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CCP Speaks on Allegations of Misconduct in Eve
Arti writes "Last week the hacker spoke, raising questions for many about how game companies should deal with 'out of game' tactics. What about the game companies themselves? The man behind Kugutsumen.com alleged that CCP employees had been involved too intimately with the game's top alliance, Band of Brothers (who, ironically, have publicly described themselves as 'omnipotence itself'). These claims were made based on posts apparently hacked from the alliance's private forums. CCP promised to look into the allegations. Now they report in a post that many players say is inadequate and does nothing to address a crisis of confidence in CCP's oversight of its employees. Developers need to understand the games they make, and deserve to enjoy them, but how far? And what should a company do when an issue like this pits it against some of its own customers?" Blues News has an excellent summary of the thread's contents, distressing though they be.
You can't do that in a game like this. One of the major restraints on out-of-game play in WoW is the the many servers invovled. Also the "unique", "epic", and "soulbound" objects prevent any wholesale selling of in game items. That being said, I am sure the farmers would be more than happy to farm for your epic for a fee. Combined with the "threat" of being banded, it regales out-of-play as kind of deviant, not-acceptable. Besides, you have to become self sufficient at one point in the game, or it just stops being fun.
Eve, however, is DESIGNED for everything to be up for grabs. You can buy, sell, and make anything provided you have the resources. Even if you spend the "real" cash for all the ISK you want, it doesn't mean dick of you don't have the skills (defined by time) to use the stuff you buy. Even if you do buy it, you need some kind of constant influx of ISK and materials to keep those resource heavy stations flying. Just because you have the money to buy a Titan doesn't mean you can find someone who can make it. Even if you did, it would take months to get the material together not to mention the months to learn the skills.
In the first example, because of WoW's limited world size, buying exp/gold doesn't help in the long run. At best, you get to 70 and go on some big world quests, but by skipping over allot of the world, its just boring. Its quest based and when all the quests are done, there isn't much left. However, Eve is so cut-throat that your status is worth more than the price. No mater how many skills or money you have, its not enough. A dev offers to "help" his alliance by offing some pre-patch advanced ships? How about "accidentally" adding a bunch of materials for the titan the alliance is building? The lure of the dark side is too great.
I personally think this problem can be solved by limiting GM power abilities to only their internal network and any kind of world modifications go though a manager. I rather have some player screw me who plays by the same rules than some GM who can wink me out of existence. I like the freedom Eve brings, in or outside of play. I don't want it destroyed because of some dumb ass CCP employees.
Wow, you're just trolling. Do you even PLAY eve? One of the best things about the game is cutthroat play, and CCP heavily regulates anything that violates the sandbox rules. Out of game contact isn't regulated because in game contact is not regulated (with a few obvious expcetions).
The problem in THIS case is that it appears a GM was violating the rules that everyone plays by. You seem to imply that somehow those other out-of-game contacts violate the rules, and this isn't so.
The issue here is that the game is fair only so long as every player has the same set of rules.
Really. All games have 'out of game' issues.
But when you have the Dev's and other employees breaking the rules and cheating by using their special priviledges, well that is a whole different story. If you're paying RL money to play in Eve, I wouldn't be surprised if this constituted as fraud (IANAL).
CCP is at fault here (Big Time) for letting their Dev's and GM's play in the game as regular players and not making sure they didn't cheat. They're more at fault for not dealing with the cheating (by firing said Dev's and GM's) when the people paying to play the game complained.
Why people are playing Eve anymore now that this has been exposed is beyond me.
That's really all gaming is (and this probably applies to sport too). You create a simpler universe with problems to solve and challenges to face. The problems are designed to be entertaining, and you can derive a sense of satisfaction from it because many familiar rules from our own universe are programmed into the games. Online multiplayer adds human conflict as another source of entertainment. That's a big part of why it's so fun.
What people do in their leisure time usually doesn't detract from what they can accomplish in "serious time". Just because they enjoy stuff like this during their time off doesn't prevent them from working towards world peace at the U.N. from 9 to 5.
"Prettiest space game ever - and also the worst and most boring space game ever...Everyone could do whatever they wanted, but all the big established guys had the power, and crushed the little folks."
Obviously your opinion, but very highly skewed, I was a casual player, darting in and out of the game (allowing my account to lapse in between), and never even joined corp. Obviously I could not fight a megacorp in their area, but there were huge areas of space to explore, goods to buy and sell (I did both), and so on.
Sure, if you wanted to mine the best minerals, or hunt the best areas of space, you needed a corp. But if you played in your means (you are just one person), it's not like anybody could really stop you.
Now, more specifically:
"crap like major newbie areas linked by unpatrolled space, that was near constantly gate-camped by people playing "pirate" in HUGE ships"
Of course, you could use the map to determine areas where there had been kills the last 24 hours and 1 hour (with the star glowing based on how many kills there had been) to get around the worst of it. Also, you could chart these areas in newbie frigates, bookmark map-points, and then jump around to those points so fast that it was practically impossible for someone to stop you. Yes, you had to plan and think, you couldn't just bull your way through it. But it could be done, and by a single player.
For the record, when I wanted to try trading, I jumped around in my big trader (Amarr bestower, I think), and never once saw a pirate in all the lawless areas I went through.
"Let's not even start talking about the economy. Man was that thing hosed."
Sorry, but that is nonsense. I as a few-month old player dabbled in production of newbie ammunition and made money because I found a few systems where new players were hunting and nobody else was selling.
There is plenty of opportunity for buying and selling and market play in the game. If you are determined to compete with the big boys, then yes you will lose. But there are so many niches you have to willfully try to fail. Just pick something small, look around, plan.
"advancement was near hopeless"
This is bald-faced lie. To advance a skill you simply pick it as your current skill to train, and you advance in that skill. No force in the game can stop that. It takes very little money to buy a huge number of skills, so for most intents and purposes any single player can advance as far as they want.
Again, you don't need to go into dangerous areas to advance. You do not gain XP for bopping rats (pirates). You simply train a skill, and it happens whether or not you are online. Nothing on earth beyond a server failure can stop you.
-Jeff
Please learn the difference between a dissenting opinion and a troll before you moderate.
Even with it's many flaws, I like Eve. I keep hoping CCP does something about this soon (and not just the namby-pamby stuff they've talked about this so far - because I have a lot of friends on Eve, and I'm just getting to the point where having my smaller frigates blown up doesn't hurt so much.
For a game that's been hanging tough while others have fallen by the wayside, this news comes at a bad time. It's already a difficult game for new players to join - I really wouldn't have made it past the newbie stage if I didn't have a lot of advice from people I knew - and now the game makers themselves are found to be conspiring against other players?
You are right. You are more on topic than you know.
It is a tad better now for a new player because they give new characters about a month of training when they first start, but the game is pure hell for a new player that doesn't know anyone. It doesn't have a learning cuve so much as it haves a leaning wall. Well actually the wall is actually tilted towards you with mines every few inches.
Eve is all about the groups being dependent on your comrades, which makes these alligations all the worse. Helping your friends, hurts their enemies. But their enemies are paying customers that have no way to match this cheating.
The latest seems to be that a leader of a big guild was a dev, a dev who was perfectly aware of ebaying and account sharing in blantant disregard for the EULA and all professionalism. CCP has also banned all of the whistleblowers accounts for his actions outside of the game. Posts are being censored within minutes on the official forum. The responce is pityful. There is no confirm / deny if anything happened. It seems to be 'oh they found out who was who. Time to delete them and roll some more alt characters lol.' You know I don't even want blood, I just want transparency.
I do not pay $30 a month for two accounts for the Devs to play butt buddy and give their friends free shit//advantages, so that they use that attack me. One of my accounts just expired and it seems I have about 12 more days left on my main.
There are no Subscriptions
Goodbye Eve
Right on.
There is simply not any accountability for GMs! They can do what they want, and you can't even escalate when you suspect that there's corruption at work. An alliance mate of mine was once ordered to not escalate and was additionally ordered to tell the rest of the alliance not to petition -- as if my fellow pilot even had the authority to do that!
That's like having a judicial system with no appeals. Pure Gestapo!
The situation? After a node crash, the two hours of shield damage our fleet did to the enemy station's shields was magically undone. The enemy stole our floating drones and destroyed ships that reentered the game near the enemy base, which was only possible because of the node crash, but the GM did nothing about *that*. Our side was winning, and victory would've been inevitable but for the node crash. Very fishy!
So, were we allowed to appeal this? No. Were we even allowed to air our grievances in the forums? (Equivalent to the "Press") No.
You have to have some system of accountability for devs/GMs. Otherwise you will get corruption. From what I've seen, Eve doesn't have enough.
I have been playing EVE for about a year and a half. I really like it. Sure it has some problems, but EVE is a different type of game then WOW and the other fantasy based MMO's. But some earlier comments are right about it being hard to play alone. The way the combat system is put together it's geared towards fleet warfare.
But also, I think the whole point of an MMO is to play with others, so even if I could play the game alone, it's being able to play with friends that makes it more interesting.
Apparently, the guy who blew the lid off this whole scandal just had all of his EVE accounts banned.