Call me Nostradamus. We had COVID visit our household shortly after my last post. My 13 year daughter picked it up at school. A week of isolation for the family, with my Daughter further confined to her room and the adjacent bathroom. Copious use of masks, sanitiser and disinfectant, and communication through phones, video chats and yelling at doors, and we got through the week without anyone else catching it. My daughter had moderate cold symptoms for a day, mild symptoms for a couple of days, and then has been fine. I however foresee more isolations in our near futures.
I have my new Desktop PC. I splurged a little more than I might usually, getting some of the latest 12th Gen / DD5 etc tech. I have been reminded about why I don’t historically get the latest and greatest – with little niggly issues and unfulfilled promises. In some cases I am stuck waiting for resolutions to randomly turn up in firmware updates. Meanwhile my Son got his first Desktop PC that he sized and paid for himself from his two part time jobs. He took my sage advice and got 11th Gen / DD4 etc tech, saving himself $1,000 on his build and having it all work effectively straight out of the box.
I installed EVE and Pyfa on the new PC, but have not taken to logging back in regularly. Turns out however that you don’t need to play EVE for there to be plenty of drama to peruse. I am of course talking about the Blackout campaign in protest against being able to buy a Retriever via an Account Pack.
I don’t need to write much about it – Wilhelm Arcturus at The Ancient Gaming Noob covers it well:
To selectively summarise, there are a small number of players protesting, a small number of players championing it, and a “great uncaring mass of players who likely don’t know and probably don’t care either way“.
CCP has been conjuring up ships out of nothing for years. Look at all those special edition give away ships, such as the Praxis and Gnosis from the Society of Conscious Thought. You got extra of these if you were a paid subscriber. I am pretty sure I got extra through purchasing some of the special EVE books – although I stand to be corrected. Those hulls are much more impactful than Retrievers.
While I get the focus on the ship being conjured instead of made by players – people have long been able to conjure up stuff for themselves in game by buying things like PLEX and converting it into ISK. It is not like the game is some pure microcosm.
Having said that – it is worth being mindful of one of Mr Arcturus’ quotes on the possible mindset of some protestors “If you don’t push back today, tomorrow the company will do something worse“.
Meanwhile in the little I have read on this topic, I note this from CCP:
“We hear your worries about the continued escalation of this kind of sale and want to reassure you that our design will remain directed towards new players finding their footing in New Eden.“
“One of the topics for Fanfest is a new project that we’re in the middle of developing, that will transform these and any future packs – a paradigm where packs of this type will be supplied by players, ensuring that any ship we offer to new players through sales, will have origins from actual player work in New Eden“
A possibly complicated solution to a problem that may not have needed to be solved.
Now I return you to your regularly scheduled program.
Evehermit 