According to Cointelegraph, CCP Games, the developer and publisher of Eve Online, officially announced its upcoming massively multiplayer online survival game, Eve Frontier, on September 12. The game will feature a unique blockchain integration, allowing players to create their own self-contained economies with a built-in digital-to-fiat bridge.
In a recent interview with CCP executives, it was revealed that players will have the freedom to create their own cryptocurrencies, trade digital assets for real-world commodities, and vice versa. CCP Games detailed the game's “community-driven and dynamic economy” in a recent blog post, stating that players can “create custom currencies, establish markets, and trade assets, services, and reputation in a truly open environment.”
Hilmar Pétursson, CEO of CCP Games, commented, “EVE Frontier redefines the survival genre by fusing intense space survival gameplay with the limitless emergent potential of a player-driven, persistent sandbox universe. From exploiting space itself to shaping entire economies, every decision ripples across this dark and uncompromising expanse.” Players will have access to their own spaces where they can establish their own rules, including what currencies are accepted and what services are available.
The core gameplay loop revolves around obtaining resources to build and expand individual player empires. Eve Frontier’s most distinguishing feature may be its player-controlled economy. As previously reported by Cointelegraph, the game was intentionally designed to be blockchain-capable, although CCP Games has been reticent to explain exactly what that meant until now. Even in its most recent communication, the company does not refer to the underlying blockchain technology allowing server-side player augmentations to the gaming world.
Allowing players to dictate how currency is created, valued, and earned in an economy-driven sandbox could become a valuable social experiment. Eve Online, the original title in the “Eve universe” on which Eve Frontier is based, has a long history of large-scale player-coordinated events, such as years-long wars involving tens of thousands of players. Expanding the idea of a player-driven economy from the game world itself to the outside world via blockchain could result in the proliferation of game-coins with real-world value tied directly to their in-game worth.