Star Trek Online: Here We Go Again!

[UnSub]

Heavy instancing in CO and CoH bugs me, but for some reason it works in STO. 

I've seen people complain that it takes too long to travel through sector space, then complain they want more 'real space' to travel through. Do these people not get the idea of what 'space' actually is, i.e. lots and lots of empty space? Sector space is pretty easy to deal with: don't alt-tab, or don't be surprised if you end up somewhere you didn't want to go.

The instancing works because it concentrates the action, much like the show.

[Shatter]

The key thing about STO is that Cryptic only had 2 years to develop it. I'm not sure who was driving that 2 years - Atari, the contract with Paramount / CBS - but that appears to have been a hard target for release. For that release period, I think they've done better than expected. A lot of the issues I've seen with the game (content aside) come down to design decisions like player captains or being heavily instanced, and I'm personally fine with those choices.

Still haven't bought it though. Going to give it a while and see what settles down.

Reviews have been mixed - I thought Gamespot was a bit vicious with a 5.5, given that the same reviewer gave WAR an 8.5. Sales appear to be pretty good though.

While Im not always a fan of reviews, most reviews for this game show it as sub par which is correct.  However, the thing to note is that almost every review is consistent in their assessment and issues with the game(many of which I posted above).  These issues include repetitiveness, lack of content, etc etc.  

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/20/arts/television/20start.html
In other words, he perfectly fits the narrow yet potentially deep demographic that Star Trek Online aims to appeal to. That is, Trekkies who are willing to overlook brain-lockingly repetitive gameplay, unvaried design, thin storytelling, buggy client software and an almost complete dearth of meaningful social interaction in favor of a mildly diverting, moderately attractive, cleverly episodic collection of simple combat encounters among spaceships and soldiers

http://pc.ign.com/articles/106/1069985p3.html
A smattering of memorable moments in 50+ hours of game time simply isn’t good enough for me to be able to recommend Star Trek Online to MMO fans. It’s quite a gorgeous game, but that novelty evaporates, and what’s left is repetitive, and simple in all the wrong parts. Hardcore Star Trek fans will probably find and enjoy countless in-jokes and references to their beloved series, but people who came looking for a new hobby will likely find themselves wanting.

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/startrekonline/review.html
It isn't bugs that make Star Trek Online feel unfinished, however. It's the inherent shallowness. It's light, airy, and simple--attributes that might attract you at first but only let you down when you find that the game is more boring than bold. Some of the flaws will improve in time; MMOGs are, by their very nature, evolving creatures. Other flaws--the poor ground combat and oddly disconnected nature of the universe--are threaded into the core design and less likely to see improvement. For now, be wary of Star Trek Online. The prospect of epic space combat may seem tempting, but a smattering of entertaining battles are merely oases amongst the monotony. Star Trek Online is a shell, lacking the substance and the style that the franchise so rightfully deserves.

While Xfire is far from the holy grail of determining how a game is doing it gives a general idea.  Aion is 10th, CO is 232, and STO is 32 which isnt good for a game thats only 3 weeks out live.  Will be fun to watch it plummet before 1 month and a huge chunck of people decide its not worth a monthly sub

[Venkman]

How is this even a debate? It's a standard MMO launch which means (in no specific order): it's incomplete, it's buggy, it doesn't meet its potential, it launched too soon, and people are having with it anyway.

Only MMOs still get that special type of forgiveness beaten out of almost every other genre. "It only had two years in development [and it launched anyway]" can be positioned as a good thing. How any MMO gets rated above a 6/60%/3-out-of-5 by places that also review other genres is beyond me. MMOs seem to get the equivalence of a 20% score boost simply because the expectations are so low.

Over five years after Blizzard showed how to make an MMO roughly comparable to a normal AAA video game, this genre still gets way too much latitude.

[Der Helm]

Der Helm, I got a 10 day trial key if you want one.

Downloading now... using the downloader... at 72 kb/s 

[Shatter]

Der Helm, I got a 10 day trial key if you want one.

Downloading now... using the downloader... at 72 kb/s 

Even their downloader is shit!   

[Der Helm]

Even their downloader is shit!   

I am at 50% now and the download speed picked up somewhat, fluctuates between 100 and 500 kb/s now. Still not awesome. 

[statisticalfool]

I think I remember the gamespot people posting about how they missed the boat a bit with AoC and WAR, awarding too many points for "future potential". But yeah, their reviewing strategy evolves over time: there's a lot of scores in their past they're probably not very happy with.

I feel like the reviews are pretty consistent: if all you wanted was Star Trek and spaceship battles, then all of them admit that you can have fun with that, but that all the surroundings are sparse.  It's just most of them are judging this on the: "how does this do as being a MMO now?", while most people here are having fun based on: "Why hello there, online persistent SFC!" Both of these readings seem pretty compatible. I feel like it's easy to understand why some people are having fun and people like Shatter aren't.

The key thing about STO is that Cryptic only had 2 years to develop it. I'm not sure who was driving that 2 years - Atari, the contract with Paramount / CBS - but that appears to have been a hard target for release. For that release period, I think they've done better than expected. A lot of the issues I've seen with the game (content aside) come down to design decisions like player captains or being heavily instanced, and I'm personally fine with those choices.

Still haven't bought it though. Going to give it a while and see what settles down.

Reviews have been mixed - I thought Gamespot was a bit vicious with a 5.5, given that the same reviewer gave WAR an 8.5. Sales appear to be pretty good though.

[Murgos]

I got in on a buddy key over the weekend.

Since I just went in for space battles and Star Trek mythos I'm enjoying it quite a bit and will probably buy when my key expires.

[ghost]

Reviews have been mixed - I thought Gamespot was a bit vicious with a 5.5, given that the same reviewer gave WAR an 8.5. Sales appear to be pretty good though.

That is odd, since it was pretty clear Warhammer was a turd from the middle of tier 1. 

STO has actually been quite fun.  I guess it makes a big difference when you don't need a game to be super involved and difficult. 

[Kovacs]

Reviews have been mixed - I thought Gamespot was a bit vicious with a 5.5, given that the same reviewer gave WAR an 8.5. Sales appear to be pretty good though.

I'm actually suprised at how disappointed I am that somebody would not just read a Gamespot review but refer to one unironically. 

Although, as someone who's completely lost without an above average editor I love that this guy loves punctuation more than words.  Any 'writer' who manages to fit a semicolon, two commas, a period and two sets of dashes around 20 words is just a failed editor looking for an easier gig in the gaming industry imo.

[Murgos]

WAR I hated from the first hour I logged.  AoC I liked until mid-20's when the unfinished nature of the game just became too apparent.  EQ2 had to grow on me but the strong world and massive list of things to do eventually won me over, I'd go back even now but the 8 year old nature of the engine is too big a hurdle.  CoH I loved from beta through to the age of hamfisted nerfs.  ChampO I never even made it out of the starting blocks, I literally was too annoyed with it to finish the newb quest.  I've tried WoW three times now, I can never last more than a few days without wandering off to do something else.

So far STO is in that CoH/AoC/WoW area for me.  Fun for the short term but I am undecided on long term interest.  At Lt. 7 though the long term prospects seem limited and like they might be too repetitive to be sustainable.

[Pennilenko]

STO has actually been quite fun.  I guess it makes a big difference when you don't need a game to be super involved and difficult.  

I think that is why it appeals to me so much, I can log  in, and get to dispatching some Klingons, I don't have to think too hard, and I don't have to have the reflexes of a cat. I also don't have to play for a huge chunk of time to notice a difference.

P.S. For those people complaining about repetition in the game, I would like to point out that the Star Trek franchise is repetitious as fuck.

[tazelbain]

And WAR had that.

[Pennilenko]

And WAR had that.

War didn't show me progress I was happy with, fast enough.

[ghost]

Cryptic has actually formed a couple of games that I can log on and just screw around for an hour or so and have fun.  There aren't fifty experience bars and all that bullshit to deal with, at least not at my current level.  My days of raiding are done.  I think the Cryptic guys may be on to something with more casual accessible gameplay.  I think that may have been what Warhammer was trying to do, but they missed.  Badly.

[Tannhauser]

I can try to give someone a buddy key if they want.  Also, whoever runs the f13 guild, can I get an invite?

Rok@tannhausergates

[Stormwaltz]

I noticed something odd today, and was wondering if anyone could confirm or contradict.

I was playing a mission where I had to defend a wimpy science ship with my more awesome science ship. My bread and butter skills are Sensor Jamming -- shutting down the target's ability to fire weapons.

But after locking down the enemy, I noticed it was still firing at the NPC. I tried it a couple more times with the same result; Sensor Jamming kept the enemies from firing at me (and from prior experience with Fleet Actions, it keeps them from firing at other players), but it doesn't appear to keep them from firing at NPCs.

Which, when you're doing an escort mission, is somewhat counterproductive

[Valmorian]

I noticed something odd today, and was wondering if anyone could confirm or contradict.

I was playing a mission where I had to defend a wimpy science ship with my more awesome science ship. My bread and butter skills are Sensor Jamming -- shutting down the target's ability to fire weapons.

But after locking down the enemy, I noticed it was still firing at the NPC. I tried it a couple more times with the same result; Sensor Jamming kept the enemies from firing at me (and from prior experience with Fleet Actions, it keeps them from firing at other players), but it doesn't appear to keep them from firing at NPCs.

Which, when you're doing an escort mission, is somewhat counterproductive

yeah, that's pretty much what placate is.  Same as in Champions Online.

[Tannhauser]

I have SJ and I'm about to drop it for Hazard Emitters.  I've had the same experience Storm has with it.  My little escort is always being hit by five or so enemy ships, whats one less?  Never seem to run into a 'boss ship' alone.

Oh and plasma torps are 

[Murgos]

I dropped Sensor Jam for Science Team (+Shield, +Shield Resist).  It's saved my bacon on several occasions.

[Jherad]

Also have a buddy key if anyone wants one.

Jherad@Jherad if a fleet ever gets set up, though I'm starting to flag a little - been sat on RA5 for a while now, and there's not a lot to do at the mo if you're only on for 30 mins to an hour (PvP queues can take that long).

[Der Helm]

So, I have been playing for a few hours now, thanks to a 10 day trial key ( )...

I got my Federation character to Lt.Cmd. 2 and my Klingon is still sitting at Lt7.

In MMOs I usually gravitate to PvP if present. So far my experience with STO PvP (in Arenas) is as follows.

Federation (Space) My fellow pilots fly single file into the waiting Klingon blob, get picked off one after another.

Klingon (Space) Federation pilots behave like described above, after about 5-10 kills for "red", they don't respawn at all or leave the system.

Klingon (Ground) Surprisingly fun, so far I lost only one game (against an organized team, entered the game with a score of 20 blue 5 red, game ended 40/31 for blue)

Does the space PvP get better ? Is there anything else BUT Arenas ? I entered a few systems with where described as Battlegrounds or somesuch, but they were either bugged or i did not understand the mechanics.

Are there any PvP guides for this game, mechanics-wise or other ?

So far I am tempted to give them some money, IF they drop the price for the box/key. 

[Murgos]

10 bux off on Steam (39.99).  Anyway, I expect pvp to get better as people get used to it and/or some changes are made.  The game is 2 weeks old, in the history of MMOs having even a marginally functional pvp experience in a mostly pve game that quickly is pretty much unique.  AoC and WAR, which practically billed themselves as PVP MMOs, were at or around the same point at launch (well, AoC was actually quite a bit behind).

[Jherad]

Looks like they're starting surveys (email link, 240 CP if you complete):

[01101010]

That's actually a pretty comprehensive survey as far as these things usually go. Hope this has teeth and is not just there to pacify people into thinking Cryptic cares.

Still no mention of Romunlans though. 

[Riggswolfe]

Yeah, I did the survey yesterday. I was happy to see that a few things I cared about were actually in the list of "what do you want to see?" like more ship interiors.

[GenVec]

Does the space PvP get better ? Is there anything else BUT Arenas ? I entered a few systems with where described as Battlegrounds or somesuch, but they were either bugged or i did not understand the mechanics.

Are there any PvP guides for this game, mechanics-wise or other ?

There are systems you can fight in/over (the Battlegrounds you entered), but the vast disparity between Klingon and Federation populations makes this an unattractive prospect even at the best of times. From what I understand they function like a competitive fleet action.

The few occasions I've wandered into them have resulted in me being blown to hell before I can even cloak by spawn-camping fed fleets.

I think the PvP has a lot of potential, but they really need to move beyond the awful arenas... and I don't know how you can stand ground combat. I refuse to set foot off my ship.

[UnSub]

I'll give them points for doing what looks to be a pretty good survey. They offer an incentive to complete it and allows for some customer segmentation and price modelling.

[Xilren's Twin]

I have also been trying this with a buddy pass and I think I will hold off and revisit in a few months.
Overall, it's pretty decent, but there are enough things i found annoying so far that i am going to wait on it.
Ship combat is pretty good, just very slooooww.  It's pretty enough and I like the various weapons and ship types and some of the abilities are neat.
Ground combat on the other hand, just leaves me cold.  Having to shoot unshielded mobs 10 times with an energy weapon just feels off.  And if it's not the bugs (like having a mission where my entire away team and the enemy mobs vanish yet I'm still taking damage), it's the random seeming difficulty.  Most egregious mission so far was one where I could find no way to kill the last group of Klingon's without getting wtfpwned in about 10 seconds flat.  Last group had like 2-3 regular warriors, a swordmaster, munitions officer, some other officer and i guess what qualifies as a boss mob of some kind (some dual disruptor pistol wielding fat guy) who could kill any member of my team in seconds.  I'm not a mmorpg rookie so i figured i could solve this encounter somehow.  But no matter what tactics I tried, special abilities i employed, as soon as combat started every enemy mobs makes a bee line for me (whether i fired a shot or not) and blam dead.  Kiting? dead.  Trying to use the obstacles in the environment to avoid direct fire? dead. Team Focus fire on the boss? dead and barely scratched him. etc etc.  And after each death you respawn back at the starting point and have to run 2-3 minutes through the otherwise empty zone to lose that fight again in seconds.  I literally tried this 10 times before finally just beaming the hell off planet feeling like i just wasted 30 minutes of my time.  I don't mind quests that may need an actually group to complete rather than just me and my 4 pets, but it would be nice to know that before hand.

The overall pace of the game feels glacial to me; I'm not sure why.  Only made it to level 4 thus far, but just don't feel the pull to keep trying. 

I'd say it's worthy trying first for anyone who is interested.

[Hawkbit]

Oddly, the casual aspect of this game would really fit my lifestyle right now, but I simply can't see myself dropping $50 to start it up.  If they let me digital download with a free month for $20, I'd jump on it and have some fun.  It's just too much of an initial cost for me to justify. 

[Nebu]

Oddly, the casual aspect of this game would really fit my lifestyle right now, but I simply can't see myself dropping $50 to start it up.  If they let me digital download with a free month for $20, I'd jump on it and have some fun.  It's just too much of an initial cost for me to justify.  

Give it 3 months.  I'm betting the box cost will be down to $20 by then.  

I don't mean this as a slight by the way.  I just think that it's good business for subscription-based games to lower box costs after the initial push to improve word-of-mouth marketing. 

[Shatter]

Oddly, the casual aspect of this game would really fit my lifestyle right now, but I simply can't see myself dropping $50 to start it up.  If they let me digital download with a free month for $20, I'd jump on it and have some fun.  It's just too much of an initial cost for me to justify.  

Give it 3 months.  I'm betting the box cost will be down to $20 by then.  

I don't mean this as a slight by the way.  I just think that it's good business for subscription-based games to lower box costs after the initial push to improve word-of-mouth marketing. 

There wont be much of a population left in 3 months

[Nebu]

There wont be much of a population left in 3 months

I'm willing to give this game a chance.  I think that it's different enough to attract a steady flow of people willing to plunk down some green for a diversion.  I intend to be one of those people after the game gets fixed a bit. 

[Lantyssa]

So was PotBS...

[Nebu]

So was PotBS...

... and I got suckered out of my money there too.  I'm sensing a trend.