Rushlock posted this video about the Doctor Who event, which I believe ends today, and when he posted it over on the Partner Discord he asked, "Wonder if this topic interests Rixx?"
Now, if you are here to learn about the event, or PvE, or Abyssal sites, or anything to do with the mechanics of this cross-over event, you are in the wrong place. I do not participate in PvE, or Abyssal sites, or any of those things in-game. I have sometimes jumped into those 1v1 or Cruiser Abyssal things that happen from time to time, mostly just to see what they are about. But that's it. The only interaction I have with NPCs in Eve is when I'm waiting on a gate. Recently some Blood Raider NPCs have been harassing one of our structures and it took a long time for us Pirates to figure out what was happening. I'm focused on PvP in Eve. It takes all my attention to keep up with that.
However, what I do know about is marketing. In real life I'm currently the Chief Marketing Officer for a technology e-commerce company located in California. I ran my own advertising agency for 12 years. I even once pitched marketing professionally to CCP Games. (We didn't win the account sadly. We didn't lose it either, to be fair it just never happened. Bet you didn't know that one.) And what I do know about this Doctor Who cross-over event is that you are going to be seeing a lot more of these types of events in the future.
Look, this isn't rocket science, Eve Online is a very, very old game. In a few short years it will be transitioning into its third decade. This coming September I will have been playing Eve for 14 years myself. That's insane. But the more insane part is that Eve is still even around to be played. Other games in this genre have come and gone, many proposed games never even launched. The fact that Eve has survived for almost 20 years now is a major miracle. Especially when you consider just how much opportunity CCP Games has squandered over those twenty years. We truly are a dedicated fan base of players.
In order to keep surviving and fulfill the "Eve Forever" goal, CCP needs to market Eve Online to new potential players. And, overall, they do a decent job at keeping Eve in the media, in articles, world-records, battle reports, and all the other things that come along. They do a solid job of churning the news. But that churn is rotational marketing, primarily to an established audience of players. And while some new potential players may see it, or read an article, or otherwise be drawn into the universe - it is primarily speaking to the choir. Which is why events like this Doctor Who event are so important. I might even say critical to the long-term health of Eve Online.
Where do I need to go to get new customers? It is one of the most important elements of any marketing effort. Where do my potential customers live, what do they do, how to attract them to our offering? What do I have that they might be interested in? For Eve, those customers are players and those players are primarily gamers, science-fiction gamers, and gamers that might never have heard of a game called Eve Online. Doesn't matter, because either way they might want to try it out for themselves. Especially if something they already enjoy, like Doctor Who, just happens to be involved.
Beyond that, the sheer media exposure, the social media conversation, the community discussion, gets inflated and your marketing dollars extended for you. Suddenly people are talking about Eve Online again and it is everywhere. You might argue that much of that exposure might be negative, but primarily that negativity is coming from those that are already customers. From what I've seen, the news outside of the Eve bitter bubble was primarily extremely positive. The old adage that there is no such thing as bad PR is a cliche for a reason.
I don't spend a lot of time worrying about the server numbers, but I do pay attention. From what I can casually gleam it looks like possibly 10-15k new players tried Eve Online over the course of the run-up and execution of the Doctor Who event. If those numbers are even close to being accurate it was well worth the effort. And I believe it means we will see more of this in the future. Or, at the very least, more like it. Perhaps they won't all be cross-overs, those may be challenging to obtain regularly, but more marketing events that draw eyes from other franchises.
I will tell you this anecdotally, I saw more new players in space. I know people who participated enjoyed it. And I talked to more than a few new players who jumped into Eve because of it. It did nothing to harm my playstyle. And if it means more new players, then so be it. I think all-in-all this was a well executed event.
Thanks for listening to my Ted Talk.