Tbh i honestly don't understand the trouble you're having. I picked up a controller for the first time in my life just over a year ago when i bought a PS3 for DUST. I'm doing ok, having fun and holding my own.

This game has been dumbed down a lot from EVE. Apart from figuring out the skill tree and suit fitting, for now it's just another lobby fps where bloodthirsty starship pilots from another game get killmails ;) That will be changing in big ways in the near future, which is the whole reason many of us are sticking around.

As far as welcoming new players, much more could be done for the NPE, and the sooner the better. But in terms of making the game easier and more forgiving in order to attract a broader player base, absolutely not. I honestly expect 95% of all modern FPS players who try DUST to quit it. It's not a game designed for everybody, and i can understand peeps who experience the savage pounding DUST can give them and find it deeply unpleasant and ego-crushing.

But i love it. The loss, the frustration, the rage, the hoplessness DUST can evoke are a filter, and those who survive, adapt and excel in the face of this brutality are the players i want as my enemies and allies.

The new players who have joined us in recent months have faced a genuine trial by fire. Those who have stayed are worthy of respect, and if and when they destroy me on the battlefield i will know that although i fell, i fell to a warrior. And if the battle goes the other way and i lay him low, well the triumph is all the sweeter.

Agreed.

To keep it all real, i run an alt who doesn't get passive sp and has no boosters.

Decided to do this to try out all the different racial weapons/suits i'd never put serious effort into. I had a big eye-opening when at about 650k sp my female Ammarian alt went 19-0 with the standard scrambler rifle at lvl 2

But don't let anybody tell you it's OP. They don't know what they're talking about.