Star Wars Galaxies chapter 8 goes live

The developers of Star Wars Galaxies continue their good works. Just like clockwork and about two months after the release of Chapter 7, Chapter 8 is hitting live servers today. The full patch notes for the release can be found on the official site, but here are some highlights:

• The Nova Orion Station - A two-faction quest hub that will allow players to work through the dodgey politics of the Nova Orion company.
  
• Imperial Star Destroyer Heroic Encounter - The newest group high-level content for the game, the newest encounter pits groups of adventurers against some truly tough opponents.
• New ground-based collections, as well as a space-based collection system.
• Four new ships have been added: the Rebel Incom X4 Gunship, Imperial YE-4 Assault Gunship, Blacksun AEG-77 Vigo Gunship, and the Naboo N-1 Starfighter.
  

There are, of course, numerous other tweaks to the game in this update; two big areas of correction include the User Interface and Waypoints. If you're curious about the process of creating the new ships for the update, make sure and check out System Designer Thomas Eidson's dev blog from just yesterday.

And, of course, thanks to Grizz for reminding us this was happening today. For a taste of the Chapter 8 flavour, go check out his videos of the new ships in flight (with appropriate music to match).