My Star Trek Online Wishlist

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One of the best MMORPGs on the market right now, in my opinion is Cryptic’s “Star Trek Online“. Not because of the IP, but because it’s a really well-developed game! Sure, the name “Star Trek” is what first attracted me, but it’s the game play that has kept me subscribed for the last year.

After all, a good IP does not guarantee a good game. Take Star Wars Galaxies for instance, or Star Trek Armada. Both had great IP’s and majorly suckage games.

So, what makes STO stand out from the rest? Well, to begin with the game is always improving. The developers care enough about this title, to go to great lengths to keep it from getting stale. Things are always being added, or improved. In fact, STO has only been out slightly over a year, and already the game has seen more advancement and improvements than any other MMORPG I have played. They have remastered older episodes to add cut-scenes and voice overs, and to make the missions more involving and epic.

Not to mention the foundry which allows you to create and share your own star trek missions with the game community. This means there is a constant stream of new content being added daily, from some very creative minds.

Is the game perfect? No, of course not, but it’s well on its way to getting there! Here are a few things that could be added that would increase my enjoyment of the game.

1) More factions: Currently you can play Federation and Klingon, but I would love to see some other playable factions. The Romulans, Cardassians or even the borg.

2) More visitable iconic planets: Currently you can beam down to a handful of iconic star trek planets. Like Andoria, Vulcan and Risa just to name a few, but I would love more! Ferenginar or Earth for starters! Sorry, I don’t count Earth Space Dock as earth.

3) UGC Slots: Some more slots for making UGC in the game would be nice. It would be a shame if people started deleting some of the great missions available, so they can make new ones.

4) Non-STF mission versions: This probably seems really stupid to people, but one thing I would like to see is versions of the end game missions that don’t require STF. Maybe have the Non-STF versions not give rewards or drops, but there just for the story. Fact of the matter is, I play games for the stories and in an STF(Raid) people tend to rush, which means others who might not have experienced it, miss out on some kick ass storylines. If they had a non-STF version with no rewards, people could play through it for the story, and then play the STF version for the epic lewtz while everyone is rushing around like mad-men.

5) More Q!: Come on, who doesn’t love Q? How about some Q love?? Give us some Q missions, or a Feature Episode series starring Q.

6) Favorite Authors: Since the arrival of the Foundry, the STO community has been blessed with some great missions and authors. Some authors create incredible Feature Episode style missions as well. So, it would be nice if there was a way to tag an author as a favorite, so that you can be notified when your favorite content creators publish a new story for your gaming enjoyment.

Anyway, those are just a few of what I would like to see.

Foundry goes live!

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The foundry has finally gone live on the holodeck server of Star Trek Online. For those not in the know, the foundry allows its users to creat and play User Created Missions, or more commonly referred to as User Generated Content(UGC). The Foundry has been available for beta testing on the Star Trek Online Tribble server for a while, however it’s now finished and on the main live server, so that everyone can make all their star trek stories and ideas come to life.

Why is this such a big deal? because it increases the content of Star Trek Online, by leaps and bounds. Their will be new missions added, not just weekly but daily! Will the missions be any good though? Well, if you ask any sci-fi geek, he will tell you that star trek fans are one of the most creative groups of people you will find. So, yes! The UGC has high potential for some fantastic missions and stories. In fact, even though The Foundry has been out but for a few days, there are already a few good stories out! Don’t believe me? Check out to Helna and Back, Deep Space 11 and Dissent Part I: Walking in the Air. These are but a few of the already great stories published in just a couple of days.

Granted, at the moment, most of the stories aren’t high quality, however that’s because people are learning the tools and creating basic missions in order to get a feel for things. When they do however, the great missions will come pouring in!

This also means that there will be more missions available for the Klingon faction. As most STO players are aware, the Klingons have been largely ignored in terms of missions, quests and klingon exclusive storylines, because they were intended to be used mainly for PVP, however now the users and players have a chance to change all that, since they themselves can begin making content for the klingon faction.

Basically, the Foundry has some huge potential and I am very excited to see where all this leads.

Television does not = Reality

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You know what cracks me up? People who see something on TV and think, because the boob-tube told them so, it must be fact. Take for instance those television commercials for World of Warcraft, where they have a celebrity, most notably Mr. T and William Shatner, talking about the game. People see these ads, and automatically assume these ACTORS play the game.

Now, personally, I have no idea if they play WoW or not, however I have trouble imagining William Shatnet sitting down at his computer with a bottle of Mountain Dew and gearing up for a weekend raid. I however do know that people in commercials and Movies and TV shows are ACTORS, unless it’s stated otherwise, and an ACTORs job is to ACT a certain way.

For those of you who might be slightly dense, ACTING is basically pretending. ACTORS get paid to pretend, so just because Mr. T and William Shatner are ACTING on a WoW commercial, does not automatically mean they play WoW, or even that they play video games at all!

Keep in mind, Mr. T also acted as a mercenary in the A-Team television series, but I doubt if you paid him a few bucks, that he would travel to some south american country, and rescue your friend or family member from a dictator.

Just sayin’.

Pirates of the Burning Sea

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Recently there has been a whole slew of Pay-to-play MMORPGs turning to the Free-to-play market, One of the more recent titles to adopt this change is an MMORPG called Pirates of the Burning Sea. Since this game turned Free-to-Play, naturally I downloaded it and checked it out.

Right from the get-go, it’s obvious how much work was put into this game, the visuals are stunning and the audio is perfect. The basic controls of the game leave much to be desired however, and the writing is very poor.

All in all, the game just didn’t appeal to me on any basic level. I didn’t feel sucked into my role as pirate captain, and the story arcs all seemed boring and repetitive.

I am not saying the game’s horrible, just that it didn’t work for me. Perhaps it’s due to the fact that I am not, nor have I ever been a huge fan of traditional pirate tales. The only pirate movies I have ever seen are the Sinbad movies, Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy and a few pippy longstocking flicks, and I seriously doubt any of those count as real pirate movies.

As you can tell, most of my pirate knowledge comes from Fantasy type pirate tales, whereas PotBS deals with traditional historic pirates. You won’t find yourself battling skeleton crews or krakens, but what you will find yourself fighting is captains of other ships. Over and over and over again. If you love pirate tales, this might be for you, but it certainly wasn’t for me.

To Console or not to console

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Sony Online Entertainment recently released DC Universe Online. The game was released on both PC and PS3, and though they are on both platforms, they aren’t cross-platform. Meaning, PS3 users will only be playing with PS3 subscribers, and PC players will only be playing with PC subscribers.

Before the game was even released, PC gamers were whining and complaining about it. Mainly they were bitching and moaning about the game being released on the Playstation 3. They believe that MMORPGs don’t belong on consoles. They feel that MMORPGs should remain on computers. Personally, I disagree. I believe that MMORPGs can work very well on consoles if done right. I believe people who whine about MMORPGs being on consoles simply want the game genre they prefer to be on their gaming platform of choice. Basically, they want to hold the MMORPG genre over the head of consoles gamers and brag about what they have that the console gamers don’t. They basically just want to feel superior.

In all actuality, MMORPGs play quite well on consoles. EverQuest Online Adventures proved that 7 years ago. It’s still running with a healthy community even today. Granted, EQOA was a console exclusive MMORPG, so it was designed for Console controls, but it still showed that an MMORPG could work on a console, even a subscription based one.

Granted, Final Fantasy 11 on consoles didn’t turn out that well, but in all fairness, the game wasn’t even that great on the PC! So, it’s not overly surprising tha the console release turned out abysmal. In fact, it pretty much killed MMORPGs on consoles. After that, nobody really had the balls to do it again.

Until recently, with the release of DCUO of course. The end result? Smooth as silk! A perfect console MMORPG. I have bought it on both the PS3 as well as the PC and am pleased completely with both releases, although to be fair, I prefer the console version over the PC release, and spend more time playing it.

Granted, I am not saying EVERY game would work on a console. However some games would play just fine on a consoles! Games like Star Trek Online and Champions online. Even Dungeons and Dragons online with a little fiddling would play well on a console.

in fact Champions online, even allows use of the Xbox 360 PC gamepad, and when I play CO, I rarely ever use the keyboard or mouse. It just plays so much better with a gamepad!

Games like EverQuest or World of Warcraft though? I don’t believe they would play well on a console. However, I have heard of people who play WOW using an XBOX 360 PC controller, and a third-party program called Xpadder that allows you to play any game with a gamepad. In fact, there are some vids on youtube of people doing this. However, it looks complicated to set up, and even more complicated to play.

DCUO Beta Play

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So, you applied for Beta for DC Universe Online, and haven’t heard anything yet? You might have, and just missed it! Be sure and check your spam folder, especially if you use Gmail as your mail address. The reason I suggest this, is because this happened to me. I had received Beta information awhile ago, but was unaware of it, because the Gmail filter labeled the letter spam and tossed it in the spam folder. If I hadn’t been going through the spam folder to clear it out, I would never have noticed it.

However, I did notice it and have since begun downloading the PS3 Beta of DCUO. Which I will tell you is a HUGE download! We’re talking 15 gigs here, and about a 5 hour download. So, unless you have five hours to kill, I suggest getting the download started before going to bed, so it will be all ready for you when you wake up, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.

Anyway, as I said, I began downloading the game, and have since been playing it, and to be honest, I am just not that impressed. Actually, that’s an understatement. I hate it! I would rather play City of Heroes with an ice pick shoved in my head, that subscribe to DCUO.

The game sucks! At least for me, chances are most gamers will enjoy the game! It plays very much like the ultra-popular Everquest game series, and that did alright for its self! For me though, it just lacks too much to hold my interest. Like all SOE MMORPGs, it’s basically a grindfest. Which appeals to a lot of people, but just not to me! If I am going to play a game, MMORPG or not, I want to encounter a fantastic story, an epic tale. I want to feel like I am a part of something major, and that’s just not what DCUO does for me.

Like I said though, most gamers will probably enjoy the game, and I encourage you all to try and get beta access. However, keep in mind, that like all beta games, this isn’t the finished product. You will encounter bugs, you will freeze up a lot. I froze every 15 to 20 mins. You will have trouble reading the text. You will get frustrated with the game. However, that’s what beta is for! It will all be fixed by release date, and most likely before.

In the end, I think I can safely say I won’t be playing the game when it’s released. In fact, I have already canceled my pre-order from Amazon. I think I will just stick to Champions Online. However I wish SOE and DCUO all the best and good luck. I hope they do well, and who knows, after a while I might decide to give it another go in the future. Lord knows I have a habit of restarting subscriptions to SOE games. I can’t tell you how many times I have resubscribed to EverQuest, EverQuest II or Star Wars: Galaxies.

Set Phasers to Stunning!

Cryptic today went live on their holodeck server, with a patch for Star Trek Online. This is the 3rd major free content update, and includes many new graphical changes, as well as sets the stage for the soon to come release of the foundry, which will allow users to create their own missions to play.

In terms of graphical changes, the biggest change would have to be for sector space. It’s been totally revamped, to give it a more realistic and expansive feel! Before this update, space didn’t have that Star Trek feel, and didn’t look real at all. Now though, not only does space take on realistic features, but stars fly past you as you zip through the cosmos at warp speeds.

How much of a difference to graphics are we talking here? Well, a picture is worth a thousand words.

Happy Cataclysm eve!

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Bottles of Mountain dew have begun flying off store shelves, as Hard-core gamers, and basement dwellers alike, have begun swooping into grocery stores all across the country! The reason? In anticipation of the midnight release of World of Warcrafts third expansion pack, Cataclysm of course!

Apparently, many WoW gamers have taken time off from work, and plan on staying up for a couple of days straight, so they can play through this expansion pack. Apparently, they never heard of taking your time and savoring something you enjoy.

Now, I am sure you all know what World of Warcraft is, unless of course you have been living under a rock without internet access for the past 7 years. So, I am not going to go into explaining what it is. Because you should know!

I don’t play WoW any more, so I am obviously not joining in the festivities. In fact, not only do I not play WoW anymore, but I honestly don’t know how the game can remain as popular as it is. Don’t get me wrong here people! I’m not saying the game is horrible, but what I am saying is the game is average! There’s nothing special about the game that other games don’t have! The only major plus for the game, is its simplicity. If you have never played an MMORPG, you could start playing WoW and not feel overwhelmed.

Here’s the thing though. The game get’s old. Sure, they release expansions, but what exactly is the point of the expansions? It’s the same stuff, with a different background. You will still find yourself fighting a monster, and collecting a number of their body parts. Sure, these monsters might be new, or they might be just recolored versions of old monster. You will then take these body parts to some person, who for some odd reason, wants to collect monster body parts, and in turn they will give you some experience and a piece of treasure.

You also of course get the level caps raised, so you can run around grinding on monster kills to get your level up, so you can get that next body part collecting quest being offered by that other person in the neighboring town!

After awhile, the routine get’s boring. For me, it took 3 years to realise that the game was boring as hell. They released their first expansion pack, and I admit it, I went for a midnight release! I was excited, I came home and started playing it, and then realised that I was doing the exact same crap I had spent the last 60 levels doing. So, I quit! I went checking out other MMORPGs, and discovered that all MMOs followed the same formula, however learned that many actually had entertaining stories, and offered more versatility in gameplay.

After discovering this, and moving on to better games, I asked myself why WoW continued to be so popular, and I never got an answer, until just right now. As I was writing this blog entry, the answer hit me! The reason WoW continues to be popular, is because it’s simple! Sure, it lacks depth, sure it lacks versatility and yea, it lacks a deep engrossing story, but it’s simple to play! Since the game is simple to begin playing, it attracts first time MMO gamers, who basically get their feet wet in this game, develop a character and then have spent so much time building this character up, that they don’t want to just let it go. So, when the next expansion comes out, they ignore the fact that it’s nothing new, and that’s it’s just the same old stuff repackaged in a shiny package.

I will admit though, the PvP in World of Warcraft, is the best I have experienced. No matter the MMO, none has come close to matching the balance and enjoyment that exists in World of Warcraft. Is PvP alone enough to warrant sticking through all the other crap? Maybe for some, but unfortunately it wasn’t enough for me to stick around.

Anyway, to all the people who continue to play WoW: Happy Cataclysm Eve!

Going where no MMORPG has gone before!

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Star Trek: Online, is an MMORPG set in the Star Trek Universe, and it is one of, if not the best MMORPG I have ever played, and I have played them all. Granted, the enjoyment factor is increased if you are a fan of Star Trek, otherwise you might not enjoy it as much as someone who enjoys Star Trek.

The game has several cool features. Everything from ground combat to space combat, the fact that you get your own spaceship right at the start of the game, the fact that many star trek voices appear in the game, including Leonard Nimoy. However one of the best features of Star Trek Online is one, not quite out yet. It releases within the next couple months, and is currently in beta testing. The feature is UGC(User Generated Content), it allows us, the players, to make our own missions, to craft or own adventures, to tell our stories. It’s going to be pretty damn spiffy!

For those who might not be fully aware of what exactly Star Trek Online is, I will inform you. As I mentioned earlier, the game takes place in the Star Trek Prime Universe. What does Prime universe mean exactly? The Star Trek Prime universe is the universe where Kirk battled the Gorn, Where Picard met Q and in turn met the Borg and where the Borg created Locutus. The Prime universe is the universe you watched on TV, and saw in the movies. What of the recent movie you ask? The one by JJ Abrams? That’s apparently an alternate reality.

See, when Spock and Nero traveled back in time, and caused all those changes, they created an alternate reality.That’s the official statement anyway, and is even mentioned in the newer movie. So, since it became an alternate reality, it didn’t affect the prime timeline. Everything happened as it did before, there’s no change. Kirks father wasn’t killed at the moment of his birth, Vulcan was never destroyed and time continued as it always did. What did happen however, is everything that led up to the point of Nero and Spock traveling through time. In the Prime universe, Romulus was destroyed and Spock did vanish. After that however? Life went on.

That’s pretty much where you come in.

See? It’s all pretty simple, and it’s an incredible game, with a fantastic community. It doesn’t matter if you are into Role Play, Group Play or even Solo Play. This game suits all players.

Still not convinced? I’m going to do you a favor, If you are interested in giving Star Trek Online a play, just comment in here with your Email address, and I will send you a referral code. This will allow you to download the game, play through the tutorial and beyond. If you like it, just purchase the game, and continue your character where you left off.

Champions Online Going Free-2-Play?!

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As of the time of this writing, there are two Super Hero themed MMORPGs in existence. First, there is City of Heroes, and its expansion packs. Secondly, there is Champions Online. In the not too distant future, you will be able to add DC Universe Online to that list, but at the moment, it’s not currently available.

Out of the 2 currently available, my favorite is Champions Online. The graphics are outstanding, and the stories and play is fun and entertaining, plus it’s Solo friendly, and offers gamepad support, so you can play the game with an Xbox360/PC USB gamepad, which just so happens to me my preferred method of play!

As if all of that, wasn’t reason enough to play, Cryptic has decided to give you yet another reason to make Champions Online your preferred Super Hero MMORPG of choice. It’s going Free-2-Play! That’s right, Champions Online has decided to join in with all the other subscription based MMORPGs that have recently decided to go Free-2-Play. Which means, you will be able to enjoy this video game goodness free!

Will this change make me cancel my subscription and go to a free account? Hell no! The game is extremely enjoyable, and worth every cent I pay each month. I’m sure many of you will feel the same way I do after playing it as well.

I’ll see ya in world!