I have been playing EVE now for almost 2 years and for the amount of work I put into EVE vs where I stand in the game I am way further along as I would have been if I was playing another MMO like Final Fantasy 14, World of Warcraft, New World or Lost Ark. I have been goofing off in EVE most of the time. So why is this so? Well there is a couple of things that I found that helped me along with EVE progression:
Leveling offline → Skill que research that happens even while you are offline. This is a system that Facebook and Mobile games uses but its one off the things that take the stress of falling behind other players in game away.
Sandbox MMO → Everything in EVE is optional. You don’t have to do anything and you can do only the stuff you really want. If you just like sitting a star base and just talk to new players in rookie chat, you can do that. If you want to go and mine asteroids, well go mine. If you want to go gank miners in high-sec, go blow up some care bears (I am one of those care bears by the way). If you want to join a fleet and go and assault a rival corporation in their own space, just do it. You just want to blow stuff up, go find some NPC pirates bases and take your combat ship and go make some bounties. You can make stuff, mine stuff or buy stuff cheap and sell it on the market. Your fun in the game is absolutely up to you. Even role play if that floats your boat or flies your boat.
Plex → I know it makes EVE “pay to win” (more like pay to loose real money to gankers) but it makes it possible for people who have no time but do have money to spend to get in-game currency they can use to buy stuff in-game. I have an Orca and a Golem again (loadshedding killed my first one, South African people will know all about that) and I bought all of them with Plex.
Alts are optional → Alts are pointless except for gankers. You can’t farm anything in EVE faster using alts except if you are a multi-boxer but then having multiple accounts make more sense. Maybe you can use alts with skill extractor to get extra skill points for your main but then you have to get multi-que training and that costs money…
I can see myself playing this game for a long long time to come. WoW and FF14 are becoming too much or a chore. Things just take way too long and God help you if you have alts, especially on WoW. EVE is just fun and can play as casual or as intensive as you want or just fill your skill que, log off and go and live you life IRL and log back on again when you feel like you want to have an adventure in space.
Thanks CCP for making this world a bit better place and give people somewhere to escape too when real live becomes a little too meh…
PS. I would love to see what EVE would look like in the Oasis of Ready Player One…
Your average MMO including Eve is scripted in a way that progression is,
A-B-C-D-…X-Y-Z, but Eve online B,C,D & E (the new player experience was missing for 15 years) so most players went to A-F. They then realised you can just skip most letters in the Alphabet and CCP has spent the last decade trying to patch such short cuts out.
Being a level A pilot and being able to gank a level K and just take his position is Eve’s charm.
X, Y, Z are actually theoretical or imaginary letters that exist in a meta external to the client, ie your space emperors managing empires via discord and IRL communication.
Yes, I came to the same conclusion. I’ve played lots of MMOs that required a chunk of time investment just to get established, and EVE is the first one that doesn’t demand that. I am skilling up even while offline and even the smallest efforts bring noticable progress. I can see myself sticking around here a long time, especially with the annual sub working out to $!0 a month US.
EVE is so unique in its payment structure as I can plex with the ISK I make. I can play premium EVE if I put the work in. Its why EVE sets itself apart from others. I agree with OP. And with the addition of abyssal deadspace CCP aims to create quick content for people who even have less time. So many things you can do if your already set up.
At first I would have said yes, because of how training works. New players are likely to fly around hisec, do missions, mine ore, and see progression in those activities regardless of how much time they invest. The numbers get bigger each time you play.
But now I would say no, as the reality of the game is that it’s not training your skills that demand you log in on specific times, but timers set by other people and contexts created by others. Should you be content with playing solo this might not be relevant, but within the context of playing with groups those timers and leadership’s plans will dictate a lot of activities.
People that “don’t have the time to play an MMO” are better served with single player top down roleplaying games they can play at their own pace. I am such a person and I recommend Pillars of Eternity, Wasteland 3 and Kenshi. Alas, no spaceships though (those are all character-based games).
Yes, but people that “don’t have the time to play an MMO” do not often play in groups unless it is a bunch of friends that get together to play together for an hour or two. Most of the time they play solo. The point is that if your friends are “hardcore” EVE players that have their own corp setup in a null-sec system and they are PvE and PvP gods and feature all over th ZKill boards. You, as their “no-time” friend, are quite able to do stuff with them and have access to all the same ships and setups that they have without having to put in 16 hours a day. With and Omega account, a loaded skill que and being able to buy plex to get the ISK you need to buy the ships and equipment you want so you can quite easily fleet up with them. There is no need to farm gear or anything else to upgrade your ship. You may not have their skills in combat, but you can still join a fleet of professionals and have a ton of fun. Any company owner knows you are only as good as the people you surround yourself with. Sometimes you may only have an hour or two to kill and you just want to be part off and talk to a community sharing the same experience and you don’t want to farm stuff or blow stuff up. Some of the most fun I have had in game was sitting in a station and just chatting to new players in Rookie help and helping them some simple questions I had when I started playing. There is no need to do anything in game that you don’t want to do.
I stick by my original story. This is definitely the MMO for people who don’t have a lot of time to play a MMO.
Hm. Funny you mention that “if your friends” because the people that got me into this game, never flew with me. Why? Because they were embedded into some alliance. You and me both know those are too paranoid to tolerate non-commital “allies”. In theory you can but in practice you probably won’t.
Then again, if you find a playstyle that you can enjoy casually then all power to you. My point is simply that the gameplay available to players that don’t have much time is rather limited, too limited for my tastes.
Well I am a casual player. I have very little time to actually play and MMO. I have “played” EVE now for almost 2 years. I have put in a staggering amount of time into this game (about 50 hours in total) and still I own a Golem, I researched it offline, I bought it with plex and love it to bits. I have been killed more times in various ships through ganking than the amount of NPCs I have killed in the game yet I smile every time I log on. I am having fun.
MMOs are also collectors games and EVE has a ton of ships to collect and you can even “dress them up” with skins just like the other Barbie dress up games like FF14 and Lost Ark. Without having to actually farm any resources. You just que the skills, wait for them to research and buy plex. Playing the game is completely optional if you just want to collect stuff.
