Given the organic, ever-evolving nature of MMOGs these days, the line between alpha, beta, open beta and release are blurring moreso than in usual titles. Even though Cryptic will be releasing its latest MMOG, Star Trek Online, in a bit over a week, the state it goes live in will likely not be representative of the game in a few months. As such it's difficult to give a really fair round-up of the game, or any MMOG in general, because they change so drastically in such a rapid space of time.
Perhaps because I played the Champions Online beta, I am approaching Cryptic's latest offering with a bit of a raised eyebrow. In its current state, Star Trek Online is a rather buggy mess that shows great promise but feels rushed and unpolished. A similar issue plagued Champions Online as well and I at least hoped that Cryptic would have learned a lesson from the experience. Especially given the fact that there is a grumbling consensus who feels that Cryptic dropped support for Champions in order to work on STO, I was more than a little surprised to log into the open beta for the first time and see that it was in an unfinished state worse than Champions had been at the same point in its own release cycle.
But first, an exploration of the game itself. While STO very much does have a Star Trek feel to it, it also feels extremely similar to Champions Online as well, and I saw several comments in-game remarking that the game looks like Champions with a themed skin on top of it. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, and to players who never touched Champions you probably won't even notice the difference. Champions' combat in particular was extremely fun, although the rest of the game was more than a little superficial. Cryptic has also added new functionality and dropped stuff from Champions that wouldn't make sense in a non-superhero MMOG.
In STO, gameplay takes place primarily between your ship in space combat or as an avatar in ground-based away missions. While the away missions are pretty generic-MMOG, the space combat is very interesting– even if your ship flies like an argumentative beached whale.
Your ship is staffed with spots for up to three officers specializing in things like science or tactical positions; these officers will also follow you on your away team when you beam down to a planet, and each of them have different special abilities depending on whether they're on the ship or on a planet. These abilities range from being able to drain the shields of enemy ships in space combat, or healing you from damage when you're on the ground. Combat in your ship is pretty strategic and frantic, a welcome departure from how generic it is on away missions. You have to monitor both your position in space relative to the enemy, ensuring that their attacks are consistently hitting different parts of your shields, or they will manage to take down a section and launch their attacks directly against your craft's hull. In turn, you must do your best to aim your attacks at the same spots always as well, draining the enemy's shields to hit their ships hard with phasers and photon torpedoes. Position is important in other ways as well, as enemies get a damage modifier if they manage to flank you from different sides; this matters both on the ground and in space, and it's always important to avoid this whenever possible because this bonus can tear you apart quickly. Of course, if you're playing with other players (or your away team) you get this bonus as well, and it's worth being aware of where you are in order to take advantage of it.
Unfortunately, and rather un-Star Trekky, the game is extremely combat oriented as far as I played. There's really no way to diplomatically solve any quests I came across and they all required some sort of fighting and destruction to complete. While this is certainly fun in a MMOG, and the various Star Trek media certainly featured a lot of fighting as well, I'm also reminded of the ingenious diplomatic solutions of characters like Picard and Janeway and lament that your captain alter-ego is not as level headed.
If you've enjoyed the appearance of Champions Online, you're going to like STO, as graphically they look identical save Champions' cel-shaded outline. The phenomenal character customization employed by Champions makes its way to STO in a similar fashion, though of course you can't make a human officer who looks like a dreanai shaman with the same ease as the former game. Interestingly, you're also able to customize your ship with the same level of detail, allowing would-be space captains a lot of latitude towards originality. Music and the game's sound effects will also elicit nostalgia from Trekkies as these little details conjure up memories of the TV shows or movies; when you're flying around space surrounded by Borg cubes and the sound of phasers is filling your eardrums, the effect is truly epic.
But a lot of the potential is bogged down by the serious technical issues the game still faces less than two weeks before it's supposed to be "finished." While Cryptic has consistently impressed me with their adeptness in fixing a multitude of bugs days before final release, I reiterate my earlier surprise at just how broken things are this late in the game. The UI and quests have serious problems with typos and spelling/grammar to the extent that it makes everything feel jarringly incomplete. If Cryptic is able to fix this stuff quickly, STO has a chance.
However, therein lies my frustration with the current state of STO. Champions Online also had a lot of promise and potential before launch and it largely feels as if the ball was dropped in favor of supporting STO– whether or not this isn't the reality of things, it is the perception of many in the community, and I at least hoped that STO would be further along to justify the resource shift. At least if there's any small consolation, Star Trek is a larger property for Cryptic and the developer has no further titles to look forward to if it flops. A lot is riding on this game and as such Cryptic has a lot invested in getting their launch and subsequent experience right. It's still too early overall to see how things will shake out for the title and a lot will change up to and after its day one launch. If you're a die-hard Star Trek fan, STO is going to be a fun and nostalgic experience for you and you're probably going to be willing to overlook the game's existing problems. It remains to be seen, though, if STO is going to manage to pull in customers from those who aren't in the existing Star Trek fandom.
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Kit
23 Jan 2010 · 10:43 AM Kit[quote this]
I love you so much for your Janeway reference. Now you must include a Beverly Crusher reference. Then I shall be extremely happy.
Dave
28 Jan 2010 · 5:15 AM Dave[quote this]
Just like to follow on that I finished the beta and they cleaned it up a LOT in the last week.
You'd still need to be a trekkie to really enjoy it though.