Part-MMO, part-FPS, Eve Vanguard's devs are toying with a fascinating solution for bad in-game behaviour: leverage toxic players' actions for content

Eve Vanguard is a strange proposition: part-MMO, part-FPS, part-companion game to the seemingly eternal juggernaut that is Eve Online, it’s developer CCP’s latest attempt to make a shooter that works as part of the storied universe. And I think, so far, it shows a lot of promise. The potential in Vanguard is the result of a passionate team being given (relatively) free rein to do what they want, as long as it’s fun and abides by the Eve bible. In a world where many developers are looking at smaller games with shorter development cycles, Vanguard’s gestation time – and trust from its parent company – is an increasingly rare thing.

But it’s driven by trust, and a genuine desire to see something like Vanguard take off. Bigwigs at CCP have told me, directly, that getting a shooter in the world of Eve to work is “an age-old dream CCP has been wanting to realise.” And it’s not for lack of trying. Previously, we’ve had Dust 514, the cult MMOFPS PS3 game that CCP worked on with Sony in 2013, which shut down in 2016. Since then, we’ve heard about both Project Nova and Project Legion, neither of which made it to release. Now, there’s Vanguard – a game I’ve personally been following for quite some time.

As such, I’ve seen the development process first-hand, seen how the ambitious shooter fleshes out. I’ve played it when the guns didn’t even really have models, when enemies were just amorphous grey blobs. But CCP London has been open about it every step of the way – and when it unveiled the new direction (more 00s space shooter than bland military sim), I was thrilled. It offered something different: a take on the Tarkov-like shooter that puts fun before punishment.