Jita Burn 2.0 Eve Online Live Stream THIS WEEKEND

[Katashi_itto]

http://www.twitch.tv/daopa

http://www.livestream.com/live2030

For quite some time, the Jita solar system has been the most populated solar system in EVE Online on a sustained basis, having organically risen as the main player trade hub in game due to its location and the basic human need to gather together and trade stuff.

It's had a varied reputation as [wretched hive of scum, villainy and scammers], [representative product of EVE's emergent sandbox game design], [indefatigable cog of economic prosperity], and [rallying point for impassioned protestors].

And, starting last night, it was on fire.

Actually, Jita itself wasn't on fire, but thousands of players who normally find it a "safe" haven of trade and economic gameplay found their ships on fire - everything from a lonely hauler on up to the simply massive, highly-armored freighters moving thousands of USD equivalents of ships and goods.

As you can see from the below "kill" heatmap of the EVE universe (where each dot is one of the 5,431 solar systems in EVE's known universe), it was a pretty big deal.


And it all happened because a few players wanted to make it happen and then, after convincing thousands of others to join them from around the world, they made it happen.

"BURN JITA"

For several months now, a coalition of thousands of players have been planning the "Burn Jita" event, aimed at disrupting the biggest trade hub in game in order to wreak some terrific, universe-wide changes by shaking the very pillars of EVE's economy at its metaphorical heart. Surely there was some sort of larger, meta-economic objective that likely would cause them great profit. This planning happened both in game and outside of game, via voice over IP chat, secret forums, Twitter and more. A sci-fi plot of the new information age if there ever was one.

Using game mechanics and some very impressive logistics, the coalition, lead by a group known as Goonswarm, amassed a tremendous amount of manpower and ships in a concentrated effort that would probably make many real life military strategists jaw-drop. Bravado-saturated propaganda was also a pretty big part of their plot.

Fast forward to Friday: Player fleets comprised of high-damage-dealing ships began to destroy high-value industrial ships during a sustained campaign with single, coordinated volleys, sacrificing themselves in waves because the in-game "police" warps in almost immediately with harsh, reprimanding justice.

Amidst this orchestrated chaos, opportunistic salvagers profited from the wrecks left behind and EVE's deep, talented player community began blogging about, filming, screenshotting, livestreaming and celebrating/decrying the event. Some opposing fleets rose up to fight the invading hordes as well - to mixed success.

All of it occured in the same framework of unrestricted player movement and limitless player choice in a single, shared game universe. As our senior producer put it "f*cking brilliant". As a participating player put it: "There’s just something special about building 15,000 spaceships and loading their guns with 1 round of ammo to shoot. And doing it right in front of the police."

As developers we watched in awe at another amazing thing our players brought to the universe we created. Yet there was a lot more going on behind the scenes on our end besides popcorn and a comfy chair...

THE VERY TECHNICAL SIDE

Since the "Burn Jita" event was announced well in advance and CCP wants to support player-driven events (as long they are within the rules of the game), we reinforced the Jita solar system on our beefiest hardware, further reinforced all neighbouring systems and set out to monitor the event and provide the best experience we could to willing (and unwilling) participants. Then things started to unfold a day earlier than announced on Friday morning. We gathered data and fine-tuned the systems and as CCP Veritas put it: "It's okay, didn't want that Friday night anyway."