IMO, This game is gonna suck.

My example? Matrix Online.

That's not really a fair comparison. The Matrix Online was handled by Sony Online Entertainment, who had Everquest to their name, but nothing else. They kicked off the MMO craze but failed to innovate, and while Everquest is still around it has faded into the background. The Matrix Online is just a further illustration of Sony's failure at marketing MMO games, as it doesn't even have a free trial, minimal mindshare, and the game is impossible to find if you actually want to buy it. So if you look at developers, Cryptic at least has a good track record with City of Heroes/City of Villains, so Star Trek Online has some promise. CoX is orders of magnitude better than anything SOE have released so I wouldn't dismiss it just because it's a movie license.

Actually, June of last year, Matrix Online was shut down.

But yeah, no trial or anything, and it failed pretty hard.

Cryptic, I think, has a reputation of taking old concepts and re-inventing them, not really producing anything really new or different.

Personally I think Star Trek Online will probable end up as another space shooter with different textures.

They have champions online and city of heroes.
they dont seem on the forefront of originality

Matrix Online was good in the early days when it had cutscenes uploaded to it which expanded the story based on what the millions of players had been doing. There was also the live events. Once it came under Sony though they cut back on everything. The cutscenes became stills which became an in game newspaper. Plus Sony only operated live events from their American offices which made the game almost obsolete for anyone who couldn't play in the early hours of the morning.

I usually say that finding "SOE" in to corner of your MMO is the equivalent of finding "LJN" on the corner of your NES game.

And to bash SOE one final time, Penny Arcade said it best: "There's something wrong with you if can make make an MMO about Star Wars, and manage to make nobody want to play it."

Until then, I think Cryptic has a shot, as I was having way more fun with Champions Online than I was/am with Aion. (Both are still nothing compared to WoW though...)

But ya, this game gives me a BAD vibe. It's spent far too long in development hell. Add to that dissapointing screen-shots and the company desperatly wanting to boot the thing out the door, annnnd...
I really want this game to be good, I do. But a lot of signs point towards...failure. Star Trek has never been treated well in the translation to video-game format. This probalby won't be any different.
Give us a good review and, hopefully, make the nasayers eat their words.
Edit: And if it does suck, let the developers know what a good Trek game would be for us, please?

Not a trekie or a ST fan myself, but I think the game is being rushed, I understand as much of ST to know that.

Actually, I think that the Genesis System is probably my biggest fear for the game. I'm worried that it might just recycle a dozen or so different types of terrain, until the free-exploration's just an annoying grind.

I haven't too high hopes.

As a player of Champions Online, I have to say that Cryptic doesn't seem to play the games they make. Champs Online has been neglected since its own launch.

That being said though, they might have taken those devs off CO to make STO..

To me it might be good amongst it's flaws and there are always patches to fix those flaws (well some) I also like the Genesis system and of course the Dual Gameplay.

The game should never......NEVER!!!! be rushed.
Also have destructive ships...GET TO IT HAVOC!!!!!

As someone who has played MMOs for years (since eq 1 beta)... I can tell you that right off the bat you are going to have players that are going to be non stop - wanting to see the end of the game as fast as possible. Its going to be interesting to see what kind of "farming" will happen right off the bat. Also what kind of end game content there is going to be... how do you "max" out your ship and crew?
If this is like most MMOs out there - the power gamers are going to take over as the most powerful "guilds" (or how ever that works in star trek)... get to end game and farm the raid content over and over until the expansion comes out.
Another thing that kind of concerns me (that is a huge issue in MMOs) is player balance .. or class balance.
I just hope this doesnt turn into another Star Wars Galaxy type game (it sounds like it might).

The more I look at this game the more I am convinced that it will be a good, BUT it will be trumped by Star Wars: The Old Republic. That game isn't looking rushed and is made by Bioware, so quality is almost guranteed. To top it all off, there is speculation that it may come to Xbox 360, which as someone with a crap PC, would be fantastic for me

[size=medium]The jump cut involving the red shirt is distracting. You should have embraced it rather than attempt to disguise it. The rest of your video plays on this philosophy, making it appear more purposely cheesy... in a good way.[/size]

i hope they do something like this with star wars, i was never a treky(trekie) but this looks really fun

They are Check out Star Wars The Old Republic at www.SWTOR.com

[color=purple][i][b]When was the last time anyone played a good game based on Star Trek?



[/b][/i][/color]

so, is it "free roaming" or do you have to go into annoying portals to load and ruins the feeling? :side:

Hm... is it really a good idea to have the final verdict show up as the "still-screen"?

Edit: Oh wait, nevermind.

I thought that too. :P

The game better have at least 2 Orion slavegirls in each crewman's quarters!

I've never been into MMOs either, but with Star Trek Online and Star Wars The Old Republic coming out, I'm getting ready to change that.

You made some very good points, Joe. If you go out and lay down cash for a game that is also going to cost you more in monthly fees, it had better get it right off the bat.
Ok, maybe that's a little over-dramatic, but paying monthly fees while *hoping* that the developers get round to adding more content to the game, apart from expansions, is a little absurd.

Oh well, time will tell.

I'm sceptical about this game.

There are next to none decent space mmorpg's for as far as I know. EVE Online is probably the most known one and also the best. Space oriented games should imo give a total feeling of immersion and EVE Online just does that. It even has cases of virtual crimes that made the news for God's sake.

Another space mmo that might be decent will be Jumpgate Evolution. I haven't played it but I've heard from beta players that they like it alot.

I believe Star Trek Online will be popular though because it's fricking Star Trek AND it has the experienced MMO developer behind it who made City of Heroes/Villains and Champions Online.

The only way they can screw it up is by rushing the release like you said. What was the fatal error Sony Online did when they released the incredible buggy piece of crap that's known as Star Wars Galaxies.

And as a sidenote, the only recent singleplayer space game I liked was a remake of an older game. Yes, that's how crappy recent space games in general are. It's called Privateer Gemini Gold and is a free remake of Wing Commander Privateer(1993). You should play it sometime. It really gives the same total immersion feeling EVE Online gives.

If anyone knows any decent space MMO's or singleplayer games, please let me know!

If you mean space as in you fly around in a ship in space, there is the Rogue Squadron series from last gen. Then there's the StarFox games, although the Gamecube ones fumbled a bit (hopefully Nintendo gets around to making a new one for Wii).

As for this generation, while there are some good games that have space themes (Mass Effect, Dead Space) there doesn't really seem to be any good space shooters at the moment. It's a bit of a shame. :(

While I find this game somewhat interesting, if I had to bet money on it I would say that it would start with a large number of purchases, but would quickly dwindle. Here's some reasons:

Firstly: This game has been in development hell for a while, and that alone is a bad sign. Add to that the fact that is now feels to be rushed, and it looks pretty shaky. Not to mention that one of the biggest reasons that new MMO's don't get too far off the ground is due to feeling very unfinished, as opposed to a game like WoW that you know has been out for a long time and successful.

Secondly: While the game itself is interesting, the advertisement videos I've seen are bland or terrible. While this may not be a measure of the game itself, it is to some degree a measure of the budget and creativity of the company. At any rate, their video trailers haven't impressed me.

Thirdly: Space combat, while cool for a while, starts to LOOK very similar. I'm having trouble identifying some, if any, difference in progression. The ships just all seem to flying around each other with laser-light shows going on. I also think the turning is a little awkward, but that's just my opinion.

Fourthly: The Genesis system does sound amazing, but it also seems too good to be true. The fact that the developers haven't said much about it so close to release, when it should be a selling point, doesn't bode too well.

Fifthly: The ground combat just doesn't look all that dynamic to me. This is again just opinion, but considering that the developers haven't even made any videos specifically looking at ground combat they seem to be focusing more on space. Basically, I share your concern that the two play styles won't be balanced.

Sixthly: Cryptic seems to make many MMO's, though many don't seem to be all that remarkable. This is troubling, as their focus won't be directed to any one of their MMO's, especially considering the divergent themes (superheroes vs Star Trek.

Lastly: I'm not sure if this is true, but I remember hearing that on a poll around the end of 2009, that was gauging the "most expected game of 2010" STO developers were actually promising in-game rewards to people who voted for them. Like I said, I'm not certain if it's true, and I don't think it was a major poll anyways.


Nevertheless, I hope that STO does well. To be honest, I'm more of a Star Wars fan than Star Trek. I am looking forward to Bioware's [b]Star Wars The Old Republic[/b] so I may very well be biased. But I think I'll be at least trying out STO, as I'm bored with having so many damn fantasy MMOS, not to mention I hope to see some good old fashioned Wars vs. Trek competition. However TOR seems to have both a bigger budget and a stronger development position, whereas STO seems to be just another MMO to Cryptic's "collection".

Great review!

It is always good to hear prediction from a gamer, instead of game/online magazine, it always seems they raising the score some points and ignoring the broing and frustrating aspects of a game, especially if it is hyped as hell. Games have flaws, this will be no exception.

I played a few MMO before and I also played WoW (yeah yeah keep boohing :) )

I have a few concerns. For one, I hope the space battles will not get boring too fast. If you are down to it, a Federation Ship has Phasers and Photon/Quantum Torpedos and that's it, so I hope you do not just have to wait for cooldowns so you can fire again.

Shipcustomization, on first thought this sounds really cool, however as we are playing a Federation Captain why is this allowed as we are part of a "militaristic" community? Hope they find a good explanation for this.

The Diplomatic aspect, I have to aggree with Joe, Star Trek was never only space battle/ground battle based. It is called 'United Federation of Planets' for a reason. Space Battles are cool, no doubt, however I also would appreciate it if you just could get in contact with other races, and maybe have influence in the game in a way.

The Klingons are only for PVP...This is my biggest concern, I am a huge Klingon fan, and when I hearded a Star Trek based MMO will hit the scene (and the Klingongs were playable) I was hyped as hell, but first to Unlock them and then only play them in PvP sucks, hope they will fix that very very soon.

That were my concerns, I still think this game will kick ass and it is defently a BUY for me.

Awesome reveiw! As you said, the developers are just waiting to release "Star Trek Online Expansion Pack: The stuff that wasn't in the original, but still not enough to satisfy you".

Still, It looks pretty cool.

Also, we have the same chair, I think! Did you buy it on IKEA? :woohoo:

KHAAAAAAAAAAANNNN!!!

And now that I got that out of my system, MMO, specially those with constant paying, are out of my league, but I sure understand your hype!

I wonder what are your other 2 games though... :huh:

BTW, I wish to sugest 2 games that I'm hyped myself: [i]BioShock 2[/i] and, specially, [b][i]Final Fantasy XIII[/i][/b].

I don't know if you are interested in FF13 or any J-RPG, Joe, but hey, doesn't hurt to ask, right? :P

try not to get too disappointed. all mmo's suck when they release (even WoW) and then get patched up.

The one thing that's going to make this game suck, for me anyway, is the monthly fees. I hate monthly fees in a game that you can buy fresh off the shelf at any local gamestop or walmart. Unlike EVE online this game should not want to take all of your money strait off the bat.
Yes it looks cool, but the one thing thats going to ruin it is the f-ing monthly fees.

a good preview Joe, tho your complain about none specific ship damage was a bit empty, it is a well know fact MMO always plays with weaker engines then other games to minimise server stress and also to scale down the system requirements thus making the game accessable to more people.

So unless new developments are made hardware wise for making server handle data faster and better single player games will always spank the sh*t out of MMO in the graphics and physics department.

You actually have hope for a Random Scenario Generator? You know how those work?

Remember how stuff like that works in every other game? It has a bunch of preset designs and then randomly mixes them up. It will never be as cool as you think it is.

The most anticipated feature is what is essentially a Holo Deck? You escape into the Reality of Star Trek, and while there the thing you want most is to be able to escape into a different virtual reality.

I'm not very happy with the point and click combat its going to have, or so it seems like its going to have... i feel scifi mmos should always go for 'fps' style combat, even if its still got all the mmo skills and alot of dice rolling, initially, you should have to actually aim and shoot. not just click on an enemy and press skills all day

I don't feel it's going to have the depth people want. Not enough races and for me the matrix system sounds dull. Lots of randomness in MMOs is irritating. Allow the players interaction to make the random element if you ask me.

I'll be sticking with eve-online. They are really making the game a lot better over the last 2 years. The system for conquering space has recenetly been revamped and its great.

So i'm afraid i dont have confidence in the game. Why you may ask? Star Trek needs depth of story to work as an mmo and the fact you only really play as the federation snuffs it out. Will try the new star wars game though and only for one reason: Bioware tell great stories and i like the old republic setting :)

Of all the things you liked about the game you have forgotten the one thing a great Star Trek MMO must have. Green alien chicks to have sex with.

ofc it will suck