to do with my PC hardware. Hud adjustments do not save, so the first 5-10 minutes of every session are just getting hotkeys and hud placement fixed. There are sessions that only last 10-30 minutes before I have to relog because either I can't access my harvestors, my craft tool has stopped working, my ability to group has problems (at one point, every time I tried to group it put me in a group that I was in 4 hours ago, even though half the people were logged off). When grouped and complete a destroy mission, no exp. When grouped and killing mobs, no exp. In cities my FPS drops below 3 fps on a Geforce 4 4400ti. I have had CTD in cities when my lag gets bad. This is with all options cranked down (no names, no chat bubbles, etc).Just now, I was able to finally craft two wind harvestors and place them. Waiting a couple minutes I gathered 50 energy resources from the harvestors. Then I /sampled until I could make a mineral harvestor. I ran off to a good location and and placed the mineral harvestor. Seeing that it would eat through my 50 energy units pretty fast, I go back to the wind harvestors to collect more. Now it won't open up the window you get when you select Operate, on either wind harvestor. I figure, it's just another chance for me to have to log out and play with my hud for another 10 minutes. I log out and get back in and it's still not letting me at the Operate window. The pay maintenance window, the admin list, the status windows all pop up, but no Operate window (which you need to empty the collected resources). After two more re-logs it's still not letting me get to the Operate window, so I can't get any power to go keep my mineral harvestor operating. Like I said above, these are issues all of my guildmates are experiencing, they are not user errors or problems with the players PC hardware. This is of course the common excuse that Holo and the devs give in the forums, that thousands of people are able to log in and play without issues (right...), but that if you have a problem right now, it must be your computer's drivers or hardware. The issues that my guildmates can all duplicate are a indication of just how unstable and unready for live that SWG is currently. Heck, I see people that have full stormtrooper armor on 2nd day of launch, from the faction points exploits that were discovered weeks ago in beta, the same exploits that Holo said would be fixed before live but STILL didn't get fixed.But after 3 days of pure frustration, I'm at the point were I feel I have no other choice but to put out this warning to the SWG Developers.I come from a guild of over 130+ players in DAoC. If the state of the game isn't resolved soon, and the timer for the first free month pushed back, I'll have no choice but to warn everyone to avoid getting SWG.I'm at the point were I feel that the next step to put pressure on the developers is to have to contact the local telivision station here in Sillicon Valley that runs lots of consumer warning shows during the news, I'm sure they would LOVE to run a juicy consumer warning piece showing all the problems that SWG players are having with the game.I give the Devs till the end of next week before I start to contact all the major television and newspaper media outlets in the San Fransisco bay area telling them they have a big story they could be doing on the exploitation of Star Wars fans by a product that was rushed to and unready for the market.I also suggest that other players consider contacting your local media outlets to do the same thing. The MMORPG industry will continue to take advantage of consumers with buggy game launches if you don't make them pay the price of bad press from launches like SWG.I posted all of the above in the SWG disscusion forum on the SWG site, but the thread was closed for "trolling"....God forbid the customers know they have an option to get the Devs to commit to their problems with the gameEason