EVE General Discussion

Despite the fact that I did not agree with the direction that CCP was taking with EVE, I never unsubed my account during NeXgate. In the end, this came down to the fact that I still had fun playing EVE. The game play that I had enjoyed for so long was still compelling, and I enjoyed spending my free time blowing up spaceships with my friends. I advocated strongly for my positions on MT and the state of FIS, but I never stopped playing the game.

That may change next month.

Up until this point, every objection I have had towards CCP has been on the basis of game mechanics, or where they put their development time. They were differences of opinion about somethings that in all honesty are not that terribly important. Now however, CCP has done something that I find moral reprehensible; something that has an impact on more than a hundred peoples lives.

CCP has recently laid off 20% of its workforce; programmers, artists, community managers. Hilmar has labeled this mass lay-off as part of an attempt to "refocus" CCP's priorities. In other words, the people at CCP who have actually listened to our concerns, who have put in the work making EVE what it is, who have in many cases advocated on our behalf are the ones who are paying for the mistakes of CCP's upper management.

This is sadly something that happens all the time, in every industry. When companies start to run into financial pressure, they do not look to upper management to cut payroll costs. Instead they immediately go to the bottom of the pay scale, to the people who are actually being productive. They cut positions where the most harm to the companies capabilities per dollar is done. It is corporate culture at its very worst. That does not mean that it is something I simply accept as the status quo. I do not support companies that treat employees like this.

This means, that come next month when my subscription is up I will not be continuing my account. This is a terrible shame, as this comes at a time when I could not be happier with the direction the game seems to be heading. Some things are more important than internet space ships however.

A large number of the people I fly with are also considering letting their subs lapse. A few people in Rote went inactive during the summer, but it was not because they were outraged at CCP. It was in most cases simply because they had gotten bored with the game. It was not something we had huge discussions about, occasionally someone would just mention that they were unsubbing to take a break for a while. Some of them have come back and are flying with us again, some of them are waiting until this winter. Either way, it was never something that significantly disrupted alliance operations.

This time around, there are quite a few people in Rote who are livid over CCP's actions. People are actively trying to get others to unsub with them over this, and a 10 page thread about this poped up nearly instantly on our forums (which usually go weeks with out much more than a few CTA threads.) I can tell you, those of us who have friends at CCP, and those of us who have been affected by the same upper management mentality care about this.

I totally agree with you in regards to this. However, I feel that unsubscribing is not the best way to get the point accross, because it effectively cuts off exposure to said displeasure. The only way to effectively get the point accross is to voice it with reasonable objections. Unfortunately, it may be awhile before CCP starts to listen.

A well-written wall of text predicting unsubs (In terms of grammar and punctuation). +1
Poorly thought out and very emotional wall of text. -5

Why did you feel the need to post this ?
I am genuinely curious as to why you are saying you're leaving and feel you have to post about it. Would your post and responses to it somehow affect the future of Eve, or yourself ?
I'm trying not to be flippant about anything, but come on dude, you could just have said "I am leaving because I am p1ssed with what CCP has done by firing 20% of their staff"

I'm in danger now of creating a wall of text, so I'll cease now and wish you luck, whatever you may do.

Cheers.

Haha I was thinking the same thing! "I love your product but because you had to lay off a part of your workforce (something that every single company has been doing for the past 4 years), I'm going to stop using your product, thereby forcing you to lay off more people."

*Sigh*...college students who've never had to live in the real world...

posting in another useless thread

1 person =/= wave of unsubs

I "liked" your post because I do support the principle you epouse (that there is room for honour and decency in business ). But I do also agree with Malcanis that we need to be looking at the way the game develops now.

Where these two arguments collide is in the detail of who is getting fired though.

For me I will be pretty furious if it turns out that the rank and file CCP'ers got culled at the cost of maintaining the people who advocated and attempted to foist MT/NeX on Eve Online and directly caused this trouble for everyone.

I can understand the need for redundancies as a result for mismanagement and essential refinancing - its horrible but neccessary for the long term survival of the game.

But I can't understand IF the VERY people who caused this problem somehow are the ones who survive it having many times failed to take responsibilty for their corrosive greedy money-grubbing nonsense that brought CCP so close to ruin.

Let me be plain. For me to consider subscribing with real $ rather than plexing up from my in-game assets I need to see the NeX Concept and all its advocates figuritively swinging from the lampposts in Reykjavik and Hilmar should be plainly putting his hands up in admission that NeX has no place in Eve.

Now is the time to show that you care for this game by -not- unsubscribing.

CCP made a few big mistakes last summer when it came to EVE and they completely overstretched themselves over the past years by working on 3 properties, of which they under supported their only money making property.

It's too late to turn the clock back, all CCP can do now is going forward, hopefully with the lessons learned not stored in the short term memory banks but in the long term memory banks.

Protesting now by unsubscribing will not bring those people back who sadly had to be laid off.
It also will not serve any purpose in trying to communicate towards CCP that you do not agree with the direction they have taken.
You are a bit late for that.

All you can hope for is that things actually will get better, not worse. And having a second round of people will make things worse. Maybe so bad that once you decide to return all you find here is a 404 page.

I recommend you read this Jester's Trek Burn Rate if you have an interest in this issue, it never hurts to look at the other side of the issue.

While the job losses are unfortunate and I have a great deal of sympathy for those on the sharp end of these cuts, (been in a similar situation and it's not a good place to be) it must be remembered that CCP is a business and is doing nothing different than any other business faced with a similar problem would do.

Reducing CCP's revenue in protest at their cutting of jobs can be considered counter productive at best (I'm being polite there) and will only lead to further cuts being made if taken up by a large number of subscribers.

Maybe everyone was hoping soundwave would get fired...

Well community devs aren't reeeeally developers in the strictest sense of the word, they're in PR, not game development/programming and are a luxury for most games (no offence spitfire) ... having 6 of them does seem slightly excessive, especially with all those players unsubbing the other month meaning they'd have less of a player base to deal with.

People are threatening to leave because of EVE's new direction? Engine trails, implants of mails, more control through player owned customs offices, cap nerf, new ships, nebulae, etc, etc.
*Sigh*

Finally, deal with the fact CCP had to fire a bunch of people. In the end, it's the best.
Either CCP goes broke and fires everyone, or cuts out 20% of its developers, who aren't even earning money for CCP yet, and everyone's better off as a whole.

Yes, getting fired would suck, but if Iceland is as developed as I think it is, the workers will receive compensation from either the government or CCP.