3pointD.com

I was just over in Iceland, visiting with CCP Games, makers of my favorite massively multiplayer online game, EVE Online. I was there to swap wisdom with some devs and attend CCP’s tenth anniversary party. We heard about a raft of new developments EVE has in the pipeline, most of which have been previously reported. One, though, was merely a tantalizing hint from CEO Hilmar Petursson, though it merits closer inspection, if you ask me. EVE and CCP have been hit lately by a raft of accusations that close ties between players and devs have made it easier for some in-game groups to dominate. In a blog post, the company acknowledges that a previous accusation has merit, while denying more recent claims. I haven’t followed the issue closely enough to have an opinion on either side, but it has certainly rocked the community and had a big impact within CCP itself, where there is now an Internal Affairs team to look into such allegations. It also sounds as if EVE may be in store for some new governance tools at some point in the future, tools that could help players resolve these sorts of conflicts for themselves. I’m basing that only on comments from Hilmar that “something big” is in store in that area, but considering that it’s EVE, that something could be very interesting indeed. [UPDATE: EVE will indeed get a player-led oversight committee.]

One of the tropes bouncing around the tenth anniversary celebrations was that CCP isn’t building a game so much as it is creating an online society. While this harks back to Philip Rosedale’s contentions that in Second Life he is “building a country,” it’s actually a much more modest claim, and one I can definitely get behind. One of the great innovations of EVE is that it gives its players more control over the game environment than almost any other MMO except perhaps Ultima Online. What CCP provides for EVE’s players is not so much narrative or even “path,” for the most part, but simply tools and choices. It will be fascinating if the company’s reponse to the current flap ultimately takes similar shape.

What that shape might be I can’t really imagine. One interesting possibility is that it will involve out-of-game communications tools, which the company has considered implementing in the past. Will EVE become the first MMO to require its players to reveal their real-life identities? Highly doubtful, for the usual reasons. (No one wants to find out that there’s a 14-year-old boy behind that hot Caldari majorette.) But perhaps there’s some user-driven discipline scheme in the works that will resemble the mechanisms of eBay or Slashdot.

I don’t really know what’s coming, but I’m sure it will be interesting. CCP’s handling of the recent drama hasn’t always been the best, but if it results in an innovative new tool of community self-governance, it all will have been worth it.