Friday, December 14, 2007

Time enough to fly

The last few weeks have been so busy that I've barely had time to spend playing EVE. A while back I had a poll on the number of hours one spends playing EVE in a week. The poll is still up there (on the top right). The idea had come after reading a great article from Robin Torres over at Massively entitled "Gamer Interrupted: You can be a great parent, spouse and gamer".

As a new dad, I'm currently struggling to find the right schedule for me. One where I'm able to dedicate as much of my time to my daughter, to my wife, to work, while finding time to play EVE and enjoy my other hobbies. It hasn't been easy and I'm still working on that schedule. As a result, EVE time has been going down lately. Before becoming a dad, I used to play EVE a good 20-30 hours a week with relative ease. These day it's more like 5-10, and the last two weeks even less. True that it's the end of the year, and I'm swamped at work. So I'm hopeful things should calm down soon and I should be able to get back to a more normal pace.

As for EVE, and the new Trinity upgrade, I took these shots last night, after finally being able to sit a few hours and enjoy the new graphics. There should be more of these soon, as well as an update on the Rags to Richies contest. I owe you one Drew!





Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Trinity is Dead! Long live Trinity!

As I write this post, CCPers are hard at work on the latest (and greatest) update to EVE: Trinity 2. And so I take a moment to say good bye to Trinity 1, EVE's initial graphic engine, as it goes into retirement.

Though it's gotten a few improvements over the last 4 years, Trinity 1 still looked great as of yesterday. Just take a look at any of the more than fifteen hundred screenshots I took and uploaded to my EVE Online Flickr set over the last 3 years. Out of that set I chose over three hundred shots as favorites and created a seperate set. Both of these will be sealed off and replaced with 2 new Trinity 2 sets.

So have fun browsing these old screenshots, and here's to Trinity 2 and all those lovely new shots I'll be uploading very soon!

Looking forward to it, as much as we all are!

Monday, December 03, 2007

From Rags to Riches, The Challenge

Day 2 of the Rags to Riches challenge set forth by fellow blogger, Drew Shiel from The Wizard of Duke Street. The challenge started yesterday, but I was only able to get on board today, having been away for the week-end.

The challenge is simple: create a new EVE character through the 14-day trial account and amass the greatest sum of ISK. All this while blogging about it. The winner gets an EVE Online 30-day game time code.

I've created my new character, Saoundra Meezo, a Khanid pilot part of the great Amarr Empire. I'll be posting in character throughout the next 2 weeks, in addition to my regular (irregular is more appropriate these days) posts.

My fellow challenger are Bellacrow and Wiseones. Good luck gents!

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

EVE Online Trinity expansion released on Dec 5th

By next Wednesday, over 200,000 EVE players will be drooling as they log into a new universe. Both the NY Times and WorldsinMotion.biz have confirmed that the latest and greatest EVE expansion will be released on December 5th, so mark your calendar, call in sick, cancel appointments cause it's gonna be showtime!

Here's a quote from the CCP press release:

CCP is releasing two versions of EVE Online: Trinity. Gameplay will remain the same in both versions and both will be available as free downloads. A Classic version of EVE Online: Trinity will be available December 5, 2007 for Microsoft Windows, Macintosh and Linux platforms at http://www.eve-online.com/download/. The Premium version of EVE Online: Trinity, which will include updated and enhanced graphics, will be available on Microsoft Windows on December 5, 2007 and to Mac and Linux subscribers in the first quarter of 2008.

The premium version is compatible with graphics cards capable of displaying Shader 3.0 graphics or better.

Looking good people!

Tuesday, November 27, 2007

A Universe is reborn

The Trinity expansion is just around the corner, and with it the new Trinity 2.0 graphics engine and a lot more new features. In anticipation of this, CCP has just released a breath taking video - let me rephrase that, a kick ass video that'll blow your mind away!



The video is now available for download in high-quality over at GameTrailers.com. For those who are not aware, or simply unsure, the new engine requires DirectX 9.0c, not DirectX 10. If you're looking to see if your video card will be able to take full advantage of Trinity 2.0 follow this link and run the little applet provided by CCP.

In my case, I've got an archaic AGP mobo, but I know I'll be able to enjoy the new engine since my card supports Shader Model 3 - it's an XFX GeForce 7600 GT, 256 MB DDR3, 580MHz, AGP 8x. Thanks to CCP's, good judgement. Hell, not everyone is running Vista with DX 10 and a 512MB PCIX video card.

Xmas is just around the corner folks!

Friday, November 23, 2007

EVE Online Speedlinking for November 23rd

Having been under the weather for the last 2 weeks, I missed last week's speedlinking post. As such, today link list will cover both this week and the last. I should be back to my normal schedule now that I'm almost fully recovered.
So lots of news and posts over the last two weeks. Most of these might be old news to you, but I still wanted to let you know about it all.

Fly Safe!

Monday, November 19, 2007

EVE Online Newsletter Volume 15 is out


And boy is this one full of juicy details.

All of it covers information that was shared at the EVE Fan Fest, which 99.5% of the EVE player base did not get to see live (only a thousand attend the fan fest!).

Thankfully, CCP have put together a Trinity sub-section on the EVE Online site, just as they had done for Revelations II. It contains a ton of stuff, from features list, to screenshots, to wallpapers (updated mine to this one), to 4 must see interviews that we got a chance to see during Fan Fest. I say we, because I was able to view them through the EVE TV broadcast. But, now you can view them in high quality over and over and over.

Oh, Trinity, how I look forward to running you for the first time!

Thursday, November 15, 2007

Back after a 2 days absence

On Monday night I came down with some very nasty bug which put me offline, in bed for 2 days. I'm back now and trying to keep up the the latest EVE news, and over 600 posts in Google Reader (down to 331 as I write this post).

My only disappointment was to have missed what's been one of the most hotly debated post on EVE in recent times. Head over to Hardcore Casual, to read Syncaine's "Throwing down the gaunlet, the great MMO challenge". I plan to let the dust settle before speaking my mind, lest I'd be like a sober chipmunk walking into a drunken lumberjack bar brawl!

Friday, November 09, 2007

EVE Online Speedlinking for November 9th

What a busy week it's been for EVE Online. With the Fan Fest happening last at the end of last week. News has been coming left, right and center about a number of developments for EVE. I've listed below the pieces of news and videos I believe are all must see if you haven't already.

Enjoy!

Articles:

Links Wrap-Ups:
On the Mac/Linux Port:
On the Future of EVE, Ambulation and all:
Academic:
Video Bonanza:
Told you it was a great week!

Thursday, November 08, 2007

EON Magazine - Table of Content

As promised in late October, I wanted to put together all the Table of Content for every issue of EON published so far. Well it's done!

We can now go back to this list and see the full content available to us thanks to the hard work for the folks at MMMPublishing.

You can easily see if you need to order a particular issue you've missed, because of a specific article you'd like to consult. If you decide to order a specific issue, or a full year subscription, head over the to the EON store to do so!

The full list can be accessed using the 'eon toc' tag. If instead you're interested in a particular issue simply select from the list below. As for future issues, I'll keep updating this post as I receive new issues. Please let me know if you spot any errors that may have slipped in.

Here's the full list:

  1. Issue #001 - Super Size EVE
  2. Issue #002 - Empires Strike Back
  3. Issue #003 - Rebuilding EVE
  4. Issue #004 - Holy Trinity
  5. Issue #005 - 200 Rounds
  6. Issue #006 - Looks Who's Walking
  7. Issue #007 - Turning Up The HEAT
  8. Issue #008 - Pirate Battleships
  9. Issue #009 - Ascension
  10. Issue #010 - Power to the Players
  11. Issue #011 - The 0.0 Thought Experiment
  12. Issue #012 - Mining Evolved
  13. Issue #013 - Hostile Takeover
  14. Issue #014 - Ship Shape
  15. Issue #015 - The End of New Eden
  16. Issue #016 - Territorial Advance
  17. Issue #017 - DUST 514
  18. Issue #018 - 2010
  19. Issue #019 - Soon!
  20. Issue #020 - Soon!
  21. Issue #021 - Event Horizons
  22. Issue #022 (coming soon)
While we're on the subject of EON, let me ask you this: Which is your favorite issue so far? Please fill in the poll and use the comments to let me know why.

Fly Safe!


[LAST EDIT: April 4th, 2010]

High Quality Fan Fest Trinity Teaser

Well after some poking and searching around the eve-forums and eve-files, I finally found the high-quality teaser. The 16:9 video is available here on EVE-Files.com and also over at Stage6, which has a much better quality then anything on Youtube - see embedded video below. Time to download it, show it to your friends, better-half, mother, extended family and all!!!



Wednesday, November 07, 2007

EVE Fan Fest Trinity Teaser

The is the teaser video of the Trinity upgrade soon to be released. I saw this one while watching the EVE TV Fanfest broadcast last Saturday, and I've been looking for it ever since. Thanks to MatChengUK for posting it up. Can't wait for CCP to release the hi-def video.

Monday, November 05, 2007

EVE TV's Live Broadcast of the EVE Fanfest 2007

For thoses of us who could not make it to this year's fanfest, EVE TV had a special gift for us. This past Saturday, at 1200GMT, EVE TV started broadcasting Live from Reykjavik. Though family responsibilities prevented me from watching the broadcast from start to finish, I was able to sit through most of Nathan's (aka Oveur) presentation and managed to see Hilmar's full presentation.

The first impression I got from viewing the broadcast was a sense of belonging, a strange sensation that though Iceland lay an ocean away, somehow through the magic of modern communication part of me was there. Call it virtual eyeballs or whatever, but I felt a touch of the excitement of my fellow EVE citizens.

Thank you EVE TV for gave us the opportunity to witness all the exciting news as it was divulged to the fanfesters (is that a word?). Speaking of which, I do recall that spiralJunkie mentioned that the clips and broadcast would be available next Saturday. So for those that missed the entire show, or for those like me that missed a few, we'll get our chance to relive the magic (ok, enough of this pixel dust sensitivity!).

I thought I'd share with my notes which I jotted down while listening to the broadcast.

Nathan's Presentation:
  • Trinity Upgrade represents 50 man-years Ambulation - decadently gorgeous
  • Planets - nowhere near
  • Ambulation, but it'll be kick ass
  • Bloopers - especially those of Nathan, were funny as hell
Hilmar's Presentation:
  • Spoke about the growth of CCP and player base
  • iEVE – Transgaming President, Vikas Gupta’s presentation
  • Ambulation – drop dead gorgeous
  • CCP working with IBM and Microsoft to build Europe biggest supercomputer by mid-2008
  • Council of Stellar Management – a council of players
This doesn’t give justice to the fun I had watching these two, but it still is fun stuff to know. So make sure you take the time to watch when EVE TV releases them – hopefully by next week-end, as promised!

Fly safely!

Sunday, November 04, 2007

EVE Fanfest 2007 News wrap-up






With the EVE Online Fanfest 2007 edition now behind us, I thought I'd pull all the various sources of news on it into one location. As additional news gets published, I'll add them to this same post. This way we have one easy listing of all the news. So if you've got great links to good coverage of the fanfest which isn't listed here, please let me know.

Major Gaming Sites:

Blogs:
On Web Wars EVE:
On Trinity 2:
Photos:
Various:
As I mentioned, keep an eye on this post, as you're likely to see it grow over the new days.

Friday, November 02, 2007

EVE Online Speedlinking for November 2nd, 2007

I'll admit, I've been somewhat negligent in my Speedlinking posts. I promise to be more regular.

This week, was a very busy week in EVE news. With the Fanfest kicking off yesterday EVE Online has been atop the MMO news circuit. So here are some great articles and other links for your week-end morning read!

There you have it! This should keep you busy for a while. Feel free to comment and let me know if I've missed anything major.

Fly Safe!

Thursday, November 01, 2007

CrazyKinux's Musing - Looking back at October 2007

With October behind us and less than two months before Christmas, it's time again for another monthly rap-up. Let's take a look at the stats first:
  • 15 posts
  • 17 comments
  • 14,211 page views
  • 9,105 visitors
  • 1,337 returning visitors
Apart from the low post count which was a result of a week vacationing in Cancun, and a few days last week in Atlanta on business, the rest of the stats are pretty encouraging. Were almost at the 10,000 visitors a month mark, and just shy also of the 15,000 monthly page views. We're getting good traffic that's for sure!

Other major milestones for the month include:
  • Achieving the 50,000 page views mark since the launch of this site
  • And the 60,000 mark later that same month
  • Getting to a 30 Authority rating with Technorati
  • Going from a PageRank of 3 to a 5 with Google's ranking overhaul
  • Passing under the 500,000 mark on Alexa's ranking system
Over all, I'm happy with the October results, though I wished I had posted a bit more. With no business trip or vacation planned this month, I should be more regular and prolific over the next 30 days. If not, you're welcome to remind me!

For those who visit on a regular basis, you may have noticed that the site went for a 2 column template to a 3. I made these changes in order to allow the site to load faster, since by spreading links and other components over 2 columns instead of one, I was able to shorten the home page length, and reduce the number of posts on the page. Which should make for faster loading times; that's the idea anyway. On the top right sidebar, I've got a poll running; feel free to let me know what you think of the new look!

As for EVE, lots has happened also this month. I left Phoenix Propulsion labs (again), move back into Empire space, to establish a new one-man (for the time being) corporation. Mazouk Mercantile Corporation was established in Caldari space near the Gallente border. My goal over the next few months will be to continue training my Trade skills, establish a good standing with Trade agents, then find profitable trade routes. I'm really excited about this and look forward to sharing the experience with you!

So here's to a new month, a new corp, and a new adventure beginning. November is looking to be an interesting month!

Fly safe!

Sunday, October 28, 2007

The amazing Day of Darkness video

Back in mid-June of this year, I was referred to an amazing video. This masterpiece of motion and sound is the work of Dire Lauthris, while he was a member of the Coreli Corporation - a corp I used to be way back when before it split. The story is based on the "Day of Darkness" chronicle which tells the story of the enslavement of the Minmatar. This is fan creativity at its best. Enjoy!



Read up on it on the EVE Forums here.

Trinity 2 Ship Comparison Model Video

With Trinity II on its way very shortly, I thought I'd share with you the comparison video that shows the improvements we'll soon enjoy when CCP rolls out the Revelations III patch. By the way, see this interesting DevBlog post on the upgrade/update patch process.

I saw this video for the first time in an interview done during the 2007 Games Convention in Leipzig, which I wrote about in this post back in late August. It shows the before/after full 3D renders of 4 ships: the Prophecy, a pirate frigate, the mighty Vexor and finally the Thrasher.

I got the original video through the EVE Affiliate program and was allowed to share it with you here. I've uploaded it to Youtube (see embedded video below) for a quick viewing, but you can also download the full 55Mb version here on my Box.net account.



To really appreciate it you'll need to view the full version. Only then can you appreciate the leap forward EVE will undertake when Trinity II is completed.

Enjoy!

EON #009 - Table of Content

By now, most of you (who subscribe to EON) have received your issue or are about to - I got mine this past Thursday, upon my return from Atlanta.

For those who don't subscribe or who order issue by issue, and for subscribers who want a quick way to find content I thought it would be a great way to add the 'Table of Content' in a post, so that we can easily search for something using my blog's Google Search box (in the right column).

I may end up going back and adding a ToC for each past issue, so that we can do searches for every issue published so far. Call me crazy, but I hate loosing time looking for information (flipping through every issue), when I can easily search using this blog's search field!



Table of Content - EON 009
  • Page 6 --- E-ON Upfront (News)
  • 14 ---- Postcards from the edge (Screen shots)
  • 24 ---- In Crowd: Torfi Frans Olafsson (CCP Employee Interview)
  • 26 ---- Chronicles: Green Dreams by John Kastronis
  • 32 ---- In Character: Vegeta (Player Character Interview)
  • 34 ---- Alliance Profile: Agony Empire
  • 36 ---- Cover Feature: EVE: Ascension (Homeworld 2 mod)
  • 42 ---- Chronicle: Just Another Traffic Advisory by Nixon Bardsley
  • 46 ---- Alliance Profile: KIA Alliance
  • 48 ---- Testflight: Motherships (Nyx, Aeon, Hel and Wyvern)
  • 58 ---- In Crowd: Solveig Maria Magnusdottir (CCP Employee Interview)
  • 60 ---- Chronicle: The New Damage by Gauti Fridriksson
  • 65 ---- In Character: Chribba (Player Character Interview)
  • 66 ---- Insider's Guide: Being a CEO (Players Guide)
  • 74 ---- Insider's Guide: Fleet Operations (Players Guide)
  • 82 ---- Teh Funnies (EVE Humour)
So there you have it! This latest issue is the biggest so far with 82 pages, and it's full of great information, fun stuff, useful guides and great lore. A must for dedicated EVE players. Highly recommended that you order it or better yet, subscribe!

Have fun reading it!

Saturday, October 27, 2007

Caldari Wyvern reviewed on EVE TV

Any episode of EVE TV, and ship review. This time it's the mighty Caldari mothership, the Wyvern. I really love EVE TV's new format and the splitting of the show into it's various parts. Makes it easy to jump to your points of interests.

Wyvern (Episode 18)

Caldari WyvernImage courtesy of the EVE Online Player Ship Gallery.

Friday, October 26, 2007

Web Wars EVE and John Galt Games Teaser

This just came across my Google alerts. Seems that there will be a major announcements at this year's EVE fanfest regarding a new game (??) WebWars: EVE. The developer is Texas based John Galt Games. That's about all the information I have except this article that I uncovered. The post is from Trey Ratcliff's blog, Stuck in Customs, which mentions an interview in the Financial Times about the capitalistic inner workings of EVE
If anyone has more info, I'd love to know!

Thursday, October 25, 2007

Warp Drive Active Episode 17th is out

Seems that they've been left out of their mental institutions again. Urban Mongral and Winterblink are at their best (or worst depending on who you ask) in this hilarious latest EVE Online podcast.

Be warned that enormous amounts hilarity and debauchery are a click away. As always, this one's better appreciated when in a slightly tipsy state of mind.

You've been warned!

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

EVE Ship reviews on EVE TV

I missed the last two EVE TV broadcasts and only watch them earlier this week. As many viewers, I was happy to see the move to the free format. I don't mind the commercial, and must say that the cast and crew are getting better with every show.

One of the reports I always look forward to is the ship review. And since EVE TV now splits the shows into its various parts, each ship review can be accessed directly. Here listed below are the links to the last 4 ship reviews.

Amarr
Abaddon (Episode 16)

Amarr AbaddonImage courtesy of CCP.

Caldari
Eagle (Episode 14)

Caldari EagleImage courtesy of the EVE Online Player Ship Gallery.

Gallente
Eris (Episode 15)

Gallente ErisImage courtesy of the EVE Online Player Ship Gallery.

Minmatar
Wolf (Episode 17)

Minmatar WolfImage courtesy of MotherMoon.

I plan to link new reviews as each new EVE TV Episode is released. Enjoy the clips!

Monday, October 22, 2007

Heading to Atlanta...

...for TeclcoTV that is, not CCP North America! I'll be at the Georgia World Congress Center for the next three days for the trade show, to meeting with clients and look for new ones. And since I'll be walking distance from the convention center, I'll have a chance to visit Atlanta.

Unfortunately, since I'll only be there on for a short time, I won't have a chance to visit the new offices of CCP North America since it's not exactly close to where I'll be staying. Well at least we've got this article over at TenTonHammer, with some great photos of the opening day.

Maybe next time I'll have more time.

EON Issue 009 on its way soon

A new issue of EON is on it's way! And this one will be the biggest ever; 84 beautiful pages! Here's a brief overview of what to look for:

EVE: ASCENSION
Anyone who has played one of the Homeworld games will remember its epic fleet battles, with hundreds of fighters, corvettes and battleships trading laser fire across the billowing folds of deep space. Well now, thanks to the efforts of a small team of coders and artists, the massive EVE universe is being condensed, blended and trimmed to fit the mechanics of one of the best real-time strategy games ever made. EVE: Ascension will be the result of EVE and Homeworld's coming together, and we chat with the project leader about the stresses, strains and ambitions behind EVE's biggest fan project


NEW FICTION
More pages in this issue means we've been able to squeeze in more fiction than ever before - three epic stories on the dangers of terraforming ("Green Dreams"), gate maintenance ("Just Another Traffic Advisory" - yes, it's hard work keeping those highways open) and having ideas above your station ("The New Damage")


INSIDER GUIDES
Two massive guides, one on how to lead your corporations and alliances, the other detailing the duties and responsibilities one must have in mind when on fleet operations. So whether you lead from the front, or attack from the rear, there should be something in this issue for you ;)


TOURNAMENT RECAP
E-ON#009 has unofficially been dubbed 'The Verone Issue', as not only did the Veto leader pen a guide to being an effective CEO (above), but also helped out with a look back on all the group stages of the recent Alliance Tournament, which if you missed, you can catch up with here.


PLUS
Mothership Testflight - Profiles on KIA Alliance & Agony Empire - Interviews with t0rfiFrans & 'The Mother of CCP' - Chats with Vegeta and Chribba - The latest news about EVE and CCP


FREE SUBSCRIBER GIFT - POSTER-SIZED 2008 E-ON YEAR PLANNER

Looking forward to it. If it was to arrive before Fan Fest it would be even better since at least I could console myself reading through it.

Sunday, October 21, 2007

10 sites for every new EVE Online Player

With more and more players joining the ranks of the capsuleers, I thought I'd put together a list of sites that I believe anyone considering playing EVE should have bookmarked. Now, this is not a an exhaustive list, but simply the 10 most valuables sites to help you get through the first few weeks of playing without too much difficulty. Anyways, I wish I had known about these when I started!
  1. EVE Online Player Guide (online version)
  2. New Character Creation Guide
  3. Character Attributes & Skills Guide
  4. EVEMon - A great tool to plan your skills
  5. EVE Fitting Tool - Know thy ship
  6. EVE Guides
  7. Grismar's EVE Wiki - very useful
  8. EVE Ships Wiki - also useful
  9. EVE Files - The greatest of all EVE database
  10. EVE Tribune - To stay on top of the news
  11. Warp Drive Active - Cause sometimes laughing is a great remedy
  12. Battleclinic.com - "The" largest and most comprehensive support sites for EVE-Online
[EDIT: Somehow I forgot Battleclinic.com in there! My bad!!!]

Ok, so that's 11 [EDIT: now 12!], but you can't blame me for WDA, it has to be a regular stop for any EVE player that pretends to know something.

Well, there you have it. This should help anyone trying to learn the complexities of EVE and give himself, or herself, a edge. If you think I forgotten a sites that's been helpful to you when you started, or still is, then please let me know!

As I leave you, here is a quote that sums up very poignantly what it's all about: "EVE is like a sandbox with land mines, deal with it!"

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

My best EVE Online screenshots

Well I'm back, tanned, rested and ready for some fun! After going through about 500 emails, both personal and professional, and over 300 posts in Google Reader, I'm now pretty much up to date.

Which brings me to todays posts, EVE's beautiful vistas and the screenshots I've captured over the 3 years I've been traveling its universe.

With the upcoming Trinity 2 upgrade almost upon us, and the various news articles we've read over the last few weeks, I thought I'd share with you my favorite screen shots. Over the last 3 years, I've captured and have loaded on my Flickr account no less than fifteen-hundred screen shots in 2 sets (overall set and favorites set), which have gathered altogether about 7000 views to date.

So here below are my 10 favorites. It'll be interesting to see the difference between these and the ones I'll take when Trinity 2 has rolled out! Which one's your favorite?











Saturday, October 06, 2007

Gone off to Cancun for a week


Well I'm off again for another week, though this time it's for pleasure. Taking the family to Cancun, Mexico for some R&R at an all inclusive resort. So no updates for another week. Looks like October is going to be another slow month in posts. Will have to play catch-up when I get back!

See you in a week, fly safe till then!

Friday, October 05, 2007

EVE Online Speedlinking for October 5th

A quiet week, if not for some interesting news.
Enjoy!!

Thursday, October 04, 2007

Just received my copy of The Art of EVE

This past Monday was my 36th birthday and as a gift my wife got me a copy of The Art of EVE, which was delivered by FedEx this afternoon. Man, what a beautiful book! The packaging was more than sufficient and the book was in mint condition. Can you guess that I'm a nit picker!!

Suffice to say, the first thing I did when I got home was to open the package, unwrap the plastic, slide the book out of its casing and start flipping through the pages. I've gone through it once for a quick review, but I plan on taking my time and enjoy this work of art. I'll post a review once I've given it a good read, in the mean time I thought I'd give you a look at the table of content.
  1. Building the Universe
  2. Bringing EVE to Life: Flesh to the bones
  3. Ships, Weapons & Modules: The toys of the elite
  4. After the Fact: From Second Genesis to Third Revelations
  5. The Future
So stay tuned for the review!

Wednesday, October 03, 2007

CCP opens North Americans offices

Looks like our favorite Vikings are busy continuing the North American expansion.

They plan to hire 100 new employees over the next year. Read the article over at Gamasutra!

Sunday, September 30, 2007

EVE Online Fan Fest 2007 Teaser

For those lucky enough to attend this year's EVE Online Fan Fest, here's a teaser of what to expect!

Saturday, September 29, 2007

The Halo virus has struck!


Wow, another week gone by and still no post. What the hell is going on you maybe asking yourself? Well on September 25th, last Tuesday, Halo 3 came out, and I've been victim of this virus since then! Seems I'm not the only EVE player who's been struck down!

Though I'm really into it, and won't be able to finish the game in one sitting, like of you out there, I'll be playing on and off EVE until then. So in the mean time, please bare with me. Please!

Saturday, September 22, 2007

Change is in the air...

Since I've been back from Amsterdam, I've barely played EVE, except to set a new skill. At first I wondered why. Why, even though I longed to play the game while away, did I not find interest now that I had the time.

And then it struck me. Boredom. Since my return to Phoenix Labs, I've seen the corp crumble to a mere shadow of itself. Over the last few weeks, every time I've logged in, I was either alone, or with other corp mates who were afk. And with FIX in constant wars left and right, that left me stuck in various systems, with little to do. Now we did try to get things going again, but it's been happening at a crawl.

It was time for me to come to a decision. Stick around some more, or cut the chase, grab my things and head out there to make a name for myself. Ok, that may be too theatrical, but you get the picture.

I've mentioned in the past my desire to start up a mercantile operation - a trading corporation that would navigate through empire space and lowsec, and reap the riches doing so. Well I think this time has come. I'm thinking of dusting off the old chart of the corporation I had founded way back when, and start trading in goods again. I'll need to reread the trading articles in those 3 EON issues; sell some of the stuff I've got lying in Querious and head over back to Gallente space to establish the new corp.

Any way that's the plan.

Having said that, I should now return to my regular posting schedule for the next few weeks.

So stay tuned!

Monday, September 17, 2007

I'm back and ready to get back to business


After almost a 2 weeks hiatus I'm back home and ready to start posting again! I took the weekend off and barely touch the PC. I must say it's refreshing to do so. But now, EVE is calling me again, like a mermaid singing her melodies, she's begging me for attention.

Looking forward to renew with you and continue the conversations we left off 2 weeks back.

Friday, September 07, 2007

Greetings from Amsterdam!

Hi folks! Just wanted to let know why I hadn't done any posts recently. I'm writing this post, sitting in my hotel room, overlooking Rambrendtplein in Amsterdam, in the Netherlands. I'm here on business for IBC 2007 for the whole show. I plan to be back next week, so don't expect any major updates until then.

In the mean time fly safe!!!

Monday, September 03, 2007

Crazy Monday: Sigg Jones CG Movie

Mondays, back to work, to school, maybe a stressful time for some of us. So starting this week, I've taken upon me to add a bit of diversity and fun to this mostly EVE Online blog. It's kind of ironic that I would choose Labour Day, a Monday which is off for most of my readers to start, still, I've decided to have this new weekly post series every Monday to share with you the oddities that I come across in my meanderings.

For this first Crazy Monday post, here is a great CG Movie made by 3 students at Supinfocom School in France: Sigg Jones. I would love to see one made for EVE - a bit of in station ambulation and ship combat. Now that would be great!


Thanks to Geeks are Sexy for pointing it out!

Sunday, September 02, 2007

CrazyKinux's Musing: Looking back at August 2007

Well August has come and gone, and what a month this was. The Post-a-day challenge is now over, and though I know I wasn't able to do exactly that (that is, make at least one post everyday), I still did achieve my second goal, which was to increase my overall posts for the month. I haven't started looking at all the other blogs which I challenged, but I'll get to it in a post or two (patience young Wilhelm!), and post the winner!

Now, let's have a look at August shall we!

  • 26 posts
  • 95 comments
  • 1 poll
  • 11,326 pageviews
  • 7000 visitors
  • 1,255 returning visitors
If we compare that to July we're looking at an increase of 44% in page views, 29% in visitors and 45% in returning visitors. During that month my Technorati Authority went from 5 to 23, and I managed to come up below the million mark on Alexa Rank - Mmm, come up below sounds so weird!

One of the highlights of this month was getting one of my posts - My extensive EVE Online wish list - mentioned and reviewed by the charming fellows of Warp Drive Active in Podcast #8. Thanks to Urban Mungral and fellow Canadian, Winterblink for there review. Your critique is much appreciated!

So back to our statistic, I wish I could tell you which post brought in the most hits, but since I'm on Blogger, I don't have that functionality. If you're using this same blogging platform and know of a way to get these stats, then please let me know.

I think that I've managed to find a good balance between playing EVE and reporting about it. I still owe you a few posts on my Myrmidon and I promise to do so as soon as possible. So here's to September and more quality posts.

Friday, August 31, 2007

EVE Online Speedlinking for August 31st

It's been another busy week in EVE Online news. So here are the pieces of news I've chosen to highlight.
Have Fun, and to those like me who have a 3 day week-end enjoy!

Thursday, August 30, 2007

Gallente Vexor Screenshot

I haven't flown old Brutus IV in a while. The Vexor is one of my favorite ships. It's quick, packs a punch and can easily be armor tanked. I think I might take her out for a spin.

A Gallente Cruiser, the Vexor

Monday, August 27, 2007

Two videos of the Rorqual in transformation mode

With this new industrial capital mining ship being introduced in the next Revelations Patch (2.2), I thought it'd be nice to see is it in action. Before you hit the play button though, here a description of the ship, taken from an interview done during Leipzig GC 2007 by the guys from TenTonHammer:

Another item that will be making an introduction into EVE Online in the near future will be the Rorqual, which is designed to be the mother of all mining support ships. "The Rorqual is designed to be able to compress ore to a fraction of its original size for easy transportation, and when it's in siege mode it has a 300 km tractor beam," Arend said. "It has a clone vat bay just like other capitals. It has a hanger array. The only thing I can compare it to is a Japanese whaling fleet. This is the mothership and all your mining barges are the feeders. We're still looking to balance it as far as compression ratios and defensive capabilities are concerned, but this is really going to be an asset," In the opinion of all those sitting at the table, we couldn't help but agree that even if some of the smaller corps could build one of these ships they could become much more economically viable.

"We're really looking forward to seeing how this affects the game," Arend said. "Our lead economist is tracking this particular ship very closely to see what kind of difference it makes. At the moment we're seeing mineral prices go to really, really high levels, and it's getting more expensive to produce stuff in the game. Seeing as our economy is player-driven, our economist is just keeping a really close eye on things. I think this is one of those situations where having a full-time economist is really going to pay off for us and especially the players. Economics in the real world is tricky at best; it's even different for a virtual world." According to Arend, the Rorqual will be released in Revelations 2.2, which is supposed to hit the servers in "a month or so."

This thing is going to be big, real big. Here are the videos then.





And here's a third one I just found after publishing this post:


Finally, here's a post on the EVE Forums with a few good screenshots of the behemoth. I can't wait to head over in a field of asteroids and rip through it! Oh well, you can't take the carebear out of me I guess!

A great video interview with EVE Associate Producer

The guys over at MMORPG.com have a great 15 minute interview with Arend Stuhrmann done during the 2007 Games Convention in Leipzig. There's a lot of great pieces of information in it, and a cool video comparing the before and after implementation of Trinity II, EVE's upcoming improved graphic engine - out by the end of the year. Here's a list of the major points covered in the video, though I encourage you to go over and take the 15 minutes to watch it.
  • Trinity II will be out by the end of 2007
  • It will require XP and DX9, not Vista and DX10 (woohoo!!)
  • Dynamic Lighting (how sweet it looks)
  • Trinity II lays the ground work for future DX10 improvements
  • Moves a lot of the processing to the GPU, thus improving game performance (crosses me fingers)
  • It'll be big at over 2Gb - a mother of a patch!
  • Trinity II and the upcoming Revelations III patch might be separate patches (god, lets hope so)
  • Revelations III's Factional WarFare is still being worked on
  • Revelations 2.2 will have the new Rorqual Industrial Capital ship (this is one badass Carebear ship)
  • A bit on the EVE economist
  • "Avatars walking in station" feature is also being worked on
Told you is would be juicy!!

*********************Here's a screenshot of a Scorpion as rendered in the new Trinity II graphic engine.

Friday, August 24, 2007

EVE Online Speedlinking for August 24th

And here are this week's links. Enjoy!

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

A North American EVE Fanfest?

In one of my previous posts, I listed attending an EVE Online North American Fan Fest as one of my wishes. Well it seems that unless the community puts it together, there will never be one. In a recent interview over at Gaming Moments, CCP's CEO explained that if there ever was a fan fest on these shores (I'm in Canada), it would be put together by us fans, not by CCP themselves.

The question, submitted by yours truly, was fielded by Mandrill during an interview with Hilmar Petursson, at the Edinburgh Interactive Festival earlier this month. As a result of having my question chosen for the interview, I won a Gaming Moments T-shirt! It's currently on it's way! I'll post a picture of it when I get.

I highly recommend you head over and read the interview titled, "The God of EVE Online, Hilmar Petursson". It's not your typical interview, with the same old and repetitive questions - which Hilmar seems to have given over the last couple of weeks. Mandrill went out of his way to ask different questions, and as a result, I learned a couple of new things about EVE. Have a read and let Mandrill know what you thought.

Getting back to the Fan Fest, is anyone out there interested in putting together such an event? Maybe we could start with CCP White Wolf and start annoying them with the idea. As I've mentioned in the past, I've been to a fan fest held in Las Vegas (pictures here) and though a bit short, it was a blast. I'm sure there are enough EVE fans out there to hold another soon. Maybe on the east coast this time.

I'm convinced this could be really a big event. Taking into account the results of my latest poll, in which 69% of you wished they could attend the EVE Fan Fest in Iceland, I'm sure that some of you in the States or Canada would most likely travel to such an event. Hell, I know I would!

Anyway, the idea has been put forth. Let me know if this is something you'd be interested in putting together. I for one, am ready to give it a try. Let's see where this leads.

Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Another amazing Goonswarm video

Another amazing video from christianethic (Stahlregen) from Goonswarm. Seriously this guy needs to get paid by CCP for these videos, or at the very least get some freebies from the EVE Store. Have a look at the video and let him know how much you appreciate his work on the forum thread.

Monday, August 20, 2007

21 EVE Online acronyms for newbies


While setting up my Myrmidon for PvP, I came across a couple of new acronyms I'd never heard before. And that got me thinking. All these noobs joining EVE right now and coming along the forums trying to understand it all and put some good setups for their ships will most likely run into these difficulties. This is especially true when it comes to modules.

So in order to help you, here's my list of ten acronyms or terms you've got to know:
  1. Newbie, noob: a new player
  2. Carebear: an EVE player who does not engage in PVP
  3. MWD: Microwarp Drive (1/10/100 MN)
  4. AB: Afterburner (1/10/100 MN)
  5. Hardener: Armour or Shield hardener, both active and passive
  6. EANM: Energized Adaptive Nano Membrane
  7. RMR: Red Moon Rising
  8. PVP: Player vs Player
  9. PVE: Player vs Environment
  10. NPC: Non-Player Character
  11. 0.0: lawless space that lies outside empire sovereignty - also known as nosec
  12. Ratting: going after pirates, both NPC and PC
  13. Mission: running agent missions
  14. Solo: solo PVP, usually self sufficient with ability to tank, gank, and tackle
  15. Podded: Losing ones ship and the ejected pod
  16. NOS: nosferatu
  17. Gank: the amount of damage a ship is set up to do
  18. Tank: The amount of damage a ship is set up to absorb
  19. Tackle/Tackler: To Warp Scramble/Disrupt a target
  20. Named: usually modules of higher quality (and price)
  21. Camp or gatecamp: - a group of players sitting at a gate waiting to ambush other players
These were taken from a great forum thread started by Litus Arowar over on the EVE Forums. So get to it, read up and let him know how thankful you are for helping you to not look like the newbie you are!!

Friday, August 17, 2007

Dungeons & Dragon 4th Edition Teaser video

Ok, this is another one that has no relationship with EVE, but.... ...well in a way it has, it's RPG! MMORPG, get it? Anyways, enjoy!

EVE Online Speedlinking for August 17th

Here's this week's links:
Enjoy!

Thursday, August 16, 2007

More CCP Interviews: Revelations III, Avatars and books

There's a great interview over at Gamespot. Game Journalist Emma Boyes, from Gamespot UK, interviewed Hilmar Petursson and she's got a ton of juicy bits of information for us. I've summarized them here, but I suggest you head over to Gamespot and read the full article.
  • No Factional Warfare in Revelations III
  • New graphic engine will be released soon
  • Avatars are there mainly to attract new (female) players
  • Of the 250 CCP employees, 200 of them currently work on EVE
  • EVE Online novels by the first quarter of 2008
  • The RPG books are coming along nicely
  • The Art of EVE Online book is almost upon us
  • EVE mobile is not a priority
  • No playable Jovians any time soon
It answers a lot of the questions I've had over the past few posts. Still, I'd like to see some firm dates on a lot of this stuff - EVE Mobile, RPG books, new graphic engine. When are they really coming out? Oh well, we will just have to wait for them I guess.

And to bare that wait a bit more easily, here's a video interview with Torfi Frans Olafsson, CCP's Technical Producer for EVE Online. It was done way back in December of last year, during the last EVE Tournament I believe. It was put up on YouTube by Xyliana, who's now producing EVE TV for MMMPublishing. Torfi talks mostly about the avatar project, and so it's a great interview for those, like me, who long for this new feature in EVE. Enjoy!

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

The Gallente Myrmidon Battlecruiser

Gallente Myrmidon in space
Here she is again, in all her beauty, the mighty Myrmidon Battlecruiser. Long day at work, so this is the lazy man's version of a post. Eh! Better then nothing.

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

EVE Online news from the Edinburgh Interactive Festival

The Edinburgh Interactive Festival was being held today and yesterday and CCP's Hilmar Petursson was there to give a session on the past, present and future of EVE Online. Some news started to trickle down to us unlucky enough not to attend the Festival.

The one piece that caught my attention is CCP's goal to have 3D character avatars (yes, that's the walking kind) some time by end of 2008. How realistic is that in view of the complexity most likely involved (hardware, lag, game play, purpose), only time will tell. Still, I can't wait to see this happen. This, and Trinity II will be the only reasons why I upgrade this PC to be able to run Vista and DX10.

Here's a few links I've put together for your perusal:

Enjoy!

P.S.: I'll keep editing this post, adding new articles as they appear. So keep an eye on this one!

Still looking for a good PvP setup for my Myrmidon

The saga continues. After recently posting about the tribulations (1) (2) of my PvP experimentation, fellow EVE Online player Arrghs was kind enough to suggest the following PvP setup after chatting with him in a private channel.
HIGH SLOT: 3 Nos, 3 Electron IIs
MED SLOT: AB/Web/Scram/Electrochem injector
LOW SLOT: 2 Medium Reps, therm/kin/exp hard, Damage control

Myrmidon Battlecruiser
Though I haven't really tried the setup yet, something tells me that this one should work a bit better, especially since this time, I'm getting all Tech II weapons and gear. I'm currently in the process of gathering the right modules, and also training accordingly to meet all these new requirements. Add to that the new tactics that I'm learning (like not to fly solo in low sec), and I should have an easier time during my next encounter.

It'll most likely take a week or two to get where I need to be in order to able able to fly such a set. Once I've got the complete setup, I'll let you all know.