Saturday Night Fever

Welcome to the first installment of the EVE Blog Banter, the monthly EVE Online blogging extravaganza created by CrazyKinux. The EVE Blog Banter involves an enthusiastic group of gaming bloggers, a common topic within the realm of EVE Online, and a week to post articles pertaining to the said topic. The resulting articles can either be short or quite extensive, either funny or dead serious, but are always a great fun to read! Any questions about the EVE Blog Banter should be directed here. Check out other EVE Blog Banter articles at the bottom of this post!

This month's topic comes to us from PsycheDiver: Ambulation: What are your hopes for your avatar and new functionality of stations?

What do I hope??

To be honest I don't know what to hope for... and in all likelihood will not be disappointed whatever we may get.

On the other hand, do I know what I don't hope for??

• Everyone running around like they're jacked into the mains
• People feeling the need to stand in a spot and jump, jump, jump, jump........
• The dreaded "/dance" being used just about EVERYWHERE
• ...continued frothing at the mouth

My greatest concern for ambulation is not that it will not meet the community's (and mine) expectations, but rather that it will live up to our worse fears.

Although the RP element in Eve is small, and that most people talk "Out Of Character"; it is safe to say that most of us do enjoy the immersive nature of Eve.

In an odd way the lack of avatar control allowed, and indeed forced, players to imagine a world that their characters could inhabit, either through the Eve's art, trailers, written lore, or even just through the aesthetic nature of stations/ships/etc.

With ambulation comes the chance that we may individually find that our view of the Eve characters life does not match that of CCPs, or indeed the rest of the community....

Will this risk breaking some players investment into the game? Possibly, however CCP have stated it will be an optional aspect of Eve, and that everything you can do from your ship now, will still be possible from your ship after ambulation.

The problem is that this will likely result in empire space stations being empty, with no reason to talk to each other directly or to leave the ship, most people will likely stay inside their ships. While ironically in 0.0, where Alliances can have a strong sense of community, there will already be good reason to interact outside of the ships.

The obvious solution would be to "make" people use ambulation, however that is likely to be counter productive and could result in a "Star Wars: NGE" like drama; which is likely why it will remain optional.

Instead, following the most logical course, CCP have indicated that they will add new game play, that provides a reason for people to leave their ships... Shops, "Saloons" with "in-game" games of chance, and the such like.

Again, this simply adds to the reasons why I believe ambulation will end up being quite popular in the depths of 0.0, despite all the likely protestations that we'd rather CCP just focused on lag instead.

• The ability to have briefing sessions to communicate to a gang (prior to setting out); where they are going, why, and how they could get back if it went wrong.
• Provide a means for players to just congregate in an area, without looking like the morning commute traffic jam.
• Customisation of avatars, without the risk of impacting on the main combat game engine.
• Morale building, and non-ship entertainment - i.e. gaming and the such like.

The benefits will be huge to 0.0 alliances trying to coordinate pilots and build their morale. Though just how ambulation will work in conjunction to the external 3rd party voice applications, does remain a concern.

However, for all these possible benefits and best intentions, CCP can not control the human element.

So the risk remains; that having provided the tools, it will be only a matter of time until some one goes and organises a massive zombie like conga line through the Jita 4-4 station while singing the BeeGees....... or something like that.

Participants:

• CrazyKinux's Musing: Exotic Dancers, Corporate Meetings & more
  
The Wandering Druid of Tranquility: Ambulation - what I hope to see

Semper EVE: Ambulation and Me
• Roc's Ramblings: Blog Banter #1 - Ambulation
The Ralpha Dogs: Ambulation/Walking in Stations: A "Second Life" for EVE?
• Drunk in Space: Look at how much weight he put on…
  
• Diving into PsycheDiver's Psyche: Ambulation and Her
  
• Inner Sanctum of the Ninveah: Eve Blog Banter - Ambulation
I am Keith Neilson: Going For A Stroll Through EVE
Life in Low Sec: Ambulation Fantasies
• Shahirs Journey: Hopes for Ambulation
  
A Mule in EVE: Ambulation
• Protosolus: EVE: Gawking in Stations
• One Man, One Ship: Ambulation
• Achernar: Avatars in a spaceships game
  
• The Shard: Ambulation
• I May Find Peace Within The Emptiness…: Walking Around…
• Ombeve: Ambulation