This week CCP Games introduced Incarna, a massive new free expansion for its space-based MMO EVE Online, available for Mac and Windows. All EVE Online gamers will get the update when they log in to EVE Online.
[ad#Google Adsense 300×250 in story]With the last expansion, Incursion, players were introduced to a new avatar generation system that enabled them to create intricately detailed portraits for their in-game characters using very sophisticated 3D modeling software.
It was the first step towards taking players out of their spaceships – a first for the long-running game, which up to now has focused specifically on interstellar flight, trading and combat, but never on the humans behind that effort.
For now, players are relegated to their “Captain’s Quarters” – areas on space stations where their avatars can get more information about what’s going on in the game. But with future free expansion packs, EVE Online will let gamers commingle in common areas and more.
Other enhancements in Incarna 1.0 include the new Noble Exchange, a place where players can customize their characters, ships and surroundings with custom content.
A new and dramatically revamped tutorial system has been added, along with a new “agent” finder so you can improve experience (and your wallet) with non-player character-based missions and new corporation recruitment tools.
Full patch notes have been posted online.
Peter, the latest EVE release may let you leave your ship but it’s beyond pointless. With the new features, you can now exit your ship and loot at yourself in the mirror or pay $15 to buy a pair of boots for your character. In exchange, the client is buggy and patches are exhausting.
This is the worst expansion in Eve’s history, Peter. Don’t believe me? Visit the forums and MMO news sites to see the overwhelmingly negative reaction. Many players are quitting as a result, or considering their options like me. It’s just getting too absurd. CPP have lost the plot.
Christopher,
The Noble Exchange in EVE are based on a currency called “Aurum”. The conversion from dollars to Aurum works like so: $15 -> 1 PLEX -> 3600 Aurum, noting the arrows are one way. There is no way to exchange items bought with Aurum for Aurum, and no way to exchange PLEX for dollars. There might be a way to convert Aurum back to PLEX at some point in the future, but that is irrelevant. In the meantime, PLEX can be traded ingame for ISK – they are a commodity. The items from the store can be sold on the market too – they are commodities.
Since the items in the game are commodities and can be traded for ISK, I can get a naval uniform for my character for some billions of ISK. Those billions of ISK are not “worth” dollars. Though one could argue that I could have bought that 1.4B ISK using the PLEX sale method, for about $70, the fact is that I didn’t and don’t need to.
There is a lot of bellyaching in the community because they’ve been talking about “microtransactions” while CCP has been talking about “virtual goods”. The disconnect between the two is that folks talking about “microtransactions” expect to be buying things worth as much as $5. CCP is looking for ways to increase the demand for ISK, thus driving the PLEX market, thus boosting their bottom line. So CCP is doing the Tesla Motors thing: head straight for the rich end of town.
CCP are doing the “virtual goods” thing as a money spinner, so they’re aiming squarely where the money is.