Star Trek Online Preview

NikolaX

NikolaX

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The game is approximately equal parts space combat, interstellar travel and on-planet missions. As with the TV series (the original one, anyway), the action ensures that you're never in the same place for very long, constantly moving between space and planet surfaces, boarding ships, spacestations and satellites, zipping between systems at warp-speed in search of where no man has ever gone before. Although the Klingon and Federation players will be locked in a war, the game is heavily instanced; all the foes you face will be computer-controlled. It's emphatically not EVE Online.

Space combat is slow-paced and tactical. "If you look at combat in the Star Trek universe, it's not a dogfighter,"says Zinkievich. "These are huge, powerful starships. It's a tactical, strategic experience. It's all about positioning, how you're balancing the energy to your different systems, lining up that final attack and taking them down."
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http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/star-trek-online-hands-on

Who is excited ?
 
Me.

Mainly because of this:

You can be any race from the Star Trek universe, or create your own. The basic philosophy of the game is to enable you to experience it exactly as you want to. You can wander around in the neutral zone picking up trading missions, you can go out fighting in the great vastness of space, you can follow the story, you can just explore. It's all cool, as far as Cryptic is concerned.
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And this:

"We have hundreds and hundreds of maps in the game right now," claims Zinkievich. "We have invested a lot of time and engineering resources in what we call the genesis system, which allows the game to algorithmically generate new planets, new systems and new alien races to meet." While story content will probably have been designed by the game's artists, other exploration will be generated automatically.
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Seems like a huge game.
 
I sure hope it ends up being nothing short of incredible.
 
No interest in MMO's whatsoever due to having to fork out a monthly sub for them. I do think a decent Star Trek MMO could work well though.
 
I do think it sounds interesting, sadly I've never been that big a fan of Star Trek's take on space-combat, it's way too unrealistic for me, and it often seems as though the designers have never even read about Newtonian physics.

All in all, Star Trek in many ways, just like Star Wars, symbolizes some of the things I dislike the most about some sci-fi series, an ABUNDANCE of intelligent life for both of'em. Star Trek also has it's silly utopian style that I take no enjoyment in.

Now, if someone were to make an MMO based on the Dune books, boy-howdy I'd be one excited sonnovabitch!

Anyway end-point - I'll likely try it out if they release a free trial for it.
 
I have lost interest in it after i saw how Champions Online turned out. The only thing that Cryptic is good at is making Character Creators. The other aspects of their games are below subpar. If it wasn't for NCSoft, City of Heroes would have been buried and forgotten long ago.
 
I lost interest when they dropped the idea of players being a crew aboard a starship and had everyone be a captain.

Cryptic said:
"We didn't think it would be very interesting to sit down in the transporter room and press a button for twenty hours to level up, and then maybe get to work in engineering for a while," says executive producer Craig Zinkievich. "What everybody's really interested in the captain experience, the command experience."
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Eurogamer said:
He's not wrong.
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He IS wrong. In a game based off Star Trek, you know how pimp it'd be to walk aboard a bridge, every member of the crew a real person, all coordinating in an awesome starship battle? These are STAR TREK fans we're talking about here. You're seriously going to tell me that Star Trek fans aren't going to want to be chief engineer, security officer, etc.? Who says all you'd do is man a teleporter console for ten levels? You could do other awesome stuff aboard the ship, like fixing warp drives and shit.
 
Darkside55 said:
I lost interest when they dropped the idea of players being a crew aboard a starship and had everyone be a captain.




He IS wrong. In a game based off Star Trek, you know how pimp it'd be to walk aboard a bridge, every member of the crew a real person, all coordinating in an awesome starship battle? These are STAR TREK fans we're talking about here. You're seriously going to tell me that Star Trek fans aren't going to want to be chief engineer, security officer, etc.? Who says all you'd do is man a teleporter console for ten levels? You could do other awesome stuff aboard the ship, like fixing warp drives and shit.
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You'll be the one in the red shirt. :hmph:
 
Why would I be wearing a red shirt if I wanted to be in engineering? Durr hurr hurr engineers on away missions hurp durp.

I'd be aboard the ship making sure it's at maximum efficiency, checking our weapon systems and deflector arrays and crawling through tight corridors to fix this circuitry break in life support so that everybody on the ship doesn't die a horrible choking death. Shit would be so La Forge.
 
He's right though. This is a bloody MMO we're talking about; you really think everybody is going to be co-ordinated and mature enough to all operate as a unique crew member each delegated to a certain task? They'll just be loads of "F**K U I GUNNA B CAPTIAN ITS K00LEST".

Nobody would want to do the boring jobs. Wouldn't work at all.
 
TheOneFreeMan said:
He's right though. This is a bloody MMO we're talking about; you really think everybody is going to be co-ordinated and mature enough to all operate as a unique crew member each delegated to a certain task? They'll just be loads of "F**K U I GUNNA B CAPTIAN ITS K00LEST".

Nobody would want to do the boring jobs. Wouldn't work at all.
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And who's fault is that? You know who's fault it is. It's YOURS. Yeah, you. You, and everyone else reading who thinks they'd be "boring jobs" that "wouldn't work." It's your fault. You, the previewer at Eurogamer, and everyone else who thinks like you. YOU are directly responsible.

"It's a bloody MMO so people can't be coordinated an mature." I hate this mentality. It's not that you're necessarily wrong, it's that everyone who reads this would think, "Yeah, I guess he's right," and then developers are like, "Well shit, we could've done something super awesome but I guess nobody will be mature enough to do it because everyone out there playing MMOs are immature fagets." And then EVERYBODY IS CAPTAIN! You're the reason we can't have nice things.

And especially for something like Star Trek, whose fans are already is the nerdiest of the nerdy, you'd think they could handle something like that. Hell I bet there are a lot of people out there who were thinking the same kind of thing like, "Yeah, I want to be First Officer," "I want to be a helmsman," "I want to be the doctor," that kind of thing. You can't even say it wouldn't be awesome.
 
Darkside...I've never said this before...but...I want to have your babies. All of them. Even the monkey one. Especially the monkey one.
 
beta signup !! !!

Star Trek Online team is happy to announce we’re taking applications for the Star Trek Online closed beta, which will occur later this year!

As we proceed with testing the game, we're relying on you, our fans, to help us work out kinks, squash bugs and create the best Star Trek experience we can. To apply for the beta, please visit this web form and answer the questions provided. We'l randomly select from that group as we ramp up toward open beta. If you purchased a six-month or lifetime subscription to Champions Online, you're already accepted to the Star Trek Online beta and won't need to apply. We'll have more information about how and when you can join the beta at a later date.

We're very happy to have all of you with us as we take this bold step forward. We can't wait to see you in game.
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That's rather bare boned for an application. Doesn't even ask you of your previous testing/gaming experience, clan affiliations etc. I don't remember the CO preview application being this lazy.

Ti iz hrvatske, eh?
 
Well, they will randomly select people for closed beta, so application form don't really matter...

Da, iz Zagreba :) korjene vuces iz Hrvatske ?
 
Wait.. they scrapped the crew idea?

damn I wanted to be a science officer :l
 
I don't see how any of those mundane tasks would be fun to play. It would get boring very quickly. This is an MMO after all. Not a simulation. There's other aspects of Star Trek that are much more appealing than that. Leave the multitasking for the AI.


Da, vucem is hrvatske, bosne i serbije. I Am a mixed breed.
 
TwwIX said:
I don't see how any of those mundane tasks would be fun to play. It would get boring very quickly. This is an MMO after all. Not a simulation. There's other aspects of Star Trek that are much more appealing than that. Leave the multitasking for the AI.
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You people lack imagination, you really do. I'd almost suspect that none of you have ever even seen Star Trek from the way you talk, and I don't even really watch too much Star Trek and I can see how those jobs would be fun.

Again, it's all people saying "Oh that would be boring" because they lack vision. Especially considering, as you said, "This is an MMO after all." Seems like everyone wants to boil this down to the standard MMO experience.

Which is formulaic shit.

Enjoy your instanced planet raids as captain.
 
Darkside55 said:
You people lack imagination, you really do. I'd almost suspect that none of you have ever even seen Star Trek from the way you talk, and I don't even really watch too much Star Trek and I can see how those jobs would be fun.

Again, it's all people saying "Oh that would be boring" because they lack vision. Especially considering, as you said, "This is an MMO after all." Seems like everyone wants to boil this down to the standard MMO experience.

Which is formulaic shit.

Enjoy your instanced planet raids as captain.
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Give us an example then of how you would implement those tedious tasks, Mr. Visionary. Instead of just ranting away and insulting everybody that disagrees with you.
 
I did, in a previous post. But if you want more examples...

Engineers could have things like on-ship instances where you gain experience by making sure everything's running. Imagine that a warp coil blows out and everybody's going to die in one hour unless you can get in there and replace it. Or having to crawl through ducts in order to fix the thrusters. Imagine a ship vs. ship battle where you're responsible for maintaining the shields and routing power to weapons. What if your ship was hit hard enough that something gets screwed up on the bridge and you have to override bridge control? You know who's gonna do that? The engineer. What a boring job he has, am I right?

Security officer, you're in charge of firing the weapons at the captain's order. You could have an instance where you need to capture/guard prisoners onboard the ship. Or what about visiting a planet where the inhabitants are hostile and you need to provide protection for the away team? You could even be in charge of tactical positioning and coordination of fleet strikes.

Doctor, you're in charge of maintaining the health of people onboard and you can also go on away team missions and get XP healing your crewmates and even doing missions where you have to assist the local populace in medical emergencies.

It's really friggin' simple to come up with this stuff, no joke. And these are just a few jobs. There's still things like helmsman, navigator...
 
Not to mention the roleplaying potential.
 
And you tell me one MMO that has had anywhere close to the potential for a true teamwork experience like this. Having a crew onboard a ship that has to work in perfect harmony in order to function...god that's so sick. That's the whole point of MMOs, to interact with other people. Believe it or not that's what the point of MMOs was before it dissolved into GRIND AND FARM IN EVERY GAME.

And these short-sighted naysayers just want "Duhr hurr I'm the captain, time to play Mass Effect online."
 
Thought I'd bump this since the open beta starts tomorrow for those who pre-ordered the game or acquired keys from the different sites that offered them.

Some recent previews:

Eurogamer

At this basic level, Star Trek Online seems enjoyable and easy to get into, and like Cryptic's previous games, it's likely to be more suitable for casual, short-session play than many other MMOs. Although it might not boast lavish production values, it also seems well-equipped to introduce a wider audience of Star Trek fans to the genre, as well as giving the field of massively-multiplayer sci-fi a much-needed, much lighter counterpart to the intimidating EVE Online.

But with several key features yet to be implemented in the beta - notably the ability to create Klingon Empire characters [edit: actually you can do this, I just forgot that it unlocks later in the game] and the Genesis system that creates randomly-generated content for explorers - the bigger picture is currently impossible to make out. We'll be watching it come together over the next month, and bring you our review as close to launch as possible.
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PC Gamer

It's the ridiculous level of freedom you have that most excites me - in levelling up your character, fitting out your ship and cherry-picking your crew. I've changed my mind three times about what kind of captain I'm going to make first, and I never really dared hope we might get a Star Trek game that would inspire such a geek-out in me.

If I'm wrong, and the ground combat does ruin it, at least I know there's an emote for the occasion: /facepalm makes your character do a pitch-perfect impression of Captain Picard's ultimate expression of exasperation and dismay.
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Kinda excited for this but the lack of uniformly positive previews have stopped me from pre-ordering. Is anyone here in the beta?
 
Despite Champions Online ending up as a disappointment (absolutely nothing to keep you playing for more than a month), I have preordered this and will be playing the beta sometime this week. I've been needing my space fix, and another short little Mass Effect game later this month just wouldn't be enough. :p And EVE sounds and looks like a nightmare.

I watched a live feed of someone playing this yesterday... he mostly just did ship vs. ship PvP, but it looked fun. You get to choose what class you are as a captain, what type of ship you fly (more options as you level up), and even how to train your crew.
 
Letters said:
I watched a live feed of someone playing this yesterday... he mostly just did ship vs. ship PvP, but it looked fun. You get to choose what class you are as a captain, what type of ship you fly (more options as you level up), and even how to train your crew.
Click to expand...

Yeah, the whole crew idea is pretty nice, especially since you can sorta customise 'em and they have skill trees of them own. What I am not sure about is the MMO aspect. I don't hope space is just a bunch of instances.
 
Darkside55 said:
And you tell me one MMO that has had anywhere close to the potential for a true teamwork experience like this. Having a crew onboard a ship that has to work in perfect harmony in order to function...god that's so sick. That's the whole point of MMOs, to interact with other people. Believe it or not that's what the point of MMOs was before it dissolved into GRIND AND FARM IN EVERY GAME.

And these short-sighted naysayers just want "Duhr hurr I'm the captain, time to play Mass Effect online."
Click to expand...

There is a game like that out there, an MMO, it's very small and indie, since it's a very hardcore simulation of starships, including every major crew position.

I can't for the love of God remember the name of it right now though.

I played it but got bored of it because the community was so extremely small and there was no AI automation for vacant crew positions on ships, which in other words meant, if there weren't enough players on, the entire world completely stopped pretty much.
 
Darkside55 said:
Why would I be wearing a red shirt if I wanted to be in engineering? Durr hurr hurr engineers on away missions hurp durp.
Click to expand...

*ahem*

star-treks-scotty.jpg


:rolleyes:
 
Yes, the NDA is in effect less than a day before the open beta starts... give me a break.
 
I like what Darkside was talking about before...

and I dunno if we have the same picture of an MMO like that but my idea of it is that you basically create a character and are automatically assigned to an open slot in a space ship (server) that looks like the ships in Star Trek. You would probably have a couple thousand or at least a few hundred players on each ship. You do your job for other people who need your expertise, you generally try to improve the space ship, and you help deal with random global encounters like alien pirates trying to hijack the entire ship or fungus problems on deck 15 or something. Maybe you could also have teams to do some exploration on alien planets and stuff to find fuel/supplies for the ship too...

I'd be a bartender/fighter pilot.
 
All codes are gone, sucks!:(

Signed up to get one automatically emailed to me from FilePlanet automatically when it becomes available again, hope I'm not too late.
 
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