A Long Time Ago in a Galaxy Far Far Away
Last night I did a stupid (perhaps more then one, but I'm only talking about the one here). Some background will be needed for this to make sense, so background time it is.
Some friends (should they read this they will know who they are and can name themselves if they so choose, if they don't read/name themselves it's not my place to and won't change what I am saying here) gave me Star Wars Galaxies as an early christmas present. I started playing on the 20th of december, hence the early part. It was a good game, and I appreciated the gift, was very nice of them to give it to me. But I had difficulties with it at the same time.
The game itself was a very nice game, at least as far into it as I got. It's hard to do a comprehensive review with how short a time that I played, but I did like what I saw. I havn't played very many online games, but I have played many offline, and there were some nice features in this game.
For example, in most games I've played you gain a total xp that you can then spend on anything you want. You can kill things and get xp that you use to improve your crafting skill. Doesn't make much sense. does it? Well in SWG if you want to get better at doing something, you do it. Killing things xp is used to improve killing things skills, crafting skill xp improves crafting, and so on. Seems to make much more sense to me. And it being in the star wars universe lets them use existing well developed people/locations, which is a nice touch. While I never saw any of the big name people (Luke, Vader, etc), I did travel around and see some interesting sites (Jabba's palace, Ewok villages, etc). They also included a profession (Image Designer) that changes how people look, which I thought was a great thing to do. I don't know how many times I've played a game and wanted to change my appearance part way through, but couldn't.
I never got involved in the Rebel/Imperial conflict, didn't take many missions either. My character focused on making things (or trying to at least), gathering materials to make things, and wandering the planets while trying not to get killed. So there were many areas of the game I just didn't see, but what I did see of the game was very nice. Saw some room for improvment too, but nothing critical.
I said some friends gave me this game, so what of them? Well they were combat types, or at least that was my impression, so our paths didn't cross as much as I would have liked. Sure we would meet up here or there and do stuff, but I couldn't really go out and play with them. The few times I tried I would end up hiding away from the monsters while they killed things, wasn't what I would call enjoyable. Don't get me wrong here, they were very nice and helped me get into the game, and it was a good game, but me being me, the social aspect killed it.
As I saw it I had one of two options. I could be the crafter I wanted to be and not play with my friends, just cross their paths from time to time, making things for them and others, living a rather solitary game life. Or I could toss aside what I wanted to do in game and become a combat oriented player and spend more time in game with my friends, yet resenting that I wasn't able to do what I wanted. In a way the choice is like the choices I see in my life, do what I want or change myself to do what others want.
Well in my short time in game I tried both options to some extent. I enjoyed making things, and gathering the materials to make things, but not being able to do much with my friends was frustrating. From time to time we would be able to do things, and that was fun. One of my favorite parts was making 200 cdef pistols for one of them to do something with, practice slicing I think. Sure it was highly repetitive, but I enjoyed the helping. But those situations didn't happen all that often, at least from my point of view. So I gave combat a try.
When I had great big strong medicness helping I could actually kill some things. When I didn't I died, alot. So I either needed a babysitter or would die more often then I killed things. I didn't enjoy dying, and because of that combat was beyond frustrating, maddening would be a good word. So I couldn't play with my friends.
So last night I was playing as I did, and was listening to people chat in the guild chat. And I realized that I wanted them to fail at what they were doing. I wanted my friends to be unhappy, and from that take happiness for myself. This was not good, was very not good. So I left the guild, and left the game.
In doing so I think I hurt my friends, which I am sorry for. By the time I post this article I will have sent my friends an email apologizing for my actions. Will it make any difference? Probably not, I don't think the words exist that will make things all better, but I feel I owe them an apology at least.
For the record, I am not upset because of the game, the game merely became an outlet for my upsetness. And in doing so I was hurtful to my friends, and that was the stupid I started this article about.