Eve Online Developer Opens U.K. Studio

[Greg Tito]

Eve Online Developer Opens U.K. Studio

The company behind space economy MMOG, Eve Online, has opened a new studio in Newcastle, UK.

CCP, an acronym for Crowd Control Productions, is a game developer based in Iceland most well known for creating and running Eve Online. But the company is trying to expand. In 2006, CCP acquired the tabletop gaming company, White Wolf, in order to harness its expertise in offline game product. In August 2009, CCP announced that it was developing a FPS at a studio in Shanghai, China, called Dust 514. Then yesterday, CCP said that they are opening a new studio in the U.K. Plans are in place to hire 10 to 20 staff who will work closely with the headquarters in Reykjavík and the office in China.

It was not revealed whether the office will handle game development or support such as game mastering or customer relations. CCP recently hired Robert Troughton, former employee of Midway's Newcastle studio, however, which lends credence to the fact that this new studio might concentrate on making new games.

The question is: what game will it work on? Part of the deal with White Wolf was that CCP would be able to create games based on some of the tabletop company's IP. The Newcastle CCP studio may in fact begin work on a MMOG based on the World of Darkness ruleset and setting.

A Vampire: The Masquerade MMOG? Badass.

Source: Gamesindustry [http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/eve-online-developer-ccp-opens-uk-office]

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[Onyx Oblivion]

A Vampire space economy MMOG?

Well...they're not doing that. I hope.

 

[DarkSaber]

I was under the impression that a World of Darkness had been in production for some time already, but possibly caught in Development Hell.

 

[BlindTom]

Vampire: The Masquerade is mindblowingly underrated.

 

[Gildan Bladeborn]

The only problem I can foresee with a Vampire: The Masquerade MMO is all the other people playing it - I love the setting and characters of that particular RPG, but the people who actually played the PnP version tend to trend firmly towards the Ann Rice side of the spectrum, and prospect of interacting with literal hordes of those types is... not very appealing.

I'd rather they just make another single-player game like Bloodlines, only you know, less buggy.

 

[thenumberthirteen]

Sweet! That's where I live! When it opens I shall attempt to infiltrate the studio and bring back juicy information.

Actually its a good place as the university there has some good games development courses, so plenty of interns. I'll see if I can get a job there.

 

[Lucifron]

The World of Darkness MMO has been in the works ever since CCP acquired White Wolf. I was under the impression that their US studio has been working on it.

An expansion into the UK seems logical, as much of EVE Online's playerbase is British, and the server cluster for EVE Online is located there.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

A Vampire: The Masquerade MMOG? Badass.

Oh. My. God.

I am THERE like Malkav baby.

 

[More Fun To Compute]

Hopefully this will be the game about vampire space pirates that we have all been waiting for.

 

[Femaref]

An expansion into the UK seems logical, as much of EVE Online's playerbase is British, and the server cluster for EVE Online is located there.

orly. Most of the playerbase is from the USA, second Russia and third around Europe.

 

[Jared]

Shame. Wish I lived nearer would hound em for a job!

 

[Sneaklemming]

omg... what an unbelievable tease...

 

[Nicolai]

The White Wolf MMO has ben in development for well over a year now. CCP have been pushing ahead withthe project, but there's been no word on how far.

Also, no idea if it's a Vampire or a full World of Darkness MMO, which would include Changelings, Werewolves, Mages and various other factions and potentially make it far more interesting. I trust CCP to make something interesting and hopefully not too mainstream which may put off the WoW-playing Anne Rice fans, but should leave people who want a bit more out of their MMOs a place to go. We'll see how it pans out.

 

[stompythebeast]

lmfao, vampire space pirates, good one sir

 

[Valksy]

It does look as if the new CCP office is in game development - I see from the website that they are seeking physics and rendering engineers. It isn't just customer service. Doubt they will have much problem finding qualified people - Midway used to have a development studio in Newcastle but it went to the wall a while ago.

 

[Amnestic]

So that's what CCP stands for.

Nice to see they're expanding though. Proof that you don't need a millions upon million strong MMO playerbase to stay afloat and make a profit.

 

[Little Duck]

Awwww. Until this moment, all British developers have been releasing good games. God dammit.

But in all honesty though, I look forward to the geordie powered shooter.

 

[hansari]

Vampire: The Masquerade is mindblowingly underrated.

True but there were a ridiculous amount of bugs in it, enough to crash your pc once or twice...

Seriously though, no one bring up a Bloodlines MMO...its just cruel unless its 100% true...

 

[BobisOnlyBob]

It's unlikely it'd be based on Vampire: the Masquerade. More likely to be New World of Darkness, Vampire: the Requiem or possibly even Werewolf/Mage.

 

[Wuvlycuddles]

A Vampire: The Masquerade mmo would be pure awesooooome, however, i fully predict a plague of "lestats" in the game, just like every other mmo with elves suffer from legolas syndrome.