EVE: Online x Doctor Who initial thoughts and rambling
Still in the process of examining and breaking down Gallifrey's appearance in EVE: Online. I'd like to get to it myself but haven't managed yet since I'm new at the game, so for now have been relying on gameplay videos online. This does mean there may be stuff I'm missing, perhaps overlooked by the experienced EVE players whose videos I was watching.
Initial thoughts?
As far as I can tell there's basically no lore or story, which is a bit disappointing given it was advertised as featuring remnants from the Time War. The main takeaway is the loot (some Eve: Online stuff (which I guess you could argue absorbs EVE's lore into the Doctor Who universe: it's also called an "interstellar convergence" not a multiversal one) and some Who-themed outfits and skins, though I did find a scrap piece of a Dalek plunger so there may be more unique stuff?), gameplay, and the Gallifrey maps.
I'm mostly positive on the latter. A bit disappointed that it's not an explorable system, but rather isolated regions with a surrounding skybox, though the different "warp matrix filaments" do lead to different positions around Gallifrey, so you do get to see it from multiple perspectives.
They also clearly went with style over substance, which has pros and cons. On one hand, I clearly can't use sizes or distances for analysis as everything is way too close together to work physically.
On the other hand - a lot is visible!
For example?
Polarfrey (!!!)
Well granted, it's not labelled as that or anything, but that's the best fit for the planet in Gamma Kasterborous.
In fact, I think the artist must have done some research, as they didn't do a bad job with the system.
Gallifrey with it's two moons and rings (a bit thicker than they probably should be, but again, I'll let it pass for visuals). The moons match up pretty nicely with sources. Right is obviously the very large and close coppery Pazithi Gallifreya. Left is the other, thus-far unnamed smaller moon.
Interestingly, the colours vary a lot from different perspectives. Just above the atmosphere of Gallifrey, everything is very red, suggesting perhaps an effect of the upper atmosphere or transduction barrier, or maybe just relative desaturation due to the surrounding warp convergence and nebulae. The second moon also looks more grey than blue, which fits quite nicely with its differing depictions.
While not much detail is clear from high orbit, low orbit does show visible bodies of water! It seems to only be a small portion of the surface visible though.
There's also this planet, which I think is either Karn or Tersurus. It seems to be opposite the suns, I think, which suggests one of those outer planets, plus it doesn't match the inner Venus-like planet seen in Power Rangers: Lost Galaxy.
So yeah, either a somewhat desaturated Karn, or Tersurus mixing its Big Finish and Fatal Death designs. Both also have at least one moon, which matches up.
Background visuals are also very played up, considering Gallifrey's supposed to be sat in the dying days of space.
My many possible Watsonian explanations:
This could simply be an effect of the Convergence, which does create smaller nebulae and wormhole-like structures.
This Gallifrey could be yet another cloneworld (probably not, but always a nice fallback theory).
Gallifrey is no longer positioned at the end of the universe (which would have interesting implications, given that red-grassed planet Bel visited in the present day in Flux).
This is Gallifrey at another point in its history than the Doctor's present (but clearly post-Time War - arguably disproven by the presence of 13th Doctor-styled loot?). Maybe this is set between Day and Time of the Doctor, and the EVE universe is one the Time Lords explored trying to find their way back into N-Space? Or the EVE universe IS the universe Gallifrey was stored in after Day?
Gallifrey's system briefly popped into the EVE universe for another reason, or just as a natural effect of the convergence? Maybe it's the same kind of convergence that led to the events of Assimilation^2, hence the mix of EVE: Online and DW items - it's a temporarily merged 'amalgam' universe akin to the Star Trek/Doctor Who universe in that comic?
Possible Division/Flux related shenanigans, given we were just exploring the idea of re-establishing in a whole new universe (though my interpretation was that it would have been the post-universe, which would have a greatly different appearance and physics).
