Classic SOE strongarming tactics to get people to stay. I quit EQ 9 months ago and I guarantee that all 4 of my t00ns are alive and well, waiting to be resurrected. This 5 day and "order of magnitude" nonsense is their way of quietly scaring you into keeping your account.
To debunk the character storage myth, I gurantee that even a crappy database server running Oracle (which they claim is their RDB) can easily hold every character on every galaxy and include all manner of detail, without breaking some theoretical bank of memory. Having worked in sales for one of the antion's largest cell phone networks, with over 3 million people in my DB, I can tell you that crappy DB servers of 7 years ago can easily handle millions of records in very complex databases. If they need help, they should email me, since it isn't rocket science.
The 5 day thing cracks me up. In EQ they used carrots to draw the horse, now they tell the horse that if it doesn't pull the cart for 5 days, it's getting shot. What a feel good story. =(
Q-3PO's July 28th Q&A
Here is the Q&A Q-3PO posted in the official forums. Feel free to add your comments:
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I’m not going to touch profession issues right yet. We’re in the process of reviewing all of the top 5 issues and getting some responses back to the correspondents. Here are a couple of other questions answered. I’ll post a bit more later today.
How long will my character be saved if I cancel my account? Currently the answer is 5 days. Our intention is to have it be for at least a month or more, but that won’t be changing in the near future. As many of you know, every character in SWG takes up an order of magnitude more database space than other MMOs. That is because we have so many unique variables per character (millions of character customization possibilities, every player made object having several unique attributes, large storage space in banks and houses, etc.). When we have a solution worked out for saving these characters longer, I’ll let you know. Believe me, we want to save these characters. There are a significant number of people who, after leaving an MMO, will return at a later time if their character is intact still.
i've noticed over the last 2 weeks that a lot of people have either quit SWG, or have gone on vacation. its a lot more empty around cities, yet somehow the lag is worse. even in the middle of a barren planet, the lag is horrible. anyways... just wondering if i'm the only one noticing that this place is starting to get a bit empty.
Airstud32, our simultaneous user numbers continue to break internal records. In fact, we will likely be bringing up additional galaxies soon. While there is expected “churn” (industry term for people who have decided the game isn’t for them and left), we’re seeing decent retention rate so far. What you may be experiencing is other players moving on to more challenging planets. As for the “lag”, hopefully you will see that getting better, not worse, at this point.
Where are the game cards?
Still planned but no date yet. I'll bug the Powers That Be again about this.
Kevin "Q-3PO" O'Hara
SWG Community Relations Manager
Tags: News, StarWarsGalaxies