Star Wars Galaxies was a Star Wars–themed massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) for Microsoft Windows, developed by Sony Online Entertainment (SOE) and published by LucasArts. The game was released in stores on June 26, 2003, and spawned several expansions and updates through 2005.
The servers shut down on December 15, 2011 due to contract expiration. There are several private emulator projects in various stages of development that intend to allow users to experience Galaxies in different incarnations of the game's existence.
Gameplay
Races and character creation The ten species that were available to players included: Human, Twi'lek, Zabrak, Wookiee, Trandoshan, Rodian, Mon Calamari, Bothan, Sullustan and Ithorian.
Players could hire Entertainers to change their appearance in-game, with even more options than those available at creation. Many visual aspects of a character were changeable after character creation except species and gender.
Professions At launch, players had access to 34 professions, with six basic professions: Artisan, Brawler, Entertainer, Marksman, Medic, and Scout. There were a total of 24 advanced professions.
Each profession had advanced tier options, including hybrids that combined traits of two professions. Each profession consisted of a tree-like structure of skills, with a single Novice level, four independent branches with four levels, and a Master level which required completion of all four branches. Characters purchased these skills with experience points gained through a related activity.
After the New Game Enhancement update in November 2005, the developers reduced the number of professions to nine: Jedi (available for the first time as a selection at character creation), Bounty Hunter, Smuggler, Commando, Spy, Officer, Medic, Entertainer, and Trader. Progress in these professions was divided into three separate experience source groups: combat, crafting, and entertaining. In addition to these professions, a character could also pursue three optional side professions: Pilot, Chronicler, and Politician.
Combat On the game's release, each character and creature possessed three "pools" (called Health, Action, and Mind; or "HAM") that represented their physical and mental reserves. When any one of those pools was fully depleted, the character would faint. Combat required the player to carefully manage his or her actions to avoid depleting a pool.
With the New Game Enhancement update, ground combat was changed to real-time and similar to a first-person shooter. The player would aim a targeting reticule and left-click the mouse to fire. Auto-aim and auto-fire features were available, but players who eschewed those options were rewarded with an increased chance of maximum damage. As characters' levels increased, they gained access to additional combat abilities called "specials" which were activated by the right mouse button or by accessing the ability on a toolbar. In addition to providing high-damage attacks, specials were also used to heal, buff, debuff, and crowd control enemies. Players gained the ability to use more powerful weapons as they advanced in level. Players also earned "Expertise Points" as they leveled up, which were used to advance their professions. The player could allot 45 points to various abilities and attributes, from weapons specialties to healing and armor proficiency. Once a character reached level 90, they would gain access to collaborative "Heroic" missions. The five heroic missions were: Tusken Invasion, IG88, Axkva Min, Imperial Star Destroyer, and Exar Kun.
Spacecraft The Jump to Lightspeed expansion added space combat and allowed players to own and pilot spaceships. Ships ranged in size from fighter crafts to larger gunships with up to three decks.
In-game economy, infrastructure, and politics Characters could erect, own, and decorate a variety of communal, personal, and governmental buildings. These buildings, when grouped, could be organized into cities. Players held elections via ballot box for Mayor. Elected mayors granted city members permission to place structures within the city. Elections were held every three weeks. If another player wished to run for mayor, they would add their name to the ballot box to run against the incumbent. As cities grew in population, they became eligible to add services and facilities such as vehicle repair garages, shuttle ports, cloning facilities, hospitals, cantinas, and garden displays. They could show up on planet maps alongside canonical cities such as Theed and Mos Eisley.
The gameplay design aimed towards realistic social institutions like a dynamic virtual economy and other real-life social phenomena like a complicated division of labor. In this virtual economy, players were responsible for creating many in-game items including blasters, starships, clothing, armor, food, housing, furniture and even a wide variety of droids. According to Star Wars Galaxies and the Division of Labor, the division of labor in Star Wars Galaxies produced in-game results similar to those in real life.
Setting Star Wars Galaxies was set between the events of A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back. The game launched with 10 planets: Tatooine, Naboo, Corellia, Talus, Rori, Dantooine, Lok, Yavin 4, the Forest Moon of Endor, and Dathomir. Later paid expansions added the planets of Kashyyyk and Mustafar.Star Wars - Star Wars News about the saga There were 12 space zones, added primarily during the release of the Jump to Lightspeed expansion. Nine space zones were associated with one or more of the playable planets, and three, Kessel, Ord Mantell, and Deep Space, were solely used for space gameplay and player-versus-player combat, with no land equivalent. The planet Hoth was added in November 2008, but could only be explored during an instance depicting the events of the Battle of Echo Base from The Empire Strikes Back.
Players could also meet many characters from the main and expanded universe of Star Wars, including Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Princess Leia Organa, Darth Vader, and Chewbacca, among others.
Development Prerelease The game was announced in 2000, when LucasArts Entertainment began a partnership with EverQuest creators Verant Interactive and Sony Online Entertainment to create a massively multiplayer Star Wars online role-playing game. The announcement included an expected release date of 2001 and that the game would take place during the original trilogy era. According to Raph Koster, director of the game during its early development, Star Wars Galaxies had a budget of $10-$12 million.
On May 17, 2001, the first expansion's development was announced, which would include gameplay in outer space. In the same press release, the release date of the base game was delayed to the second half of 2002. Rich Vogel, director of development at Sony Online Entertainment Austin, said that delaying the space expansion's release until after the base game's would give players time to establish their characters and understand ground gameplay. A new official website was also released on the same day. It included screenshots, movies, an updated frequently-asked questions section, concept art, development team member's profiles, features about the game, and a forum. The site reached 100,001 users by December 2001. Throughout the next year, new content would be posted on the website. This content included information on species and locations, new images and movies of game elements, and 360-degree QuickTime VR panoramas of different in-game locations.
The closed beta test began in July 2002. SOE continued to share information about the game on the website as the beta progressed. LucasArts also stated in 2002 that both the Xbox and PlayStation 2 would get a version of the game; however, both versions were cancelled.
On December 20, 2002, LucasArts announced an April 15, 2003 release date for the game, and that the base game of Galaxies would be called An Empire Divided. LucasArts also announced that the game's online community had grown to over 400,000 users since its inception in November 2000. At the time, this represented one of the largest ever fan communities amassed for any game prior to retail availability.
Galaxies release was delayed for one final time on March 14, 2003, announcing that the game would not release on April 15 as previously planned. The eventual release date of June 26, 2003, was announced by LucasArts on June 17.
Release and continued development The base game, titled Star Wars Galaxies: An Empire Divided, was released in North America on June 26, 2003, and in Europe on November 7, 2003. A localized version for the Japanese market was published by EA Japan and released on December 23, 2004.
In November 2005, SOE announced that the Japanese servers would shut down, and offered players the option of a refund or to transfer their account to a European or American server. The game's lack of success in Japan was attributed to cultural differences, as well as its futuristic setting being less popular than in the west.
The game was released in Australia on November 15, 2006.
Jedi Jedi presented a challenge for the gameplay of Galaxies. During the in-universe period where the game was set, between A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back, Jedi were canonically extremely rare and hunted down by the Empire. However, Jedi needed to be attainable to the players in order to achieve commercial success and fulfill the fantasy of players. Raph Koster, lead designer of Galaxies during its pre-release and immediate post-release development, said that there were two design choices for the team; either to make Jedi not more powerful than other player classes, or make them more powerful, but with a gameplay tradeoff. Koster initially asked to move the setting of the game to sometime after Return of the Jedi, when Luke Skywalker had set up his new Jedi Temple, but the time period of the game had been set by the licensing contract between SOE and LucasArts, and his request was denied.
During pre-release development, a separate Jedi slot was designed to unlock for each player upon completion of a list of tasks across a variety of gameplay experiences available in the game. This was designed to reward players who dabbled in every system available, and not only reward those who exclusively focused on combat, socialization, or exploring. Each player would have a unique list of these achievements, and the list would remain hidden to players. Once these tasks were achieved, a separate Jedi character slot on a player's account would unlock, allowing them to create a new, force-sensitive character. Originally, this new Jedi character would be subject to permadeath, a concept inspired by Diablo's hardcore mode, but this was removed at the request of SOE before release.
The initial set of player experiences proved too technically challenging given Galaxy's crunched development. Two months before the game's launch, Koster approved a plan to replace the checklist with a randomized number of the game's professions.
The decision to shift to profession proved to be a mistake, according to Koster. Players were highly unlikely to become a jack-of-all-trades with professions, which was required to unlock a Jedi slot. When asked by the game's marketing department when the first Jedi would appear in order to boost sales before Christmas, Koster estimated a decade. This was unacceptable to SOE, and the developers began offering hints. Players quickly shared among each other the hints, and the gameplay experience of abandoning their previous professions to chase a Jedi slot proved negative to player satisfaction, per Koster.
Expansions Jump to Lightspeed