Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Producer Thomas Farrer explained the controversial decision to make EVE tie-in shooter DUST 514 a PS3 exclusive in an interview with RPS earlier today. He explained: “most of DUST is running on our own technology, it’s running on our own super-computer, on Tranquillity. And Sony is a lot more… open, shall we say, to allowing you to do those things. It may seem silly, but on Xbox Live your identity is your Xbox Live identity. In the EVE universe, having people not know who you are is quite important.”

When asked whether a 360 version was an impossibility, he reasoned that “I don’t think it’s about saying we “couldn’t” do it. I think some of the challenges we’d meet would be tricky. But then also as a developer you’ve got to weigh the balance. It’s nice to work on one platform rather than two, because it means you don’t have to make any awkward compromises, technically. Also you get the benefit of a closer relationship with that platform. “

On the prickly issue of there not being a PC client, Farrer explained: “we don’t want to cannibalise our own player-base.” Read the full thing here.

CCP’s much vaunted console accompaniment to EVE, DUST 514, has now been officially confirmed as a PS3 exclusive. Apparently it’s because the PS3 is much better designed for online worlds and micro-payments. I’m a touch confused about what DUST 514 is all about, especially how it interacts with PC players of a separate game. (Hence our discussing it.) Confusion I’m going to clear up when I speak to CCP tomorrow (later today in RCT, but it’s still yesterday in America). So yes, this is sort of console news, but if you read on you’ll quite how PC news it really is.

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We have all manner of crazed reportage on the recent EVE fan-fest due from the boy Smith throughout this week, but while we wait for him to purge all those mysterious Icelandic alcohols from his system, let’s take a look at CCP’s video vision of their MMO’s not-too-distant future…
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EDIT: No platforms are confirmed for this other than “console”, we’ll get more info as soon as possible.

So CCP have revealed just what the mysterious Dust 514 actually is: a console action MMO featuring “first-person shooter and RTS-style gameplay”, set in the Eve Online universe. Disappointing, eh? But there’s an intriguing twist: PC and console games will be able to interact, and the faction warfare map that gets decided in space on the PC, will also decide the map in the console game. There’s more, as Gamasutra reports:

Players in the PC MMO can “fund mercenaries and give them goals” in the console title. CCP’s Petursson hope that “these communities will meld over time”, expecting specific Dust 514 corporations to start with, but eventually social structures that bridge across the two. He quipped of the new game and the relationship between the two titles: “While the fleet does the flying, the infantry does the dying.”

So PC gamers get to be the space-bound commanders of the console foot-soldiers… That isn’t going to help our elitism complex, is it?

Eve Online developers CCP have filed two new trademarks pertaining to online gaming: Dust, and Dust 514. And it could be something Eve-related, but that’s totally a word I would use were I trademarking a post-apocalyptic game world. Actually I’d probably call it “Dust Tribes”, for the vehicular combat vibe, but that’s just me (Omg, to the trademark factory!) There’s loads of speculation flying around about this at the moment – particularly since CCP showed an FPS prototype a while back – but we don’t know anything more. We’re expecting something to be revealed at the Cologne games Con, where the CCP bossman is going to give a keynote.

Needless to say, if CCP do end up making a post-apocalyptic PvP-focused MMO, my life will be ruined.