DUST 514 "absolutely" exists - EVE dev
Has "large and powerful development team".
DUST 514 doesn't 'connect' with EVE Online yet, CCP has told Eurogamer - but the ambitious console shooter "absolutely" still exists.
"No, the interaction between the two has not been implemented," Torfi Frans Olafsson, creative director of EVE Online, divulged.
"There's a large and powerful development team on DUST, growing considerably even in the past few months.
"Production is in full swing," he added, "you can play the game internally and shoot stuff, and designers and engineers are working collaboratively both on the DUST side and the EVE side on designing and roughing-out the first implementations of the two games together."
DUST 514 was unveiled in 2009 as a console FPS for PS3 and Xbox 360. The headline feature was the ability for the game to "directly" impact the universe of EVE Online; the two games would work together, interact.
Today, DUST 514 is a "dark, gritty shooter", said Olafsson, with "a very broad" range of customisation options and "deep" player progression paths.
"The tactical options and the customisation options in it are going to be very empowering to people. They way it strikes me is it's fast, fun, gritty, dark, mean and very open and sandboxy."
And, he added: "The EVE connection means the battle has a purpose and a meaning, and you are participating in something greater than a five-minute bout of shooting people in the face.
"We are designing it so that there's a symbiotic relationship between an EVE player and a DUST player: both will be essentially happy that the other one is there.
"DUST players will become important allies to any EVE power-player or major alliance," Olafsson said.
The grey area of the two games' relationship was how spaceships from EVE Online might impact the planetary playing-field DUST 514: could a vessel breach the atmosphere and zap ground troops to aid an ally?
"No. No," stressed Olafsson. "Maybe in the far distant future.
"But even though we have crazy optimistic ideas, we've tried to be realistic with implementing them. The relationship will revolve more around contracts and exchange of goods in return for services rendered."
Olafsson couldn't comment on a release date; he could only say DUST 514 was "in development" and "should be arriving in stores 'soon'" - a familiar line he delivered with an ironic laugh.
But the game isn't close, and Olafsson - who issued another "no comment" when pressed - admitted that "it won't be happening in the next few months".