UPDATE EDIT:
This thread are my own impressions and suggestions for the game. I think I am a useful data point for game designers because most people that are not EVE players have a very negative view of the game and its PVP culture.
First 100 posts are people telling me why this initial idea wouldn’t work. After that, I accept permapvp parameters and offer alternative solutions throughout the thread to make EVE PVP less terrible for new players. I think updating the game for modern users is going to happen in a dialogue with existing players, not from CCP fiat.
I hope my thoughts lead to a discussion of how EVE can evolve and look at engaging new fans. I believe that EVE’s best years are ahead of it and I consider sharing my impressions to be a miniscule contribution to that future.
…
This is a simple idea to get CCP access to a huge new income stream: Pay $25 dollars a month and you ignore all pvp in EVE.
You can’t do damage or even bump any other player ships. They can’t interact with you. You can only engage in trade, PI, PvE, indy.
CCP could be monetizing and creating monetary gatekeeping to avoid what I find the worst part about playing EVE: the playerbase. This isn’t a dig at particular ways of playing the game. I’m saying from my perspective, the pretty game about flying through space is often rudely interrupted by other people who only have fun by hurting others.
The number one thing that ends my engagement with EVE is engaging with the playerbase. Last month, I spent hours hauling water and antibiotics around New Eden. Someone ganked me in LS. Just as I was turning a profit after paying off the industrial, after hours and hours of play hauling consumer goods between NPC, someone blew up my ship. I haven’t played since, I never want to feel the way I felt when I had my nice reverie of trading interrupted. I realize most people have a bad experience like this and never look back. I’m looking bad to say that I miss EVE. I would pay CCP $50 a month to ignore pvp in EVE.
I know a lot of people would. Probably not a lot of people on the self-selecting population that is the forums, but testing this theory would be easy with a simple sentiment survey of Steam reviews or omega cancelations.
They can be making more money by selling CONCORD BADGE NFTs or whatever they want to gate playing EVE cooperatively behind.
I logged 700 hours in the game. I’ve been in LS less than 10 times. I’ve never even seen NS. I never will because involuntary pvp in EVE hurts too much. It’s not fun. I don’t like crying because I just wasted four hours of my life and I hate knowing another person did that to me personally for fun.
I’m an autistic mom. With a few changes, I’d love your game. I am willing to pay you to make the changes that would make me be a returning customer. I’m willing to bet some variation is literally the most requested feature from customers who had high engagement and then hit a wall and never played the game again. (CCP have the data, please tell me I’m wrong.)
I just want to play the game without having hours of my life blown up for another player’s amusement. It hurts too much to play. I promise I won’t get bored. EVE is very complicated and big, I want to see all of it.
If this bothers anyone in the playerbase, you’re not interacting with me right now in game because the thought of having my experience interrupted by PVP keeps me from playing. The thought of interacting with involuntary PVP means I am not in game to gank. From CCP’s perspective, if I pay them $50 and you can’t lock me, it’s a win for them. For PVPers, it’s a wash, because you are never going to interact with me. I will either pay to avoid you or not play the game.
Please allow me to use an allegory: I sell a card game where everyone kicks the loser in the stomach for 90 seconds after each hand, and my card game sells way fewer units than other games with no gut-kicking.
The number one complaint with people who play the game for a short period is the stomach kicking phase. If the developers want to actually continue the game as their playerbase ages into diabetic limblessness, they may want to address the stomach kicking.
Someone is saying they will pay me money to play the exact same game without the stomach-kicking. The opinions of people who love kicking people in the stomach and conversely getting kicked in the stomach don’t matter for the negotiation, keeping each stomach-kicker happy drove 10 more people away. I would be walking away from money out of fidelity to the core stomach-kicking vision in the base product. Players tell new players that everyone hates getting kicked in the stomach, it’s just part of the game, new players need to learn to enjoy getting kicked in the stomach or that they should get good enough to kick more stomachs. I’m willing to bet most just leave.
I am writing this because I think the developers are in a feedback loop where they are trying to sell NFTs and Dr. Who to a fanbase that has entirely self-selected around the gut punting. I’m telling them if players could pay to make every other player invisible except in station, I am positing the data supports that it would be good for CCP. Maybe not for the 10,000 logged-in people that truly and deeply love having their tummy stomped and kicking stomachs. I was told by customer support that occasionally devs actually read these forums. I’m just asking them to evaluate the data on my way out.
If getting killed in EVE is supposed to drive away players like me, if the safe space is being in a happy gut kicking zone, that’s fine. In the spirit of communicating, I just want to make sure that’s clear to them…
The thread in general got locked because I think I posted it to the wrong section. I wanted to make sure that my message was at least received.
