SWG- Emulators and ‘Insiders’

June 28, 2006 on 8:56 am | In MMO (Live), SWG, Industry

Perusing the headlines at slashdot yesterday, I come across an article that almost made me fall out of my chair:

The Star Wars Galaxies Emulator hits Alpha

Here's a quote from CoffeeHedake:

"The SWGEMU (Star Wars Galaxies Emulator) Team has successfully run their first Alpha stage test of a reverse-engineered version of Sony Online Entertainment's Star Wars Galaxies server software. An announcement was made on the SWGEMU bulletin boards that something special would be shown in their IRC channel at 12:00AM EST Today. A hosted video montage of the successfully connecting the SWG client to an emulated server, loading a character, zoning from one area to another, and other huge leaps were shown in the clip."

First, I've got to get something out of the way:

I don't believe for a second this will be around for long. It's a great project. I can attest to just how many former SWG players would love a return to the pre-CU days of SWG. Heck, some of those would actually even like the game they think they're remembering. But I highly doubt the project team would be able to successfully face the combined legal teams from SOE and LA. And there's really no reason at all for either company to let this project see the light of day.

Now onto other thoughts:

Both groups have been relatively silent on this EMU, as far as I know, the first of it's kind. For example, on the same day Slashdot released this news, Stratics hosted a SWG House of Commons Chat with the SWG team. I have to imagine at least one of the various participants in the IRC chat session posed the question, and that it not being asked nor answered is perhaps a pre-instruction from SOE to Stratics to not talk about this at all.

There's also been the usual round of "insider info", like this gem over at the MMORPG forums, copy/pasted here for posterity that haven't been commented on. Basically, it includes a bunch of unsubstantiated stuffInsights into the SWG EMU project. It's an interesting read, even if it could be all lies. I cut some stuff out to try and make it shorter, so be sure to read the full link, which includes the poster's claimed role at SOE.

… 

Now on to a well known Emulator site regarding the above game.

Many of you have posted and replied to that site.  SOE and LEC indeed know about this site, and are actively monitoring it. 

I have read the updates section  and i feel i must say something. 

The main updates that the administrators have given to you are false.  Here are my reasons for you to browse.

The most recent updates that have been made available there are incorrect. 

The loading screen you see can easily be made and changed by anyone who has access to the .tre file that was included in the Jump to Lightspeed (JTL) major publish.  All it is is a simple background  that you can extract from the .tre file  using a program known as insideSWG or SWGExplorer.  You can then import it into a image editing program, edit it how you like, then recompile it back into the.tre file.   Evidence of this is a lack of a  full video going from login screen to main game on the Emulator site. All you see is a screenshot.

With reference to the "ingame zone" screenshots.  these are again false.   There is indeed a mod that replicates all aspects of the games original system  User Interface. However if you look closely  you will notice that there are no active "HAM" bars. this is because the code which we inserted into the core of the game is made to do this, thus making the mod useless and basically unuseable.  You may also notice the small unobtainable experience information module in one of the screenshots   This is a well known bug that occurs with an original system User interface Mod. This occurs because the mod  links to coding within the client  that has been commented out. therefore it was not able to be changed. 

…

Taken altogether, combined with the relative silence, it sounds like the respective parties are waiting to see if SWG EMU is actually successful in doing what they claim. That they're already claiming to work with assets they shouldn't be (per the SWG EULA) would make one think that's enough to get attorneys involved. However, with all coverage of SWG since November effectively being negative, they may want to not move on something with such strong fan support until they know if the thing actually works. There's a huge amount of complexity with emulating SWG, everything from the proprietary engine to the Oracle database backend. Just delivering a bunch of videos doesn't really prove anything, at least not enough to the companies behind the main game.

And then there's the other problem: the players.

Many ex-fans have wanted a SWG EMU server to give them the game they used to like. However, many of these ex-fans who've most loudly requested such quit well before the major changes came anyway. Would these players seriously spend time in the old game they accepted, warts and all, when there's so many higher-polished titles out there?

Loving Star Wars is only going to arm one with so much patience. Break down the old-skool SWG playerbase and you have a number of different sub-groups. Of these sub-groups, the people who played SWG because they absolutely loved the combat system of old are probably not a significant majority of that old playerbase.

Now imagine those old players returning. The moment they arrived, they'd be reminded of everything that used to aggravate them about the game anyway. In its heydey, players accepted the bugs because everyone accepted the bugs. But once people started divorcing themselves emotionally from the game, they saw just how much of a hodge-podge of broken and fixed it really was.

It's good to see the blood, sweat and tears efforts of ardent fans, and perhaps they wouldn't need any more than 1,000 people playing on the server. While that would feel pretty empty, given the combined 4,00 square kilometers of navigable worlds even on launch day, I think it would be fine if they restricted all building to maybe the main worlds of Tatooine, Corellia and Naboo. But such fundamental rules changes implies huge achievements for this team beyond just making the emulator work itself.

And that's the problem. If this works, that'll be when the companies probably have to serve a cease-and-desist notice. There's no good that an emulator server can bring the core game, and there's just too much money and brand equity tied to the latter to see it sullied even more. They probably just couldn't take the chance that SWG EMU would be successful at all.

Some links of note:

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