MMORPG.com Correspondent Andrew Wallace writes this look at EVE Online and how the sandbox nature of the game means that every player has a slightly different perecption of what exactly the game is.

While I was scanning through an EVE related forum the other day, I saw someone ranting on about how some new changes to the game would affect "my EVE". Now, as much as seeing this kind of perceived ownership in regard to games usually has me reaching for the nearest sharp object to jam through my skull, it actually got me thinking, what is "my EVE"?

Games are very much a subjective medium, but with MMOs in particular there is such a wide range of content that it's possible for players to have radically different experiences. EVE Online is very similar to the age old Elite series of games, or the more recent X series- space-sims with massive, open universes, where you can fight, trade, and explore to your heart's content. Now, with the addition of other human players to the universe, the possibility for dramatic events suddenly becomes quite ridiculous. EVE runs on player interaction, with people that will either help you out, shoot you, or a combination of the two. These interactions define our experiences in the game, and this is what separates the MMO from any other genre.

Read My EVE

My Eve started 3 years ago as a mainly solo experience. 

I'm not the most social person in RL and that translates into my gaming.  Eve however lends itself much more to solo play than a lot of other MMO's. In empire if you want to enjoy the game by yourself there is nothing stopping you.  You can be a trader, producer, miner, mission runner all by yourself.  You can't compete with the big boys but the universe is large enough that you can always find a place to carve out your small niche.  I later learned that you can even go out into 0.0 alone and survive, although this does take a lot more skill and knowledge many a time have solo vagabonds terrorized whole areas.

Of course Eve does really start to shine when you join a corporation and get involved in the politics of the game.  Not many other games will have players whose names are instantly recognised by 90% of the player base.  As boring as a gate camp in 0.0 can be, sitting at a jumpbridge waiting for the order to jump in and ambush the enemy can get the adrenaline pumping.  The first time in a gang with an experienced Fleet Commander opens up a whole new understanding of the tatics used by someone who knows what he's doing.  Being in a fleet and hearing the shouts of joy over vent when a titan got killed was great, the bookmark to that killmail will stay in my favourites for a long time. 

On the other hand once in  a corporation the problems do start.  A lot of people invest a lot of time and effort into this game and for some it seems to become a bit more than just a game.  Temper tantrums, verbal attacks, espionage, back-stabbing, sulking, griefing, all the baser human emotions get their chance in the game.  Trust is one of the most valuble commodities, everybody in a corporation has had experience with a corp thief and some people have lost nearly everything they built up over one or more years in one day.

My Eve has quietly grown over the years to something I just can't let go.

My EVE is completely different.

I spend my time trading between the Corp/Alliance HQ and Jita. I do this to supply the Northern Coalition with stuff. The idea of being involved in some insignificant little war has no appeal for me.

Trading while avoiding the big boys, like Triumvirate, keeps me happy.

When walking in stations comes out, I plan on running a bar for the Alliance.

As a veteran gamer (40+) with limited conection time, socializing wasn't a choice, I just didn't have the time to play AND build a social network so my EvE was a solo affair in empire from the beginning.

Some months later I decided to join an empire corp, in principle just to use their resources and tag along while I play my solo game, but then my Eve changed dramatically, and I got so involved in the running of the corp that I ended up being a director and finally CEO of that corp. My EvE was the corp at that stage.

With over a year of game experience and a hefty pocket I decided to join a 0.0 corp closely related to the previous one. This time RL made me stop playing for a few months, when I came back to join my mates in 0.0 I find the corp being disbanded and its members split among several different corps. So now I was back again to playing solo.

Today I am in a small pirate corp, just three RL friends. We move in low sec and ransom pilots, we stalk wormholes for unsuspecting victims, we die often and we fly to a new systems when the dying gets to repetitive. That's my EvE today...

Rather than categorically describe what "My Eve" is i prefer to describe what it is as of right now.

At the moment it's being in a small corp with a group of people i get along with very well socially. We're into missions, mining, hisec exploration, small scale wormholing ops and low level invention. But at other times it was big corp stuff in 0.0 alliances and politics. And in yet other periods it was just minding my own buisness in my NPC corp. I can pretty much relate to all of those "your Eve"s that have been mentioned in this thread, and what i think the essence of those posts is, is that everyone's "My Eve" is subject to change, and in my opinion that's the beauty of it.

New features are introduced into the game, you meet new people with different backgrounds which may give you new ideas about what to do or you simply get fed up with your current "My Eve" so that you steer it into a different direction all by yourself. So, while i don't have extensive experience with any other MMOs like i have with Eve, i would imagine that it's pretty much the same with "My WoW", "My LOTRO" and "My Whatever". Though possibly on a wider scale in Eve due to it's sandbox character.

What i really am curious about is how much people's "My Eve" resembles their actual "My Me" if you know what i mean. Personally my playing style very much reflects who i am and how i act as an actual person. That sometimes irritates me really coz i think "hell, you're supposed to PLAY a role....ANY role". Instead i end up "copying" myself into the game. Any game with an roleplaying element really  And often enough i've talked to other players telling me the same thing. Rather than living out their "dark sides" they're just being the Mr. niceguys they're used to be in their real lives too.

Nobody get me wrong here though. I'm not saying that every pirate, scammer, suicide ganker or Goonswarm member is an evil, sociopathic, criminal SOB as an actual person ;-) Still i think the answer to that question would make for an interesting read.

EVE is a game for me, not a second job, and I intend to keep it that way. My time is split between hi-sec L4 missions when I need to turn my brain off and weekends of shooting people in the face in Factional Warfare. I like making some fast cash trading while waiting for a fleet to form up. The politics do not matter at all to me. I have no interest in flying anything larger than a battleship. I am not in a player corp.

My EVE is a way for me to kill off a couple hours here and there without any emotional investment (or mining).