you can pretty much play it whatever you like... best way to imagine it is the developers went like "here, have a galaxy, have fun"

Some people like to play as soldiers/warriors, fighting npc's or eachother
Some people try to carve out a small place of space for themselves, or their group,
Some people play the markets, ammasing riches and influence
and finaly there are some who set out to explore the unknown space.

but yeah, many people spend a lot of time on economy; every ship, weapon, and bullet is made by other players, and not by some npc, so prices of everything are controlled by supply and demand only, you basically have to pay another person to build you a ship, if you dont do it yourself, and even if you do, you still need to buy materials, (or mine them yourself, which requires another ship)

TL;DR: EVE is a huge, complex, sandbox RPG, where you can do pretty much what you want, if the other players will let you

PS if you have any questions, feel free to ask

okay... this seems like a game i would love, but i dont dare try it. It seems so complex and hard for a noobie to join at this point. Also, it seems like it requires alot of time to progress in this game. IF i start, any tips? what kind of ship, what should be the first things to do? look for a guild/clan?
just add anything you want, i have never tried it, but i want to.

first of all; progress is a little strange...
You can baasically divide it in 3: Skills, money, and experience.
Skills are not trained like in other games, (kill 50 things and get a lv, ect) but in real time, so no matter how much you play, you will get better stats, and be able to fly better ships ect, (as long as you train for the right things)

money and experience arent as simple however, and needless to say, you need to play to get eigther, but it will come

A general starting guide is hard to make, it realy depends on what you plan to do, and ill be happy to help, but i think its easier if you throw me a PM and we can talk about it.

Rule #1: Fit your ships for efficiency, not balls to the wall best stats
If your ship blows up, the hull is gone, along with most (if not all) of your modules. So the best items in the game are not always the best items to use.

Rule #2: Plan your skills
One of the big mistakes I made was training in too many directions at once. Know what you want to do (if you don't, ask someone who is familiar with the game to find out, because there are a LOT of different things you can do)

Rule #2a: Stick to your plan
The other thing I did was get distracted too much. I would start training one thing and then see something else I would want to do and start training for that. It is a lot more satisfying to train for things one at a time instead of being all over the place.

Rule #3: Learn from someone with more experience
You will save SO MUCH GODDAMN TIME if you let someone else impart their knowledge onto you. Your biggest asset in EVE is your knowledge of the game and unfortunately new players have none. I love to see new players join the game but a large number of them get burned out or overwhelmed due to the sheer size and intricacies that is EVE.

If anyone else is interested, I would be more than happy to answer more questions via PM or other mediums.

Start by watching Youtube videos that have commentary on fits and fights. Watch twitch streams and ask questions.

There's a dedicated and active Reddit page that I frequent that helps:
www.reddit.com/r/Eve/comments/3ugqb1/weekly_howto_eve_resources_and_guides_november_27/

Eve University also has a HUGE wiki page on about everything you'd need:
wiki.eveuniversity.org/Main_Page

Also, i found that listening to podcasts is super helpful too. High Drag and Crossing Zebras are some of my favorites...

It takes time to learn, but 90% of people in the game are more than happy to help you out. Shoot, PM me in game if you give the 30 day trial a shot -- name's Beta Frost

My opinion, it's the MMORPG that the smart people play. Way less drama in the corp than my time in WoW.

I've been playing for a few years and I'll take a crack at it.

10% Wishing you had more money
25% PvE grinding so you can get more money
10% buying **** you don't need/can't even use
5% actually fighting/getting blown up
15% sitting in stations because all your ship blew up
5% trash talking in local
and about 70% waiting for skills to train

He's talking about PvP. I live in a Wormhole with my corp.

10% Wondering what to do with all my filthy wormhole ISK
25% Scanning down sites and bookmarking for the rest of the corp.
20% Running sites and killing sleepers
15% Hoping for a Static with a HS....
5 % Hauling fuel for your stations
15% Shooting unlucky people/ sweet fleet fights.

100% Gud fites in WH space.

I've actually wanted to try wh life for a while. Heard there's bukus of isk there

There is! You just have to accept that everything you bring into the WH is more than likely going to blow up. But you need the blingy stuff to tear through sites faster. Then you have to justify building that 2B Tengu so you can make that dank isk

Note: this is if you take a PvP approach to the game, as opposed to a mining/economics mogul approach which you can do and get filthy freaking rich too

Sounds like real life, but in space.