GoonSwarm vs. CCP:
The Battle
for EVE Online Continues...

Over the last few weeks, a gladiatorial duel has been
waged
between two opposing factions, each of which believes that they are in
the right. The two combatants are the game development studio, CCP Games, and
their in-game customers, the GoonSwarm alliance. Their chosen arena is EVE
Online, and each side is determined to win this battle. If you haven't
been following the ongoing chronicle of EVE Online, there's a bevy of
information available on the Internet, everything from href="http://www.kugutsumen.com/showthread.php?t=832">accusations
of
developer
misconduct
to href="http://myeve.eve-online.com/devblog.asp?a=blog&bid=472">previous
responses made by CCP. Everyone seemed to have an opinion on
the matter, including some of the Internet's most href="http://www.raphkoster.com/2007/05/30/eve-scandal-a-frame-job/">prominent
bloggers and href="http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/26/0016226">news
sites.

Just as things were beginning to die down, the hornet's nest
was
kicked
again when the Ten Ton Hammer staff published an href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/8355">interview with
CCP CMO, Magnus
Bergsson, which held a brief statement about the conduct of a
portion of their player base. GoonSwarm, enlivened by the remarks
made by
Bergsson, issued a formal response with Ten Ton Hammer. To
make matters fair, we also asked CCP for a follow-up response to the
GoonSwarm statement. As always, if you have any thoughts on what you
read below, please feel free to href="mailto:[email protected]">email us or
href="http://forums.tentonhammer.com/showthread.php?p=150772#post150772">talk
about it in our forums!


src="http://images.tentonhammer.com/eve/CCPvsGS/goonswarm_response.jpg">


The recent scandal was a response from the EVE community as a
whole. EVE is billed as a "sandbox", created by CCP but always with the
intention of being developed by the players. Customers create
characters and venture into the "box" to shape the metaphorical hills
and valleys in the "sand". Whether it be through conflict or peace,
destruction or production, we as the entire collection of people who
play EVE wish to be in charge of our own direction.

Developer misconduct has occured in the past, a fact admitted
by the company. Direct communication between players and members of
CCP's volunteer team which handles forum moderation, in-game bug
hunting and storyline development has occured despite the rule that
members of the volunteer program should under no circumstances reveal
who they are to anyone, a fact admitted by some of the players and
members of the volunteer team in unison. Both instances lead to the
perception that biased influence is being injected like a virus into
the "sandbox" which strips away some of the freedom people log in to
experience.

We all play this game to have fun, whether it be to rise to
power as a space-controlling alliance, to corner a part of the
player-driven market and reap the financial benefits, or simply to
undock and fly off into the darkness looking for a target to point our
guns toward with the expectation that no favoritism from an outside and
infinitely powerful entity exists.

Resentment occurs when the assumed level playing ground begins
to vanish, regardless of which side it appears to favor. The scandals
existed and exist whether Goonswarm plays or not, to paint it any
differently is to hypocritically deny that there has ever been a
problem. While a collection of members within Goonswarm made a loud
racket (primarily a knee-jerk reaction to the perception that
misconduct still exists even after CCP's creation of an Internal
Affairs department to stamp out such issues), the voices of hundreds
and hundreds of other unaffiliated players rose up from all corners of
EVE's universe to express their equally shared dissatisfaction.

EVE Online is an amazing source of entertainment with a vast
market, constant conflict and heart-pounding PvP combat always at the
hand of, and created by, the players, using the systems set up by the
developers. The space for metagaming within the conflict between
powerful groups and alliances of players with respect to internal
disruption and spying is by far one of the best "features" which has
come about, again due to the actions of players interacting this way
within the unbiased construct of the game. Many people play the game
solely for this aspect and the desire to lay waste to whatever
opposition bars their way, or to stand up and fight against the
well-established old powers of veteran characters.

It's not about winning or losing an intergalactic space war
inside an imaginary universe on the internet, it is about feeling
secure that whatever we do is the direct result of our own efforts free
from the assistance or impedance of a guiding hand. To view the events
that transpired as unwarranted outrage or to claim that a certain group
of people behaved in a manner purely because of a conflict within a
computer game is to ignore and discard the feelings and opinions of
many thousands more who wish to see EVE shine in its full capacity and
enjoy the ride.

- Goonswarm

src="http://images.tentonhammer.com/eve/CCPvsGS/ccp_response.jpg">


The increased interest in EVE Online, not only from gamers but
multilaterally – even from those who have never actually
played the game – illustrates the extraordinary
characteristics we believe set us apart. Just because it's a game
doesn't mean that everything related to it is virtual. It's compelling,
aggressive and provocative, and those core elements are not only what
makes it interesting but also what can evoke real emotion from the
players who delve deeply into it. They have a genuine sense of
ownership within the gameworld that we want to encourage. Moving beyond
the confines of the server lines to discuss in-game matters with gusto
and fervor is as much a part of the game for them as hunting NPCs or
building a battleship. It's that passion that inspires us as developers
and makes us strive to continue to push the boundaries of what EVE is
and all that it can be.

- CCP 


To read the latest guides, news, and features you can visit our EVE Online Game Page.

Last Updated: Mar 29, 2016

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