Black Abyss

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Remember me? I know it's been awhile since I've posted, but fortunately we have Syrana to keep you occupied with her wonderful posts. I'm definitely still playing Warcraft, but a little less than usual. I tend to have a short attention span with some games. I jump around a bit at certain points. While this helps me keep from getting to bored with one game, it also spreads out my attention to a few games.

I jumped a bit back in EVE Online recently. If you've never played EVE, it's a MMORPG set in space. It's tough to generally compare EVE and WoW, so I won't really try to do that here. Their major similarities stop at MMORPG.  EVE's description, from their website, is “a massive multiplayer online game (MMOG) set in a science-fiction based, persistent world. Players take the role of spaceship pilots seeking fame, fortune, and adventure in a huge, complex, exciting, and sometimes hostile galaxy.”

There are no levels or level caps in EVE. You gain no experience from kills and quests. You gain skills by simply choosing to learn that specific skill. You learn these skills in real time, whether you are logged on or not. Skills range from Combat to Mining to Industry to Covert Ops. In WoW, your leveling speed is limited by how quickly you can do quests or grind. In EVE, you learn skills at, more or less, the same rate as any other player. How fast you learn skill points is determined by your attribute points – intelligence, perception, will power and so on.

But, you say to yourself, “Uncle Sideshow, won't people who have been playing longer be that much better than me?” Yes and no. Obviously, there are some players who have been playing since the beginning and are extremely awesome. Though, most of the players have specialized their skills into a certain area, so you could easily be better than them in your chosen skill set. It's just about, if not, impossible to learn every skill in the game.

Here are a few things I really enjoy about the game:

• Almost all of the items in game are created by the players in the game. There are few items that are sold from a few vendors, but these are usually Tech I (lower-level) items.
• It has one of the most advanced and detailed economic markets in any game.
• Everyone plays on one server, not on “shards” like WoW. So, when you here about some crazy stuff happening in EVE Online, it happened in the same place that you play.
• Even though it's a very good PvP-based game, overall, it has a ton more to do if you're not the fightin' type. Players need ships, which are made from materials, and those are created from minerals, which are mined from asteroids and then these things need to be shipped all over the galaxy through safe and hostile territories. Pick one.
• I am gaining skill points as I sit and type this post.

I admit, the game has a bit of a high learning curve, or at least it did, but I think I've heard that they worked on the tutorials. There definitely some great sites out there to help new players out and even an in-game Corporation dedicated to that exact thing named Eve University. I was in this corp for a bit in the beginning and it was amazing. Classes, videos, podcasts, tutorials, etc all done by volunteers to teach you the game.

Maybe it's not your cup of tea, but it is something new to try. If you do give the 14-day trial a shot, look me up. My two characters are named Earl Scolari (my blue-collar workin' man) and Xander Kivotsky (my rough, badass-looking soldier.)

While browsing after this post, I found this amazing video made by an EVE player using all game footage. Definitely watch it in HD at YouTube.

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