I started in 2004 and played on and off until 2015 with a quick stint in 2020.

It was amazing in the early days, it felt like nothing else. I had a background in Ultima Online and Dark Age of Camelot. I liked PVP and I wanted full loot drop on kill.

EVE online has many times been referred to as the spiritual successor of UO, what made it really special however was the one server architecture (until China shard).

My name was Dieter Rams—I ganked, scammed and griefed. I probably made a lot of people quit the game; this was the appeal. I wanted to play a game where I could be the villain (successfully).

This was the original trailer for the game, in my opinion the true vision: https://youtu.be/GwpgXFA3UQk

Over the years it lost its soul as the internet grew, social media became more prevalent and information disseminated more rapidly (watch madseasonshow on youtube for a great coverage on this topic) around the optimal ways to play etc.

All MMOs suffered for this, you could look everything up before doing anything and so the sense of discovery and adventure was lost. The frontier was no longer undiscovered, and once pay to win came into play everything came off the rails.

The developer made this video in 2014:

This is EVE - Uncensored https://youtu.be/AdfFnTt2UT0

This is when I quit for real or as the EVE players say "won EVE".

A better comedic version of the video is this one by Honorable Third Party (typical EVE humor): This is REALLY EvE https://youtu.be/LmS9vcVNr5A

I came back in 2020 for a month but it's like that saying you can't step into the same river twice. I was older but the game had also changed so much. Other players were pressuring me to multibox (play multiple accounts), it felt terrible.

I knew a guy who played 30 characters at the same time, his setup was a technical marvel but it made me sad what gaming had become. There was a similar issue with buffbots in Dark Age of Camelot.

The fact that EVE needs a new player tutorial says everything you need to know about the state of the game (and gaming in general). Everyone needs a lot of handholding these days, in 2004 you were just thrown into the universe with nothing but the chat and other players to help you out.

Figuring things out was part of the game.

There were no YouTube guides, no tutorial and no real money to make things easier. The playing field was equal no matter who you were.

The magic was lost because of money, it's always the money in the end.