Since about Saturday I've been glued to EVE Online. The shenanigans surrounding the stargate fluctuations, as well as the excitement from what became the largest battle in MMO history, kept me logging into the world in order to find out what was coming next.
Monday we saw gates go down, including the incredibly important Jita/Perimeter stargate. Tuesday, well, systems controlled by the Triglavians during the Invasion seemingly vanished from known space, forming what is now being referred to by some as T-Space, or even TrigSec. I watched a livestream most of the day yesterday on Twitch showing a live feed from one of the most important systems to be captured by the Triglavian Collective, Niarja, as a wormhole formed and the system ceased to be accessible by normal means.
The entire spectacle renewed my personal love for EVE Online - and it was less about what the devs were doing and more about watching how its players reacted to the changes.
Many weren't happy, as some in a few of the chats I'm a part of expressed. They wished they had more of a heads up as to how to tackle the new threats. Players who were in TrigSec were treated to some pretty wild spectacles, but there were plenty of capsuleers stranded there as a new filament is needed to transport between the systems now in Abyssal Deadspace and Known Space.
Other players, like myself, relished the changes and the challenge that comes with overcoming the curveballs this update threw at New Eden. I found myself searching Hisec systems for new Drone combat anomolies to continue building my standing with the Triglavian Collective. (Edit: 9:06am 10/14 - Welp, looks like this was actually an exploit, as CCP declared this morning.) I soaked in as much as I could from EVE-centric news sites run by capsuleers, such as INN and Talking in Stations. I wanted to know more.
And it's been a while since I could say that about an MMO.
My favorite MMO has been recorded here multiple times - it's The Lord of the Rings Online. I got my start in games journalism writing about this game back in 2012. My Twitter handle is LOTRLore. To say I'm obsessed with The Lord of the Rings is an understatement (seriously - ask me why Balrogs don't have wings). However, part of the excitement for me in LotRO has seemingly worn off. Standing Stone Games continually updates their game, but nothing really has felt as exciting to me as this past weekend in EVE Online.
And I think part of that is simply the sheer fact that Middle-earth's overarching story is, well, complete. The Ring has been destroyed. While Evil isn't dead, the cataclysmic threat to the Free Peoples has been over for a few years in the MMO.
However, EVE Online's future is simply unknown. Quadrant 4, titled "Phoenix" was just announced this morning, yet the future of EVE is still largely up for the players to create. How will the changes we've seen in New Eden affect the MMO in the coming months, weeks, and even years? How will the capsuleers of EVE Online use this new monumental shift to their advantage? Will new, T-Space based alliances form? How will those who sided with EDENCOM during the Invasion deal with the permenance that the new pocket of TrigSec brings to New Eden?
There are so many unknowns that it feels so exciting to try to find them out.
Hopefully, though, I won't be PKed again by Rick Sanchez whilst trying to do so.
Featured Image via Reddit User VPope
