Flying Solo In EVE: PvP Fest 2026

Before turning to the topic of the day, let's look at the average concurrent users numbers from Chribba's EVE-Offline.net.

ACU the week of Feb 2-8, 2026

Two good developments occurred last week. The first is the ACU line stayed at 25,000 accounts logged in for last week. The line has a variance of +/- 500, meaning the average number of players logged in stayed at least 24,500, meaning my prediction of over 24,000 for the entire year is still looking good. The second was less periods of interruption on Tranquility last week. I did get kicked out of the game twice on Sunday, meaning some instability is still present.

Selected stats so far in 2026

For the week, the peak (PCU) only reached 36,408 on Sunday, which I partially attribute to the server instability as something was happening before the peak was reached.

History of the global PLEX market

The average price of PLEX fell last week by 1.6%, from 4,475,000 PLEX down to 4,403,000 ISK. But the volumes sold increased as the amount of PLEX expressed as gametime exchanged on the global PLEX market increased by 17.2%. The amount of ISK traded increased by 3.1% up to 43.8 trillion ISK. And if anyone wondered, CCP did hold a PLEX sale. Starting on 6 February the company is holding a 20% off sale on select packages of PLEX. Along with the discount on all packages of 1000 PLEX and above CCP is also offering historic Gallente SKINs until 17 February.

And finally, for all the solo PvP crowd, CCP is offering PvP Fest. From downtime 9 February to 17 February CCP Games is holding a competition. The rules are designed to hopefully cut down on cheating.

This event gives you an opportunity to flex your PvP muscles in a new and fun way. The goal is to score as many kills as you can, provided they fulfill the following criteria:

• Solo: Defined with the same consistency as zKillboard – scoring a solo kill (with NPCs or sentry guns on the killmail is acceptable.)
  
  
• Uniquely Piloted: Meaning that if you kill “player A” in a ship once, more kills against Player A will not count as additional kills.
  
  
• Individual Ship Kills: Meaning that destroying a specific ship type in a given area of space counts once toward your kill count. For example, if you destroy a Rifter in lowsec, more Rifters in lowsec won’t count. However, if you destroy a Rifter in a different area, such as nullsec, that does count as a new kill. The same applies to all ship types across different areas of space.

Each kill is counted the same way. Meaning a shuttle and a freighter count as 1 kill each.

The unofficial leaderboards for the event are available on zKillboard.

A Lazy PvE Ishkur Fit For EVE Online

I'm in the process of skilling up one of my planetary industry alts in EVE Online. While I want to upgrade to flying a Deluge, in order to take full advantage of the monthly opportunities track I really need something a little less fancy to kill low level NPCs in high sec. I keep Jaguars, the Minmatar assault frigate, around for my main characters to buzz around in. But as my alt is Gallente I decided to choose to fly a new ship for me, the Ishkur.

I also did something interesting. I let an AI pick out the fit. I turned to CoPilot, but I'm not sure the AI program really knew the difference between an Ishkur and an Ishtar. Also, Copilot's knowledge was a little out of date as it thought the ship still had 4 low slots and 3 mid slots. The numbers were flipped back in the Uprising expansion in 2022. I had to tell the AI about the change.

The mix-up with the slot layout wasn't the only reason for some extensive interaction with the program. When I typed in I wanted a PvE fit Ishkur, I was asked if I would like a shield-fit passive regen Ishkur. Copilot described the fit this way:

The passive‑shield Ishkur is one of those “this shouldn’t work but it actually does” fits — and when you understand why it works, it becomes a surprisingly fun, lazy PvE frigate for certain content.

If anyone wants I can make a post with Copilot's explanation. All I know is that I was taught that if a ship has more mid slots than low slots I can shield tank the ship. I was set up for shield tanking because I shield tank all my mining ships and until now my alt had only flown shield tanked ships.

Fit by an AI

With my skills I only have my certificate of mastery for the Ishkur up to level 2. But for an alt I like the ship. Paper DPS of 160 counting both blasters firing T1 ammo and Tech 2 drones, the ship has a passive regen tank of 32 DPS. I told Copilot I just wanted to run 1/10 to 3/10 sites in Minmatar space so the AI didn't bother trying to plug the EM hole in the shield tank. I also like the align time of 3.96 seconds. If anything under 3.99 seconds is a waste, the AI didn't waste very much.

Below is the actual fit of the ship, including drones and ammo:

[Ishkur, Lazy Boy]

Shield Power Relay II

Shield Power Relay II

Drone Damage Amplifier II

1MN Y-S8 Compact Afterburner

Medium F-S9 Regolith Compact Shield Extender

M51 Benefactor Compact Shield Recharger

M51 Benefactor Compact Shield Recharger

Drone Link Augmentor I

Regulated Light Ion Phase Cannon I

Regulated Light Ion Phase Cannon I

Small Core Defense Field Purger I

Small Core Defense Field Purger I

Hobgoblin II x5

Acolyte II x5

Iridium Charge S x500

Plutonium Charge S x1000

Antimatter Charge S x2000

I should add I let Copilot pick out almost everything except the type of guns. Copilot wanted to use autocannon but my alt didn't have autocannon skills so we went with hybrids instead. I did let Copilot pick out which guns. The AI didn't seem familiar with all the meta modules so I went ahead and picked the ones in the fit based on the description. I also went ahead and fit meta shield rechargers due to fitting reasons and didn't ask Copilot. I was getting a little tired of the back and forth.

I even received advice on how to fly the ship.

How to Fly It (Lazy Mode)

• Turn on AB and leave it on
• Orbit something at 20–30 km
• Launch drones
• Let the passive regen handle everything
• If you get neuted, nothing changes
• If drones get shot, recall → relaunch

This is as close to “hands‑off” as an Assault Frigate gets.

Honestly I still don't fully trust the AI. If I can make the fit totally tech 2 these are the stats Copilot thinks I should achieve.

Max skills?

But what I plan to do is use my AI-fit assault frigate to help with the skill point track and get 500K extra skill points a month. I'll keep track of how I do and report back on the success of the fit next month.

FFXIV Cosmic Exploration: A Fishing Hyperrod Delayed

The title of the post might be a little misleading when looked at a certain way. I felt like I really started flying through the grind of leveling each of my cosmic tools once I received the 150% progress bonus for having upgraded 5 tools. Going into last night I definitely felt I could complete upgrading my last two tools, the Cross-pein Hyperhammer for blacksmiths and the Fishing Hyperrod. Of course something had to come up to delay those plans. That's right, server maintenance. 

The maintenance began at 9pm Pacific/midnight Eastern time. That's right, right in the middle of prime time for those who live west of the Mississippi (and some of use who live east of the river as well). But unlike the 5-10 minutes of downtime the poor EVE players in Australia have to put up with, these updates usually take hours. While annoying, an EVE-style shortage today gives me time to go downstairs and fill up my drinks. With Final Fantasy XIV updates I just go to bed (or log into EVE).

I really can't complain too much because a couple of issues with Cosmic Explorations were fixed. The first one is an annoyance and hasn't affected me let on Oizys: the screen would fail to fade out during the cutscene after completing Cosmic Exploration Projects. I haven't been online to see that bug in patch 7.4.1 but I have another 13 opportunities to do so.

The second bug is a lot more serious, I think. Cosmic Exploration Projects and Red Alerts would occur simultaneously. Yikes! Failing to finish off the exploration project would delay progress for the whole server. I'm not sure for how long, but usually its harder to get everyone back together for a second try, especially for the smaller population worlds. At least, that's what I've heard.

As for my progress last night? I finished off upgrading the blacksmith cosmic tool. As for the Fishing Hyperrod? I'm two Class A fishing missions away from completing the set of Hypertools. I should have that completed tonight. Then on to grinding for the mechanical spider.

Flying Solo In EVE: The 2026 Roadmap

I always start these posts with a look at the weekly average number of concurrent users based on the data from Chribba's EVE-Offline.net. 

The average concurrent user count for the week ending 1 Feb 2026

The average line dropped by 1000 users last week. Yes, some technical difficulties resulted in service interruptions on both Thursday and Saturday but I don't think by enough to drop the number by itself. 

The PLEX market thru 2 February 2026

The price of PLEX remained steady lastweek, only dropping 1% in price during the week. The sales in the cash shop concentrated on mastery packs and remastered value packs. One interesting detail to observe in the near future is whether the first week of the month results in higher PLEX sales.

The reason for wanting to highlight the above information is the leadership of EVE's development seem pretty pleased with themselves with the state of the game.  I'll drop the video into the post below.

The video is part of the introduction of the roadmap for EVE Online for 2026. 

The roadmap is pretty basic and gives a 30,000 foot view (10,000 meters?) of what players can expect over the next 11 months. First, we get two expansions in the now familiar second and fourth quarters of the year. The word is the expansions will concentrate on factional warfare, meaning the Q1 entry for the Gallente election will probably impact at least the summer expansion.

In addition to the two expansions, expect four other major content drops in 2026. The first two will appear in the next few weeks. The EVE Evolved initiative is usually used to update the code base and functions of this game that will celebrate its 23rd year of operating in May. The last EVE Evolved in August of last year concentrated on updating the ESI as well as Upscaling & Ray-traced Shadows as well as an initiative from the art team titled Smoke, Fire & Smart Lights.

In addition to one in March will be another set of updated planned in the third quarter ahead of the winter expansion. The developers are only planning one major mid-expansion patch, this one for the Catalyst expansion, coming up in the next few weeks.

In addition to EVE Online, 2026 is the year EVE Vanguard enters Alpha. The roadmap shows a major event occurring in Q3 while Steam lists the same time period as the release of CCP's new first-person-shooter on the platform. The roadmap lists Vanguard as beginning a playtest on Steam in the final three months of the year.

Finally players will see the usual events such as Capsuleer Day celebrating the anniversary of the launch of the game, the Crimson Harvest and the Winter Nexus.

The post and video had more information but I just wanted to provide a quick road map. We'll probably see more details as time goes on.

Ashes Of Creations And Intrepid Studios Shuts Down Today

 Over the weekend stories were published about the shut down of the crowdfunded MMORPG Ashes of Creations that launched as an Early Access game on Steam on 11 December 2025. 

As seen on Steam on 2 February 2026

The accusations are flying around that the game is a scam. Perhaps the game started off as an honest project. Honestly I haven't enough research into the history of the game to make that kind of determination. I do know that the Warn Act is a federal law that requires employers give 60 days written notice before closing a single site workplace with over 100 employees. 

To meet the requirements of the Warn Act, Intrepid Studios would have had to issued the written layoff notices by 3 December 2025, a full week before the game launched on Steam as an early access title. 

Part of the story doesn't sound right. According to PCGamesN Intrepid Studios founder Steven Sharif made a post on Discord that didn't exactly clear up matters in my mind.

Not long after this, Sharif shared a short post to the game's Discord, seemingly confirming the reported layoffs. "I can make a limited statement in my personal capacity and not on behalf of the company, regarding the situation." He claims that "Control of the company shifted away from me, and the Board began directing actions that I could not ethically agree with or carry out.

"As a result, I chose to resign in protest rather than lend my name or authority to decisions I could not ethically support," Sharif claims. "Following my resignation, much of the senior leadership team resigned. Following those departures, the Board made the decision to issue WARN Act notices and proceed with a mass layoff.

When did the leadership resignations occur? Just from the sound of the statement I would guess before the game launched on Steam. And with this limited knowledge I would not blame anyone for believing the Steam launch indeed was a last gasp for one last money grap before Ashes of Creation jointed the rest of the games that never reached a commercial release.

Cloud Imperium January 2026 Sales Revenue Up 8.1% Year-Over-Year

Year 2 of the new leadership team's reign over Cloud Imperium Games began on a solid note, recording an 8.1% year-over-year increase in cash shop sales. Last month set another record for January with $8.4 million in sales according to the CCU Game Dashboard. While not explosive growth like January 2025's 44.2% YoY growth in cash shop revenue, the growth is in-line with my expectations of a 10% growth in sales in 2026 if sales of Squadron 42 are not included in the cash shop total.

As a note for 2026 I will continue the practice of adding the previous year and the 3-year average in the monthly sales chart. I like the three year average because I feel it gives a longer-term historical perspective. I have the feeling the metric will make CIG's marketing department look good in 2026. For January, sales were 20.6% over average sales in January for 2023-2025.

The $937.6 million displayed on the Roberts Space Industries funding page at the end of January was not a comprehensive accounting for all of CIG's revenue since the project's Kickstarter in October 2012. Overall, the company has recorded $1,061.9 million ($1.06 billion) in confirmed revenue (the funding page & the 2023 financial report).

• Sales/Pledges: $937.5 million (through 31 January 2026)
• Other cash shop revenue: $2.3 million (through 31 December 2023)
• Subscriptions: $39.5 million (through 31 December 2023)
• All other sources: $82.6 million (through 31 December 2023)

In addition, the company has received a total of $68.25 million in outside investment. According to the 2023 financial report, $4.8 million of the amount was returned to investors in 2020 and another $1.9 million in 2023. Including the outside investment money, the total amount raised by CIG to create Squadron 42 and Star Citizen is $1.130.1 million ($1.13 billion), or $1.123.4 million ($1.12 billion) when excluding the returned funds. An additional $12.6 million in loans issued in March 2025 and due for repayment on 31 December 2027 are not included in the total.

I realize that including data from 2023 in an article covering the first month of 2026 isn't great, but Cloud Imperium has a history of not providing financial data in a timely manner, even to governments. For example, CIG has failed to submit its financial accounts to UK Companies House by the 30 September deadline in 5 of the last 6 years. Stale data is just a fact of life when observing CIG.

New user accounts - For those interested in the number of new accounts created, January was the 8th month in a row the number of new accounts rose year-over-year. The streak began one month before the implementation of the new referral system in July 2025. 

In January new user account creation increased by 71.8%, to 58,423, compared to January 2025's 34,005 accounts. The major change in the monthly charts in 2026 is the removal of an attempt to project the number of accounts created in a month. Between the effectiveness of the new referral system and the expected release of Squadron 42 sometime in 2026 I couldn't come up with a way to model the result.

What to look for - I see three things observers should be on the lookout for that might affect the numbers.

1. Fallout from the shutdown of Ashes of Creation. Tomorrow Intrepid Studios shuts down operations, thereby killing the game, such as it was. Will any of the fallout from AoC's collapse splash onto Cloud Imperium Games and Star Citizen? Theoretically no, but if Squadron 42 does not launch this year, expect the cries of "Scam Citizen" to echo even louder than in the past.

2. Publication of 2024's financial report. Cloud Imperium is in a bit of a Catch-22 situation. Don't release the report in February and get accused of hiding bad news. Not a good look following the collapse of Intrepid Studios. But due to Cloud Imperium's practice of greatly delaying financial news, a release now would probably be bad as the company is expected to have lost millions of dollars in 2024.

3. The new patch release cycle. The constant release of new content last year helped retain interest and increased spending to new heights. Will the new bi-monthly (every other month) release schedule slow down interest? I believe February is the first month without a scheduled patch release in quite awhile. Will  year-over-year revenue decrease?

FFXIV's Cosmic Exploration: First Three Days On Oizys

Three days ago Square Enix released patch 7.41 for Final Fantasy XIV. I finally got the chance to play on the new planet in cosmic exploration, Oizys. In addition to new levels for our cosmic tools a new system using drones to find artifacts on the planet was introduced. And of course a bunch of new mounts and minions was added to the zone.

After leveling one tool

For this patch the tools can only be increased three times, from iLevel 750 to iLevel 765. Because I spent time collecting class points I already had enough research to get the first level of tool. I spent a few minutes upgrading the 11 crafting and gathering tools. I then started leveling the botanist tool. An added bonus is that I already had enough Cosmic Botanist V points for the second tool, making the upgrade go that much faster. To my surprise I had the Hyperhatchet in my hands when I logged off on Wednesday night.

My first hyper tool

I like the looks of the tool with the decoration resembling the floating rocks located on Oizys. The purple color on the head of the tool I think is a nice touch.

The drone found an artifact

The new system involves buying drone modules. Crafters and gatherers now gain drone bits by successfully completing Type A and higher cosmic missions at gold level. Once a player has a drone module, the drone is used to find one of three grades of artifacts: gold, silver, and bronze. I've used 14 drones so far. Below is what I've received after turning in the artifacts.

Gold ancient records

Ufiti Horn - 2

Silver ancient records

Private Moai

Wind up Dullahan

Bronze ancient records

Adventure Basket

Coblyn Larva

Gigantpole

Wind-up Aldgoat

Wind-up Qiqirn

Pastoral Dot Parasol

Craftsman's Cunning XI

Gatherer's Guile XII - 2

I have a limited sample size but I think gold artifacts provide mounts, silver artifacts provide the higher level minions, and bronze artifacts provide lower value minions and other items.

The Volatile Gravity Vacuum Suit

While I already had a Ufiti, I have acquired two new mounts so far. The first, Rapid-fab Vacuum Suit, cost 20,000 cosmocredits. The other, Volatile Gravity Vacuum Suit, I managed to win playing Cosmic Fortune. Patch 7.41 introduced three other new mounts:

Alert Red Warp Loader - a red version of the yellow mount acquired on Phaenna, the mount costs 20,000 cosmocredits.

Cosmic Armored Weapon - a mechanical spider mount used in mech ops missions. Acquired by turning in 60 Oizys Token Booklets.

Cosmic Countenance - A larger version of the Private Moai, the mount is acquired by turning in a Gold ancient records. Assuming the RNG gods cooperate.

So far I've managed to upgrade a tool once per night. Hopefully once I get my pickaxe upgraded the bonuses will help the grinding portion go faster as the research bonus increases from 50% to 100% with 2 tools upgraded to iLevel 765. But I still need to do all the little mini-games until I can buy or win all the items I want. I'll probably type a few more posts as I progress through the content. 

Flying Solo In EVE: Beware Of Ghost Sites

Yesterday I mentioned the three-year trend in EVE Online where the average number of concurrent users has increased by approximately 60%. That remarkable statistic is one of the reasons I start each of these posts with what Chribba's Eve-offline.net displays each week. 

The week of January 19-26, 2026

And sure enough, two months after the launch of the Catalyst expansion the ACU is running in a range of 25,500 - 26,500 accounts logged in at any one time according to the site. Next week Jester runs his graphs for the end of the month and I'm really interested to see the results for January.

The entire history of the Global PLEX Market

A factor that influences the number of players in the game is the price of PLEX. The normal price of one month of game time in the New Eden Store is 500 PLEX. That price declined by 100,000 ISK per PLEX last week, making the price of a month's gametime approximately 2.2-2.3 billion ISK. When the global PLEX market launched last July the price was over 3 billion ISK.

My topic today is a quick reminder about ghost sites. While Ray Parker Jr ain't afraid of no ghosts, I received a reminder of why I should be. I was probing down sites on my combat main, saw a data site, and warped in flying a Cheetah. I was in high sec and had nothing to worry about, right? I kind of ignored the warning about the site being a Lesser Angel Covert Research Facility. Usually Covert Research Facility throws up a big red flag, but I didn't have my probing window opened wide enough to see the full site name.

Now, I was still okay up until the time I got greedy. The first can I opened gave me two Ascendency blueprint copies. At that time I should have just scooped up the BPCs and warped off. Instead I tried to hack more cans. Sure enough, the site blew up on me. Not only did I lose my Cheetah but I lost one of the blueprints as well.

The worst part of the story is, I had a Stratios in a neighboring system set up to withstand the blast of an exploding ghost site. Oh well, every few years I have to relearn the lesson that everything potentially can kill me. But don't be like me. Fly safe everyone.

New World Gets A Sunset Date: January 31, 2027

I'm a little late to the party on this, or should I say wake? New World, a game with one of the worst launches in MMORPG history, now has an official sunset date: 31 January 2027. 

The disastrous launch was documented in a Josh Strife Hayes video published in December 2021.

Now, I know some publications as well as fans of the game will try to gaslight people into believing the game was finally fixed and on the upswing. But as the Steam charts show, even with the launch of a new expansion the average number of concurrent players was still below that of EVE Online's global server.

Steam chart for New World

And outside months with an expansion launch, the monthly ACU in EVE Online was 2-3 times greater than that in New World. I think if Tranquility ever showed activity that low that Pearl Abyss would wind up forcing CCP Games to shut down the servers.

For those who wish to know what an improved and recovering game looks like, below is Jester's ACU graph for the past 10 years.

Jester's 10-year ACU chart - Jan 2016 to Jan 2026

Unlike New World's Steamcharts, Jester's EVE Online ACU chart shows and approximately 60% growth in logged in accounts since CCP returned to the 2-expansion per year model at the end of 2022.

Perhaps if New World would have seen such a recovery a couple of years ago, not only would the game have been saved, but the studio as well. But given the history of failure, Amazon finally realized it was not good at video games, finally cut their losses and is shutting down the studio. I think Amazon will remain as a publisher, but for now AAA games are no longer part of the business plan.

Crimson Desert Has Gone Gold

Yesterday Pearl Abyss issued a press release announcing Crimson Desert has "gone gold".

Amsterdam, The Netherlands — January 21, 2026 — Pearl Abyss announced today that its upcoming title Crimson Desert has officially gone gold, marking a major development milestone ahead of its global launch. 

In a message shared via the official Crimson Desert social media channels, Pearl Abyss thanked fans worldwide for their continued support. “We sincerely thank our fans around the world for being with us on this meaningful journey,” the developer said. “Thanks to your support, we have reached this important milestone. We look forward to welcoming you to the continent of Pywel on March 19”.

But what does "gone gold" mean? According to GameRant:

The term "gone gold" is shorthand for the gaming industry phrase "gold master". When a game enters this stage of development, it means that it has reached the point where it is finished and ready for release. Everything that the developers want to put into the game is in the most recent build. At this stage, the developers and publisher believe that the game is ready for the public. So when a game goes gold, this is good news for players that are looking forward to a particular release.

Crimson Desert is set to go on PlayStation 5 as well as Xbox Series X and S. Going gold also means that Sony and Microsoft have certified the game. Going back to the GameRant article:

In order for a game to go gold, it must also pass the certification process that companies like Microsoft and Sony set to ensure that anything released on their platforms is stable and won't have any major issues. This includes things like crashes that make the game completely unplayable or bugs that would result in a less-than-ideal experience for players. Once a game has gone through this whole process, it will be put onto physical discs (where applicable) and then shipped out to be sold at various retailers.

So, barring major production issues with printing the discs, next month's earnings call should be the last where analysts ask Pearl Abyss the years-long question, "Are we there yet?"