EVE Online Comments by Jim Rossignol

More power to EVE, it's got a strong slow-burn going on and long may it last.

I so wish I had the time to devote to this, reckon I'd love it!

hmm bit short on actual facts this re-review.

I hate it when EG do a EVE article. I always end up starting back up again, playing for a couple of weeks and the remembering that I really don't have the time so I have to cancel my sub.

God dam you EG, Dam you to HELL!!

This review raises more question than it answers:

Which genre is this game? Is it a space shooter? Is it an Elite style trading sim? Is it a combination? What AM I doing in this game most of the time? Are these parts holding up as a game?

How am I advancing in this game? At which rate does that happen? How much time does playing this game require? What is the minimum length of a typical session?

What is the MMO side of this game? I heard of weird alliances, how do they work and impact my gameplay from start to finish? Small 20 man cooperation? Does that mean I can't play alone and have to commit to a grinding cartel who will kick me if I don't deliver?

8/10 also sounds to me as if there weren't enough reasons to give it a 9/10 but awarding a 7/10 would also need good negative arguments that can't be provided. 8/10 is sort of the middle ground that neither offends fans nor publisher. I rather play a 6/10 game if I can see the author hating on stuff that I don't mind.

Awesome game!

@ KOS

:D

I actually had the urge to re-download the client after reading that. I always do after reading every EVE article - until I realise that I'd probably have to find somewhere else to live if my GF caught me!

4thVariety, you'll find answers to some of your questions in Jim's "Getting into EVE" feature from last month: http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?art...

I really wish I liked this game. It always seems like everything I've ever wanted in a game, but then I play it and couldn't be less engaged.

Ah so there was another eve article written by the gnome just recently? I was getting a sense of deja vu...

Jim, be honest now. This really was just an excuse to play more EVE and not feel guilty. ;)

This is one of those games where I love the idea behind it and I love the stories, but I just don't have the time to get into it and the mining / slow start would likely turn me off anyway.

Hopefully World of Darkness will be a more accessible next step.

After unsubbing to WoW for the time being I foolishly downloaded this and subscribed. (It is one of few MMOs with a Mac client, even if they just emulate DirectX underneath the Windows client.)

Frag it, I had forgotten how you end up setting your alarm clocks to when a skill training has completed. How you end up adjusting your life to those times when you can start training another skill...

I need to unsubscribe. Soon. I just have to complete this mission in 1 hour and ten minutes to get the time bonus...

I once tried the demo of this game. It started with a tutorial that you couldn't interrupt, and which lasted for hours. After about three hours, I gave up and moved on. With my life, that is.

Who ever finished that tutorial? How long does it eventually take?

tob the tutorial may be a bore but unlike games like LOTRO and WoW you can't just jump in and go pew pew to every ship out there, EVE is very much 'either you can hack it or can't' hence the reason why it's lastest so long the players in it want to play, once you get out of the tutorial you understand why you needed it, EVE as bigger comittments then a lot of MMOs out there and can't just leave the game alone is the earily stages for more the a few hours...

Bottom line is EvE isn't just a game, it's an alturate life, like MMOs should be.

While I know Jim's always been a big fan of EVE and is therefore very well-informed about the game, I'd really have liked to have seen a review by someone coming at the game from a newbie's perspective. This review leaves most of the game something of a mystery to most readers because Jim's only really explaining the new bits since the last big patch.
You could come back at me and say that the original review is there for learning that (such is the beauty of the infinite internet) but trying to piece together a picture of the modern EVE from the orginal review and successive re-reviews is rather more of a task than I'd expect to have to complete as a prospective buyer.

For those of you out there left similarly mystified about the game, I leave a link to an image showing a graph of EVE's learning curve when compared to other MMOs.
http://livingwithstyle.com/1869957099-le...

I want to like Eve, I really do. Whenever I read about the "endgame", the PvP, the economy and the politics it all sounds so appealing.

Then I try to play it and remember that there's nothing for me to do except mine and run boring agent missions and agonisingly wait for my skills to increase to a point where I might just be able to engage in any of the interesting stuff in the distant future.

The new tutorial is much more streamlined. I finished it in about twenty minutes, or under. CCP have done a good job with that aspect.

They really need to reset the server and start again. Either that or bring out EVE II.

So this interactive screen saver and spreedsheet got an visual update then?

I guess the games fine if you can spend all day and night staring blankly at your screen. Personally I gave up smoking the stuff that lets you do a long long time ago. But for the rest of the space cadets who burnt out their minds, they may find the mining rocks in space screen saver just what they need to chill out and fill the emptiness of doing nothing else with their lives.

Yeah, the big problem with Eve is that for long, long periods of time, you sit there staring at the screen, waiting for your ship to reach its destination. Or you're waiting for your skill training to complete. Or for your manufacturing to finish. Maybe if they someday do that whole getting-out-of-your-ship thing I might start it up again.

But hey, for those who like management games in space, this is GOLD!

Hmm...if this is a re-review, where is the first review? It's no where to be found??

Why is there a re-review?

By the gods this thing is addictive, and it looks soo good, but I really don't have the time. So please, no-more features on this please? I loved it, but it just wanted more and more of my time. Got all sulky when I said I had to go out and eat. Last time I was in, we were in a massive war with the Red Alliance. Long time ago that.

Maybe I should just check the status of the different factions out there.

Eve is crazy, it's one of the only games I know about where some of the larger corps have internal intelligence services and counter-intelligence officers.

We seem to be in some kind of mature phase now, with the biggest war the game has ever seen finishing up, and dozens of other, smaller conflicts breaking out.

i cant see BOB and Goons ending with 'tonight we dine in NOL'

PS: http://gamers.eurogamer.net/groups.php?g...

i bet they'll entice a lot of new players with one more server. A chance to start the same as everyone else.

Article up Armada Online!

Kind of missing the point of the whole 'one server for the world, unless you're Chinese' aspect of the game.

Statecorp FTW. How are they all doing?

I played this quite a bit and would love to spend more time on it but time is a luxury I have little of at the moment. Next winter I may start up my account again for a couple of months.

@Ergates

We rock mate, naturally. Come back so you can be primary'd again, deV's getting sick of it.

tried to get into it, and i know its fantastic, but i just CANT break the mindset of having a standard, humanoid character

EVE is 5 years old and doing well, you'd forget it's that "old" because it never achieved superstar status like WoW (different type of fantasy anyway); aside from the technical marvels, like the unique server shard, it's way up there in terms of quality and diversity. Players aren't pigeon-holed into class/race/profession combos, there's no need to roll multiple alts to experience different aspects of the game (hello other MMOs that rely on rerolling to extend replayability).

Definitely not for everybody, the learning curve is steep, it's not about instant gratification either, but there's definitely a need for such a game; here's to another 5 years and more.

God i really want to get into this game i bought a copy about 6 months ago but its so daunting especially when theres people there telling you, you won't be able to do much for 2-3 months. Maybe i'll resub seeing as i now have 8 weeks of holidays.

I favorite dark orbit because a space ship. I try to EVE online

after 6 months i cancelled.

a 5 year old game with an engine that does not support AA. servers that do not support it's own end-game... the GUI is a horrible mess. forums that take DAYS to upload your avatar. piles of little things like that left me with the impression that CCP are too full of themselves and their fancy ideas for the future to actually look at their game and make it work. who cares that the game is far from stable despite its age? we have real architects working on the station environments for our next expansion!

PVP is inherently imbalanced, because...

combat_effectiveness = skills(time_spent_playing)*quality_of_equipment(time_spent_p
laying)*size_of_army(time_spent_playing)


you find yourself doing the same missions for effin MONTHS, over and over and over again (i'm not even going to go into MINING, which is exactly as much fun as it sounds), looking forward to finishing the skills to board the next class of ships.
and if you persevere you may end up enjoying your ship for a mere days, before you run into a bunch of bored pirates...

I love the concept of it, don't get me wrong. I even got used to the idea of a "cold universe" that dedicated players seem to excuse almost all shortcomings of the gameplay with. There's just NOT ENOUGH FUN to be had, though. It's all spread too thinly. Also, far too dependent on other people for my taste and not really fit for casual players (unless they're half asleep or really undemanding, because you can safely spend 12 hrs at a time in EVE without anything even slightly exciting happening; hell, did i say 12 hrs? make that 12 weeks!).

i'd play EVE if it was free to play. the way it is i just don't feel i'm getting my money's worth. it feels like me paying them to be allowed to go to work.