The CEO of a 22-year-old Space MMO says PC is still the center of innovation in gaming

Eve Online is a free-to-play sandbox MMORPG with a persistent world, where players can choose from a wide variety of roles and explore the game in their own unique way. From mining and exploration to piracy and law enforcement, players are given limitless options for how to play. Developed by CCP Games and released in 2003, the game has grown in content, scope, and its player base. It is currently ranked Mostly Positive with over 27,000 positive reviews. 

There is also a social sandbox aspect to the game, where players form relationships that play into the game, for example, different alliances working with or against each other to their own benefit. This approach to the game has led to some interesting moments throughout its over 2-decade lifespan. The event known as “Judge’s Betrayal,” for example, is seen as one of its most consequential events.

The ‘Betrayal’ is considered one of the most notable twists of its kind, where a player known as Judge spent several years in an alliance called the Circle of 2, or Co2. After becoming one of its highest-ranking members and a diplomat, Judge relieved Co2 of all its assets, including what was described as a Death Star equivalent space fortress, and sold them to their rivals, the alliance known as The Imperium. 

The core of the game revolves around player-driven choices, the content, the drama, and the events that lead to them, and beyond, all made possible by the player's input, and all these relationships are genuine. Real bonds created over years of interaction, each player has their own story in the ever-growing overarching story of Eve Online.

This kind of innovative gameplay is what CCP, the developers of Eve Online, CEO Hilmar Veigar Pétursson, believes is most commonly found in PC gaming. "I think most of the innovation in gaming has happened on PC, to some extent on mobile, just because of sheer volume," Pétursson told PC Gamer at EVE Fanfest. "But I don't think we're observing a lot of innovation in mobile right now. I think we're observing a lot of refinement and execution and formula, kind of hardening. On PC, we still see a lot of experimentation." he continued.

Pétursson admits that discovering games on the PC is still tricky. Still, platforms like Steam and Itch.io have played a massive role in encouraging it. "success comes out of very random places," he added, "remains strong against all odds," in reference to these platforms. 

PC Gamer reminisced with Pétursson about past times when people had declared ‘PC gaming’ as dead. "The death certificate has been signed several times," Pétursson added.

Using the very popular game Cuphead as an example, Pétursson explained, "PC seems to be an environment where a lot of these kinds of things just come alive. When I love a game, it's so deeply PC." He continued by noting that modding was so strong on the PC. It’s also worth noting that games like Counter-Strike and Dota 2 started as mods. He explained that this is an aspect of the game that they will implement heavily in their current in-development project, EVE Frontier.

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