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EVE Online Scandal Deliberate Frame-Job?
Last Friday, we discussed serious allegations leveled against CCP by players of the game. The comments on the discussion were lively, and pointed. Perhaps a bit too pointed, as CCP's internal affairs investigation claims that a plot to smear the company with false accusations over the long holiday weekend was behind the flurry of online activity. "The objective of this scheme was to permanently paint CCP as a biased and corrupt company that favors a select group of players over the rest of our community. In this particular case, instead of receiving notification of a possible problem and sufficient time to examine and address it, we faced a coordinated and hostile attack executed on our forums, Digg, Wikipedia, Slashdot, and other outlets at the beginning of a three-day weekend. We believe this speaks volumes of the intention of the person(s) responsible for orchestrating this scheme. Verification of this can be readily found on the forums of the people responsible--or at least could, the last time we looked." Scott Jennings over at Broken Toys points the finger at the Goon Fleet corporation, an organization based out of the Something Awful forums. As I noted in the original post, the evidence presented on both sides is challenging to verify independently. Take everything you read about these events with a grain of salt.
Yadda Yadda. It's a damned game already. People care too much. If you don't like it then stop playing. Oh wait, people feel like they have "invested" in the game and it "owes" them. Too bad if they ever decide to discontinue it. I'd hate to hear the outcry then.
My brother plays Eve religiously. He's addicted. He cares. He's a sad little person. The only saving grace of Eve addiction is that it's marginally cheaper than cocaine and at least it doesn't physically rot your insides.
I drink to make other people interesting!
While this "scandal" is getting headlines it is quite unremarkable tbh. It's just more baseless accusations from the same group of people as last time. There's nothing misleading to the evidence presented either. Of course, this time most of the players already knew the score before CCP finished their investigation.
It turns out there's nothing remotely true of the accusations made this time which is downhill from the last round where they got everything wrong as well but got browny points for being close and shaking CCP up a bit.
It's a shame people are succeeding in showcasing EVE and CCP in a rather bad way when almost all of the rumours are flat-out wrong.
I for one thing hope they dont.
They are the one of the most arrogant piles of shit in the web, and could really need a downer.
(got i hate the " I payed money to post, and money for my avatar, and money to use the search, so we are all better than the rest of the internet" thing they have going)
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
That has got to be one of the most defensive and petty "responses" I've ever seen come from a company. At a time when people are calling for CCP to act professionally, they pull this stunt and come off looking like bitter nerds, not a mulit-million dollar company.
My advice to anyone even *thinking* about playing this game...don't. It's painfully obvious that CCP will go to any length to protect their perks, privileges, and collusions with certain alliances. They don't want a fair game because they want to have fun themselves, customers be damned. The clock is ticking for CCP, how much longer until the final explosion?
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"Every artist is a cannibal, every poet is a thief."
A text excerpt from one of the posted articles: "Would like to petition you guys for sendin in a isd reporter that did bump my dreadnaught when we were at align to hostile pros..."
Holy shit! Someone needs a little dose of reality...
We're all IT people here. You're either missing a 0 on how much 100 billion ISK is worth or you accidentally typed years instead of months. Or both. Which one is it?
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
The favoritism needs to stop. It's that simple. The alliance that CCP is accused of playing favorites has admitted in the official forums three times that they're friends with the developers and chat with them over MSN. Those posts have since been immortalized by the other big opposing alliance.
The very proof that CCP posted on their site makes it clear that when a Band of Brothers member complains to them over MSN the response is near-instantaneous (see the IRC log in the open letter).
This type of favoritism is unacceptable to most players and probably should be to all. I don't care if they chat about their personal lives, or their "real lives", or even about EVE on MSN. That's cool by me. But when they solicit in-game responses from the company over a channel that no other alliance, corporation, or player has access to - and get it immediately, then there is a problem. That's favoritism and is not acceptable. It's not even that difficult a policy to implement and it won't even ruffle anyone's feathers too badly. Developers: If you get a request for customer support over MSN, tell the requestor to file a petition just like everyone else. And obviously don't provide them in-game resources of any kind. That I shouldn't have to explain.
Yes, I am in Goonswarm.
No I did not participate in the Goonswarm's massive public campaign across the internet to stir up trouble. Thus far, this has been my first post on any forum regarding what's been going on.
It's very disappointing. I love the game, but the proven favoritism is sickening. Who wants to play a game where the house is playing favorites for one of the players?
Question everything
I quit EVE a while back (after the last "scandal") so I have no vested interest in this current round of crap thats going down.
EVE management (CCP) really need to get their shit together. They have a great game, but they are blowing it by running it in such an unprofessional manor. If they really want people to take them seriously, they need to look at how 90% of the rest of the MMO industry runs things (Devs not allowed to use GM clients on live and GM's only allowed to work from a supervised central company location). None of this "MSN a Dev for personal service" crap.
Their IA is a joke. Everything they "investigate" is "Not our problem, the people reporting this are a joke, everyone keep playing (paying)".
Look at the latest drama. WTF (Why The Fheck) would a _developer_ become involved _instantly_ (within 40 seconds) after being summoned by some BoB guy to sack a volunteer for bumping a dread (big fekking deal, you had to re-align). I mean, come on, who would be stupid enough to think there ISN'T some sort of nepotism going on. Oh, of course the BoB guy that said "He's just a friend, aren't devs allowed to have friends" would be that stupid, but who else really?
CCP has a great game, it's a shame they dont have management that realises how serious this kind of thing is. Blizzard do (even if they are the McDonald of gaming). Hell, even Vanguard devs aren't allowed Dev access on live servers (or AC, or, *insert most MMO's here*).