EVE Online at Ten Ton Hammer - Taking MMOG Gamers to the Next Level!

After completing a number of missions in which you learn deeper aspects of combat and space travel, you're presented with a choice of three profession specialist agents to start working for. Each of the three will send you on a series of ten missions. Although you don't have to, completing these missions will prove to be invaluable to you. Not only will you get a far greater understanding of how things work in the EVE universe than you most likely would on your own, but it's highly lucrative as well. You'll be rewarded with massive amounts of credits, a number of skill books, and more than one new ship.

The Dangers of Space

Once you've finished your set of specialist missions, you can still locate other agents to get assignments from, but by now, you should be getting the itch to do some exploring on your own. Most of the time so far, you've been flying in secure space, meaning any sector with a rating of 0.7 or higher has very little PvP or random pirate appearing during travel because it's considered safe space. This is great for learning, but it's not where glory and riches are to be found.

As you progress further into lower numbered sectors, space becomes far more dangerous, but as the risks increase, so do the riches available. Inevitably, you're going to see the question of when you should fly into low-sec space. The correct answer is always the same no matter who asks or why: Never fly into low-sec space unless you’re willing to lose whatever you're flying.

This doesn't mean you necessarily will (although the lower you go, the greater the chances are of that happening), but it means you'll be able to actually have fun there. If you've worked for a month to get a Battlecruiser and all the skills required to fly it, are flat broke, haven't updated your clone (if your skill points are higher than what your current clone is good for), then fly into a 0.3 sector and get blown out of space in less than two minutes, you're going to come completely unglued. Take the extra time to earn enough credits for a better clone, a second Battlecruiser, and insurance for everything. Then you can fly around and just concentrate on having a good time.

Though EVE’s learning curve is still arguably the harshest around, players around the world are continuing to check the game out because of its immense depth and complexity. Rather than being a complete deterrent, it’s actually one of the game's selling points as gamers seek something to actually immerse themselves in. This is how the MMOG world looked back in the day. There was very little information to be had, we struggled forever until we got a grip, and we loved it. Pay no heed to the tales of snapping like brittle twigs when some bastard would kill-steal a mob we'd been waiting hours to spawn. In those days, screaming was all you had. Oh, how times have changed.

Given a fair chance, EVE can be an extremely fun and rewarding game to those that take the time to learn. The addition of missions to guide you, a rookie channel to ask questions in, and an increased skill learning rate have gone a long way towards making the game more accessible to players around the world. All without taking away the extreme depth and complexity that engrossed their continually growing player base in the first place. That's no small feat to pull off and kudos to them.