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EVETV - Sport For Nerds 150

Posted by Zonk from the pretty-lights dept.
Your grandparents will be watching golf tonight, so why not watch some sports of your own? If golf isn't your thing, then perhaps multi-ton space vessels slamming each other with lasers and missiles might be more entertaining? Virgin Worlds is carrying some details for the riveting EveTV. Today, the channel is in reruns, but tune in anyway to see some matches from the last few days. Footage from ongoing PVP matches in the space MMOG EVE Online will make your Sunday go by much quicker. From the article: "The commentary is just like a traditional sports cast and the fellows calling the matches seem quite knowledgeable not only on the technicals of play, but also the backgrounds of the competitors. If you have an opportunity to check it out, I recommend it. Kudos to CCP for organizing this event."
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EVETV - Sport For Nerds More

EVETV - Sport For Nerds

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  • Your grandparents will be watching golf tonight
    That's presuming a bit much.

  • I don't watch sports. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Poromenos1 ( 830658 ) on Sunday July 16, 2006 @01:12PM (#15728422) Homepage
    I don't watch sports because I don't like sports, not because there are none I like. If I was going to watch something, I'd watch football (soccer to you), not some people playing Eve.

    If I wanted to do that, I'd go to a net cafe and stand over people's shoulders.

    • Don't knock it 'til you've tried it. (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Taevin ( 850923 ) * on Sunday July 16, 2006 @01:21PM (#15728461)
      This is not just watching "some people play EVE." These are quick, 5-on-5, tournament style battles between alliances. I really don't see any difference between that and watching a physical sporting event. "Watching people play EVE" sounds like "watching football players practice for the game," which is not what this is.

      If you haven't or don't play EVE, it might be hard for you to enjoy (unless you just like watching space ships blow each other up ;). For those of us that do play, it's fun to have open in another window to watch the alliances we fight with every day get their asses handed to them by a relatively unknown one.

    • Re:I don't watch sports. (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Wow, that added nothing to the conversation....just because you don't like something doesn't mean the rest of us don't.

    • Re:I don't watch sports. (Score:4, Interesting)

      by MillionthMonkey ( 240664 ) on Sunday July 16, 2006 @01:33PM (#15728500)
      Screw multi-ton space vessels.

      The sport *I* would like to see would be a normal sport, like football, soccer, or hockey, where the "no drugs" pretense has been dropped, no testing is perormed, and players are encouraged to enhance their performance by any means possible wink wink. A game where all the players are on uppers and going through 'roid rage would make me more interested in the sport.
      • In other words, it would be almost exactly like professional sports today. Steriod testing is currently a joke.
        • Almost. The pretense is still there that it is a drug-free game.

          I think you'd see much more steroid use if that pretense were dropped. Currently our athletes are forced to choose steroids based on their serum trace and the chance of being caught, instead of just choosing the best steroid for the job which should be their ONLY consideration. If everyone is on steroids anyway then as a fan I want my team to be on the best steroids.
      • You mean like professional wrestling?

        That's pretty much what any sport would eventually turn into if you did that. (especially if the point is to witness a "'roid rage")

      • Or they could go back to the old fashioned blood-sports. I don't think there was ever generating a sellout at the Roman arenas.
      • The sport *I* would like to see would be a normal sport, like football, soccer, or hockey, where the "no drugs" pretense has been dropped, no testing is perormed, and players are encouraged to enhance their performance by any means possible wink wink. A game where all the players are on uppers and going through 'roid rage would make me more interested in the sport.

        I hate to be the one to break it to you, this is the sport you *already* watch - the only difference is that the players are also taking masking

  • Windows-only (Score:2, Informative)

    by tomhudson ( 43916 )
    http://ccp.vo.llnwd.net/o2/EVE_3913a.exe [llnwd.net]

    "You have chosen to download EVE_3913_a.exe"

    no thanks.

    • Works in Cedega (possibly Wine too but I couldn't say).

      You must have an extremely small game collection if that's your reaction to a Windows game. Don't get me wrong, games are **the only** reason I still have a Windows partition; but I guess I just like computer games too much to stubbornly refuse to use a crappy operating system on principle alone.

    • Re:Windows-only (Score:3, Informative)

      by Silverlancer ( 786390 )
      It runs almost flawlessly on Cedega, and its on the top of the list of games that Wine is working on supporting.

  • No (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Lord_Dweomer ( 648696 ) on Sunday July 16, 2006 @01:16PM (#15728440) Homepage
    Its been said before and I'll say it again...the reason TV for gamers will have difficulty taking off the way traditional sports TV has is that in order to have a good professional sports team, you need a lot of athletes at the peak of physical fitness. For computer games you bar is much lower and thus there is a much larger percent of the population who, even though they might not be the "best of the best" could still give them a run for their money.

    So you're wondering "big deal, why does that affect things?"

    Simple. People for the most part would rather PLAY video games than watch them.

    • Yes (Score:2)

      by xigxag ( 167441 )
      It's probably not going to happen with EVE Online, but it will happen one day. Actually, it's already happened (in a sense) with Texas Hold-Em. One of its primary attractions is that, often, anyone from anywhere can join the tournament. If you join, you might not get far, But even so, if not you, then people you know or have interacted with will be playing at world-class levels. The illusion that only a bit of luck and practice separates you from the upper echelons is a large part of what keeps the fish
    • People for the most part would rather PLAY video games than watch them.

      They said the same thing about sports. "What? Broadcast a soccer/football match to nobody in particular and you actually expect people to get enjoyment sitting on their couch for hours watching OTHER people playing it? And that, between plays, we could actually get paid to pitch products to them and they'd enjoy it?"
       
      • Since the dawn of civilization, sports have been watched by more people than were playing. The Mayans had huge audiences for their ball games, as did the ancient Greeks with their Olympics.

        Start up a basketball game in a park, and a few people might sit down on the nearby benches and watch. Hold a little-leage baseball game, and parents will sit in bleachers with video cameras.

        So with the rich tradition of people finding enjoyment in watching sports, it was natural that broadcast media would pick it up.
        • Nobody in the history of mankind has ever said, "hey, I've got an idea. Let's go out and watch people play computer games. That would be the perfect way to spend an evening!"

          What a lousy argument. For how much of "the history of mankind" have videogames existed? That aside, many sports today appeal to large members of the population because they grew up watching them on TV. If videogames ever reach the same kind of critical mass that sports currently has, I doubt it will be much different. We already ha
    • For computer games you bar is much lower and thus there is a much larger percent of the population who, even though they might not be the "best of the best" could still give them a run for their money.

      This is mostly untrue. Ever heard of Professional StarCraft players? These guys train every day. Some Professional StarCraft players have over 300APM (actions per minute) [youtube.com]. I guarantee that an average player have no chance of beating these professional players.

      Simple. People for the most part would rathe
      • Your link mostly proved how fantastically boring it is to watch people play video games. That was even more dull than I would have guessed.

        As for the quick shot of what appeared to be maybe 70 people attending the event... It was obviously a convention crowd. Go to any sci-fi or anime convention in Japan, Korea, or the US, and you can get a crowd that big to gather for just about anything. There was a far bigger crowd than that at this year's Anime Expo for the sushi-cooking demonstration.
        • Your link mostly proved how fantastically boring it is to watch people play video games. That was even more dull than I would have guessed.

          It was boring for you. That doesn't mean it's boring to EVERYONE. The spectators were obviously into the match (there seemed to be much more than 70 btw). If they were just there for a convention, I don't think they would have been cheering the winner with such excitement. I thought the match was really interesting because I used to play starcraft religously when I wa
    • Bunch of fat slobs playing and a person watching at home has a chance of beating them.

      Yet there must be 20 poker shows a week (not counting multiple airings).

    • From Kotaku [kotaku.com]:

      DirectTV and IGN have teamed up with Microsoft and a bunch of other companies to put together a new pro-gaming series that launches next year.

      The Championship Gaming Series is a new professional gaming league that will air competitions exclusively on DirectTV.

      Now I agree with you - watching people play video games can be atkin to viewing a paint drying contest - but something sees something in it.

    • I would cite the active communities of Quake, and Quake 3 DM and Tourney Footage as against what you say.

      Once you actually know the games inside and out seeing what the best players are thinking and their little tricks is quite entertaining.

      I just saw a match in a game I'd never played and it was great fun to watch.
  • Where's the Natalie Portman Grits-pool Freestyle?
  • Even with the low video quality and the odd buffering issues it is still better than most of the shows that are on the networks right now. Actually, I'm listening to the commentary as I'm posting this and it's better than listening to College Football on the radio. Sure, that's just my opinion, but I can't stand most of the shows that play during prime time.

    Give it a try. The worst that can happen is you waste a few minutes of your time. Better than watching another episode of Survivor: New Jersey or
  • I'm not trying to troll, but maybe someone can help me by explaining what is so "incredible" about EVE? I played it once back when a trial was opened to the public and had trouble finding anything very interesting about the game. The game was large in the sense you could go many places, but it was constant flying back and forth. I never got far enough to do PvP, but I can't imagine it being heart stopping. Outside of fighting, you were stuck trading, mining, and building.

    Is this just one of those games that

    • Outside of fighting, you were stuck trading, mining, and building.

      Absolutely, in the same sense that Doom, outside of fighting, was just running to the next area and picking up powerups. Perhaps it just caters to players with a longer attention span that want to feel like they are accomplishing something (even if it is in a virtual world) - like every MMORPG.

      One of the nice things about EVE is that you can focus almost exclusively on one type of gameplay that you like. Want to mine and build stuff? Go

    • Re:Maybe someone can help me (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Well, simple:

      Eve has one server for all players. the peak concurrent user count was 26000, in one "shard".
      Eve is incredibly complex game, and very well balanced.
      well, and these things result in a very good PvP environment.

      For features go visit the webpage, because eve has come a long way since its release.
      Some Namedropping:
      Player built Outposts(spacestations) and smaller strucktures.
      ships in all flavors (frigates,cruisers, covert ops, battleships, carriers, logistics, support,transports, mortherships, titan
    • What's so incredible is that the game doesn't tell you what to do. There aren't "career options" that the developers give you - PvP, mining, and missions are just the common ones that everybody comes up with (the developers recently said that when the game was released, they had no intention of having mining be a career - the players just did it). If you want to do anything in the game, you have to invent the ability to do it. There are lottery managers, casino managers, industry tycoons, bookies, etc. e
      • I suppose the 2 week trial that I messed around with a few years ago doesn't really do the game justice enough.

        Based on the replies, the things I found very dull (mining, trading, building, etc), seem to gain more depth the longer you play the game. The 2 week trial just barely allowed the player to brush the surface of the game. Based on the replies, the way people place EVE reminds me a lot of UO (old UO, pre-Renaissance), it is just the setting is different.

        And from being a fan of UO, I can understand it
        • I was a UO junkie, and I have to say that eve brought me back to MMORPGs. I also was actually able to enjoy the PVP (which is actually not all griefing, and griefers can be avoided) and loot/weath systems, and social aspects of the game.

          The big selling point and reason that people don't like Eve is that there is a huge amount of depth and not a whole lot of direction after the "primer" tutorial missions. There are no "rails" or path and there is no "winning eve". That said, there are tycoons fixing marke
    • It's fun, but once you realize that the people who run the game, also play *alot* you start to feel cheated out of the high end content. I don't really blame them, they orchestrate the publicity in the mmorpg world pretty good (this is one example). There is also a concerted effort and ongoing patches that are driving the game ever and ever more towards PvP -- which makes the safer aspects of the game less fun and much less profitable. If you like individual or "solo" play, you can forget about experienc
      • There is also a concerted effort and ongoing patches that are driving the game ever and ever more towards PvP
        The entire game revolves around PvP, so it's pretty hard to make it more PvP centric than it already is.

    • Re:Maybe someone can help me (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      For one thing- Eve has a free 2 week trial program. If you want to try it, google for it. No CC needed.

      The thing about eve is the PVP. It's one of few games that dieing can actually cost you something. Or everything. You can spend your entire eve career never entering PVP. I wouldn't suggest it.

      I would suggest getting a few months in the game, and then trying to engage in combat with another player. You won't have a problem finding someone to fight. And when you notice your heart rate going thru the
    • The world is littered with throw away titles, they vary in quality from craptacular to superlative, but the common thread is they're good for a day, a week, perhaps even a few months, then you are done with them and there's not much interest in replaying them. Then there is that small subset that are not throwaway, that are able to hold people's interest indefinately. These invariable get the rave comments from fans, because they contain a depth of interaction that often goes beyond the developer's intentio
    • I'm not trying to troll, but maybe someone can help me by explaining what is so "incredible" about EVE? I played it once back when a trial was opened to the public and had trouble finding anything very interesting about the game. The game was large in the sense you could go many places, but it was constant flying back and forth. I never got far enough to do PvP, but I can't imagine it being heart stopping. Outside of fighting, you were stuck trading, mining, and building.

      Is this just one of those games that
      • As I mentioned in a reply above, EVE reminds me of "UO in Space" (pre-Ren) after hearing peoples comments on the game. I think the reason why the game never got interesting in the trial was due to the fact that two weeks really isn't enough time to really get in depth, in my opinion. It just barely brushes the surface in multiple areas. It introduces the concepts of trading, building, training, and fighting, and thats about it.

        UO in Space, that has a nice ring to it. :)
    • It's a fair question, and in answer, it's not just WoW with lasers.

      It is more balanced, and deeper. It's, as far as I know, unique amongst mmorpgs in the player-driven content area. The markets are all player-driven. You can build empires out in deep space, and have them shown as your territory. You can claim it from others. You can use strategy, instead of just tactics. Winning and losing matter, it's not just a respawn. Being there for your teammates matters. It's absurd to think of rescuing someone in Wo
    • How long ago was that?

      I played from the start, and quit in approximately a year. For its first year, EVE was a great concept with an utterly crap implementation.

      Somehow I decided to give it a second chance, mainly because it seemed to be winning so many awards... It's like a whole different game, and I'm actually having FUN now. The addition of all sorts of new ship classes so as to make the game battleship-dominated has been a huge help.
  • Seriously, when has that ever been fun?
    • It's pretty fun in person, i love sitting around the living room watching roomies beat each other up or whatever on the screen. We even watch each other play nethack, altho sometimes that's less spectating than "Agile" gameplay. But i grant you, a video feed- less appealing.
    • When has watching a bunch of guys kick a ball back and forth been fun? IMHO never, but it's still one of the most popular activities in the country...
    • It's not watching people play video games that's fun. It's watching people REALLY good at video games that could be fun, (assuming you know enough about the game to determine what is really good).

      If you played soccer all your life, you will probably like to watch the world cup simply because you are impressed by the skill of the best players in the world. Furthermore, by watching a sport at a professional level you might be able to pick up some new moves to try out on the field when you play. This is no

  • EVE (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    It's not like this is intended to appeal to non-players. For those of us who play it, it's fun to see which of the big alliances prevail in what is essentially a PVP competition. I have no interest in watching WoW recordings, because I don't play it, and I assume the same would be true of people who don't play EVE.

    EVE is great but it's very difficult to get any kind of enjoyment out of it when you play by yourself. The fun starts when you join an aggressive 0.0 (lawless space) corp. It's beyond me what the
    • Gee, I don't know. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that 'empire carebears' can't _get_ to 0.0 space UNLESS they join some huge alliance. There are plenty of small corps that would like to get into low-sec space, but unless they cleared up the whole "Access to 50% of the galaxy requires travel through 1 of 4 bottlenecks" deal, they don't stand a chance. This is one of the big reasons I quit playing, along with the fact that the entire game became a grind. It's a pretty game, and it's interesting,

      • Gee, I don't know. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that 'empire carebears' can't _get_ to 0.0 space UNLESS they join some huge alliance.

        Look at the population of empire space vs. the population of 0.0 space. I don't think there is any question which has the advantage of numbers. However, if those in empire can't organize a force to go take 0.0 space, then they don't deserve to be there.

        The only thing keeping you out of 0.0 is yourselves. You want access, go get it.

      • You sound very bitter. I am part of a small corp, and I've been into 0.0 with them and solo repeatedly, without permission from the owners. It's really not that hard. I'm only a 6 month char. Maybe you played years ago on the older map that had more chokepoints, but things have changed.

        And whining about people who've played longer than you... please. Eve is unique amongst MMORPGs in that even new characters are useful. How useful are you as a lvl 10 priest in a raid? You wouldn't be allowed in a million yea
  • I'm sitting there, watching EVE TV and chatting with my friends in game when all the sudden, someone posts "EVE TV just got put on Slashdot." I have friends in both LV and IAC and they are both in the running for 1st! All I want to do is watch the tournament! Why would someone go and try to ruin my day by crashing their servers?

  • am i the only one? (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    i'm actually waiting for more games to broadcast live... of course it would help if the game was something i was interested in. it's an opportunity to see the best player's skills and learn from their techniques. (yeah, I know player demos are a good way of doing that too). and i can also see people playing in real world situations where there is added pressure (you think you are good enough to play in front of hundreds to millions of viewers in competition style play). i think i could be entertained j
  • From the program:

    Schedule
    Day 3. July 16th
    14:50 Start of Broadcast
    15:00 The Five vs Pure.
    15:20 I R O N vs Dusk and Dawn
    15:40 OPUS Alliance vs Veritas Immortalis
    16:00 Red Alliance vs Fate Weavers

    Nowhere on that page do they tell what timezone the schedule is based on.

    Nowhere on that page do they tell what time it is right now in the timezone the schedule is based on.

    What is this schedule useful for? Amateurs.

    • It's all GMT... any eve player would know that ;-)
    • What is this schedule useful for? Amateurs.

      It's useful for the viewers they expect: other EVE players. And every EVE player that has been playing more than a few days knows that EVE's timezone is GMT.

      If you are currently in the Eastern Daylight Savings timezone, subtract 4 hours from the above to yield your local time. Everyone else should be able to figure it out from that.

    • It is gametime. The intended audience is Eve players and since it is a single shard in london all times is GMT (no daylight saving time)
    • ROFL you think only amatuers can understand that GMT is a globaly accepted time? Obviously if the time isnt stated what zone its in then its safe to assume its in GMT!

      incredible!
      • ROFL you think only amatuers can understand that GMT is a globaly accepted time? Obviously if the time isnt stated what zone its in then its safe to assume its in GMT!
        No, it is never safe to assume that a time is GMT unless it is stated. Most of the time a lack of timezone info only indicates that the writer did not expect that someone could be living in another timezone than himself. Quite often, that writer lives in a timezone which is 4-6 hours behind GMT.
        • Oh Snap! So you're saying it's mostly us world-ignorant Americans that would omit a detail as important as the timezone? Wow, impressive. At any rate, as mentioned above, the assumption is sound becacuse of the target audience. If you are in Japan and see a commercial for Jimmy John Joe Bob Ford Dealership in Georgia (USA), you can assume times advertised are meant for an audience in Georgia (USA) not anywhere else. The same goes for Eve. *sigh*
    • Coverage is between 15.00 and 21.00 GMT on the 14th, 15th and 16th, and then 21st 22nd and 23rd of July. To view the coverage tune in free by clicking the link below.

      That was on the page linked to in the article, second paragraph. Amateur
    • You're right. It should have read:

      Schedule
      Day 3. July 16th
      14:50 Start of Broadcast
      15:00 The Five vs Pure.
      15:20 I R O N vs Dusk and Dawn
      15:40 OPUS Alliance vs Veritas Immortalis
      16:00 Red Alliance vs Fate Weavers
      17:57 Slashdotted!!! OMGWTFBBQ!!!!11
  • what's with all these nerds talking? Where are the spaceships?
  • Am I missing something? I turned it on right now, and it is just a group of brits sitting around a table in a pub. I have no clue what they are saying as every other words is bleeped out.

    That's definitely an interesting MMORPG they've got there.
  • i can't hear these "sport for nerds" things anymore! The typical nerds sits at lot of time on his work-worn chair starring for hours on some digits.. come on guys you have to do REAL sport.. not just for your healthiness but as well to stay in balance with the life outside. so i personally think that for nerds doing sport is even more important as for other people! Give it a try, it's not that hard..
  • Anyone know any other games being broadcast? Like Guildwars or WoW-battlegrounds? Would be very interesting to see w good commentary. I spose you'd need to have a small timedelay to avoid spoiling the game by "looking over the shoulder."

  • Not the only one (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    In Germany for example there's Giga and Gamesports. http://gamesports.de/ [gamesports.de]Gamesports cover Warcraft 3, Starcraft, Quake and Counterstrike matches. For example during the Electronic Sports World Cup last Month in Paris, it streamed live matches for hours. http://giga.de/ [giga.de]Giga concentrates more about the games themselves but about 2 hours every day, they cover the matches in their Giga e-sports programm. Giga 2 is a pay for view that streams live matches of many games.

  • first post ? (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by oPless ( 63249 )
    cool stuff!
  • This is really exciting, and I can say that everyone in my alliance was paying attention to it. Eve video is huge for many reasons, because you can often watch people you don't like get blown up, learn your enemy's strategies and setups, and pick up a few pointers. They are also a tremendous tool for propaganda and promotion of one's organization -- which ends up being more important than any single battle.

    If you want a small peek into the number of video work being done, check out eve videos [eve-videos.com] or the relat

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