In our weekly update on the MMORPG Star Trek Online we take a look at some of the looming competition for the game, including new trailers from E3. There are also some cool new C-Store items and a new STOked vidcast focused on ground combat.
New Cryptic Store Items
This week Cryptic added a whole bunch of new items to the Cryptic Store for you to customize your character or ship, including ways for you to turn your 25th century adventure into something old-school. Check out all the new items at www.startrekonline.com/store.
TOS customizations some of the new C-store items for STO
New E3 Trailers for STO Competition: Star Wars, BSG and more space MMO’s coming
While the universe of massive multiplayer games is dominated by fantasy-style titles, "Star Trek Online" has some competition coming up in the world of space-based MMOs, some of which showed off new trailers this week at the E3 gaming show. Probably the biggest threat to STO will be the upcoming Star Wars MMO, but it isn’t the only one. Let’s take a look at the new trailers.
Star Wars: The Old Republic (Release: Spring 2011)
PC-based, from BioWare
Battlestar Galactica Online (Release: Fall 2010)
Browser-based, Free-to-play, from Bigpoint
Black Prophecy (Release: Unknown, currently in closed beta)
Free-to-play, from Reakktor Media
Jumpgate Evolution (Release: Unknown, originally slated for 2009)
PC-based, from Codemasters
STOked takes a look at ground combat
This week’s episode of the STOked video podcast focuses on what is said to be STO’s weakest link, ground combat.
Free Demo
If you want to give Star Trek Online a go without buying it, you can play a demo of the game for an unlimited amount of time (with some restrictions) and includes the “Stranded in Space” mission. More info and demo download at startrekonline.com/demo
Start Playing
If you want to get into the 25th century and play Star Trek Online it is available at Amazon discounted currently for less than $27 (or $48 for the collectors edition), and that includes a one month subscription.
Star Wars and Galactica look awesome, would like to see some actual game play though.
Star Wars looks cool. Battlestar looks cooler, but I won’t have enough money for that many MMOs
damn. Old republic looks sick!
The windows and anti-collision lights on the TOS E are wrong. This is a disaster!
The Maelstrom looks cool.
The Nimbus? That’s Zap Brannigan’s ship, right?
The Comet looks like it was designed by committee.
Of course I love the TOS unis. That treatment makes me think JJ shoulda stayed DAMN close to TOS in his production designs. Ah well, I guess in the future we’re NOT wearing groovy velour, but rather hip Nike sportswear.
Some of the bridges make it look like the captain sits a hundred yards from anyone. Must be the Old Spice.
Anyway, cool stuff.
the insignia on those uniforms is wrong, it’s engineering not command
Since when are TOS uniforms that unisex in design? The female uniform was always a different style. Even the versions that had pants had a top with a different collar.
Ahh don’t worry, the skirts and high boots are in there too. The depeartment insignias are changeable too.
I’m most definately gettin Old Republic when it finally gets out…..BioWare doesn’t seem to know hot to make bad games!
#6–it was adapted for 25th century, meaning gold for engineering, red for command.
SOMEONE FROM THE R&D TEAM GET THE 09 FILM VERSION OF CONSTITUTION CLASS IN THE GAME SO PLAYERS CAN PUT THE 2 OF THEM SIDE BY SIDE AND SEE HOW THEY COMPARE IN SIZING!
I cry tears that STO is so terrible and may never be good and what a proper star trek fan wants.
Still Hello Kitty Spaceship lame combat game
#9- alright i can see that, but answer me this, why does the guy have captain stripes?
so…. what about StarWars Galaxies…? and they need another game?
ok…. THAT starwars trailer…. was cool.
BSG’s trailer…. uh… Yahn. I liked it but the show isnt on the air anymore…
@14 Neither is trek, or wars.
Also is there more Klingon stuff, yet? I would like to be able to hit level up without pvp.
@#12 – Star Wars Galaxies has been slowly dieing for years. It took a huge population loss years ago after they dramatic changes the made to the professions with the ‘New Game Enhancements’ (NGE) and never recovered. Many “pre-NGE” players still complain about that to this day. The funny thing is if the NGE didn’t happen we probably wouldn’t be getting a new Star Wars MMO now. I consider it Lucas Arts way of saying ‘Sorry, we should have never worked with Sony in the first place.’
@#13 – Unfortunately the game will look nothing like that (but I’m guessing most people already knew that). And it’s actually their second trailer. The first is just as awesome.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DOvbv-LkK6w
I was originally worried about the Old Republic; I though it would end up lopsided cause everyone would rush to play as a sooper speshul eeeeevil sith lord and no one would play on the Republic side.
…. Yeah. Not so worried any more. Republic Trooper for the f***ing WIN!
Bye Bye STO. Looks like KOTOR is gonna rock.
BSG online looks like it could be a good MMO, better idea than Trek honestly since its about war.
#11…theres nothing saying that there cannot be an engineering-based captain, anymore than it can be said there cannot be a medical-based one or any other non-command colored department…that we havent seen one onscreen doesnt mean they dont exist…
@10
Correction: What /YOU/ as a star trek fan wants. Just because you don’t like the game doesn’t mean other people have the same opinion as you.
I’m a Star Trek fan and I love STO.
@#9
Your forgetting in STO, your uniforms on your ship are customizable to your liking, meaning you set department colors.
@11, Scotty was a Captain in the Movies. So was Spock even while Kirk was a Captain, and in Command of the Enterprise.
If I thought for a second the old republic game actually looked like that I would be excited. Great cut scene animations though, but it’s no realtime game we’re gonna see.
I know the bioware people are good, but no computer I have is going to look like that trailer.
Show me in game resolutions and actions and I’ll take an interest.
Star Trek fan and i love STO too.. so, if you dont like this grate game with grate potential, its bad for you, but leave ppl enjoy it.
Black Prophecy is the only game shown here that interests me, mostly because it’s the only one with a trailer that shows GAME PLAY. The other are wannabe movie trailers, but BP shows you how the game will look. Sure, it looks a lot like a million other space games, but at least they showed us that.
And what’s with the wood-nymph Jedi in the Star Wars trailer? Trying to appeal to fantasy gamers? ;)
And as for STO, well, I’m an old-school Trekkie and I think STO is a very weak game. Not fun for more than a few minutes. It’s simply not well developed YET. Maybe it will be someday. So far, it’s not worth the money unless you just have way too much money (and time) on your hands.
Why couldn’t the last 3 Star Wars movies have been as good as that trailer? Wow! (Oh yeah, George Lucas.)
STO is already the best Star Trek game, Imho, and it still evolves and becomes more and more fascinating over time.
There was nothing in the BSG trailer that showed actual gameplay. So you can’t say it looks good or looks bad. Its was all pre-rendered cut-scenes.
@24
You fool!
They have shown hundreads of screens of actual gameplay, look them up @ IGN…
Despite what see for BSG, and hoe much I wish it will be good, it’s still a BROWSER game…. how powerful is Internet Explorer?
Poor STO, I still play pretty often but it will be at least a year before it gets twice as good than it is now.
^23, 11 As a captain of engineering, Scotty wears the movie-era uniform’s gold engineering division shirt. During exile on Vulcan he accidentally put the shirt in the laundry with bleached whites and the shirt became white like a command division shirt. After he got back to Earth he had a spare gold shirt to wear under the standard dress jacket, but he kept wearing the white shirt under his engineering vest.
Star Trek MMO? Is that still going? I assumed it’s suckiness would have already ended it.
@30
IGN for screen shots? Why would I go anywhere else for my news but here?
Ok, I’ll give it a try. Any game play TRAILERS anywhere?
Just curious, for those of you that constantly complain about STO, how
many of you had played an MMO before trying STO?
Also, perhaps some of the the humor is lost on me, but it`s getting to the point where I cannnot tell if some of these posts are jokes or serious.
As for KOTOR, I have played Bioware`s previous two Star Wars games, and they rocked. I have faith the KOTOR MMO will be good, if not outstanding.
I stuck with Galaxies for over a year, b/f the NGE. It was fun being a part of the SW universe, and there were some features I have yet to see in other MMOs (your own house that you can arrange the way you want, own Guild hall with guild items), but in the end Galaxies was a near miss as far as gameplay.
The best MMOs I have played were WoW and City of Heroes. Wow probably has the best overall gaming experience, period. The biggest reason I stopped was the setting, I`m more of a Sci-fi guy. I had had enough of the sword & sorcery thing after a year.
@#33 – IGN has a ‘sub site’ they bought a while back called VooDoo Extreme. http://ve3d.ign.com
You can find screen shots, trailers, game play videos and video game news there.
If I recall correctly, in “All Good Things” Beverly Crusher became a captain, even though she was from a medical background.
Re: #8 – But can you change out the badge itself? Remember in the TOS era, only crewmembers from the Enterprise wore the “arrowhead.” It would be cool if you could create and wear your own starship badge for the TOS uniforms.
Either way, these people seem like they’re definately regretting making the game TNG-era instead of TOS-era like it should have been.
So what’s the story with the BSG trailer? How come it looks like the Beyond the Red Line demo, but with cut scene quality rendering? Did the fans involved in that project cut a deal with the games company?
And still waiting for that Mac port. (sigh)
The Old Republic looks absoutly AMAZING…. I never knew the past of the sith that there were thousands of them. THE GAME WOULD MAKE FOR A DOWN RIGHT AWSOME STAR WARS MOVIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Dare i say PREQUAL to the PREQUAL