Sympathy for CCP Devil

While many of you were watching the o7 show, I was in a conference call with a vendor at work.  Perhaps I was thinking of what I was missing, but I had a momentary and fractional vision of what it must be like to be a customer-facing CCP Dev.  Mind you, my colleague and I were being a lot more polite to the vendor than your average toxin-zombie on reddit, but as we went over the mockups for the proposed new functionality the vendor was offering I had a thought process that many CCP watchers have experienced.

What were they thinking?  Seriously, how much thought did they put into this?  How much of a priority is our business really for them, if this is what they are offering and on this time schedule?

As we wrapped up the call, I mentioned to the vendor's product manager that I had sympathy for them.  I've seen our own people come out of calls with customers with puzzled looks on their faces that probably are very similar to how the CCP devs leave some interactions with Eve players.

Do they not get how this stuff works?  Did we not communicate well enough why this new functionality is great and will make their life so much better?  Why are they so stuck on their current processes when we're showing them how using this new process will do everything better - they just have to make some changes to do it.  Does that one guy just have an actual steel rod stuck up his ass?

Now back home from work I'm watching the o7 show and skimming over the new dev blogs. Oh man, watching this o7 show on replay via twitch is painful.  Play, wait for it to buffer, play some more.  But at least it matches well with getting the kids ready for bed.  And did all of you immediately know who Mike Azariah was by his appearance even before the name-tag appeared?

That vendor I mentioned was providing functionality related to agile software development.  There's a good analogy there to CCP.  Part of my frustration with that vendor is that delivering the complete package that I want for my users is far away and is only being provided in dribs and drabs.  Little pieces that do as much to frustrate our users at what is missing as make them rejoice at what they're getting.  Sound familiar?

So welcome back expansions.  Welcome back longer wait times to get a bigger big bang.  Will that be the silver bullet that turns every werewolf on reddit back into a starry-eyed newbie in love with the scope and potential in Eve?

Of course not.  I still feel there are some people who are just so wrapped up in their bitterness that there is nothing that CCP can do to turn them around.  The only solution for those people is either to take a break from Eve or for them to try something completely new - and that's a choice that only they can make.

But for the rest of us - there is still a great vision that CCP Seagull is working towards.  The fact that CCP is willing to change the way they are doing things while pushing forward towards the greater roadmap is a great sign.  For those of us not overloaded on bitter-toxins it's a pretty cool future.

And until that arrives, I'll keep enjoying this game and the people I've met in it.



p.s. that Quafe Hyperion does look really sweet...