the politics is fantastic. you really need to join an alliance with some drama to keep things interesting. before i stopped playing (a while ago now) my whole alliance was at war with a bunch of other alliances with raids and all sorts of chaos going on.
i checked in 2 months ago to find my alliance (xetic) has disintegrated and the galaxy map which was stagnant for the months i was playing has completely changed. i am thinking of re-signing.
current galactic map -
http://www.eve-files.com/media/corp/CRII/Latest.jpg
thread with links to old maps to see how its all changed
http://myeve.eve-online.com/ingamebo...hreadID=201323
a few new expansions have bought in a lot of player made facilities and new ship types which seems to have shaken up ship combat a bit. some of the mercenary corps look like fun as well, alliances actually pay for their services. if you go solo you'll get bored, but if you join a corp and get involved in some alliance based galactic drama you'll have plenty to do.