Tuesday, May 26, 2009

EVE Blog Banter #8: Care for a little game of SecWars?


Welcome to the eighth installment of the EVE Blog Banter , the monthly EVE Online blogging extravaganza created by CrazyKinux. The EVE Blog Banter involves an enthusiastic group of gaming bloggers, a common topic within the realm of EVE Online, and a week to post articles pertaining to the said topic. The resulting articles can either be short or quite extensive, either funny or dead serious, but are always a great fun to read! Any questions about the EVE Blog Banter should be directed here . Check out otherEVE Blog Banter articles at the bottom of this post!

This month's topic comes to us from me, Ga'len at The Wandering Druid of Tranquility. He asks: "What new game mechanic or mechanics would you like to see created and brought into the EVE Online universe and how would this be incorporated into the current game universe? Be specific and give details, this is not meant to be a 'nerf this, boost my game play' post like we see on the EVE forums."

Ga'len my friend, you are one bright star in the New Eden universe! But seriously, game mechanics? Who do you think I am, Hilmar? Listen, before I wreck havoc to the inner workings of EVE, I'll let game design and game mechanics to the Intertubes Gnomes and stick to what I know! Socializing of course!


When I'm not blogging or making a podcast (been a long time) about EVE, I'm either running missions, transporting ore from a mining operations back to a station or a Phoenix Labs POS, or mostly likely docked at a station, chatting in 4 or 5 different in-game channels! I've always thought that there was a more entertaining way to chat with a few corp mates while docked, waiting for a corp ops to start, or at the end of a long mining session.

Back at Fanfest 2008, we had the chance to see the development of mini-games during the Walking-in-Station demo. Well actually, we've only had the chance to see one of these games, but it struck a cord. Flash forward a few months, and we still don't have WiS, but why couldn't we have those mini-games?

Why couldn't I play with a mate in another station, 30 jumps away? The opportunity exists to create mini-games that could be as addictive as SecWars, or Defense Grid for that matter. And I'm sure that we could come-up with 10 of these together quite easily. You could play for fun, for ISKs, for modules, ships, or whatever you want to gamble. We could have tournaments, just like we have the Alliance Tournament! Or we could simply have a one-on-one! Oh the possibilities!!


List of Participants:

  1. CrazyKinux's Musing, EVE Blog Banter #8: Care for a little game of SecWars?
  2. The Wandering Druid of Tranquility, Wow, that new thing is so shiny!!!
  3. I am Keith Nielson, EVE Blog Banter #8 - Return of the Top Gun
  4. Once More from the Beginning, EVE Blog Banter #8 - Devil's in the Details
  5. A merry life and a short one, EVE Blog Banter #8: In the Year of Our Awesome
  6. Inner Sanctum of the Ninveah, Planets
  7. Helicity Boson, Bantering the blog
  8. Achernar, Unique adventures
  9. Ecliptic Rift, OOC: EVE Blog Banter 8: Standings and secondary factions
  10. The New Edener, EVE Blog Banter #8
  11. Journey to New Eden, Eve Blog Banter #8: What new mechanic should be added to Eve?
  12. One Man And His Spaceship, Blog Banter 8 - Something new to ponder about
  13. Life, The Universe and Everything, Blog banter 8: mentorship
  14. EVE Guru, EBB 8: Yarr! Prepare to be boarded!
  15. The Ralpha Dogs, Greed Is Good, Greed Works
  16. Rifter Drifter, Blog Banter 8: Strategic Gunnery
  17. A Mule in EVE, Expanding EVE
  18. Letrange's EvE Blog, 8th Blog Banter
  19. Roc's Ramblings, Blog Banter #8
  20. The Nude Nerd, Blog Banter #8
  21. Scop's Log, Blog Banter #8: "We're caught in a tractor beam! It's pulling us in!"
  22. Speed Fairy, EVE Blog Banter #8: Charisma Tanking
  23. Industrialist with Teeth, EVE Blog Banter #8: It’s Like Tetris for OCD People
  24. Diary of a Pod Pilot, EVE blog banter #8: Killing in the name of
  25. Talk Unfraid, Physical Communications
  26. Sceadugenca, EVE Blog Banter #8: Fighter-Class Ships and Sqadrons
  27. Kyle Langdon's Journeys in EVE, 8th Blog Banter
  28. Into the Unknown, Eve Blog Banter #8: Player Bases
  29. EVE's Weekend Warrior, EVE Blog Banter #8
  30. Life in Low Sec, Blog Banter #8: The Exasperation Factor
  31. Symptom of a Greater Cure, EVE Blog Banter: #8 - Tug Me Away
  32. EVE Journey, OOC - EVE Blog Banter #8: Marine Leader : “We have secured the ship, Sir!”
  33. Thoughts from an Accidental Minmatar Revolutionary, All Hands on Deck! We are at War!
  34. Ripe Lacunae, Into the Great Unknown (Eve Blog Banter 8)
  35. Mdhi Lihu's EVE Online Blog, 009 - Blog Banter #8
  36. Break Vol, EVE Blog Banter #8
  37. Inanity and Doom, EVE Blog Banter #8 - If I Ran The Universe
  38. Once More from the Beginning, EVE Blog Banter #8: Devil's in the details
  39. The Flightless Geek, EVE Blog Banter #8
  40. DeafPlasma's EVE Musing, EVE Blog Banter #8 - Legalized Gambling
  41. Matt's EVE Online Blog, EVE Blog Banter #8: Improved autopilot (IAP)

16 comments:

PaulM said...

They should have lots of mini-games and ditch the walking-in-stations. It's too much effort and too high-risk to put 3d models in there when 2D shops, casinos, and other games will do exactly what people want without all the extra cost and fuss.

Erbo Evans said...

I might go further and say, "make it possible for players to create their own minigames." In Second Life, people have created "games" layered over the existing world like Tiny Empires and Bloodlines; someone who does something like that in EVE might reap the wealth of Midas for their efforts.

(Incidentally, the sequel game to Tiny Empires in SL, Tiny Empires 3000, has been reported to be very EVE-like in flavor. I haven't played that one, so I can't comment, but, if I do, I'll have to report back on that.)

Myrhial Arkenath said...

http://myrhial.blogspot.com/2009/05/eve-blog-banter-8-killing-in-name-of.html

My post for this month.

Anonymous said...

I went ahead and leapt right in with my first (but hopefully not last) banter ever... http://www.talkunafraid.co.uk/2009/05/physical-communications/

Kyle Langdon said...

http://thecoldworldofeve.blogspot.com/

My post for this banter :)

And on the whole mini game thing. It would be interesting but doesn't that defeat the point of the game? I mean if something is so boring that we need a mini game while we are doing it shouldn't it be relooked at rather than covered up with mini games? Just my 2 cents

Atsuma Yishami said...

Hey CK,

I've got my entry for this month up now :)

By the way, my sites changed to www.intotheunknown.mygamescribe.com.

Entry is at: http://intotheunknown.mygamescribe.com/2009/eve-blog-banter-8-player-baseseve-blog-banter-8-player-bases.html

hope you enjoy reading it as much as I ended up enjoying writing it :P

TheNudeNerd said...

I'd take this a step further and say let these mini-games be played outside of station! No more hours of boring mining! Who's with me!?

Anonymous said...

I've got to say I've got pretty mixed feelings about Ambulation and in station games. While it would definitely be an improvement on spinning your ship while counting down a timer or waiting for a camp to disperse it would also potentially stop people from undocking. I love Eve for the fact that I get to fly around in a spaceship and I really hope that the focus stays there.

Carole Pivarnik said...

This post reminded me of a mechanic I've jokingly expressed a wish for many a time: Auto-undock after 10 minutes unless you're at a station where your corp has an office. Ha!

Seriously though, as far as mini games go, I'd be happy just to have Texas Hold 'Em available.

Jar Calhoun said...

http://www.eve-journey.com/2009/05/ooc-eve-blog-banter-8-marine-leader-we-have-secured-the-ship-sir/

Ship Boarding! My first post to the Blog Banters :)

Ghenna said...

http://www.ripelacunae.net/archives/114

Wow, has it been a month already!

Regarding Ambulation, I am excited, though I hope it's not a waste of dev time. I like the RP aspect, so even if it's completely 'optional', as they say, it'd still be a nice addition.

That being said though, I'm desperately hoping that when they say 'optional' they don't mean 'complete waste of your time'. We'll see.

Thorvik said...

If I had one thing to change...? Would it be games? I'm not that excited about WIS as I believe, like Wensley above, that it will just give more people an excuse to stay in station.

My thoughts?

http://podlogs.com/thorvik/

Mdih Lihu said...

Joining in the banter for the first time :)

http://mdihlihu.blogspot.com/2009/05/009-blog-banter-8.html

Vol said...

My first blanter:

http://breakvol.blogspot.com/2009/05/eve-blog-banter-8.html

Sul Trewtis said...

Oh, look. Another Blog Banter newbie. ;)

The Flightless Geek's first blog banterAnd Crazy,
Thanks for these ideas to get the Eve community chatting every month.

Oam Mkoll said...

Sorry CK but that's a bad idea IMO. If minigames are so good that you log into EVE just to play them, then the whole 'eve thing' is bound to become a nuisance. You can play Peggle, Plants vs. Zombies, Secwars and all the other stuff easily on your mobile, iphone, smartphone, pocket PC, flash and probably facebook and myspace. Why should we allow people to put additional stress on the servers, clutter local and increase Jita lag just to let them do something that WILL NOT make them subscribe to eve and WILL NOT make them keep their subscription?
The whole idea of ambulation is a waste of resources because everyone except the roleplayers will stop using it within a month from release and players coming from other games will not find it compelling enough to stay. People playing eve do it (and new people start doing it) because of the core EvE experience. That's how products thrive on the market. CCP cannot afford to host a Second Life with flying dongs because it won't pay for itself.