While we remain intrigued by the technology, for us, NFT stands for “Not for Tranquility”. Overall the EVE IP will continue to push the boundaries of digital economies and virtual worlds – and we will continue to explore that outside of TQ.
-CCP Hellmar, dev blog
Pearl Abyss and CCP have been the focus of a minor controversy over their apparent eagerness to embrace blockchain, crypto, and things like NFTs over the past months.
I do want to make it clear that the controversy is entirely of their own making. You cannot hype up crypto at every quarterly earnings call, introduce NFTs into the alliance tournament, and have the official EVE Online Twitter account retweeting about the CEO meeting with crypto investors about the game and then wonder why people think you’re serious about blockchain and crypto. This was not some fantasy conspiracy theory dreamed up in the community. It was absolutely the result of the actions and messaging of Pearl Abyss and CCP.
CCP is always specifically mentioned or part of these events, and CCP has but one video game title out there, EVE Online, so the conclusion one jumps to isn’t exactly a huge leap.
So this morning we got a dev blog post from CCP Hellmar, the handle of CCP CEO Hilmar Veigar, who has been out there helping stir up the controversy. It went as follows”
Blockchain and EVE Online
There has been a lot of speculation around blockchain technology, NFTs and cryptocurrency and what that means for the future of EVE Online, so I wanted to address it.
At CCP, our mission is to have the EVE Universe outlive us all: EVE Forever. One huge part of this is exploring new technologies and new possibilities – something EVE players know that I’m always fascinated by. This philosophy is rooted in EVE Online’s inception; when we created EVE, it was seen as too radical and ambitious, yet here we are about to celebrate EVE’s 19th anniversary.
Many of us at CCP have been following the new frontier that has been developing around blockchains and cryptocurrencies for the past years. We’ve read your feedback and we also see what you see – blockchain tech has both a lot of untapped potential and a lot of work needed before being ready for EVE-scale games.
On that note, we have no plans to add blockchain technology into EVE Online’s global server Tranquility for the foreseeable future. For the coming years development for Tranquility will focus on building exciting new opportunities on top of the robust foundation that has been laid over the past two decades.
While we remain intrigued by the technology, for us, NFT stands for “Not for Tranquility”. Overall the EVE IP will continue to push the boundaries of digital economies and virtual worlds – and we will continue to explore that outside of TQ.
Fanfest is a month out and personally, I’m very excited – It’s been 2.5 years since our last in-person meet, in London during the EVE World Tour. I look forward to seeing many of you in the flesh again and talk about EVE and our future!
CCP Hellmar
The “foreseeable future” is not “never,” but it does at least leave us safe from the scourge of crypto for now.
My prediction from last month, based on the behavior and statements from Pearl Abyss, CCP, and Hilmar in particular, about a coming of a pay to earn announcement at Fanfest seems to have been proven false. At least it won’t be something blockchain based, if it comes to pass at all, and that makes me happy.
But we also know that statements from CCP have an expatriation date. We learned that with skill points and how they went from a promise that all skill points in the game would come from players to the current state where skill points generated out of thin air are for sale in the web store. They boiled the frog slowly, but it ended up cooked all the same.
So the price of a blockchain free New Eden is constant vigilance. Hilmar didn’t write this up because he’s our pal, he wrote it up because players were getting angry about all of his flirtations with blockchain technology and that seemed to threaten the company’s bottom line.
And that is always the final determination. If Pearl Abyss and CCP think crypto will hurt their revenue, then they will not bring it into the game, so when they start talking their crypto talk again… and they will… we need to keep letting them know how we feel about it.
Related coverage that does not simply repeat CCP’s statement: