Eve Online Review on GameSpot

Gamespot has posted a scathing review of Eve Online: The Second Genesis. Like everyone else, Ron Dulin of Gamespot finds many problems with Eve Online. Here's a snip:

EVE's gameplay primarily consists of you executing some action and then waiting around until it's resolved. Both combat and travel are lengthy and uninvolving, requiring you to simply press a button and wait. While cynical critics will tell you that this complaint can be made about most massively multiplayer games, EVE takes the process to new levels of inaction. Combat literally requires just two clicks--one to acquire a target and one to activate your guns. Your combat ability is completely dependent on your character's skills and your ship's equipment--there's none of the hands-on combat found in Jumpgate. While sitting back and letting battles resolve themselves based on your character's skills and abilities may make sense for a role-playing game, it seems clear at this point that there must be some sort of compromise between the arcade action of space-combat simulations and the hands-off combat found in EVE and Earth & Beyond, because both of those games have proven that this passive model for deep-space dogfights just isn't any fun. At least online games like Shadowbane and EverQuest give you special attacks and spells that you can perform after hitting the attack key.

See this is what worries me about another really bad space MMOG coming out. Yes, all of the space sim MMOGs so far have been travesties. But that doesn't mean it can't be done.

Making a really good working MMOG is perhaps the greatest challenge a development team can undertake. It's been shown time and time again that only the most devoted, dedicated, driven innovators in the industry can develop and execute a moderately playable massive multiplayer game. I'm not a developer and I don't know why. I just see it in every nook and cranny of the industry.

Developers: don't let the fact that it hasn't been done yet stop you from trying, however, let the fact that a good MMOG is a nearly impossible feat be a warning to you.

Read GameSpot's Review of Eve Online