“This acquisition will be excellent for CCP, for our games, and especially our players,” Hilmar Veigar Pétursson, CEO of CCP Games, said cheerfully as he patted the server hardware sitting next to him on an Icelandair flight to Seoul the morning of September 9, 2018. Speaking to reporters on Saturday, EVE Online’s slowest time of the week, Péturrson assured those gathered that any disruptions in service for CCP’s hit sci-fi MMORPG would be barely noticeable.

That was before the CCP team missed the connecting flight to Seoul in London’s Heathrow Airport.

“I’m not sure we are going to make it,” Hilmar said impatiently as the CCP Dev Team slowly snaked its way through Heathrow’s byzantine queues and transportation services, laden with backpacks of their office belongings from Reykjavik while carrying or pushing server equipment. Looking back over the caravan of polo-clad staff and employees, Pétursson muttered to reporters, “It may not have been a good idea to do an office move at the same time as a server transfer.”

In order to better accommodate the move and to provide as little disruption to EVE Online as possible, twenty percent of the server architecture was left behind. A senior CCP server technician, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the Pearl Abyss acquisition, stated, “We believed that twenty percent would be sufficient, considering the traditionally low player turnout on weekends and the numbers of players who had reported they were unsubscribing and uninstalling our client over the last few days.”

Expecting that the lower player population would translate into less stress on the servers, the remaining twenty percent was designed to primarily accommodate Jita station traders, players using the autopilot feature, and to support the monetary transactions on the EVE Online website. When players began activating modules, undocking their ships, and transferring items between hangars, however, the remaining architecture began to cascade in failure.

Players immediately noticed the slowdown in service. The r/Eve subreddit was especially active in voicing disappointment, with many users lamenting they might “have to go outside.” Players purportedly from Australia, on the other hand, believed the lag to be a new game feature designed to equalize latency.

At the gate, the CCP team let out a collective sigh of traveler’s disappointment as they watched their British Airways flight depart for Seoul. After taking nearly half a day to navigate through Heathrow, the team was exhausted. Server equipment and office supplies were heaped in the waiting area while CCP staff worked to book the next earliest flight to Seoul, though British Airways was unprepared to accommodate such a large party on any flights for some time.

CCP Falcon attempted to take to the forums to address user concerns, but his responses were delayed by up to thirty minutes or more. CCP Guard, who had been carrying server equipment under both arms and had subsequently disappeared behind the stacks of equipment, could not be reached for comment. When pressed on when he believed the servers would be back online, Péturrson declined to answer directly.

“All acquisitions have unexpected situations and we just need to be patient,” Péturrson said as he opened his smartphone to a surface vessel shipping company’s website.

Have you or a loved one been affected by lag in EVE Online? We would love to hear from you! Tweet us @EVEOnionNews

Popular charity event Games Done Quick recently concluded its SGDQ event, raising just over $2 million for charity. For those not in the know, Games Done Quick is a charity livestream that brings in various video game speedrunners to complete video games in a speedy manner while viewers make donations for charity. However, there is often controversy at such events, such as the exclusion of certain runners and games, and this year is no different.

EVE Online was slated to be played at the event in front of a large audience, but was cancelled soon after the stream began. No exact reasoning was given to the runner, but speculation of the war starting up, and people actually doing something in the game for once, made the RNG too unpredictable, and the speedrun wouldn’t be completed in a reasonable period of time.

“The run was going to be a 100% map exploration” said a disheartened Jermino93, who was going to run the game, “but now people are actually undocking supers; it’s like a whole other game now. It’s as if you practiced version 1.0 of a game, and the developers patched to version 3.3 overnight. My entire route will have to be remade, now.”

He goes on to explain how his route took into consideration the average amount of player activity per system, types of ships active, and security status, among other values. It was a lot easier to map these things out due to how predictable EVE has become. That’s all been shaken up. “I’ve never had this happen before” says Jermino93, amazed at how radically different the game is now.

Not all hope is lost, however. Jermino93 says he has plans for a different type of speedrun come the next GDQ event. “I’m doing my best to reduce RNG for a speedrun to get one billion ISK from scamming in Jita. GDQ should approve this run because they’re real familiar with money-related scams,” were his last words before being escorted off of the GDQ event grounds, along with me and everyone he had spoken to that day.

After considerable positive feedback concerning the reduction in Jump Fatigue, CCP has officially renounced the new plan. “In the next few days,” says CCP Falcon, “a new item will be available in the PLEX store that will reduce the blue timer created by Jump Fatigue. A stimulant for capsuleers to keep them going for the long haul.”

To be sold individually—and in bundles—these “stimpacks” will enable more rapid capital movement. “Like coffee for truckers,” one dev was quoted. “We hope Stimpacks will allow more rapid hauling for freighters and enable players to engage in capital brawls further from their null fortresses.”

When issues of balance and inequality favoring so-called “wallet warriors” were brought up, CCP stated they plan to up Jump Fatigue timers again, balancing out the reduction offered by these stimpacks.

FRT exec Noraus has been praising the news on Reddit, calling it “a long-time coming that CCP delivers on this hotly debated topic.”

Earlier this week, CCP Games CEO Hilmar announced an NIP with Cloud Imperium Games, the development studio of Star Citizen. During the announcement, Hilmar was certain that the two games and their respective developers would coexist in harmony, evenly sharing customers and their space bucks.

However, this humble offer was very quickly shot down by Cloud Imperium Games, as just a few short hours later they announced a new feature to be added to their game, one that may sound quite familiar. “We are pleased to announce a new feature coming to Star Citizen,” begins a tweet from one of the developers. “When you pre-order the Deluxe Collector’s Edition of Star Citizen, you will be given an Enigma Code™. It will be redeemable intermittently in the future for various rewards, including cosmetic clothing and paint jobs for your ships. We would also like to announce our new Star Pass …”

While details are still sketchy about the now ongoing conflict between CCP and CIG, I will do my best to report on what is known so far. CGI struck hard and fast by selling the now-infamous Vulture, a design very similar to the EVE Online Venture. Not only was the designed heavily inspired, but the price tag was ridiculous, and fans of Star Citizen were quick to defend the design of the ship. CCP fired back with their Venture Capitalist bundle, taunting the fact that you could be subscribed to EVE Online for 6 months for the cost of one ship in Star Citizen. Inside sources say CCP is upset that they can’t get away with charging $140 for one ship.

CCP then began the talks of a possible lawsuit, claiming the Imperium existed in EVE long before Cloud Imperium Games existed, and that CIG is very similar to SIG, which the Imperium is well known for. Dozens of potential lawsuits and counter suits have been theorycrafted, simulated, and put on the table, but none so far have gone through; CCP claiming that due to their HQ being in Iceland, they can’t get the formidable swing power of Texas law on their side.

One aspect of this war that neither side saw coming was the Reddit front. Hundreds and thousands of space-faring folk from across multiple galaxies, and possibly even realities, have converged to troll and farm salt in amounts not seen in ages. Both the Star Citizen and EVE subreddits have been placed under martial law. The EVE subreddit trying to figure out if Star Citizen will ever be released, while the Star Citizen subreddit is trying to figure out what Stain is, and why it needs a Lowsec gate.

Internet Spaceships Are Serious Businesstm. Holesale Operations, while not in the same category as Hard Knocks (the ‘n’ is silent), L A Z E R H A W K S, Scary Wormhole People, or even MCAV, has earned a reputation as a “legit” wormhole corporation (ZKill 74% Dangerous), frequently ranking high in rolling-holes.com reports (sadly, now defunct thanks to API changes). While often tailing more aggressive and efficient wormhole operations such as HK, LAZERHAWKS, and WiNGSPAN Delivery Services, Holesale frequently finds itself among the top 10 wormhole alliances in ISK destroyed in J-space, and in efficiency.

There’s something new in the works, however.

In 2015, Holesale initiated 0 wardecs. In 2016, 19. In 2017, 7. In the first 5 months of 2018, 10.

In June 2018? 24.

That’s right… 24.

What could cause such a massive change in focus? What is Nykke planning? Why would Holesale abandon J-Space to focus on HighSec Wardecs?

TalisAkijitsu has a theory… Reddit salt. “Holesale is generally at the very least, very competent,” Talis suggested, but WINGSPANTT’s (aka Chance Ravinne) recent interview with “the former wormhole CSM candidate,” TDSIN’s ExookiZ, seems to have triggered Holesale’s sudden shift.

Is it jealousy, as Chance Ravinne throws his 31 alts and considerable influence behind the ExookiZ candidacy? Is it WDS agents decloaking on reddit, claiming to be “wormholer, btw,” despite all assertions by “real” wormholers to the contrary? Is high class J-space in such a poor state as a result of consolidations, as Teufel Morder suggests, that Holesale has to resort to… this? Is there a deeper and more personal reason, perhaps associated with ExookiZ and Chance holding an extended discussion on erections in wormholes?

Nykke suggest they are “just looking forward to having some hisec police roam,” but… 24 wardecs by a “wormhole” alliance? What’s New Eden coming to?