It's been only two days since Incarna went live, but a lot has happened. Here's a summary of what's been going on.

Vanity Item Prices Spark Outrage

The Noble Exchange Store features six new cosmetic upgrades for characters. The price on these ranges from 1,000 to 12,000 Aurum for the 'Monocle'. With Aurum being converted from PLEX at a 1:3500 ratio, these items cost 0.3 to 3.4 PLEX. This coverts to 120m to 1.36b; or $10 to $70.

Player outrage against these prices are strong, pointing out that these items cost as much as a faction battleship or a dreadnaught with no actual in-game advantage. Player perception leading up to the availability of these goods was based on CCP describing them as microtransactions. With expensive items costing as much as several months of account time, it is difficult to call these 'micro'transactions. Player sentiment is that this these prices represent a cash-grab by CCP. CCP has not commented on this issue yet.

CEOs Protest Vanity Items By Banning Use

Starting with Alice Celadon of Pandemic Legion, CEOs of corporations are protesting the prices of vanity items by removing players who have purchased these items from their corporations and refusing to accept new applicants who have purchased vanity items. The impact of this on vanity item sales remains unknown.

Leaked CCP Memo Describes Future Pay-For-Items Model

Download here, password: 'dominixevenews24'.

First reported by Evenews24, this internal CCP memo, titled 'Greed is Good?' extensively covers what may be the future of the virtual goods market in EVE.

This document was initially confirmed to be authentic by CSM member Myxnee. At this time of writing, theFailheap Challenge site discussing the document was offline.

Page 1 of the document compares EVE players to golfers, and suggests that EVE players may enjoy spending more money to enhance their game experience. "[Eve players] might even go as far as buying a $500 leather jacket that matches the one their avatar is wearing. And all of these expenditures will actually improve their experience of the game and make them feel better about it and about themselves."

Page 2 of the document contains opinion pieces by two CCP employees about virtual good sales. Kristoffer Touborg writes in favor of virtual good sales, and includes a proposed virtual good: "Right now, you can store 50 personal fittings on our servers. ... Why not be able to add more storage space for a small amount of money?". John Turbefield writes against virtual good sales, noting that other games with virtual good sales, such a Lord of the Rings Online, do not charge a subscription fee: "It is worth pointing out though that they made almost everything microtransaction based and at the same time removed subscription fees. ... Making our customers feel like they are being 'double billed' to be able to play on the same level is just a step too far.'

Page 3 contains an article by Scott Holden discussing how virtual good sales would be implemented, along with examples. Items discussed include: "'nano-paints' that allow one to customize ships"; "new items, ammunition, ships"; "faction standings". One interesting note is that in sharp contrast to the high prices of current items, Holden suggests that, "No pair of pants, no matter how cool, should cost the same as a new Maserati."

Page 4 is written my Eino Joas and covers virtual goods sales in DUST514. The article suggests spectator viewing of DUST514 games will cost money: "To offset the cost of 'freeloading spectators', DUST will have a nominal cover charge". Virtual goods in DUST514 are also planned to degrade over time and require repurchase: "In the real world, light bulbs are engineered to last for a thousand hours and fashion cycles get people to buy new stuff season after season. If we are in this for the long run, we have to be thinking in similar terms regarding virtual goods."

Page 5 covers World of Darkness; I will not go over it here.

Player reaction to this memo has been strongly negative, with suggestions that CCP is 'selling out' and breaking game play balance by offering performance-enhancing items for cash. Most comments suggest that players do not have issues with non-functional vanity items at reasonable prices, but are opposed to being able to buy performance advantages with real cash.

Noteable Eve Players Cancel Subscriptions

Several well-known Eve players have canceled their subscriptions, including Paul Clavet and Ecliptic Rift. The Failheap Challenge website contained a thread where several other noteables, including Mxynee and Helicity had canceled their accounts, but that site is now offline.

Removal of Classic 'Station Spinning' Causes Protests

While in station, players in Incarna my elect to use the new Captain's Quarters, or disable it; disabling it provides a static picture of the interior. This has angered many players, who are requesting that the classic view of one's spaceship in the hangar be returned.

Captain's Quarters Causes Graphic Cards To Overheat

Numerous reports of graphic cards overheating while CQ was being used were reported on the EVE Online forums. CCP has responded to the issue by issuing a request for details. Players also report very poor performance in CQ even with modern hardware.

Pirate Faction Implants Broken

Players reported that pirate faction implants would disappear after Incarna, or only appear intermittently. A fix for this was included in downtime for June 23rd.

Damage Bonus Modules Stop Working

Players reported that damage-enhancing modules such as heatsinks, gyrostabilizers, and ballistic control units were no longer functioning; that is, they no longer provided any bonus. CCP has not commented on this issue.

If you have any additions or corrections, feel free to post a reply.