fuel-blocks
Latest
EVE Evolved: Returning EVE to the Crucible
When EVE Online launched in 2003, it was a barren game without many of the comforts we enjoy today. The user interface was abysmally worse than today's (if you can imagine such a thing), players with cruisers were top dog, and practically the only activities were mining or blowing up miners. The culmination of years of hard work by a small indie studio, EVE Online sold almost entirely on its future potential. When I was introduced to the game by an excited friend in early 2004 during the Castor expansion, he encouraged me to get in on the ground floor because he believed the game was going to be huge. Years later, I find myself introducing the game to thousands of readers on the same premise. EVE's continual success over the years transformed a fresh-faced CCP Games into a multinational game development giant. And yet, for all that growth and all the updates to EVE over the years, the fact that the game sells largely on future potential is still firmly embedded in both players and developers. Players subscribe not only because they like the game but because they want to support development to reach EVE's true potential. Two years with very little iteration on existing features sent the message that developers weren't trying to reach that potential, but it seems that trend is soon to be completely reversed. With the newly announced Crucible expansion, CCP will be adding countless small features, graphical updates and iterations that put EVE firmly back on the path to reaching its full potential. In this week's EVE Evolved, I look at CCP's plans to return EVE to the crucible and reforge it into something awesome. Those waiting for the third part of my look at the new player experience can catch that in next week's column, as Kajatta is enjoying his final week in EVE before delivering his verdict.
EVE dev blog outlines starbase-related tweaks
Oh those crazy CCP devs! Not too long ago the company was hell-bent on steering EVE Online down the microtransaction dress-up path, and now the folks behind the sci-fi sandbox are posting spaceship-centric blog updates on a daily basis. The title of the latest feel-good entry is Starbase Happy Fun Time (we kid you not), and it's all about introducing the changes that are appearing in advance of CCP's planned starbase revamp. CCP Greyscale gives us the skinny on tweaks to jump bridges, timers, and fuel blocks, and all of the adjustments are being made with an eye towards increasing capsuleer quality of life across the board. If the balance change theme sounds somewhat familiar, it's because CCP is making a habit of saying all the right things lately.
