EVE Vegas is running this weekend. The one time player driven event that has turned into a CCP sponsored affair, complete with a keynote speech full of new treats.
CCP Seagull kicked things off with a theme and overview of how CCP is looking at the upcoming changes. The idea is that CCP wants to create things where they cannot predict the outcome, because they if they can then we can as well. So roll on emergent game play.
Playing and Outplaying
She reviewed the titan themed expansions so far this year…
The new expansions so far…
And talked a bit about items we have heard mentioned before. Then she gave us the release plan for 2015.
2015 Release Plan
That is 10 release for 2015, plus the two we have left this year, Phoebe and Rhea. This all led into a bit more overview on what the upcoming phases of change they are planning.
Going through a phase
Phase 1 is looming, with Phoebe dropping in just a couple of weeks, but Phase 2 is where the shape of null sec might change. She then wrapped up with a revised version of the road map for EVE Online.
Where we are…
This is a bit trimmed down from the old one. The green line shows where CCP feels they stand, so industry is pretty much done but many more major changes are left to come.
CCP Seagull wrapped up and handed the stage over to CCP Fozzie who got to talk about some more specific items related to the Rhea expansion coming in December. Most of that is still under wraps, but there were a couple of neat things.
Quick look at Rhea
The art change consisted of an update to the Blackbird/Falcon/Rook ship model. There was a very early mock up of what they want to do with the some of the most loved/hated ships in the game, but CCP Fozzie said that it would likely bristle with antennae when it was done.
Then there was a new ship type announced, currently codenamed “Tug.”
The Tug
This will be a freighter sized ship that will be used for carrying around multiple fitted sub cap ships. A mock up of the ship was shown.
The model is still early on, so no textures have been applied, but CCP Fozzie did say something about the art team pushing the envelope when it come to the number of polygons used. I suspect that this will be a popular ship.
Then CCP Fozzie spoke about the research race/contest that had been going on for the last week. The results were in, which he announced, along with what it would mean.
Research Race results
Each of the empires will get their version of the end result in the order in which they place… and what they are getting is Tech 3 Tactical destroyers.
Tech 3 Destroyers
The Amarr should get theirs as part of the Rhea expansion, which other races getting theirs with following expansion. There were even some mock-ups of potential models for the Amarr tactical destroyers shown.
Amarr tactical concepts
He also showed mock-ups of the Caldari version, because apparently the Caldari were in first place in the race until almost the end, so the art team started in on what looked like the winning team early.
Caldari tactical concepts
As with the “Tug” announcement, there were no final names or any stats for the ships.
That about wrapped up CCP Fozzie’s time, and he then gave way to CCP Seagull again who spoke of exciting times coming in the game with all of the changes they have planned.
Others talking about they keynote:
Also, the video of the keynote is up on YouTube now.
And on a related topic, CSM member Sugar Kyle has summarized some of the CCP roundtables.
The Ancient Gaming Noob 