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Star Trek Online interview (create your own race)

ManaByte

ManaByte

Rage Bait Youtuber
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5ikj6V-CYYWISldz8cmkiJ9avC11QD92E92UG0

LOS ANGELES (AP) — "Star Trek Online" is finally going warp speed ahead.

After years in development limbo, the "Trek"-themed massively multiplayer online game will engage, according to game developer Cryptic Studios Inc.

Jack Emmert, Cryptic Chief Creative Officer, said players will begin "Star Trek Online" as the captain of a small Starfleet or Klingon Empire ship. They can customize their characters from pre-existing "Trek" species — from Klingons to Gorn — and can create entirely new alien races. As they progress through the game, players can increase in rank and gain larger vessels and more crew.

"You'll venture through space exploring new civilizations and life-forms," said Emmert. "You'll also beam down to planets and have adventures inside your ship. It's a galactic-wide game. There's going to be tons of space to investigate. We have a great system for exploration, which will allow for almost infinite possibilities."

Cryptic recently announced it had secured the rights to develop and publish "Star Trek Online" from CBS Consumer Products after now-defunct Perpetual Entertainment set the besieged project to kill.

"We had a friendly relationship with them," Emmert said. "As it became apparent they weren't going to continue to function, they decided to sell off the license. We swooped in and grabbed it. We took no assets. There was nothing to be had, to be honest. We're building everything from the ground up."

Players will also be able to battle against other vessels in laser-blasting, missile-firing deep space scuffles reminiscent of "The Wrath of Khan" and the Dominion War in "Deep Space Nine." Because the game will be set a few generations following the last "Trek" film, players shouldn't expect to run into James T. Kirk or Jean-Luc Picard.

"There might be a ship called Enterprise flying around, but it's probably not the same ship anymore," said Emmert. "Most of the characters will have either retired or passed on, but you'll definitely be going to all the places you know and love from 'Star Trek.' Expect to see oldies like Vulcan and Bajor but also fan favorites like Andoria and Qo'noS."

Emmert plans to unveil footage and more details about "Star Trek Online" — which has no release date set — with Leonard Nimoy at a "Star Trek" convention Sunday in Las Vegas at the Gene Roddenberry Theater inside the Las Vegas Hilton. The "Star Trek Online" panel will also be broadcast live at StarTrekOnline.com.

"You're going to see the actual game working and functioning," said Emmert. "This isn't renders. This isn't concept art. Everything that people will see on Sunday is going to be taken right from 'Star Trek Online' as it stands today, so hardened people should know that a release date might be closer than they think."

Cryptic, the developer originally responsible for "City of Heroes" and "City of Villains," is also working on the superhero-themed online game "Champions Online," scheduled for release for Windows PC and Xbox 360 next year. Emmert said "Star Trek Online" would definitely be available for Windows PC and perhaps Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3.

Other online games based on popular entertainment franchises include "The Lord of the Rings Online," "The Matrix Online," "Pirates of the Caribbean Online" and "Star Wars Galaxies." Sony Online Entertainment is currently developing "DC Universe Online" while MGM Interactive is working on "Stargate Worlds."
Click to expand...
 
ManaByte

ManaByte

Rage Bait Youtuber
CNN has a new pic up too:
art.startrek.ap.jpg


Bigger:
strekonline5_k5ajuvnc.jpg
 
M

Mr Jared

Member
I can't help but feel excited over this, even as a casual fan of the series. I guess I just have more faith in the Star Trek community to pull together in-game and make it a fun place to just totally nerd out for a while.
 
ManaByte

ManaByte

Rage Bait Youtuber
Dax01 said:
Perhaps Xbox 360 and PS3? Make it so!
Click to expand...

It's going to be 360 for sure. It's using the exact same engine as Champions and that game is on 360 and PC with cross-platform play.
 
K

klownboots

Member
hrmmm... create the gayest looking alien, fly through the universe on a big ship and terrorize people?

I kinda like the idea...
 
K

klownboots

Member
zoku88 said:
So, only one person per ship? No crew? No teamwork? Or did I misunderstand something?
Click to expand...

oh there better be a crew system, how else would I take over the universe without my army of dispensable crewmembers?
 
Z

zoku88

Member
klownboots said:
oh there better be a crew system, how else would I take over the universe without my army of dispensable crewmembers?
Click to expand...
Aww, just the red shirts are dispensable. Everyone else are worth something :p
 
T

Tobor

Member
ManaByte said:
It's going to be 360 for sure. It's using the exact same engine as Champions and that game is on 360 and PC with cross-platform play.
Click to expand...

/party in the streets
 
M

Malfunky

Member
Darkflight said:
I bet the in-game support accounts are Qs :lol That would be cool. Can't wait to see footage.
Click to expand...

Holy shit, they better be. And they all have to be John De Lancie. Screw the others.

I'm a little disappointed about the time the game takes place in. I was hoping for a few decades after TNG, like Perpetual how was making it. I wanted to see Picard as that "terran ambassador" they announced and people speculated about, or Spock as the President of the federation, if that was true.

But I like how it opens up for some hot alien cross-breeding, as I hope "create your own race" implies. Sexy.

Then again, who knows exactly when it takes place. If Leonard Nimoy is helping announce it, Spock must play some role.
 
N

NullPointer

Member
So is it really 'create your own race'? Or is it just 'create your own bumpy forehead design'?

The only really alien races are in the novels.
 
L

laserbeam

Banned
Games website says it takes place in the 25th century. Im really having my doubts about the game now. It seems like everyone is gonna be a captain now and its moving from the People grouping as a crew using one ship that the old game was going for.

One thing all those avid online Star Trek RPGs do is get a ton of trekkies togeather to run a single ship in a fleet to have that experiance.

This could alienate those people who would be the vast majority wanting to play the game.
 
Z

Zenith

Banned
laserbeam said:
One thing all those avid online Star Trek RPGs do is get a ton of trekkies togeather to run a single ship in a fleet to have that experiance.

This could alienate those people who would be the vast majority wanting to play the game.
Click to expand...

yeah, people always pointed out that "no one wants to be a cadet", but if you limited it to just the bridge heads and engineering it'd be great. you could have people who specialise in science or piloting whose experience adds points to your ship's speed or stuff like that. it'd be great if your chief engineer could extensively retool your warp core so that it affects speed, power, damage repair, etc. then you'd have all the Scotty types exchanging tips online for the best parts and combinations. and then "miracle workers" would get highly sought after by other ships and put in for transfers. plus it'd lead to an extensive range in ship types even if they were the same class.
 
L

laserbeam

Banned
Zenith said:
yeah, people always pointed out that "no one wants to be a cadet", but if you limited it to just the bridge heads and engineering it'd be great. you could have people who specialise in science or piloting whose experience adds points to your ship's speed or stuff like that. it'd be great if your chief engineer could extensively retool your warp core so that it affects speed, power, damage repair, etc. then you'd have all the Scotty types exchanging tips online for the best parts and combinations. and then "miracle workers" would get highly sought after by other ships and put in for transfers. plus it'd lead to an extensive range in ship types even if they were the same class.
Click to expand...

Exactly. Not everyone wants to be the Captain. All of these "Federation Sims" out there are people who get togeather and are usually the Senior Command Staff of each ship. Thats the direction they should take this game and they could probably get themselves a very hardcore fanbase giving those simmers a graphical game for their simming.
 
G

GDJustin

stuck my tongue deep inside Atlus' cookies
A group of real-world people all getting together to pilot ONE virtual ship has already been done, and been done very well:

http://www.puzzlepirates.com/

One group manned the sails, one group manned the bilge, and the captain navigated. During and after ship battles, some people could switch over to repairing the ship with carpentry, and reloading the cannons.

A small ship could be crewed with just a couple people, but I remember for a while everyone on a message board I went to was playing, and we would have 20-30 people all cruising around the ocean on a single ship, all working together. It was awesome.

So... I'm disappointed in the new Star Trek Online. "Everyone's a Captain" is a much much easier game design, but it's ultimately less appealing over the long term, imo.
 
J

JoeMartin

Member
Color me extremely skeptical. They've only had the license for how long and the game is closer to release than we think?
 
ManaByte

ManaByte

Rage Bait Youtuber
JoeMartin said:
Color me extremely skeptical. They've only had the license for how long and the game is closer to release than we think?
Click to expand...

They only had the license officially for a while.

Also, the Cryptic Engine is apparently very easy to slap new assets into. They turned Marvel Online into Champions Online in almost no time at all. This isn't UE3.
 
M

Malfunky

Member
GDJustin said:
A group of real-world people all getting together to pilot ONE virtual ship has already been done, and been done very well:

http://www.puzzlepirates.com/

One group manned the sails, one group manned the bilge, and the captain navigated. During and after ship battles, some people could switch over to repairing the ship with carpentry, and reloading the cannons.

A small ship could be crewed with just a couple people, but I remember for a while everyone on a message board I went to was playing, and we would have 20-30 people all cruising around the ocean on a single ship, all working together. It was awesome.

So... I'm disappointed in the new Star Trek Online. "Everyone's a Captain" is a much much easier game design, but it's ultimately less appealing over the long term, imo.
Click to expand...

This "everyone's a captain" focus reflects WoW's influence on a more casual style, where there is more emphasis is on the individual character. The majority of people wont want to perform the menial tasks of a Starfleet underling. They wont want to be down in engineering performing routine maintenance on the warp nacelles while the bridge crew is fighting lizard men and being impregnated by bubble creatures. I definitely would, but I hate to say, it's just not profitable. Especially with the new film coming out. It's going to attract a lot of casuals into the series, expecting crazy Star Wars excitement or something. People are going to want to be Kirk, and that's how they're gonna make their money.

My hope is that the highest ship individual players can is akin to the DS9 Defiant or something, so they can save the larger capitol ships for guild or end game content for the hardcore and Trekkie communities.

For example, it would be cool if large capitol ships were this game's version of a "guild hall," where people wanting to work as a large, cooperative team maintaining and adventuring in a large ship can do so. Or it could even be like large raid encounters, where instead of 25 people fighting a dragon, 25 people are using their respective skills to defeat another ship in battle. Maybe a high level navigator would give an evasion bonus, or a high level engineer could act as the healer and give a shield generation bonus, or an experienced captain could give a morale stat bonus. Fuck, that's cool.

I seriously doubt that, but whatever. I'll be happy exploring the galaxy regardless. Cryptic is growing on me. I think they'll do a good job.
 
wolfmat

wolfmat

Confirmed Asshole
I don't get all the scepticism. You orbit a planet in a system in the outer skirts of the Alpha Quadrant, a cardassian vessel drops out of warp and fucks your ship up with some proton torpedoes, you smash onto the planet, an alien lifeform infiltrates the ship, you try to communicate with it and it turns out it is sentient etc etc

What's not to like?

Actual ship drama is overrated in my opinion. It's like a sitcom. Not that I don't like it, it just may not be as good as some here think it would be.

Imagine your Captain making totally dumb decisions. Your ship blows up. Yay.
 
ManaByte

ManaByte

Rage Bait Youtuber
Apparently Cryptic was well into development when Perpetual went under. They were both close to the Bay Area in CA and Cryptic became aware of Perpetuals troubles (likely last year when Gods and Heroes went bust) so they started work on the game a lot longer back than people seem to think. That's why it could be out as early as next year.
 
B

bloodforge

Member
Malfunky said:
This "everyone's a captain" focus reflects WoW's influence on a more casual style, where there is more emphasis is on the individual character. The majority of people wont want to perform the menial tasks of a Starfleet underling. They wont want to be down in engineering performing routine maintenance on the warp nacelles while the bridge crew is fighting lizard men and being impregnated by bubble creatures. I definitely would, but I hate to say, it's just not profitable. Especially with the new film coming out. It's going to attract a lot of casuals into the series, expecting crazy Star Wars excitement or something. People are going to want to be Kirk, and that's how they're gonna make their money.

My hope is that the highest ship individual players can is akin to the DS9 Defiant or something, so they can save the larger capitol ships for guild or end game content for the hardcore and Trekkie communities.

For example, it would be cool if large capitol ships were this game's version of a "guild hall," where people wanting to work as a large, cooperative team maintaining and adventuring in a large ship can do so. Or it could even be like large raid encounters, where instead of 25 people fighting a dragon, 25 people are using their respective skills to defeat another ship in battle. Maybe a high level navigator would give an evasion bonus, or a high level engineer could act as the healer and give a shield generation bonus, or an experienced captain could give a morale stat bonus. Fuck, that's cool.

I seriously doubt that, but whatever. I'll be happy exploring the galaxy regardless. Cryptic is growing on me. I think they'll do a good job.
Click to expand...

That's exactly what I hope they do, would make forming and being a part of a guild, or "crew" in this case, a hell of a lot of fun.
 
T

Tobor

Member
bloodforge said:
That's exactly what I hope they do, would make forming and being a part of a guild, or "crew" in this case, a hell of a lot of fun.
Click to expand...

No thanks. I want to fly my own ship. Why would I pay good money to be an ensign on someone else's ship? Boooorrrrriiiinnng.
 
wolfmat

wolfmat

Confirmed Asshole
Tobor said:
No thanks. I want to fly my own ship. Why would I pay good money to be an ensign on someone else's ship? Boooorrrrriiiinnng.
Click to expand...
I'm with you. Now beam over your warp core or face the consequences.
 
wolfmat

wolfmat

Confirmed Asshole
Tobor said:
Red Alert.
Click to expand...
Evasive maneuver Omega Three. Target their rear thrusters. They'll be dead in the water in no time.

Open a channel.

Toborian vessel. Prepare to be boarded.

Ensign, assemble a boarding team. Set phasers to stun. I'll be in my readyroom.
 
M

Malfunky

Member
Everyone wants their own ship. I want my own ship. I don't want to be stuck in my quarters in some asshole captain's ship when I could be messing with some suckers on the other side of the Neutral Zone. But I don't think everyone needs an Enterprise. It wouldn't make sense. You'd have an entire ship that, in the mythos, carries thousands of people. Limiting those ships to individual people would be a waste. They should save them for raids or guilds or even city hubs. Some sort of large-scale cooperative play. Plus they'd probably be some pretty bulky, slow, and boring ships by yourself.

I'd perfectly fine with my own Bird of Prey or something.




Shit, I want this game.
 
T

Tobor

Member
wmat said:
Evasive maneuver Omega Three. Target their rear thrusters. They'll be dead in the water in no time.

Open a channel.

Toborian vessel. Prepare to be boarded.

Ensign, assemble a boarding team. Set phasers to stun. I'll be in my readyroom.
Click to expand...

Pssssst. /whispers

Bloodforge, that's your cue.
 
S

Sibylus

Banned
wmat said:
Evasive maneuver Omega Three. Target their rear thrusters. They'll be dead in the water in no time.

Open a channel.

Toborian vessel. Prepare to be boarded.

Ensign, assemble a boarding team. Set phasers to stun. I'll be in my readyroom.
Click to expand...
Is this when you send friends requests to the babez?
 
J

jeffy_johnson

Member
Break out the phase compression rifles! Security teams to decks 5 through 7.

I wonder if you can be Delta Quadrant races? Hirogen would be badass.
 
N

NolbertoS

Member
I'm taking on the entire GAF Guild if it ever gets created. I own almost all the Star Trek Seasons, so you can bet this Trekkie will any Guild's ass.
 
S

super-heated plasma

Member
I will be in Las vegas sunday for the unveil. hopefully I'll get an interview for my site inputgame.com

Any questions you guys think I should ask if the situation presents itself?
 
wolfmat

wolfmat

Confirmed Asshole
super-heated plasma said:
I will be in Las vegas sunday for the unveil. hopefully I'll get an interview for my site inputgame.com

Any questions you guys think I should ask if the situation presents itself?
Click to expand...
Ask whether the plasma injectors induce replicator anomalies when the transwarp conduit is overpowered in subspace.

Seriously though, ask how fighting works ship vs ship, I'd like to know that. And whether there will be multiship battles. And if we can play in 1st person the whole time.
 
K

Kevin

Member
I preferred the more realistic MMO they were working on:


Sprint2Final_sShots_0023_obRm02m.jpg



That being said, I'll check out the gameplay video on Sunday and see if this new version interests me or not. So far I'm not really digging the art style.
 
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