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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.
Real world economic impact on MMOs and virtual worlds?
Given the drastic real world economic shifts of late, is it unreasonable to assume that there will be repercussions in virtual worlds and MMOs? That's the gist of a question posed by CBBC, a longtime commentator at the Terra Nova blog, but specifically he asks: "What now for virtual economies? What happens to EVE now that Iceland's economy is collapsing?... Will my WoW gold be worth more or less? Will games go under taking their value with them? Will we see a run on games the same as a run on banks?" While his questions aren't focused solely on EVE Online, and are more of a general inquiry, CCP's title is not surprisingly the main example cited by both the CBBC and Terra Nova's readers. As expected, the responses to the question are intelligent and shed some more light on how real world economics might affect MMO economies, namely that of EVE Online. Some speculate that real world issues will result in increased escapism, imbuing virtual worlds and their economies with greater significance. Others related financial scenarios that affect CCP Games and its virtual economics. If you're interested in the economies of MMOs and virtual worlds, you might want to get involved in the discussion of "Whither MMO economies?" over at Terra Nova.
EVE Evolved: The cost of failure
The harsh death penalty in EVE Online is something that's talked about a lot. I even touched on the issue myself when I compared EVE Online's style of PvP to Age of Conan and when I investigated the phenomenon of suicide ganking. In EVE, your ship being destroyed means millions of your hard-earned isk is flushed down the drain. If you're unlucky enough not to get away in your escape pod, you'll be killed and recloned, costing yet more isk and destroying any expensive implants in your head. The brutal death penalty associated with PvP in EVE is responsible for putting a lot of players off playing the game but is the taste of death really as bitter as people make it out to be?In this article, I examine the cost of defeat in PvP and how to minimise these costs without ruining your PvP performance.
EVE Evolved: The cost of failure, part 2
As before, this doesn't hold true in EVE Online, where the quality of equipment is a relatively small factor in the outcome of PvP. The main factor in the outcome of PvP is skill, and not the type on your character sheet. Joining a good player corporation that specialises in PvP and learning from them will provide a bigger boost to your effectiveness in PvP than equipment ever could.
A look at the salvaging mini-profession in EVE Online
EVE Online is a game where players don't need to choose a certain class and remain locked into that role as they progress. Essentially, any player can learn to do anything in the game, given enough skill training time and backed by enough isk. Professions in EVE can be freeform and varied, allowing a player to try their hand at a number of different playstyles in the game. One of these 'mini-professions' is salvaging the wrecks of NPCs and other players. Salvaging can be learned in a rather short amount of time, yet can be quite lucrative, especially for a newer player. MMORPG.com's EVE Online correspondent, Andrew Wallace, put together a guide to salvaging, laying out how the game mechanics work, and explaining how he salvages in different scenarios and with what ship fittings. Check out MMORPG.com's Salvaging Guide for Wallace's take on how to reap the greatest rewards from the misfortunes of your fellow EVE pilots.
EVE Evolved: Money for nothing
In most MMOs, making currency without actually playing usually involves rule-breaking macro-farming which risks getting your account banned. In EVE Online, however, a number of viable options exist for making ISK with absolutely no effort. From hiring research and development agents to public investment schemes and even a player-run bank, there are plenty of ways to make ISK in EVE without even logging in.Investment Schemes:In the market discussion forums, players can sell shares in their company and present a business plan to potential investors. The corporation receives ISK in exchange for its shares and agrees to make regular dividend payments to all shareholders. Buyers have to trust that the company owner won't just run off with their ISK, so only the most trustworthy players have managed to successfully start very large investment schemes.In this article, I look at the different ways you can make ISK with virtually no effort, in some cases even if your account is inactive.
The Daily Grind: What's your single most expensive in-game item?
From spending lots and lots of gold on a flying mount in World of Warcraft, to blowing insane amounts of ISK on a rare ship type in EVE Online, there are all manner of expensive items floating around out there just waiting to be purchased. Some folks enjoy spending game cash on cool armor (or dyes to make armor much cooler than it was) or mounts. Others prefer to hoard gold and spend it on other things that are less common like paying other, better-progressed guilds, for runs through certain dungeons to achieve things like epic weapons or even special items like pets or riding mounts. Beyond the most obvious in-game items, you now have microtransaction models, enabling you to spend real-world money on your game trinkets. On top of that, we also have the items that come from things like trading card game codes -- the spectral tiger from WoW being a highly-sought-after example. So what's your most expensive in-game purchase? What item could you just not live without?
EVE Online currency sellers rip off players (shocker)
Well, here we are again... certain people among EVE Online's player base who buy their isk from shady sites are the focus of another dev announcement. GM Grimmi just posted the following: "We have had a number of cases recently with hacked accounts and similar issues and we have found that a lot of them are directly connected with a certain website. This website sells ISK and supposedly EVE Time Codes (ETC), though the ETCs always turn out to be faulty or already used. Players that go to this website and do business with them are running a very high risk of getting keyloggers placed on their system and subsequently having their EVE accounts hacked, and ISK and assets removed. Customer Support cannot correct damages that result from problems with the security of username and passwords. We strongly urge everyone to keep their virus protection up to date and stay away from dodgy ISK seller websites."Here's another novel idea. Admittedly it's a radical concept and some people might not be ready for it: Play the game and stop trying to buy your way to the top. That said, the ability to legitimately buy and sell ETC is supported by CCP Games, but only from the official ETC resellers, paired with a secure system of buying/selling ETC at the EVE website. The incidents that GM Grimmi describes, as have numerous other dev blogs in the past, stem from players shelling out cash for their isk, presumably from those spam bot sites that turn up in popular channels from time to time. Standard practice with the GMs is to give the isk buyer a negative wallet balance and force him or her to claw their way back up to a positive balance; CCP bans sellers but not buyers. But perhaps this is too lenient. Do you think these players should get banned for buying isk? How does your MMO of choice handle players who try to buy their currency and gear?
Rogue Signal: The wonderful world of alts
With EVE Online's time-based skill system of character progression, multiple accounts are pretty commonplace amongst the hardcore and even semi-casual player. CCP even occasionally holds special discounts for the opening of new accounts, called the Power of Two program. EVE is unique in the way that it handles alts, in many ways. Since only one character can be training at a time, and, unlike other MMOs, there is no real end to the training a character will do, if you want to start something new from the ground up, you're going to need to either scrap your existing character, or open up a new account. Today, we'll take a look at how to go about creating an alt.
EVE Online calls RMT evil
GM Grimmi of EVE Online comes out strong against RMT in an official post called 'Real money trading is bad, mkay?' In no uncertain terms, RMT activities are said to be linked to keyloggers, phishing sites, and hacking attempts, and lead to real-world illegal activities like fraud and theft. Grimmi then goes on to say that there is a service available to players who want more ISK that is not only legitimate, but also helps both the game economy and supports other players: the Secure ETC Trading system.From the post: 'When you buy an ETC and then sell it for ISK via the Secure ETC Trading System you are directly contributing to the growth of EVE as the code will be applied to an account and someone will be using it to play. Some players do not have the means to pay for their subscriptions with credit cards or similar and the Secure ETC Trading System helps them pay and play. The economics are quite different as well since wealth is redistributed between active members of the community rather than injected into the game.' This is a much more creative approach to fighting RMT activity than simple banning of accounts (though that happens as well). Bravo, EVE, slam evil!
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?
From Rags to Riches in EVE Online
CrazyKinux has got a post up about something I wish I'd known about before it started-- there's a "Rags to Riches" contest going on in EVE Online right now. The participants started up a 14-day free trial account, and like a virtual world reality show, they are seeing who can raise the most ISK doing... whatever it is they come up with.It looks like there's only three entrants (should have let us know about it, Duke!), but the 14 days started at the beginning of this week, so here's hoping they're feverishly working as we speak to get enough ISK together to win a 30-day game card. And sneaky starting it during patch week, too-- that cuts it down to 13 days, really considering all the downtime and downloading today. And they're going to be blogging about it the whole time-- Wiseones is up to about 819k on Day 2, just by doing the newbie missions and mining.EVE players, what would you do for a ton of ISK in such a short time? The best thing I can think of would be to somehow gain access to a corporation's funds (perhaps by mining for them only for 13 days straight), and then shamelessly rip them off completely on the last day, pulling all their accounts and selling everything you can get your hands on. Hey, it's not pretty or nice, but you can't get to the top of the ladder without stepping on some hands, right?
Financial bigwig says virtual worlds leading digital currency charge
Andy Kyte, vice president of Gartner, Inc., told Gartner Symposium attendees last week that virtual worlds such as Second Life are "contributing to the drive to use electronic currencies." This comes from a ZDNet report on Kyte's talk about the potential of electronic currencies to reduce overhead costs for pretty much every one. He said Singapore has already introduced an electronic currency and that the rest of the world is watching what happens there.He also said, though, that online currencies like Second Life's Linden Dollar carry with them security issues that create "phenomenal opportunities for money laundering and tax evasion." Those issues would have to be resolved before online currencies similar to the L$ or EVE Online's ISK can be used with confidence in the real world.[Via Worlds in Motion]
The first EVE Online quarterly economic newsletter has some interesting facts
The one world server in EVE Online is pivotal to the monstrous and dynamic economy that only enhances EVE Online's appeal. Players in nearly every system engage in a tug-of-war with different drains and faucets to get the most out of their investment, that being time, and look to increase their fortunes. With such a complex dynamic (player versus player) economy that is integral to the overall well being of EVE's universe, CCP needed an economy care-taker, and hired Dr. "Eyjo" Guðmundsson, formerly Dean of the Faculty of Business and Science at the University of Akureyri, Iceland, to lead up the Research and Statistics group. Dr. "Eyjo" Guðmundsson is more or less known as the "EVE Economist." One of Dr. "Eyjo" Guðmundsson responsibilities is to evaluate, scrutinize, parse the EVE'economy and its inhabitants, and report back the team's findings in a quarterly economic newsletter. The overall purpose from this public data-mine is to inform pilots about the status of the in-game economy from a behind-the-scenes look and glean the information therein. The first in a series, dubbed the 3rd quarter 2007 economic newsletter, covers EVE demographics, macroeconomics, price levels, economic and market snap shots. [.PDF link] The graphs and charts alone make it worth downloading for any EVE player. There are a few glaring erroneous parameters that were used for some calculations such as including inactive accounts as pointed out in this discussion thread, but overall, this information is fantastic and with the right feedback will only get better. Some highlights from Q3 include:
The EVE Challenge
Hardcore Casual has thrown down the gauntlet, and challenged all comers to prove something interesting: that EVE Online hasn't yet solved our MMO problems. That's a strange thing to prove, but we here at Massively love nothing more than a challenge, so here goes.HC's point is that in EVE, you can pretty much do anything the way you want to, anywhere at any time. EVE is limitless in terms of both progression and size-- skills can be leveled for months and years, and even if all the skills are maxed out (they won't be, because CCP keeps adding new ones), there's always more ISK to be made. And because the game is so big and mostly empty space, everyone can play on one world, and there's no need for the sharding that other games must do to keep their servers up.However, as much as I love EVE, it is not a perfect MMO.
Massively's Massive Giveaways: EVE Online part 3
I admit it. I don't tend to go into low-sec because the last time I wandered there, I was instantly destroyed. Luckily, I'd insured my ship, but I haven't made the same mistake again. Once I get a better ship, though -- it's on! Now some of you have no idea what I just said, so let me explain. If you like PvP, EVE Online is definitely a game you should check out if you're not playing it already. You will never know when or where you're going to get attacked, if your ship will make it through, if you'll have to warp out, or for that matter -- if you're heading into an ambush any time you move around. Some Corps have even gone so far as to declare all alliances broken, and proclaim that anyone who crosses into their space will immediately be killed. Dangerous? Sure. Fun? Absolutely! In the spirit of helping more people enjoy getting their PvP on, we're offering up a third 100-day time card for EVE Online. For those of you who absolutely love PvP, nothing could be better! (Well, okay, a big ship would be better, but we don't have that kind of ISK floating around or we would have bigger ships.) All you have to do to have a chance to win the time card is to leave your comment between now and tomorrow at 2:15 PM Eastern (11/14), be 18+, a U.S. resident, and otherwise agree to the official rules. Of course, if you'd skip off podding us in our wee little ships when we fly through your space, we'd appreciate that too.
Time is money, friend!
MMOs have a variety of currencies. WoW, Dungeon Runners, and dozens of other games have gold, EverQuest one-ups that with platinum, Final Fantasy has gil, and EVE Online has ISK. Like real-world economies, MMO economies can exhibit a variety of interesting characteristics, from inflation to deflation to complete death. Inflation in particular seems quite prominent; in my WoW experience, everything has gotten more expensive over time on every server I've played on. More expensive in terms of gold, that is.Tobold argues that this inflation is, in effect, not real. His thesis is that time is the real currency of MMOs, not gold or ISK or whatever. And with respect to time, most in-game economies undergo deflation, not inflation. While it may cost me twice as much gold to buy a stack of Netherweave now as compared to when the Burning Crusade launched, I make gold five times as fast, so in fact it takes me less than half as long to get the Netherweave as it used to. Low-level characters are better off as well, because there is now more of a market for what they have to sell, so they'll have more gold to put towards items and training.
