Eve Online: A love/Hate Relationship. Sixth Meditation on Media

A long time ago in a town far, far away, I beta tested a game called Eve Online. Oh, what wonders I beheld in Eve’s beautifully painted solar systems and asteroid fields. Before I could bet my footing and understand the game, the beta was over and I was ejected from it (for lack of money to pay the subscription). A few years later my friends had picked it up and so I started playing again with them.

Eve Online is a Massive Multiplayer Online game or MMO created by the Icelandic company CCP. That means that everyone who plays, plays together… or at least near each other. Eve Online has only one server cluster so there is no one you cannot meet-if they play Eve, you can find them.

I have been playing eve for almost four years now, but when I say play, I hardly mean so. I don’t play eve like I play any other game. Eve play’s itself. To learn a new skill it eve, you just plug it into your training que and away you go. Each skill take a certain amount of real life time in order to be learned, whether you are playing the game or not. Right at this moment my character in the game is training some shield related skill and I’m not even logged in to the game. That skill will complete in 22 hours whether I’m there or not.

When I used to actually play Eve (I also hope to again when I get time) My time was spent making money to afford the expensive space ships I want to fly around. The ships are so expensive you can save up for months just to afford one. You can also get it blown up by another player in a matter of seconds if you’re not careful. This is where the love/hate comes in.

The older your character is, the better. There is really no way around it. Even my character, who sits and does nothing, is better than anyone who was born after him. There are many players out there who have very old characters that essentially rule the galaxy. These players have mastered the game and have positioned themselves to benefit as much as possible from the game mechanics. However, many of the games mechanics are slow, boring, or misguided in their function. Because of the support the older player base gives to the game, these mechanics will never change.

CCP takes pride in the fact that they listen to their player base and make changes to the game based on feedback given through their forum. The problem is that the only ones who are on the forums are the older player base who doesn’t want to see the game change. This means that even though the game always gets improvements, the core elements to the game that make it a boring game will never leave. I have tried to speak out on the forums about those problems, but anyone who proposes a change gets flamed by the older players within minutes.

Even with those nagging flaws, I still let my character sit and train skills for that eventual day I might play again. I have fond memories of playing with my fiends and I would like to keep the door open for good times in the future.

Here is one of the trailers for Eve Online. I like this one because it makes the game look way more exciting than it actually is.




This second video gives some insight into how the large scale fleet battle work:




Like any other media, EVE Online has an effect on us individually and on society as part of a larger MMO movement in games.

Triune Brain:
Eve Online is considered a thinking MMO. The first few minutes you play it can leave your neo-cortex throbbing from an information overload. Eve is not a simple game and it takes time to learn how to navigate the multilayered user interface. There is also true to real life market data and hundreds of statistics on ships and equipment you can purchase.

The limbic brain is also engaged with Eve’s light atmospheric music. IT really gives the game its feel. There is nothing more spacey than some light, flowing, down-tempo techno.

The reptilian brain sits dormant for most of time spent playing that is until you get into a fight. When you are stuck in a battle with a ship you spent the last two months saving up for, you can’t help but sweat. I have never been so nervous in any other situation in my life. One wrong move and you have lost the last two months worth of playtime. Eve is not a forgiving game. There is nothing like that moment in Eve when your reptilian brain fires up and all you know is that you have to escape.

Eight Shifts:
Technological Shift – Eve’s server cluster is something amazing. Every player that plays Eve Online plays together. I don’t even want to think of the technological overhead that makes it possible. There are battles in Eve where each side brings one to two hundred pilots. I have never heard of any other game accomplishing a battle with that many player participants.

Economic Shift – Eve Online boasts a real to life economy. Assets in the game are produced by players and sold to other players. Money is not made by selling anything to computers. The economy in Eve is so robust that CCP has hired a real life market analysis to write up market reports for the players. This is the most elaborate economy in any video game.

Seven Principles:
Reality Construction/Trade-offs – Because Eve is a total immersion game there is little that needs to be said about the reality construction. However, there is more to it than just the reality the is constructed for the game. There arte other realities that are a product of the mechanics of the game and not intended for the atmosphere. One is that the game is incredibly unforgiving and anyone can take advantage of you. Eve is famous for being a game that destroys real life friendships. Players plot against each other and steal to attain assets and it is encouraged by the players base because it’s just a part of what makes Eve Eve.

Production Techniques – CCP is a small company in Iceland that produces Eve Online and only eve online. All their time is put into perfecting the game and creating new content to keep it fresh and exiting. There is always an expansion in the works that keeps players interested. Also, CCP tries to be very transparent in their development so that the players can have input on new features to the game. Every year the company hold elections in the game and the players that the get the most votes gets to go to Iceland and have meetings with the developers to decide what direction the game will go in. This is something very unique in the production of any MMO.

Persuasive Techniques:
Flattery – Eve players like to consider themselves a more advanced player than those that play other games. CCP caters to this by stroking their egos indirectly through to forums and through press releases. If anyone mentions the name of the leading MMO, World of Warcraft, in the forums, the players go on a frenzy and will bash that person into the ground.

Bribery – One of the main tactics that CCP employs to gain new players is by offering various bonuses. Either they extend the trial membership time, or give a month subscription free. Sometimes they give current players free months if they recruit new paying players.

Group Dynamics – Most of the recent ads for Eve Online focus on how a player can become par tof the world and work with others to attain goals. While the real way the game is played makes it a little hard to do, it is something that each players desires. That sense of belonging and community is strong even in video games.

Soon, Eve will have a new expansion called Tyrannis. This new expansion will give planetary interaction options to over 60,000 planets that already exist in the Eve universe. As to whether this will be something new and interesting or just a new way to do the same old things is left to be seen. Who knows, maybe I will have a reason to play again. If you're interested in trying out Eve onlight just follow this link.