Playing EVE Online gets people better jobs.
EVE Online is a science fiction game played by hundreds of thousands of people. It is hard to learn, and many new players leave.
CCP Games (now Fenris Creations) asked Bakamo what the game gives the players who stay. We read what players say to each other about the game and about their lives. Players make friends, learn skills, and some get better jobs.
- 73%
- made new friends through the game
- 56%
- have used a skill learned in EVE outside the game
- 72%
- think EVE skills have helped people get better jobs
759 EVE players, November 2019. Survey run by CCP Games, analysed by Bakamo.
"The EVE effect is the notion that a game like EVE can build your friends network and your skillset to make you the best version of yourself."
CCP's question
What CCP asked us
CCP Games makes EVE Online. Its stated mission is to create virtual worlds more meaningful than life.
The company tracks how many new players stay. EVE is a complex game. For established players the difficulty is the appeal. For new players it is the reason to leave.
CCP wanted to know whether the game improves players' lives outside it, and whether that could bring in new players. Bakamo had first read EVE Online conversation for CCP in 2016. This study ran from April 2019 to early 2020.
Method
How we did the research
We did not run a survey or interviews for this part. We read what players had already written to each other.
Where EVE players talk about their lives
Players write about their lives outside the game in three places.
Gaming subreddits
Where EVE players meet players of other games.
EVE message boards and blogs
Where the game itself is discussed.
The "out of pod" threads
Threads on the official forums for life outside the game.
Keyword search did not work
Talkwalker found where the conversations happen. Keyword search could not find the conversations we needed. Self-improvement has no fixed vocabulary. A player who learned to lead a fleet does not write that they learned leadership.
Analysts collected the quotes by hand: every comment in organic EVE talk that refers to life outside the game, stated or implied. Each quote was then placed on a hierarchy of needs drawn for EVE.
The four steps in the May 2019 report
01
Social media monitoring finds the communities and where they talk.
02
Analysts collect comments by hand: quotes from organic EVE talk that refer to real life, stated or implied.
03
Each quote is read and placed on the EVE hierarchy of needs.
04
The patterns of self-expression are read for what is left unsaid.
A player's path
What we found: friends first, then skills
We placed what players wrote on Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Friendship sits on the lower layers and skills on the upper ones. In between, players start to notice what the game has taught them. Below are the seven steps, in the order players go through them.
1 of 7. Friends
Step 1
The player joins a corporation.
EVE is built for groups. Most players join a corporation early and fly with the same people most nights.
The first benefit is friendship. Players feel it long before they notice they are learning anything.
73%
of surveyed players made new friends through the game
"My corpmate is my best man."
Step 2 · The moment that decides who stays
The player loses a first ship.
CCP identified one moment that decides whether a player stays. The first serious loss, usually a ship. In EVE a destroyed ship is not returned.
Many new players leave at this point. Players who stay develop their first skills here. They ask for help, work out what went wrong, and go back out.
Step 3
Rising to the challenge.
The player decides to stay and learn the game. The May 2019 report names this the first stage of the Real Butterfly Effect.
Step 4
Learning through play.
Doing well in EVE takes planning, arithmetic, leadership and trust. Players build spreadsheets to run a market and lead fleets of people they have never met. Nobody calls it learning at the time.
Step 5
"I'm getting good at this."
The player notices they can do things they could not do before, and begins to name them.
"Learning how to play this game since 2005 made regular spreadsheet tasks outside of the game a breeze."
Step 6
"EVE is real."
The player uses the skill at work, in a job interview or in a spreadsheet that has nothing to do with the game.
56%
of surveyed players have used a skill learned in EVE outside the game
Step 7
The player puts it on a CV.
On the upper layers the player can describe what the game taught them. Some write it on their CV.
72%
of surveyed players think EVE skills have helped people get better jobs
"Put EVE on my CV, got a job."
Skills
The skills players say they got from EVE
Players named these skills in their posts. We grouped them.
People skills
- People skills
- Charisma
- Leadership
- Management
- Networking
- Authority and responsibility
- Politics
- Trust
- Loyalty
- Persuasion, learned writing faction war propaganda
Hard skills
- Excel
- Raw data analysis
- Programming
- Supply chain management
- Language skills
- Reading into writing
Character traits
- Dealing with consequences
- Getting back up
- Ownership
- Skepticism
- Openness
- Curiosity
Player quotes
What players wrote
Public forum posts by EVE players, collected by hand in 2019. Players are not named.
"Put EVE on my CV, got a job."
EVE player, public forum post, 2019
"Learning how to play this game since 2005 made regular spreadsheet tasks outside of the game a breeze."
EVE player, public forum post, 2019
"My corpmate is my best man."
EVE player, public forum post, 2019
What CCP did
What CCP did with the research
CCP and Bakamo called the finding the EVE Effect.
Hilmar Pétursson presented it at EVE Down Under in 2019 under the title of the Bakamo report, "Beyond the Friendship Machine". CCP presented it again at EVE Vegas in October 2019.
In November 2019 CCP ran a player survey and Bakamo analysed it. The three figures at the top of this page come from that survey.
CCP commissioned a white paper for recruiters, "Demystifying gamers for HR", by the HR consultant András Horváth. It was published on Medium in May 2020.
Changes CCP made to the game and its support
From the Talkwalker case study.
- Extra player support after a serious loss, so players who would have left stay.
- A recruitment programme for player groups built on the social skills gamers value.
- A fleet finder, so players can join people like them.
- More direct customer support for new players, to build on the friendship connection.
For recruiters
What this means for recruiters
100 million
online role-playing gamers worldwide, by the case study's count
Many gamers do not mention the hobby to employers. They expect it to count against them. So the skills stay off the CV.
The white paper lists the skills for recruiters, among them Excel, supply chain management and team leadership, and says where to find the people who have them.
Learning through play works for adults. Recruiters looking for rare skills have a large pool to recruit from.
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