Atlantica - 01.02.2002, Blaðsíða 13

On The Game
Do the words ‘massively multiplayer’ mean anything to you? There’s a good
chance they won’t, but they mean a great deal to hundreds of thousands of peo-
ple around the world who are part of a Net-gaming culture that is actually a sub-
culture in itself. In this case, ‘massively multiplayer’ basically means that the
game’s participants are connected via the Internet to play in the same game
world, where they can interact with other players from all over the globe.
Icelandic games company, Crowd Control Productions (CCP) will be uniting
many of these online gamers in a futuristic spacescape where almost anything
can happen.
The game is called EVE: The Second Genesis. It’s a super-real, online, persistent
(that means when you stop playing, life in the game’s parallel universe contin-
ues) world game. You will never return to this game to find it as you left it. Like
real life, it unfolds. And just as we have a fate to steer and fulfil in this life, the
EVE players will also have a fate to fulfil online for their characters and cohorts.
When it’s up and away, the EVE world will be alive and kicking 24 – 7, and the
game already has thousands of players all over the world ready to move into its
arena (see www.eve-online.com).
CCP was founded in 1997 and advances with confidence into its business realm,
secure in the fact that the massively multiplayer gaming scene is still growing.
Nearly all the hard work has been put in now, developing a game that can
respond and grow, where each player creates a character – a spaceship captain
cruising around the universe, trading, fighting and communicating with other
players.
But, of course, the proof of this kind of venture-capital pudding is truly in the
eating. The massively multiplayer market will saturate sometime, leaving the
online games to battle for their market shares. Bear in mind, however, that for
many, EVE is a tantalising proposition.
As with human life, players go through a steep learning curve to begin with,
while they learn the dynamics of the EVE universe. They can buy skills, like lan-
guages or navigational prowess, and these will mature with time, whether the
player is logged on or fast asleep in bed. They can make decisions about their
characters’ virtues or vices. They can decide to follow a straight and narrow
path, or they can opt to live life on the darker side, as a space pirate or contra-
band runner.
Having a hand in the fate of such an online alter ego is a compelling pastime.
So much so that players of the existent massively multiplayer games have
proven to be a very reliable client base. Despite the dot.com downturn, these
kinds of games have the security of a significant number of loyal players who
are ready to commit financially to their cyber alter egos. Long ago, companies
discovered that real life is one thing, but lifestyle is everything. Now these
online games are giving lifestyle a cyber twist.
Indeed, the believable world of EVE may well become a preferable place for
some earthlings to dwell. And since CCP is responsible for furnishing that world
with detailed histories, complex characters and around 5000 solar systems, it
seems only fair that they collect the rent when thousands of this world’s resi-
dents migrate on to their screens.
Already the enthusiasm and anticipation surrounding EVE-online has reached
fever pitch, with many defence teams being established to play together and
alliances formed. The web site receives up to 14,000 hits a day, with people
checking out the graphics or audio and video downloads on offer there.
Says CCP marketing manager, Sigurdur Ólafsson, “Being a nerd is no longer
passé. The richest man on earth is a nerd. Many of the guys with the highest
salaries in Iceland are nerds.” Touché to that. And long live the Internet playboy
with his immortal online alter ego. Here’s to the cyberspace cowgirl too, who’s
riding to the dot.com industry’s rescue. Eve-online starts soon, you see, and this
game will never stop while there are still people willing to pay and play. JMcC
EVE Atlantica looks into the online world
of EVE, a tempting cyberland that
many will find preferable to real life.
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