A lot…
Attempt one
I thought that mining cannot be very violent or difficult – a peaceful profession somewhere away from big battles. All those $$$ lost due to close encounters with Corporations and Alliances leaves decent people crying a lot over money and time spent on ships which was just wasted.
An hour into the mining I was done. Mostly remember flashing light. My dead body in space.
Tried one more time – same effect but quicker. Didn’t like it at all. So I cancelled my account promising myself that I will never try again. It was nearly 2 years ago.
Attempt two
In the middle of the tutorials I felt really bored. Then I was approached by a recruitment officer from one of the corporations – whose name I do not remember.
He gave me a nice, shiny ship and loads of skill books. He gave me this twice to be honest, as I lost first ship in 5 minutes trying to travel to the Corpo system with autopilot. Newbie mistake of course, but I wasn’t first or the last player to lose their life in this way.
A week later and I still didn’t know what was it about. They, Corpo, gave me a mining ship and told me to train my skills for some sort of frigate while I was mining for ISK – the in-game currency. While I was mining for money to buy, and training to fly, the frigate – she was expensive to buy – luckily Corpo me her for free.
That was suspicious.
Then they told me to go and fight. But I still did not understand why and how, so it was rather quick and disappointing experience.
I uninstalled the game. Promised to never play again.
Attempt three
Yeah. I am not good at keeping to my promises around games. I think third time it was long due my return, but it turned into a boring trip to Sagittarius A in Elite: Dangerous.
Long story short – didn’t like it again. Smart old players making good fun from my mistakes.
And I thought this time this is really it.
Elite: Dangerous can be really boring
This is exactly what happened. E:D was not enough any more, and No Man’s Sky appeared to be very sophisticated scum…
So I came back to EVE. But I did it a completely different way.
This time I started by reading about the game mechanics, politics and dynamics. Regardless how painful it was, I went through all tutorials. I really thought about my character and initial skills.
And I understood most important thing about EVE:
Finding a good Corpo is the key to success
In my case it was Signal Cartel – a bunch of guys who are mainly exploring, and apparently exploring is my thing. Mostly because I can freely watch how beautiful a game EVE is. I doubt all those guys shooting each other five times per second can still notice this.
EVE is work of art. Exactly what every fan of space gaming is looking for.
The good people from Signal Cartel gave me know how and some access to simple exploration ships. Ever since then – I was exploring. From time to time being killed by trigger happy gankers. But overall, EVE became for me exactly the game I was expecting from the beginning; a game with stunning views and even more stunning music in the background.
I finally saw it clearly – there is no such thing as unmerciful community of crazy players in EVE. Of course – no mercy still applies. Anybody can be killed and lose even the most expensive ship. Such is life! Accept it.
And they all enjoy the vast EVE reality of space. It is a feeling worth losing more than one ship to gain.
Alpha version of No Mercy
With a new patch, people can now play EVE on free accounts which are designed to give new players, Alpha Clones, some sort of safety from the skilled or paying players, or Omega Clones.
To be honest with you I am not sure how this is going to protect anybody from being killed in EVE since EVE is all about reality of killing and losing something.
True, Alpha means no monthly payments, but it also comes with some limitations on skill learning and access to ships.
Good news is that this is the way for the vast amount of space gaming fans to finally access EVE, and see that this is not a too bad experience once you will start to embrace it.
And you do not need to have expensive ships really.
My T1 exploring ships are easy to rebuy so I do not have tears in my eyes when I am killed. I think this is a better protection than an Alpha Clone account.
Opinion
So what is my opinion about EVE and new free to play system? Well, it’s not going to stop the mass killing in game. But certainly will bring more people who will be able to appreciate how beautiful game EVE can be.
Try it for yourself.
