I have found it very difficult. Here is my experience. 1) the learning curve was always steep and there is an awful lot to relearn never mind the new content. Complexity has certainly increased. 2) The reasons I stopped playing remain - it requires a large time investment which can be difficult to justify 3) Its a PVP game which means you have to be part of a group which means you have to make a certain level of commitment which may or may not be possible, given a lot of time has to be spent trying to grips with the new content as well 4) The invasion stuff was difficult to get into in the latter stages; I cant find a way of getting into this content now (which I would have enjoyed and which might have kept me paying) 5) Even after a 10 years gap, doing level 4 missions is almost exactly the same. I guess mining is the same - so the ISK grind does not seem to have changed for better or worse. 6) its still a beautifully crafted game and community content is great. Dicks still play dicks and nice guys play nice guys. Itās all good on that score. 7) I dont think its going to work for you just on a casual dip in and out basis - it hasnāt for me. But if you can afford the time, go for it.
Any return is a good return
Your post is an excellent 'āin a nutshellā summary of whatās been holding EVE back from gaining decent popularity.
I feel that your entire post is very pertinent, but wanted to emphasize this one point. EVE requires in general far too much time and effort/commitment for the gaming reward it offers. It is fine to offer higher end gaming rewards that take more time and commitment for the serious players. Things like Null sov, large corp operations, high end mining, fleet battles, strong manufacturing and research setups, they should definitely reward the people who do the research and put in the time and effort.
However what EVE has consistently failed to develop is the short game. Thereās been virtually no development of content for 30-60 minute gameplay for a decade. The portions of gameplay theyāve come out with in that range (decent events, Abyssal dives, daily skills), have all been popular and drive logins, but CCP canāt seem to recognize the short game will drive the long game if they develop it.
CCP appears to be stuck in some notion from 2003 that if it isnāt complex, slow, and clumsy, then it canāt be part of EVE. I can get more gaming satisfaction in 2 hours of gameplay on other games than I can in a week of 1-hour daily sessions in EVE.
CCP needs to stop āyanking the carpet out from under playersā in hopes that something will randomly make the game work better, and start learning how to design a game that has both short play to keep players involved on a daily basis, and long play to keep them committed for the long term.
only way to find out is to try ā you will either find it really fun and innovative or a complete ā ā ā ā show.
The thing about the invasion which was appealing was āpop-upā PVP groups - you dont have to make a specific commitment to a corp (with the likelyhood you will let everyone down due to time constraints) but whenever you log in theres a chance of there being a group you can join up with. This general commitment to one side or the other I think is a really good idea. Even prepping relevant ships in parts of space for where the content might occur is not a grind. Sadly I was a little late to get in on it, but I am hanging on to see if this becomes a recurring part of the game as it might provide the content I want, and possibly the OP and other vets.
This is what I did, afterwards I sold some assets to exchange for PLEX. I do and I donāt get out of it what I desired: such is the reality of playing a game of which your have fond memories, but burned out on before. I too miss the gudfites of yore, but since my old crew no longer plays Iāll have to join another corp or find something else that I enjoy.
I had never ran Abyssal sites before and Iām honestly quite enjoying them. At the very least it adds something to my repetoire of ingame professions - Iāve done everything except dread/carrier ratting and the new Structure stuff by now.
Iām still just derping around solo in lowsec and Iāve found plenty of people to shoot at, more then when I left in fact. Thereās even people krabbing in BS in my old haunt 
This month Iāve made enough ISK to PLEX for another month and if that keeps up, I might stick around a while longer.
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