Cryptic has announced, to the surprise of no one, that they are developing Star Trek Online. I freely admit it, I like Star Trek. Mostly, I am a fan of The Next Generation (TNG). Deep Space Nine (DS9) was ok... and it just went downhill from there. The Original Series (TOS) was alright, just a bit before my time though.
Star Trek is a tough theme to make into a MMO. The old Diku (EQ, WoW) formula will not work with this IP since it is about much more than combat. Star Trek is about exploration, decisions, characters, politics, space ships and some combat.
I can see it now, a Starfleet officer with an exclamation point over his head telling me to go down to a planet and kill 15 tribbles. I beam on down and start to Phaser tribbles. Ding I level up, yay! On a tribble's fluffy corpse, I find a new Phaser that does .3 more DPS. I then use that phaser to incinerate myself.
If there is ever a time for a sandbox game, this is that opportunity. Please Cryptic, take a chance. I know it is risky, but without risk there is little reward. Make this game something different. I know you will at least get one Collectors Edition pre-order from me if you do. You can feed your families on that right?
Monday, July 28, 2008
Boldly go where others have gone before?
3 comments:
I do hope they come up with, if not something original, something novel.
Right now it is sloshing around in my head as some sort of Frankenstein MMO.
Add a pinch of EvE for space combat.
Add a dash of Stargate Worlds/Tabula Rasa for FPS away missions and cover use.
Add a smidgeon of City of Heroes for character customization.
Mix well and deposit in an SWGesque sandbox of several planets/space zones.
Oh and instance the shit out of it for the user content and randomnewworld123
Those are some good ideas. Lets hope they are on the same page. Instancing is the only real way to pull off exploration.
Sure they're good ideas. They clearly work for each MMO mentioned.
My point however is this. WAR is already being compared to and held up against WoW despite being a drastically different take on fantasy MMORPG.
Do we really want Frankentrek that is all the good bits from half a dozen different games cloned?
I'm hoping for something .... unusual. Maybe not Bartle levels of new and innovative, but something that makes ST:O shine for what it is, rather than what it can mash together.
Post a Comment