Thursday, 4 February 2016

Dust 514 RIP, new unspecified PC game (re)announced.

For those that don't know, Dust 514 (a first person shooter somewhat linked to Eve) is end of life, to be closed on May 30th, 2016.  https://forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=225484

CCP have plans to build something better on the PC. ... build a new game from scratch using Unreal Engine 4 while harnessing all our learnings from DUST 514 ...

CCP are a company, and have to have a reasonable expectation of a return of any new expenditure, preferably with a profit on top of that.  Other games can can be subsidized in part by Eve itself, and I encourage a level of risk with new ventures, but I understand closing what I understand to be a loss making venture. 

The Eve player base is PC based.  Dust was Play Station 3, and that platform is very much end of life.

I have never played Dust, I do not own a console, and in general do not play first person shooters.

The Dust players who are about to have their internet pixels turned off have my sympathy, and it is a sobering reminder to us playing other games, that hosted platforms can indeed be turned off.

Dust players have the consolation prize of tiered recognition rewards. 

I have been involved in software development far too long, and know well enough that software delivery always takes far longer than the developers and their publishers think.

Once on a PC I will even have a closer look at the new game.  Fanfest will have more details in April.  I ... just would prefer to see a little more 'sugar coating', possibly in the form of a real replacement game, to soften the blow to our cousins in Eve, either that or possibly a longer period of life support to tide players over until the new software arrives.

Who knows, I maybe overly pessimistic, and there might be a new game released before the end of May.  Maybe, but probably we will be without an Eve FPS for a while.

1 comment:

  1. At least CCP are not re-inventing the wheel. By using the well established Unreal4 which already has several titles to its name. There would hopefully be a base of developers within the industry experienced with its application.

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