EVE Online Letter to Players and Winter Expansion Detailed

We have a fair bit of news to report on for fans of CCP’s EVE Online, which recently went through some trouble with its playerbase. First we have a letter from CCP’s CEO Hilmar Veigar Pétursson to the players, in which he admits the mistakes committed and tries to explain how that happened. Here’s a snippet on the much-discussed issue of virtual goods:

Next we arrive at our rather underwhelming virtual goods rollout. There was hardly anything to purchase initially, let alone to put the cost of the infamous monocle in perspective. The last thing we wanted to do was create the perception that all items in the store would be in that price range. Quite frankly, it was rather pointless to begin with because we did not have a multiuser environment in which players could show off their purchases. It was another feature that we rushed out the door before it was ready.

We also didn’t do enough to assure you that this wasn’t the beginning of a (pay to win) scenario in EVE. Let me be blunt: Unless the MMO business changes radically, our virtual goods strategy for EVE Online will remain limited in scope and focus on vanity items, or as we said after the CSM visit this summer: The investment of money in EVE should not give you an unfair advantage over the investment of time.

Though the introduction was clearly flawed, our plans for virtual goods are intended to make your playing experience better, not to disrupt it. From a strategic perspective, we had to take these first steps because monthly subscriptions are increasingly becoming a thing of the past. The culture of online gaming is changing, just as the notion of digital ownership did with music. If we don’t evolve our technology, our game design and our revenue model, then we risk obsolescence, and we just can’t allow that to happen to EVE or to our community.

Then senior producer Arnar Hrafn Gylfason explains part of the plans to restore the community’s trust, and specifically what Winter 2011 expansion will involve. Here’s a generous snippet:

EVE Online´s Winter 2011 expansion will be themed around improvements to warfare and PVP. We will be talking more specifically about each of the features and items in the coming weeks but, for now, here’˜s an overview of what functionality, systems and gameplay we’˜re going to improve and add to.

Hybrid weapons balancing

Factional warfare

Assault ships

Capital ship balancing

New T2 modules

Starbase logistics management

New EWAR-Drones

T2 Rigs manufacturing

Ship spinning

New font

More captains quarters

Time dilation