STO Update: Design New Enterprise Winner Revealed + Section 31 Uniforms May 5, 2011
by Anthony Pascale , Filed under: Star Trek Online , trackback
Today Cryptic has announced the winner (and runners up) of the Design the Next Enterprise Contest. Check them out below, plus a video showing off Star Trek Online’s new Section 31 uniforms. All that plus the latest STOked podcast.
Star Trek Online’s New Enterprise
Cryptic turned to the fans to help create the next Starship Enterprise to be used in Star Trek Online. The winning entry was created by Adam Ihle. Here it is.
Winning entry
Here are the first three runners up.
2nd Place -
by C. Calloway
3rd Place -
by D. Shick
4th Place -
by JM Trexler
Visit startrekonline.com for full list of winners and runners up.
New Section 31 uniforms
Officially Section 31 doesn’t exist so it seems kind of ironic that they would have uniforms, but maybe it is one of those things where you have to be in the know. Regardless, Cryptic has added new Section 31 uniforms, available now in the C-Store.
STOked: Podcast Summit Highlights
The latest STOked shows off highlights from the recent STO Podcast Summit.
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Comments
cool design!
Would like to see more pictures!
We still have insurgents in the 24th century? The Patriot Act must have lost its effectiveness.
Ugh. Well, they’re certainly not giving me any reasons to restart my subscription to this awful game.
Which one, Gorn Captain? I like 2nd place better.
I like it. Beefed up, yet graceful design that looks familiar. Bring on the renders! :D
How do you get from the primary to secondary hulls, and vice versa? (See: Oberth problem.)
Ok, maybe im just getting old,,,,,,
But what happend to when Star Trek starships looked sleek, graceful and majestic??
They look like Borg assimilations .
I so miss Matt Jeffries and all the original designers and consultants.
The winning entry has a mix of all the famous starships in Trek-lore. Very Impressive indeed.
Very good. I like all of them!
As a side note, I hope STO goes free-to-play like Champions Online. Has anyone heard how free-to-play Champions Online is working out for Crypitc?
Yeah, not sure I really like the first place one but maybe better when put into 3d. I liked a couple of the runner ups much better and a few really good ones that didn’t even make it to the final choices?
To me it looks more like a step back, somewhere between the Ent-D and E maybe.
I must be getting crotchety in my middle age, but I agree wholeheartedly with # 7 (Dave Thornton).
Ya just can’t get any better than the Andy Probert Motion Picture redesign for beauty and grace!
Just my two cents, people.
I don’t like the winner. It looks bad.
If you ask me, fourth place looks like what an Enterprise SHOULD look like.
Even the New Movie Enterprise; (Exterior) with modern C.g.I. ,
never Once (NOT ONCE) looked as beautiful and elegant as “The Motionless Picture” U.S.S. Enterprise did.
This game was a huge disappointment. A shame.
These are all nice work, but one must keep in mind that they are all variations on Matt Jefferies’ original design concept. A concept, I must add, that has stood the test of time.
BTW, my favorite of the above entries is the 4th place one.
@7:
No, you are not getting old. Because I am under 25, and I’m wondering why all the Enterprises are getting fatter and webbier with each decade. I totally agree with #12–the 2009 movie Enterprise was my favorite next to the original.
1st and 2nd look pretty good
I like 3rd place the best, at least they are trying to establish some design lineage towards the Enterprise J from Enterprise.
Ugh, they’re all pretty poor. Agree with #19 in that at the very least there’s some design lineage (although the J didn’t look like a particularly pretty ship.)
Just looking at the silhouette for the first place winner shows why it’s a bad design–it’s heavily imbalanced, and lacks clear lines for the eye.
They all feel like they belong in Star Trek Online – which is a bit of a visual hotch-potch as it is. I find them all a bit meh, but then there’s only so much you can do with a saucer, engineering section and two nacelles that hasn’t already been done many times. Like some other folks here, the TMP refit is the pinnacle of Enterprise design for me and I’ve really not seen a design that I either liked nor felt was in any way doing anything interesting since the Enterprise D.
Certainly the Enterprise E was one of the contributing factors in my lack of enjoyment of the Next Gen movies. It’s just so bland.
My opinions:
The winner: awful, probably the worst design for the Enterprise I’ve ever seen (except for the “battleship” Enterprise I saw floating around some years ago). It takes the worst aspects of the Enterprise-D (my least favorite), and exacerbates them.
Second place: stubby looking, but okay.
Third place: Enterprise-J much? Still, seeing as it’s transitional, maybe that’s not so bad.
Fourth place: An acceptable amalgam between the Sovereign and Intrepid classes.
My rankings of favorite Enterprise classes:
1. Sovereign class
2. refit Constitution class
3. ST2009 Constitution class
4. original Constitution class
5. NX class
6. Excelsior class
7. Ambassador class
8. Galaxy class
The official site has a load of other runners up.
http://www.startrekonline.com/node/2415
They’re all equally bland an uninteresting, that is to say that the couple that do do something interesting and unusual break the silhouette so completely as to be unrecognisable as the Enterprise.
That said, I quite liked J. ‘Vector’ Lee’s:
http://www.startrekonline.com/enterprise/gallery?share=1335
Of the runners up, this is the one I would have chosen:
http://www.startrekonline.com/enterprise/gallery?share=869
Clean lines, well balanced
That is quite nice, actually and sits quite well between E and J.
I like both J. Vector Lee’s and Chris Madden’s.
I also like this one:
http://www.startrekonline.com/enterprise/sites/default/files/imagecache/preview/shawn_weixelman_1701f.jpg.
The shuttle bay has a cool Syd Mead look to it.
I am not disappointed in the winner. I think everyone that entered would have given their best. However i am disappointed that it was selected by cryptic as the winner while some really nice designs were overlooked and that’s just in the runners up.
It wasn’t really selected by cryptic it was selected by paramount. Thats how I understand it anyway and why it took like a month longer than it was originally planned…they didn’t like them.
26. Yeah that was one of the nicer looking ones, though I wasn’t sure about it as an Enterprise…and it didn’t even make it into the top 25… :(
Went back and found one of the Eaves/Perpetual designs I kinda liked.
http://johneaves.files.wordpress.com/2010/04/fed-starships-11.jpg?w=655&h=355
stupid idea that section 31 has ‘uniforms’ ^^
That won??!! WHY?? its so ugly!!! =(
Chris Madden’s design is really wonderful, IMO.
http://www.startrekonline.com/enterprise/gallery?share=869
Of the ones shown above, I also think the 3rd place one seems most logical. It’s looks like something between the E and the J.
24. 4 8 15 16 23 42 – May 6, 2011
I agree with you guys who have mentioned Chris Madden’s. How the hell did that not win? It’s absolutely stunning. It somehow manages to subtly tie together the essence of all the ships without looking completely cobbled together….unlike the ship that actually won. That ship looks like it was just put together with used parts from the older ships. :/
Crapola.
At least the design looks nothing like a “Hot Rod”. Freaking Trek09.
Fourth place is amazing! Looks so confortable!
4th place was better by a LONG shot.
Wow, I REALLY hate the winning entry.
Who judged this?
Chris Madden’s ship… my god, Paramount ouught to take a look and that I think about doing a new series using that design!
Chris Madden’s Enterprise-F is the best and most beautiful Enterprise-design I’ve seen since John Eave’s Enterprise-E. Okay, Andy Probert’s and Richard Taylor’s TMP Enterprise is above everything, but Madden’s ship come very close. His artwork is stunning as well. If someone would ask me, his design should be the next tv-Enterprise – when a new show will be produced one day.
I can’t understand the judges and their decission – but if you look at the STO-starship-designs produced for that game, then you know someone has a very bad taste anyway.
@ 7 Totally agree.
No disrespect to the designer, but I think it’s horrid. A crude mashing together of the D & E.
I don’t know why they couldn’t hire someone like John Eaves or Rich Sternbach to design it instead of the public.
@24
Yep, by far the best design on there.
Congratulations to all! I can’t wait to see the finale model for the winning design.
Chris Maddens design is stunning…use it for a tv show please
Sorry, but the Original Series design was perfection. Anything else is just a step down…IMO, of course ;-)
Again I repeat: How does one resolve the Oberth problem with the first-place version? Those twin struts do not look particularly efficient as a means of conveyance if one has to go between hulls.
Does anyone think these things through in such manner anymore, or is it simply a matter of pure aesthetics?
http://www.startrekonline.com/enterprise/gallery?share=869
Best one. The Winner one is fugly as susan boyle
Who picked these? J.J.’s designer?
Chris Madden’s all the way. It is graceful, elegant, stunning. Definitely a ship worthy of the name Enterprise. I want some 3d renderings and meshes of that ship.
At least STO is not canon, right? Never played it so I wouldn’t know.
Darn, I was hoping to get an early reply to this. But please vote here whether you like the winner or not:
http://polldaddy.com/poll/5022933/
THAT IS THE DESIGN THAT WON… Oh man.
2nd place looks like the Aventine from the Ships of the line calendar.
3rd place at least has a sense of balance. It even shows some of the same lines shown at the back of the TNG tech manual.
@ “The STO ships are to clunky crowd” HERE! HERE!
Cool Design. But a bad picture I can’t wait to see a better photo
He could of at least colored his photo. at least all of the other ones are in color. His presentation stinks. However it is a really cool design, I can’t wait to see it in color.
With all the praise heaped on Chris Madden, to me it simply looks like a concept of the 2009 ship from STAR TREK: THE ART OF THE FILM.
My favorite design for an Enterprise-F has already been done: The Vestra-class USS AVENTINE by Mark Rademaker.
http://mark-rademaker.blogspot.com/2010/12/what-is-going-on.html
The contest winning design doesn’t come close and ignores the design lineage.
@47 that thing is a beauty!
Best
Enterprise
Ever…
http://bluray.ign.com/dor/objects/14330484/star-trek-original-motion-picture-collection/images/star-trek-original-motion-picture-collection-blu-ray-review-20090518021458642.html?classid=-1&page=mediaFull
Love the top view of the 3rd place winner. Bulky/formidable looking but also sleek. Awesome work dude!
Looks like something designed by input from thousands of fans. Now, imagine a script like that, and you will have a new contenter for worst film ever.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_F4bK7ZAp4qo/TIhlHp9guuI/AAAAAAAAAZ8/DbYb_to0bWY/s1600/Homer-Simpson-car-21638.jpg
Chris Madden’s is the best design, simply put.
I am not a fan of the “spoon shaped” Enterprises. The Enterprise E looks really slick and all but it doesn’t look like a functional starship to me. It’s all pointy’s and angles and I just don’t see any functionality to it. The D was a big deparutre from the previous incarnations but it seemed to be a logical next step.
It’s all a matter of taste. But i would rather see the Enterprise be a take on “saucer section, neck, engineering hull, two pylons and two nacelles”.
Lets try to avoid using the term “functional” with any of Star Treks ship designs. The stresses induced at any sub-light acceleration would tear any of these ships apart. As these are beauty pagents, enjoy, but no spaceship in the future will ever look like this.
Three cheers for Chris Madden. That’s graceful, and would be great onscreen. And thank you for using a CIRCLE for the saucer. I’m tired of ellipticals: it’s an impractical engineering design to use spoon shapes. Circles divide forces and stresses evenly.
.
@60: Killjoy.
All poorly done – UGH!!
Seriously, why didn’t Andy Probert, Rick Sternbach or John Eaves get invited to offer multiple designs which the STO members would choose/vote from?
Bad form, Cryptic.
Cool designs. All of them really. I’ve actually designed a 1701-K this past year. Working on a model now. I figure if everyone’s gonna be making up Enterprise’s using every letter of the alphabet these days, I’d jump on the bandwagon. At least on one that’s still past ‘J”.
I’m assuming that there’s a conventional neck between the saucer and the engineering section, otherwise it seems like we’ve got another Oberth Class on our hands.
Aside from that though, I have to say it looks pretty good. Yeah, no where near as good as the Constitution Refit, but then again what is? Seems very much in line with the 24th/25th century style.
Of course you can’t really judge a design until you see it fully realized and in motion.
Aw, the D and the E had a baby, that’s so cute!
Wait a second. Section 31 is a SECRET organization, like the CIA. How can they have uniforms?
66. A secret organization, more like Delta Force or SEAL’s. As everyone in the Star Trek universe seems to wear modified versions of pajamas, does it really matter?
Congrats to the winners and runner ups! The top 4 aren’t my faves, but the majority of those in the list were above avg.
Maybe its an generational assumption that you prefer the hero that you grew up with for example Sean Connery vs Daniel Craig, Tom Baker vs David Tennant and the Enterprise “A ” vs Enterprise “D”
I too, am of a certain age and I also love Star Wars but I have a question for you.
What other ship that was as beautiful and graceful as Andy Proberts masterpiece could make the Millennium Falcon look like an ugly duckling ?
A depressing number of the submissions Startrek.com’s gallery seem to be rip offs of other people’s designs. One of them’s just a publicity photo of the Enterprise -E with http://www.startrek.com written along the bottom – maybe one of their own wallpapers?
IMO… This should have been the 1701-F
http://bridgecommander.filefront.com/screenshots/File/82748/
They could have picked a worse winner. Many of the submitted designs are just bland, or they are strangely distorted caricatures of starships, or they rip off other designs as John Pearse already mentioned.
Alas, the only unique feature about the winning design is the split neck. And so it suffers from all the same problems as the Oberth class (even though we could imagine that the neck is considerably thicker on the new Enterprise).
Personally, I would have preferred this beauty (like some other people):
http://www.startrekonline.com/enterprise/gallery?share=869
Or this one:
http://www.startrekonline.com/enterprise/gallery?share=1300
@49, no indeed, STO is most definitely NOT canon… the very idea makes my skin crawl.
Hey Don, I know you read this! Your design blows the other 3 away. it is the only one of these 4 that actually looks like it falls between “E” and “J”.
-Dave
FYI: Here are three interesting Q&A’s from STO Executive Producer Dan Stahl in todays “Ask Cryptic: May 2011.”
—-
Q: dorko1 – I know that the refit is still a touchy subject, but could you guys shed any light on what might happen? I understand that there should be obvious misgivings about the idea of the Constitution class outmatching a vessel 200 yrs new and twice its size, but a replica that’s really more of an Excalibur class vessel might be able to add something to the mix.
A: You are correct that it is a touchy subject amongst the community and based on the discussions we’ve had with CBS about ships, I don’t think we’re going to put a high-end Constitution Class refit into the game. You can still have a lower tier TOS Connie use the Squad Leader feature to bring their stats up to a higher level, but the odds of an end game Connie refit is a long shot.
—-
Q: Idlewind – Everyone knows that Cryptic plans to bring out a new Enterprise, but what will become of the former Enterprise E? Will we witness it’s destruction? will it simply be retired? Does cryptic have any ships coming down the pipe that are original cryptic designs?
A: I’m not at liberty to discuss the fate of the Enterprise E, but I can say that we absolutely have some original cryptic ship designs slated for 2012.
—-
Q: RA-Morris With the upcoming release of the player designed Enterprise, will we have a mission that either destroys the Enterprise-E or will it simply be added? Creating a mission (or Episode) that adds the player to something as important as the mission where the Enterprise-E was lost would be fun.
A: While I’m not at liberty to discuss the fate of the Enterprise-E, we are working on a fun way to introduce and showcase the new fan designed Enterprise.
They choose that design? And I thought the Enterprise from JJ Abrams’ STAR TREK was terrible. IMO, I like the third place design.
To be honest guys I didn’t think my design would win over some like chris Maddens or Vektors, all I can say is I am honored paramount and cryptic chose it. I am interested to see what comes from my concept design.
I still prefer the Enterprise-@.
TOS, as redrawn by Vektor is the best. On my office desktop, it looks real.
Hey Adam, I would like to say Congratulations.
However, I don’t like your design overall. I see where it has merit.
But it just does not seems to fit where it is placed and it seems way to derivative of the old Ambassador Class Concept Art. (With an Oberth neck thrown in)
The NCC-F as in Fail, right?
How in the world did this one not win? http://startrekonline.com/enterprise/sites/default/files/imagecache/preview/ent-f_final_small.jpg
@ #81 and others of the same mind -
AGREED! The sleek lines and proportions of Chris Madden’s design make it a thing of swan-like beauty -
http://www.startrekonline.com/enterprise/gallery?share=869
I sure wish it could somehow be used to replace J.J.s ugly duckling movie version for the sequels. Chris’s terrific design would be a far superior-looking ‘alternative timeline’ Enterprise.
@#77_Adam…
Don’t let em give you too much crap….85% on those on here would hate on whatever design had won.
You gave it you best shot…good job winning.
24.
Agree. Design 869 is awesome.
#82
I disagree, sure any design would get some hate, but some of the other designs probably wouldn’t have gotten as much hate vs love.
I say Congrats to the artist for winning, but though I’ve disliked some of the other designs, I think many of them work better.
jeeeeze….It’s JUST a TV sh, errr…Video Game
GET A LIFE PEOPLE !!
For any that may have missed it a poll has been posted to get people’s opinion of the new ship:
http://polldaddy.com/poll/5022933/
Unfortunately for those involved in the contest, it seems most people do not agree with the winner.
Agree with Sheldon. It does fit into the J lineage!
I really dislike the winning ship, it looks so flawed with those Oberthian struts. Cryptic obviously chose that design because they could make money off it than actually listening to the fans. Hopefully, CBS and Paramount never uses that ugly thing as the real Enterprise-F.
http://www.startrekonline.com/enterprise/gallery?share=869
This is nice artwork, but all I see is a redone Consitution. Rather see something new and beautiful than some kitbash like the winner or a old design brought back. With some rework, I see plenty of potential candidates for the non-publicized runner-ups. One I loved was the one that had the shuttlebay on the underside with the twin rear impulse engines.
Section 31 are like the “Men In Black” of Starfleet. They have a uniform, but its worn to keep descriptions vague.
I think in retrospect cryptic probably picked the best ship for cryptic. It certainly is not the prettiest of the top 25, but then it should not have to be, given they stated that the winning design would inspire the new enterprise, not be directly used to make it. So really what they wanted here was not necessarily a polished digital painting or 3d model nailed down to every fine detail, which makes some of the entries look hella better than winner. What they wanted was a ship layout that looked different from existing ones, and the winner fits the bill perfectly for that purpose, while the majority seen from a rough detail less perspective click into the standard body layouts of the average enterprise.
Horrible design.
#1 kind of resembles Probert’s artwork, perhaps he submitted under someone else’s name? Sorry Andy, I KNOW you wouldn’t really do that!
Maddens and Lee’s designs are beautiful. Amazing looking starships. I really like the forth place runner up too.
This really was a no win scenerio – stray to far from the TOS, and be accused of ripping off the origional, or do something unique, and be accused of straying to far from the origional. That’s bugged me about the production values for a while now, you had Federation White, Klingon Red, and Romulan Green. Come on, guys, are we so locked into canon that if the Federation ship isn’t white, it’s not Star Trek?
…oh,wait, we are that locked into canon. Never mind.
They should post an official poll here on this site to get people’s opinion of the winner.
Do any of the new enterprise look close enough to the other enteprises that exist in Star Trek TV series and films?
I realize Star Trek 2009 enterprise is the most different in design.
FYI: Another interesting Q&A posted today on the STO Forums.
—–
Q: Commadore_Bob – Understanding CBS Involvement
I’m generaly confused about the relationship between CBS and Cryptic. I’m aware that Cryptic needs CBS’s approval in order to have a Star Trek game, that’s part of the license. But why does Cryptic need to run EVERYTHING by CBS? It has been made clear that what happens in this game has absolutely no impact on established canon. So why does every little thing have to be run by the studio?
A: Wishstone – Cryptic Community Representative
We run everything by CBS. New Uniform? New ship? New story line? Has to at least be seen by them. If they dislike it (and that has happened before) we must make changes or we might scrap things.
STO is not a “we can do whatever the heck we wanna”-deal. We work with CBS at all points because they care about Trek as much as you guys and we here at Cryptic do. They make sure that what is in STO is what they would want to have in Trek. Myself, I’m pretty happy that we have such a close relationship.
Some of you ask for details on this: These I cannot give you. There are contracts and licensing deals and a whole slew of other things involved.
To much like the galaxy class D i would have liked something along the lines of the E, but with the kind of streamlined design of the enterprise A or Refit from the motion picture.
The 2nd place entry is better because it does somewhat give a nod to the tos.
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