samedi 25 septembre 2010

06: EvE Online

EvE is a revolutionary game in which you take the roll of a rookie star pilot who has to slowly climb the ladder of fame and power, all the while learning new skills and buying better ships and equipment.

-Pros: The game is enormous, and by that i really mean gargantuan, the map spreads across most of a galaxy with literally hundreds of stars and untold thousands of planets and asteroid fields, just begging to be explored and exploited by a daring adventurer. If he can avoid being horribly mangled and violated by the OTHER daring adventurers that is....
The core structure of the game are the Alliances, massive player-run collections of hundreds of corporations (the EvE version of Guilds) all working together to control territory and resources. There can be many thousands of players in an Alliance, and when two Alliances clash, it can shift the entire EvE universe. There are no realms, only one huge server that every player uses, making EvE a contained world of it's own, with it's own news feeds and factions, the actions of one corporation or even one player can make headline news, making for a very realistic and immersive universe. You will feel a huge sense of brotherhood with your chosen corp, becoming a second family to you as you share adventures.
The ships, environments and graphics in general are all 100% gorgeous, with award-winning lighting effects making the sleek ships glisten. The gameplay can be slow at times, but the PvP is without precedent, with massive battles being organised and coordinated all the time. If you want to really be part of a team there is nothing like performing your role in a fleet of 2000 players, dogfighting and speeding about at 4km/s. There are hundreds of ships in the game, from sleek, speedy interceptors to mammoth mining barges that can eat away a whole asteroid belt in a few hours.

-Cons: EvE is probably the slowest game that exists today when it comes to gaining skills and money. When you start out it's like being thrown naked into a shark tank, the learning curve is pretty massive, but if you stick with it (or find a mentor to teach you the ropes as i did) you will eventually get used to it. EvE is not just a game, it's a second life (or a second job at times) and if you want to get far, expect to be playing this game during most of your free time.
Players expecting to be flung straight into the action will be dissapointed, as it will take you at least TWO YEARS (real-time, not game-time!) of skill learning to become a competent PvP pilot, and during that time you will be mostly mining and fighting NPCs in quests.
On the subject of skills, you don't gain exp like most MMORPG games, you buy skills that automatically train over time, unlocking new items, ships and equipment for you to use. Fitting ships with the right equipment is best left to experts, ask your corp members or google set-ups for your ships, it's an exact science that is very hard to learn.
When you die, if you don't have a clone (a kind of back-up life) your skills can be reset to ZERO, losing months of time and effort, and when you are killed, you lose your ship, period. You can take out insurance policies on your favourite cruisers, but if you lose them, they're gone for good.

EvE is time-consuming and downright boring at times, but IF you can succeed,there is no greater feeling.

-Price: EvE is set in stone at 15€ a month, and no private servers are available (that would defeat the purpose of the game), a physical copy of EvE will cost about 30€/$ and includes a month of gameplay, although i have never seen a used copy anywhere.

3 commentaires:

  1. I'm not that into MMORPG's, but this game looks really promising and the graphics look just awesome.

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  2. ahem...
    Spreadsheets iinnn Spppaaaaaace!~

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  3. This game was really boring actually, I played it for a couple weeks and really tried to get into it. But the best thing about this is the music, all techno, all the time.

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