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EVE Evolved: Four ways Guild Wars 2 is like EVE Online
With its single-shard server structure and sandbox ruleset, EVE Online seems to have little in common with a sharded fantasy themepark like Guild Wars 2. But dig a little deeper past GW2's fluffy exterior and you'll find it shares some core game mechanics and ideas with the world's biggest PvP sandbox. GW2's Trading Post bears a striking resemblance to EVE's Jita 4-4 market, and many of the same market tricks that work in New Eden have proven just as effective in the land of Tyria. EVE's PLEX system lets people buy game time for in-game ISK and undercuts illicit RMT by giving players a legitimate way to buy ISK, a system that's very closely mirrored in GW2's gem trade. GW2's Karma system resembles a heavily restricted version of EVE's loyalty point mechanic, and PvP in both games may be more similar than it appears. The same strategies that work for faction warfare fleets in the depths of space are currently helping guilds win World vs. World vs. World PvP. In this week's EVE Evolved, I look at four Guild Wars 2 game mechanics that are similar to those in EVE Online and how lessons from EVE can be applied to GW2.
EVE Online Inferno 1.1 opens for business
Patches are serious business. Just ask CCP, which has deployed its first major post-Inferno update to EVE Online's space cowboys and their cute toy ships. Inferno 1.1 is nothing to sneeze at, with its expanded loyalty point stores, increased visuals, and a cargo hold full of fixes and tweaks. Players sucking up to one of the four militias in the game now have more merchandise to drool over. The loyalty point stores now include factional uniforms that come in both male and female varieties. Alternatively, you can drop real-world money for other uniform variants that have been added to the NeX store. The Minmatar ships finally receive a dose of graphical love in 1.1, with V3 shader upgrades for their hardware. Due to popular demand, players are now able to watch a target area for a while after the target's been blown to kingdom come. As always, there are too many changes to summarize in a few short paragraphs, so check out the patch notes to get the down low on Inferno 1.1!
EVE players abuse faction warfare to produce trillions of ISK
If there's one constant in the EVE Online universe, it's that the players can never be underestimated and every care must be taken to make sure systems can't be abused in unintended ways. In 2009, a handful of players figured out how to artificially boost the number of valuable faction warfare loyalty points rewarded for completing missions and farmed enough ISK to build a titan. That record was completely blown out of the water today as five EVE players revealed how they'd generated five trillion ISK using game mechanics introduced in the Inferno expansion. Inferno added a new reward system for faction warfare that gave players loyalty points for enemy ship kills based on the value of the destroyed ship and cargo. A bug was found that rewarded players for both the destroyed and surviving cargo, even though surviving cargo could be recovered. GoonWaffe pilot Aryth and four friends began destroying their own freighters full of minerals to cash the minerals out into loyalty points, which were then used to buy items for sale. When CCP discovered this bug and fixed it, the group manipulated the market price of one of the game's least-purchased items up to a huge number. When the price index for the value of that item updated, the players began destroying haulers full of them to generate billions of loyalty points for almost nothing. The points were cashed out into items for sale on the market, producing a total profit of over five trillion ISK. The abuse has not yet been declared an exploit, but CCP has fixed the issue and is still investigating it. At current market prices, five trillion ISK is enough to buy around 10,000 30-day game time codes worth a total of $175,000 US.
EVE Evolved: The evolution of microtransactions
Two weeks ago, the escalating drama in EVE Online saw me drained of my normal enthusiasm as I contemplated the very real possibility that my time in the game I love was coming to an end. While the forums were filled with the most vocal and angry players, discussions with veteran players featured mainly disappointment and a distinct sadness. For those few days spent in limbo waiting for the results of the emergency CSM meeting, I and many of my in-game friends remained a hair's breadth from giving up on EVE entirely. It was a delicate situation based more on perception and poor communication than intent or fact, and I think CCP pulled things back well with formal statements from both itself and the CSM in addition to an in-depth follow-up press conference. One of the big points to come out of the press conference was that while CCP and the CSM are both confident that none of the future microtransaction plans are game-breaking, the company did not restrict itself to vanity goods such as Incarna clothing. While the CSM was convinced that CCP planned only to produce pure vanity goods, CCP Zulu was careful not to rule out gameplay-affecting microtransactions altogether. Both CCP and the CSM also talked about "game-breaking" sales rather than using a clearer term like "gameplay-affecting" or "non-vanity." It's reasonable then to assume that in the future we might eventually get non-vanity goods that do interact with gameplay but aren't game-breaking in terms of balance, mechanics or interaction with the in-game economy. In this week's EVE Evolved, I show exactly why options like selling ships would be game-breaking and then let my imagination run wild as I speculate on possible non-vanity microtransactions for the far future that shouldn't disrupt gameplay.
PAX 2010: CCP unveils EVE Online's latest expansion
Tweet var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/story/r/pax_2010_ccp_unveils_eve_online_s_latest_expansion_massively'; At PAX Prime, we caught up with CCP's lead game designer Noah Ward, who paused helpfully between the roaring crowds on all sides of the booth to fill us in on the "secret sauce" to EVE Online's continued growth and success. Ward said it was simple: CCP's steadfast commitment to the game for the long haul. The dev team strongly believes in the growth of EVE and works hard to expand it both inward and upward. Part of that growth includes continued expansions to the title, and Ward was excited to reveal the next one on deck. While it doesn't yet have a name -- at least, nothing CCP could put in print -- the team is hyped up about its latest expansion to the EVE Online franchise. Set to debut later this winter, the expansion looks to build on many of the key foundations that Tyrannis began. Hit the jump to hear about the four new features that EVE fans will find themselves crowing about by the time Santa comes a-callin'!
Factional warfare to be "cleaned up" by EVE developers
Factional warfare, while a great idea when it came out, is in need of some trimming as of late. Some have even gone so far to say that the developers at CCP have abandoned the project but a recent EVE dev post says otherwise. CCP Ytterbium has gone on the record to say that there are changes coming to the factional warfare system. While the entire system can't be completely cleaned up in one go, Ytterbium has laid out a series of modifications to make the system more lucrative and playable.
CCP Games reveals next major Apocrypha update for EVE Online
EVE Online senior producer CCP t0rfifrans just published a dev blog about the next major update to the game, Apocrypha 1.5. This is not a completely new expansion, just a significant update they will release in August before EVE's (as-yet-unnamed) winter expansion. While CCP hasn't released the complete rundown of Apocrypha 1.5's features and changes, they have announced a few highlights: Perhaps the biggest changes in 1.5 will be factional warfare improvements. Beyond responding to the lag issues many players have been reporting with factional warfare, CCP is going to introduce Loyalty Points (LP) for kills and captures, and each militia will have its own LP store where militia players can cash in for items unique to that faction. Several Level 4 epic mission arcs will be introduced, tied to specific races in New Eden. CCP t0rfifrans writes: "These captivating stories deal with moral ambiguity, intrigue, honor, and some people's lack of it. This should come as no surprise to those who know EVE and what we are about. As before with the epic arc that was released with Apocrypha, they provide a deep, interesting story, where your choices influence the outcome." One of the long awaited buffs for Black Ops battleships will arrive: specialized cargo holds. The first use of this system will be to give Black Ops ships fuel bays, but this feature paves the way for similar additions to other ship classes in the future. For instance, some ships may one day be given ammo bays, freeing up valuable cargo space. Rigs will be offered in different sizes, with frigate and cruiser sized rigs introduced to the game. These new small and medium rigs will be cheaper to buy or manufacture, and thus provide a lower cost way for players to trick out their ships. CCP t0rfifrans also dropped a few hints about the forthcoming winter expansion, which will *not* be Walking in Stations. He writes: "All I can say, is that it is focused on sovereignty and you will not be able to walk in it." We'll keep our eyes open for more about Apocrypha 1.5 as information becomes available.
EVE mission runners and their tormentors rejoice! New Level 4 agents added
Mission running in EVE Online is one of the more lucrative activities players can spend their time doing, at least while in the safety of high security space. The cumulative rewards from NPC bounties, loyalty points, salvage, and loot -- in addition to the mission rewards from NPC agents -- make Level 4 missions a decent ISK/hour income for many of EVE Online's pilots. Level 4 missions are the most popular, due to their relative ease and multiple battleship (high bounty) NPC spawns which yield better loot drops and more salvage components, as well as optimal loyalty point gain. However, the grouping of agents that give the best missions leads to 'mission hubs' where hundreds of players operate in the same solar systems. The latest dev blog by EVE's lead content creator CCP Molock is simply titled "New Level 4 Agents", and deals with dispersing the crowds (and clutter) from some of the high sec mission hubs in New Eden. CCP Games has added twenty-three new level 4 agents to the game in locations a bit removed from the heavily populated mission hubs, hopefully encourage more mission runners to fill quieter solar systems in the galaxy. Molock lists the new agents, along with their corporation and quality, as well as system security ratings for each location.
