EVE Evolved: The secret of EVE Online's success, part 2

by Brendan Drain on Mar 8th 2009 6:00PM

Server model (continued):

It's no secret that I play a little Everquest 2 now and then in addition to EVE. Over the weekend, I met another Everquest 2 player at a party but soon discovered that we play on different servers. Unless one of us pays cash to transfer to the other server, we can never play together. I think this is one of the big points that developers need to get and it's one of the main failings of the ageing sharded server model. EVE Online's single-server world allows every player to potentially interact with every other player, so if you find someone that plays EVE you can always play with them.

It's been known for a long time that having friends in an MMO is a strong barrier to exit and most people play MMOs with real life friends and family. A sharded server model can prevent friends from playing together and limit the potential for making new friends in-game. But what if a game's server model could have the best of both worlds – sharding the server to provide scalable server hosting while allowing all players to play together. Surprisingly enough, Runescape hit on this idea during their early development too and use a server model that achieves just that.

While Runescape has hundreds of separate servers, players can log into any server they like. Not only does this mean that the marketplaces are more price-stable across the game since items can be transferred between servers but it means you'll always be able to play with a friend who plays the game. If current MMO developers aren't willing to subscribe to EVE Online's server model, they could at least take a cue from Runescape and stop tying players down to one server. If that happened, I think we'd see less players quitting and even more playing with their friends.

Staged delivery:

Like all game developers, CCP are big thinkers with big ideas. Their original plan for EVE Online could fill an entire book and contained such wonderful things as planetary flight, mining rogue comets in space and, of course, walking in stations. They recognised quite early on in development that this plan was going to be far too much work to feasibly implement all at once and so they opted for a staged delivery process that is still ongoing to this day. This process involves identifying which things are feasible to do now with the current resources and which will become feasible in the future. It eliminates the problem of having to spend an inordinate amount of time and money trying to deliver an infeasibly large amount of content and gameplay at launch.

As each part of the master plan becomes technically feasible, CCP set about making it a reality. Walking in stations was thought completely infeasible but as computers began to get faster and CCP began to gain the capital necessary for such an undertaking, it suddenly went from the wish-list to the development table. Walking in stations is likely to take up the bulk of CCP's focus once the Apocrypha expansion goes live and could be ready as early as winter this year.

Summary:
There are people out there that think EVE Online's success has been a colossal accident and proclaim loudly that the game is going to die in the near future. This has gone on for six years running and by now it should be clear that CCP really have hit on some important winning formulae and game design concepts. The developers themselves put it down to the player community that's built up around the game. In addition, I think ideas like offering free expansions and constant evolution of the game world have been major factors in EVE's success and the constant increase in size of its subscriber base.

There are of course other major contributing factors to EVE's success such as their committment to providing real PvP but the ones I mentioned in this article are those that could be easily applied to other MMOs. I think it's a real shame that they haven't, what do you think?

< < The secret of EVE's success, part one of two

Brendan "Nyphur" Drain is an early veteran of EVE Online and writer of the weekly EVE Evolved column here at massively.com. The column covers anything and everything relating to EVE Online, from in-depth guides to speculative opinion pieces. If you want to message him, send him an e-mail at brendan.drain AT weblogsinc DOT com.

Reader Comments (16)

Man, every time I read articles about eve, I get an urge to give it another try. Maybe after Apocrypha hits I'll get another steam trial.

@Ghede: Buy the retail box, as far as I know its going to be reasonably priced and include 60 days of game time. If you do, feel free to look me up and I'll be happy to give you a leg up the cliff that is EVE's Learning curve. I'm Jmarr Hyrgund in game.

EVE is going to be here for the long haul, When the lands of Azeroth have long gone the way of Tabula Rasa and Hellgate: London New Eden will still be there and it'll be better than ever.

I agree. It may never get anywhere near the lofty heights in popularity of the other titles but make no mistake, this is a slow burning game with a solid future.

Not in your wildest dreams.

Just wait till a few REAL MMORPG's will come out with a science fiction theme.

And with REAL mmo's; I mean a science fiction game with REAL 3D worlds and gravity models.
A game where you acutally LIVE in a world instead of sitting for ever in a cockpit chair.
A game where you adventure in instead of looking at a spreadsheet to have PvP.

A game where you no longer advance with being logged off.

You will and can never go anywhere in EVE these days compared to the veterans, who just advance without even playing.

For the rest it is about the DULLEST slowest game mining ever designed.

Good to have it on your resume in a bragging forum, but hardly worth subcribing to if you want to have a world you LIVE in.

So EVE has a market until KOTOR, Star Trek and certainly the new space MMO from Blizzard comes along. Until then it can be hyped to 200/250K.

BTW 250K was already reached 3 years ago and the game didn't go up in these last 3 years at all.

I know why, I played it two times. No tx not a third one, despite the obvious lying in this artcle.

The day EVE would have some real 3D, like some "trivial" trees, rivers, forests and a planet landscape, you would see how hollow a slogan is .... it can be played on a single server.

Of cours it can NOT if the game would have even the slightest landscape included.

It is as hollow as the space it represents.... in ALL facets.

Bossy, do you know what is in CCP's 10 year plan? I didn't think so. Planets will come as will many many other things.

In my view EVEis the only REAL MMO out there at the moment. It is a world that you live in not just a theme park that you visit when you fancy going on the ride you've already experienced 50 or 60 times. You get out of EVE what you put into it, it doesn't lead you by the hand and say 'you should do this next'

As far as I know Star Trek, KOTOR, Jumpgate, Black Prophecy and the rest (not even counting Blizzards offering as no-one on the outside even knows what that is yet) are just going to follow the old model of the theme park MMO.

If you want your fun handed to you on a plate in a neat little package then by all means stick with the WoW clones, which to me are just as hollow as you say EVE is. The beauty of EVE is that it gives you a space within which you can make your own fun and in the long run that is far more rewarding.

Are you so blinded by your fanboism that you cannot accept that WoW will eventually die? If that is the case then you're so deep in denial that you could be snorkeling in central Cairo.

I don't want to get into an argument of opinion with you Bossy but you've definitely misrepresented a few facts here. Three years ago, EVE had about 130,000 subscriptions ( http://www.mmogchart.com/Chart2.html ) with a peak concurrent user record of just over 26k. It hit 250k in the later part of 2008 and the most recent peak concurrent user record is over 51k. Whether you like EVE or not, the game is going strong.

And frankly, I look forward to some competition in the sci-fi MMO market because the last time EVE had significant competition they produced some of the finest expansion work I've ever seen. Apart from the latest apocrypha expansion, which is awesome.

Yep. Step One: Build something that you can afford to build, within budget, on time. Step Two: Get it out the door and start collecting income. Step Three: Reinvest the income into making more stuff.

No MMO that has followed this formula has failed. Not all of them got huge (Puzzle Pirates comes to mind), but they all stayed profitable.

I have NO idea why this is so hard for so many MMO producers to understand. Instead, they follow the guaranteed-to-fail model. Step One: Borrow about $100 million, and start having to make interest payments on it every month for the next three years. Step Two: After you've borrowed the money, design (in this order) the art assets, then the missions, then the game play; but make sure you use all $100 million on the art assets, so the missions and the game play get knocked together in one month at the end of a three year period, after the interest payments have eaten half of your development budget. Step Three: Ship it out the door half finished and the immediately lay off half or more of the staff, since the game is now "done."

No MMO that has followed this formula has succeeded in the long term. A few have had a good year or two, but they all started to decline steadily as soon as the developers got laid off.

No, really, it is this easy.

Wow Bossy, you played a game a whole 2 times and you reacted so heavily? You, my friend, need medication.

I'm not saying, or even implying, that EVE is for everyone. It's obviously not. But your main points are all being addressed by CCP. Are they going to be released tomorrow in the M10 expansion, No of course not. Walking in stations is planned for release in the winter expansion. They have talked and shown atmospheric flighting. At the last fanfest they 'accidentally slipped' and showed planetary fighting ala FPS.

Ive been playing for over 3 years now so I'm probably considered one of those veterans you claim to not be able to catch up to. You know what? You don't have to. I may have more SP than you but it wasn't until just recently that I really learned how to fight with most of the ships Ive had for quite some time. Becoming a force to be reckoned with in EVE isn't all about your skillpoints, its more about how you strategize and use what you have against an hostile fleet.

Eve is such a strange nut to crack. I just find that it is more fun to talk, read and listen (WDA and drione Bay podcasts!) about than it is to actually play it. Yet, I find myself resubbing very often when I hear a great story or read about a new expansion. The GHSC and the recent BoB disaster come to mind. Ghost training was another thing that made returning easier too, the idea that coming back meant I now had Battleship V or tech 2 missles was pretty cool (so sad to see that "feature" go even though I know it had to for financial reasons).

The fact that those new expansions are free is what gets me back in those cases. If you read something awesome about Mines of Moria or WotLK and get excited there is still the barrier of going to purchase as well as resub...that can easily be $50-$60 U.S. for that content, enough to make some people reconsider that resub and lose a potential returning customer.

Now, to be fair, an Eve "expansion" is MUCH lighter in content IMO than Wrath or Moria. It's expansions are more like major patches in most MMOs but I don't want to take anything away from the model because I wuld love to see it catch on.

We'll see how WAR does with it's "live expansion" idea, maybe it will spark an increase in sub numbers and catch some attention in the industry...

@ Bossy

You are going to be very disappointed then, if you want a MMO, sci-fi or otherwise with actual physics in it. Because while you seem to have some hopeful candidates to being a "real" MMO. These "real" MMOs by your definition will be crippled by none other than the very real laws of physics and math in our time.

Sure, you could have a MMO based on the laws of physics, but it would rule warp travel out as warp travel is only possible in theory thus as far.. sorry. And a 3D object, like a tree, would let you interact with it regardless if it's quest or not.

So that makes all MMOs, "real" or otherwise, hollow.

Actually, Eve's physics is pretty real as it is anyway. Sure it's all speculative and theoretical, but there's very little going on in-game that we KNOW is impossible. Like all good hard-sci-fi, it takes real scientific ideas and puts them to use, even though we don't really understand how the manufacture process would work.

In that sense, I've always enjoyed Eve's realism. Try flying from one planet to another without warp - that's pretty damn realistic. Painfully so.

And @Bossy, as others have pointed out, CCP plan to include out-of-cockpit gaming... They've just been keen to work on making what they've got as good as it can be first.

Sure, the gameplay might seem hollow to you, but it sounds as if you're looking to get from it something that's not there - you're so concerned with questing your way to the top of the food chain, you've missed the fact there isn't one. The veterans may have bigger guns, more money, and more skill points, but that does not make them gods.

The game has many flaws, as all games do, but your criticisms just highlight how pointless it is to form an opinion on a game based on two plays. If it's not for you, fair enough; but do your homework before you start spreading BS.

I have no doubt that an interesting theme park sci-fi MMO will come along shortly. However, they will be inherently different from EVE because EVE is a sandbox game. JGE, SW:TOR, and STO will all be more themepark then sandbox. They will probably share more in common with WoW, AOC, and WAR then EVE. Additionally, DFO is more like EVE then any sci-fi game. The primary draw of EVE is its complexity, sandbox nature, and PvP. Not its sci-fi setting. The sci-fi setting just facilitates those aspects. Many who try EVE because of its setting end up disappointed.

I think the number one thing that makes EVE fun is being a part of a group. If you are not the kind of MMO player who is interested in injecting themselves into the community, whether as an actual member of a player corporation or simply by interacting with other people on a daily basis, then EVE is not going to offer you much. The solo PvE content is currently pretty bland, although it may improve with the advent of Epic Missions Arcs. It's not even a shadow of the content you can find in say LOTRO. But the group content is really amazing. It's one of the few MMOs where you get a sense of actually going on an adventure if you and your buddies decide to grab some ships and head into the lawless territories. The sandbox nature also give you an amazing sense of accomplishment as you grow with the game.

To quote bossy :

"A game where you no longer advance with being logged off."

As opposed too.... Staying up all night, becoming super fat, hanging out in dense basements grinding wild boars in the forest all night?

The leveling system is easily one of the best selling points of the eve universe.

Its no use trying to make a dyied in the wool WOWhead understand that Eve's inovinative systems/rules of play actually is a good thing 4 how most ppl play eve. Many fantasy mmoers are so entrenched in their old mmo's method of play -grinding, instancing etc that when they play eve they try to apply the same method of play. Which imo guessing would be grinding missions. For a WOWhead the fact that skills are time based and he cant kill rats to improve his skills is taking all the fun out of the game.

Many ppl dont understand that eve has its own grinding which is grinding for isk to provide money for pvp or to reinvest into making more isk (industry). IMO this is why missions are so popular. Solo PVE is eves weak point and many WOWheads soon leave eve for better PVE in WOW.( which is why fac-war is in the game to keep all the empire dwellers still in the game.) They maybe dont know or want to try other methods of isk grinding which is to get out of carebear land (industry is too skill/ isk demanding for a Fighter train toon to get into without alot of effort) and into 0.0 where they can earn alot more isk by ratting/plexing/pirating etc which is alot more fun and the real meat and potatoes of the game. The fact that they cant solo play and have to be more group active in a 0.0 is something alien to them aswell.

Also alot of WOWheads have big difficulties with putting their PVE ships on the line in 0.0. Eves system of non consential PVP is and big downer for them aswell. Ive been in a 0.0 industry/ carebear corp and ive seen the tantrums on the chat channels and team speak when they loose their ratting ship to a red roamer hahahaha (They always demand that all of the allience come to their aid against this 15 man gang which has his ship locked down and 15 seconds away from popping aswell ;p Also they forget the fact that they would be the last person to do the same if the table was turned.) Theres another reason to keep the WOWhead in empire where they are safe aslong as they dont fly around in a uber leet missioning ship and modules and get high sec ganked, which it usually is the WOWhead such a thing would happen to anyway. Plus the fact that fac-war is almost like a Fantasy MMOs system of arena/ consential based PVP is another tick in the box for staying in empire. I bet my front teeth CCP will never give the rats in a lv 4 mission any AI or atleast enough to make doing them any more risky.

A WOWhead and some1 who GETS eve are like chalk and cheese. All he sees is the end game where really its the roller coaster journey, all the adrenaling pumping risk taking. Some1 who gets eve enbrases all of this understands that eve is a Love where the rough and the smooth go hand in hand and that he should savor all of it. A WOWhead sadly hates all of that. which judging from all the fact we are so easy to troll gets our backs up when some1 just doesnt get eve.

All ill say after this comment which turned into practically a blog of its own. Is that thank god eve is was the 1st and will for a very long time be the only MMO ive played. if not i might of been a WOWHead myself.

trevhead:

-this man speaks truth.

hehe i got myself going abit there. Ill get off my puplit now :-)

EVE Evolved: The secret of EVE Online's success, part 2

Reader Comments (16)

Posted: Mar 8th 2009 9:09PM Ghede said

Posted: Mar 8th 2009 10:25PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Mar 8th 2009 11:32PM Benicio said

Posted: Mar 9th 2009 3:11AM (Unverified) said

Posted: Mar 9th 2009 5:44AM (Unverified) said

Posted: Mar 9th 2009 8:12AM Brendan Drain said

Posted: Mar 9th 2009 1:12AM J Brad Hicks said

Posted: Mar 9th 2009 7:15AM Pacey said

Posted: Mar 9th 2009 8:17AM Drexel said

Posted: Mar 9th 2009 8:22AM (Unverified) said

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