Kafka On The Shore

Welcome to the wonderful world of Eve online

I’ve never been on Eve but it’s not a place for me, for, you see, you need to be a super geek to survive in that virutal world i.e. you need to be seriously smart, have a warrior mentality and be able to dedicate 8 hours+ of your day to the game. Eve is a place where industrial espionage and theft are rife (Billions Stolen in Online Robbery reports the BBC), where you have triple agents, where alliances get created and broken several times a day and where there’s always a psycho geek who’s out to destroy the entire world of Eve just out of spite or fun.
A couple of years ago, a friend and I found refuge in a London pub for a pint, only to find ourselves surrounded by Eve’s super geeks who had come to town for a meet and to plot to take over the world. We hooked up with two of those kids (one from the north of Britain and one from Spain if I remember correctly) who talked with real passion about the game. Hours later we left in awe of their brain power and passion but secretely relieved that they were spending their potentially dangerous talents in the virtual world and not in the real one…well, for now at least.