Whenever we hear about a game developer using AI, it’s always followed by an uncertain pause. Are they using said AI to replace developers and designers? Often, yeah. But in this case, no. CCP Games, the studio behind the long-running space MMO Eve Online, has announced an AI-powered chat training tool designed to help new players integrate!
The space MMO’s AI-powered chat tool, known as Aura Guidance, is a long-term initiative designed to modernize the long-running game and help rookie players enter the deep sandbox universe.
That said, it’s still in active development.
Essentially, new players create a character and are then randomly assigned to a group with access to the companion or to a control group with the standard game onboarding. Then, CCP Games watches to refine the AI tool.
Aura Guidance At A Glance
Directly from CCP Games:
- Aura Guidance is an in-development chat tool designed to help new pilots find their footing without reliance on external resources. It is currently a prototype and will be iterated on over time as CCP Games collects data on how players use it. The results will determine what to keep, what to discard, what to improve, and where to go next.
- Built using insights from more than 5.8 million messages sent in the Rookie Help channel across nine months, Aura Guidance is an AI-powered system trained on real questions and answers from EVE Online players. In its current early release state, the chat tool focuses on helping new players build foundational knowledge during their early experience in New Eden.
- Responses are informed by in-game context, including where a pilot is and what they are flying. When the system cannot find a confident match, it redirects players to Rookie Help, ensuring guidance remains accurate and community-driven.
- Aura Guidance reflects CCP Games’ vision for Aura: a responsible AI companion designed to assist newcomers through their first steps in New Eden, while strengthening the tradition of capsuleers helping one another that has long defined EVE’s new player experience.
Bergur Finnbogason, Creative Director, said:
The next step for EVE Evolved continues our long-term commitment to EVE Forever with relentless innovation and enhancements to EVE Online’s systems. Aura Guidance is an opportunity to drastically improve the way players find information and reduce friction for new capsuleers taking their first jumps into New Eden.
Players submitted over 5.8 million Rookie Help messages in just the nine months we analyzed. That’s an impossible amount of content to navigate when you’re trying to answer a single question. We built Aura Guidance to make that process easier, enabling capsuleers to get fast, accurate answers drawn from the generations of rookies and veterans who helped them navigate EVE’s complexities.
Adding to that, Snorri Árnason, Executive Producer, said:
First and foremost, Aura Guidance is not generative AI and does not produce game content, create art, or replace creative work. Aura Guidance has been carefully designed by our team and is grounded in existing player support data to supplement Rookie Chat, not supersede it.
We are building this tool to make EVE Online’s depth and intricacy more welcoming for aspiring capsuleers who want to join our community of passionate players. We remain committed to EVE Forever, and to make that vision a reality, we are dedicated to ensuring our game is approachable to current and future players.
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