Sorry. I know that was an terrible pun, but I just couldn't resist.
It has been a long, long time. In all honesty, i've been out of the game for many reasons. Lack of money for the subscription being the main one, but also lots of little life issues that won't seem to settle down. For now though I've decided to get myself another trial and see how I go. Right now, I'm thinking that I might be sticking around for a while.
I watched a video on youtube of some of the new features that came in with Odyssey and I was very, very excited. I've been playing around with a couple of different F2P MMO's and I have lost all patience with them and their intentions. I'm not naming any names, but the one specific game in questions has a lot to answer for in terms of how they conduct their business with some of their most hardened fans. Moving to a free to play model is a risky decision that requires you to have some understanding of what your players want and what they will get when they decide to either stick with the sub or go for the freebie account. This certain company has made their decision and somehow managed to appease neither side, opting to cater to customisation fetishists above all else with their cash shop and nothing else. But anyway...enough about them.
I signed up for a new trial with EVE and when I got in I was struck by the little tiny changes. Scanning is now amazingly simple and I frigging love it. Exploration has become the enjoyable activity I always wanted it to be. The simplification of the whole system has meant that I can't wait to get out there and explore things. I'm having fun just floating around and looking for stuff.
I'm going to have to sell a kidney for the sub I think. I'm totally sure it's worth it though. My kidneys are pretty ruined.
Wednesday, 6 November 2013
Monday, 2 April 2012
A change of scenery
I found out that i can dictate journal entries to the computer. So that makes things a lot easier. I also found out that the setup only recognises certain spellings and phrases. Which is a pain in the ass. (apparently spelling ass "A-R-S-E" isn't real word.)
So it has been officially two days since i walked out (in a manner of speaking) on Drillcorp and took my duty frigate with me. I'm not exactly sure where i'm supposed to go with it. I'm considering trying to head for one of the lowsec zones just to be out of reach in case Drillcorp want their ship and their money back. Hiding out somewhere remote would probably be the best course of action. But then again, dude with no contacts alone in deep nothing doesn't really sound like a success story to me.
The colours are so much brighter and more vivid, even just four or five jumps into the trip. Getting twenty or thirty jumps away, the scenery changes so much it's like a whole different universe. Seeing more stuff than i've seen in a long time all at once, it's a bit of a shock to the system. But it's also really refreshing. It feels like an adventure. I feel like i'm alive again. Sorry for the cliche, but some things are cliche because they're overused, and they're overused because they're true.
I'm hoping i'll be able to find a station that doesn't seem too dangerous. Don't want to rush things too fast. There'll be plenty of that to go around soon enough. Hopefully this 200 k will keep me going for at least a couple of weeks, maybe even a month. We'll see how it goes. Worst come to worst i'll just drop orbit on a factory or some such and get some shut eye
---
So it has been officially two days since i walked out (in a manner of speaking) on Drillcorp and took my duty frigate with me. I'm not exactly sure where i'm supposed to go with it. I'm considering trying to head for one of the lowsec zones just to be out of reach in case Drillcorp want their ship and their money back. Hiding out somewhere remote would probably be the best course of action. But then again, dude with no contacts alone in deep nothing doesn't really sound like a success story to me.
The colours are so much brighter and more vivid, even just four or five jumps into the trip. Getting twenty or thirty jumps away, the scenery changes so much it's like a whole different universe. Seeing more stuff than i've seen in a long time all at once, it's a bit of a shock to the system. But it's also really refreshing. It feels like an adventure. I feel like i'm alive again. Sorry for the cliche, but some things are cliche because they're overused, and they're overused because they're true.
I'm hoping i'll be able to find a station that doesn't seem too dangerous. Don't want to rush things too fast. There'll be plenty of that to go around soon enough. Hopefully this 200 k will keep me going for at least a couple of weeks, maybe even a month. We'll see how it goes. Worst come to worst i'll just drop orbit on a factory or some such and get some shut eye
---
Saturday, 31 March 2012
DRILLCORP Ltd Employee #52786
JOURNAL ENTRY #271828
"To whom it may concern.
It has been so long since I felt the thrill of a life well lived. Too long, perhaps. I'm not even sure if there is still time left in these bones to make such a change to my stuck-in-a-rut life. But there is something that i should be doing. I feel it every day when i look out through the hangar doors and see the stars glinting millions of miles away. I want to be close enough to be able to touch those stars, but i know that I'm not going to be able to reach out from where I'm sitting right now. So i need to make a move. I need to prove to myself, and maybe only to myself, that there is still some blood left in my veins. Or whatever may pass for blood these days. I'm not completely sure what it is that i'm supposed to be doing, but I know that I won't find out just rotting away in this same room day after day. I hope that once I find it, I will recognise it and embrace it as some sort of purpose. Time will tell.
I have left my pass cards on the desk. All company property will be returned intact, and any that cannot be returned intact, you will be remimbursed for.
In case it isn't obvious, I quit. I'm mining for myself now.
Sincerely
Chim Demex.
P.S.
I.O.U. 200 000 ISK. And whatever the ship is worth. I'll forward it along with the rest of your property."
------
JOURNAL ENDS
DELETE? Y/N
JOURNAL ENTRY #271828
"To whom it may concern.
It has been so long since I felt the thrill of a life well lived. Too long, perhaps. I'm not even sure if there is still time left in these bones to make such a change to my stuck-in-a-rut life. But there is something that i should be doing. I feel it every day when i look out through the hangar doors and see the stars glinting millions of miles away. I want to be close enough to be able to touch those stars, but i know that I'm not going to be able to reach out from where I'm sitting right now. So i need to make a move. I need to prove to myself, and maybe only to myself, that there is still some blood left in my veins. Or whatever may pass for blood these days. I'm not completely sure what it is that i'm supposed to be doing, but I know that I won't find out just rotting away in this same room day after day. I hope that once I find it, I will recognise it and embrace it as some sort of purpose. Time will tell.
I have left my pass cards on the desk. All company property will be returned intact, and any that cannot be returned intact, you will be remimbursed for.
In case it isn't obvious, I quit. I'm mining for myself now.
Sincerely
Chim Demex.
P.S.
I.O.U. 200 000 ISK. And whatever the ship is worth. I'll forward it along with the rest of your property."
------
JOURNAL ENDS
DELETE? Y/N
In Decision
It had been a few months since Chim had sat at the terminal. The chair was still settled to fit him perfectly, and screen was at the right angle to limit the glare coming down from the flouro's. He sat for a minute and waited for words to come to him; waited for something to demand to be typed. He stood up and walked over to the counter where the caffeinated drinks were kept. He missed coffee, and the synthetic stuff they got here was crap. He missed the smell and the warmth that floated down his throat after that first sip. The memory alone was enough to keep him awake these days. That, and the CAFMax that was apparently sponsoring this wreck.
He went back to the terminal with his drink and placed it in the gap amidst the old gears and pens that littered the desk. He looked up at the blank screen and the reflection of a tired old man stared back. The eyes were puckered and due for renovation, and the rest was no better. All his life he had been afraid of seeing a ghost, and yet here he was, watching himself become one.
His fingers waited patiently above the keys. There they stayed, motionless for a good few minutes. The hum of the cooling unit on the underside of the terminal became a drone. Chim waited for a thought, or rather he waited for a thought that felt significant enough to record. It occurred to him how often the insignificance of his own life entered his head on a daily basis. How often he felt lonely, how often he felt abandoned out here in the arse end of a place he was never quite certain he could spell the name of. He thought of how many times the same stories and ideas had come back to him, and whether he had already written them down, or whether he was just replaying them for himself. He thought of all the stories that he had never written down because they seemed unimportant. Stories that no-one else would be able to tell. Stories that would probably be enjoyed by someone, if he had bothered to capture them while they were fresh. But those old stories were faded now. He slumped back in his chair.
After a moment he looked up at the screen and saw the words that he had typed. Words that he had never said out loud, but here they were, staring him down. Shapes on a screen daring him to do something. Make something. Find one more story so that the next time he sat down at the terminal he would have some words to type.
He smiled. And his reflection smiled back.
He went back to the terminal with his drink and placed it in the gap amidst the old gears and pens that littered the desk. He looked up at the blank screen and the reflection of a tired old man stared back. The eyes were puckered and due for renovation, and the rest was no better. All his life he had been afraid of seeing a ghost, and yet here he was, watching himself become one.
His fingers waited patiently above the keys. There they stayed, motionless for a good few minutes. The hum of the cooling unit on the underside of the terminal became a drone. Chim waited for a thought, or rather he waited for a thought that felt significant enough to record. It occurred to him how often the insignificance of his own life entered his head on a daily basis. How often he felt lonely, how often he felt abandoned out here in the arse end of a place he was never quite certain he could spell the name of. He thought of how many times the same stories and ideas had come back to him, and whether he had already written them down, or whether he was just replaying them for himself. He thought of all the stories that he had never written down because they seemed unimportant. Stories that no-one else would be able to tell. Stories that would probably be enjoyed by someone, if he had bothered to capture them while they were fresh. But those old stories were faded now. He slumped back in his chair.
After a moment he looked up at the screen and saw the words that he had typed. Words that he had never said out loud, but here they were, staring him down. Shapes on a screen daring him to do something. Make something. Find one more story so that the next time he sat down at the terminal he would have some words to type.
He smiled. And his reflection smiled back.
Monday, 9 January 2012
Lost in spaces...
There was no feeling like being out on the edge. That was point of doing it, at least for him it was. Being able to stand on the lip of the hangar, hold his breath, open his eyes suddenly and look in whichever direction he guessed was up. It was a sort of rush for him. It felt like the exact opposite of falling. Rather than that floaty, weightless feeling in his stomach, there was a heavy, violent spasm. Rather than moving closer to the surface, it felt like the surface was racing towards him. It felt like Chim was the exact central point of the galaxy.
And then he would step back from the edge and close his eyes again, let his leg muscles relax and drop to the floor. This feeling wouldn't last for very long and he liked to savour it, remember it. It made him feel fractionally more comfortable knowing that he might be able to catch a piece of that sensation this time. Inevitably, it ran through his fingers just like the first time. He had thrown up that first time and in a panic he had tried to hold it in and catch it before it hit the floor. Inevitably, it ran through his fingers.
As placements went, this wasn't the most terrible place he could be. It was secure, mostly warm, almost comfortable. But there was this itch in the back of his mind that he couldn't scratch. Mining was just so mind numbing. It was easy enough and he was making a fair amount to keep himself surviving out here. He just didn't feel like he was really doing anything. Like he was wasting this chance to make a difference in this ridiculous universe.
When he opened his eyes again he would always find that his body had re-taken control of his lungs and he was once more breathing normally. He would stand up, pull on his boots and go to work.
On his way to the mirror he switched the radio off and picked up the badge he kept next to the sink. It was something he had found a few years ago before he made the big move. It was faded and rusty and you could only just barely make out what it once had written upon it in bright red ink. Now the white background had become grey and the words had turned pink. But it still said those same four words. He read the badge again, and put it back next to sink, where he would find it tomorrow before he went out to work.
I love you dad.
And then he would step back from the edge and close his eyes again, let his leg muscles relax and drop to the floor. This feeling wouldn't last for very long and he liked to savour it, remember it. It made him feel fractionally more comfortable knowing that he might be able to catch a piece of that sensation this time. Inevitably, it ran through his fingers just like the first time. He had thrown up that first time and in a panic he had tried to hold it in and catch it before it hit the floor. Inevitably, it ran through his fingers.
As placements went, this wasn't the most terrible place he could be. It was secure, mostly warm, almost comfortable. But there was this itch in the back of his mind that he couldn't scratch. Mining was just so mind numbing. It was easy enough and he was making a fair amount to keep himself surviving out here. He just didn't feel like he was really doing anything. Like he was wasting this chance to make a difference in this ridiculous universe.
When he opened his eyes again he would always find that his body had re-taken control of his lungs and he was once more breathing normally. He would stand up, pull on his boots and go to work.
On his way to the mirror he switched the radio off and picked up the badge he kept next to the sink. It was something he had found a few years ago before he made the big move. It was faded and rusty and you could only just barely make out what it once had written upon it in bright red ink. Now the white background had become grey and the words had turned pink. But it still said those same four words. He read the badge again, and put it back next to sink, where he would find it tomorrow before he went out to work.
I love you dad.
Monday, 19 December 2011
Something dull thudded against the side of Chim's head. Something thick and hard and dull. It took him a moment to realise that it was the window of the pod he was floating in. Two seconds ago the pod had ejected from what was now a decimated shell, previously a mining freighter. Now he felt another dull thud from behind and all too late realised that the structure of the pod was falling away around him.
When he was nine years old his father broke his arm as punishment for lying to him about not going to school. From that day forward he was schooled at home, where his father could keep his eye on him.
When he was fourteen, he kissed his first girlfriend for the first time. It took her four days to find someone else to kiss for the first time. He broke that other boy's arm as punishment. It felt like the right thing to do then.
When he was fifteen, he was put into a home where he would be "properly looked after". He wasn't. It was a converted internment camp where they sent the junkie kids and the girls who had stabbed their parents to death and the boys who had set their houses on fire.
When he was fifteen he left and got a job as a scrubber on an old carrier. It was a lot better than waiting to be stabbed or burned. Here he felt useful. There was always something to do, and provided you did the job right, you were praised. It made more sense to Chim than being ignored until you did it wrong.
When he was fifteen he died for the first time. He didn't remember anything much about it. Just that the list of memories to go through in that last second was a lot shorter back then. But he never did remember much about anything after that first death.
"It's not death," they told him at training. "Consider it...relocation."
They had a funny way of trying to make everything sound more palatable. It simultaneously made him feel more comfortable, and nauseous.
As the last breath left his lungs, he felt his muscles snap into the position in which this body would be found. He always tried to starfish his body. For no other reason than it was amusing to him in that final moment before relocation. Someone would find the frozen body of a clone and it would haunt them. Why did he stretch his limbs out like that? What did he see that made him do that? Who was this man that would put his last ounce of strength into trying to take up as much space as possible? These questions fled through his head as his body froze solid, and the last muscle movement would be the corners of his mouth twisting upwards into a sly grin.
****
He woke up groggy, as usual. He stood up slowly and walked to the mirror. It was a little ritual of his every time this happened. He felt as though he needed to check that he was still himself. That he hadn't somehow accidentally had his thoughts, his essence, inserted into a different body. There were stories, where a friend of a friend would know a guy that had been put into the body of a woman, or the other way around. But it had not happened to him.
Not yet.
He cursed under his breath.
Maybe next time.
When he was nine years old his father broke his arm as punishment for lying to him about not going to school. From that day forward he was schooled at home, where his father could keep his eye on him.
When he was fourteen, he kissed his first girlfriend for the first time. It took her four days to find someone else to kiss for the first time. He broke that other boy's arm as punishment. It felt like the right thing to do then.
When he was fifteen, he was put into a home where he would be "properly looked after". He wasn't. It was a converted internment camp where they sent the junkie kids and the girls who had stabbed their parents to death and the boys who had set their houses on fire.
When he was fifteen he left and got a job as a scrubber on an old carrier. It was a lot better than waiting to be stabbed or burned. Here he felt useful. There was always something to do, and provided you did the job right, you were praised. It made more sense to Chim than being ignored until you did it wrong.
When he was fifteen he died for the first time. He didn't remember anything much about it. Just that the list of memories to go through in that last second was a lot shorter back then. But he never did remember much about anything after that first death.
"It's not death," they told him at training. "Consider it...relocation."
They had a funny way of trying to make everything sound more palatable. It simultaneously made him feel more comfortable, and nauseous.
As the last breath left his lungs, he felt his muscles snap into the position in which this body would be found. He always tried to starfish his body. For no other reason than it was amusing to him in that final moment before relocation. Someone would find the frozen body of a clone and it would haunt them. Why did he stretch his limbs out like that? What did he see that made him do that? Who was this man that would put his last ounce of strength into trying to take up as much space as possible? These questions fled through his head as his body froze solid, and the last muscle movement would be the corners of his mouth twisting upwards into a sly grin.
****
He woke up groggy, as usual. He stood up slowly and walked to the mirror. It was a little ritual of his every time this happened. He felt as though he needed to check that he was still himself. That he hadn't somehow accidentally had his thoughts, his essence, inserted into a different body. There were stories, where a friend of a friend would know a guy that had been put into the body of a woman, or the other way around. But it had not happened to him.
Not yet.
He cursed under his breath.
Maybe next time.
Saturday, 17 December 2011
oh...that's how it goes...
Whilst trying to figure out whether i wanted to sign up for a subscription account (I did, so I did) I tried a new character on a trial account. I ran all the tutorial agent missions and had a bash at doing some mining. That coupled with the plan I was formulating about storylines and in-game activities convinced me that I needed to re-subscribe. Running the missions as a Minmatar I found that it was...not so much easy...but not that difficult.
Not so for the Caldari.
I have found, since birthing Chim into the world, that Caldari are supposedly the chosen race of CCP. I cannot for the life of me understand why.
I have my reasons, and it won't mean that I will change races or anything. But man...the ships suck. I can only assume that they get better later on. In one of the missions very early on (the one with the pirate guy who has a tower that webs you, whilst two guys wail on you) i get destroyed so quickly it doesn't even seem worth it until i can get into the Merlin.
I have to train for it anyway. Which means 6 hours of not being able to do the mission. I'm thinking i'll just have to do business missions...or exploration. But i remember quitting exploration when it got to the part with learning how to use scan drones. Those things are completely fucking useless. Or maybe I just need to be a higher level at that too.
I have watched all the tutorial videos, asked for help on the rookie channel. Everything. And whenever it gets to the bit where i'm supposed to see a red ring around the bit i need to be searching within. The red ring doesn't show up. So i'm blindly making the search area larger and smaller until i can get back to finding a 33% gravimetric reading to start again. And then i just stop bothering.
Apart from that, no probs.
Not so for the Caldari.
I have found, since birthing Chim into the world, that Caldari are supposedly the chosen race of CCP. I cannot for the life of me understand why.
I have my reasons, and it won't mean that I will change races or anything. But man...the ships suck. I can only assume that they get better later on. In one of the missions very early on (the one with the pirate guy who has a tower that webs you, whilst two guys wail on you) i get destroyed so quickly it doesn't even seem worth it until i can get into the Merlin.
I have to train for it anyway. Which means 6 hours of not being able to do the mission. I'm thinking i'll just have to do business missions...or exploration. But i remember quitting exploration when it got to the part with learning how to use scan drones. Those things are completely fucking useless. Or maybe I just need to be a higher level at that too.
I have watched all the tutorial videos, asked for help on the rookie channel. Everything. And whenever it gets to the bit where i'm supposed to see a red ring around the bit i need to be searching within. The red ring doesn't show up. So i'm blindly making the search area larger and smaller until i can get back to finding a 33% gravimetric reading to start again. And then i just stop bothering.
Apart from that, no probs.
Thursday, 15 December 2011
< fiction > Night people.
A cold hand reached up and gently pressed the small, circular lamp. A dim haze of chilled, sterile light bloomed out from the disc and the hand dropped once more. Chim sat up slowly, a nagging urge to rub his face spread across his brain, but he knew to ignore it. He knew that it would be pointless. Long stretches between periods of sleep always made his arms, head and face constantly itchy. He would ignore it again for as long as he could. He stood up, wrapped the bedsheet around his shoulders and padded over towards the window. He waved his hand, half-heartedly, in the general direction of the vid screen and it hummed immediately to half-life. A dull blue faded across the cabin and with it the voices of various pundits and opinioneers. Someone shot at someone else, somebody different got upset. Same old, same old.
Chim dragged his feet over towards the table, pulled out a chair and dragged it towards the window. By now the voices from the screen had become unintelligible static. Background noise that was easy to ignore. Chim liked it that way. He looked upwards and his eyes found a moon. He stared. Days seemed to pass while he watched the rock and the rock watched him back.
From the cabin he could see forever. He was surrounded by it. It stretched off into the distance in every direction. At least when you were on a planet there was a sky. You could look up and be drawn into the colours. Here there was black, and that was all. Here out in the middle of occupied nowhere there was nothing but black. Stars and moons and other assorted rocks gave brief respite, and every so often an array of clouds would commandeer the windows, spraying colour into the room beyond making Chim think it had been worth it to get here after all. Much like the colours that feeling didn't usually last very long.
At first the darkness had been interesting. Exciting, even. But now it seemed to be just miles and miles and miles of nothing. Darkness used to be comfortable. A sign of night and of peace and quiet. Time for creativity and for secrets. The night had once been his friend and his partner in crime. Now though, night was all that there ever was and it was no longer Chim's friend. Night people don't stay night people in space.
They just become people.
The chair groaned as it grew accustomed to the weight upon it's back legs. The dry-heater clicked on and almost instantly the cabin seemed to warm. At least it would not be a cold night as well as a sleepless one.
Chim dragged his feet over towards the table, pulled out a chair and dragged it towards the window. By now the voices from the screen had become unintelligible static. Background noise that was easy to ignore. Chim liked it that way. He looked upwards and his eyes found a moon. He stared. Days seemed to pass while he watched the rock and the rock watched him back.
From the cabin he could see forever. He was surrounded by it. It stretched off into the distance in every direction. At least when you were on a planet there was a sky. You could look up and be drawn into the colours. Here there was black, and that was all. Here out in the middle of occupied nowhere there was nothing but black. Stars and moons and other assorted rocks gave brief respite, and every so often an array of clouds would commandeer the windows, spraying colour into the room beyond making Chim think it had been worth it to get here after all. Much like the colours that feeling didn't usually last very long.
At first the darkness had been interesting. Exciting, even. But now it seemed to be just miles and miles and miles of nothing. Darkness used to be comfortable. A sign of night and of peace and quiet. Time for creativity and for secrets. The night had once been his friend and his partner in crime. Now though, night was all that there ever was and it was no longer Chim's friend. Night people don't stay night people in space.
They just become people.
The chair groaned as it grew accustomed to the weight upon it's back legs. The dry-heater clicked on and almost instantly the cabin seemed to warm. At least it would not be a cold night as well as a sleepless one.
Tuesday, 13 December 2011
Testing...
There seems to be a few common threads between myself and the greater EVE community, or at least those who talk/blog about it. They are pretty much the reasons i keep finding myself coming back to the game, and apparently the reason everyone else does too.
Firstly, to date I have been playing EVE for roughly a month. I played for a week on a trial, loved it and signed up for the three month deal. Then had two more weeks, had no idea what I was doing and lost my original excitement and stopped playing. After a few months away I decided to get back into it. Apparently, this is not uncommon. I can't help but feel as though CCP have set the game up just so, almost as a way to ward off...how should i say it...slackards. (I know i just invented that word, but it does the job nicely.)
There is, regardless of this huge step upwards in difficulty (which I have been informed is the first of many) something mesmerising about the world the game is set within. It's like when someone asks you what you want to eat. If they give you two or three choices, you have no problem. If they ask you to choose from everything edible in the world, it's almost not worth trying to decide. One you get past this initial barrier there is the realisation that as huge as the world is, there is still only a finite amount of stuff you can do. Which makes the whole thing much more palatable. It's still a difficult choice, but not insurmountable.
Secondly, (this will probably make some of you stop reading altogether. I know what the deal is. It's OK) having come across from another MMO, the difference in...everything is very daunting to begin with. The other players, the style of play, the goals, the activities. Every. Single. Thing. More than any of those things though, is that by all appearances, the people who play EVE actually want new people to learn how to play and get involved. Other games, or rather the players of those games, have this weird idea that new players, more players, will kill the game. That somehow newer players have no idea what they are doing and will be completely unable to learn, so the game will have to be made easier. I understand that most of the reason new people are welcome is because it's easier to kill noobs. And I am fine with that. I am quite looking forward to it in fact. Just as I am looking forward to getting better and being able to do the same to future generations of noobs. But it is nonetheless refreshing and almost unsettling to feel welcome. Or at least as welcome as it's possible to feel.
Thirdly, this is the game I have always wanted to play. Since I was twelve and tried to learn to program in QBASIC in an attempt to program a game that was like Frontier: Elite II, this has been the game I was looking for. The idea that whatever happens affects someone else blows me away every time i think about it. The idea that the whole game is built on the premise that players run the systems, become the crime bosses, run companies into the ground and build empires upon the ruins of the old. I am not sure that anyone outside of the game (and even some of those inside it) understand just how fucking magnificent the idea is. It feels very close to how this sort of thing should be done. Once you get past the steep learning curve (we've all seen the XKCD strip right?) and appreciate just why it has to be like that (we don't want to be sitting around for a month of learning before we can get into a ship, of course) it's very easy to see, to me at least, that something of this scale is obviously going to be scary at first glance. But you just have to dive in and make it happen. And when it does, it makes me grin like a crazy person.
Something else that struck me as I started playing. In any other game I have played, with very few exceptions, you start the game as either someone who is destined to be a hero of some kind, or someone who has the powers/abilities of a hero thrust upon them and is forced to act for the good of others despite their own status or beliefs. EVE, on the other hand, abandons you in deepest space and that's it. You are not special or exemplary in any way save for the fact that you are a capsuleer. (Which I am given to understand is something special in itself in that you (plus the rest of the subscribers) are part of a group of people who are able to clone themselves and are gifted with the piloting skills that you will require.) But, aside from that, you are not the saviour of humanity, nor are you expected to perform any specific taks or fulfill anyone's premonitions of fate. In that way it is much closer to the pen and paper RPG's that seem so much rarer these days. There is no storyline (unless you choose to follow the missions) that is not created by you and the people that share the universe with you.
Strangely enough, it was just before all the controversy in the summer that I first started playing. And that whole rioting/subscription hemorhaging/anger but not merely in a typical, pointless, internet ranting way, that all made me even more excited about the game. The fact that people were so angry that they actually protested in-game. The fact that this was a world, not just a collection of numbers and textures. There was a power structure, a way for people to make their grievances known that was just as futile and impotent as protesting in real life, but looked equally cool and like something that you really wanted to be a part of. I wanted that from my games. I still do. If i'm going to be paying monthly, I want what I do to matter. I don't want it to be just busy work, like reading a book or watching a film. It's interactive for a reason, and although it may be more widespread than I am familiar with, EVE is the only example I've ever found of a truly living world in a game.
I'll see you in there.
Firstly, to date I have been playing EVE for roughly a month. I played for a week on a trial, loved it and signed up for the three month deal. Then had two more weeks, had no idea what I was doing and lost my original excitement and stopped playing. After a few months away I decided to get back into it. Apparently, this is not uncommon. I can't help but feel as though CCP have set the game up just so, almost as a way to ward off...how should i say it...slackards. (I know i just invented that word, but it does the job nicely.)
There is, regardless of this huge step upwards in difficulty (which I have been informed is the first of many) something mesmerising about the world the game is set within. It's like when someone asks you what you want to eat. If they give you two or three choices, you have no problem. If they ask you to choose from everything edible in the world, it's almost not worth trying to decide. One you get past this initial barrier there is the realisation that as huge as the world is, there is still only a finite amount of stuff you can do. Which makes the whole thing much more palatable. It's still a difficult choice, but not insurmountable.
Secondly, (this will probably make some of you stop reading altogether. I know what the deal is. It's OK) having come across from another MMO, the difference in...everything is very daunting to begin with. The other players, the style of play, the goals, the activities. Every. Single. Thing. More than any of those things though, is that by all appearances, the people who play EVE actually want new people to learn how to play and get involved. Other games, or rather the players of those games, have this weird idea that new players, more players, will kill the game. That somehow newer players have no idea what they are doing and will be completely unable to learn, so the game will have to be made easier. I understand that most of the reason new people are welcome is because it's easier to kill noobs. And I am fine with that. I am quite looking forward to it in fact. Just as I am looking forward to getting better and being able to do the same to future generations of noobs. But it is nonetheless refreshing and almost unsettling to feel welcome. Or at least as welcome as it's possible to feel.
Thirdly, this is the game I have always wanted to play. Since I was twelve and tried to learn to program in QBASIC in an attempt to program a game that was like Frontier: Elite II, this has been the game I was looking for. The idea that whatever happens affects someone else blows me away every time i think about it. The idea that the whole game is built on the premise that players run the systems, become the crime bosses, run companies into the ground and build empires upon the ruins of the old. I am not sure that anyone outside of the game (and even some of those inside it) understand just how fucking magnificent the idea is. It feels very close to how this sort of thing should be done. Once you get past the steep learning curve (we've all seen the XKCD strip right?) and appreciate just why it has to be like that (we don't want to be sitting around for a month of learning before we can get into a ship, of course) it's very easy to see, to me at least, that something of this scale is obviously going to be scary at first glance. But you just have to dive in and make it happen. And when it does, it makes me grin like a crazy person.
Something else that struck me as I started playing. In any other game I have played, with very few exceptions, you start the game as either someone who is destined to be a hero of some kind, or someone who has the powers/abilities of a hero thrust upon them and is forced to act for the good of others despite their own status or beliefs. EVE, on the other hand, abandons you in deepest space and that's it. You are not special or exemplary in any way save for the fact that you are a capsuleer. (Which I am given to understand is something special in itself in that you (plus the rest of the subscribers) are part of a group of people who are able to clone themselves and are gifted with the piloting skills that you will require.) But, aside from that, you are not the saviour of humanity, nor are you expected to perform any specific taks or fulfill anyone's premonitions of fate. In that way it is much closer to the pen and paper RPG's that seem so much rarer these days. There is no storyline (unless you choose to follow the missions) that is not created by you and the people that share the universe with you.
Strangely enough, it was just before all the controversy in the summer that I first started playing. And that whole rioting/subscription hemorhaging/anger but not merely in a typical, pointless, internet ranting way, that all made me even more excited about the game. The fact that people were so angry that they actually protested in-game. The fact that this was a world, not just a collection of numbers and textures. There was a power structure, a way for people to make their grievances known that was just as futile and impotent as protesting in real life, but looked equally cool and like something that you really wanted to be a part of. I wanted that from my games. I still do. If i'm going to be paying monthly, I want what I do to matter. I don't want it to be just busy work, like reading a book or watching a film. It's interactive for a reason, and although it may be more widespread than I am familiar with, EVE is the only example I've ever found of a truly living world in a game.
I'll see you in there.
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