I started the year wanting to play more of The Lord of the Rings Online. Yet by the end of the year, it's been EVE Online that has been dominant in my MMO life during 2023.
I really wasn't surprised in the end to see in my Steam Year In Review that EVE Online was my most played game after Baldur's Gate 3, despite my efforts to play more of what has historically been my MMO comfort game. Yet this year, for whatever reason, I just felt more drawn to New Eden over Middle-earth.
This surprises me not at all. #SteamReplay2023 pic.twitter.com/JqGiWUbzqq
— Joseph Bradford (@LotRLore) December 19, 2023
I think the main reason for this is simple: New Eden brought better overall experiences this year over what I experienced in LotRO.
This isn't to say I didn't have fun in The Lord of the Rings Online - I have. But the two expansions, plus just falling in love with my pirate lifestyle in EVE has brought me so much joy this year.
The best experience I've had in an MMO all year was just last month in EVE Online, in fact. Right after Havoc launched, I found myself in more and more fleets, teaming up with my Angel Cartel militia mates to sow chaos and corruption in New Eden.
The first Saturday after the expansion launch, we were in a random roaming fleet, running the sites and trying to get into some PvP battles. It's a scene I described in an earlier article about how EVE's new expansion was living up to its name: a fight against a Phoenix Navy Issue ship with easily 100 people on grid with me.
It was the largest fight I'd ever been in and one of the first times I experienced real fleet warfare despite playing EVE Online since 2017. It was strangely calming, listening to the Fleet Commander call out war targets, only for me to lock and fire away, swapping to the next when so ordered.
What struck me as well was I had this idea built up in my head that these larger fleet battles were hectic callouts, with a ton of people trying to get others on side. My experience with hasty PUGs in other MMOs where there wasn't a designated shot caller was coloring my vision here for sure. I've been in plenty of PUGs that were doomed because we just could not coordinate clearly.
Yet I remembered something a fellow EVE journalist and someone who fights on the frontlines of Goonswarm's many wars, Lee Yancy, told me: these calls are almost eerily silent.
And I think that was my favorite part in all this. I mentioned it was strangely calming. Normally when I find myself in solo PvP in EVE, I tend to panic a little bit. Let's be real: I panic in any PvP situation, regardless of game. Yet the calm feeling that washed over our Discord call as our FC called out the targets was infectious.
I lost my Cormmorant in the fight, but it was worth it to land on the killmail. It was certainly the highlight of the year for me, and the insurgency system that CCP Games brought to EVE Online breathed new life into the MMO for me. I had long wanted to take part in Factional Warfare, but wasn't willing to leave my corporation to do so. Now, I could without that problem, and the whole experience has now been a blast.
This one weekend was the most fun I've had in any MMO all year. Sure, I've enjoyed catching up in Final Fantasy 14, even starting a new character to go through the content as a tank so I can play a Gunbreaker with a semblance of how tank in the MMO, and LotRO still makes me feel like I'm coming home every time I log in, but EVE really excited me this year. I yearned to log into New Eden in a way I haven't felt in a long time.
I mean, it's running in the background as I type this.
So for my money. EVE Online's Havoc have brought the best experiences for me all year. What about you? What has been your MMO highlight of the year? What experience or moment are you looking back on as we close out 2023? Let us know in the comments below.
