Pistoleer Archive

Well folks, it's time for ol' K'K to hang up his pistol belt and ride his faithful Dewback, Pinky, into the sunset, a pack of snarling Kusaks following behind.

It was an interesting experience. By no means my first online game, but my first true MMORPG. I got interested in Galaxies by following the antics on the pre-Beta (and wonderfully pre-Lithium) forums. I hooked up with the whacky GAT'ers and went off with them to form our long-discussed GAT City the minute Player Cities went live. (That, incidentally, was when TH took his first big credibility hit with me, when he predicted it would take "weeks" for planets to reach the initial City Cap, when in fact it took hours, as most of us predicted.)

I have nothing but praise and admiration for the people actually coding this game ... the art, the sound, the interface -- it's all first class, top quality work. If this was a $5.00 screensaver and chat client with no monthly fees, I'd call it one of the great software releases of all time.

Regretably, it was supposed to be much more than that. And it still could be, somewhere down the road. But I have come to the point where I can't justify paying a monthly fee for another year while wondering when there is going to be some progress made toward an actual, functioning *game*. We've been in an eight-month holding pattern if you want to actually do anything related to PvP or the GCW, and the player economy has never really recovered from the Hologrind fiasco. There just isn't enough managerial focus in this project for me to endorse it with my dollars, and as somebody who works in a software development organization in real life, the way this game's code is tested (or not) simply astounds me. I really had no idea the quality standards could be so low in any dev organization. I think that there's a mindset that this is somehow acceptable because it's 'just a game,' but that only works for me if I get to pay with 'just pretend money'. Otherwise, code is code, and if I pay for it, you better build and test it properly.

So ... I'd love to say I'll be back in 3, or 6, or 9 months ... but that will only happen if there's a major improvement in the way they do business in this organization, and I'm fairly skeptical of that ever happening. There's good management and bad, and bad management doesn't just magically learn to be good ... they either get replaced or they take down the company.

Since it's summertime, I won't be jumping right into another game ... most of my weekends are dedicated to time on the boat or a hike in the mountains. But by the winter I'll be looking for another way to distract myself on the computer, and probably choosing between the best of the alternatives that we'll have in October-November. See some of you 'round the next one, and for those who remain here, good luck & I really do hope for the best for you.

K