Early game access - official from forums (not new) - But thorough.

[Neofate]

This I found that I missed somehow on the forums. It explains in a much better way than I received it the exact nature of the launch.

If you never had a chance to see it, here it is.. If you did. Well here is a reminder lol.

Hello everyone,

We’re happy to finally announce today that Early Game Access begins December 13th, 2011. This means that everyone who has pre-ordered Star Wars: The Old Republic and redeemed their pre-order code will have up to seven days to play the game early.

As before, when your Early Game Access begins will be determined based on when you redeemed your pre-order code. You will be emailed on the day you are being admitted to Early Game Access to confirm you can now access the game.

Early Game Access was extended to seven days to allow us to gradually ramp up the number of people in the game over a longer period. This allows us to ensure maximum stability and a good population across servers. It also allows us to have more flexibility on exactly how many people we admit per day.

With that said, we’re still planning on allowing a large number of people into Early Game Access on a daily basis. In our final Beta Testing Weekends, we had hundreds of thousands of players on the game servers – and we have additional server capacity for launch. However, we still need to remain flexible during Early Game Access, and this led to the decision to notify people on the day that their Early Game Access begins.

We know many of you expected and wanted advance notice on Early Game Access, but we made this decision to ensure that we could remain flexible and react to unforseen issues during launch. Our number one priority has always been a smooth launch, so this decision was a necessity.

The good news is that effectively everyone is being given two ‘extra bonus’ days as the EGA program is now up to seven days long. The bad news is unfortunately we cannot let people know on an individual basis when they will gain access until we are ready.

We do understand that you are concerned about when you will receive the email. To save your F5 keys, as well as being notified by email, you will also be able to check the Launcher for Star Wars: The Old Republic. When you have been granted Early Game Access, your Play button will be enabled. (You will need to restart the Launcher on occasion if you’re still grey.) Finally, you will be able to login to your account page here on SWTOR.com and check your status.

We absolutely understand (and appreciate!) everyone’s eagerness to play, but this plan will ensure that we don’t fall at the final hurdle – bringing people into the game at launch. We hope you’ll bear with us as we gradually grant Early Game Access to everyone who pre-ordered.

The "Two extra Bonus Days" sounds like we get whatever we were going to have + 2. That doesn't seem like such a bad deal.

[Sanguinesun]

This I found that I missed somehow on the forums. It explains in a much better way than I received it the exact nature of the launch.

If you never had a chance to see it, here it is.. If you did. Well here is a reminder lol.



The "Two extra Bonus Days" sounds like we get whatever we were going to have + 2. That doesn't seem like such a bad deal.

Except that this contradicts a recent twitter from Reid stating that people at the worst will only get 1 day in early access.

I'd go with the worst case scenario since so far they can be trusted to keep their information consistent and implemented. The no grace fiasco is a prime example(I even got an email from their CS the -day- Reid posted on the forums saying there was no grace to be given that the CS rep very clearly worded that there would be. I wont then explain the further incompetence over 2 more replies from their CS there after in complaint of their inconsistencies on that either... just suffice to say I got good reason to believe that there will be people with little or not early access time.

[Deleted]

The problem is...even with those possible additiional 2 days, there seem to be people who are yet to be satisfied. We had on guy in the German Forum whoi was complaining his ass off, because he felt pretermitted since he wasn't sure about this Game and only preordered AFTER the 2 Beta-Weekends and his "gullible" Friends preordered right when it was available. Now he is blaming BioWare that he may not get in too early because they made too few advertisement for ToR when the Pre-Order Phase began.

[Neofate]

I was all over SR's tweets today, have a thread on the important ones.

I know the exact tweets you refer too when people asked in various ways if they ordered now would it be worth it.. what they would get and so on. He said "You will get at minimum 1 day."

That is exactly his words.

Now this is a bit of smoke and mirrors like everything else that goes on around these parts..

He can't give up any definitive time frames for anyone because this EA is very much playing it 'by ear'. If things go well, we could see people in much faster than anticipated. If for some reason things go poorly.. then not so well.

I asked him personally, and asked what the 'average' person would have in terms of access. He said there "was no average person. But that people will be happy."

There is a tweet that makes it sound good for any that can be turned the other way.

I am not saying you are wrong, I am right -- I am saying this is my positive side of the way I see things from the past few months.. and I tend to really believe my 'general' theories on how this will occur give or take a day,..

There will not be people without early access who pre-order. It just won't happen. I think you will be surprised how things work in come Tuesday into Wednesday. In a good way.

As for the grace period, I totally agree. That was an epic failure on all accounts.

The only reason anyone can come up with is so people who cancel pre-orders and 'don't pay for the game' can't free load past launch date. But I've beat that horse to death. If they are going to stick to it, well they are. We have to deal with it. Doesn't mean we forget, not by a long shot.

Further SR doesn't make any real decisions. He is the senior liasion, .. the guy who talks to US... relays info -- and fields general questions without giving away specifics.

He takes the info given to him, and gives it to us in his 'own' way. Which he is not bad at.

People blame him for the whole grace period, I don't think he ever wanted to go back on his 'word'. I think he HAD to. He doesn't make the call to allow a grace period ... he isn't even close in that chain.

[Mavecryst]

Does anyone know of the approximate timing for the first wave of EGA?

[Deleted]

Iirc the EGA starts at 1300 GMT

[terrahero]

Pretty much what i expected. They keep the 1 day early access at a minimum, as they described "a worst case scenario". They said before that this "worst case scenario" is if a natural disaster strikes the server park or something of that sorts.

If things go smoothly i expect most, if not all, pre-orders to be playing over the weekend before the release. And only if something goes terribly wrong, they will tone down the entry. And even then they want to guarantee atleast 1 day of early-access.

[Sanguinesun]

I was all over SR's tweets today, have a thread on the important ones.

I know the exact tweets you refer too when people asked in various ways if they ordered now would it be worth it.. what they would get and so on. He said "You will get at minimum 1 day."

That is exactly his words.

Now this is a bit of smoke and mirrors like everything else that goes on around these parts..

He can't give up any definitive time frames for anyone because this EA is very much playing it 'by ear'. If things go well, we could see people in much faster than anticipated. If for some reason things go poorly.. then not so well.

I asked him personally, and asked what the 'average' person would have in terms of access. He said there "was no average person. But that people will be happy."

There is a tweet that makes it sound good for any that can be turned the other way.

I am not saying you are wrong, I am right -- I am saying this is my positive side of the way I see things from the past few months.. and I tend to really believe my 'general' theories on how this will occur give or take a day,..

There will not be people without early access who pre-order. It just won't happen. I think you will be surprised how things work in come Tuesday into Wednesday. In a good way.

As for the grace period, I totally agree. That was an epic failure on all accounts.

The only reason anyone can come up with is so people who cancel pre-orders and 'don't pay for the game' can't free load past launch date. But I've beat that horse to death. If they are going to stick to it, well they are. We have to deal with it. Doesn't mean we forget, not by a long shot.

Further SR doesn't make any real decisions. He is the senior liasion, .. the guy who talks to US... relays info -- and fields general questions without giving away specifics.

He takes the info given to him, and gives it to us in his 'own' way. Which he is not bad at.

People blame him for the whole grace period, I don't think he ever wanted to go back on his 'word'. I think he HAD to. He doesn't make the call to allow a grace period ... he isn't even close in that chain.

I dont blame Reid except in his being a rep for EA. I blame EA for the pile of continuing incompetence. When things reach a head Im sure he'll be one of the first too to polish his resume, along with some senior design person. Its how many mmo's these days run .

As I said though, ultimately they will never be held accountable for their dirtiness, especially in the short run. In the long run even if things become so abyssmally bad with people leaving the game in unprecidented numbers later, they'll have still turned a significant profit from the venture, that's also how games roll these days, its not about retention but a revolving door.

---------- Post added 2011-12-12 at 06:51 PM ----------

The problem is...even with those possible additiional 2 days, there seem to be people who are yet to be satisfied. We had on guy in the German Forum whoi was complaining his ass off, because he felt pretermitted since he wasn't sure about this Game and only preordered AFTER the 2 Beta-Weekends and his "gullible" Friends preordered right when it was available. Now he is blaming BioWare that he may not get in too early because they made too few advertisement for ToR when the Pre-Order Phase began.

Early access just isnt really an issue. The bait and switch they did with the grace period and consistency of access, plus their essentially having lied and through multiple different ways(ie Reid, customer service emails, etc) and the general patronizing manner their customer service has already been treating people: all -very- normal EA standards and practices.

[Dammagia]

As before, when your Early Game Access begins will be determined based on when you redeemed your pre-order code. You will be emailed on the day you are being admitted to Early Game Access to confirm you can now access the game.

This kinda sucked tbh, I preordered my early access from Play.com weeks ago, but hadn't had a pre-order code, so had to cancel it when they announced this and buy from Origin to get the code.

Only orders from origin got their code immediately

However, I cannot fault them for staggering it, that made a lot of sense, just the way they dealt with preorders through anyone but Origin has been handled badly.

[gabrield]

This kinda sucked tbh, I preordered my early access from Play.com weeks ago, but hadn't had a pre-order code, so had to cancel it when they announced this and buy from Origin to get the code.

Only orders from origin got their code immediately

However, I cannot fault them for staggering it, that made a lot of sense, just the way they dealt with preorders through anyone but Origin has been handled badly.

I ordered from Amazon and received my code immediately.

[-oz-]

Only orders from origin got their code immediately

Not True. I ordered from Amazon and got my code 1 min after the order confirmation came through.

[Idoru]

Iirc the EGA starts at 1300 GMT

12.00 GMT (Noon), 13.00 Central Europe.

[Deleted]

The only thing that annoys the piss out of me is that i had to pay 5 euro's (The recite said 49,99 for the game and 5,00 for early access + color stone) while apparently Americans got their 5 DOLLARS back.

[Zannis]

Listen, I don't normally admit this to many people, but time travel does exist, people from the future hide in plain sight everywhen and everywhere, and we will occasionally risk sounding like batshit loons to give people a hint on things to come.

Everyone in this thread will be playing by the 14th. Except Sanguinesun. Sanguine, you're going to slip and fall in about 5 hours and break your arm. You'll start playing when you get back from the hospital, but won't be able to REALLY get into it until the cast comes off in late January.

[Nier]

The only thing that annoys the piss out of me is that i had to pay 5 euro's (The recite said 49,99 for the game and 5,00 for early access + color stone) while apparently Americans got their 5 DOLLARS back.

No we don't get the $5 back. It is just being subtracted from the actual full cost of the order. For eg. if you pre-ordered DDE, which is $79.90, you're paying $5 at the time you place the order, then $74.90 on 16th (digital ordered are charged on the 16th). It works exactly the same was as for you guys.

---------- Post added 2011-12-12 at 06:50 AM ----------

About early access, I guess the reason behind providing additional 2 days is to tier out people more easily. If you had just 5 days, maybe (for example) those that ordered in Nov and last week probably have gotten just 1 early access day. But with 7 days maybe those that ordered in Nov will get 2-3 days at least and those that ordered last week get 1-2 days.

But yeah, their decision about no grace period sucks pretty bad, especially with holidays looming around.