EVE Online: “Incursion” 1.1 Launches, Includes New Character Creator

Since the game’s release more than seven years ago, players have gone through a rather basic character creation process. It mostly involved editing the face of a character and the background that would display as your portrait in-game. That’s because EVE Online was all about flying a spaceship in outer space — there wasn’t any “character” except in the way the game interacted with you, referencing you as a pilot. But that’s changing, starting with today’s Incursion 1.1 patch.

CCP has bigger dreams now than just throwing you in a ship and being done with it, and the new character creator is just the first step. Later on, probably some time this summer, they have aspirations of releasing another expansion for the game that will allow you to exit your ship and walk around space stations as your character. The one you’re going to create when you log on for the first time after patching up to Incursion 1.1.

“We couldn’t give our players anything less in a character creator to represent themselves and the depth of their experience—because in EVE everything is real,” says Arnar Gylfasson, Senior Producer for EVE Online. “Do not attempt to adjust your set.”

But the character creator is just the tip of the iceberg for Incursion 1.1. It also includes over forty new storyline missions, improvements to the Planetary Interaction system, and upgrades to the Contracts system with better filtering and more intuitive searches. Plus there’s the new “EVE Voice” which is now in beta, allowing players to join in-game channels while outside of the game, permitting them to socialize or participate in fleet ops through a web browser — all without the need to run the EVE Online client.

The Sansha’s Nation “Incursions” will begin in a week’s time, as epic group player-versus-environment content joins EVE with scalable rewards and system wide effects that pit groups against deadly Sansha A.I. in random systems across known space.