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New player experience: is CCP playing pranks?

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Alavaria Fera
GoonWaffe
#21 - 2013-12-30 19:14:19 UTC
Malcolm Shinhwa wrote:
J'Poll wrote:
Issue is: CCP can't make a tutorial that revolves around Player interaction. As you can't script it into a tutorial how a player reacts to another player.


And honestly the last time CCP tried to lead newbies into some player interaction lead to a slaughter on the Doril gate by those who need no such tutorial.

You can look at Eve as a game, learn the rules and accept what comes as part of the learning process. Or you can look at Eve as some sort of actual life and rage anytime something bad happens that you deem unfair. The first group are probably the players more likely to stay for the long term. They are also the ones more likely to be doing the unfair to the second group.

So since it is unfair, perhaps some intervention is necessary ...

Triggered by: Wars of Sovless Agression, Bending the Knee, Twisting the Knife, Eating Sov Wheaties, Bombless Bombers, Fizzlesov, Interceptor Fleets, Running Away, GhostTime Vuln, Renters, Bombs, Bubbles ?
CCP Phantom
C C P
C C P Alliance
#22 - 2013-12-30 20:18:13 UTC
Some spam was removed from this thread. Please stay on topic and polite, thank you.

CCP Phantom - Senior Community Developer
J'Poll
School of Applied Knowledge
Caldari State
#23 - 2013-12-30 21:04:46 UTC
J'Poll wrote:
Issue is: CCP can't make a tutorial that revolves around Player interaction. As you can't script it into a tutorial how a player reacts to another player.

I say...go back to the old tutorials: Here is your ship, here is the undock button...Go forth and multiply.

I doesn't give a false sense of security nor does it push anybody into any sort of mindset.

EDIT:

And the whole EVE-Uni part.

Another fine example of emergent gameplay where the players make the game and CCP just provides the tools to do it.


CCP can script an entire virtual Universe of interacting players that is Eve Online but it can't script a player interacting tutorial inside the existing Eve universe. Did I get it right or …? I don't know about you but that doesn't sound like Mozart to me, if you know what I mean. I'm not suggesting that they aren't challenges to overcome but still I think it is in their reach if they want to consider such thing.[/quote]

So...if you are so good.

Explain to me HOW CCP should make a tutorial (which ALWAYS will be PvE, as you are fighting a NON player) that mimics player vs player interaction.

There is NO way to make a NPC script that will mimic a player and it's decisions.

Personal channel: Crazy Dutch Guy

Help channel: Help chat - Reloaded

Public roams channels: RvB Ganked / Redemption Road / Spectre Fleet / Bombers bar / The Content Club
J'Poll
School of Applied Knowledge
Caldari State
#24 - 2013-12-30 21:06:52 UTC
Sofia Tsero wrote:
I'm a pretty new player myself so I have the Rookie Help channel open. It's nice for things like, "What does a blue container mean?" But 99% of the time, the reason a player can't get through the "Click this button to undock and then go here and click this button to board your rookie ship" tutorial or the career agents is because they just haven't read what CCP is telling them to do. Yes, the font is small. Yes, there's a lot of it. But it does explain to you what high sec and low sec and null sec mean and it tells you that even though NPCs won't shoot at your pod, other players will. The tutorial even warns you about the potential dangers of autopiloting. (I'm pretty sure I could have my entire apartment mopped, dusted, and vacuumed in the amount of time it took me to get to Arnon from Uitra, but I'm not autopiloting.)

I don't think it felt like being pranked at all. I think CCP is making an honest effort to make the game as accessible as possible to new players, but new players can't just skim the mission journals. You're right that the game really isn't that difficult, but I there is a complexity to it that doesn't exist in other MMOs.

I'm sure the tutorials can be improved upon, but I'm not sure how. So far, all I know is that I'm enjoying my very early PvE experiences in EVE, and I know that when it comes to a lot of things, I still have a lot to learn.


Thanks Sofia.

This clearly proofs a point that even if CCP is playing pranks...they are doing it on the people who deserve it for NOT reading stuff that is presented to you.

Personal channel: Crazy Dutch Guy

Help channel: Help chat - Reloaded

Public roams channels: RvB Ganked / Redemption Road / Spectre Fleet / Bombers bar / The Content Club
J'Poll
School of Applied Knowledge
Caldari State
#25 - 2013-12-30 21:12:45 UTC
Malcolm Shinhwa wrote:
J'Poll wrote:
Issue is: CCP can't make a tutorial that revolves around Player interaction. As you can't script it into a tutorial how a player reacts to another player.


And honestly the last time CCP tried to lead newbies into some player interaction lead to a slaughter on the Doril gate by those who need no such tutorial.


That was awesome...and I was on the receiving end of the fight with an alt

Personal channel: Crazy Dutch Guy

Help channel: Help chat - Reloaded

Public roams channels: RvB Ganked / Redemption Road / Spectre Fleet / Bombers bar / The Content Club
J'Poll
School of Applied Knowledge
Caldari State
#26 - 2013-12-30 21:13:32 UTC
Alavaria Fera wrote:
Malcolm Shinhwa wrote:
J'Poll wrote:
Issue is: CCP can't make a tutorial that revolves around Player interaction. As you can't script it into a tutorial how a player reacts to another player.


And honestly the last time CCP tried to lead newbies into some player interaction lead to a slaughter on the Doril gate by those who need no such tutorial.

You can look at Eve as a game, learn the rules and accept what comes as part of the learning process. Or you can look at Eve as some sort of actual life and rage anytime something bad happens that you deem unfair. The first group are probably the players more likely to stay for the long term. They are also the ones more likely to be doing the unfair to the second group.

So since it is unfair, perhaps some intervention is necessary ...


Nope, as that beat the entire sandbox idea.

Personal channel: Crazy Dutch Guy

Help channel: Help chat - Reloaded

Public roams channels: RvB Ganked / Redemption Road / Spectre Fleet / Bombers bar / The Content Club
Herzog Wolfhammer
Sigma Special Tactics Group
#27 - 2013-12-30 22:15:04 UTC
stoicfaux wrote:
Dead Shade wrote:
You can't have EVE's enormous amount of content and expect a comprehensive tutorial. If you did have a tutorial covering everything that could possibly happen to you when you undock, new player retention would likely be a hundred times worse. Imagine listening to Aura's inane rambling for a few weeks every time you log in.

"Oh look, you've opened the "People and Places" window, let's spend an hour or twenty going over every conceivable use. Hey! You've opened the map window! Let's analyze EVERY filter in the star system view!"

The bare bones tutorial isn't a prank or a problem. Adding much more would make it an even longer tedious mess. This is a huge sandbox game, not a cell phone game you learn in 2 seconds.





That's not the problem. The problem is that the NPE doesn't help most new users make the extreme paradigm shift that EVE represents. The question to ask is: "Does the NPE help WoW players make the transition to the heavily PvP environment that is EVE?" Generally speaking, the answer is "no," plus the NPE tends to instead promote a PvE paradigm, which makes the surprise high-sec PvP ********* really surprising, a surprise compounded by the cacti of obtuse aggression, scamming, and game mechanics.




This is interesting and quite correct. I think a new gamer overall who didn't play WoW or FPS game either won't find Eve to be harsh.

The real difference here to address is "quick gratification versus delayed reward". It may not be WoW in particular because FPS games, played for the kill and get killed aspect of FPS gaming, offer quick gratification as well.

And as we see often, those who want quick gratification and are used to getting it are the ones who will complain the loudest. It has more to do with the poor quality of people these days and less to do with actual quality of the games.


As for a "De-WoWization" of gamers coming to Eve, I would say that the Skilling Point system is one of the first things to address. The reason for this is that so many games out there, and WoW in particular, are about skill LEVELs and expectations and abilities built around them (we can also use the word "entitlement") that taking the same approach to the Eve SP system is disastrous. I think that anybody who starts out first with the Eve SP system would find the "leveling" approach of other games intolerable, if the SP system was handled correctly in the first place. Poor handling of the SP system is why new players will think they have a WINboat and get sent back to the clone vat with a sore ass without even firing a shot, or from a different approach, have players grinding away for years thinking they need 10s of millions of SP and either getting bored out of the game OR having spent a year or more mis-applying their SP, then go off thinking they have a WINboat and being sent back to the clone vat with a slapmark because they spent years accumulating SP and not really learning how to play - then they ragequit.

Bring back DEEEEP Space!
Alavaria Fera
GoonWaffe
#28 - 2013-12-30 22:46:28 UTC
J'Poll wrote:
Alavaria Fera wrote:
Malcolm Shinhwa wrote:
J'Poll wrote:
Issue is: CCP can't make a tutorial that revolves around Player interaction. As you can't script it into a tutorial how a player reacts to another player.


And honestly the last time CCP tried to lead newbies into some player interaction lead to a slaughter on the Doril gate by those who need no such tutorial.

You can look at Eve as a game, learn the rules and accept what comes as part of the learning process. Or you can look at Eve as some sort of actual life and rage anytime something bad happens that you deem unfair. The first group are probably the players more likely to stay for the long term. They are also the ones more likely to be doing the unfair to the second group.

So since it is unfair, perhaps some intervention is necessary ...


Nope, as that beat the entire sandbox idea.

Buff barges some more, ganking isn't legitimate pvp anyway, according to the ganked miners I've heard from

Triggered by: Wars of Sovless Agression, Bending the Knee, Twisting the Knife, Eating Sov Wheaties, Bombless Bombers, Fizzlesov, Interceptor Fleets, Running Away, GhostTime Vuln, Renters, Bombs, Bubbles ?
Malcolm Shinhwa
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#29 - 2013-12-31 00:26:14 UTC  |  Edited by: Malcolm Shinhwa
Alavaria Fera wrote:
J'Poll wrote:
Alavaria Fera wrote:
Malcolm Shinhwa wrote:
J'Poll wrote:
Issue is: CCP can't make a tutorial that revolves around Player interaction. As you can't script it into a tutorial how a player reacts to another player.


And honestly the last time CCP tried to lead newbies into some player interaction lead to a slaughter on the Doril gate by those who need no such tutorial.

You can look at Eve as a game, learn the rules and accept what comes as part of the learning process. Or you can look at Eve as some sort of actual life and rage anytime something bad happens that you deem unfair. The first group are probably the players more likely to stay for the long term. They are also the ones more likely to be doing the unfair to the second group.

So since it is unfair, perhaps some intervention is necessary ...


Nope, as that beat the entire sandbox idea.

Buff barges some more, ganking isn't legitimate pvp anyway, according to the ganked miners I've heard from


Yeah but no PvP is legitimate to the guy who lost anyway. They're losers, so who cares what they think.

[i]"The purpose of fighting is to win. There is no possible victory in defense. The sword is more important than the shield and skill is more important than either. The final weapon is the brain. All else is supplemental[/i]."
Alavaria Fera
GoonWaffe
#30 - 2013-12-31 00:29:06 UTC
Malcolm Shinhwa wrote:
Alavaria Fera wrote:
J'Poll wrote:
Alavaria Fera wrote:
Malcolm Shinhwa wrote:

And honestly the last time CCP tried to lead newbies into some player interaction lead to a slaughter on the Doril gate by those who need no such tutorial.

You can look at Eve as a game, learn the rules and accept what comes as part of the learning process. Or you can look at Eve as some sort of actual life and rage anytime something bad happens that you deem unfair. The first group are probably the players more likely to stay for the long term. They are also the ones more likely to be doing the unfair to the second group.

So since it is unfair, perhaps some intervention is necessary ...

Nope, as that beat the entire sandbox idea.

Buff barges some more, ganking isn't legitimate pvp anyway, according to the ganked miners I've heard from

Yeah but no PvP is legitimate to the guy who lost anyway. They're losers, so who cares what they think.

How ... harsh and cold. Just like eve online

Triggered by: Wars of Sovless Agression, Bending the Knee, Twisting the Knife, Eating Sov Wheaties, Bombless Bombers, Fizzlesov, Interceptor Fleets, Running Away, GhostTime Vuln, Renters, Bombs, Bubbles ?
Yosef Brinalle
University of Caille
Gallente Federation
#31 - 2013-12-31 00:31:48 UTC
stoicfaux wrote:

That's not the problem. The problem is that the NPE doesn't help most new users make the extreme paradigm shift that EVE represents. The question to ask is: "Does the NPE help WoW players make the transition to the heavily PvP environment that is EVE?" Generally speaking, the answer is "no," plus the NPE tends to instead promote a PvE paradigm, which makes the surprise high-sec PvP ********* really surprising, a surprise compounded by the cacti of obtuse aggression, scamming, and game mechanics.


As a 4 week old player - BINGO!

Last night I had a paradigm shift - this is a game of hunter and prey. If you are playing prey at the moment you must outsmart the hunters. If you are playing hunter at the moment you must outsmart the prey. The game is more enjoyable and makes a lot more sense once I saw it that way. Where CCP fails? They DO NOT state this core game philosophy in a clear and unmistakeable way that penetrates to the core of people used to PVE games. Or even most other PVP type games for that matter where everyone is hunter and prey at the same time.

If there had not been a special on subscription rates I would have abandoned the game at the end of the 3 week trial. Now, at 4 weeks, I get it and will take the next three moths to see whether I like it. How many new players 'don't get it' during their 2 or 3 week trial and just bag it?
Sofia Tsero
Deep Core Mining Inc.
Caldari State
#32 - 2013-12-31 02:14:16 UTC
Yosef Brinalle wrote:
stoicfaux wrote:

That's not the problem. The problem is that the NPE doesn't help most new users make the extreme paradigm shift that EVE represents. The question to ask is: "Does the NPE help WoW players make the transition to the heavily PvP environment that is EVE?" Generally speaking, the answer is "no," plus the NPE tends to instead promote a PvE paradigm, which makes the surprise high-sec PvP ********* really surprising, a surprise compounded by the cacti of obtuse aggression, scamming, and game mechanics.


As a 4 week old player - BINGO!

Last night I had a paradigm shift - this is a game of hunter and prey. If you are playing prey at the moment you must outsmart the hunters. If you are playing hunter at the moment you must outsmart the prey. The game is more enjoyable and makes a lot more sense once I saw it that way. Where CCP fails? They DO NOT state this core game philosophy in a clear and unmistakeable way that penetrates to the core of people used to PVE games. Or even most other PVP type games for that matter where everyone is hunter and prey at the same time.

If there had not been a special on subscription rates I would have abandoned the game at the end of the 3 week trial. Now, at 4 weeks, I get it and will take the next three moths to see whether I like it. How many new players 'don't get it' during their 2 or 3 week trial and just bag it?

Except, why is it CCP's responsibility to "transition" WoW players to the very different gameplay that is EVE? That's great that you had a paradigm shift, but why is it CCP's job to ease you into it even more than they already do? You can pretty easily stay out of PvP for decent amount of time and get acclimated. I guess I'm just not comfortable with the idea that it's CCP's job to keep the training wheels on any longer than they already do because, oh, WoW players just aren't getting it.
Tarn Wolfen
Tiger's Bite
#33 - 2013-12-31 04:18:14 UTC
Eve is possibly as close to a Darwenian "Survival of the Fittest" game on a truly comprehensively epic scale as presently exists.

There is virtually an infinite number of ways of surviving and prospering in Eve, and learning quickly, being flexible and adapting quickly, are all traits that will take you far. And just as many opportunities to fail or fall victim. Everywhere around you there are opportunities, challenges, hazards, threats, dangers, riches, risks and rewards. And therein is succinctly the game.

It truly intrigues me. It offers a universe from which the only limit on what you can take for yourself is yourself.

I have only been here about a year. It has seemed since the first week that the veterans have huge advantages over the new players, but I have found that the separation can be far more quickly reduced than at first it seemed. You just have to learn quickly, and realize that your knowledge of the game properly applied to whatever your present challenge may be, gives you frequent opportunities to play the role of David versus Goliath with equal success and reward.

In other games after you learn the basic game, it often seems the one with the ultimate advantage is the one with the fastest internet connection, the best computer and the quickest reflexes. But in Eve it is far more about who has applied themselves to learning more and faster, and having better information, and better plans, and better flexibility and adaptation, etc.

I was looking for a game like Eve. I am very glad I came to it. Like any truly new player the going was hard at first. But there are the tutorials, the rookie channel, the forums, google, in game contacts, friends and helpful corps, etc. If you have what it takes and apply yourself it is not nearly as hard in hindsight, as it seems initially.

But there is something to the argument that the unique learning curve of Eve culls too many would be players. I am not sure more could not be done to make it possible for more to survive long enough to learn that this game is the truest sandbox game out there, with the greatest set of possibilities, and decide whether it is for them. I am sure some get culled out who would make good veterans if they had more encouragement to stay. On the other hand, too much handholding would contradict the essence of this game.

My personal concern is that at this stage the game will not continue to exist and develop and grow as much as I would like, as I can see making a huge investment over time in it, and I would not want that to go for naught too soon. So I have motivation to work towards productive and doable suggestions to counteract the "over-culling of new players".
Hasikan Miallok
Republic University
Minmatar Republic
#34 - 2013-12-31 04:23:24 UTC  |  Edited by: Hasikan Miallok
Malcolm Shinhwa wrote:
Alavaria Fera wrote:

Buff barges some more, ganking isn't legitimate pvp anyway, according to the ganked miners I've heard from


Yeah but no PvP is legitimate to the guy who lost anyway. They're losers, so who cares what they think.


No ... it's the people that actually pvp (null/ losec roams etc ... where the outcome is not predetermined by picking a defenceless target) that usually say hisec mining gankers such as the new order mob are just another form of carebear. The miners themselves see them as scarey gankers.

I recall one situation where a "leet new order pvp-er" was asked to join a losec roam being put together and refused cos losec was too dangerous :D
Diomedes Calypso
Aetolian Armada
#35 - 2013-12-31 04:43:52 UTC
I've started a few new accounts for the heck of it the last 3 months. I'm not really sure what I needed with a 6th 7th an 8th account but... maybe I'll find something. The first 5 sort of pay for themselves in passive ways and..well if you train right you can come close to paying for them by selling the character you trained over a year or so.

Topic at hand.

Sick CCP joke:

Default settings are horrendous !

I'm not sure what the default market setting it but it isn't lowest to highest...

Overview settings.. common, they can do a better default than to have a friend show as a criminal.. (or a few very like that if that one isn't precise.. I changed them all can't exactly remember)

Just a visual nuisance.. but do many people really want pictures of both the speakers in the scroll and the list of characters in channel on the right? (Both I mean.. I can see an either or ... pics on the right are fairly colorful)

I'm sure there are others.. I know I had to go to a lot of effort to turn stuff off.. maybe they're not all bad for new players but there were a few others.

Scam of the day pop ups would be a lot more useful than aurora popping up until you figure out where in the tiered tabs in the esc menu to go to turn off the tutorials (is it in the reset section?)

-


Also "complication" I'm not sure that the game is complicated but that there is so much of it..... years later I haven't tried hacking...not that hacking is difficult to learn but each and everything takes a bit of effort to learn... not a huge amount but you could go every night for months before you tried every aspect of the game to a point where you knew the terms involved.


The "steep learning curve" has as much about Figuing out WHAT to do, not HOW to do it.

The how isn't hard within a corp of people willing to train you or give you enough tips to know what to look for.

I think it is a matter of "not knowing the questions" --- once you know the question you want to figure out, it isn't that complex to find the resources in the Evelopedia or in forum searches.

You do need to learn not to expect the game itself to point you to what you need to learn to get engaged in the game.

.
Diomedes Calypso
Aetolian Armada
#36 - 2013-12-31 05:03:35 UTC
Yosef Brinalle wrote:
stoicfaux wrote:

That's not the problem. The problem is that the NPE doesn't help most new users make the extreme paradigm shift that EVE represents. The question to ask is: "Does the NPE help WoW players make the transition to the heavily PvP environment that is EVE?" Generally speaking, the answer is "no," plus the NPE tends to instead promote a PvE paradigm, which makes the surprise high-sec PvP ********* really surprising, a surprise compounded by the cacti of obtuse aggression, scamming, and game mechanics.


As a 4 week old player - BINGO!

Last night I had a paradigm shift - this is a game of hunter and prey. If you are playing prey at the moment you must outsmart the hunters. If you are playing hunter at the moment you must outsmart the prey. The game is more enjoyable and makes a lot more sense once I saw it that way. Where CCP fails? They DO NOT state this core game philosophy in a clear and unmistakeable way that penetrates to the core of people used to PVE games. Or even most other PVP type games for that matter where everyone is hunter and prey at the same time.

If there had not been a special on subscription rates I would have abandoned the game at the end of the 3 week trial. Now, at 4 weeks, I get it and will take the next three moths to see whether I like it. How many new players 'don't get it' during their 2 or 3 week trial and just bag it?



Excellent description:

Hunter and Prey.

once you get your head around that there isn't any "why did they pick on me" or "this pvp isn't about skill"

Even the markets are "hunter and prey" ... not maybe as universally, but price maniuplation, intimidation but undercutting .. extra zero scams etc... very much a part of the "railroad baron" game.


The game is about going around and finding someone or something to prey on. You're a coyote looking for rabits.. or a pack of coyotes looking for rabits.

Sometimes ... on pack of coyotes fights another pack but, usually you don't have the same numbers...

... but its the hunt anyway.

I've played WoW now and then and the PvP seems so contrived to me there. I guess its the same on consoles.

Why would you want the same number of players on each team? Well , you would if it was a game like football or basketball or something.

This is trying to be a "world".. a virtual universe.. not some instanced chance to show off twitch skills or episodic bouts of strategy on a level playing field.

.
Don Purple
Snuggle Society
Test Alliance Please Ignore
#37 - 2013-12-31 05:46:42 UTC
I met a new player in a mission the other day, maybe a few months old, the poor bloke had fallen asleep and had forgotten to finish the mission. I soon afterwords spawned his next two waves and even spent the time to drag them over to his ship. His tank didn't hold. Since I felt bad he must have been lonely and cold sitting there in his pod I sent him back to station!!.

Eve tutorials brought to you by Don Purple.
Don't fall asleep in missions 101.

I am just here to snuggle and do spy stuff.
Ritual Union
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#38 - 2013-12-31 09:48:16 UTC
[You can only quote 5 times in a single post. - As such, multiple posts coming]

Oh boy, spelling CCP as CPP on the official CCP forum has to make one feel somewhat dumb. I make no exception, original post edited. I offer my sincere apologies. Let's go now to the point of this topic.

Quotes from people who unfortunately didn't get the spirit and/or the message of my initial post:
Major Xadi wrote:
the OP contends the tutorials are a joke which don't fully prepare new players for the harshness of EvE.

Ioci wrote:
The game is ten years old. You really thought there was going to be some innovative bullshit to make it new person friendly?

Dead Shade wrote:
You can't have EVE's enormous amount of content and expect a comprehensive tutorial. This is a huge sandbox game, not a cell phone game you learn in 2 seconds.

Quotes from people making assumptions, assumptions that I don't find to be correct:
J'Poll wrote:
Explain to me HOW CCP should make a tutorial (which ALWAYS will be PvE, as you are fighting a NON player) that mimics player vs player interaction..

...
Ritual Union
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#39 - 2013-12-31 09:49:22 UTC
[You can only quote 5 times in a single post. - As such, multiple posts coming]

Quotes from people who fortunately did get, even if only in part, the spirit and/or the message of my initial post:
Arduemont wrote:
Telling them how to avoid scams, ganks, gate camps, dying in general etc is not the point. The point is, that they know it can happen so they will be less pissed when it does.

Haedonism Bot wrote:
It is true that the tutorials give one a false impression that this is a PVE game, and when taken alone that is bad.

stoicfaux wrote:
The problem is that the NPE doesn't help most new users make the extreme paradigm shift that EVE represents. ..., the NPE tends to instead promote a PvE paradigm, ...

Yosef Brinalle wrote:
Last night I had a paradigm shift - this is a game of hunter and prey. If you are playing prey at the moment you must outsmart the hunters. If you are playing hunter at the moment you must outsmart the prey. The game is more enjoyable and makes a lot more sense once I saw it that way. Where CCP fails? They DO NOT state this core game philosophy in a clear and unmistakable way that penetrates to the core of people used to PVE games. ..., If there had not been a special on subscription rates I would have abandoned the game at the end of the 3 week trial.

...
Ritual Union
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#40 - 2013-12-31 09:56:07 UTC  |  Edited by: Ritual Union
Limited number of quotes problem solved. Now some comments.

The initial post is not about preparing the new players for the Eve harshness, is not about making Eve a new person friendly place or about making Eve tutorials fully comprehensive. The post was about why in a game that offers you a PvP centric universe you have a PvE oriented set of tutorials! I'm glad that at least some of the posters here got it exactly right.

Imagine you are about to buy your 24th car. You go the car dealer and he's selling you a jet airplane while acting as if he was selling you a car. Wouldn't you feel to be the subject of prank in that case? How's Eve tutorials case any different?

I wouldn't expect the tutorials in a massive multiplayer online game to teach players how to play the damn game. However, I would expect an honest introduction to what is the game about. Eve is not only PvE, to which part the tutorials introduce you. In fact, with the exception of the Eve Economy, where PvE plays the essential role of generating the ISK (with the exception of the insurance generated ISK, the PvE activities are, to my present knowledge, the only activities in Eve generating ISK), all the fuzz around Eve is PvP related.

New player experience obviously is much more than doing the tutorials. However, I mentioned only the tutorials because they are the standard method of introducing a new player to a game. Moreover, in Eve case they are the instrument that CCP could touch at will without breaking the sandbox paradigm.

As I see it, once introduced to Eve, there are two ways to follow: you hate it or you love it. This is great! What I'm arguing here is that many new players come to hate Eve without having any introduction to it. Learning to play a game is every player responsibility, teaching the game to new players is an optional activity done by the community if there is a community to begin with. In Eve there is. EveUni and the likes are doing a wonderful job at it. Making an honest introduction (read it as presentation) to a game is not the community job at all. You don't pay the subscription to EveUni.

(In response to J'Poll) I fail to comprehend why you are making the assumption: tutorials need to be always PvE oriented, especially for a mmo. You asked for examples and examples you'll get. These are from the top of my head. Give the new player an npc fleet to follow and ask him to go to low.sec, or to null.sec, or both. Ask him to go and kill some random real player. Ask him to make his own corporation and declare war to some random small corporation. Ask him to make a fleet with other real players and go roaming. etc. The point of all these tasks is not for him to be successful but to get a taste of what Eve is: a never-ending PvP universe, a hunter and prey game, exactly as a poster above nicely put it.

A new player doesn't necessarily need a tutorial to do all that. For example, I didn't need one. Many others didn't need one either. After all, tutorial in all games (mmo's or not) should be optional. Then you may ask (like a previous poster did), why should CCP help the new players making the paradigm shift to Eve, the transition from the "quick gratification" type of games (WOW like) to the "delayed reward" (Eve like) type (borrowing terms here from an inspiring previous post)?

Well, duh …, I don't know. Could it be because of the fact that Eve players are their spoiled children, and what a parent wouldn't do for them? I'm not saying it. I'm just asking it. (Remark addressed to Sofia Tsero: Oh dear, some people on this planet! I edited this remark to make it clear.)

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