It’s virtually surreal to journey a drop pod all the way down to the floor of one in all EVE Online’s tens of hundreds of planets within the upcoming shooter tie-in, EVE Vanguard. I’ve flown by them lots of of instances within the a few years I’ve been enjoying the venerable spaceship MMO, however often at astronomical distances. I at all times questioned about what was happening down there. I’d make up tales about it in my head. Now I’ve a high-powered house rifle in my palms and I’m experiencing the universe up shut and private. And whereas it was a really, very construct that could not exhibit a variety of the larger guarantees, to my disappointment, there are some promising hints already.
As a fast caveat, the footage you are seeing remains to be from an early construct and a variety of issues, together with the weapon and enemy fashions, will not be last. CCP simply introduced that Vanguard will probably be going into Early Access in Summer 2026, so we have nonetheless bought some time to attend. Also, the portion we truly bought to play was solely the session-based shooter maps themselves, and never the profession and development stuff that will probably be going down again in house. But I bought to speak to the devs about each, so we’ll get right into a bit of every right here.
What, precisely, is a Vanguard? Well, like most issues in EVE Online, it is some esoteric excessive idea sci-fi that may appear slightly bewildering at first. Your character is a semi-immortal “infomorph” – which is to say a digital human consciousness that lives in our on-line world. I suppose you possibly can say you are one thing like Johnny Silverhand from Cyberpunk 2077. To combat on the entrance traces of New Eden’s many wars, you add your self into a robust warfare clone, which is purpose-grown from a contemporary soup of organic matter for every mission. They’re not free, however you’ll be able to name down a brand new one in the course of a mission if the one you are in will get blown up, explaining how one can respawn time and again.
On a scale from random cannon fodder to Master Chief, the devs stated you’ll be able to consider warfare clones as not precisely superhuman, however extra like absolutely the peak of human capability an elite athlete might obtain. They are famend throughout the galaxy, and operating into one other player-controlled Vanguard on a deployment is supposed to really feel like a mini boss combat.
Suit Up
Vanguards collect in bastions, which CCP says you possibly can consider virtually like The Continental from John Wick. I swear I’m not making an attempt to shoehorn in additional Keanu references right here. It simply occurs! It’s impartial floor to buy, swap tales, and decide up new contracts, represented by a digital house the place you’ll bodily stroll round and work together with different mercs’ avatars. As somebody who was devastated when EVE Online eliminated the power to stroll round in stations, I used to be significantly happy to listen to this.
The actually cool factor, although, is that these bastions exist out in the identical universe the place EVE Online gamers are zipping round of their spaceships. The preliminary ones will probably be NPC-controlled, however it would finally be potential for gamers to assault, construct, and even personal their very own bastions. CCP hopes particular bastions may develop a popularity because the place you go if you actually need a job completed proper. And just like how EVE has “excessive sec” house the place NPC regulation enforcement protects new gamers and “low” or “null sec” the place gamers are free to PvP to their coronary heart’s content material, new Vanguards will even be capable of select the place they find yourself based mostly on how they’re in preventing different gamers.
Hair Trigger
One of the largest adjustments in philosophy EVE Vanguard has undergone since its reveal again in 2023 is how the weapons themselves are being designed. We’re transferring away from glossy, understated army sci-fi into what the designers referred to as an homage to the “golden age” of shooters, citing inspirations like Doom, Quake, and Unreal. There remains to be your commonplace house rifle, which is available in a number of totally different faction variants. But I additionally bought to mess around with an power shotgun with ricocheting projectiles that may fireplace in a ramification sample, or a single, large orb of destruction if you happen to maintain down the hearth button for a pair seconds.
As extra of a long-range enjoyer, my favourite was this high-powered sniper rifle that options the power to carry your breath to line up an ideal shot. While the mannequin is clearly unfinished, the reload animation of swapping out the little focusing crystal is slick and memorable as nicely. Like in EVE Online, virtually the whole lot is gathered and crafted by gamers, too. Even in a mission, I needed to loot some corpses and spend a little bit of time with my moveable fabricator to high up my ammo. Mining and business will even be part of the Vanguard expertise. It will even be potential to specialise in it – although the devs warned me that you’re going to in all probability wish to carry some backup with fight expertise if you happen to do.
You may see me switching weapons with a debug menu within the video on the high of the web page, which was only for the demo. Eventually, we’ll be selecting our loadout from the deck of our personal battlebarge forward of a deployment. This will even allow us to decide which type of warfare clone to spawn, and we have been instructed they may finally are available in all totally different sizes and shapes for various specializations. Vanguard will even have a little bit of separation from the principle EVE Online financial system. Notably, you do not purchase weapons and ammo with ISK, which is the principle foreign money for the starship jockeys, because it would not make a lot sense for a rifle to value the identical as a frigate.
There completely will probably be methods for gamers of each video games to work collectively and profit each other symbiotically, although. Some supplies Vanguards can entry planetside won’t be considerable in house, for example. Another instance I used to be given likened it to Star Wars: Rogue One or Return of the Jedi, the place an elite floor crew might need to take down a defend generator so the fleet above can assault a fortified station.
Nightmare Fuel
The enemies listed here are additionally a work-in-progress. Using placeholder fashions, they spawn in small teams and principally maintain their distance, however I did get caught a pair instances by a flanking assault from an sudden course. We bought to see some idea artwork of one of many PvE enemy factions, Mordu’s Legion, although, and they’re extraordinarily unsettling. These cyborg house mercs who’ve their coronary heart ritually eliminated as a part of their initiation will are available in a number of totally different ranks, with some having the ability to direct the others on the battlefield.
On any given deployment, you may find yourself operating into these NPCs and different gamers. These arenas are large, open-ended, and various, a mix of procedurally-generated terrain and handcrafted battlegrounds that includes the wreckage of a few of EVE’s recognizable starships. In this mission, there was particles actively streaking via the environment as we fought, which was a extremely superior contact.
For now, EVE Vanguard remains to be a variety of “wills,” “shoulds,” and ” hope tos.” It is playable, and the gunplay feels a bit unpolished nonetheless, however satisfying. The environments are spectacular, and the weapon designs are numerous and bombastic. It’s simply onerous to get the complete image with out truly experiencing the way it will tie into the EVE Online shared universe or the social options, that are undoubtedly essentially the most thrilling a part of the entire concept. For that we’ll have to attend till the center of subsequent 12 months when Early Access warps in, at which level each video games will probably be related ultimately.
