What Do You Mean, Jesus Is Dead?

In his most recent blog, CSM Member Trebor Daehdoow (Robert Woodhead) made special note of Hilmar's declaration that "The era of the Jesus feature is over.” Since the minutes aren’t out yet, I'll speculate for a bit; what CCP learned lesson is encompassed by Hilmar’s statement?

What counts as a Jesus Feature? I think we can call the self-referenced Incursions, alongside Apocrypha’s Wormholes, to be examples of Jesus Features, and relatively successful ones at that; they are, and have been, generally enjoyed by most player participants. On the other side of the coin, Tyrannis’ Planetary Interaction and Incarna’s Walking in Stations flopped for, among other reasons, being dull, tedious and devoid of entertainment value.

If these four features are examples of Jesus Features, I don’t see anything inherently wrong with making a big "Jesus Feature" the focus for an expansion. However, a big feature focus only really works if other components of the game that players like, or have, to use are not broken and not in need of work; unusable, unenjoyable or unworkable content seriously damages the appeal of the game. When big problems are neglected in favor of shiny new things, what might have been a good feature is immediately tarnished by what its introduction took the place of repairing. If the big feature just plain sucks, the results can be, and have been, absolutely devastating.

If CCP learned that big features have to be good features - for the game and for the player alike - and can’t take the place of fixing what’s currently broken, we should be in good shape for the future. If CCP has learned to not try to make big features, we’re probably in for some rough spots ahead. Time will tell what lies further down the road.