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Changes to custom alliance logos in EVE Online
One of the nicer aspects of establishing an alliance identity in EVE Online is that you're not stuck with the standard mix-and-match of graphics to create a logo. You can submit your own custom image which then becomes your alliance logo, viewable in-game. EVE dev CCP Loktofeit stated that there are now going to be changes with the Alliance Logo System which should cut down on the time between submission and when your logo is visible in-game.Unfortunately, as this new submission process goes into effect, any alliance that has submitted their logos but have not yet received approval will need to re-submit. Loktofeit said, "All previous submissions have been purged form the database in preparation for the new system." If this situation affects you or your alliance, you'll need to review the updated submission criteria, and read up a bit on the new submission/review/acceptance processes as well, which are detailed in CCP Loktofeit's dev blog and being discussed on the forums.
EVE's new Weapon Grouping feature explained
Weapon Grouping is one of the new features coming to EVE Online, via the multi-staged release of the Quantum Rise expansion. Players spotted and have been giving updates on what they've seen on the Singularity test server, but now EVE dev CCP Ytterbium has posted a dev blog that explains this new feature in great detail, right down to screengrabs of Weapon Grouping in action. If you've been waiting to hear more about this, you'll want to check out CCP Ytterbium's dev blog, 'Weapon Grouping', for his visual explanation of how you'll soon be able to consolidate your weapons into a single icon, and reload all of them at once. He also lays out the scenarios when you wouldn't want to take advantage of this feature, like when attacking multiple targets (although there's a solution to that built into the feature). Additionally, he's written a lengthy FAQ that should help dispel some of the confusion surrounding Weapon Grouping.
EVE Online forum revamp may lead to disappearing threads
The last week or so in EVE Online has seen the forums set ablaze with Ghostbusters references, but now it may be some threads which are disappearing. CCP Wrangler posted a note about this today on the EVE site, reminding us of a dev blog from August, Forums Refined, which had stated that some significant changes to the forums were on the way. Well, as anyone who's logged into the official EVE Online forums today found out, those changes have arrived. While it'll take a little time to get used to the new layout and categorization of topics, there may be an issue with players not being able to find their old threads, some of which have been moved with the forum revamp. CCP Wrangler addressed the potential confusion this might cause, and had this to say: "If you had a thread that has disappeared due to these changes, for example if the forum no longer exists, please contact us by creating a petition in the Other Issues - Forums category. Please include a direct link to the thread in question if you have one, otherwise you have to include as much information about the thread as possible to help us find it. The name of the forum, the name of the thread and anything else you can remember would be very helpful."
Live dev blog with EVE Online Senior Producer, October 23
Given all the EVE Online news of the past two weeks, not limited to new features being added to the game and old 'features' being taken away, CCP Games has announced a Live Dev Blog for tomorrow, October 23, at 20:00 GMT. The event is expected to last for about one hour. This time, the Senior Producer of EVE Online, CCP t0rfifrans, will be fielding questions from the players. As with the last few live dev blogs, the way this works is you need to post in the announcement thread with the questions you'd like answered. You can listen to the dev blog tomorrow by joining the in-game channel 'Live Dev Blog' and enabling EVE Voice via your right-click options once you're in. No doubt there will be a wave of Ghost Training nerf questions but it seems unlikely that this issue will be addressed any more beyond the two dev blogs on the matter. Then again, why should that stop you from trying if you've got legitimate concerns? But this would also be an excellent time for people to get Walking in Stations (Ambulation) questions answered as CCP is prepping a playable demo of it for Fanfest attendees, not to mention asking about new ship models like the Orca capital industrial ship.
The EVE Performance Group
"CCP fix lag nao!!" That's essentially what this writer has been hearing from players since he began EVE Online, and most assuredly it was being uttered long before that. Whether it's a typical forum whine or something much more clever, the message remains the same: Players really want to have fleet battles with several hundred people at once. After all, the shardless galaxy that players populate, in theory, should allow for that. But in practice, lag can turn such engagements into a slide show. Is it unrealistic to assume that 1000-player fleet battles will ever be a reality in EVE? Time will tell. Still, you'd think that CCP Games didn't care about wiping out lag from much of what you read on the forums. They're making some inroads with their new server technologies and ongoing initiatives to improve performance, but players still wonder what goes on behind the scenes. The latest in the recent blitz of dev blogs from CCP Games comes from CCP Tanis, "Introducing: the EVE Performance Group," and is an attempt to explain how this group of developers works to make EVE "run better, faster, and smarter." CCP Tanis lays out how they using monitoring, profiling, and debugging tools to try and reduce server load and increase performance.
CEO of CCP Games addresses EVE's continuity through turbulent times
Recent world events and their impact on global finance threaten to have dramatic consequences on the game industry. While an economic downturn isn't something to be taken lightly, it is unique in comparison with similar problems in the past -- now real world economic issues can potentially ripple into virtual economies, just as they certainly impact the companies who create MMOs and virtual worlds. CCP Games, founded in Reykjavik, Iceland, is a case-in-point. There has been commentary and speculation among EVE Online's playerbase and in the media about how Iceland's economic woes may impact the game. The CEO of CCP Games, Hilmar V. Pétursson, (aka CCP Hellmar) addresses these concerns in his dev blog, "Born Global."
Quarterly Economic Newsletter for EVE Online released
EVE Online is unique among MMOs in that its economy is so complex and dynamic that CCP Games hired an economist, Dr. Eyjólfur Guðmundsson, to keep track of how the market evolves. One would imagine this is no easy task, with an overall trade value of all EVE markets ranging between 2 and 2.5 trillion isk per day. Lead Economist CCP Dr. EyjoG released a Quarterly Economic Newsletter (QEN) for EVE Online today, which is 18 pages full of data which should keep EVE's market and industry-oriented players happy (and hopefully make up for the delayed QEN, which Dr. EyjoG addresses in his announcement). The Q1 2008 QEN kicks off with an editorial, and here are some brief highlights of what follows: Demographics (number of accounts, most and least populated regions) Price Level Changes (Mineral prices, Primary Producer Price Index, Secondary Producer Price Index, and Consumer Price Index) Mining ship production and losses (with the venerable "Hulk" exhumer losses accounting for a staggering 6 trillion isk in destroyed property in Q1 2008) Market Snapshots Five years of EVE Market history If you're interested in reading the Q1 2008 economic newsletter, you'll find the download link to the PDF in Dr. EyjoG's dev blog. A discussion of his findings is already underway on the EVE forums.
Changes to combat and contracts in EVE confirmed by devs
New changes to EVE Online seem to be on the way as reported by players on the test server, and confirmed by CCP Games developers on the forums: weapon grouping and contract refinements, in addition to the previously-reported certificates. Having several high slots of weapon turrets and needing to change ammo types mid-combat has likely frustrated most EVE players at some point. Now, it seems that it'll be possible to link up weapons systems (turrets and launchers only, at first), simplifying reloads and ammo swaps. EVE dev CCP Ytterbium says, "This feature allows players to group weapons together into one slot. From there you can swap all ammo at once without doing the usual ritual of right-click gun 1, load ammo, right-click gun 2, load ammo again etc..." He does caution that the feature is nowhere near ready to go live on Tranquility, and should be considered a work in progress. More information on this feature (which is a welcome change for many EVE players) will be detailed in a future dev blog, he said.
Certificates and medals coming to EVE Online
Most players who've been drawn to EVE Online enjoy the game for its complexity. For such gamers, complexity in a title can be a strength, not a drawback. However, you know what they say about having too much a good thing... Newer players especially find aspects of the game daunting to learn, particularly in terms of skills and skill training plans. This complexity surrounding skills, while not a big deal to veteran players, can be hard to grasp for newer players. Enter "certificates" -- EVE's simplified and (visually) ranked groups of skills that should help rookie players better understand what they should focus on to achieve particular goals. If the feature does what the developers hope, certificates will remedy a problem newer players face -- "an inability to clearly see where a particular skill fits into the greater scheme of things, what it enables, how to get there and where to go next," CCP Greyscale writes in his latest dev blog "Certificates: Planning the Future."
CCP Games kills 'ghost training' on inactive EVE accounts
EVE Online players who habitually 'ghost train' their alts on inactive accounts are about to be given a wake-up call. The myriad options that a player can take in the sandbox game means that training up specialized alts is a common practice. The time-based skill training system in EVE means that higher ranked skills can take well over a month to train to their maximum of level five. When creating a carrier or mothership alt, for example, it's typical to simply, well, not pay $15 for a month when you're not actually playing on that character while your skill training progresses. This isn't limited to capital ship alts though. Many players unsubscribe after queuing up a long skill and resub once skill training is complete. This is how it's always been in the game (at least since this writer began playing), and by all indications is something CCP Games has been well aware of. Those days, as confirmed in today's announcement from CCP, are over.
EVE Fanfest 2008 PvP Tournament details announced in video
We've mentioned that EVE Online's next PvP tournament will be unusual, featuring a mix of ship combat (as expected) and mining (completely unexpected). The end result promises to be wonderfully chaotic and offers something interesting for players of all types, whether hardcore PvP-er or carebear. In fact, this also creates the new possibility of having industry-focused players giving tournament commentary alongside the PvP veterans, but there's been no word on this to date. While EVE's PvP tournament viewers at Fanfest 2008 can look forward to the pandemonium of coordinating mining lasers with missile fire, it's a safe assumption that the tournament participants themselves would like to know how this is expected to go down. CCP Games now has a video explaining how the tournament will work, and has posted two charts showing the brackets of the EVE Fanfest 2008 PvP Tournament schedule. In fact, devs CCP Mindstar and CCP Claw were filmed randomly drawing teams from a 'hat' and matching them up, which was later solidified into the schedule.
CCP Games updates on Walking in Stations expansion for EVE
The latest EVE Online dev blog comes to us from CCP Eris Discordia. Her post, "Boozing in Stations", deals with the Walking in Stations expansion (formerly known by the much cooler name 'Ambulation'). She states that CCP Games is making good progress on Walking in Stations, but some more feedback from the players is needed: "We are continuously testing, designing, integrating, iterating and polishing on our internal server, but something is missing... the MM part from MMO -- the massively multiplayer part. Our fix? Open up the internal release for the Fanfest attendees so that for a few days our internal release will be public!" As reported earlier, EVE Fanfest 2008 attendees will get to preview Walking in Stations firsthand, well in advance of the expansion's release.She writes that this preview is not a public beta or even an alpha, just that CCP wants to share what they've done with the players. "There is only so much that we can explain through pictures and visual aids. In the end, you need to experience it in order to get a good idea of what we are truly doing." Eris also writes that EVE Fanfest 2008 will have a number of presentations by CCP devs on the Walking in Stations expansion, as well as roundtable discussions. Check out her "Boozing in Stations" dev blog for more info about where the Ambulation... no, Walking in Stations expansion is in terms of its development and what EVE Fanfest 2008 attendees can look forward to.
EVE server upgrades open possibilities for 1000+ player combat
There's been much talk of late about EVE Online's servers and the underlying technology that powers over 5000 solar systems in New Eden. CCP Explorer's latest dev blog, "EVE64", focuses on the tech side of EVE, and discusses StacklessIO, the blade cluster, and the migration of the EVE servers to 64-bit. The server enhancements, while not without some issues, are showing some promise according to CCP Explorer. "This Monday, 29 September, we saw a fleet battle with over 1100 pilots reported in local. Field reports indicate that the fight was quite responsive for the first 10 minutes but then the node 'missed its heart beat'... and was removed from the cluster...," he says. Despite such setbacks, it's good to see that CCP is doing something about the server issues resulting from an ever-increasing number of pilots in New Eden. Player response to this dev blog seems positive, with a few reporting their experiences being in combat with 1100+ players on the official forums, and even more players weighing in on the server changes at Scrapheap Challenge.
EVE dev blog charts much improved customer support experiences
Long petition queues, particularly related to expansions, has long been a problem in EVE Online. These long waits may very well be a thing of the past, according to GM Nova, Senior Game Master for EVE Online. GM Nova's latest dev blog, "Such stuff as dreams are made on," deals with the deployment of the Empyrean Age 1.1 patch in early September, as seen from a Customer Support perspective. "We at Customer Support, being at the front lines so to speak, are in a unique position to judge or evaluate whether a patch was successfully deployed and if ther is any fallout or unexpected problems involved, as the potential torrent of problems are directed at us to pass on," he said.GM Nova points out how that 'torrent of problems' has slowed down to a trickle, using graph data of the Trinity expansion deployment (predictably an insane amount of petitions), the subsequent Empyrean Age 1.0 patch (so smooth they thought their petition system had crashed), and finally Empyrean Age 1.1. The trend evidenced by the graphs is that their patch deployments are becoming less fraught with complications, meaning happier players in the long run. GM Nova goes on to discuss some of the structural changes made to CCP's Customer Support department that improve petition response time, saying,"We are happy to announce that our average petition age is currently two days with most normal requests handled in hours. We hope our efforts shine through in the level of support we are able to offer." Would you agree with GM Nova's assessment, and have your own petitions of late in EVE Online been resolved in a reasonable amount of time?
EVE Evolved: EVE Online's server model
Almost any time a discussion about EVE Online comes up, one way or another we end up talking about the server. EVE Online is unique among today's most popular MMOs for its single-server approach. While most MMOs deal with large number of users by starting up large numbers of separate servers with identical game universes, EVE maintains only a single copy of its game universe on a massive cluster of servers. CCP's decision to go with a server model that doesn't use any sharding or instancing whatsoever has had a major impact on in-game activities and how the game has developed.Server woes:Unfortunately for CCP, maintaining their vision of a single game universe has proven a lot more difficult and costly than anyone anticipated. Working with IBM, the EVE server cluster is maintained in London and is currently the largest supercomputer employed in the gaming industry. Even with this massive power behind the EVE universe, there are still problems as CCP tries to keep the server upgraded ahead of its ever-expanding playerbase.In this article, I discuss the unique gameplay that is possible thanks to EVE's server model, the problems the server currently faces and what CCP is planning to do about it.
EVE Online's first CSM term ending, next approaching
The latest EVE Online dev blog deals with the forthcoming changing of the guard, in terms of the player-elected Council of Stellar Management (CSM). EVE dev CCP Xhagen touched upon the fact that in the nearly 4 months that the first CSM has held office, it became clear(er) to the developers that their own views on some aspects of the game can be differ from how the players see it. While CCP Xhagen didn't list the CSM's accomplishments, he said that some of what the CSM brought to CCP Games won't be implemented until well after the new Council is elected, due to the time it takes to implement changes in the development pipeline. However, some of their efforts "will start to become visible in WAR 1.2 and the winter expansion." He also announced the dates and details for the second Council of Stellar Management, with a few changes made to the rules. CCP Xhagen said, "... the chairman is eligible for the chair-position again should he decide to step down as such and have the CSM vote a new one; 25% of actual voters are required to force a topic up to the CSM; the biggest change is the 21 year age limit to be a valid candidate." In addition, the timetable for the existing CSM stepping down and the newly elected Council moving into their role is as follows:
CCP dev blog addresses lag issues, new features
The latest EVE Online dev blog comes to use from CCP Atlas, and deals with some sweeping changes to that most problematic of systems in the game: Jita. In "A Tale of Two Cities," CCP Atlas makes an analogy between the conveniences of city life and the similar situation of pilots seeking convenience in EVE, often needing to cross through the busy system to reach a destination. CCP's solution is to decentralize Jita from routes between solar systems. In effect, limiting the non-commerce presence in the Jita system, so it can -- hopefully -- continue in its established role as a market hub in New Eden without being a detriment to the players in terms of lag. Once the changes go into effect, players will no longer need to navigate through Jita to reach their destination (namely the Ruomo constellation), nor run agent missions in Jita. That is to say, Jita, as previously announced, will be a dead zone for mission agents; mission runners given missions from agents outside of Jita will not be sent into or through Jita as part of their mission completion.
EVE Online implements temporary population control measures
We mentioned that CCP Games is working on thinning out Local in EVE Online's highsec trade hubs like Jita, but they're also looking into other ways of keeping lag at manageable levels, even if it requires taking temporary (and unpopular) measures. CCP Wrangler announced today that the latest downtime brought with it a new feature to Tranquility: EVE's stargates will check how many players there are in a given solar system and deny access if the system has hit its population limit. The temporary measures are presently being discussed on the EVE Online forums, with a few clarifications and amendments made by the devs. There is some debate as to whether the pop limit affects Jita alone or if it affects all systems in New Eden, but regardless, the devs have stated multiple times that they're working to resolve the population issue. However, if the system population issue expands to other high traffic solar systems in EVE, this could stand to be a serious problem for the larger 0.0 alliances who rely upon their numbers to hold territory. The latest word from the devs states that only Jita is affected by population limits, and that a node crash is responsible for most of the 'traffic advisory' warnings players are receiving about multiple systems being inaccessible. These are some of the issues that can arise in an unsharded MMO, but hopefully the changes to stargates will remain as CCP states: temporary.Update: A hotfix deployed during Monday's downtime removed the system cap from all solar systems except Jita, which now has a player capacity of 1024. CCP Explorer stated that the capacity will be raised over time as they make server adjustments. Ultimately they hope to remove the population limit altogether.
Even NPC agents are running from Jita's lag in EVE
Despite being the most notoriously lag-choked solar system in EVE Online, the teeming trade hub of Jita remains a central destination for all things bought and sold in New Eden. Jita is very much a victim of its own success though, as we said before: "Not a day goes by without an EVE pilot, somewhere, cursing Jita and calling for the system to be nuked." The Need for Speed initiative launched by CCP in 2007 aims at improving both server and client performance, and their latest announcement -- the removal of agents from Jita -- is the latest effort they're using to combat lag. This writer feels you're just begging to have your mission probed out, or you might have a masochistic streak by dealing with Level 4 aggro coupled with Jita lag, but that's not for us to decide.Apparently a number of mission runners use agents in Jita, but according to CCP Wrangler, these players will soon be receiving EVE mails "informing them that the agents are relocating and the date of the downtime when the move will take place. From that point the agents will cease to offer new missions but they will accept ongoing missions, and of course they will resume their normal activities after the move." We'll see how well removing mission runners from the fabric of Jita's lag will improve the situation, but this might be a step in the right direction. The relocation of agents is likely one of a number of steps CCP Games will need to take to deliver smooth gameplay to a playerbase that keeps growing every year, making lag issues more pressing. On the topic of being relocated, have any of you ever gotten stuck in Jita and needed to be moved by a GM?
The great divide between EVE's players and developers
Once upon a time, there was a game about internet spaceships set in a vast galaxy, just waiting to be explored and conquered. It wasn't a huge game in terms of subscribers, in fact it was quite niche, but its small following was devoted. The size of the community allowed the developers to really interact with them and refine the game. The devs were approachable, open, and direct. In many respects, the players and developers were friends. All seemed well in the internet spaceships game, until the player base's numbers grew, and so did the collective din of their voices. The developers soon found they had to be careful about what they said to the players, in case they'd be accused of going back on their word somewhere down the line. At the same time, the game company grew to handle all of these new faces. As with most internet communities, the ever-growing numbers of players became more and more hostile, and the developers grew more and more silent...Then, a developer -- let's call him "t20" -- used his knowledge of the game to cheat a little. Some players received an unfair advantage over others because of this lapse of judgment, and it was revealed publicly. The players became enraged. The developers were embarrassed and apologetic. Many players left the game, or at least loudly professed that they would. Many perceived that the developers, seen as a whole, were untrustworthy. Given how bad this situation was, and seeing no real way to change these perceptions, the game's creators had to accept that this was how things were. The people who built up the game from nothing saw little recourse but to withdraw even further from the very community which was so vital to their success. Does our story end there?
