EVE quarterly economic newsletter highlights various facets of player activity
by James Egan 
Aug 29th 2009 at 8:00PM
Filed under: Sci-fi, EVE Online, Economy, MMO industry, Crafting
With all the info about the DUST 514 console MMO set in the EVE Online universe, and player-run banks in the game mirroring the financial meltdowns we read about in real world headlines, we didn't have much time to look over something that's quite unique to the game. EVE's developer CCP Games releases "Quarterly Economic Newsletters" (QEN) which show the various ways in which player actions affect the game universe, given its player-driven economy. The QEN for the second quarter of 2009 has been released and gives us a snapshot of player activity in EVE's single-shard world.
When you PvP in EVE, someone's going to win while other ships are obliterated. Someone manufactured the ship, modules, and ammunition you used to take down your opponents, likewise the ships and modules you destroyed were also created by other player characters somewhere in the New Eden galaxy -- players who have mined and refined, bought and sold materials needed to build the various items put to use by EVE's pilots every day.
The QEN goes beyond a simple analysis of supply and demand in a virtual economy and tracks the trends that run throughout EVE, providing useful information about things the players do in the sandbox. More than anything, the QENs are an overview of player activity in the game throughout the year.
This is the only massively multiplayer online title we're aware of where the in-game economy, entirely player-driven, is so dynamic that the developer has an economist on staff to study the in-game data. The Quarterly Economic Newsletters are put together by Dr. Eyjólfur Guðmundsson with the help of a small team of researchers focused on player activity in EVE. The end result is an easily understood snapshot of the game's economic activity for the playerbase to use.
What this latest QEN contains is really beyond the scope of this post, but we wanted to let you know about it. If you're into crafting in your MMO of choice, or are just curious about the things that happen in EVE Online's sandbox setting of New Eden, you can find the Quarterly Economic Newsletter for Q2 2009 in PDF format on the EVE Online site.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
DrewIW said on 8:24PM 8-29-2009
I'm surprised by the volume of T2 items that are still being produced from BPOs.
Reply
Benicio said on 1:15AM 8-30-2009
How so?
DrewIW said on 12:49PM 8-30-2009
@ Benicio
CCP introduced invention to try and open up the T2 market, and take some of the monopoly away from T2 BPO holders.
Unfortunately, the margins on so many inventions are so low, that many items are produced only from BPOs.
There's a reason that T2 BPOs (even relatively obscure ones) regularly sell for 10s of billions of ISK.
dwfowl said on 9:09AM 8-30-2009
Because, CCP doesn't give out T2 BPOs any more, all T2 items come from BPCs that have been researched from T1 BPOs.
Reply