Eve Online – the sci-fi MMO space-faring epic – saw a surge in players at the tail end of 2025. The game’s one-millionth player logged in during 2025, and it has benefited from the largest influx of new and returning players in years.
Why has a nearly 23-year-old MMO seen such an influx of fresh faces? The game has continued to receive updates, with the recent Catalyst expansion bringing an exciting new material to mine, hidden among the stars. But can that truly be all that’s going on here?
To find out more, Eurogamer sat down to speak with creative director for Eve Online, Bergur Finnbogason. During the conversation, I quizzed Finnbogason on what on Earth (and beyond) was going on with Eve, what sort of players the game is attracting these days, and his thoughts on wider shifts in the MMO landscape right now.
“We’re getting close to our 23rd birthday so… That’s something! To see these numbers at this point shows the game is very much alive and kicking,” Finnbogason stated when asked why the game has seen such an influx of players this year. “Over the last few years, we’ve been getting back to the core of the game, really trying to fix the deeper, harder things. Steering the evil Icelandic killer ship, staring deep into its eyes and feeling the consequences of that.
“I think that’s paying off! We’ve been seeing a healthy uptick in players over the last three-or-four years, and of course we’ve just released a really fantastic expansion looking at mining, something we’ve not touched for years. There’s been some really cool player activity happening at the same time, too!”
The catalyst expansion, released on the 18th November, brought with it new ships to pilot, a new valuable ore to mine, a mining overhaul to help revitalise the system, a new epic narrative arc, and a new 2D map, among other slick new features. It is doubtless an interesting time to be an Eve player, but what sort of new faces has Eve been attracting into the fold with such additions to the MMO? Totally new folk, or lapsed pilots?
Finnbogason explained: “By the nature of the game, it’s very complex. It’s brimming with possibilities – you can be whoever you want to be! That can be a very daunting thing when you come into it for the first time. As human beings, we give ourselves, what, 23 years to decide what we want to be when we grow up? Some people decide when they’re five, others when they’re 46, and that’s fine.
“Somehow we think with Eve players, they should have a concrete idea of what they should want to be in-game within 180 minutes, and that’s a tall order. So it’s been common for us to see people who tried the game a couple of years ago and are coming back to us now. We view them as returning players, but in all honesty we [should] see them as fresh players. We also see people who played 10-15 years ago come back to meet old friends and get the band back together.
“The beauty there is even if the core DNA of the game still remains, the journey is still there. We’ve swapped out the windows, we’ve changed the roof and fixed up the bathroom. So it’s not the same crammed, sticky old den that it used to be. Now it’s all the things a new building should be.”
It is obvious that an influx of new life into a game like Eve is a good thing for players and developers alike, as would be true for any online game. But for a game so dependant on community-narratives, and steeped in such history, what doors does such an occasion open?
“It changes a lot. We’re seeing a lot of new players, and the game of course would never survive without an influx of new players, new blood flowing into the game,” Finnbogason elaborates. “Our game is built a lot around the community – it’s fundamental to the success of the game. More players means more content, which means more fun. More players doesn’t just mean more people shooting you in the face, it also means there are more people to play with, more to take on those epic projects that Eve players take on. That’s the essence of our game and universe.
“So this surge really helps us plan into the future. The player who starts playing today, they start contributing to the game meaningfully tomorrow, though we know most players won’t get into player organisations or deep faction warfare until maybe a month-or-two in. It’s important that new players now reap the benefits down the line.”
Finally, it’s no secret that MMOs in general are in a weird spot right now. New releases aren’t having the staying power one would expect, with games like Throne and Liberty largely fizzling out. New World has been hit with the five point palm exploding heart technique by Amazon higher ups as the company moves away from game development, walking solemnly into 2026 without much life left.
In the same breath its Lord of the Rings MMO has been killed, Fantastic Pixel Castle’s MMO has been cancelled, T-Minus Zero was shut down in September but thankfully saved last month. Zenimax had to cancel project Blackbird during the Microsoft cuts earlier this year – it’s a brutal time for the genre. With all this context in mind, and the rising popularity of these older MMOs right now, what does Finnbogason think about what’s going on?
“We’re living in really interesting times. You can also see it in first-person shooters and, like, all games, ” Finnbogason states with raised hands. “You’re seeing a lot of returning old IPs. Five, six, seven years ago it was all about the new. A fresh IP, a new IP, a fresh, cool, new thing. But it feels now like the new and shiny, people aren’t buying into it as easily as they used to. They’re relying more on existing IPs. I think maybe that’s the reason why people are coming back to these OG MMOs.
“It’s funny because we’ve been doing this for so long. Eve Online feels so normal for us. But we’ve gone through times where we were definitely the bell of the ball. Then we’ve also had times when we were definitely a turd in the corner, when people were like ‘oh it’s a game for game-makers’. But I’m super excited – I think Eve is always relevant.
“I’m a big sci-fi nerd. Sci-fi is a mirror to the time it’s created in, and because of how we lean on the community, looking at the world through the lens of Eve is a very interesting way of viewing things. We’re going through some turbulent times, and Eve is a good way of trying to quantify and understand it.”
Eve Online is available now on PC, you can download it for free on Steam and the game’s official website.
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