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Unnecessary review #557
HitechLolife
Member Posts: 210
I flew to planet Vulcan to check it out. Wasn't allowed to beam down and instead my ship started to 'bounce' off the planet's atmosphere.
The end.
OR IS IT??/one
So as pointed out by the helpful Blurr lower down that my facetious post is made moot by them putting Vulcan in game. You can go to the surface now, it's outdoors and bigger than I was expecting. Doesn't look like there's anything to actually do on the planet but it's pretty. Looks kinda like crisis in the Desert from CO without the mobs/ buildings.
..
So there you have it. I'm glad they added it in but honestly I could have chosen any number of ways that STO limits the feel of space exploration. I actually think Cryptic make some of the best zones out there, (thinking of CoH) so it was fairly suprising to see what they chose to offer with STO.
Currently Playing: The Game
Comments
ouch, yall cant even land on Vulcan either..... So sounds like this game only got 1 planet then you can stretch yer legs on?
Uhmm.... no Vulcan planet....? Cryptic you dissapoint me...
To clarify, there's probably a small instance on Vulcan for a quest I haven't come across. The point is you can't just go off and explore like in a normal MMO. If you have no quest for it there's nothing for you to do but shut up and quest where they tell you to.
There are many times you'll beam down to a part of a planet which is fenced off with blatant invisible walls for the purpose of a quest. but yeah. Only if you're boldly going where a quest tells you to go.
Currently Playing: The Game
From the Jan 20th patch notes
Does nobody read patch notes anymore?
"Because it's easier to nitpick something than to be constructive." -roach5000
Cool, I'll go check it out and post a proper review of planet vulcan. Here's hoping it's not too space station like the great halls on Q'o'nos(sp)
Incidently I wasn't reading the patch notes as my interest plummeted after my first visit to places like Vulcan.
Currently Playing: The Game
Exploration STO style. Wtg!
Yep, visited Risa today
Expresso gave me a Hearthstone beta key.....I'm so happy
I think this is necessary.
and yet you found the interest to run here and post incorrect information?
I am not a fan of STO, by a long way, but you kinda shot yourself in the foot here. There is enough to criticise this game over already, without getting it wrong.
People are just way to quick to troll and look like a smart ass on these forums.
Awesome review, but you didn't offer a rating. Is it STO a great game, or STO the greatest game?
It is the greatest Star Trek MMO in the world.
Actually, guys I learnt something today and after getting served the patch notes in my face I gave the game another spin last night. So here is my review (for reals).
Basically your enjoyment of STO comes down to how much instancing you can handle. The game is going a different route to most MMOs and instead of investing in zones that try and be timeless and expected to be retread numerous times, STO throws economically made content at you in a rapid succession. (I found it oddly similar to the TV show, sets are reused and only a small, secluded part of a planet is ever shown.) CoH was similar however, once you've accepted the game's highly instanced nature STO is probably a better fit for the style.
My expectation of Cryptic would be that since this kind of throw away content is easy to make -compared to say Millenium City from their own CO. - there should be utter tonnes of the stuff. From this perspective STO may have a very viable future as content is rapidly and easily added perhaps feeding the gluttonous bellies of mmo players like never before. CO players might wonder where their content is since it uses the same engine but that would be ignoring their game's status as the red headed stepchild.
So the game isn't perfect but it is pretty fun. Claims of it being a CO clone are great over stated although the interface is pretty similar. The genesis missions range from a reasonably cool invasions of abandoned space stations to the spectacularly crap beam down to this 10 x 10 patch of uninhabited, uninteresting land and click on 4 things. While click on 4 things is nothing new, travelling light years, then orbiting a planet and beaming down for the privledge is a bit much. It could work with some improvement.
Space battles are fun, if a little repetitive. As most people realise it's where the meat of the game is and rightly so. For myself it shines a lot more in pvp. being part of a fleet of ships swooping down and reigning phasery death on some poor bastard. On the subject of pvp i was happy to see like 20x the amount of options offered in CO.
The best thing about STO is it's community. Talking about obscure sci fi and trek stuff, debating over who sucks harder as a Captain between Janeway and Archer and so forth has been a blast. If MMOs actually are nothing more than irc with graphics then this is #star_trek, so if nothing else the game offers that.
No the game isn't perfect by any means but it is something far more entertaining than collecting another 10 wolfpaws. Even if that's what you're still doing , Cryptic have applied a lot of smoke and mirrors to disguise it.
Despite what my earlier post would imply I did put in quite a bit of time previously. A lot of design decissions made for the game were and still are totally bafflings and somewhat offputting. For example - they managed to make warp speed seem slow. I understand the need for travel sink but at least give me the facade that i'm travelling at light speeds here. I also expected larger ground zones, and while I went into zoning above, I do think the game could do with a couple of planets offering SWG style fare. There's a slightly claustrophobic feel to the galaxy which is kinda unnerving.
Overall the game is not perfect and fails to capture the feel of star trek more often then it nails it. There are a tonne of easter eggs and nods to episodes that are entertaining although the fan service can seem forced. STO is not a good video game but most MMOs aren't either. It's a refreshing change from wolf paws but not a refreshing change from a MMO releases that are banking on players seeing the potential of the whole affair.
Currently Playing: The Game
It is the greatest Star Trek MMO in the world.
Actually, ... the game is not perfect and fails to capture the feel of star trek more often then it nails it. ... STO is not a good video game but most MMOs aren't either. It's a refreshing change from wolf paws but not a refreshing change from a MMO releases that are banking on players seeing the potential of the whole affair.
All snipped up as a TLDR version.
I actually understand and mostly agree with your *updated* review. I still don't know if I'm going to buy it or not! I've kind of enjoyed moments in beta, but I don't know if it's "$50 + sub + item mall = fun" or "= /quit".
so...
I'm probably not going to buy it either. I do think it captures the ST environment pretty well, and I've never felt that I was playing just another space mmo. There's just no variety in the combat encounters, and that makes for a dull exp grind. It's not the designers fault as much as it is a limitation in the IP. Everyone has phasers or disrupters, as they should have, and that makes for the same encounter every time. The elfs and magic of the fantasy mmo open the door for a little more variety, and I'm just used to that I guess. Or maybe it's the in your face aspect of close combat that can't be reproduced by a couple of tin cans batlling it out at 10 clicks. I dunno, but it's old already and I didn't even get a chance to pay for it.
The one and only thing that grates me as far as the IP goes is the Federation offering me rewards for completing missions. I mean aren't we at war. Maybe you should outfit "your" Federation starship and "your" officers before you send them out to battle. I understand the risk/reward nature of mmos, but maybe loot should distributed differently here. Yeh ok, that's weird. Seeya.