Cryptic Studios Releases New Star Trek Online Details, Trailer 272
Two days ago, an AP interview with Cryptic Studios' Jack Emmert provided new details about Star Trek: Online, which was lost in developmental limbo for quite some time. Today, Cryptic released a game-play trailer and a forty-minute webcast discussing the game.
Space combat + fps + rpg... (Score:2, Interesting)
Just replace "Trek" with "Wars" and I'm sold.
The space combat and personal combat scenarios in "Star Wars" are just too juicy, but, all things considered I'd probably want to actually role play in the Trek universe.
Space... (Score:3, Interesting)
I really loved some of the early Star Trek TOS games (like Judgement Rites) since they actually had a decent storyline. I would have loved to see something like Starfleet Academy ship-level control, integrated with a true story based scenario like Judgement Rites...
But lately, the Trek game offerings seem to be lacking in that respect. So much so that I've stopped playing Star Trek games, and started to help Star Trek episodes instead...
The place I work... (the Bridge of the TOS Enterprise) [startrekphase2media.com]
If this game ends up being decent, then I guess I need to find time for both... I love video games too much not to.
Re:Marketing Pitch (Score:3, Interesting)
I can think of at least one exception. Chief O'Brien.
Re:Marketing Pitch (Score:3, Interesting)
Ehn. Gene R. was an oldtime Air Force zoomie, and from what he once said, his belief matched that of the Air Force as far as space missions went: Officers only aboard spacecraft. Unfortnately, he mixed it with naval ranks and called his Wagontrain-to-the-stars military organization' StarFLEET' (and gave them maritime ranks, natch) instead of, say, 'Star Force' or something more Army/Air Force, so it confuses the heck out of people.
Over time the powers-that-be have altered things a bit. You start to see enlisted personnel (like Crewman Dax in ST6, Chief O'Brien, etc.), and you start to see ranks other than maritime ones (Colonel what's-his-face in ST6, as well, the one and only hint that Starfleet has a naval infantry component.) And of course in 'fanon' there's a whole enlisted rank structure.
So don't worry, it's confused a heck of a lot of people over time, and Gene's comment about 'officers only aboard spacecraft' is not only obscure but also increasingly obsolete. We'll probably start seeing more enlisted personnel in Abrams' ST reboot.
Star Control 2? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Marketing Pitch (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes, he was only in the Air Force during the largest war in history and only had two awards for his outstanding service. I think that means he knows nothing, nope, not a thing.
Don't worry, it is unlikely (Score:3, Interesting)
If you look at other games like WoW or Lotro or Everquest etc etc with each update the potential memory requirements just goes up and up.
Console games tend to get around the tiny memory on the hardware by having highly predicatable scenes where the designer limits what has to be loaded at anyone time.
But how are you going to do that in a MMO where you might have dozens of players on screen all with their own artwork?
SWG was supposed to be for the PS2, a game that ran best with 2gigs. Age of Conan is meant for the 360 a game that really needs 3 gig. Mind you, that is MAIN memory we are talking about, anyone actually play AoC with a less then 512mb videocard? Remember, 360 has 512mb TOTAL memory.
But of course, consoles don't run windows. True, but is the game of say Lotro quickly after launch reaches 900mb or so, what does that have to do with windows?
Looking at the trailer and the few real in game shots, we might be dealing with a MMO with very tiny areas. Tricky, where is the sense of scale then, the MASSIVE in MMO? Afterall a dozen people on a 100m square unexplored planet would be a bit silly.
It is high time MMO's cross over onto the consoles, but right now these consoles are so limited that I can't see it happen unless you get around the typical reasons why PC MMO's are such memory hogs.
Just remember why Deus Ex 2 sucked so much.
Re:Marketing Pitch (Score:3, Interesting)
This is of course not cannon, but works best of any possible explanations. The fact most enlisted members have very specific roles, like transporter chief, supports it a lot.
Re:Where no one has gone before?? (Score:3, Interesting)
Have you not seen Star Trek: The Next Generation? Patrick Stuart's voiceover in the title credits had already changed it to "where no one has gone before" in 1987. Considering this game takes place 30 years after Star Trek: Nemesis (a Next Generation movie), it's fitting to use the Next Generation wording.
Re:Space combat + fps + rpg... (Score:2, Interesting)
Just replace "Trek" with "Wars" and I'm sold. The space combat and personal combat scenarios in "Star Wars" are just too juicy, but, all things considered I'd probably want to actually role play in the Trek universe.
Then replace "Star" with "Tek" and you'll have the greatest MMO of all time.
RED FLAG! (Score:4, Interesting)
Yes, because those lasers and missiles were the key weapons in both of those events.
If they don't know that phasers and torpedoes are two completely different things, I don't expect them to understand the various intricacies of the franchise.
Oh well, a crap star trek game? At least it wont be disappointing, it's what we've come to expect.
Re:Ranks on starships (Score:3, Interesting)
The size of the crew has less to do with the era when a ship existed and more to do with her size -- you'll see a much smaller crew on a destroyer than you do on a carrier. The TNG Enterprise was a much larger ship (really, two ships held together with latches and explosive bolts and such) so you need a larger crew to man her and, to some extent, many positions are duplicated to some extent in the event the ship splits up into two parts.
Ships of the line in the 18th century had large crews, too, don't forget. HMS Victory was only about 57 meters long, yet had a crew of 850. That's a lot, comparatively, for a ship of that size -- no automation means humans had to do everything.
One person per ship (Score:1, Interesting)
Am I the only one who finds it odd that there's only one player per ship & the crew is all AI?
I was expecting that the game would be started on a bustling space station & that you'd be teamed with other players to go on missions in a ship together.