EVE

Naysayers aside, many EVE Online players are enjoying something called F-U-N. In his latest One Jump Home column, MMORPG.com's Ross McDermott talks about some of the good times he's been enjoying in game and predicts that the future of EVE is still quite bright. Check it out and then leave us your comments.

And so, fun was had. Some followed, most were hesitant, and few considered the political ramifications of their actions. It took two pilots, two from Test Alliance Please Ignore and one from Elite Space Guild – The Alliance I happen to be the CEO of – to get caught in the crossfire before it all came tumbling down. After a night of fanciful free-flying through Delve, the fleet of Pandemic Legion, TEST and ESG were ready to pack up their bags. Good fights were nowhere to be had and tiredness and boredom were beginning to take hold. Sleepy pilots were ready for their beds, so ships were hauled towards the system known as 1DH and all the gates were green.

Read more of Ross McDermott's One Jump Home: The Serpent’s Apple.

CCP Guard has posted a great new look at the Gallente Talos, a new ship that will arrive with the Winter expansion to EVE online.

The Talos was heavily influenced by the winning entry in the recent EVE Online: Design a Starship contest held on Deviant Art. Michael Shierup's ship was originally named Seraphim but it was decided to rename the battlecruiser Talos after the Grecian guardian of the island of Crete.

Find out more about the Talos on the EVE Online blog.

CCP Navigator has penned the latest article on the EVE Online blog. In it, Navigator talks about the recently announced staff reductions and how the Community Team will be impacted.

According to Navigator, players are worried that communication between the dev team and the community will not be as prolific as it's been in the past. In response, Navigator said, "The Community team has merged with Customer Support to create the Customer Relations wing of CCP. Hilmar, the CEO of CCP, recently stated in an interview with Eurogamer, ‘ By centralizing customer support and community we have more people doing community work than we did before. Being co-located with the developers allows the information within the community groups to have a much more direct effect on the development process.’"

Read the full blog post on the EVE Online site.

The CCP blog has been updated with news that the company will be refocusing its efforts on EVE Online and Dust 514. As a result of the restructuring of the focus, the number of staff will be reduced by 20% worldwide and World of Darkness will be sidelined.

Following this reorganization, we must do a better job by focusing on these priorities:

• For the immediate future, our mission is to enrich the vast EVE Universe by strengthening the continuous development of EVE Online while preparing to bring DUST 514 to market on the PS3. We do this in order to realize our ambitious and challenging plan of joining the two in a cross-platform, truly massive online world.
• World of Darkness will continue development with a significantly reduced team. This team will continue to iterate and expand on the gameplay and systems they have designed. We will also redeploy creative teams in Atlanta to support the launch of DUST 514.

Read the full notice on the EVE Online site.

Thanks to Minsc for the tip!

In today's One Jump Home column, MMORPG.com's Ross McDermott takes a look at the past several months in EVE Online and some of the events and statements that have literally shaken New Eden to its core. Check out Ross's unique perspective on things such as the Incarna debacle and Monacle-gate and then weigh in with a few thoughts of your own in the comments.

For the CEO of a videogames company to admit a significant error is, in my opinion, incredibly brave. I've met CCP Hellmar at the Icelandic CSM Summits; the man is genuine and sincere in his person and with his words. He reminisced with us about how he helped to build EVE Online from scratch, about how coders sat in a dark room often working far longer than they needed to to make the project come to life. For him to come forth and admit that mistakes were made is not only brave, but a breath of fresh air in a world of pressed suits and 'New Game Experiences' which outright murder MMORPGs and then turn the blame on their communities for 'Not understanding their perspective'.

Read more of Ross McDermott's One Jump Home: EVE Will Be Reborn.