OMG, I've been playing for 19 years? I started in beta

Give it a month for the 'free' 7 days to run out and see if everyone re-subs. There's a lot still wrong with current game play loops and revamping Faction Warfare doesn't go nearly far enough. That said there's nothing going on that can't be fixed, and all credit due to CCP Aurora and her team for this great update, a former player who taught herself to code. Truly inspiring!

Yes! that's what eve needs! The good old methods that were successful and broke player-base records. I never go the point of those "mini-patches" without a name tag to indicate what was coming. I was missing the Eve Odyssey, Tyrannis, Rubicon, Citadel, Crucible days (not in order). After I saw what was coming in Uprising, I immediately subbed 2 of my accounts and started catching up on what I had missed in 2 years!

What made EVE enticing, attractive and unique between 2003-2013 was that the ecosystem that existed enabled player corps and alliances to create a daily, exciting history of their engagements, politics, warfare, cooperation and more. CCP's focus was on creating an ecosystem that supported this. Then around 2013-2014 someone at CCP decided they needed to begin extracting more profit from the game, and took it into an entirely different direction - one of monetisation and "find your own content" solo PVE gameplay. Everything that has followed that since - all the Triglavian silliness, artificially invented areas and nonsense "events" - has made EVE into just another monetised, transaction-based, mostly PVE-centred pastime, with large-scale social interactions and stories of corp/alliance-shaped universe history taking a distant back seat. There is no surprise that taking the game away from the model that spawned entire books on it, into a direction of being nothing but another PVE-centred copy-paste MMO, has led to a gradual reduction in player numbers. Why would a game that is no longer special keep attracting more people, which seemed simply inevitable in those glory days? This update doesn't change anything at the base of the game, and that is where the malaise is. They haven't even imposed significant enough and long overdue changes to FW here. Instead of making it into a place of major inter-faction fleet clashes and multi-member sov control, it is still a design that first talks about a struggle between empires, and then drops you into the pitiful miniature reality of solo frigs orbiting unimposing stations in artificially ship-limited areas to somehow change control of a supposed entire solar system. That is a triumph of underwhelming, unambitious design that is devoid of credibility and completely detached from how faction warfare is promoted in trailers and lore, and how it should be if it is about militias of supposedly major empires clashing. Until and unless CCP addresses that fatal decision made 8-9 years ago - of switching away from a "living, breathing universe" design involving corp/alliance-shaped daily developments interwoven with lore into a solo-focused temporary gratification of microtransactions, "flavour of the month" events and "magic spaces" - and introduces relevant, fundamental changes to the very basis of the game, these half-baked attempts will change nothing in the long-term trend of declining concurrent players, and EVE will never regain the magical, legendary spot it had in the online gaming space in the first decade of its existence. What has happened to this game is one of the big tragedies of immersive multiplayer universes, and of gaming in general.

Man... this is enticing news. Five years ago, after spending 10years in New Eden, I decided I'd won Eve. I melted everything I owned, pulled all the SP out of my main character and then gave over 50 billion ISK/Plex (2018 value) to my long time friend and left. The goal was to make the idea of coming back really difficult since I'd have to skill up for years again, or dump a bunch of money into skill boosters to get back to where I was at. But, like other beautiful and terrible things, I occasionally yearn for a return and this big update is a threat to my willpower! Good video and analysis! Cheers! :)

I came back to EvE less than a week ago (started playing back in 2012) after a break of over a year and I have to say I‘m hooked again. I‘m a specialized Industrialist (mainly T3 and T2 Production) who likes to shoot some stuff occasionally and I also enjoy the roleplay outside of the EvE Client. I‘ve been a Diplomat and also a spy. There is nothing more fun than creating an incident which causes a war and make a profit because my Alliance stood neutral and delivered weapons to both war partys. No other MMORPG offers the experience that EvE offers. Or to say it with the Words of Rock Paper Shotgun: „unmatched in its drama“.

Don't forget they boosted the numbers with a 7day free omega for everyone, applicable in a 2 week span! so MANY multiboxers activated alpha toons to play with during that time too

I haven't played eve in almost 15 years, it required too much time investment but there's nothing quite like it and I respect it for that.

Great video. Eve is as good as ever, and I’m enjoying it now more that I have since I started playing. There truly is nothing else like it.

Eve is still one of my favorite games. There's just nothing like it out there.

Love this video. Still waiting for your eve online story videos.

Great video as always RS, much appreciated and thank you.

I just found this channel, seeing the drone video from a year ago. This is the first channel I've found that really explains mechanics and WHY x is better then Y without throwing all the lingo as if I should already know it. What has convinced me i've really found a gem of a channel is the Dark Crystal reference, very nice, keep it up.

Quick reminder that while dust514 was in action eve online saw the largest player counts in it's history.

I think the end of high-sec alpha-account suicide gankers will also help bring players back; and it will definitely help with new player retention.

Wonderful video. I love how you did the history of the expansions

I'm new and hooked. I'll be on everyday! Fly safe

I love this game's universe, lore, aesthetic, and even the concept. In practice it's a job simulator, and a time sink. I want to enjoy EVE, but no matter how much I learn or how long I play, I would always feel like I'm behind the curve.

Great video! I have wanted to come back and play again but I just feel I don't have the time with a kid and owning a business. Would love to jump back in but don't even know where to start now.

If my Jita sales are anything to go by, Uprising has been big. Really big.

Great historic recap. Thank you.

Nice summary, love the outtakes at the end

honestly i dont know much about this game I only got into it recently but it seems that the updates that have come out this year have really improved the game, I sure as hell find it more easier to get into then when I tried in 2016, kept me hooked for a few weeks now.

I got suckered into playing during the free Omega week but when i saw the price of the Omega sub had rocketed to £16, i just played out the 7 days and left it at that. No way is this game worth £16 a month to me. If they are trying to get people to return then they should be lowering the cost, not hiking it!

First week playing, the rookie chat has helped me very much, and all people I encountered has been very patient and friendly 👍

The hard part about measuring player activity is all the players with 2+ accounts. Only Eve truely know what the real pop changes are.

I recently came back after a 10 month hiatus. Although I have played for 12 years now and breaks are not uncommon, I have noticed lots of others returning at the same time. Maybe it is due to lots people getting burned out in the longest war eve has seen to date and deciding now is a good time to return or, more likely, its just some server hamster voodoo! Whatever the case, welcome back guys lets blow up some space ships :)

I quit playing 3-4 years ago after 7 or 8 years of daily play. CCP are the masters of half-assed, half-finished-that-they-never-finish updates. The barbie dolls and walking in stations updates are the most egregious examples. Then they introduced the pay-to-win business model. I had a toon I worked on for years to be able to fly all 4 factions battleships and 3 of 4 faction capitol ships that became "Yawn, I can do that in a few months with a couple of hundred bucks." The biggest lulz tho was when the guy that wrote the code for the stations quit and took the code with him so they had to scramble to come up with the citadels and keepstars.

Excellent video. I played Eve for years and left around 2017'ish. I still feel the itch from time to time to dust of the pirate skills and head to low sec. This was just the update information I was looking for. I'll have to think about a $20 subscription fee. Ooof. That's a bit much...

I played Eve on and off in the past, but not recently. Not really into PVP and the game kinda is mostly PVP. I do like the idea of making stuff, trading stuff and hauling stuff to different places. I also like to PVE against the npc ships, although real players would always butt in and try to make me PVP, which I did not liked. So that is why I quit. I also loved mining but alphas can only use the small little venture so there is that. Thats it. Why I dont play it now. Also the updates it has gotten over the years are laughable at best. A small graphical update here and there does not fix a game. It needs more things to do in place. Stop focusing on the PVP and give the PVE people some love!

Eve introduced me to Star Citizen and its been a love/hate relationship ever since.

I sold my high-skill characters after the T20 incident. I knew if I kept them I'd get sucked back in. Very addictive.

awesome video friend!!!

I want a "My other ship is a Gila" sticker for Frigates.

the free 7day omega did help increase those numbers a bit :)

nice vid. you might consider doing the "long" version of the expansion.

Been an alpha since 2018, still going strong

i just came back. I think it looks way better. less bugs more items and content. the new daily rewards and skill points as rewards is awesome and makes trying the new stuff fun! the 1,000,000 free skill points rt now is cool to try new things or ships!

Is it practical to actually start as a new player? I played for a few weeks in.... 05? But probably couldn't even access my account. I loved the game, but I don't know if it really is practical to start at 0

Eve is a game but also a simulation extraordinaire! Life long player here!

I roughly remember the drifter invasion of nullsec. I don't know of anyone that directly participated in that. I think the barrier to entry was simply too great. You had to roll up in a capital ship group, or a full fleet of battleships I thought? Getting those numbers is annoying amounts of effort. The difficulty of the drifters meant all ships were at risk, when shares of rewards for that many people/that expensive hardware wasn't worth the risk. On top of that, dedicating a capital group to drifters took them away from their regular alliance work, and PvE in most alliances isn't covered under most alliances ship replacement programs - so you take a few carriers out, get dunked by drifters - now you're out 25-30 billion for just 5 carriers, no one made a dime, the alliance refuses to replace anything for your group, and also points and laughs. And despite what it seems like, not everyone can even fly capital ships in null, or some of us could, but pretty much use smaller ships exclusively instead.

played eve since 2003 and still going strong

I think pochven was intentionally tuned super high so that people would fleet up and we would have a totally new type of pve like incursions but it didn't catch on outside of flashpoints

Give it a couple weeks and see if the numbers crash... If they do, it's a good bet a lot of people came back, tried it again, got ganked/griefed by a select few asshats, and then said "Yep, the same shit that caused me to quit last time is still going on, I'm out." and then immediately quit playing afterwards... I'm guessing that's exactly what's going to happen until EvE finally cuts the cord on the toxic ass players that are ruining the game for everyone.. Themselves included.

I just started playing it. I quite enjoy it :)

Please. 2019 on has been really rough relative to rest of the "dying" I've made friends, enemies, memories, and learned lessons no other game will ever teach. Watching it get shoved through the MMO shredder like every other one it seems it upsetting, so I hope this means there's a glimmer of hope. I'm stopping by and losing for a while either way. P.S. Also, in 2009 the Great War was happening, and null sec was nuts for many years compared to today so I imagine that drove a lot of new player reading headlines and such

Well, it's nearly 1pm here in the UK on a Wednesday which means most of the us hasn't woken up yet and most of Europe are still at work. Currently 16,054 players on tranquility, looks alive to me.

I loved nullsec blackout so much. I felt thats how it always was supposed to be

YES, but, this game is missing the final key, the traditional open world feeling, the need to land and walk inside these amazing stations and on planets, and all in one game, is what I truly wish it brings, multiple level economy between the experiences, where capsuleers can be planet explorers and city slickers, or station scum, corpo high class areas, 3rd person gameplay in these walkable massive areas, with function and purpose, signing up for planetary warfare, or eve valkyrie sign ups for pc from within a station within eve online, seamless transitions, the fps idea they had, my apartment or property purchasing on planets and stations, in ship crew pov and cockpit level detail to explore the views and enjoy space trucking from. So much more could be done with this game to make it an MMO for all category of player. Think Mass Effect in Eve, / Yeah like a minor Star Citizen kind of level of detail. Just IMO

I've always been saying that CCP's resignation from big, yearly extensions is.. big mistake. Ppl love to wait for major changes in their playground, significant updates, new ships, environmental effects, graphics and vast revamps to space around them. Even if WiS is not a thing, that was big hype generator back in its years. Good job CCP, this is the way.

i have been playing lots more lately, seeing more on my friends lists and mail lists being active. this si a good thing. eve has a colorful past and it is sad newer players do not have the "hayday" experience to fall back on. if this is a new reversal...i call it a win.

i just started playing eve. it’s awesome

is it worth starting absolutely ground zero doing free to play for at least a while?

I miss walk in stations, it gave me a sense of accomplishment from getting killed several times in a Venator to the ease and comfort of a Vexor (they removed WIS just when I'm getting Myrmidon and Megathron, still my best feeling was with my Algos, transitioning from Tristan to Algos was magical, I even did a stupid thing of parking my Algos in the middle of bumfuck nowhere, go back to the station, pick up my Venator, then fly to that Algos, make a complete 360 fly by of the ship before leaving my Venator forever behind and going back to the station with the Algos, it just felt ceremonial. Makes me wonder what happened to the Venator, I'm sure a ganker would be completely disappointed that they blew it up but there's no corpse inside) I want to walk close to my ships and see how big I've become. My player character did not grow taller. But the Metallic extension did, or in the case of Tristan, became dummy Thicc. (cause it's a Fat man, get it?) Docking in player stations feels like a showroom, sure your corpmates can show off flying a titan while you fly by in a puny frigate but I can never enjoy it fully because I'm busy trying to dodge a laser bukkake from the enemy we just tackled.

I think a big thing that would help the industrialist players would be to revert the Rorqual nerfs and release a successor to Dust 514 (on PC and console since crossplay is viable now and this would maximize player counts), we know an FPS game is in the works and having it tied to EVE's economy would do a lot for the players mining and crafting. Making tons of vehicles, weapons, and dropsuits that you know will be destroyed within a few hours of gameplay would drive those EVE players and create the resource scarcity CCP is trying to introduce without having to kneecap players. This one is more of a personal gripe but I want pirate factions to have more influence in Null Sec. Whether it's done by NPC fleets attacking less used systems and taking them from players then fortifying them to expand their holdings until players push back enough or the pirate factions hire players to wage war on their behalf and the territory simply goes over to the pirate factions. Yes this can get annoying but I think the possibility of creating more small team fights and things for players to do is always good. They have to be tougher or at least longer than Sansha Incursions because those can get melted in a couple hours thanks to dedicated teams running those. Factions could also have different states of aggression, starting at Calm: not taking territory, only fighting when attacked -> Scouting: Small teams show up in nearby systems, could have an effect on Planetary Interactions -> Aggressive: Begins attacking nearby systems to claim them -> Calm again. This could be modified for a Drifter invasion as well, starting with small fleets trying to take somewhere to make a headquarters then expand out a set amount, requiring players to fight into the newly taken territory and destroy the headquarters to stop the invasion and dissolve the remaining forces.

My PC is 10 years old, and I left Eve around 2012 as real life things took precedence over a video game, but I'm now retired, and🤞all-being-well, once I have all my post retirement jobs and things to do done sometime hopefully this year I'll have a new PC and can then reinstall it, and get back into the game.

I played EVE from 2006 to 2008 I was part of the SWG NGE refugees (as we were called lol) I believe around 6-8k players joined then, had to stop due to RL obligations, I could not justify paying for a MMO that I was only playing two or three times a month. During my time in EVE I hung out in the Artisan system and would run the pirate gauntlet to get to Jita to sell my wares. I never made enough to be considered big time, but I had fun, I had two accounts, one was a dedicated Miner and the other was my runner. Whenever a group of grievers would try to ruin my fun I would just create a Caracter in another area and play that for a couple of months, then I would just play my main characters and continue playing solo. in my entire time I only lost two ships to pirates. And both times were me being stupid, once I was heading to Jita and I forgot to switch my ships layout from miner to ship combat, yea 5 minutes of sitting at a gate unable to do anything because I had a mining layout lol, the other time I bragged about getting a great ship kill in system chat and had around 6 players jump me. the rest of the time I was just mining and moving cargo from Artisan to Jita, to break up the monotony I would do some "rat hunting" and explore EVE, but I had fun mining and making goods for others to buy.

Feth it I'm going back!!! Destoth La'Rakian is coming!

EVE"s Not dead! ❤️

i like the ideal,enlisted FW without leave corp or alliance

I really enjoyed eve from 2010-2013. RL took off and now with two kids I struggle with the thought of logging on again. I've come back a few times but still find it out of balance with the fun vs time sink. Still haven't uninstalled yet. I've replaced with Stellaris, it's runs on my schedule. Glad to see updates are still happening.

Cool ideas. I hope they don't turn out to be bad things in the long term and affect player experience negatively. Do you think of having Eve Online vs other sci fi universes sometime like you did 5 years with the Empire vs New Eden? Like maybe perhaps New Eden vs the Imperium of Man or Covenant? Those would make good naval battles especially Titans vs Gloriana-Class Battleships or Covenant Super Carriers seem awesome. I believe New Eden's industrial capacity and the amount of freedom privateer groups have in the clusters boarders and how much more logically efficient, advance, and tactically flexible makes them much better then a Imperium navy group in skirmishes or defensive conflicts in their borders. Especially since the Imperium is very stagnant and refuses to innovate leaving them very unadaptive and very arrogant. Though imagine New Eden's reaction to a Forerunner megastructure though would make even them in awe of something so much larger then their trade hubs and fortress stations.

EVE WILL NEVER DIE!!!

we will see if the comeback stays or if the numbers drop off a cliff after all the free trials end.

I am playing eve again... it feels great.

Changing nullsec is always risky. Because to own and maintain null space you need to put lots of time and effort into it, then if a change by CCP makes the space you fought hard for no longer safe with now drifter rats, and reinforcing structures, which others can now exploit to attack, which they wouldnt be able to before and for the person that spent all the time setting up the station, capturing the space and keeping the index rates up by mining, industry and ratting, its understandably annoying.

i HAD NO IDEA that E/O was still up here - I use to have a GREAT time playing with corp-mates from the Americas and the UK -- would love to get back to this sometime - $20? it cast me just $15 back when - I think I could STILL afford this . . . ;-)

Not going to deny. Not interested in going back to EVE, I won and I plan to keep winning. I get nostalgic for it, but I look at it from time to time to see what's going on.

Eve is the most incredible game I've ever played.... Played for years, stoped, game back, stoped again... I wish I could come bqck, but the new price of subscription+ the fact that my coin is internationally worthless... Makes playing this game quite an expensive hobby :(

spredsheets in SPACEEEEEEE!!!!!!!! 📠

I quit my 5 accounts back around the blackout and resource scarcity crap, miss the game sometimes. It's a shame they've ruined it.

They really need to figure out something for all the ships that only have T1 versions and no navy versions.

I was a full-time miner/ salvager/ explorer/ hacker. Sadly I was never in a corp big enough to resist the PITA players

Picked up the box from Walmart in 2003. Never looked back.

I always liked the concept of EVE but never really got into it. Was debating it again recently but I think I can never decide what I want to do in game and then never find a corp. I usually just end up mining while working lol

I wanted to come back, but all of my stuff is in Ichorya, which was high sec so it has all my high sec ships stored there now it is so far in low sec that I dont even see a reason to come back.

i actually like eve, but i simply never had the dedication to maintain the cash flow necessary to replenish the ships i would ultimately lose. I love mining, but i would rather do it in peace. Having my hulk blowed up by some pirate wanna be was never really a gun time so i just kept them docked. It is a great thing that such a unique game has managed to remain as the rest have faded into the annals of history.

Have played a prime and alt since 2005 - been rich been broke been in a dozen corps and twice as many wars, biggest issue is changing track - ie moving from faction to Corp to low sec to whatever- just like life really decisions have consequences - hard to play well easy to die - miss the old days of strange players helping each other noobs get ganked A LOT currently doing a lot of mining runs to no sec - a little rare ore can be worth dodging the bubbles and gangs - probably play until I die (I’m really old) and no you can’t have my stuff - or they go off line, fly safe

I'm an old school pirate myself, started back in 2008. I lived the hard core pirates life, relying on corpmates with alts of decent standing to even get to jita and back. It was rough, barely kept any sort of functioning wallet, always flying over-engineered disposable pirate-build ships...But it still is the best solo and social gameplay I've ever had in a game ever. I truely miss my old internet spaceship family. We were just that, family. I've recently returned just to fly my old favorite ships again and I'm blown away at how far the game has come since '08. I've honestly cried some days at how awesome this game has become (Im a weirdo, I dont care, yarr harr forever youngblooded amateurs!) despite not being at the cutting edge of "metagame" anymore. I fly how I want, do what I want...yall should too. Live safe, fly dangerous! Always down to roam, sincerely Captain Jon Ritmann o7.

a year later and this video didn't age as well as hoped...

Im in love in EVE

Started playing in 2008, and after a 5 year break I'm back and really enjoying it. Eve is far from dead and if anything the opposite is true.

But did they fix PVE? Last time I played was a few years ago and the NPCs were still cheating with unbreakable ewar

I am back after several years away. I am once again helping to ensure that Wormhole space stays spooky.

You missed a couple of items, null sec is more profitable now for players and therefore alliances so there should be more fights, which should feed industry and missioners in hi sec. Also getting rid of alpha clones doing large scale ganks should improve the gam.

Damn! I fell for it and came back to Eve. Help me!! :D

EVE is pretty cool

I played EvE from, say, late 2004 to 2007 as Apollo Balthar. Was part of some no name corp of which the name eludes me in fountain at the very kickstart of the fountain wars. Remember our CEO being a chicken and just gave up without hardly a fight which infuriated me as I wanted to throw all my ships into the war before being 'teleported' back to low sec space and start all over again. Started back up with some guys which went to another pirate corp which I joined later. But having some serious real life issues the essentially booted me in the lamest way. Tried to find fun as a single player corporation declaring war to miners, attacking in cheap and cheerful ships bordering on suicide attacks before I decided it was a fun run but the game didn't fit in my life anymore. EvE was a magnificent game in those days. I have fond memories of the guys I flew with (Rheinkraft and Harvey Skywarker most notably) and also the enemies I flew against (some xxxDeathxxx guys, snuff or snuffer, Goonswarm, MoO corp and BoB. One name I still remember is Amego. Can't remember which corp). Almost felt honoured to die as cannon fodder trying to web sir Molle at some point. Maybe I'll give the game another spin. Sold all my stuff though, and I'm getting mixed reports. Seems the player driven part is nerfed quite severely.

I've had my account for 17 years. Played off and on for big chunks and small. When they upped the price to $20 a month, making this the most expensive monthly cost for an MMO that I was aware of, I decided it wasn't worth the money anymore. Not sure what gives them the gall to charge more for Eve than WoW or FF charges but here we are.

great video, but one thing you did miss out is the fact the driters attacked more of goons space then any of the other null empires and the drama that caused was funny as hell becouse even if you were not a goon you could see that ccp was lieing about it being random

And it is right at 03:04 that you start lying to your audience in favor of the game. That graph does not show how many PLAYER's Eve has active, but it does shows how many ACCOUNTS are logging in instead; remember that Eve not only has multy-box as it encourages you to pay for multiple accounts and do so yourself. So there is many ppl that log 6 to 9 accounts at the same time no problem, and can gank and destroy you no problem what so ever with a simple to code copy command bot. The real player count of EVE can be traced with moderate accuracy in the steam charts, as most of the accounts ar logged by the steam launcher this days, and no matter how many eve accounts you log in, the steam chart log your activity as One account (as it should be).

Just how do you turn off docking animations, it's laggy as F and locks camera. In other words sucks stick.

im coming back after 3 years break. EVE FOREVER

yes I'm one of those cranky old eve player and i like the big patches. But i hate what they did with capital warfare and jump lag we probably will never see a fight like the one that set the record and dallor amount loss

I like Elite's travel to sun system better than the stargate thing as the sun travel to each system is just so much simpler. However, I like eve's real world graphics as they do not look all animated, at least much less animated then Elite's...

if eve could get someone like me to play it i bet its numbers would go thru the roof. i am really interested in star citizen and i like the x3 games.

I am returning to the EVE game... I started first playing in 2006 then played for a very long time and then 5 years back stopped.

EVE has died for me… five times already; and reborn again some time after every death!! Can never walk away forever 7o

I played eve pretty hard core a decade ago. Even had a Titan pilot but walked away when the game within the game took over.

man i came back to eve and it created an uproar now all of a sudden +1 player and its alive again...