I may have mentioned before that while I am continually fascinated by EVE Online and its idiosyncrasies, I also am not a powerful enough gamer to sustain the will and mental fortitude required to play EVE at any level of seriousness. It’s an intimidating game to get into, for someone raised on friendlier, World of Warcraft-ian MMO fare.
Developer CCP seems to be aware of that, and will be taking steps to help new players along as they dive into the cutthroat world of null-sec space. The December 3rd retail release of EVE Online, called the “Commissioned Officer Edition” will have an exclusive in-game item, the “Cerebral Accelerator”, which greatly increases the speed of skill development for the first 30 days of a player’s new life. The box also includes a month of free game time.
It’s notable that there’s a new retail release on the horizon, given that some big changes are afoot with the game’s next (free) expansion, Incursion, which aims to expand cooperative player-vs-environment play options, revamp the character creator, and add in a bunch of UI improvements.
Some longtime EVE players might cry foul, but frankly speaking I’m all for anything that helps lower the barrier to entry for this craziness. There aren’t nearly as many decent sci-fi MMO games as fantasy ones, and EVE’s is especially interesting. Who knows, maybe this will tip me off the fence.
EVE: Queue-skipping edition [Rock Paper Shotgun]
