Star Trek Online

jedd_kenobi

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was perusing through www.play.com earlier today and noticed that Star Trek Online is scheduled for a release next month. thats come around so fast and unexpected. i remember when it was only on the drawing board and nothing was known about it. only problem is that it comes out so close to the release of Mass Effect 2 and i know that ME2 will eat up a lot of time.

From the looks of it, it'll be your standard MMORPG fare except built around a Star Trek theme. From what i've managed to gather, characters can command starships, explore, discover and attack. Enemy parties can board ships. At the moment it looks like the ship will only have the bridge but the game studio is working on making it so all of the ship can be explored and walked around in.
Away Teams can be formed and beamed down to planets. Its looking good and i'll probably give it a shot once i've played Mass Effect 2 to death.

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tK1HMiTWZBI[/YOUTUBE]
[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0N2NO2wPz8[/YOUTUBE]
[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XD_DOAWfzrk[/YOUTUBE]

wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_trek_online
official site: http://www.startrekonline.com
 
Yeah, gonna try to hit up the Open beta on the 12th. I'm pretty sure I'm gonna buy it.
 
I'm signed up for the beta. EVE online was a bit too uninvolved for me, maybe this will be a good space game. But I don't really want to get involved with yet another MMO. They suck so much time... which is funny because I'm also signed up and hyped for the FFXIV beta. :p
 
I'm signed up for the beta. EVE online was a bit too uninvolved for me, maybe this will be a good space game. But I don't really want to get involved with yet another MMO. They suck so much time... which is funny because I'm also signed up and hyped for the FFXIV beta. :p

i've ordered the game and with some luck i'll be able to get into the open beta. it looks good and kind of reminds me of the Jump to Lightspeed expansion pack that was released for Star Wars Galaxies.
Only real problem i have is that even if i get sucked into this game, Bioware releases Star Wars: The Old Republic later in the year.
 
Yeah, gonna try to hit up the Open beta on the 12th. I'm pretty sure I'm gonna buy it.
Is it actually going to be an OPEN beta? The past few MMOs that had open betas were not open and required a key to get in.
 
Is it actually going to be an OPEN beta? The past few MMOs that had open betas were not open and required a key to get in.

i know with play.com they're offering an open beta key to those who pre-order the game. i'm sure other companies are probably doing something similar.
 
Just spoke to Gamestop and if you preorder, you get beta a code. You don't have to may in full. Just the $5 US. Well worth it I think.
 
So, I played for a couple of hours tonight. Not too bad! The only thing the reviews are going to say is something like "While STO is a good MMO, it's nothing ground breaking."

It pretty much follows the WoW formula. Click on what you want to interact with, hit corresponding key to attack/take/interact with clicked object. And while you have yourself to level up, you actually have 4 other things to level, your science, engineering, and science officers, and your ship. So, that's 5 areas to work with.

I think the part I will enjoy the most is the ship customization. Right off with the smaller ship you start with, you can change the nacelle type, saucer section, colors, and so on. It will retain it's basic shape, you just get the set the finer details.

Both space and ground combat go really smooth. It's nice to have a party with you on the ground. You will have multiple targets most of the time. So, having them fight with you is nice. Orders you can give them are simple and the AI does well with them. It's just your basic attack/passive stuff.

Ship fighting is fun. Ever play ST: Bridge Commander? It's a lot like that, just with less power allocation. If not, your ship has different phaser archs Forward, rear, port, and starboard. Your shileds are the same way. If your front shields are taking a beating, keep moving and rotating so stronger shields can take the hits. You also use the arrow keys to order a boost to those shields. Your officers have special abilities to give you buffs.

Over all, I like it. But, I'm a ST fan. If you're not a ST fan, I don't see it drawing a huge fan base outside of the ST fans.

Overall, I think I will be happy with it.

Here is a pic of my ship, the USS Warhammer.

2knamt.jpg
 
i saw a bit of the game yesterday and that was mostly just the ground combat tutorial, i'll be getting my hands on the game later today. What i saw i did like and i'm looking forward to the space stuff. From what i saw, i'll agree with johnnyracer in that its definately a game more geared to star trek fans (given the legions of star trek fans out there this could make a pretty penny for them if it works with the fanbase).
From what i saw, it actually reminded me a bit of the old Star Wars Galaxies (when it was good, before the NGE and upgrades) so if that's true then i may end up sticking with this one. at least until Star Wars: The Old Republic hits the stores.
On a side note, i am unfortunately one of those nutter's that likes to ponder on the name of the ship. While downloading the client yesterday i went through a dozen or so names looking for a appropriate one for my ship.
 
Yeah, Old Republic won't be out until Spring of '11. Heard that on IGN today.

I had "Warhammer" for my ship since I played Bridge Commander. It was time to pull it out of mothballs.
 
Just come off playing the game for most of the afternoon and really like it. The game runs a lot smoother than i was expecting. Aside from the odd niggle here and there it is mostly playable. For me, the biggest fanboy moment was when i was let loose on the ship editor and able to start customizing the ship. Must have spent a good 30 minutes trying out variations and pattern formations.
The Space Combat is for me the highlight of the game and will keep me coming back. Surprisingly though i enjoyed the ground combat as well. I'm yet to fight in a group or attempt a space group combat moment but from the last few hours i am really impressed.
I've only tried the federation stuff so far. Mostly because thats all that is available and i've not seen any klingon stuff yet. The community in the game does seem to be a lot more relaxed as well. I couldn't help but laugh when someone typed in spatial "Where is Manrik's wife?"
If the game keeps this kind of quality up they'll definately have one customer here. Really interested to see what else gets added to the game.
 
I am looking forward to trying it. If, for nothing else, the ship customization. Will this probably draw me away from WoW? probably not, but I want to try it. I hope they offer a trial or something.
 
Jedd, do you know if we get to play with any other ships? I want something bigger. That's what she said!
 
Jedd, do you know if we get to play with any other ships? I want something bigger. That's what she said!

Actually the launcher itself has some details on this bit.
Open Beta will start with characters restricted to playing Federation and Klingon Sectors only. You will not be able to access Romulan, Cardassian or Borg space until we update a little later on into the Beta.
In addition, all players will hit a lvl cap at 16 which will allow you to complete all missions available in your respective sectors. You'll be unable to spend new skillpoints until we've opened up the new sectors. We ask that you play through all of the content you can find available to you. This will ensure coverage of everything in the sectors before you move on. You will progress enough to advance past your initial ship and into and through your first tier Cruiser, Escort or Science Vessel.
Basically from that i've read that we'll be stuck with the newbie ship for the first few levels but once we reach lvl 10 or so we'll be advancing to the next tier and be able to pick something a bit more advanced. I'd much prefer it if i had something with bigger teeth than my current ship.
Personally i can't wait to get my hands on a Constitution Class ship.
 
I'm no Trekkie but if this is anything like a less absurdly deep version of EVE, then I'm interested.
 
I'm no Trekkie but if this is anything like a less absurdly deep version of EVE, then I'm interested.

from what i've seen so far, this has got a lesser learning curve to the game than EVE had. It often feels like what WoW accomplished with making everything a bit more basic.
 
I guess my best experience with a space exploration game was Freelancer. That game was a LOT of fun but once you beat the story there was little to do.

I like the idea of a space exploration MMO, and enjoyed the trial of EVE for a few days, but it was just way too much of a commitment. I respect the game, but it's not for me.

If this has an easier learning curve and faster-paced gameply, I'll give it a shot, despite my deep hatred for MMOs in general.
 
Me at WSGF said:
Well, I'm a few hours into the open beta now and one thing's clear, STO is nothing like EVE, except for a few things.

I actually like the dumbing down, this game seems pretty easy to learn but browsing through customization menus, lists of items, amount of NPC's etc. it seems there's a huge amount of game beneath the pretty exterior.

At first I didn't like the controls much but now they seem passable. They're very consoley in that you need to use excessive amounts of buttons and mouse dragging to move around, and in combat you need to lock a target and click-click-click-click-click buttons over and over again. It's tiresome and inaccurate in a hack-n-slash sort of way, meaning there doesn't appear to be a lot of player skill involved in whether you win or lose a fight, it's more about how careful you are and how well your char/ship is skilled and equipped. Well, sorta like EVE in that respect.

By now I've had a chance to warp around the universe and I kinda like the system. Just like EVE you don't get a chance to slowboat your ship into a direction and jump to warp in that direction, but rather you click a button which basically unloads your current location and loads an interactive map thingy which is like a scaled-down version of normal spaceflight, in which you warp around and can see surrounding star systems and drop out of warp there. I was a bit disappointed I didn't get to "just warp in whatever direction and explore" like I wanted to, and the scale of distances seems alarmingly small in that it takes about 3 seconds to warp from star system to another, at least here in the beginning, but overall, warp travel in this game beats the EVE jumpgate system hands down.

One thing I need to mention is the amount of settings, it's just staggering. Beats some whole-hearted hardcore PC games easily. Quickly glancing over the settings it looks like damn near everything is adjustable.

I'm still very confused with some of the game mechanics, bridge officers and away team coordination for example, so can't really comment on those.

Just have to say, in space combat, EVE is boring compared to this, there's just a lot more to think about here, because you have to manually operate shield emitters, power output, weapon banks etc. while while steering the ship. So like you'd expect I will describe STO as a better game for dogfights (I suspect those are the only thing we're getting with instancing), and EVE as better for tactical warfare.

Overall I like the casual mentality. I like I don't have to stress over hardcore difficult gaming or ruthless game mechanics. I don't need another EVE. STO is a game you fire up after a hard day at work, and RP in. And it appears you don't have to think there are masses of others right around the corner, because there's enough space for some solemnity.

Oh, and the graphics are nice. Which is nice for a Star Trek game.

So far I'm lovin' STO but we'll see how long that lasts. There's a lot of "newness" about it which makes it interesting and I haven't had much time to waste playing it which also contributed in my getting slightly hooked on it.

I do like the ship and character customization, there's loads of choice which makes it very unlikely I'll see another me (very attractive girl... obviously.)

Chose the name Hubris for my noobship, after my first EVE Battleship, which was a Megathron Navy Issue, at BS lvl 1... Perks of running your own corp :cool:

Anyways can't wait to get to fly an Intrepid class, and a Sovereign class, my favourites.

One more good thing about the game itself... It's got absolute shitloads of in-jokes for trekkies. There's just so many of them, you need to have your eyes open constantly to spot all of them. Stuff like a sector called Memory Alpha (probably named after the Star Trek wiki), an establishment at the Earth spacedock called 47 something, after all the 47 references in ST dialogue, and so on and so forth. Very funny stuff in there if you're a fan. Props to Cryptic for putting all that in, I'm tempted to give them my first 3 months' worth just for that.
 
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