Shadow of Cerberus EVE Community Forum

Suspect flag

Read this.  It's from an e-mail that I sent to a CSM member earlier this week.  Initially, I was going to stay fairly quiet about it in public for a bit and see how things played out over the next few months.  But it kind of sums up my feelings on Retribution:

CCP has been pushing hard toward new EVE players. Every single little feature in Retribution is either aimed directly at new players, or aimed at giving new players the ability to hurt veteran players (bounty hunting, turning Suspect flags on for can-flippers, etc.). Though they've been spinning and spinning to try to sell these features as veteran player features (and they are, somewhat), this release is really pushing for brand new players.

Don't get me wrong.  Retribution is turning out to be a really well-done expansion, in my opinion.  But it's not aimed at who you think it's aimed at.  Is this a bad thing?  No, not at all.  Quite the opposite, in my opinion.  But CCP has to tread carefully.

Now go read this.  It's an interview with the newly promoted CCP Unifex.  In particular,

CCP walks a fine line between satisfying veteran players and newcomers. The last three expansions, Retribution included, have focused on polishing existing features - that is, getting them to a state CCP is happy with.

But veteran players have called for new features to be added to Eve to combat what some believe is stagnation. Lander promised new features will be added to the game in 2013, but stopped short of revealing what they are.

Needless to say, I'm going to have more to say about this in the next couple of days.  But there's a couple of blog posts stacked up in front of this that I need to get published.  I've been holding back, but I think I need to go into robo-blogger mode for a bit...
Source: Suspect flag