EVE Online

Moments ago at EVE Online's tenth anniversary Fanfest, CCP revealed plans for its Second Decade Collector's Edition box. EVE never really had a proper collector's edition, and the tenth anniversary of the game is the perfect opportunity to release one. The box will come with an awesome physical Rifter model that doubles as a USB hub, a CD of the tenth anniversary EVE symphony from this year's Fanfest, and a series of codes to redeem to cosmetic items in EVE Online and DUST 514. The box is due for release in October 2013 and on the EVE store and Amazon and can be pre-purhased right now for $149.99 (€149.99 for those in Europe).

Cosmetic upgrades for EVE include a new golden pod skin that applies permanently to one character, some new bloodline-based in-game clothing, and several collector's edition ships. Players will get a five-run blueprint copy of the tenth anniversary Gnosis battlecruiser and a re-skinned red Tash-Murkon Magnate, and pre-purchasers will get a bonus Nefnatar Thrasher. DUST 514 items include a set of permanant Amarr templar drop suits and weapons with the same stats as normal items but lower skill requirements.

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EVE Online's tenth anniversary Fanfest promised to be its biggest yet, with over 1,400 players packed into Iceland's Harpa convention centre to find out the latest on EVE Online, DUST 514, and World of Darkness. The first day focused mainly on DUST and its link with the EVE universe, but today the focus largely switched back to internet spaceships. There were plenty of roundtable discussions, and the CSM and Alliance panels were as awesome as ever, but it was the EVE Keynote that really blew the crowd away.

The day got off to a good start with the highly anticipated World of Darkness talk. Most fans were probably expecting to see more airy game design ideas and another shiny trailer, but this year CCP just came out and put all its cards on the table. We saw that the game is still firmly in pre-production, with much of the previous work going into developing the engine and cool content creation tools and shaders. While I was initially disappointed at the lack of gameplay progress or shiny cinematics, I found this approach of being open and direct with fans very refreshing. As I told WoD art director Thomas Holt, honest beats shiny every time.

Read on for a full run-down of the EVE reveals from the second day of EVE's tenth anniversary Fanfest, including in-depth details of the Odyssey expansion's features.

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Details of EVE Online's exploration-focused Odyssey expansion have been floating around since PAX East, but it seems the company saved some pretty huge changes to reveal at this year's tenth anniversary Fanfest. In two massive devblogs accompanying today's EVE Online Keynote speech, CCP Fozzie discussed plans to overhaul EVE's entire resource distribution system. Everything from asteroid and ice mining to moon harvesting and nullsec industry will be affected by the revamp.

Miners will find their ice belts have been moved from static locations to hidden exploration sites that have to be scanned down, but to compensate it will now mine at double the normal rate. Normal asteroid mining in lowsec and nullsec is also due for a buff with the addition of large quantities of low-end minerals. Hidden asteroid belts will no longer need to be probed down but can be quickly located with the new Discovery scanner, and to top it off there'll even be new high quality ore sites that can only be found in prime areas of nullsec.

Outpost industrial infrastructure is due for an update with new purchaseable upgrade paths expanding factory, office and research lab capabilities to the same level as fully-fledged empire stations. Lastly, moon minerals are finally being addressed with a redistribution of rare materials and several new reaction paths to bypass current bottlenecks. A lot of value will be moved from Technetium back to rarer materials like Thulium, Neodymium, Promethium and Dysprosium, and new supplies of all four will be distributed randomly into moons across the universe. Re-scan all of your nearby moons when Odyssey lands because it could suddenly be worth a fortune!

Whether you're a die-hard fan of internet spaceships or just a gawker on the sidelines, EVE Fanfest is the EVE Online event of the year (and the key source of new DUST 514 and World of Darkness scoops!). Follow Massively's Brendan Drain as he reports back on this year's Fanfest starpower, scheming, and spoilers from exotic Reykjavik, Iceland.

The second day of EVE Fanfest 2013 is now underway, and the schedule is packed! Today kicks off with a highly anticipated talk on World of Darkness at 7:00 a.m. EDT, and continues with the CSM Panel at 8:00 a.m. EDT, Alliance Panel at 9:00 a.m. EDT and Art Panel at 10:00 a.m. EDT. The CSM and Alliance panels are usually filled with hilarious banter, but this year the CSM Panel happens at the same time as the Faction Warfare roundtable and a talk on DUST 514 planet conquering in lowsec. The big event today is of course the EVE Online Keynote at 1:00 p.m. EDT, where we'll find out details of the upcoming Odyssey expansion.

World of Darkness is still pretty early in development, so the presentation will be talking mostly about the tools being used to build it. We're unlikely to get a release schedule or any solid gameplay demos, but with developers raving about their internal play-tests I expect to see some serious progress compared to last year. Since the CSM panel is likely being streamed, I'll try to hit up the Faction Warfare roundtable and see what CCP's current thoughts are on how to improve this aging game system.

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The 10th anniversary EVE Online Fanfest is beyond massive, with over 1,400 players piling into Reykjavik's Harpa building for three days of intense internet spaceshippery. Players fly from across the world to meet their corpmates and chat with other players as passionate about EVE as they are. CCP runs a packed schedule of game design presentations, reveals, and roundtable discussions with players, but for many attendees, the event is about being a part of a tight-knit community that usually exists only inside a game server.

CCP made the bold statement to the press team this morning that its goal is "to create virtual worlds more meaningful than real life," and with so many people flying across the world to meet other players face to face, I'd say the studio has succeeded. Today saw talks on EVE's hugely successful Retribution expansion, ship rebalancing, map generation in DUST 514, and lowsec PvP, and of course, we attended the DUST 514 keynote speech. There were also some hilarious shenanigans with the wormhole roundtable room filling to bursting and a guest science lecture on the possibility of faster than light travel in real life.

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What better way to express your love for EVE Online than with EVE-branded clothing? OK, well, a tattoo might beat that, but you'll have less regret with a Concord Ops jacket.

CCP has announced today that its EVE store has reopened, allowing fans of the popular space MMO to buy starmap-adorned t-shirts and Guristas jackets to their hearts' content. In addition to what's currently available on the store, CCP plans to announce all new products (an expansion pack for the store, if you will) at this weekend's Fanfest.

Speaking of Fanfest, you can follow our coverage of the Icelandic party event all weekend.

EVE Online's colossal tenth anniversary Fanfest hasn't even officially begun, but the excitement from attendees is already practically palpable. The Reykjavik nightlife has been invaded by hundreds of foreigners yelling about internet spaceships as players from around the world reunite with their online comrades and meet corpmates for the first time. Over the course of the weekend, a record 1,400 EVE fans and hundreds more press and partners will flood into the Harpa building for non-stop news and festivities from EVE Online, DUST 514, and World of Darkness.

The talks and events start later today, but last night CCP kicked off the festivities with the Icelandic Symphony Orchestra delivering stunning renditions of tracks from the EVE Online soundtrack. Today, I'll be reporting back from key talks including the Retribution expansion roundup at 8 a.m. EDT (noon GMT), ship rebalancing at 9 a.m. EDT (1 p.m. GMT), lowsec PvP and crimewatch at noon EDT (4 p.m. GMT), and of course, the DUST 514 keynote speech at 2 p.m. EDT (6 p.m. GMT). I may also be able to join in on the roundtable discussion on wormholes and live events at 10 a.m. EDT (2 p.m. GMT) for an inside look at CCP's current thoughts. Check out the Fanfest timetable and let me know if there's something interesting you think I should try to squeeze in.

I'd expect the tone of these talks to be one of looking back at another successful year and the great player response to the Retribution expansion. We probably won't hear much of anything about the Odyssey expansion today, but I do expect some big DUST 514 news from the keynote. While many are probably hoping for word of a PC release, I'd be very surprised to see CCP actually do it. We'll most likely just get a release schedule for the PS3 launch and possibly footage of the game running on a PS4 devkit. I'm personally also hoping for more details on post-release updates such as the ability for DUST corps to own and manage their own territory and industrial supply chains.

Whether you're a die-hard fan of internet spaceships or just a gawker on the sidelines, EVE Fanfest is the EVE Online event of the year (and the key source of new DUST 514 and World of Darkness scoops!). Follow Massively's Brendan Drain as he reports back on this year's Fanfest starpower, scheming, and spoilers from exotic Reykjavik, Iceland.

About five years ago, on April 27th, 2008, I joined the Massively team and wrote the very first issue of the EVE Evolved column. Five years later, the column is still going strong and delivering its weekly dose of EVE Online to thousands of readers. I used to worry about running out of ideas to write about, but regular game updates and hilarious player shenanigans mean there's always something interesting going on in New Eden. When EVE hits its 10th anniversary in May, this column will have been running for just over half of the game's lifetime. In that time, I've written over 250 in-depth articles, guides, in-game stories and opinion pieces on EVE Online and a few on DUST 514.

As usual, I'll be celebrating this anniversary by rounding up this year's column highlights and giving away two 30-day Pilot's License Extensions to two lucky readers. To enter the competition, write a comment explaining which EVE Evolved articles from this year you liked best and what topics you'd like to see covered in the coming year. You will need an active EVE account to claim the prize, so be sure to include your character name in your comment if you want to be in with a chance. If you'd rather not give out your character name or don't have an EVE account but would like to give the game a go, you can sign up a new trial account and use the name of your new character.

In this week's EVE Evolved, I look back at the highlights from the column's fifth year!

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EVE Fanfest is next week and the faithful are preparing to descend upon Reykjavik, Iceland, for the three-day convention. If you're one of the travelers who are heading there or are just looking to follow along on livestream, CCP has released the full program with the event's schedule.

Fanfest will have three keynotes about the past, present, and future of CCP's titles, respectively. There will also be several panels, including one discussing EVE Online's inclusion in the New York Museum of Modern Art.

EVE Online also released a new dev blog talking about the team's war on unauthorized client modification and violations of the EULA. Apparently CCP has taken additional steps to beef up detection and prevention, and the team wanted to be clear with players as to what is and is not allowed.

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There's just over a week to go until EVE Online's massive tenth anniversary Fanfest, and you'll be pleased to hear that Massively will be there this year to cover the action! CCP is aiming to make this the biggest Fanfest yet, promising huge reveals and announcements about EVE's summer Odyssey expansion and beyond. We can also expect to hear some big news about upcoming console MMOFPS DUST 514, and fans of Vampire: The Masquerade will undoubtedly get to see some of the year's progress toward making the World of Darkness MMO a reality.

Tickets to this year's Fanfest sold out in record time, so many players who really wanted to be there for EVE's tenth anniversary celebration weren't able to secure a spot. CCP is running its usual livestream of the main talks for those not in attendance, but only certain parts of the event are being streamed. Here at Massively, we plan to give you an inside look at Fanfest with ongoing news coverage from April 25th to April 27th and in-depth opinion pieces on what each announcement means for players.

In this week's short and sweet EVE Evolved, I lay out Massively's plans for in-depth coverage of EVE Fanfest 2013 and ask what you'd like to see reported on.

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It looks like EVE Online's Jon Lander, otherwise known as CCP Unifex, will be moving on from his position as executive producer of the 10-year-old single-shard space MMO to concentrate on CCP's "emerging mobile strategy," according to a recent dev blog. Lander helped steer the team through EVE Online expansions Crucible, Inferno, Retribution, and the upcoming Odyssey. Don't worry, though; Senior Producer CCP Seagull and Development Director CCP Ripley will continue on with production of the game. Odyssey's release is still set for June 4th, and CCP promises that the transition will have zero impact on the quality of the upcoming new expansion.

Even more intriguingly, CCP wants to fill the position that Jon vacated with a candidate from outside the company. The dev blog wonders whether you have what it takes to take on the massive responsibility of running the world's biggest collection of pew-pews, or maybe you know someone who does. Good luck!

As EVE Online approaches the big 1-0, many can't help but think about how all the events and happenings over the last 10 years had shaped life in this massive space sandbox. But trying to explain a full decade of New Eden's extensive history was no easy task -- until now. CCP has just introduced the EVE timeline, an interactive exploration of the setting and lore of both EVE and its new companion, DUST 514.

In its inaugural form, this timeline sticks with core concepts, discussing how the universe was discovered and colonized. As time progresses, the functionality of the timeline will expand, including the addition of excerpts from the True Stories initiative as well as accounts from other major player events. Check it out on the new EVE.com website, then let CCP know what moments you think warrant mentioning in this easy-to-navigate history via the blog's comment section.

According to the latest dev blog, the last time navy ships saw any real developer attention in EVE Online was way back in 2009. Some ship specs, like the cruisers, haven't been dusted off in even longer. But fans can finally look forward to some of the rebalancing and retrofitting that other groups of ships have enjoyed in recent expansions; with Odyssey, navy vessels are getting an overhaul. The blog details the incoming changes, from a light once-over of the various frigates to a boat-load of changes for the cruisers and battlecruisers. Check out the full blog for specifics on your favorite ships.

A new blog post at Gamasutra gives an interesting perspective on EVE Online's economic trends and how they translate to real life. Virtual World Economist Ramin Shokrizade writes about his time helping CCP build the game's economy in the early days and how land tax and real estate bubbles can (and can't) work both in and out of a virtual environment.

Most notably, Shokrizade elaborates on a prediction he made in 2006 regarding the failed global banking system and how EVE Online taught him the warning signs. Now Shokrizade is an economic consultant to three international gaming companies, and he owes it all to EVE Online.