Some days ago CCP announced a Doctor Who crossover event that is going to start this week. And for some reason many people on many Discord servers, forums, and other platforms are complaining.
Because apparently it is not allowed to like both a TV show and a video game. And of course there cannot actually be an overlap between people liking a sci-fi TV show and a sci-fi video game. Whatever these people are smoking, can I have some of that?
One of the most ludicrous “arguments” (if it can be called that) was that a Doctor Who crossover would somehow “break the immersion.” Are you bloody kidding me?! You are playing a space-based video game where ships move like they’re under water, top speed has nothing to do with acceleration, energy is basically free, asteroids respawn like clockwork (and their distribution depends on the social construct “security status”), you can be cloned, your consciousness can be transferred over many lightyears within fractions of a second, assembling a ship that is 15 km in length takes literally 0 time — but a Doctor Who crossover breaks the immersion? Get the fuck out of here.
Apart from that I can understand the reluctance in accepting mixing intellectual properties (or fandoms, if you prefer) like that. What has worked for others (LEGO vs. pretty much everything comes to mind as something that’s both fun and incredibly successful) doesn’t necessarily have to work for EVE and/or Doctor Who. I do have the feeling that EVE players will have more problems accepting this crossover than Doctor Who fans; Doctor Who is a show that thrives on change and the inherent challenges whereas while you could say that EVE is also a lot about adaptation to changing circumstances usually the first reaction of reddit and other forums frequented by EVE players is to throw hissy fits left and right as soon as one value changes from 0.123512 to 0.123511. In an environment like this CCP can only lose, no matter how awesome the event turns out to be…
Anyway, while it is totally possible that New Eden exists somewhere in the Doctor Who universe we all know that the Doctor usually hangs around near Cardiff, Wales because apparently that’s where all the alien action happens! I am for my part looking forward to see what events there will be and how much of the Doctor Who feeling they will actually have. And when it’s over I’m sure New Eden will be back to its usual old self…