They're doing it

Bold Pilot Log, Entry #7

So yeah, DUST 514 is coming.  CCP in their infinite wishdom decided several years back that they would do another game that makes the planets in EVE matter. And they recently announced the new game that's born out of the enthusiasm. It will probably be cool. Or not. But that'as not the point. The point is, CCP is trying to do something very different with DUST than they did with EVE.

Our beloved spaceship game is a game of long planning. You sourself set the objectives of the game by selecting some features - and they are available for anybody working hard enough towards them - or create entirely new ones using the already existing features as tools.

Mind you, DUST will be inherently different. They could have gone with something like an RTS or some simulator game, it would have been very good and using the experience they gathered from EVE. Rather than choosing easy, they 'in their infinite' wishdom thought of something more crazy. A shooter. On console. And they say it will be sandbox and in a persistent world. How, then, you may ask it is different from internet pixel space? The keyword, my dear friends is instant gratification.

First of all, they wanted something that you can hop in right away and go play with. So yeah, that narrows the possibilities to a few options. Then when you take it further, you realize that this kind of stuff is best played out on console. The next step was obvious in the thinking: look for areas with lot of free market, because that's waht CCP is good at. And you end up right away with console shooter.

So you'll have this game where people insert their disk to the box, load up and start shooting internet pixel clone people right away. It does not require planning. It does not require you setting an long-run objective. But you CAN. And some people will. And they'll become the leadership of DUST 514 corps or specialists in say, vehicles. But. To get ahead of the crowd, you must spend real money to unlock that new gun.

And here we go again. They try something different. Microtransactions. Oh noes, the horror. You might say that there will also be microtransactions in EVE but that's another matter. That black leather jacket you buy with AUR is not equipment. You may also point out that you can obtain ISK via selling PLEX. Albeit true, the nature of EVE online makes it so that rich as you may be, the stuff is destructible or can be taken. Nothing is bound, nothing is safe. That I can contend with. Living in the mess of a country I am, I will probably never be able to affor such luxury anyways. And then there's the DUST 514 microtransaction plans. New weapon blueprints? New vehicles? To unlock them, they say, you either pay with AUR or ISK. Now, let's talk about 'getting the edge'.

In EVE, if you want equipment as first, you must build it yourself before anyone else. To do that, you need to be anything but rich IRL. You have to be on the spot right on time, you have to have the appropriate skills and equipment first, and then vigilant enough to get ahead of competition. It takes brains not dollars.

Now look at the DUST 514 plans. So, say, you want to get your cutting edge armor before anyone else? Pay x amount of AUR. Yeah, there might be skills and rankings and other stuff you must take care of but because of the nature and speed of the game, it probably is already done by the time you can open your purse. No brains. Just dollars. Since the game will be living off the player's willingness of buying new stuff, to provide incentive for the customers, it definitely WILL give an advantage.

So regardless of what businessmen think, and regardless of what some people are parroting, I think the evaluation of success for DUST 514 can come from how true the following three sentences will be:
1: 'I haven't spent a cent over buying the game, and I still can be a successful player.'
2: 'I am strongly dependent on the happenings of both the EVE Online universe, and the layer that's DUST 514's world.'
3: 'Years have gone by, and I still play DUST 514 with a whole lot of my friends.'

Sessym out.