You only started playing as Alpha, so you have no way of telling anyway. We watch the industry as a whole and we watch CCP adapting to it. We knowfor a fact that EVE has been dumbed down significantly.
They do not tell you this, though. They use marketing speech like “making it more accessible.” What this means is that things have to be changed for those who can not grasp them easily enough. That is, literally, it. Complex things have to be broken down or simplified, because these people are having a hard time playing because of them.
There are … or were … quite a many people who really enjoyed these mechanics, because they actually made the game interesting. Nowadays, the whole industry is all about making things easy enough and baiting people with “Achievements” to get them addicted.
Skill Injectors, for example also are pure bait for those with loose wallets, short attention spans and possibly big egos. In 2012 people would have rioted because of this and they would have rioted because of the PLEX vault, too. This game is a shadow of its former glory and you have no idea what you are talking about, because you were not there.
The whole situation boils down to the following statement: Dumber people have looser wallets. They are easily baited with “shiny” or “power”, while smarter people simple are not. Tricking people into wanting to pay money for something is hard science, for a good reason.
I’m old - I mean properly old, like beyond the biblical ‘three-score years and ten’. If it weren’t for skill injectors I wouldn’t even have started Eve, as I may well not have been around/compos-mentis long enough to get enough skills to do anything really interesting. With them, I get to do all these exciting things while I still can, and if I lose a few ships in the process, so what ?
I’ll admit that in some games I an an “achievement” hunter.
Though, there are some games that I couldn’t care less about achievements - I’m just playing to watch the story unfold.
In EvE, I make up my own achievements.
Little goals that keep me subscribing.
–Gadget just noticed that even these FORUMS has achievements…
The “toxicity” that most of these companies are trying to fight against is actually caused by their own actions. The following image will explain further:
By no longer allowing players to choose their own servers and communities within the game, and instead lumping everyone of all ilks into the matchmaking boiling pot, they are causing most of the “toxicity” they complain about.
You might as well be all of those I did not mention, because it is not about people like “you”. It is about people like “them”. You benefitting from it is good for you, but besides the point. Maybe you should dial down the sensitivity.
Then I guess you’ll also remember the games of the 80’s and 90’s. EVE used to be like those. Hard, challenging, encouraging intellectual curiosity. There were half-serious jokes that you required a PhD (in a STEM field. Sod of with your religion crap ) to play EVE. It was a game by hardcore gamers, for hardcore gamers.
It defied the trend of targeting the lowest common denominator and that is what made EVE be EVE.
It’s a community game first and foremost, so EVE being hard not merely made it fun to play, but it also kept the idiots away.
Without its community, EVE is nothing, so CCP dumbing the game down to accommodate the lowest common denominator not only made the game easy and boring, it also killed the community that made the game greatly enjoyable in the first place. Hence I’m no longer saying that EVE is dying, because EVE really died already. It’s just a rotten corpse without a soul that’s left.
Compare old classics like Duke Nukem, Quake or DOOM to modern shooters and you’ll know what I mean. Games are no longer challenging, no longer hard. You don’t require any intelligence anymore, no skill. You get it all spoon fed to you, no matter how ■■■■ or stupid you are. Everyone’s a winner, every time. It’s purely profit-driven development for the lowest common denominator and it’s ruining games for all of us that strive for challenging gameplay.
What I don´t understand is the meaning of this topic and the meaning of I take it that the age of “Harden the ■■■■ Up” is gone I need to ask what´s wrong with trying to remove Toxic gaming behavior which involves allot of Online abuse and harassment. It is a serious matter just as serious as real life abuse and harassment is. I wanna see you go up to some one who´s been sexual harassed or gotten death treats and say harden the f up but don´t be surprised if that person punch you in the throat.
I have had death threats, been shot at, and been discriminated against because of my race. I would get mad, but not hurt by these things. So I learned to strike back in my own way at those things.
I became harder, less bothered by the ignorance of others. In some ways I will goad them on to see if they have any new insults I havent heard before.
And most of the people that I would say HTFU to couldn’t muster the testicular fortitude to throat punch anything. They would rather lay down and take it like the … well you get the picture.
But it still a serius matter we are talking about allowing people to bully some one in to taking suicide is not something you just say hey harden the f up to.
@LouHodo yes but every one is different in how they handle things like that and it does not make them to worthless people to ignore and because you can handle people shooting at you or give you death treats or discriminated you does not make it and okey thing to do.
Blizzard and other companies in recent news have been banning people for trivial things of late under the banner of removing “toxic” gamers. Not over real life matters, but over banter that is tame compared to banter in Jita local.
That I can agree is a way to sensitive when I read abuse and harassment I was thinking more like death treats or sexual harassment something I would say is not okey. Sure I could care less what people say to me in eve I heard even worse than what and eve player could even come up with. But I would not say that it should be ignored and I will say CCP did the right thing back in the day one a special some one did something rely bad he got banned sure for a short time but what he said is something I find sickening, human life is not something one should joke about drunk or not. I lost friends to suicide and it´s nothing I would take lightly some one joking about it.
) to play EVE. It was a game by hardcore gamers, for hardcore gamers.