For sandbox game lovers, EVE is always the most special one. In this vast cosmic world, players drive a variety of starships through more than 8,000 galaxies and unknown wormholes. They may be allied in blood or fighting each other, and the history of human civilization for thousands of years has reappeared in another way in the boundless world of EVE. The ups and downs that have taken place as a result have also been passed on among players, becoming the best footnote to EVE's longevity.
If the game is also divided into big and small years, this year is undoubtedly a "big year" for EVE. With the launch of the version of the national service mobile game, the in-game war has also spread from the end game to the mobile game, the return of old players and the influx of new players, coupled with the rise of science fiction boom in recent years, so that the world that once belonged only to the captain (end gamer) has extended to the pilot (mobile game player) and even more potential people.
At the same time, the significance of EVE IP has long gone beyond the game itself with the active participation of players, and it is not so much a vast virtual universe as it has become a digital projection of reality. On closer examination, you will find that this projection is highly similar to the current hot concept of "metaverse": although the players' active stage is the virtual starry sky, their behavior history in the game, the formation of civilization ecology, but the simulation, deduction and even prediction of the real world. And this is also the combination and fusion of virtual reality pursued by the metaverse.
In this context, EVE has also officially launched the Emberless Civilization Plan and the Morning Dawn Civilization Plan, encouraging players to record and retain the story in the game as a systematic summary of player civilization. The launch of the two major brand plans has also aroused players' deeper thinking and enthusiasm, eager to record the civilization history of this sea of stars.
As part of this brand plan, on January 8, the EVE national service team also brought a large-scale event to players. This is not only a two-way rush between players and games, but also a civilizational festival in which virtual and reality are integrated, which also opens up new thinking about the universe and metaverse.
The two-ended civilization plan is online, breaking through the boundaries of the game
Placing human civilization on an infinitely extended time scale, an ultimate proposition appears before everyone's eyes - in the face of destructive factors that may occur at any time, how can human beings continue the fire of their own civilization? For this question, past science fiction works have given two kinds of answers: to explore inward, hoping that the eternal digital world represented by the metacosm will continue human civilization in the physical world; or to expand outwards, advocating the space constraints brought by the earth to human civilization by running to a more vast universe.
Eve, standing at the intersection of the two, gives the player the choice. At the beginning of September, EVE mobile games took the lead in launching the "Emberless Civilization Plan" online. This is a player-based co-creation project, the national service team invites players to keep their stories with EVE in the form of pictures or videos, and become a witness to the Infinity Civilization. In October, Duanyou also launched the "Morning Dawn Civilization Project", which is also committed to leaving players' stories in the digital universe.
Essentially, the Civilization Plan is the player's record of the in-game story. But from another point of view, the unique personal traces left by players in the EVE universe are also the true portrayal of the continuation of human civilization through the metacosm. From this perspective, the stories recorded by players are actually promoting the integration of the "universe" and the "meta-universe" and exploring more possibilities for inheriting the spark of civilization.
So, compared to the generous rewards, what really inspires players is the sense of historical mission to participate in it. The stories they share are not limited to the victory or defeat in the game, but also have many concerns about social issues and even history. If these stories are compiled into a book, it is like a "cosmic history book" and becomes the most faithful recorder of human civilization in the digital age.
In GameLook's view, this is undoubtedly a project to break through the boundaries of the game, which makes inward exploration and outward expansion no longer a single choice. In the virtual world, players record, organize, and even try to spread human civilization to distant space, which is also an important task of the space industry in the real world. Therefore, this player-led civilization plan is not only the best interpretation of the spiritual connotation of EVE, but also allows every participant to truly feel the thickness of civilization inheritance and the romance of space exploration.
It is a grand ceremony and an academy, reshaping the imagination of civilization
Without prior knowledge, you would have mistakenly thought that the EVE Civilization Festival was an academic sociology course. The gathering of science fiction writers, aerospace experts, social scholars, and many big coffee not only made this grand event full of stars, but also brought a strong academic atmosphere.
And this academic style is also caused by EVE's player tone. In a sense, this grand ceremony is a continuation of the plan of a two-ended civilization. Like the questions and reflections that players have left in the digital world, the experts and scholars at the festival are also discussing the ultimate proposition about human civilization.
From the initial conditions of chaos, even if the core of civilization is different, it will eventually develop a large social order and a high degree of free personal identity, which is an inevitable result of the development of civilization, or a basic cause? Will individual freedom clash with social order?
These seemingly cloudy topics are not only the issues of real society, but also the melody that has always existed in the world of EVE. The planned order will suppress the development of diversity, so there will always be players in the game who will be dissatisfied with the huge alliance and pursue freedom and jump out of resistance. Therefore, this discussion is not only a review of the real civilization of the big coffee, but also a re-understanding of the EVE world by players, and a reshaping of the "civilization".
The famous science fiction writer Jiang Bo pointed out that the contradiction between respect for social order and the pursuit of individual freedom runs through the development of human society. From the perspective of the development of human civilization, a healthy and upward society needs to combine efficiency, nor can it lead to social rigidity and inelasticity due to the extreme suppression of individual freedom. In a sense, human society is in balance in the collision of free nature and social nature. EVE, on the other hand, is like a large-scale sociological experiment, in which the player's decision-making behavior in the game is actually a choice between order and freedom, between the collective and the individual. Whether it is to jump out of the existing order or accept moderate oppression, it is to personally observe and experience the opposition and unity of the free individuality and sociality of human society.
The famous science fiction writer Chen Xifan said that in the process of future cosmic exploration, human beings will face countless extreme natural environments, so it is necessary to invent a new order to build a new social and civilization form and adapt to the new era. This new order is essentially a new way of playing, and the process of trial and error of EVE players is actually a deeper understanding of the nature of the universe, reality and human consciousness through the way of games. Through games, humans can reach a deeper, more essential, and more magnificent universe that no spaceship or faster-than-light flight can reach. If human beings really have the opportunity to travel freely in space in the future, how can they live more intelligently and make choices that are more in line with the overall development direction of civilization? In-game practices are likely to become useful references to reality.
The two writers also expressed their hope at the ceremony that they hope to create unique story content inspired by the stories of EVE players in the future.
Wei Xiangquan, chief designer of the 805 Institute of the Eighth Academy of Aerospace of China, also recognized EVE's contribution to space exploration through the form of games. He said that the players' experience in EVE may also be able to bring certain inspiration and reference to China's aerospace industry in the future, and he also hopes that in the future, he will have the opportunity to let domestic EVE players participate in scientific research plans and contribute to China's aerospace industry.
Therefore, GameLook believes that as the discussion of civilization, the universe and the future at the grand ceremony, EVE, which has the prototype of the metaverse, actually provides a new way for human cognition of these issues. Many boundaries and restrictions of the real world constrain people's way of thinking, and the Internet-based sandbox world provides more room for human imagination and creativity. In EVE's metaverse, people can get rid of the laws of physics and freely examine and think about the evolution of life and the evolution of civilization from the perspective of God, so as to obtain conclusions that are difficult to obtain in the real world, and ultimately provide directional guidance for the development of space exploration and the future of human civilization.
Beyond the sea of stars, the meta-universe ecology of self-growth
In a sense, EVE has surpassed the existence of the game for players. Compared with the average gamer, EVE players tend to have obvious differences in terms of age level and social experience. Many of them are also elite leaders in all walks of life in their daily lives, and as a result, they have a stronger enthusiasm for participating in real-world issues. In May last year, after the death of Academician Yuan Longping, EVE players spontaneously organized commemorative activities in the game for the first time to express their remembrance of the great recipient of the Order of the Republic. For captains, this act of expressing concerns about social hotspots through in-game channels has become a daily routine in EVE.
In fact, this two-way interaction between the real world and the virtual world is also one of the important characteristics of the metaverse that distinguishes it from the general virtual community. At the NetEase Future Conference held in December last year, Hu Zhipeng, vice president of NetEase, said that the metacosm will not exist independently of human society, and as a useful supplement to the real society, the two will complement each other and are irreplaceable.
Therefore, whether it is the spontaneous behavior of players, or the creation of the civilization ceremony and brand plan of the national service team, it is essentially a specific practice of EVE to break the boundary between virtual and reality. With the game as the carrier, EVE is building a meta-universe ecology of its own, which can not only accommodate the brilliant galaxy, but also carry the infinite imagination of every captain and pilot for human civilization.
On this basis, the participation and creation of each player will leave a unique trajectory in this metaverse, which will also make EVE's metaverse ecology grow and thrive on its own. For this science fiction game set in space, the sea of stars is only the starting point, and through the re-cognition and re-exploration of human civilization in the meta-universe ecology, it will be the most distinctive main line of EVE for a long time in the future.
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