Thursday Matinée: “Underdog” – Solo Rupture

If you play Eve long enough (hint: it doesn’t take very long), you’ll realize that, like any hobby, your interest in it very quickly begins to spill out past just “the game” itself into outside areas. Think of pro sports and things like fantasy leagues, fanfests, training videos, message boards, player blogs…

…hmm, starting to sound a bit familiar?

Basically, these are all venues and arenas for fans of a game or hobby to talk about/discuss/rant/decry/swoon over what they love (that being said game or hobby) with other like-minded nerds fans, and Eve is widely considered to take the cake in that department. In the realm of MMO communities, it’s widely considered to be heads and shoulders above any other in terms of the sheer prolific output of community works by of its players, whether those are the blogs, the fan fiction, guides, artwork, or as I’ll be talking about today; the videos.

I first got turned on to Eve PvP videos with the old-school “Silent Killa” mission gank vids from way back (now posted here, thankfully, as SK and his videos have sadly seemed to have disappeared from youtube). In them, Silent Killa, circa 2007-ish, tricks mission CNRs and Golems into shooting at his looting Sleipnir (yes, really), and then of course proceeds to blow the living hell out of a seemingly endless horde of pimped out mission boats lining up like lambs for the slaughter; my, how mission ganking has changed since then.

Though they can hardly be called “PvP” videos, I watched those fights endlessly, and was totally hooked from then on. Through those, I discovered the hugely popular “Garmonation” series, Gods Coldblood’s “Vindication”, “Endless Subversion”, and even Fon “I’m a batshit crazy racist” Revedhort’s Nighthawk vids (but seriously, that guy is a douche).

I watch them like you might watch an episode of a sitcom or NFL highlights; a late-night quicky before bed or maybe a way to unwind with a drink after work, and I watch a lot of them. The big ones like Garmon’s or Kil2’s are obvious go-tos, but while they never cease to entertain me, I do like to find new ones; even if they don’t showcase Garmon taking on the entire NC solo in an 8 billion isk Vindicator, they can be hugely entertaining.

As an example, this past week I discovered Aldap’s “Underdog”, featuring the near-and-dear to my heart Rupture engaging in some mind-boggling solo (in the truest sense of the word) PvP. Aldap doesn’t fly with insanely expensive faction gear or tournament prize ships, and he doesn’t even always “win” (actually he “loses” quite a bit in the video, though thats a relative term), but he sure makes what hes doing look like a hell of a lot of fun. And as a Cruiser-class aficionado myself, I’ve got nothing but awe and respect for a guy who takes on things like a Prophesy/Sleipnir combo in a Rupture.

 

Definitely watch in HD on a nice screen.

Aldap’s walkthroughs of the anatomy of his fights are a really nice addition, giving a nice situational awareness of the scenario to the viewers. And the lack of bling involved in these vids in no way diminishes the edge-of-your-seat, nail-biting fights that the little Ruppy that could manages to get into and capture so well.

More videos to come as I hope to make this a regular Thursday afternoon thing. In the meantime, if you’re new to Eve PvP videos, Garmon’s channel here is a great place to start, and I also have a few of my own (substantially less cool) ones here. Someday, somewhere in my next life when I know anything about video coding and editing, I’ll find a way to get the hours of frapsed fights of me pewing down Battleships in a Cruiser into more “Project: Cruiser” vids, but thats a project for another day. Enjoy the show.

 

-Aiden

~ by Aiden Mourn on January 17, 2013.