Eve players have finally broken CCP. The Icelandic development team see themselves as caretakers to the game’s big personalities, and in the past have been happy to hold up their hands and watch their in-game Jitas burn.
But one player has found the company’s limits, after scratching out the name of a fellow pilot they disliked on Reykjavik’s new Eve monument.
“We will not tolerate this,” said community manager CCP Falcon.
“What’s happened is absolutely disgusting,” wrote Falcon on Eve’s official forums. “It’s an insult to the entire community and is clearly the work a person who believes that behavior in a virtual world is a valid reason to make a real life personal attack on someone, and deface public property.”
CCP have made very clear the distinction they draw between in-game animosity and real-world “criminal” damage – and say the majority of the Eve community are “in the same frame of mind”.
A number of players have already come forward to help CCP in their own investigation of the incident – including apparent members of the offending player’s alliance.
The developers are currently reviewing security footage from a number of buildings surrounding the monument, and have contacted the police.
Falcon invited the player responsible for the vandalism to contact him personally – an act CCP would take as a “gesture of good faith”. Nevertheless, the developers intend to take action against any related game accounts, as well as “any legal action that we feel necessary”.
“Eve is real life” – that’s the mantra CCP and their pilots live and play by, and it’s not terribly surprising that its politics and personal vendettas occasionally spill over into this marginally more tangible realm. Is it forgivable, though?
Thanks, Polygon.