Archive for the ‘Star Trek Online’ Category
Posted by Stropp on
July 29, 2008
Everyone is talking about the announcement by Cryptic that they have taken over development of Star Trek Online. Well, perhaps taken over isn’t the correct term exactly. Cryptic aren’t using any of the source code that Perpetual Entertainment wrote, mainly because they didn’t want to buy it from Perpetual. (I don’t blame ‘em. If PE managed the development as badly as they managed their company, the code would probably have been mostly rewritten anyway.)
Tipa over at West Karana had a bit of a rant about the announcement, and for the most part I agree with her. I’m definitely hoping the boys and girls over at Cryptic think outside the box on this one and try and depart from the Official World of Warcraft MMORPG Developers Guide that much of the rest of the MMOG development world seems to have adopted — or perhaps it would be more appropriate to say the MMOG marketing departments have adopted.
There are certain things that World of Warcraft does that definitely should be retained, but these are mostly usability devices. Things like GUI placement are important to give a sense of continuity. There’s nothing more jarring to a user than to expect something to be one way and find it completely different. That’s one of the reasons for the success of Windows, the GUI elements worked the same way as every other application — but that’s another story.
But that doesn’t mean the gameplay has to exactly emulate every other game out there.
One of the interesting things about Star Trek is that it isn’t about using force to solve problems. Sure. Kirk, Picard and the other in-charge types often had to resort to force, but they did it when all else had failed. More often than not the episodes were about using their brains to solve a problem with the warp nacelles or transporters (weren’t those things deathtraps. They’d never get past Occupational health and safety rules today!) Star Trek Online would absolutely rock if it managed to get this part right.
I really, really hope that the first away missions don’t involve getting sent off to kill ten space rats that are infesting the Jeffries Tubes, or some such thing.
In any case, since Cryptic aren’t using PE’s code, and by the looks of it, they aren’t using the art either, then I expect it will be some time before we can play this one. Maybe I should start a pool… 2010, 2011 anyone?
So there’s plenty of time for discussing the finer points of Star Trek Online as more info is revealed.
And just a personal request to the good folks at Cryptic. Please make sure that you have a good smattering of Star Trek species (they’re NOT races people!) for us to play.
Please. I want to play a Klingon.
Popularity: 6%
Posted by Stropp on
January 15, 2008
Kirk, Spock, and McCoy beam down to the planet. They need a little extra help so they take the bloke in the red shirt. We all know who isn’t beaming back up.
In the meantime Kirk loses his shirt and seduces the beautiful alien priestess.
No tears are shed for Mr. Red Shirt.
In the same way, I doubt there will be any tears shed for P2 Entertainment (formerly known as Perpetual Entertainment) losing the Star Trek licence.
The news is out today (Massively, Warcry, Disgruntled Gamer) that P2 Entertainment has ceased development on Star Trek Online and has transferred the Star Trek licence to an unnamed developer. This developer is supposedly in the San Francisco Bay Area, and may be Cryptic Studios according to rumors uncovered by Massively.
So, the good news is that Star Trek Online may have beamed up just in time to escape the Deadpool.
There is bad news though.
Originally slated for release this year, only the Star Trek licence and the art assets have been transferred to the new developer. The program code has not been transferred. This means the new developer now has to redevelop ALL of the code from scratch. That’s not just the client, it’s the server software as well.
This could easily take another three years, unless a turnkey solution is used. If not, expect that the art assets will also be redeveloped. Three years is a long time in the computer graphics field. That’s also not taking into account the fact that a new developer may have a new philosophy on what they want to see out of the Star Trek licence. I expect the developer to start completely from scratch, graphics, code, everything.
On the upside, if it is Cryptic Studios who have won the Star Trek licence, then expect a decent game to emerge at the end of all this.
Cryptic brought us the acclaimed City of Heroes/Villains MMO which is still going strong. They recently sold of the rights to CoH/CoV to NCsoft (who published them) and have announced that they are working on new projects.
It’s possible that Cryptic could fast track the development of Star Trek Online, as they have the domain expertise. If they have a client and server that could be used for development, then all the better.
Still, it’s a sure thing that STO won’t see the light of day this year.
Popularity: 16%
Posted by Stropp on
December 13, 2007
Things aren’t looking bright and rosy for Star Trek Online and Perpetual Entertainment.
It’s only been a month or two since Perpetual announced that their, at that stage, soon to be released MMO, Gods and Heroes was going into an indefinite hold. Everyone read between the lines and realised that Gods and Heroes was in fact being cancelled. Around about the same time there was an announcement of layoffs and transfers to the Star Trek Online team.
Turmoil like this doesn’t really bode well for a company. Even if a company is in good financial health and the projects are doing well, layoffs and cancellations have an effect. The least of which is that the remaining employees polish up their resumes, and start looking around.
Unfortunately it doesn’t really look like Perpetual is in good financial health.
Ten Ton Hammer recently broke the news that Perpetual Entertainment is being sued for fraud and breach of contract following the Gods and Heroes cancellation.
It appears that Perpetual did the dirty on a company called Kohnke by breach of contract, fraudulent transfer of holdings such as the Star Trek Online licence so that when it liquidated its assets, the other creditors wouldn’t recieve their share. All up there are seven counts of business misconduct.
All up things aren’t looking to good for Perpetual. If the suit has merit, it’s likely Perpetual will be required to cough up the STO licence and probably a whole bunch of money. A case like this may even drag on for years, and the first thing the plaintifs are likely to do is to put a freeze on any activity to do with the licence. Of course, I’m Not A Lawyer, so this is just speculation, but I expect that Star Trek Online will be the next in the MMORPG deadpool.
In the famous words of Dr McCoy.
It’s worse than that, he’s dead Jim.
Popularity: 13%
Posted by Stropp on
July 22, 2007
I was doing a bit of web surfing earlier today and came across a link to the new developers log for Perpetual Entertainments Star Trek Online. If the article is anything to go by, it looks like this will be one gorgeous game.
As a software developer myself, I’ve always had an interest in how computer games are developed. I’ve done quite a bit of reading of various developer sites like GameDev .net and Gamasutra. And back in the day, I enjoyed reading the various plan files that developers like Carmack used to put up on the net.
Anyway, enough digressing. This entry from Mike Stemmle of Perpetual Entertainment goes into quite a lot of detail about how the developers are creating the worlds that the players will eventually inhabit. He goes through each of the steps of the process of creating a world, and shows some screenshots of the results. The tool that they are using, the World Machine, looks pretty cool too. It looks like it makes the whole process a snap. Just like the Genesis Device, but with no proto-matter. BTW, I’m not a Trekkie, really.
I’m not going to pinch any images from the article to show here. You’ll have to go to the article to see those. But, if you’re interested in seeing how the games that we all know and love are made, you should check this article out.
Popularity: 17%
Posted by Stropp on
December 17, 2006
A few days ago, I wrote that I had signed up for the beta of Lord of the Rings Online. At the end of that post I mentioned that there were a bunch of other impressive MMOs on the horizon. A reader commented, asking me what they are.
Here is my list of impressive up and coming MMOs.
Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures
Developer: Funcom Official Website
Release: Q2 2007
Age of Conan is set in the universe of Conan the Barbarian at the time in the novels where Conan has become king. This is going to be a very violent game with a MA rating. It is also the only game I’ve seen where the character creation allows you to configure the shape of your arse.
Tabula Rasa
Developer: NCSoft Official Website
Release: Unknown
Tabula Rasa is a Sci-Fi MMO being developed by Richard Garriot, the man behind the Ultima games including Ultima Online. This game plays more like a FPS, but has the character development of a RPG.
Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning
Developer: Mythic Entertainment Official Website
Release: 2007
Warhammer Online is being produced by the developers of the online game, Dark Age of Camelot, and is being set in the Warhammer universe. The graphics seem to be a little reminiscent of World of Warcrafts style, but the game as I understand it, will be substantially different.
Huxley
Developer: Webzen, Inc. (No Website)
Release: 2007
Another Sci-Fi MMO that has the leveling system of most MMORPGs, but from what I understand is more of a FPS action style. I saw some gameplay video a few months ago on the G4 TV site, and this game looks awesome. Unfortunately, as yet they don’t seem to have an official site for the game.
Star Trek Online
Developer: Perpetual Entertainment Official Website
Release: 2007?
Supposed to go to beta sometime in summer 2007. It will include starship combat as well as PvP and solo play. STO will deliver the essential experiences associated with Star Trek: shipboard and starbase life, away-team missions, holodeck activities, and encounters with other starships. And the best thing about this game is that I can be a Klingon. Scrape ‘em of Jim!
Stargate Worlds
Developer: Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment Official Website
Release: Unknown
One of my favorite TV series, so I really hope they do a good job. Stargate Worlds will let you play as a Human, Jaffa, Goa’uld, or Asgard. It looks like they will include the Atlantis worlds as well, which creates almost infinite possibilities for missions. I don’t really see a warrior class for the Asgard though.
Final Thoughts
Including LotRO, this makes seven big online games in development that will soon be released. There are a few other games out there that I haven’t mentioned that are imminent. Vanguard: Saga of Heroes is one that I’ve only recently heard about. Just about every other week I see a report of another MMORPG being announced. It seems every man and his dog is getting into the business. This is not to mention the latest announcements of MMORPGs set in the Firefly and Fallout universes which can also be considered reasonably hefty licences.
I was going to include more information on each of these games, but as I was writing this article, I became aware that I couldn’t do each of these games justice with a single paragraph. If anyone is interested, I’ll do more complete articles on each of these games in the coming weeks.
Popularity: 79%
