Article first published as Star
Trek Online comes to Steam and it's Free on Technorati.
This week Steam added another Free to Play title to its
roster. Alongside such fan favorites as
Team Fortress 2 and DC Universe we now have Star Trek Online
(STO) from developer Cryptic and publisher Perfect World Entertainment. The game has actually been available
since February 2010 but was not Free to
Play on Steam until this week.
This latest installment of a game franchise that stretches
back to the early 80's aims to capture the hearts and wallets of Star Trek fans
by allowing them to explore a vast MMO world.
The game showed up on Steam on January 31st and requires 10GB of free
space to download the installation files.
For the uninitiated a Free to Play MMO title is basically a
massively multiplayer game like World of Warcraft that allows you to play
without purchasing anything. Star Trek
Online does offer "memberships" however that allow access to better
in -game equipment and perks that free players cannot access. There are also ample opportunities to
purchase items a la' carte for use in the game.
There's been much debate over whether such a model gives an
unfair advantage to players that choose to pay for a subscription but in my own
testing the subscription model is little more than an inconvenience for someone
who chooses to keep a free to play game free.
As it is with most Free to Play titles players who choose not to
purchase generally face a penalty of slower advancement timeframes, inability
to access special items or reduced functionality.
Set in the Star Trek Universe 30 years after the events of
Star Trek: Nemesis in the early 25th Century, Star Trek Online is an MMO role
playing game. Your first task upon
starting a new character is to customize them to your liking and begin your
first tutorial mission where you begin to learn how to navigate the user
interface. The tutorial missions
introduce a new player to the different gameplay modes with the first being a
third person mission where you interact with npc's and the ships controls. This mission is followed by a space combat mission and
finally ends up in a multiplayer MMO lobby cleverly disguised as a
starbase. It's an interesting epiphany
when you realize that most of the people running around the starbase are not
NPC's but other online players just like you.
Playing the game it's evident that the developer has put a
great deal of effort into creating an immersive experience designed to
encourage you to purchase a membership and/or upgrades. From detailed interior
environments to faithfully represented ship designs, care has been taken to
intrigue the most diehard Trekker.
In my time with the game I've found three basic mission
types. Space combat, away (ground )
missions and exploration. Other reviews
have noted that most missions lack depth with objectives relatively simple and
rarely varying from a formula. I've
experienced some of that but I've also noted a number of social features such
as in-game voice chat and the opportunity to join user created fleets or play
community generated missions. There is
some in-game advertising such as the periodic commercial for the voice chat
service provider while docked at a starbase but it hasn't been intrusive.
The game itself seems to combine elements from World of
Warcraft for the socialization features, Star Trek: Legacy for the space based
missions and Star Trek DS9: The Fallen for away missions. All good models for a Star Trek MMO but in
some cases the worst aspects of them have been replicated. Annoyances such as vague ship control in
space combat missions and an overall unintuitive control interface impose a
relatively steep learning curve.
New players will likely fumble through these deficiencies
for the first few sessions but can eventually adapt to master basic
functionality in the game. There are
tutorials but the control interface is too complex to master by relying on them exclusively. It's not a trait exclusive to Star Trek
Online, however, as most newer games have limited documentation and rely on
this same sink or swim model. For a game
hoping to secure a steady flow of revenue through subscriptions and upgrade
packages this may not be a good trend to follow.
The game has been in development for 8 years and in that
time has had its ownership changed 3 times with its initial launch by Atari on
February 2, 2010. Since 2008 Cryptic
studios has continued to exclusively develop the game. The game was first developed by Perpetual
Entertainment from 2004 until they went bankrupt in 2008. Cryptic obtained all the artwork and a
license to develop the game but did not receive the game engine which actually
works in its favor. When games move from
one studio to another they generally benefit from a clean slate. Adjusting to another developer's design rarely
results in a cohesive product.
I'm still exploring the universe Cryptic has provided and
the game seems to be continually undergoing updates and patches which may
address some of the deficiencies I've outlined.
It's interesting enough for me to investigate further but the jury is
out on whether I'll still be playing it 18 months from now as I've done with
Lord of Ultima.
The problem with free to
play games is that they can become a bit dull without investing in the upgrades
being pushed by the publisher. It's
tempting to shell out a few bucks to speed along an upgrade that would
otherwise take weeks or get an item otherwise unavailable. I've
invested in these types of perks before and always had buyer's remorse. Still there's a lush environment to explore in
STO that does a good job of capturing the Star Trek universe which might be
enough to keep at least a casual interest.
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