Eve Online
Author of review: Evoke
However, even those who hate it more than love it, like myself, have to admit that EVE Online is first class all the way. Even its official magazine EON was probably the best looking awesome magazine in the history of print publications, as was its ISK guides paper or pdf and its map packs (print or pdf).
And, the graphics are just the WOW. EVE's devs keep progressing the graphics and animations. It's a massive and overwhelming game in some cases, and people will shell out $15 a month to play it. The good outweighs the bad by a landslide.
Unfortunately, the few bad things about this game are the very things which are also considered good and what retains the games playerbase; it can be OVERWHELMING.
The amount of skills and ship upgrades and parts is mind blowing, also it takes alot of time to accomplish things. You have to be a very patient and detail oriented person to enjoy this game, neither of which I am, but I do admit I come back to it for about two or three months a year. In fact, so much work is being done on this game to make it more user friendly and fun, it will be hard for me to ignore it and not sub. If you like Sci-Fi and space genres, this is the game for you. If you like to REALLY, and I mean REALLY get wrapped up in an MMO, down to the intimate details, this game is for you. But, if you are impatient or lazy then forget it. Your success is equal to the work you put into it.
I know some people will disagree with me, but for anyone interested in the sci-fi space genre of MMOs, it would be well worth it to at least try the game. Don't expect a WoW type or Secret World storyline though, its all about trade, commerce, and space combat, and your ship(s) are your characters, except when you get out at a space station and walk around your private quarters.
I don't know what else to say except that, I always felt EVE was one expansion away at some point to blowing the MMO industry thru the roof. All they need, is the ability for all players to see each other and be able to congregate outside their ships and maybe cut down the learning success curve a bit to the point of not upsetting existing players, and turn up the storyline to more exciting proportions and then they will have a atomic bomb of a game to devour all others.
Of course, EVE's DUST 514 is the most ingenious feature to ever come about in an MMO, i.e. the co-existance of console and PC gamers, with PC gamers fighting it out in space and console gamers fighting it out on the ground and the contracts made between PC gamers and the console gamer to have the console gamers protect the pcgamers planetary assets on the ground is breathtaking, and even the ability of a pc gamer ship to orbital bombard the console players on the planet is EPIC.
We will see what happens.....
