The Mittani is a character and not a reflection of Gianturco’s own personality, making decisions to advance his, and his coalition’s, standing within the game. “I log in every day, but we’ve done a great job convincing the enemy that I never do so,” Gianturco says. The game’s most influential player has perpetuated the myth that he never actually plays it, but this is another example of his sleight of hand. An arch manipulator, he is keen to promote his side’s view of the current conflict, and in leaked chat logs shown to IBT after an interview with him, Gianturco boasts that the media (and IBT in particular) are “eager to print whatever I’ll tell them.” “The marketing department of the company that makes the game has attempted to capitalize on this event by promoting the conflict as similar to infamous Great Wars of the past despite the reality on the ground being very different,” Gianturco told IBT.īut it is almost impossible to take what Gianturco says at face value. Gianturco believes CCP is overselling the conflict. This is why CCP needs to change the way “Eve Online” is perceived and one way of doing that is by promoting the epic space battles taking place in New Eden. The problem for CCP Games is that attracting new players to a game that takes a long time to get exciting is difficult, and even if players do persevere, it can be daunting to come up against gamers and alliances that hold so much power. While “Eve Online” is nominally a massively multiplayer online (MMO) game alongside the likes of “World of Warcraft,” “DC Universe Online” and “Final Fantasy,” its unique aspects won’t be an attractive option for a lot of players of other MMOs. With subscriber numbers dropping in the last couple of years, CCP Games needs to make “Eve Online” more appealing to new players, and one way is by highlighting major conflicts that involve thousands of players in epic space battles. “It has brought a lot of people back, and a lot of new people in, which is great for the ‘Eve’ ecosystem - the game thrives on people and conflict,” Paul Elsy, the “Eve” universe community manager, told International Business Times. Now CCP Games is claiming this new conflict is potentially “the greatest war in Eve’s history” as it seeks to attract new players, as well as entice lapsed subscribers to return.

They pay the Icelandic developer of the game, CCP Games, $15 a month for the pleasure of playing what is one of the most unique video games ever created.Īn “Eve Online” player dressed in costume attends the game’s annual player/developer conference, FanFest, in Reykjavik, Iceland, in 2015. The game’s hundreds of thousands of players are among the most dedicated and engaged in the world. Players pilot spaceships across a vast universe of planets called New Eden, mining minerals, building ships and trying to conquer territory - which sometimes escalates into all-out war. “Eve Online” is a space adventure game founded in the early days of multiplayer online games in 2003. In the real world, Gianturco’s attempts to monetize his position within the game are being threatened, as the developer of “Eve Online” seeks to stem falling subscriptions by changing how things work in the “Eve” universe as it battles to save its multimillion-dollar business. In “Eve Online,” Gianturco’s Imperium coalition is facing its biggest challenge yet from an even bigger coalition of warlords, tired of The Mittani’s actions. He has even leveraged his position to earn a living from “Eve Online,” setting up his own website and renting out his army of mercenaries to other video games.īut his position in both the real and virtual worlds is under threat.

He has a trusted band of lieutenants and uses propaganda, espionage and deception to retain his position as the game’s most powerful player, describing himself as the Vladimir Putin of the “Eve” universe. Known as The Mittani within the virtual world of “Eve Online,” Gianturco commands an army of 40,000 space pilots loyal to his Imperium coalition. Then, in 2011, he gave up his day job at Zuckerman Spaeder LLP, moved to Madison, Wisconsin, and focused all his efforts on his other passion: being a space pirate. CCP GamesĪlex Gianturco was a successful corporate lawyer based in Washington. In the wildly popular “Eve Online,” gamers spend their time looking for minerals and sometimes fending off space pirates.

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