CCP Shanghai making console FPS aka EvE 360 - via Kotaku

[Gets]

http://kotaku.com/5339695/eve-comes-to-consoles-with-online-shooter

CCP have today taken the wraps off Dust 514, a "hybrid MMO/FPS" that not only brings the world of EVE Online to consoles, but somehow ties the game to the PC MMO as well.

Apparently the game will "interact directly" with the PC title, allowing console gamers to manually fight out the battles for planets that are part of the larger MMO conflict.

It will do this by combining FPS and RTS mechanics. The game is being worked on by CCP Shanghai, and there'll be more details announced during CCP's big fan get-together in Reykjavik, Iceland in October.

Hoo daddy! I never know whether to be thrilled, scared pantsless or bracing for disappointment when CCP, in its global quest to dominate all things concerning internet spaceships, announces something as bold as this. I mean, how will console gamers supposed to adjust to daily downtime or "Click, Wait, Move" gameplay?

Since planets are supposedly involved I'm rather curious to whether this should be in the Sov Revamp thread instead. Fanfest should be particularly interesting this year.

[Yoru]

Non-Kotaku story: http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=24886

[jason]

Without any real knowledge, I would guess the game is going to play like any other FPS/RTS game, with maps of 2/4/8/16/32 players doing normal FPS/RTS things, the outcome of which will affect resources, or prices, or some other aspects of the MMO in the system where the planet on which the map is set resides.

I doubt players of the MMO and the console game will really "interact directly" unless the FPS/RTS game is also made available for the PC, which is just going to fuel the keyboard+mouse vs controller fight.

[Gets]

I trump you with this video and some German.

http://www.golem.de/0908/69136.html

[Sir T]

Wasn't this Serek Dmart's Big Idea for Battlecruiser 3whatever?

In any case... AMBULATION! WOOHOO....

[Gets]

brb making new avatar

[Falwell]

They really CAN'T be thinking about making this console only can they? Holy fuck, that would be a business fuck up of NGE proportions.

[lac]

Sov in the MMO influenced by console FPS?
I'm starting to get very curious to see the big picture on sov mechanics after the overhaul.

I hope their next MMO feature contains phrases like 'planetary flight' and 'nuking from orbit'.

[NiX]

Did you watch the video? It actually sounds like a pretty interesting idea. It will take a lot of balance though and I'm sure a lot of corps/alliances will take to have people with 360/PS3 so they can "contract" a special group of their best console shooter players.

[Sir T]

Did you watch the video? It actually sounds like a pretty interesting idea. It will take a lot of balance though and I'm sure a lot of corps/alliances will take to have people with 360/PS3 so they can "contract" a special group of their best console shooter players.

Remember when gaming was fun and not a second job?

Well I guess we now need to have a third job to support our second job.

[Amarr HM]

Awesome idea imo.

[IainC]

They really CAN'T be thinking about making this console only can they? Holy fuck, that would be a business fuck up of NGE proportions.

Why do you say that? While it is technically feasible to make a cross platform MMO, I can see why they might not want to do that. I doubt they want to start competing with their main product so a console game seems like a reasonable plan.

[slog]

If there is a MMO company that is completely 100% NOT CAPABLE OF DEALING WITH LAG it's CCP.  This is going to be a cluster if they bring in twitch.....

[Falwell]

They really CAN'T be thinking about making this console only can they? Holy fuck, that would be a business fuck up of NGE proportions.

Why do you say that? While it is technically feasible to make a cross platform MMO, I can see why they might not want to do that. I doubt they want to start competing with their main product so a console game seems like a reasonable plan.

Wait, you're saying that taking the biggest expansion to the Eve universe ever made and ripping it out of the hands of a fanatically loyal player base unless they own a console is a good idea? Because that's what it is. It may be a whole other MMO with completely different mechanics etc. but they've already stated it's going to affect sovereignty in the current game and you can bet your ass that it'll have a presence in the market as well.

 

[Trigona]

If there is a MMO company that is completely 100% NOT CAPABLE OF DEALING WITH LAG it's CCP.  This is going to be a cluster if they bring in twitch.....

That's pretty harsh because although lag is a problem in low sec and with battles involving over 1000 people or when zillions of drones are used,  Eve afaik is still the only game where 100s of people can fight often with minimal lag.

I think this move by ccp is potential genius - it adds a delicious layer of complexity to an already complex game.

[slog]

If there is a MMO company that is completely 100% NOT CAPABLE OF DEALING WITH LAG it's CCP.  This is going to be a cluster if they bring in twitch.....

That's pretty harsh because although lag is a problem in low sec and with battles involving over 1000 people or when zillions of drones are used,  Eve afaik is still the only game where 100s of people can fight often with minimal lag.

I think this move by ccp is potential genius - it adds a delicious layer of complexity to an already complex game.

It only works because it's a dice rolling system. 

[Sir T]

Its retardeness.

I mean what the fuck. If I want to maintain sov in eve I have to get a xbox now? and play an FPS on a concole??? Assuming I even like FPSs, and the game they come out is not utter dogshit? Its not "complexity," its bollox advertising mixed up with "hey buy an Xbox" I mean we have to force people to play an FPS 4 hours a day to maintain sov in our internet spaceship game??

It's ludicrous. EVE is already a niece game, expecting and forcing that small number of gamers to cross over to another game for yet more timesinking is nuts.

[IainC]

Wait, you're saying that taking the biggest expansion to the Eve universe ever made and ripping it out of the hands of a fanatically loyal player base unless they own a console is a good idea? Because that's what it is. It may be a whole other MMO with completely different mechanics etc. but they've already stated it's going to affect sovereignty in the current game and you can bet your ass that it'll have a presence in the market as well.

I'd say it's a better plan than taking EvE players to a different PC platform game. Let's see how the interface with the MMO and sov works before proclaiming that the sky is falling.

[lac]

The hard part will be to make both worlds interact in a meaningful way without allowing one to become too dependent on the other. I wonder how they will put it off.

[Mrbloodworth]

I'm willing to bet most Hardcore eve players cant hit the side of a barn. So, contracting the deed out to mercenary's (Console users) who specialize in such things (Halo/gears players ETC..) seems like a very eve thing to do.

[Amarr HM]

Real FPS shooters use a mouse and keyboard though, console is just the arcade version.

[rand]

do console MMOs work at all, the lag would probably be horrendous

also yeah if this affects eve sov and doesn't have a PC version it'll be retarded

[UnSub]

EVE is already a niece game

Niche.

And yeah, this could be a very EvE thing to do. Especially if they launch PS3 and Xbox 360 versions at the same time...

[Falwell]

Wait, you're saying that taking the biggest expansion to the Eve universe ever made and ripping it out of the hands of a fanatically loyal player base unless they own a console is a good idea? Because that's what it is. It may be a whole other MMO with completely different mechanics etc. but they've already stated it's going to affect sovereignty in the current game and you can bet your ass that it'll have a presence in the market as well.

I'd say it's a better plan than taking EvE players to a different PC platform game. Let's see how the interface with the MMO and sov works before proclaiming that the sky is falling.

So it's better to just not give them the option unless they already own or are willing to buy a 300+ dollar piece of hardware? Also, I'm not trying to bust your balls Iain, I'm just trying to get my head wrapped around this decision.

The only way this move makes sense business wise is if they plan on pulling in a larger number of subscribers on the console over the PC for an FPS / MMO. I'm not sure that's wise thinking. Unless they DO plan to have a PC client as well and then that makes this topic a moot point and we can start bitching about control differences.

[gryeyes]

No possible way would CCP be stupid enough have the new game impact EVE in any meaningful way and limit it to console only. But then if its cross platform balancing gameplay between PC/console users is neigh fucking impossible. And no fucking update on WoD!?!

[Falwell]

As far as how much impact Dust will have on Eve, this is the best I've found, from Massively...

[NiX]

You guys are a fantastic bunch of sensationalists. It's console only because I'm sure they don't want to split their current subscriber base and in the context of how he described the way it works, EVE players control where they fight. They become your pawns in tactical warfare. Plus, it probably has a lot to do with CCP wanting to enter the console market and by splitting it between PC and console, it would diminish that effort. All EVE players will bitch and it'll wash over, just like every other time they've done something you didn't like.

Oh yeah, one word: Shadowrun.

CCP knows better than to try where even MS failed.

[tmp]

I'd say it's a better plan than taking EvE players to a different PC platform game.

How exactly is this better?

[IainC]

I think the point is that they are trying to bring in an altogether different demographic rather than risk splitting the playerbase they already have. That's just my guess of course, I don't know any more about CCP's business plan than you do. By aiming at the console FPS market they can bring on board players who would never be even remotely interested in EvE and involve them in the game without pulling too many people out of space to do some ground-pounding. I can certainly see the fear of diluting the space game unnecessarily and blunting their success so far.

[gryeyes]

How do you think having a completely different game on a different platform directly impacting the MMO will wash over? This is something a tad different than the alteration of a game mechanic.  And how exactly would a game that does not have mutually exclusive gameplay split the user base in the first fucking place. I highly doubt they will be trying to charge a subscription for a console FPS, being as how the only people who would pay it are the MMO's users. And thats the only thing i could see impacting MMO subscriptions.

You are at least correct on a cross platform FPS's being a horrible idea, even tho that was a minor aspect of Shadowruns failure.

[tmp]

By aiming at the console FPS market they can bring on board players who would never be even remotely interested in EvE and involve them in the game without pulling too many people out of space to do some ground-pounding.

Guess i just don't get how the bolded part benefits EvE in any way. I mean, people who have no interest in EvE would be just as happy to play the console shooter MMO that has no connection to EvE whatsoever, and it'd avoid the obvious drawback -- the EvE players wouldn't have to rely on these people to accomplish anything in their own game they're actually interested in playing.

It makes just as much sense as turning the mining and production tasks from EvE into Bejeweled and Cooking Mama clones on iPhone, and then forcing EvE players to 'hire' these players just so they can have anything done in their game, too

[Falwell]

Release the Kraken!

[NiX]

How do you think having a completely different game on a different platform directly impacting the MMO will wash over?

 

[tmp]

Thinking of it more, CCP dropped the ball mainly when it comes to selling the idea to their current players. The shooter part has been in development for 3 years, so they had 3 years to introduce the concept on the EvE side with enabling conquest of planet sectors carried out by NPC squads, which could be hired and armed by the EvE players to influence their odds to succeed. With such mechanics in place it'd likely be much easier to swallow an announcement of "guess what, now these NPCs on the ground don't actually have to be NPCs anymore".

[Comstar]

This is a fantastically stupid idea if they want to tie it to the 0.0 sov changes, which are supposed to happen in the next expansion.