CCP's EVE Online Commissioned Officer Edition throws a life preserver to newbies

It's never been a better time to get into EVE Online: The title is on the verge of releasing a new expansion, with another one on the way for the spring. However, many players who may find EVE appealing are hesitant to take the leap out of a fear of being so far behind that there's no way of ever catching up with the crowd.

If this is you, then CCP is extending a rare helping hand to easing you into the hardcore world it has created. On October 19th in North America, the studio is releasing a new boxed edition of the game, titled EVE Online: Commissioned Officer Edition. The "commissioned officer" refers to an exclusive in-game item that comes with the package, a Cerebral Accelerator implant that will give a significant boost to new pilot skill development for the first 30 days.

Senior producer Arnar Gylfason sees this as a great way to knock down the barrier to entry: "The Commissioned Officers Edition is the best way for a new player to get a running start in the highly competitive environment of EVE Online."

The Commissioned Officer Edition also comes with a full month of game time and an EVE poster that has a slew of helpful hints and tips on it. This edition of the game will only be available in a physical form -- no digital download, sorry! -- and will hit European brick-and-mortar stores following the NA release.

Reader Comments (36)

In before catering to the casuals.

Might get this retail box as well, even though I already play. The Collector's itch I guess!

CrazyKinux.com
- CK

This is more of a psicological perk than anything. But it's ok, forums are full of ppl misleading telling ppl that one can't catch the veterans.

You’re right, newbies can catch up, if they wanna give CCP more money.

Fyi to new players, you can buy characters and all the gold you want in game without breaking the EULA.

The sky is the limit depending on how much real life money you have. CCP takes a fee for those sales of course. You can buy your way to end game with vets with your mom’s credit card.

Newbies can catch up because you can't advance skills beyond level 5. You won't be able to fly as many different types of ships as a veteran, but who cares if you're better at flying the ones you can?

Unless you live in temporal pocket, new people can't. A 2+ year headstart on time based training won't be caught up to by someone who starts today. That's simple math right there. Someone obviously failed at learning the concept of progression over time.

Yeah its definitely not the skills that players need to worry about when they think about catching the veterans..... its the trillions of ISK and fleets of ships that make that divide.

This shortens the time it does take to catch up. It takes a long time to be able to use a T2 fit battleship, and those increasingly are the backbone of the game's fleets. It also helps newbies because not everyone is going to automatically know what they want to fly, or follow EVEmon religiously. This will give some wiggle room in case they decide they don't want to pilot a mining barge or run an interceptor.

No one uses T2 Battleships. If you were out in 0.0 you would know it is AHACS and Supers these days... Plus those damn Drake fleets!

I wouldn't recommend any newbies to hurry into a battleship. Partly because you can't really turbo train for one but mainly because it'd be a pretty damn expensive way to learn pvp. ^^

A tech 2 fitted battlecruiser on the other hand is pretty affordable, welcomed into almost any small gang and only takes a few months to train for.

I'm always amused at how eve players say "It takes only a few months" and the rest of the mmo crowd says "It's such a grind it takes weeks to complete".

@kasapina it may take a few months to get all of your core skills but at least you don't have to do hours of mind-numbing grinding for them. Eve skills train whether you're playing or not. Also, after a point, more time spent playing doesn't make you all that much better. Real experience is better than experience points in Eve.

I was thinking more long-term. There's no point to learn PvP in a BC hull or up, even that is very expensive for newbies and kind of overkill-thats when you use the frigs and cruisers. By the time you've sunk the months and SP in, its probably better to shoot for a BS unless you know for sure you like a specific role like HACs or HICs. Those take a lot of time to train too.

When I played, it seemed a requirement for many things like wormhole corps and 0.0 was a T2 fitted battleship. Even militia was heading that way, with them quickly shipping up if not dropping caps on each other.

Seems strange, you already get a 100% skill training boost for the first 1.6m points

This is the same thing just more apparent to new players. It's just a marketing thing

People are never going to stay with the game with a UI that is broken as much as it is. Until CCP understands this they will keep shooting themselves in the foot. Maybe Incursion will fix a lot of this. I notice a lot of techie-type people play Eve. It makes sense with the type of game it is, but I also think it is in part cause the techie types tend to deal better with UI crap. Also, this marketing push would be better served AFTER Incarna release where you will have more to keep the newbs around.

Hey, that's cool! So now newbs will get pwned at the higher levels instead of just the low ones. Maybe if they all joined together, they could do a newb rush on the vets!! lol

This is a news post about a new edition of an extremely popular game in an era when some games don't ever release boxes in brick-and-mortar stores period. When a game as old as EVE get a new box edition on two continents and includes pro-noobie bonus items for those who buy it, it's news.

Not a game breaking mechanic and sorry to all the nay sayers. This is a great way to help people get started in the game. If it's only for 30 days, that's cool by me. The first 3 months it's really a slog and people seem to forget those first days in the game.

It's has zero or little impact on gameplay except for the new people, I think a prudent move.

the card house is about to crumble... this is what you have to do, if your skill system is essentially flawed.

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CCP's EVE Online Commissioned Officer Edition throws a life preserver to newbies

Reader Comments (36)

Posted: Oct 12th 2010 2:37PM relgoth said

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Posted: Oct 12th 2010 2:40PM distiler said

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Posted: Oct 12th 2010 6:10PM anduz said

Posted: Oct 13th 2010 2:00AM kasapina said

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