EVE General Discussion

67 percent of >5m SP chars are in highsec. Note characters — not accounts, and certainly not players.

Out of a total of 745k characters (which fits nicely with the 350+ accounts and age-old average of just over 2 characters per account), only 24 percent of those characters (177k) run missions.

Eve isn't growing because EVE doesn't offer ANYTHING for new players. Not one shred of the game is available to new players.

What about PVE you say? PVE is exists only to support the core game economy.
What about PVP in the market? That exists to facilitate the EVE core game economy.
What about mining, industry, etc? More core game support.
What about WH? Newbs in WH? A humorous suggestion.

Oh, excuse me. I forgot FW, but that's dead from what I hear and no surprise. Why? Well it's pretty obvious to me, but then I've only been trying to play this wretched heap for six years (and that time only because it has been the only game in it's genre).

The real problem is definitional. What is EVE about? What is it's real attraction?

While there are many potential subplots in EVE, the advertised core of the game is about establishing territorial ownership of sovereign space in Zero. A great sweeping theme.

So why does it not attract? The answer lies in what is necessary to plant your flag and accomplish the end goal of "Empire in Zero".

Now most of you here begin to nod your head in agreement and begin your lectures on the importance of coordination, organization, propagandizing, planning and execution on a massive scale that makes most players weep, and in a perfect world, you would be correct. But the world is not perfect and is filled with all manner of undesireable vermin that inhabit the internet.

No, unfortunately, you would be wrong, because due to the verminous infestation, EVE is about superior numbers and that is all.

* Superior numbers of players via ONLINE CLUBS,
* Superior numbers of logistics in ingame resources via BOTTING AND RMT, and
* Superior numbers in resources that are EXTERNAL TO THE GAME, but necesessary to exert control.

The average new subscriber stays in EVE just long enough to realize this and then leaves. Barely enough stay to maintain subscriber numbers. It will stay this way until CCP decides that they can make more money by ridding the game of the vermin rather than serving the vermin community. I have severe doubts that this will happen because I believe there is probably more potential profit in running a game whose core is actually about "competing RMT forces battling each other in Zero over saleable digital assets" than battles over flags and bragging rights.

Some of you will argue here that none of this matters if you just ignore it and carry on in the sandbox, but then you have resigned yourself to just shovelling sand and you aren't really playing EVE.

(Account cancelled last year, running on isk>PLEX, and looking for another game. I wish it weren't so.)

In my very personal opinion it's because the most basic, core gameplay in its mechanic is utter ****.

As a newb you expect to join this supposedly superawesome spaceship game and shoot stuff or build your trade empire or whatnot. What you are greeted with is clicking on a button and staring at (health) bars for hours.

Earning money in missions sucks because missions and the basic spaceship combat are quite boring, as well as their visual presentation(waiting since 2008 on new effects btw). Traveling is horrid as all you basically do is again clicking on a button and staring at low res background and a blurry tunnel until you can press the same button again. I literally fall asleep after 5-6 jumps and need to tab out and read something outside of the game or watch a movie - basically doing anything possible NOT to look at my ingame screen. Which is seriously a horrible game design, imo. With even less background variety now it has became even a bit worse in that regard.

And that's what you always come back to. Want to pvp? Earn money for the ships first - boring. Got money and want to buy all you need? Try not to fall asleep as you fly around collecting modules. Got everything? Ok, now wait until you find a target or your (mini)blob gets to its destination, which might also include sitting behind a pos shield, on a gate or a safe spot - waiting. I used to tab out and watch videos when i was in an active alliance doing small gang fights and larger scale warfare just to endure all the waiting. Got in the fight - oops, lagged out, dead - get back to either making money for a new ship or collecting modules again.
Fights where you actually get a chance to utilize several modules(but you need skills for those first and a ship with lots of slots and thus skills for the ship - and nice sums of isk, too - and thus some time to skill everything up) and would not get blown up or be bored shooting fishes in a barrel were actually somewhat fun but rare. In all other cases you could "play" an Excel sheet with about the same amount of fun.

I think two things are at work here:

1. The global economy is shot. People are more limited in their game sub budgets. For younger people, this means their parents are not going to sub the kids up as often just to try a game for a short while.
2. EvE has a lot of "problems" for players that is more easily solved by getting more subscriptions. "Get an Alt" people say whenever somebody complains about something.


For example, if I had more than one sub, that would be around 30 bucks a month. For 30 bucks I can get materials for 5 gallons of good, dark homebrew beer. That's around 40 bottles of bear. I drink 60 bottles a month (2 per day, and have been doing so for over 20 years).

So two EvE subs means 40 bottles of beer. That's what I already do with the money. Just an example. For somebody else, that extra money is their phone bill, or something else.

The days of the 10 accounts player is coming to an end, thank God. I am tired of those people. EVERY solution from them is "get an alt....". What like I barely have enough time for one account consisting of me, one alt on the same account because I wanted to play with the Carbon Engine, now I gotta get more?

And if multiple accounts is the ONLY way to make it in this game, to someone who wants to win or feel like they did, that looks like a scam. Of course I don't give a rat's little gray ass about winning, but I refer to those more ambitious types. who do. If they went to play chess but had to buy more chess sets in order to have enough pieces, they would not play chess.



EvE also suffers from a great departure between mindless grind and PVP. It seems like it's either or, or a need to switch from one to facilitate the other. This is a matter of lacking opportunities. The more exciting game playing options do not sustain themselves economically (in game), while the truly boring ones bring in great funds, but are maor buzzkills.

I think that a combination of PVE and PVP, hybrid missions where players have to fight for the goal, or the kinds of missions where the target is another player, would bring in some fresh air and fresh blood. Something is going to have to be done, or the game goes away for the usual reasons that all games go away - they do get old. It's life.

While this isn't a criticism, EVE does lack the 'instant gratification' you would associate with most of the mainstream MMO's.

When i play WAR i can be in a PvP group inside of 2-3 minutes of logging on, and beating up on people within 5. i can play for 15-20 minutes and have a fairly good time, before logging off.

My missus recently started making me play SW:TOR and that too is similar.

The PvE content is also easier to access, and you can be 'raiding' almost before you logon.

For those with less disposable time, the appeal of most MMO's is that everything is put on a plate for you. and you can achieve something in a short time.

EVE in comparison is slow burning, and has nothing in the way of end game provided by the game itself. almost all the content is player created, and its not very suitable for the casual player. PvE is boring and repetetive, PvP is fast, and brutal, but finding a fight that isn't insanely one sided can be a challenge.
When i was up fighting with the NC, it took around 30 minutes to form a fleet (at least) and then 1-2 hours to complete a roam, for 'maybe' a handful of fights (win or lose) many people simply do not have that kind of time.

If CCP really wanted to boost EVE subs, and make the game a mainstream success, they would definately need to dumb down the game in a major way, make PvP optional, add battlegrounds, instanced raids and so forth. but if they did that, EVE simply wouldn't be EVE, it would be WOW with spaceships

Eve needs more conflicts. Charismatic alliance leaders producing the awesome drama sauce on blogs and forums. Epic fights that generates, videos and press reviews. Nullsec alliances are the best advocates for the game. Now ccp really needs to help them by changing sov mechanics and creating wars incentives.
Though imo small gang warfare is where the fun is, it got harder to find good fights, and you won't get much attention from outsiders advertising on 10vs10 fights (except Alliance Tournament but that's another story)

You won't attract players by creating new pve content. Other games are just better at it. Focus on what Eve is best at: epic pvp content.

As many others have mentioned, I believe a large reason this game has stagnated has been both CCP and the players changing their vision on how this game should be running.

When I first started, it seemed CCP presented the tools for the players to build. Whereas CCP were players themselves, they seem to adjust (nerf) when something really got out of hand. They allowed the players to create, destroy, and expand in ways not initially considered and let the game run from there. Yet today, it appears CCP does not play their own game. They may or may not offer a dev blog on their intentions, may or may not respond to players' complaints and issues, and then proceed since they feel they know what is best for the game. Afterwards, the same complaints and issues are ignored as they proceed to the next "shiny". Add CCP expanded into bringing in market people that tout the grandest ideas because it works in other games so it shall work here too.

But the player base changed too. While many of the early players were paper and pencil gamers that progressed into hardcore player versus player gaming, today's players seem afraid of loosing. The early players were the number crunchers versus the newer players that want only the best right now. Early players did not seem to mind waiting and working towards smaller goals while newer players want the grand prize yesterday. Early players did not seem attached to token aspects like kill boards and proceeded what might appear rashly while newer players will not proceed unless they're guaranteed complete success to not appear as "lol fail noob tears".

I could be wrong, but the early players seemed older in real life, with the wisdom and maturity to match. Today's "instant gratification" crowd seem hellbent on tossing out the various "u mad bro", "tears", and other slang terms to appear cool to each other while most likely appearing as little angels to their clueless parents. And back then, Eve was just a game with no right nor wrong way to play and proceed. But today, if you do not follow a rigid path and divert onto less ~successful~ paths in the game, like mining, then you "utterly fail". Unless you happen to bot without care or disregard, then those "fail paths" mean big business in the real world.

As a bittervet, I have seen them come and go. If I did not "care" enough about my character I buil from scratch, then I would have probably vacated a while back.

I fixed your link.

A good bulk of them being alts to people in 0.0

…which are safe to factor in a whole bunch of botters into, which means that there's quite less players actually running L4s.

See how that works?

Your signature is still hilariously inaccurate in just about every way.