Now I’ve just got to create a corp with that name.
WD’ing null blks. Small corps.
That… seems like a really small, niche list of interactions to claim has ‘removed challenge’ and is harming EVE. And in fact, pretty sure small corps and null blocs are still there, so can’t see how they’ve even been ‘removed’.
The reason I ask is because I’ve had multiple people over the past 5-10 years tell me EVE has been ‘dumbed down’ or is ‘too easy’ or ‘caters to casuals’ or ‘CCP removed all the challenges that made EVE great’. And whenever I ask what they’re talking about, I get one or two items out of a list like this:
Jetcanning, ORE mining ships, SP loss on death/medical clone updates, warning messages at jumpgates, Safety settings in high sec, learning skills, “ganking was made harder” (whatever that means), Rorquals, Citadels, or “back when wardecs really used to work and led to lots of great fights”.
Most of which are fairly irrelevant, or just plain nonsense, or were awkward pointless mechanics, or apply to one tiny facet of the game and which are balanced off by some other change.
At any rate, until somebody comes up with a better reason for “all challenge removed so EVE isn’t really a harsh game anymore and it’s only the harshness that made it popular”, I guess I’ll have to consider that whole line of reasoning to be just rose-colored glasses looking ten years back with cloudy memories.
If there’s a real reason EVE lacks the challenge it used to, it’s probably because the game is stacked full of ancient vets with billions and trillions of creds, massive alliances owning everything they see, Youtube videos and guides showing every detail of every possible game mechanic, and gamers who know how to Google before they try something new.
EVE can’t go back to being the game “it used to be” because the world and the Internet and the tools and the gamers aren’t what they used to be. And whatever slow pace EVE is dying at is mostly because all old games die. And they die faster if the dev team can’t keep the game updated and interesting.
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Yep the game has changed and will again. WHat a lot of vets forget is that they themselves did not have all the relevant SP and the challenge was to make it work until then. Had not amassed the billions or even trillions of Isk. So now the game feels to easy. The game will close up one fine day. Just not today and from where I sit not any time soon either.
I suspect a lot of bittervet talk is just rose tinted. The past is always ‘better’. Never mind if it genuinely was.
And there’s another phenomenon alongside the rose tinting. People like to think that they have gotten somewhere and want to hang on to that sense, and the best way to hang onto it and feel that it cannot be surpassed is to feel that one was around at the the best time to have gotten anywhere.
So a sense that ‘the game will never be as good again’ is really just a mental ploy to capture one’s greatness and convince oneself that nothing that comes after can supersede it.
whats wrong with eating pets??
I say that lack of accessible content is killing the game.
I’m not sure if it’s correct to say that EVE is dying. But it is obvious that the number of active players has decreased significantly over the past few years. About a fifth, more often a quarter less players (32k vs 48+k players) is a clear factual shrinkage. On the other hand, this is significantly more than when I first played EVE at the end of 2006.
Nevertheless, I would agree that EVE had and still has problems with balancing. There have always been players who, like CPP itself, wanted EVE to be primarily a PVP game, which it really isn’t, because PVP is only part of the game, and you can simply opt out of it if you don’t feel like it or don’t want to PLEX the impending losses. CCP has a good reason to want as much PVP as possible, because the game is constantly pouring out value in the form of ore, ISK (mission etc.) and item drops. This threatens to create galloping inflation, which is combated by means of “Sink”. Ammunition consumption, ship losses, “taxes” etc. are the sink in the game, which is intended to keep inflation in check.
As for the PVP fans, there has always been an easy way to experience more PVP content, for example in 0.0 space, Wormhole space, Faction Wars, etc. for some years now. But surprisingly, for some reason this is always not approved enough; …and that also has always been like that.
But in my opinion, the real problems with EVE are of a completely different nature.
I usually play solo, at least most the time, because whenever I’ve played with others in the past, EVE has a tendency to degenerate into “work”. And I mean literally “work” in the most primal sense, like, “we need to defend xyz for some more hours today”, “we need more corp mining this week”, “we need more players for roaming tonight”, “the corp wants to achive xyz”.
The issue with that? EVE is just a game!
When I work, I get paid for it. And I get paid with real money, not buttons, which I can then use to pay my rent, buy food, go on vacation, etc. pp.
But CCP nor a corp pays me with real money for playing EVE all day fulfilling “duties” and “goals”, because CCP simply offers a game with EVE Online, for which I pay money in order to be able to play it nd have some fun when I feel to have some time for that.
And if I’d rather watch a movie on Netflix in the evening, then I’ll do that, regardless of whether it’s corp mining, roaming, or whatever else might be going on in EVE.
And I also know from reliable source that this is exactly how it is for other players as well. EVE is an MMOG, with multiplayer activities whenever it is individually prefered, and otherwise also a single player game in a multiplayer environment, in which I skill my own personal skills for my style of play and do not share a common group skill set with others nor get play for spending extra hours instead of taking a nap.
A side effect of this is, that if you do not want to invest a lot of real money in PLEX, do not enjoy certain ways of playing, or only want to spend only little time with EVE, large parts of the game are not available at all, as well as, all “group activities” in Corps always have a “evil tendency” to degenerate into real “work”, for which no one will get paid, as in real life, but has to pay with real money instead (dollars/euros/etc.).
And as a result, 99% of the players I have ever met in EVE since 2006 have not played for years at this time. Their real life seems to have more to offer than duties in EVE! And about myself I can tell, I only play every some years, very irregularly, for a few months at a time and then quit again for some time, cause my real life tells me there is more than just EVE. And every each time I come back, I realize, that once again some “content” has sort of disappeared, cause it is no longer convienient or available along with the efforts I would be willing to undertake.
For example, due to the “Planetary Interaction” cartel, which, under various names, imposes 20-25% taxes on pretty much all the entire High Sec, PI-skills have actually become pretty much useless. But this issue is simple counter … by not to having any PI skills, because it has become pointless to use skillpoints for it, when PI does no longer cover the costs and effort of doing PI. The some milllion in instalations and time and effort in maintaing PI has along with the crazy taxes a negative outcome in ISK for a long time to come once an installation is started.
Now one could try PI in Low Sec and risk even more ISK (ships) by doing so, but that makes it even ever more pointless than it is already is at this time.
Now one could still argue, “take the risk!” and “go low!” or “go 0.0!” for PI. But for the average player, we all know, that is just a waste of time, ships and ISK in the same way many of the “High Sec PvP Players” don’t show up in low or 0.0 most the time for reason, if ever at all.
( That’s why they are called “High Sec PvP Players” of course! …makes sense… )
Now I have to admit, I am not into PI for real, and I tried just to take a look; not for making ISK in game. — Actually if I need ISK, I PLEX, I admit. — On the other hand PI is one of the many aspects in the game where the content is actually shrinking for the average player, that do also have a real life, besides playing EVE for some hours a week. In this regard, I only want to point out PI as just one of many examples of shrinking useful content for the “average player”. It is sadly a fact that content is shrinking one way or another in many regards from COSMOS to PI to POS to STANDINGS and whatnot else.
And in my opinion, it’s a pity!
So there certainly is a number of issues in EVE, some always had been there, and still is to this day in some way (war dec issues etc.), that over time also might take account in the decline in active player base, while EVE ages and might find it harder to attract new players for more than just taking a look what playing EVE might be like…
And while CCP tries to sink automatically generated ingame values (ORE/ISK/Items), to counter inflation as a consequence of endless ingame wealth sources, EVE has over time somewhat become shorter in content, cause new content for the average player has not been added, — most of the newer content is in fact not really useful for the average player who can “play” at best 3-4 hours game time per day, perhaps even only a few hours per weekend — while EVE is at the same time becoming increasingly a sink in regards to “real world money”.
EVE has never been as expensive to play as it is at this time!
( … by the way, my first Dominix did cost me around 60 Million in 2007. These days one hardly gets a BC for that amount of ISK… )
So as of today, the average player actually has(!) to PLEX at least some amount in addition to Omega time, to have enough ISK at hand to play the few hours per day or week, not to speak about random ship losses, most can hardly afford to compensate just by playing the “game”.
And shop offers like “Weekend Package” (2 days Omega + some PLEX) reflects exactly that scenario as part of the new reality in EVE.
There obviously is efforts undertaken by CCP to add sort of “new content”, that sadly in most part remains for reason of practicability unavailable for players who play at best a very few hours at once, each time they log in, while the price tag of playing EVE in terms of real world money has significantly increased over the years and the availability of “playable content” for the “average player” has been slowly but steadily decreasing at the same time.
And I would agree, that this development in all its many details might not increase the player base ever again to something above 46.000 players on a daily base.
Being said so, I still wouldn’t agree that EVE is dying! But EVE is obviously on a steady decline and doesn’t have its best years still lying ahead …
It’s a pity! But it is what it is…
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New COSMOS content was added like two months ago. Unfortunately, the UniWiki project to publish the ongoing research project into poorly documented COSMOS content was shuttered around the same time.
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Well, since faction standings for a High Sec POS is no longer needed, the deminishing standing returns when doing COSMOS renders it kind of useless these days, since there is no goal, but only the downside in regards to negative standing towards the opposing faction when doing COSMOS.
I didn’t want to point out every little detail in my already very long posting, but that was what I wanted to point out when I did mention COSMOS along with the increasing shortage in content over the years for the average players in small (weekend) corps.
COSMOS was of course great expirience when the a faction standing for POS in High Sec was mandatory. Now it has become more kind of a burden, imho…
POS farming is more of a thing now especially with the new hisec officer rats and changes to things that spawn diamond rats like Edencom and the insurgency/stronghold thing. Not really talked about because people have taken all the low hanging fruit and you just need one POS per system.
Honestly I think it’s a bug how farming with a POS doesn’t impact standings, but it is an interesting use case.
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I don’t have the answer for how to help, or further hurt EVE.
I do know however, that as long as everyone, and i do mean EVERYone, has their own “opinion” of how EVE should be shaped, nobody will ever have a decent idea for how to make EVE better and less “dying”
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I think it’s because of the players that it is dying because they do not send enough money to CCP and do not buy enough PLEX. The more PLEX is sold the less EVE will die.
Agreed…but…this works both ways. That simple fact seems to be forgotten all while arguing the point itself.
One cannot ask for freedom or equality, then chastise another for exercising the same right and having a difference of opinion. The truth is, it’s not about any of that. It’s about special recognition for a certain demographic (be it play style, preference, whatever…in game and out) simply because. On the other hand, one should not play a game primarily centered on player interaction, both positive and negative with a focus on conflict, then complain and expect it to change simply because they dislike conflict and deem it so.
We all (most anyways) know what Eve is and what it’s about. It’s raw conflict in many forms. Those who cannot take the heat…well, you know the rest.
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Unfortunataely, CCP has become a group of sell-outs with Devs that have likely never actually played the game, much less been in it for the long term.
I think I just said this in another post before I got a chance to read this. No one has been able to come up with any kind of fix from either side and the player base has a lot more minds available to them to think about this than CCP does. I don’t blame anyone, and I blame us al! 
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That is not necessarily true, though. Concurrency doesn’t actually tell you ‘how many people are playing Eve’. All it tells you is how many are playing at a particular moment, and that can vary widely according to how long people are logging in for on average.
So, for example, 40K people logging in for 6 hours a day would give you the same concurrency as 20K people logging in for 12 hours a day…because the 40K would be twice as many people on average logging in for half as much time.
Because of this, you cannot really compare concurrency figures on a pro rata basis…as many tend to do.
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I would disagree with that, because ranges of about 18,000 to around 34,000 these days, depending on the time of day, versus ranges of about 26,000 to a little over 48,000 actually tells a picture.
Even if this story tells that there are fewer players, many of whom have been multiboxing, that doesn’t mean that the same number of individual players have simply stopped multiboxing, but that there are in fact fewer players. The reason is simple, one can only multibox to a certain extent and not everyone did/does that in the first place.
There obviously is fewer players and the numbers clearly reflect that, even if there is some uncertainty about exactly how many fewer “individuals” ultimately lead to the numbers turning out like so, … there is obviously less individuals involved in playing EVE these days.
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eve will never die, its a great game 
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I agree with that 