Posted on February 19, 2012, in Episodes and tagged star trek online. Bookmark the permalink. 29 Comments.
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Posted on February 19, 2012, in Episodes and tagged star trek online. Bookmark the permalink. 29 Comments.
MMO Grinder 
Anyone know if the browser based Star Trek Timeline MMORPG is any good, or just another cash-in app?
You touched up on a feature where you earn a secondary currency which can then be exchanged for Cryptic points. However, you didnt go into further detail when you talked about the cashshop. I was kinda hoping you wouldve talked about that some more given how rare it is for a F2P to have that. That makes this the second game Ive ever heard of that did this.
Also, am I the only one that though Lewis should have gone hardcore like Harrison Ford and just stapled the hat to his head?
Whoohoo! I made it in the episode! *dances* (I’m the guy that Rezzed him during that ground combat mission)
But seriously, it was a pleasure to play with ya, D1.
Regarding the game, if anything, i’d like to see a racechange/sexchange option.
I don’t mind if it costs a few cryptic points (even the same amount as a character slot). It’s just that I’d like to be a Caitian, and the only way for me to do that would be to delete my character and start all over again. ugh.
Besides. it’s the 24th century. surely they’ve perfected gender reassignment surgery by then, right?
OK, sorry to make an amendment to my other large post up there, but one gripe in-particular that was made during the review can’t be emphasized enough. And that’s the lack of enemy types. There is, like, close to no animal life in the game. The few species of critters mostly fall into the “4 legged run at you and bite you” category, as well. Like I said above, I’ve been playing with the Foundry, and was honestly shocked when I got around to the “wildlife” of NPCs, and found such a limited number of critters in the game in-total.
Kind of a real failing of the game, in the sense that you can do a lot of “explore strange new planets” type missions, and there never seems to be and danged WILDLIFE on them, nor can you really add much of a variety to custom maps. Crying shame, that is.
i was never to big a fan of Trek. i like TNG and have seen a few of the original run, but i didnt get too invested into the series. im interested in seeing a more space combat focused mmo. REAL space combat… not boat combat “in space” … most scifi properties treat large spaceships like naval vessels and smaller fighter spaceships as airplanes. one of the few scifi properties that dont treat space like earth is ender’s game…wait a minute…
Ender’s Game MMOspaceRPG? could work…
but Mr. Grinder, i dont know how you feel about FPS genre, but i was wondering if youve paid any attention to Firefall the FPSMMORPG by Red 5 Studios… if they pull off what they are trying to… its going to be amazing. i just hope it isnt like APB… but APB really isnt F2P, more free2lose…alot.
Lol, I was just thinking “I’ll bet Lewis Lovhaug plays this.”
I don’t know what would be worse, going into this game never having watched any Star Treks or not having seen them in 10-15 years & having forgotten everything.
Welshy? Please give him a poke & tell him to review something, anything.
I like the emphases on solo play, but the dreary mechanical environment & lack of plant life is just a huge turn-off.
If you want simple, go oldschool. I’m still waiting for Ultima Online to go FTP, & won’t be using the updated graphics when it does.
do forsaken world…Please?
My comments on this game in responce to this video have been pretty negative so far, so I thought I’d add something that I like about this game (I have to like something if I am playing it, right?).
First is that is doesn’t really matter what profession you choose for yourself to what ship you decide you like. The profession specific space abilities you get for your character work on any ship just as good as any other. What bridge officers you get matters far more.
Second is that the Klingon ships are VERY different from the Federation ships (though their selection is mostly Escort and Escort/Cruiser hybrids). Though to be negative again, they do not get all that great of a selection in science ships, if you don’t want to pay real money for one. Also, the Gorn ships are the mentioned pay to have science ships. T.T (I like the Gorn and play them in Starfleet Battles.)
A final note is that I would like to see more playable factions in the future. This two factions only thing needs to end. It works for WoW, I suppose and games that want to be WoW, but Star trek shouldn’t limit itself like this. I’d pay for access to additional factions and would buy more character slots for them.
I started playing this about a week and a half ago, here. I DID think of trying it out a year or so ago, when it was pay-to-play, but decided against it, because I had already decided to NEVER again play any game that was subscription based but also required you to plop down $50+ on the software up front as well. ‘Cos, you know, what if you don’t like it? (Sorry, and I mean no offense, but I saw you hold up that “collector’s edition box”, and I had to laugh at you after you said you were done with it in no time flat.)
I have a Perfect World account thanks to playing Rusty Hearts, so I figured it was worth trying this now as a free game under their corporate umbrella. And so far? I’m not disappointed at all. I’m not a big Star Trek fan, and I’m not a big MMO guy, but I like this as, you know, a game-game. Even as a single-player game, something you can start up, tool around in, and just have some fun with it. There’s no real pressure to have the best gear, there’s no real grinding for money when you’re crafting with the random things you scan, and no real need to find other people to party with every time you log in. You just kind of play it, and do whatever random thing you feel like and use whatever rewards you get from your random poking around to further yourself. If anything, my one BIG complaint so far is that at the lower levels, you level up WAY TOO QUICKLY just by doing your random this-and-that combined with the Duty Officer assignment rewards. I got to the next tier of ship in less than a week, and barely got to enjoy my old one, I thought.
Sorry for the long post, but one more thing. I think you didn’t mention the Foundry at all? If you did, I missed it, because half the episode I listened to while using the Foundry, and it’s bloody addictive trying to make up your own scenario maps. It’s a REALLY fun thing to just play around with.
OK. One more one more thing. I’d argue that the lack of Bridge Officer slots on a free-account hurts a lot more so far than having to buy character slots. Because you have to buy Bridge Officer slots PER character, and once you get more officers active on a ship at once, you kind of feel a want to have more of a pool of officers (read: space abilities) to choose from at any given time.
I was playing Star Trek Online yesturday, and I agree with alot of your reasons to pass on the game. Up until the Doomsday Weapon quest. Not only is it voice acted (a bit off for some characters) But than probabily the coolest moment happen toward the end in the lead up to the fight against the doomsday weapon. I won’t spoil it but if you are a star trek fan you be grinning from ear to ear and singing right along.
It’s moments like these that I feel make a MMO, Any mmo can get repetitve with questing and such but it’s stumbling on those gems that make you go, “They did not just do that……. They did AWESOME!!!!”
i was wondering since you bought the game back when it was p2p do you get any sort of subscription or cryptic points equivalent to the game value or do they just go F it you bought it,we dont care anymore?
btw i’d like to reinterate my sugestion for Grand Chase when possible
I know I have a lot of things to answer in the off-week update… the day after tomorrow.
To answer now though, since I originally had the CE, I logged in with my original account and I have a few things unlocked.
One was a reusable item for my ship called a Red Matter Converter, that gave a boost to all ship systems. I also have access to the original Enterprise (technically the Constitution class cruiser) that has beams that level up with your character. I also have a few of the uniforms from the original series and TNG unlocked. That account has a few more inventory slots unlocked… and it also never made it past level 4.
I feel very underwhelmed by this game so far. It just doesn’t feel all that exciting or anything. I have a hard time played this for any period of time as I just feel bored by it. Maybe it get’s better after the first few levels, but who knows.
I can easily see why this went free to play. It isn’t really bad or anything, but it isn’t all that good either. It’s pretty much average.
I am glad that you mentioned (albiet briefly) my biggest problem with this game. That is, how ships move through space. No Z axis movement and you bank when you turn. I am in a SPACE ship, not a biplane, Cryptic!
It’s been mentioned several times by developers that the non-technical reason they went with this was because in the Star Trek shows, you rarely saw ships fighting in full 3D. Most often, ships in the series fought on the same plane, and rarely would you see ships fighting significantly above or below another. There were of course exceptions, like Wrath of Khan, or some of the DS9 battles involving the Defiant, but for the most part, they followed this ‘tall ships’ model. For a non-canon reason, thanks to the Alysrazor fight in WoW, I’m pretty sure 3D combat confuses a large number of people.
Yeah, but it still bothers me that the flight of the characters in the “City of…” (and presumably Champions) games is easily what Star Trek should have had (with some tweaking, of course). I’ve gotten used to it, but really.
So, why did you decide it wasn’t for you back when it was p2p? I watched through it once and a half and I don’t think you went into why, (if you did I’m sorry and I can’t find it). You did bait it in front of me, dangling an awesome story in front of me like a piece of meat.
Gimmy.
There’s no awesome story here, really. The reasons I stopped playing are scattered throughout the review (repetitive and slow, original space combat was broken.) It felt like a chore to play and since I still subscribed to WoW, I was having way more fun with that game at the time.
The only other reason I got the game was for the sheer amount of people who tweeted about how awesome it was… which I assume is what they did about 3 minutes into the tutorial, because they never spoke of it again. After my third Delta Volanis mission, I saw a grave future and couldn’t bring myself to log in again.
Yep, the free Silver accounts should get 2 character slots.
For the Zen / Cryptic Points exchange rate, you don’t actually lose anything from it, though it does seem odd. The amount of money it costs for 100 Zen is the same amount you’d pay to get 80 Cryptic Points if you were to purchase it directly from Cryptic.
If you do continue to play this game, you should use the Cryptic login you initially created as your older account will have certain attributes grandfathered in, such as 1 extra character slot, and the extra in game claimable items from the C-Store for the Collector’s Edition.
Another tip for anyone playing as a free player. While the free method does allow you access to just about everything in the game, if you do subscribe for a month, you’ll get all the extra inventory slots, bank slots, and bridge officer slots a subscriber does – even retroactively. As such, if you do play, especially more than one character, I think it’s a great idea to subscribe for 1 month at least, just so you unlock all the extra slots. These extra slots do not go away once your subscription lapses and you become a free player again.
That subscription tip seems to be a pretty common practice in all these F2P/Sub hybrid games. I’ve heard people advise doing it in LOTRO and CoH as well.
I am fairly certain that you do start with 2 character slots, one for a Federation character and one for a Klingon, so there’s no need to delete the Federation character at any time. Unless you want to of course.
To answer your question regarding character slots, from what I understand, as soon as you hit lv 25 on a federation character, you gain a new character slot, but it is only usable with an empire character.
Also, I must ask, do you have something against Perfect World?
I don’t have anything against Perfect World, but they seemed the least likely candidate to pick up the game, considering all their other titles.
I am a bit confused as to whether they named their company after their game, or named their game after their company. Either option is weird to me.
Actually, they just bought all of Cryptic. They weren’t just about to completely shut down Star Trek Online, I suppose.
sauce http://is.gd/FWm5Q3
For the record, the company was launched in 2004, the game in 2006. http://is.gd/KPZOUU
I tried this game just recently and wasn’t impressed. Perhaps a fan of Star Trek will get more out of it.
You mentioned that you liked the two varied combat options for ship and ground, which makes me want to recommend reviewing Pirates of the Burning Sea. Also started subscription based but has been f2p now for over a year. It has in my opinion the best ship combat system of any MMO. I’d even go so far as to call it the most dynamic and interesting combat system full stop. The ground combat is not as good, but at least it’s more fun than STO’s.
Interesting. I kept seeing this in stores, with various unique perks depending on where it was purchased (for instance, a unique ship, a unique weapon, or, in one case, a tribble pet,) but I didn’t pick it up because I wasn’t particularly interested.
One clarification, and please forgive me if someone else already said this, or if you knew: Steam Wallet is almost exactly what it sounds like. If you have an account with Steam, you can load up money into the wallet, which can be used later to purchase games, purchase in-game items (e.g.: TF2 hats and weapons,) or in this case, purchase points for the cash shop. From that brief glimpse, I couldn’t tell if it would be more beneficial to just purchase point through Steam than to purchase Zen and convert it. Maybe if you’re only playing this game and none of the other ones that use Zen.
Still, seeing as how it is free to play and on Steam, I might give this one a try.
The thing about Steam Wallet was partially me messing around as I could contextually figure out what it did, but I honestly didn’t hear about it until just now. I also tossed in that line at the last second (you can notice I sound a bit different when I mention it.) because I didn’t even notice it until I was going through the screenshots I took.
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