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One Shots: The Amarr 1,000 days memorial
Today we actually have a really great explanation of just what was going on in the EVE Online screenshot above. Since Rodj Blake, CEO of PIE (Praetoria Imperialis Excubitoris) was kind enough to send a full description, we're turning it over to him! Last Sunday, players of EVE Online gathered in the Amarr solar system to commemorate a thousand days since the death of Emperor Doriam II. Various members members of the Amarr RP community gave speeches whilst outside the main station in the system (the Emperor Family Academy) a fleet of around seventy Amarrian ships gathered. This image showshow part of the fleet (led by two Navy Issue Apocalypse-class battleships and a Paladin-class Marauder) in close up, orbiting the station line astern. Do you have screenshots of either player-run or GM-run events? If so, we'd love to see them. Just send them to us here at oneshots AT massively DOT com. Your screenshots could be the next ones featured here!%Gallery-9798%
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Products of Iceland: Interaction and Evolution
Our time spent plugging away in the virtual world is supposed to fun and inviting. If not, we all tend to feel like rabbits in a cage wishing to experience the world beyond those iron bars. Bearing the light of hope for those of you in a similar situation enters one of the leading brains behind EVE, Reynir Harðarson. "Yes, the key, we still believe, is human interaction. People should really feel it," he continues, "they're not just playing a game...." Remember that innovation in MMOs thing we were talking about? Reynir believes that creating interaction and evolving an MMO are what will drive a game to be successful. The nice thing about that is he fully intends to ensure his new project, World of Darkness, adopts that tantalizing philosophy."It's strange," Reynir offers, "that with so many games that [developers] create it, launch it, perhaps create a couple of expansions and then work on the sequel. These games do not grow. We don't want to think of it that way, we want to keep evolving." To our ears, that's good news! We don't know about you, but we're all feeling the group hug right about now. Ahem. Moving right along.It is wonderful to see a developer that passionate about the worlds he creates. By offering players not only the community they seek, but ensuring that the game evolves and interacts with it, the experience generated should be far more enjoyable. [via CrazyKinux]
Operatives and PvP in The Agency
A new preview for SOE's The Agency has popped up in the wild. It's a quick look at the upcoming spy-inspired MMO, but there are a couple very interesting subjects that it covers. One of these subjects is on the PvP element and how the developers want it to be optional, but still something players will try out. Their hope is that once cautious players have tried The Agency's PvP and seen that it's not a punishing experience, they will decide to take part in the activities. A lofty goal, trying to create a friendly PvP enviornment -- but one that we think is admirable. If they manage to pull it off, then we'll be right there to experience some of that ego-friendly gameplay.
Five MMOs better than World of Warcraft - Part 4
Big spaceships floating in space, mining rocks. That's CCP's EVE Online? If killing ten buzzards in Westfall is WoW, than mining rocks is EVE. EVE doesn't have cute characters or impressive armor, because your avatar isn't playing the game – YOU are. EVE Online is the first MMO we can think of where you can actively play the game on bulletin boards and email and phone calls – the universe of EVE is the universe of its players. It's a game that can draw you into its community and make the shifting alliances, broken promises and triumphant deals of its world as real as the evening news. The technical specs are pretty impressive as well. A single shard, every EVE player plays in your world, any EVE story you may have heard of, happened to the people you can see online. Fortunes can be made or lost in an instant. And you don't ever have to fire upon an enemy ship. You can stay in the safe sectors and work on researching, inventing and producing new goods; a killing made in the economy can be more powerful than a dozen battle cruisers.Split among over a hundred servers, WoW's community is fractured. By its very design, it cannot form a single community which can affect, and be affected by, every player. If you have ever wanted to play a game with an economy studied and shaped by real economists, where all the content is made and run by players, a true world limited only by whatever you can imagine – you need to play EVE Online. Plus, it's the only game on this list which works as well under Linux and OS/X as on Windows, something it shares with World of Warcraft. Find out which MMO we think has better casual, fun & stylish gameplay than WoW ==>>
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Put your money where your mouth is
With EVE continuing to amaze economic researchers due to the complexity of its economic system, I decided it would be a good idea to unload my turrets, dock, and see what it was all about. I created a trader, trained up a little, and began to wrap my hands around any resources I could hog.I was extraordinarily excited to see how my trading schemes were unfolding. I had cornered the market in a distant part of space and found a niche for hybrid turrets in empire. Wars were brewing, weapons were loading, and I was there to supply the means for the universe to unload a torrent of lead, light, and explosives. With my low sec hangar out of stock I assumed sales were going well. However, something was wrong with my inventory in empire space. There was nothing in my hangar. Just as I had suspected; outbid by a penny.
EVE Avatars come alive, for a price
EVE is peculiar compared to many MMOs in that the only real attachment players have to their in-game avatars (at least until the Ambulation feature comes out, that is) are the simple character portraits that they choose when first rolling a new toon. As you might expect, most people grow rather attached to their portrait over those longs hours spent mining and ratting, and as logically follows, there's a pretty high crossover in the use of these portraits as forum avatars.So when we stumbled on a recent blog post highlighting the creation of enhanced, animated EVE avatars, we couldn't look away. Evidently, a player going by the name of Copter Pilot is creating these bite-sized animated recreations, complete with the player's choice of creepy emotes. All you need to do is give him your character name and email address and he'll send you along an animated avatar in four different sizes. You don't even have to pay him in cash -- he's charging 20 million isk for the service.
What EVE's virtual economy can teach us about real economies
The work of Dr. Eyjólfur Guðmundsson has been discussed quite a bit online, but offline citizens of our planet have probably never heard of his work monitoring EVE Online's incredible economy. Scientific American aims to change that with an article entitled "What Can Virtual-World Economists Tell Us about Real-World Economies?" Dr. Guðmundsson lays out the basics of his work for folks unfamiliar with online economies, explaining how the vagaries of spaceflight can effect the price of, say, light drones or mining lasers.It's probably a bit low-key for hardcore EVE players, and even folks who have played a fantasy title's Auction House will have the gist. Still, it's always interesting to listen to 'Eyjó' hold forth on online economics. The passion the people behind EVE feel for their micro-world is tangible, and it's great to see some of that passion being made available to the masses.
One Shots: Weekend ratting
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/pc_games/EVE_Online_ratting_week_end_over_at_Massively_com'; As you may already know, we've been looking for a few good pilots to join our ranks here at Massively. The competition has been extremely tough, but we're almost at the end of the process. (Thank you for those who have been hanging in there!) To relax, some of us have been hanging out in EVE, enjoying many of the different aspects of game-play. Today's One Shot comes from one such (noob) adventure -- mine! This was taken while running a mission in Minmatar space, with a pile of rats bearing down on me, and a mining colony to save. Also: yum, lots of salvage.Do you have a great screenshot of Corp war, or of something equally exciting sitting in your screenshot folder gathering virtual dust? Why let it languish? Send those screenshots on to us at oneshots@massively.com along with whatever information you'd like to tell us about the scene in the picture. It could be here next. Until then, fly safe!%Gallery-9798%
The Daily Grind: In-game cash for subscriptions?
I know what some of you are thinking: gold for game time? That's just nuts. I'd probably have thought so myself, save that EVE Online does something like this with players buying time codes to trade for in-game ISK. That way the player who has extra in-game cash laying around can get some "free" gametime, and those who would normally buy game currency are able to do so in a fashion that appears to be more socially acceptable. The potential ramifications for the unethical/unapproved RMT dealers could be huge. Why buy gold from them when you can buy it from another player with the game company's blessing, and know for absolute sure that you'll actually get the in-game cash.With all that said, what do you think? Do you think that a game like World of Warcraft could benefit from the in-game cash for time-codes system that CCP has in place for EVE? If you could get playtime for cashing out game currency, would you do it? If companies offered the chance for players get in-game currency for a time-code they purchase to trade to another player, do you think it might stop those who normally would just buy from a gold farmer?
The architects of EVE society talk player elections
The Game Developer's Conference is a fantastic time to get under the surface of new announcements and game concepts. At GDC, the newest and greatest element in CCP's EVE Online – the one everyone wanted to talk about – was the ambulation system coming soon to a space station near you. Unfortunately the only place the developers of the unique single-server space title were willing to talk about that was 'on-stage' during a session. We covered that session and so we knew there was no way we were getting it any better than that ... but with some time free in the busy CCP schedule we still had the chance to ask some questions. So instead CCP CEO Hilmar Petursson, EVE Online's very own in-house economist Dr. Eyjólfur "Eyjo" Guðmundsson, and Community Researcher/Developer Petur Oskarsson gathered around a small table in their jet-black show booth to answer some questions about a slightly more esoteric subject: the Council of Stellar Management. Earlier today we brought you the general details, but this afternoon we have the word straight from the researcher's mouth. Why set up a governing body? What are the benefits? How does this tie into CCP's economic research mandate? And ultimately ... what does it mean for you as a player? Read on to find out.
Elections for EVE's player council begin in May
MMO players have long regarded the depths of EVE Online as a unique environment - in many ways a unique experience far removed from the simpler plots and machinations of fantasy games. EVE society is typified by vicious politics, corporate skulduggery -- and now democratic elections. The Council of Stellar Management (CSM), announced at last November's CCP Fan Fair, is set to be the first democratically elected body representing the citizens of an online game. They'll have direct contact with the developers and a voice in how the future of EVE plays out.More details have become available as CCP lays out the groundwork for the elections to begin! The call for candidates began yesterday, so if you're thinking about making the jump into politics now is the time to act. Candidate entries will no longer be accepted past April 1st, which gives players about a month to campaign for their cause. Elections will begin on May 5th, run for two weeks, and we should know who the first members of the Council are as of May 21st. For full details CCP has put up a pair of PDFs on the program, one laying out the background and reasons for the creation of the CSM, and the other offering up a summary of the Council's functions.Stay tuned later today for our interview with CCP CEO Hilmar Petursson, EVE economist Dr. Eyjólfur Guðmundsson, and Community Researcher/Developer Petur Oskarsson all about this unique project!
Post your interstellar rsum at EVE Careers
The second episode of the Drone Bay podcast directed listeners to check out a website called EVE Careers, a sort of Monster.com or Career Builder for players of EVE Online. There are sections where both pilots and corporations (EVE's equivalent to player guilds) can post ads to connect with one another.As the hosts of the Drone Bay noted, one of the big challenges for new players in EVE (and even experienced players, in certain circumstances) is finding a good corp to join. While it's possible to get by on your own to some extent in EVE, you'll be missing out on ... well, pretty much everything interesting about the game if you aren't part of one. EVE Careers presently has an almost 70-page list of corporations for you to check out, making it one of your best bets if you've been going it alone.CCP CEO Hilmar Petursson told the New York Times a while back that EVE is different from other games like World of Warcraft because it's not just a game, it's a society -- at least, to a greater extent than WoW-types are. With its quarterly economic reports from the CCP Fed, its Council for Stellar Management, and now this player-run job board website, that's tough to argue with, even though there are forums for guild-finding in other games as well.[Via Drone Bay]
EVE Trinity: Preliminary "Boost Patch" notes
Most EVE Online players are heavily anticipating Tuesday's patch, one that is so massive in size it is bound to take over your computer and brick it. Surely, I jest. The unlucky few that won't ever be satisfied or pleased are Amarr players. I can't say I blame them, during an older EVE live-dev blog the devs insinuated the miracle patch would fix everything. "High-five guys, this is going to be so awesome that even the Amarr players will shoot space rainbows from their asses." That's not an exact quote, but I remember the overall tone from the developers being very enthusiastic. With such a huge patch CCP wants to make sure that every change listed makes it in this installment. The notes were pulled from the official site until further notice. That's not stopping us from posting them anyway. If you'd like to get a jump start on reading there's over 7 thousand words to mull over after the jump. Disclaimer: the following notes are preliminary. The notes might see various changes, but I'm sure these are solid. The final notes should be published on the EVE site sometime tomorrow.
EVE gets a Boost on Tuesday
In case you've been too busy ratting, mining, or you've been offline training up those long-duration skills, we thought we'd point out that there's a new patch for EVE Online coming this Tuesday. The patch, called "Boost", is chock full of database fixes from what we've been given to understand. Sadly, the patch notes aren't currently out according to the official thread, or we'd have them for you here.As to why they're doing such a long downtime this Tuesday, Erlendur S. Thorsteinsson, EVE's Software Director, jumped out to answer:
Expressing concerns for EVE Online's player-elected council
As a game developer, CCP has always been the type to do things in a rather unconventional way -- especially when it comes to how they choose to interact with their community. So it's safe to say their approach to dealing with public relations disasters -- such as the now-infamous T20 incident involving a CCP dev -- was going to be interesting. Their decision ended up being the formation of a player-elected council that would serve as a sort of advisory group to the CCP team.Well, Bitter Old Noob was kind enough to give a rundown on this new-fangled idea of putting a bit of democracy into our massively games. The whole post reads as decidedly concerned for what could essentially turn into a popularity contest with the wrong people getting elected and the possibility for CCP to stop listening to non-council players -- it's a valid concern. We'll just have to wait and see, though.Voting apparently begins in May, which gives players interested in earning one of the nine spots on the council time to start campaiging. We'll be keeping tabs on how this all ends up, because this the most extreme case of a developer trying to listen to the voice of their player-base.
BBC talks to EVE's economist
The good folks over at the BBC have a writeup centered around EVE Online's very own economist, Dr. Eyjo Guðmundsson, also known as the guy CCP has hired to keep an eye on EVE's economy and to make parallels between money movements in the real and virtual worlds. There's not too much new information in there -- the good Doctor talks a little bit about the player council that will soon be introduced in EVE, and lets us in on some of academic ties to his work in the virtual universe, but as an overview of why EVE's economy is so special (even for players playing other games), it's a good read.And it should also relay just how important it is to have someone watch what's happening in the economy of a virtual world. Innovations like the new "Gross User Product" statistic that Dr. Guðmundsson and his colleagues are working on in EVE will not only help other developers learn a lot more about how to stimulate and develop virtual economies, but could very well have applications in real-world economies as well. Could a recession be avoided because of a market tweak that's experimented on in worlds like EVE? Perhaps, and if so, Dr. Guðmundsson will likely be the one to find out.
GDC08 Highlights: Eve Online, FusionFall and Lego Universe
EVE Online Eve Online talks new ships and avatarsCCP's Senior Technical Producer Torfi Frans Olafsson had a lot to say about EVE Online's upcoming space station environments. At present, EVE's player characters are little more than still portraits -- in the playable portion of the game you are primarily represented as your ship, which you can use to navigate and explore the game world. Players will one day have the ability to exit their ship and interact with other characters as a human avatar. We still don't have an exact release date, but we scored the details on the proposed gameplay and development process. %Gallery-16525%
EVE Online on Steam now
Originally slated for a February 2008 release, EVE Online's debut on Valve's Steam service only barely squeaked in late on the 29th of February. Nevertheless, EVE Online: Trinity is available on Steam right now now, currently priced at US$14.95 (including the first month). There's also a 21 day free trial available for those of you wanting to get a feel for CCP's popular space-based MMO - and it won't make your system unbootable. You'll need to have six gigabytes of hard-drive space available for steam to install it, so now's as good a time as any to tidy up the old hard-drive.
CCP releases EVE QEN, says 250k subs by Q2, and plans Gross User Product report
CCP has released their Quarterly Economic Newsletter for the 4th quarter of last year in EVE Online, and the word is "growth." They saw big increases in trade volume and value all over the place on the market. Which isn't surprising, considering how much their population surged late last year, thanks in large part to the well-received Trinity expansion. And the growth isn't done -- CCP expects to see 250,000 subscribers by the end of Q2 2008.There are lots of great numbers in here -- apparently only 9% of players are out in low sec space (much lower than I'd thought). Jita is still a madhouse (no duh -- you'll already know that if you've ever tried to go in there on a weekend). Finally, they've introduced a new tracking variable, called Gross User Product, that is the value of all services and goods produced in a period of time, minus the amount of goods and services consumed. In other words, a GDP, but for a virtual world. They don't have a figure yet (because it has to be tracked over a period of time), but the next QEN should have some even more interesting information on how we might track virtual economies in MMO games.
GDC08: EVE Online's space stations
In this morning's first panel, CCP's Senior Technical Producer Torfi Frans Olafsson had a lot to say about EVE Online's upcoming space station environments. At present, EVE's player characters are little more than still portraits -- in the playable portion of the game you are primarily represented as your ship, which you can use to navegate and explore the game world. Initially announced in a 2006 dev blog, EVE will one day have the ability to exit your ship and interact with other characters as a human avatar rather -- we still don't have an exact release date (though at GDC07 they gave a 2008 date, so there's a chance it may be included in the upcoming Kali 4 expansion, about which little is known), but we have some details on the gameplay and the development process after the break.%Gallery-16528%
