Boldly Going (Star Trek Online Beta Screens, Impressions)

[Acyl]

Star Trek Online started Open Beta on Tuesday. Now, I figure everyone here's a gamer, and an MMO gamer, at that. So here's a look at my past couple days, boldly going where...okay, a few hundred thousand beta players have already gone before. But still...



This is a pretty game. This is a very pretty game. My graphics settings are actually pretty low, because I want better framerate - but even with stuff dialed down, it looks incredible. The visuals need to be awesome in a Star Trek game, I think. And they've delivered on that score.
Feels good, too. Once you've got the hang of it, controls in this game, both in space and on the ground, are very logical and very tight. It's a joy in particular to fly around adjusting power levels and shields, while banking and turning...


Obviously the primary attraction for many players is the space gameplay. And the space environments here are brilliant - they actually manage to make space a real landscape. Star systems in this game actually do look unique. And pretty.

Starships are customisable - you get to configure the look, within a given layout for your ship type. The starter level-1 ships are all variations of the Miranda-class from Star Trek II, but as you can see from my example...you can do quite a bit to make it look different.
After all, your ship's essentially a second avatar - and much like how characters in City of Heroes and Champions are all about the customisation, so are the starships here.


Starship combat in this game is highly tactical. Think of slow-moving wet navy ship combat, from the age of sail...with everyone trying to get in position for a broadside. Except it's in space. In three dimensions.

Very basically, you need to gun down enemy shields, and then fire torpedoes at their exposed hull. But there's all sorts of wrinkles there; relative speed and turn rate...different weapon firing arcs, different weapon types (Cannons, Torpedoes, Turrets, Mines, Single Beams, Dual Beams)... and then there's special abilities like Tractor Beams, Boarding Parties...yeah.
It's easy to learn, hard to master. The basics are easy to comprehend, but there's lots of complexities. Which is cool. It feels starship-y.


Instead of a world map, interstellar space is a 'galaxy map'. The game calls this 'sector space'...you're actually flying your starship through a giant map.

It's an interesting stylistic choice. Not everyone likes it, but I do. I think it's really awesome and classy. A really smart way to depict interstellar travel, instead of just warping from point A to point B.
It also seems to be the place to hang out and chat...or look for groups, the old fashioned 'broadcast' way. Though that's a lot less necessary in this game. More on that later.

Character customisation in this game is...something else. Champions Online took what CoH had to a whole new level. This game goes Champions one better. The face and body sliders are just awesome. There's several sliders for scar and tattoo scaling alone. And a shiny-slider for the hair. I've been fairly traditional in my own design choices, but you can actually make, like, superdeformed anime proportions in this game. And if you wanna give your character a beer belly, you can...

But the canon races like Vulcans, Klingons, Ferengi and so on have a narrower range of customisation options - the character creator actually limits what you can do based on your race preset. It works VERY well.

You have full customisation for both your own avatar, and those of your bridge crew. Yeah. I said crew.



Because in STO, you don't just play a captain. You play a captain AND crew. You get to choose and customise your supporting cast. In space, they provide most of your abilities. And on the ground...if you're solo, they come with you as NPCs.

The ground game is always based around a five-man team - even if there's only one human player. Of course, human teammates will occupy slots as you bring 'em on board, but there's a robust system for handling the NPCs. This isn't Guild Wars...this is more like Mass Effect. Seriously, think Mass Effect. NPCs whom you can command to shoot, move around, use abilities...

You can even pause the game to issue commands. That's right. There's a pause button. In an MMO.
Generally, ground combat is very much like Mass Effect as well - quasi-shooter, with crouching, ducking, rolling. Weapons are your main firepower, backed up by special abilities. Positioning is quite important. The core mechanic is expose/exploit - get 'em vulnerable, and then crit 'em for massive damage.



The game isn't all combat, though most of it is. But there's a LOT of content in this game. Tons. The tutorial alone is like a two hour mission.

Then there's the random stuff. Instead of newspaper missions, STO has 'Exploration Missions'. But even this is awesome.

The devs have a procedural generator to churn out tons of random missions with scenery and maps pieced together - it actually constructs different architectural and geographical styles. So the missions LOOK different, even if the structure is the same.

But then...the mission text isn't 'madlib', because each 'random' mission has had unique text written for it. The devs have gone in and hand-written dialogue for each generated mission. And there are reportedly thousands of missions. Even the random stuff has storylines.



Missions in STO take you between space and ground - often a few times during the same mission. I'd say a slight majority of the game still takes place in space - at least in the content I've done so far. But it's a fair mix.

I honestly think they've succeeded in making this not just a great Star Trek game, but a great MMO in general. There's a lot of innovative ideas - the Exploration Missions, for instance. PvP is genuinely pretty damn fun. Not balanced - but what PvP is? Fun, though. That's important.

Then there's auto-grouping. This is an optional feature - by default it's turned on, but it's easily disabled. Some folks, of course, don't like it. But design-wise, for the average player, it's brilliant. When you enter a mission instance, the game automatically tracks other players just starting that mission...and puts together the team for you. The game PuGs FOR you.

And most of the auto-PuGs I've been on - all but one - worked out damn well. Imagine that.



Of course, this is just a beta. But strangely, it's a lot more stable than some launch MMOs I've played. Definitely better than Champions. The server was laggy as hell on the first day of beta, but it's totally fixed now. No crash or disconnect issues for me.

No real showstopper bugs either; most bugs being reported are things to do with quests and game balance, items and NPCs with incorrect stats, menu quirkiness, that sorta thing...rather than major functionality issues.

In summary - I'm really liking this. When I played Champions, it was a clear case of...I like this about the game, but that really sucks...the game's not bad when you get around that problem...

I've found nothing to hate about STO. I'm a Trek fan, you understand. But that doesn't mean I'm gonna be forgiving. Rather, my expectations are higher. And this game's pretty much meeting them. Maybe I'll be more cynical once I've been playing this for longer - but so far? It looks good.
-- Acyl