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a quick review of star trek
cagan
Member UncommonPosts: 445
Thanx to the free buddy trial keys on MMORPG I downloaded the game and started playing last friday. So far I put in 20-25 hours into the game. It is not much and I am pretty new but here it goes"
-graphics: looks very dated and animations are bad (then again I am spoiledby Skyrim). But I am not the one to worry about graphics too much, as long as the story and the gameplay are good I am in...(still playing master of magic! such an awesome game from 18 years ago)
-story &gameplay: story is good but I must admit the missions kinda get old after 5-6 hours. It is always the same scan this object, shoot this ship down etc...being a star trek fan I love the stories...the grindy missions..not that much...
-Crafting: It is not bad, not great either. I would say its decent but the down part is you can only craft in a certain planet. (maybe you can craft other places too but didnt discover that yet)
And the part that irritated me is every other option I pick or try to choose smthg the store pops up...it costs store credits to buy all the cool stuff. Paying members must be really pissed, Its outrageous to have such a big overpowered store content for a paid subscription game.
-pvp: I was in the queue for 40 mins than left, not many players in the servers or they are not interested in Pvp.
As I said this is kind of first impression after 20 + hours of gameplay. I might continue trying after F2P switch , but in its current state I wouldnt waste my money, I kinda see why its going F2P.
Comments
An interesting take on the game, and thanks for posting your review.
My thoughts on your points:
-Graphics:
I think with everything turned on and turned up,the game looks amazing. Some of the animations do get old, but it is something I would expect many people to feel as they see the same animations over and over as they progress through the game.
-Story and Game play:
I feel like the story is fairly lackluster, in that Cryptic really hasn't taken much of an original approach to the story. Set 40 years after nemesis, the story just seems a little to... safe. The game play, as in how you control the characters, at least on ground parts, seems to stiff. The abilities sometimes feel delayed and unresponsive, though not ALL the time. It feels inconsistent to me. Ship combat is pretty satisfying, and is the best part of the game by far, in my opinion.
-Crafting:
I don't have a lot to say about it, except it still feels like a vendor system. I don't necessarily like how they have added extra components only purchasable by dilithium, though I think they are included only in higher tier equipment.
-Pvp:
I can't offer an opinion with pvp, because I have never done it in this game. Though, the new community manager, BranFlakes guy or whatever his name is, has started organizing pvp sessions with players. So there's that at least.
I agree with you on your closing statement.
I'm a lifetime member and don't feel bad about what the store sells as they don't sell anything that I can't get in the game except for some fluff items. Not sure what you mean't by this though as I haven't had the store ever pop up while I'm playing the game:
"And the part that irritated me is every other option I pick or try to choose smthg the store pops up...it costs store credits to buy all the cool stuff. Paying members must be really pissed, Its outrageous to have such a big overpowered store content for a paid subscription game. "
What is smthg?
I dont really mean a store window opens every time, but what I mean is while crafting or customizing your character, ship etc there is always the "only in store" option in there. I wasn't expecting such a big store promotion in a subscription game.
-graphics: looks very dated and animations are bad (then again I am spoiledby Skyrim). But I am not the one to worry about graphics too much, as long as the story and the gameplay are good I am in...(still playing master of magic! such an awesome game from 18 years ago)
I can see why you'd view the graphics as being dated, the game's engine was designed to be generic. A quick and easy way to bang out MMOs (at least that was the line they sold Atari). [As far as MoM goes, its in my archive of essential oldies along with X-com and Magic the Gathering.
]
-story &gameplay: story is good but I must admit the missions kinda get old after 5-6 hours.
Cryptic built the game for casual players, an immersive plot would have been counter-productive. But on the other hand, ST fans expect nothing less than a good story and deep plot. All these repetitive combat missions, anomaly harvesting and ground combat missions makes the game feel very generic. However, I haven't played any of the player-created content and hope players have been more creative than Cryptic. [As it stands, my Silver account characters can't access the Forge (even though Cryptic's feature matrix says otherwise.]
The new Bridge Officers missions were introduced as being a new dimension to the game but in reality it's more like Cryptic added a card-trading game (similar to MtG). You get a couple BO starter-packs and a 100 BO limit (deck), with each BO having it's own speciality and attributes. The game is to collect BOs that best match missions. It's an easy and passive way to score extra points and resources. I also expect it's generating a lot of ca$h as players buy booster-packs.
-Crafting: It is not bad, not great either.
Harvesting anomalies is monotonous. The last update introduced a lot of changes aimed at ushering in F2P. One of the things that got cut was the amount of item slots Silver accounts get. My character, which was a Commander, lost about 28 slots (2 rows at the bank and 2 in active [bag]). So, F2P players may have to choose between amassing resources for crafting or using their limited space for equipment and materials for missions. Since we can get very rare (purple) items from the Exchange and "set" items on missions, I don't see a need for crafting.
- every other option I pick or try to choose smthg the store pops up...it costs store credits to buy all the cool stuff.
Yes, Cryptic has made it abundantly clear that their main objective is to entice players to open their wallets (again and again). If they put as much effort into developing the game as they have into monetizing it, Cryptic may have produced a game that lived up to the hype. Heck, the game still doesn't even live up to the commercial they ran at launch.
- pvp: I was in the queue for 40 mins then left
Hopefully F2P will shorten the queues. It is just about the only good thing Gold players will get out of the game going FTP.
Sometimes the problem isn't what you buy.
The juggernaunt is sold in the C-Store... the game is flooded with borg admirals with juggernaunt galaxy ships with borg attachments. The illusion of the game dies with hot pink uniforms with mid-drifts, a dance hall for starfleet officers, and the goofy animal pets running around starbases.
As we await the "free to play" to happen they churn out another 2 ship skins and a different color Horta, all the while dev blogs for the FTP has reached 25 and we will have to wait for another 25 before it happens.
Bugs for missions are still there, some of them have been there since day one. Klingons have been neglected for the longest, until the demand for them to add more content for klingons was getting borderline nasty.
Of course some fanboy always get pissed with the truth I write, will flag this post because his threshold for butthurt is severly slim... Doesn't change what EVERYONE who has played this game already knows.
Just a quick clarification: STO was originally billed as a AAA MMO. The 'we always intended it to be a casual game' line came after launch, when players started complaining en masse.
"Oh my, how horrible, someone is criticizing a MMO. Oh yeah, that is what a forum is about, looking at both sides. You rather have to be critical of anything in this genre as of late because the track record of these major studios has just been appalling." -Ozmodan