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The team at SOE-Austin has passed us an exclusive video review of the most recent big patch to Star Wars Galaxies: Game Update 3. The update introduced major overhauls to the popular Jedi profession, and this short piece will make sure you're on the right page. You can watch and listen as outgoing Community Events guru Jason "Pex" Ryan talks us through the new Jedi expertise. Light Jedi are now fully supported in their role as tanks, while Dark Jedi have the ultimate in DPS abilities.

Click on through below the cut for that video, plus a newly-released video from the official SWG site taking us inside the Exar Kun temple encounter.

The Test Center server was updated yesterday with patch notes for the fourth Game Update to Star Wars Galaxies. This time around Commandos, Officers, and Smugglers are all looking at fairly significant changes. All three classes are popular (as popular as class without a lightsaber can be), but needed some serious overhauls.

Officers now have toggleable group buffs instead of timed ones, making one of their core functions far more utilitarian. They also have two types of rally points now, one offensive and one defensive. Commandos received a rework almost from the ground up, remaking their abilities to be more effective and understandable. Stackable element-based DoTs, all new expertise options, improvements to existing abilities ... GU4 is definitely Commando Christmas.

Smugglers snagged across-the-board tweaks, making their abilities generally mesh more cohesively, and even Bounty Hunters pulled down a few useful changes. Officers, Commandos, and Smugglers will receive free respecs when they log in, allowing them to make use of their new abilities. The update includes a number of smaller tweaks, supporting both the new DoT mechanics and the wearable equipment concealment code. There's even a brand new weapon for the reworked Commandos, the CC-V 'Legion' Cryo Projector. It's always nice to get new toys.

In the wake of the Chapter 9 publish for Star Wars Galaxies, we had the chance to pass a few questions to the game's producer. Lorin "Deadmeat" Jameson has been with the project for some time, weathering the storms as they've come and gone. Today we have his responses, looking back at the impetus for the new Chapter and Update system of patches and ahead to future plans.

Read on below the cut for Mr. Jameson's take on the success of the Exar Kun instance, hints at a new expertise subsystem on level with the Beast Master, and hope for a better future in the Galaxy Far, Far Away. "We have fixed a number of long-standing issues and have added some dynamite new systems and a slew of new content. It is our intention to continue this trend and I expect to be saying the same thing about 2008 in mid-2009. We know we have a lot of work to do to meet our players' expectations for Star Wars Galaxies, but it is a fun challenge to have and we are lucky to have such a committed and loyal fan base."

Very soon the Star Wars Galaxies community will be marking the end of an era. Jason 'Pex' Ryan, the game's event support coordinator, will be moving on to the position of Community Manager for Sony Online's in-development Free Realms. Like the departure of Guild Wars' Gaile Grey, Pex's departure marks a momentous change in SWG's community backdrop. Toiling hard in-game since the early days of Galaxies' live service, Mr. Ryan has always been the puppeteer behind characters like Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, and Darth Vader. His portrayal of these and other characters in the game lead to one of the most unique systems available in any MMO today: the Storyteller system of player-placeable objects and characters.

The announcement of his departure this past week has met with a strong response from the community. Tributes to the man's work have sprung up, remembrances of events that he's run. Others reflect on the numerous event reports that he's put together over the years, a catalog of player-driven events. Others wonder about the ultimate impact that live event support's closure will have on the game. Some forward-thinking players are thinking about this development in regard to next month's momentous anniversary: Star Wars Galaxies turns 5 years old in June. Regardless of the future of the game, Pex moves on to bigger and better things having left a visible impact on the player community. Indeed, his pioneering work in this area may ultimately leave a lasting mark on the genre itself.
Good luck, Mr. Ryan, and best wishes on success with Free Realms.

At this year's Galactic Gathering community event, the team behind Star Wars Galaxies announced big news for the coming year: the battle of Hoth will be added to the game as the next Heroic encounter! The ice planet Hoth was originally seen in the movie Empire Strikes Back. That film has always been in the future of SWG's continuity, and thus perpetually out of reach. The advancement of the game's timeline has been requested by players for years. Even though this isn't a traditional expansion with a full new planet, the implications of moving forward in the Star Wars universe's timeline are endless.

Whether that movement is actually happening is still a question, though, as precious few details were available at the event. The developers did say that the instance will focus around the fight at Echo Base. According to this week's Friday Feature, the Heroic Encounter should feature Snowspeeders, AT-ATs, and snowtroopers - as well as many of the main protagonists from the original Star Wars movies. Other future highlights touch on things we've heard about before: re-confirmation of the Meatlump theme park for Chapter 10, the Droid Commander expertise system, and promises to examine Beast Masters and traders in Game Update 5.

This is some amazing news, with the possibility of some big implications for the game. We'll be sure to keep you posted as we get further details.

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.... Once more into the breach, dear friends. It's time, once again, for another edition of Ask Massively. Some of the more astute readers of this column might already have an educated guess as to what this week's Ask Massively is going to cover. In case you require a well-placed smite from the ol' "Clue-by-Four", read on and gain enlightenment.

Dear Darth Massive,
Why is it that any Role Playing Game set in the Star Wars universe seems to fail miserably? I would think that even a retarded monkey could make a Star Wars based MMORPG successful. Is the franchise jinxed? Is Lucas to blame? Sony has a pretty good track record with MMORPGs, yet every mention I hear of Star Wars Galaxies makes it sound like the worst game ever to hit the shelves. I don't even know what NGE is, but apparently it causes the same reaction in SWG players that garlic and crosses do in vampires.

Help me, Obi Wan Massively, you're my only hope.
-Laura T.

Well Laura, or can we call you Mrs. T? We're not sure how someone can lay claim to "Obi Wan" and "Darth" in the same email, but it seems like a fascinating reference to the duality of the human soul. The answer to your questions are a little more complex than you might think. After the jump, we'll be happy to take a closer look at why the Star Wars franchise appears to have such a difficult time translating to a multiplayer environment.

If you would like to seek knowledge, be smitten by 'Ye Olde Clue-by-Four", or just have an answer to a simple question that has been bugging you for some time, feel free to drop us a line at ask AT massively DOT com or stop by our tipline and let it fly. We now have enough fake "Genuine, Authentic, Honest-to-god" Rolex offers that we are considering becoming an authorized reseller. Please don't send us any more.

Lead designer on Star Wars Galaxies, Blixtev, compares going through the old Damage Over Time code to rummaging through your grandmother's attic. "It's loaded with old junk and it sure smells really bad", he says. Still, that's exactly what the SWG developers are doing as they work to revamp Commando abilities for the upcoming Game Update 4. In some posts to the official forums, Blix talks about opening up moldering trunks and tossing aside ancient silverware to get at the DoT code beneath. "The DoT system is one of our oldest systems, and it sure does some wacktacular things. We found 10 different calculations amoungst 5 functions to determine just the value of absorbtion from armor against DoTs. For folks who don't code, that's alot."

He goes on to describe their upcoming plans for the system, which will spread DoTs to two different abilities and substantially change the way they're applied. After the update they're going to stack up to 10 a piece on a single character, a process that could take some time. Because of this change, DoT removal will change as well. Taking long minutes to apply the full 10-stack to a PC shouldn't be automatically negated by a Medic power. Instead, DoT removal will take away part of the stack, and make the recipient immune to further DoT additions for a short period. Meanwhile, the existing debuff will continue to tick down - harming the character with an element type determined by the Commando's weapon.

A later update indicates that these trials are proving very effective in making the Commando a more fun profession to play, a claim we'll be able to put to the test hopefully very soon.

Both this week and last week the Friday Features on the official Star Wars Galaxies site have been all about the Jedi and their legacy. Last week team artist Christine Chugon walked us through the process of creating the amazing new heroic instance, the Tomb of Exar Kun. Kun was just recently added to the game in the Chapter 9 content patch. Chugon offers up the simple pencil drawing on lined paper that was her starting point, and takes us through the various steps required to bring the maze to life.

This week's Feature is also all about the Jedi's world - this time a walkthrough of the new Expertise tree coming to the class in Game Update 3. The tree is split into two parts, representing the Light and Dark sides of the force. The Light side offers improvements in saber technique, a simple snare or two, and the 'mind trick' ability to confuse/de-aggro an enemy. The Dark side is much more straightforward, offering crit enhancements, the ability to drain life, the force choke snare ability, and the power to throw deadly force lightning. For further discussion of the new Jedi powers, check out the vigorous thread on the official forums.

Star Wars Galaxies Technical Director Tony 'Teesquared' Tyson has been tapped to join the community and design teams, writing regular updates for the players. For his first 'Teesquared technical report', Mr. Tyson introduced the programming team, the gents who work tirelessly on the backend game components for very little recognition.

Considering the often-anonymous role that MMO game developers have on large projects, it's great to see this team individually lauded for their recent contributions. DevH (a popular forum-posting developer) is working on the back-end elements for the Chapter 10 community search feature, for example. The report also sneaks in a nugget of new information: the integration with Vivox planned for all of SOE's games is currently being trial-tested in Star Wars Galaxies by developer CancelAutoRun. It will be interesting to see what future technical reports offer, and whether the programming team can offer SWG players a built-in voicechat experience.

You're playing along in Star Wars Galaxies, enjoying the new content added by the Chapter 9 content patch. They've added a load of new stuff, like the Exar Kun heroic instance and the PvP repeatable collections. But what about the smaller content, the fun value-added stuff that you may not have had the chance to indulge in yet? One of the most entertaining of these smaller pieces of content is the Rattletrap instant travel vehicle. Previously only available to customers of certain SWG boxed sets, the ability to instant travel is most welcome on the game's large, sprawling planets.

But in order to obtain the Rattletrap you need to complete a collection. And who has the time to search the whole galaxy for all those pieces? Worry not, traveler. The devs want you to find this clunker, and they've made it exceedingly easy to do so. Today we're going to make it even easier for you by providing you with an easy guide to obtaining your own Rattletrap instant travel vehicle. If you have your own ship (obtainable for free from any factional flight trainer) this will probably take you all of ten minutes to complete. So let's get started!

This past Friday's featured article on the official Star Wars Galaxies site was all about a brand-new toy. Chapter 9 dropped onto the live servers on Thursday. Alongside the bevy of other content, a brand-new collection was added that ends by obtaining a new instant-travel vehicle called the 'Rattletrap.' Instant travel vehicles have been available for some time now as claimable gifts in retail boxes, but this piece of space trash is available to anyone with the time and keen eyes to find it.

Instant travel toys are one of the clearest departures of the 'new' SWG from the thinking of at-launch Galaxies. The lengthy runs and endless travel times of the pre-vehicle days were notorious. With vehicles and mounts in place for some time, as well as shorter shuttle waits and instant travel vehicles more recent additions, SWG marches forward towards that always-elusive goal of 'Fun'. For full details of the recent Chapter update, make sure to check out our extensively-linked breakdown.

The ninth chapter update to Star Wars Galaxies was released to the live servers yesterday! This chapter is entitled "The Fury of Exar Kun", and continues the SWG team's commitment to regular and targetted content updates. This one, unlike Game Updates 1 and 2, is nothing but a love letter to the players. The official patch notes spell out all the gory details: PvP collections, the Exar Kun heroic instance, improved Storyteller tools ... even the chapter gift (a housing-placeable terminal that lets you track the progress of the Galactic Civil War) is getting a really positive player reaction. For details RPGVault has up a piece giving us the full rundown on the Chapter, from badges to blasters.

With Chapter 9 out and being explored the next content updates are already in the works. Game Update 3 will see much love given to the Jedi and Bounty Hunter classes; the developers are testing the changes to the Jedi and have been sharing some of their play experiences with force-users on the forums. They've also been releasing information on the upcoming Chapter 10 goodies. The next big content drop will see significantly improved player search options, making it that much easier to find a group of fellow adventurers in the Galaxy Far, Far Away.

We've been following the progress of the Star Wars Galaxies team on the upcoming Chapter 9 content update for some time, and patch day shouldn't be too far off now. We've talked about the new PvP collections, discussed fan reaction to the content on the Test server, and it all sounds pretty good. How about a look, though?

All the way back at the beginning of the month we discussed preview information for Chapter 9's setpiece addition: the Exar Kun heroic instance. Today we're going to give you a look inside. Check out the four exclusive screenshots we have of this imposing facility, deep in the heart of a Yavin 4 temple. Built originally by the Massassi race, Kun has now twisted the old stones to his dark will. Looks like a great place for a fight!

The ongoing quest for more content in the galaxy Far, Far Away continues, with producer Lorin 'DeadMeat' Jameson dropping a production letter / state of the game address into the official Star Wars Galaxies forums. Jameson is enthusiastic about the upcoming release of Chapter 9, which entered public testing this past Friday. He invites players to fully test the patch, giving special notice to the much anticipated Exan Kun instance (which will feature some really fantastic rewards), the storyteller blueprint system (screenshots of the system at work are available) and a brand new ITV collection quest.

The next two Game Updates are already in the planning phases, with Bounty Hunters/Jedi scheduled for some tweaking in Update 3, and Commandos/Officers due for Update 4 (finally!).

He also teases the playerbase with hints about what we can expect in Chapter 10. According to Jameson the headliner for next chapter will be the fan-favorite Meatlumps gang. This content will be, amazingly, not for the high level. Instead, level 45-65 characters will feel the love, and face down the dangerous Meatlump gang on their home turf. The next content drop will also see dramatic improvements in the Looking For Group and player search interfaces - tweaks designed to make finding other players less of a challenge on low-population servers. All great news for the average SWG player, and another follow-through with the team's promise to keep the players happy.

The newest content update for Sony Online's Star Wars Galaxies is expected soon, and Chapter 9 promises a world of new and enjoyable content for the players in the Galaxy Far, Far Away. Last week the official SWG site offered up a preview of one of the Chapter's additions: PvP collections. Collections are a great feature, added to the game back in Chapter 7. They allow players to show off their in-game accomplishments in a very deliberate fashion, and these PvP rewards follow much the same lines.

Collections will be opened up for all kinds of PvP activities, including killing factional NPCs, slaying players on the opposing side, and downing officers of varying rank in the Rebel or Imperial forces. PvP collections not only net players swanky additions to their inventory, but have the possibility of earning the PvPer factional rewards above and beyond what they'd normally get. A rare base infiltration collection, for example, could earn a player 2500 faction points for spending/saving as they participate in the Galactic Civil War. We were promised a number of new collections in the upcoming patch, and it will be very interesting to see what other kinds of rewards will be made available post-Chapter 9.