Eve Online: Commissioned Officer Edition

Warning: long and detailed =>

While I have not purchased this particular version of the product, I had played Eve nearly continuously from Open Beta until about a year and half or so ago (when I stopped due to a lack of time), however when time permits I have activated my account for a month here and there a couple of times since then. To be honest it has an extremely steep learning curve as it is unlike any other game out there, however they have done amazing things with making it easier to learn and once you catch on to the basics it is pretty intuitive as to the user interface. Unlike other MMO's they also offer their regular expansions (typically about two per year) free to their player base (thus you don't have to spend an extra $50 to buy the new shiny bits every so often in addtion to your monthly subscription).

However this game is not for everyone. If you want to play a brain-dead game that takes very little thought you are better off with something like WoW (which in my opinion is about as challenging and engaging as opening a box of cereal). Having played more than 20 different MMORPG's over the last 10+ years, Eve Online is by far the most flexible and engaging that there is. Characters are not cookie cutter as they are in games such as WoW, in fact you are unlikely to find any two characters that are exactly the same in Eve, even with the hundreds of thousands of active accounts that exist within the single game universe (yes, everyone in the world plays together, as they don't have hundreds of different servers, but one single server farm that handles the single game universe). There are no "classes" or "professions" that limit what you can do or what you can be good at or what you can learn. In Eve Online you can train and do just about anything you set your mind to, and training is handled off-line such that you don't have to play 20+ hours a day to become powerful.

It allows for both hard-core gamers as well as casual gamers (and both can be very successful), there are no experience points and no levels. Likewise you need to be cautious as if you come across another character you have no idea if they are simply a newbie or are a skilled and dangerous player. It is also possible for a character that has been around for years to be "taken out" by a new player or character, as no one way of doing things always conquers. There are things that only small ships are capable of doing and accomplishing, likewise there are things that can only be accomplished if flying a capital ship that takes a year to work up to being able to fly and build. Likewise there are things for combat twitch gamers to do and keep their adrenaline going, while there are plenty of things for casual "care-bear" gamers to do as well (and can make damned good game money doing so with such things as mining, industrial manufacturing, hauling and transporting, or even simply buying low and selling high a wide variety of equipment and commodities in the game). There are also thousands of NPC "missions" that can be run with a variety of themes (combat, trade, hauling, mining, manufacturing, as well as combinations of these) and difficulties (can be done with a light frigate to those where you need to have an organized group of skilled pilots flying high-end battleships).

Then there are player operated and run "alliances" (essentially groups of "corporations or player run governments) that claim and rule over their own sections of space (in some cases very large sections of space). However even with more than 5,000 solar systems (all with numerous planets and resources) prime real estate is still a very hot commodity, so these alliances are constantly battling between one another (sometimes involving huge battles with hundreds of players involved on each side, and with make WoW and other similar games "arena" type battles look like a friendly game of tic-tac-toe by comparison). Not to mention that there is probably no other game or virtual world where political, military, economic, and industrial espionage all occur and one needs to be on their guard if you participate in any of these aspects of the game on a large scale. And from an economic standpoint, this game environment is a prime example of what a truly capitalistic economy is capable of being. The business end of things can be very cut-throat in some areas and commodities, but can be very rewarding and profitable if one knows what they are doing. As an example, one of my characters in the early days of the game manufactured and sold nearly 1-billion isk ("Inter-Stellar Kredits" I think is the intent of their in-game monetary system) in ammo before selling my entire collection of ammo blueprints (for every type of ammo that was available in the game at that time, all of which were heavily researched to maximize efficiency) for a sizeable amount to an organization that was one of the early fore-runners of the alliance system (before the mechanism for creating alliances even existed).

And unlike other games were resource recovery was added in as an afterthought, in Eve Online, it plays a major role in everything (if you control access to valuable resources, you control those resources, thus a major portion of the reason for claiming various solar systems or regions of space). As most items you purchase is made by a player and requires appropriately large quantities of resources to manufacture. Although even the rarest of resources are still available in many different locations, so it is probably next to impossible to truly control the economy. Although I have seen it done with an item for which there were only two blueprints available early on in the game and the owner, who purchased both of these BP's from the people who "found" them) thus became the sole supplier of them and was able to effectively set up their own monopoly and made billions of isk from the venture (at least until more BP's eventually became available).

Or if you have a darker side, there is always piracy (and if not, you will want to learn quickly what areas of the game to avoid to keep from being jumped by player pirates, as there are a fair number of them) along the fringes of the "safe" zones (security ratings 1.0 to 0.5) and the lawless zones (where the alliances tend to control large tracts of space, security ratings of 0.4 to 0.0), as the pirates tend to sit and wait along the borders of these areas and often work in small but organized groups. But beware of doing this as there are definitely repercussions, as by being a pirate you usually end up becoming "wanted" with a "bounty" being placed on your head (yes this is an active mechanism in the game), where other players will try to hunt you down for the reward and you may not be able to even enter "civilized" space without even the NPC "cops" ("CONCORD" as well as NPC law enforcement ships) attacking you.

Thus if you are interested in a game that is truly engaging and where you don't have to sit at the computer for hours on end and let it take over your life to be successful (as there are hundreds of ways to be successful, with each person being free to pursue any aspects of the game that they enjoy), then this game is well worth considering. As far as the other persons comments about not being able to transfer your free 14 day trial over to this version where you can train your character more quickly, trust me, you will make lots of mistakes and I highly recommend that you use the free trial first and then go ahead and create a new character if you purchase this product, as you will not be out that much time anyways (as the first couple of months you will still be learning what you can and want to do to enjoy it anyways and will likely change the direction of your training plans more than once). I also strongly recommend that you either find someone you know who plays to help guide and/or tutor you or that once you are in the game that you try to find someone there who is willing to help by giving advice and answering questions for new players as it does have a steep learning curve and there are so many different options and things you can do that it will likely blow your mind and you may feel overwhelmed initially.

I've played this game for over a month now, and I initially was looking into any kind of MMO. EVE caught my eye as the game that isn't easy to play. Games like WoW are popular because it's easy to play, and your endorphin rush is constantly fueled by small, insignificant rewards.

EVE, from what I've seen, is a deep and complex simulator of life in space (similar universe to Star Trek, Star Wars, your typical space opera). CCP themselves call it a MMOG instead of MMORPG.

The rewards are slower but more meaningful. Your progression in the game is measured less by flashy "Level Up!" signs and more by the excitement generated by the player when he/she is able to fly that awesome ship they've been waiting to fly, or to be able to contribute to large fleet battles, or to advance in roles in their corporation (guild).

The game sounds like this one paper: A space opera simulator in a large sandbox environment that allows the player to do whatever they want. As a player, you don't have to do missions. You can start out mining (the foundation of the player generated market ingame), you can explore wormholes and other anomalies for large profits, you can take a dip in entry level PVP. The idea is that you can do whatever you want, and there is not single way to play the game.

I won't go through the different aspects of the game, as it's pretty well described on eveonline.com and other websites. What I will mention is my absolute favorite aspects of this game.

1. Everything has consequence. Dying in this game is not a game. Dying means you loose the hard earned money you spent to buy and fit your ship. Unlike other mmo's where the goal is to make dying less significant (to attract inexperienced gamers), dying in EVE is meaningful. Later on down the road you can fit a very powerful ship, and loose it in a fleet battle, and the ship doesn't spawn back in a few seconds. You loose it for good. I love it. I've died many times, gotten ganked by other players, destroyed in fleet battles, and each time is a learning experience. Ever time I died I would tell my corp mates god I love this game.

2. One shard universe: unlike almost every other MMO in the market, EVE runs on one big server. The average number of players sharing the same universe with you at the same time is at least 40,000 to 50,000 (total number of players online at any given time). So everything you do will affect other players around you. If you did something significant in the game, the entire playerbase of EVE will hear about it. Just look up all the news EVE players have been making doing all the crazy things like corporate takeovers, massive fleet battles, etc.

3. MASSIVE FLEET BATTLES: By massive I mean hundreds to thousands of players in one area. Multiple corporations form alliances, and when alliances go to war, that is a sight. You have never seen something like this in any other game. Every player has an important role. Flying the biggest ship doesn't mean you'll win. Fleet tactics vs who can press 1, 2, 3, 4 faster.

4. Mature community: The game has one of the most impressive communities I've ever been a part of. There are almost no annoying trolls, "your mom" jokes, and other nonsense you see from communities like xbox live. The community is mature. The good players would love to help you, and the evil players would love to kill you and loot your money. But they are mature, and that's hard to find in a gaming community.

5. Player generated market: Every single item for sale ingame is manufactured by players. You can buy blueprints, and use the refined ore you mine to manufacture things in game. This mechanic allows players to pick careers where all they do is play the market. The same real world mechanics of market analysis and stock trading is used and used extensively in the game.

What I've found greatly secured my enjoyment of the game is the fact that I joined a corporation early on. EVE is not a solo game. There is no soloing at all. YOU DO NOT SOLO! Conquering the universe is best done in groups. Plus it allows for the opportunity to make the steep learning curve much less daunting.

The only thing I didn't like about EVE is the slow pacing. You will not reach a level cap in 1 month (WoW). To be able to fly the most powerful ship in the game (Titan), you will need to spend about 200 to 300 days training all the skills. Training skills is done automatically, you set the skills to train, and you don't need to be playing the game for the training to continue. This "flaw" is a double edged sword. One the negative side, it takes longer to achieve significant advancements in the game. On the positive side, it effectively removes the achievement-hunting kids who find a game boring if they're not getting giant +50 points floating over the screen every few seconds (Modern Warfare), thereby making the community extremely mature. This is the only flaw I can think of with the game, if it can be considered a flaw at all. I was so excited when I finally got to fly the next best ship after waiting for the skills to train for a week. The time took longer, but the reward was extremely satisfying.

It is said that constant bombardment of small rewards desensitizes a person and causes them to become bored unless a larger reward comes along. EVE rewards the player far less frequently, but the rewards then feel extremely powerful. Different players will find this particular aspect of the game good or bad. It is up to the player, and I'm just reporting what I've experienced.

In my opinion, the game is one of the best MMO's available. It is also one of the oldest thriving MMO's in the market (2003). It's one year older than WoW, and it's one of the few MMO's that have an ever increasing player base.

The next few updates to the game brings one of the most powerful character creators ever put into a video game (youtube it), and it prepares all the players for the Incarna update that will allow players to walk around in all the spacestations to interact with other players outside their ships. This is similar to the scale of game change similar to when Spore was catching so much attention. The difference is that as an MMO, the idea of playing in one scale, then switching to another becomes far more feasible.

The other big news is the integration of the forthcoming MMOFPS Dust 514 (PS3, Xbox 360) with EVE. Dust 514 is an FPS that integrates directly into the EVE universe. The exact details are still rumors at this point, but the game is coming out in 2011.

If you are looking for a MMO, buy EVE just because it's heading in a direction of such massive advancement. Of course, if you like the gameplay and the idea of massive fleet battles (thousands of players), massive sandbox, etc, that's probably a good reason to buy the game too.

Eve is as the first post said, incredibly open ended and unmatched in complexity or reward.

Only three things I would add, having played continuously since 2004...

In Eve you can die, and when you do, you can't go reanimate your corpse. Your ship blows up, which can happen when shot by players or npcs and possibly neural boosting implants, which will be in your character who will be in an escape pod, escape pods can only be destroyed by players. Yes there are relatively secure areas of space, but in Eve you can always die. Most say don't fly what you cant afford to lose.

In Eve you can pay for your subscription with in game currency. This is commonly done, and afk, you can still pay for your account with minimal effort and minimal real money.

In this specific edition: there is an item the Cerebral Accelerator. Yes, it is as another reviewer said interesting to get the account and what to do with it, and so on, but, that item is currently going for 650 million in game, and a month of game time costs hmm 350 - 400 million in game. So, potentially you are looking at 1 30 day time code in this box. And if you sell the unique item, a second month free, with enough extra cash on the side to buy and kit out a nice little trade business, or ship of some sort.

Regards

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