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EVE Online: The Mittani Speaks Out
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
EVE Online has seen its share of controversy over the past several months and bloggers across the globe have been speaking out. One of the most prominent is The Mittani, leader of the largest EVE alliances, Goonswarm Federation. He's posted a stinging article about what he calls "the stagnation of EVE since Incarna. MMORPG.com caught up with The Mittani to talk about the controversy and more. Read on!
So you’re of the belief that EVE is being used lately merely as a testbed for World of Darkness. Do you have any proof of this, or is it merely a feeling you and others have over recent content updates to EVE?
CCP has made no secret of the fact that the Carbon code framework is intended to provide a code-base for all three of its titles – EVE, Dust 514 and World of Darkness. That Incarna is a framework for the World of Darkness engine isn’t a matter of speculation.
Read more of Bill Murphy's interview EVE Online: The Mittani Speaks Out.
;)
Comments
Soo... After reading that it seems that WoW is not the only place that has paraniod and stingy vets ready to blame anything then themself for the facrt that they love has gone stale. And in turn has the vets still playing using the fact to propell their own agenda.
That curve looks pretty normal for a game of that age.
This have been a good conversation
Good thing you guys decided to interview The Mittani. Better to hear it directly from the man then having to read in other articles about what he supposedly said.
And he's right ofcourse. I just hope reallocation of resources is still possible in the CCP development teams, so that we can see a decent upgrade within 6 months the latest.
I'm curious in what state the WoD project is in now, but I'd much rather see some Eve improvements; these last months haven't exactly convinced me to come back.
Currently playing: Skyrim, SWTOR
Looking forward to: Guildwars 2 ! modestly excited for: The Secret World
Have played intensely: Rift, Eve, AoC, WoW, Conquer 2.0, Astonia 3
Have played less intensely: just about everything else
A poorly thought out statement to make considering the recent developments in EVE. WoW's fundamental gameplay has never changed from the start, you cant compare that with the situation here in any way, its a completely different scenario
WIth the big change in direction the games taking, and the developments CCP are clearly focussing on, I dont think that anything said wasnt justified, vet or not.
The Mittani is one of Eve biggest blowhards.
If you know his views on WH's you will quickly see he has no idea what he is talking about. He has his head so far up 0.0 and the goons he has forgotten how to play Eve.
I even voted for him but I see now it was a mistake.......
Eve is going in exciting directions. The FiS game is all still there, it’s not perfect but it is still the best mmo out. With the addition of Incarna, it opens up untold possibilities. All CCP needs to do is give Mittens some big throne in 0.0 where he can stroke his epeen from, that will shut him up.
CCP have always favoured cautious and incremental change over the "big bang" implementations, which is something I actually admire them for.
That said, they may have been too cautious with Incarna. It was a huge change in direction of game content for them, and they may have been too nervous too flesh it out further before seeing how it affected server performance in a live environment. However, the playerbase has been tantalized with "walking in stations" for years now, and the first glimpse of it was just a massive anticlimax.
If the CSM says that there's a shortage of resources deployed in FiS, then I have no reason to disbelieve them. They have direct contact with developers, I don't. The alternative is to make up my own "truth" based on my own selective reading and paranoia.
Perhaps CCP has reached "crunch time" in the development-cycle of their other 2 games. World of Darkness (WoD) has been in the oven for quite a long time (with no progress announcements), and Dust-514 is intended to launch in 2012 iirc. It could be that these pressures are pulling their focus away from large manhour-intensive new updates for EVE FiS.
The acquisition of/merger with White Wolf, development of WoD and Dust-514 has no doubt required a large chunk of capital investment. The staff of CCP has grown extensively over the last 3 years. If these 2 new projects don't fly, CCP may be in a very awkward position.
With the current world financial situation and all, and especially located on Iceland, I is my bet that CCP management regrets having started production of both DUST and WoD at the same time. One would have been enough if there should still be resources for EVE.
It is not becoming any better with the announcement of DUST being released next year as this will make management allocate even more resources away from the FiS part of EVE.
Making the design decision to remove the Hangar View and force this weak Incarna experience on everybody was certainly not a smart move either. It only shows how the vision of one man becomes an immersion breaking experience when nobody is allowed to question if the vision is realizable with the resources at hand.
With CCPs income being in dollars and Euros and presumably much of their staff cost outgoings in Kroner, they should be better off due to the financial collapse.First off he is a goon, which pretty much puts him in a very bad way to start with, then you add in he is looking out for his corp first and his perspective of the game is that of a veteran 0.0 player which is a definite minority.
My thought is, he will be very upset when he sees the changes CCP will be making to the game in the future.
So far WoD seems vaporware for many... and Dust wont save them. Future is not that bright...
well DUST514 is going to be a PS3 exclusiv.. thats Epic Fail #1 right there... thats assuming it ever makes it to release.. which is far from certain... as for WoD possibly being vapourware.. i'd have to agree.. maybe they need to concentrate on Eve and ditch some of these dodgy ideas, they could end up being very expensive lessons...
I have only been playing the game for a little over a year. I have found EVE to be the best game out there at the moment. I love the sandbox. However, I believe that Mittens is right about quite a few things. FiS is the most important aspect of EVE. WiS is neat and has awesome possibilities, however, if you neglect FiS then you can expect people to leave the game.
I am a miner/explorer. I think there are lots and lots of possibilities for them to open in the area of discovery. Why not create a few dozen of so systems? Have a few ancient gates open up or something. Have the Jovians open up trade, have us be able to investigate pulsars, quasars, black holes, and other phenomenon...and if we get caught in a black hole...blow us up...there are limitess possible ideas for FiS.
anyways...just some thoughts
Currently Play: ?
Occasionally Play: Champions, Pirates of the Burning Sea, WOW, EVE ONLINE
I may hate the Mittani and revile his playstyle, his copr/alliance, etc but he is a good advocate for EVE. He's not one to be cowtowed by upper management, he isn't afraid to speak his mind, and I believe for the most part he has the best interest of EVE at heart. In general I totally agree with what he's saying here...
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"Searchers after horror haunt strange, far places..." ~ H.P.Lovecraft, "From Beyond"
Member Since March 2004
Honestly, Planets and Incarna are what brought me back. I don't think they should ever be the central part of what Eve is about, but these pieces are important because they make the game more whole.
Intresting to see what happens in the nexts few months......
***Dances with Ho Kthanid Amarr Ladies***
All my opinions are just that..opinions. If you like my opinions..coolness.If you dont like my opinion....I really dont care.
Playing: ESO, WOT, Smite, and Marvel Heroes
lol, completely transparent. Eurogamer just "got" hold of the internal post and published it because they are that interested in posts made by the Mitt. Then it just "went" viral.
Transparent ploy and head up his own ass.
If CCP had not buckled the very first time Goonswarm threatened them and purposefully crashed the forums with their threadnaughts then all these years later, they would have avoided many "media circuses" caused by EVE's resident troublemakers.
MIttani is a tool. But he is right about EVE decline. Although it took him a year longer to notice the obvious then me.
No fate but what we make, so make me a ham sandwich please.
Yeah because Eve was so much better when developers were secretly helping their favorite corps with massive advantages that nobody else had access to. The person with his head up his own ass isn't The Mittani.
Actually I think they are aware of the problems with Eve and are going to address that in the near future. CCP's number one problem has been far too much catering to the veteran player and not to retaining new players.
Walking in stations was necessary to actually show people they had avatars and not spaceships. Despite all the vets crying it has affected them little. The changes coming up though will affect them greatly so get ready for a lot of gnashing of teeth. CCP knows it has to open up low sector and 0.0 areas to more players so that means effectively disabling the super alliances like goonswarm.
So all in all, Mittani is right to fear what is coming, his alliance is one of the ones that will take the blunt of it, but it will open up the game to a lot more players and CCP knows they really have no choice if they intend to grow the game. You know what the funny thing is, Mittani's initial foray into Eve was to take on the larger alliances with lots of small ships, now his alliance will have the same thing done to it now that they have superiority in the larger ships. Kind of funny to see the irony in that.
Mittens has pretty accurately reflected my concerns and issues with EVE.
As for those who are attempting dismiss what he says purely because they dislike his personal style or his alliance, they are sounding far more immature than the goon stereotype they claim to be reacting against. Dispute him on the facts, dispute him on the analysis, dispute him on the conclusions if you like. Disputing him because he's a goon is simply stupid. Ad hominems don't make him or his message look worse.
Falling PCU numbers are a weathervane. People who can't think of a reason to log in and play will pretty soon start wondering why they're maintaining a subscription at all. EVE's unique PLEX system has almost certainly provided a buffering effect in keeping subscriptions up - an even moderately wealthy player can easily maintain his subs without spending real life money. A shockingly high percentage of 0.0 players are now "burning fat" - selling off in game assets for ISK to buy PLEX with - rather than paying actual money. When those assets are gone, so is the player.
0.0 is a wasteland now. Horribly imbalanced supercapitals, and a sov system that's so bad that invaders are literally paying other people to grind the structures for them have left sov 0.0 largely deserted by anything except the occasional bot, a few renter corps who haven't noticed or don't care that no-one else is out there, and a few powerbloc fleets waiting on their Titan to bridge in on a 3-man drake gang.
Give me liberty or give me lasers
The mans a tool, and so far up himself it's not funny, but in this instance, and on this subject, all power to mittens tbh, despite his stupidly white-knighting for them in that cringeworthy video.
The ccp upper managment are drivng EvE into the ground with their insane decisions, and they will end up taking the staff down with them if they carry as on as they are.
The best MMO on the market might die yet again due to management idiocy.
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I think World of Darkness wont be the success CCP hopes it will be, its obvious at this point that you cant make judgments about the quality of the game but my opinion stems from CCPs RMT policy.
EVE players and the gaming press where simply stunned by the cost of the vanity items offered in Incarna, you could buy a real life EVE T Shirt from CCP for slightly less than the virtual vanity T Shirt in the in game store. Do not even mention the monocles, $70 for a small vanity item is not just excessive it was lunacy. If CCP are that stupid when it comes to the item shop in WoD I can see the game never getting off the ground.
WoD will definitely have a cash shop it just remains to be seen what form it will take, the game could be sub based with additional items or it could be a P2W style game. A F2P/P2W game with $35-70 items would be a disaster.
Currently playing:
EVE online (Ruining low sec one hotdrop at a time)
Gravity Rush,
Dishonoured: The Knife of Dunwall.
(Waiting for) Metro: Last Light,
Company of Heroes II.
Funny how a kid like Mittani touts so many useless titles and yet seems to know so little about how game developement works, or what the original vision for EVE was several years ago. I was in beta and been around EVE as a player from the beginning and it is not 100% about the ships. The goal CCP has said time and again is to develope as immersive a universe as possible. Well guess what, that involves adding features other than how fast a trigger-happy gate camper can gank a newb.
Personally at this point I hope CCP keeps players like Mittani waiting for EVE content and finishes WoD.
It's no wonder the population in EVE is stagnant lately with how crude, vulgar, and plain ignorant most of the EVE playerbase has become, making it a challenge for any new player to find any fun in the game.
Yes, the massive rise in subs and people logging in to look at their character sitting alone in a dirty motel room has certainly justified the astonishing amount of resources pourde into Incarna :eyeroll:
If the Incarna team hadn't been so shockingly unproductive, wasteful, oblivious to player requirements and demanding of resources need for the actual game that people played, if Incarna had actually delivered walking in stations, I would have been very happy with it. But what do we actually have to show for a project that has devoured the lion's share of resources for TWO YEARS?
A single poorly rendered avatar in a 7-11. No gameplay. No multiplay. No point in using it. Plenty of promises that "this is just the beginning, it's a platform for ~awesome~" of course, but looking at what CCP have done, rather than listening to what they say... they've got nothing.
90% or more of the players have looked at CQ once or maybe twice, and then simply disabled it.
Give me liberty or give me lasers
The only "feature" that was added with Incarna was the humiliatingly dreadful cash shop.
Forgive me if I am underwhelmed with this much needed alternative to the " trigger-happy gate camper" features we miss.
Give me liberty or give me lasers
Your ignorance of the topic is astounding.
Goonswarm and TEST are probably one of the bigger reasons new players even keep trying out EVE, as they welcome new player with open arms unlike most alliances/corporations in the game.
If Walking in Stations is so amazingly popular, how come subscriber numbers have stagnated since the release of Incarna instead of increased?
And Mittani has spoken for nerfing supercapiticals, such as super carriers. As such, Goons and TEST are actually at a disadvantage when it comes to large ship usage against DRF and other groups. So, technically they are still fighting larger ships with more smaller ships. Just that the smaller ships are bigger than they used to be.
Your ingorance on the subject is astounding, as you are pretty much wrong on every single point you make. Go toss around your made up facts on the EVE-O forums, they seem to love that stuff there.