Star Trek ONLINE Review

So today is 1/12/2010 Star Trek online or STO open beta started TODAY!!!

This game is no joke, if I had to explain in short terms I guess it would be close to combining "Star Trek LEGACY" the game and MMO-RPG elements. Here is a brief run down of my experience in the game and what I think about the game but before I start I wanted to point out I have read a lot of other reviews out there and I was getting the impression the game needed a lot of work due to some of the negative reviews I read about small things like the game UI and other non trivial items that make a game fun (TO ME ANYWAY) but after I got my hands on the game myself I was waiting to find these failures, these things that reviews said were annoying, things that I was going to get frustrated with but they never came... they never came....


1) Character's
First things first, you start the game being able to design your own starfleet captain! there are a few races you can choose from or you can even design your own random new alien and add to the species pool!! I will note this if you pick an already created race your customization options only go so far - example if you make a human you cant give him HORNS, why would he have horns hes human...

If you create your own custom race you can do basically whatever the hell you want though - you could probably spend an hour making your character from scratch if you wanted.

Also you get to design your own custom starfleet uniform :) which is pretty neat . some people make themselves look like spiderman which is kinda retarded but hey if they want to look stupid that's their prerogative


Also you get to pick a couple skills like racial abilities inside WoW, Once again if you pick a pre-made race you get designated racial's and a choice of 2 optional.

if you use your own custom alien race you get to pick your own 4 abilities of choice no pre-made forced racial abilities



2) Tutorial
The tutorial in this game is pretty good it does a perfect job of teaching you how to play the game without making you feel your wasting your time inside a tutorial - there are exp gains, unlocks and items you gain - you really can't bypass this tutorial but it's not that painful like some games are... there's actually action right off the bat


3) Pew pew time!!
After your tutorial your left at a MAJOR STARBASE which is just like a major city inside any other MMORPG. There are vendors and even an AUCTION HOUSE.

Here you can customize your ship and recruit new bridge officers and more!! but you don't want to do that because you get some later for free ;) SPOILER!

After shopping and exploring a bit in the city your already tossed your first real missions as a legit starfleet captain (yes an admiral said so)


3) Quests / Missions
What else is an RPG about?? QUESTS!!!
You get a series of quests that are deeply involved inside the story line - not just doing some random quest because some random starfleet guy cant find his napsack anymore. The quests you have are involved in a deep story line just like the star trek shows.

Also they are not just go kill go kill quests. Some are escort, some are defense while others are beaming down to a planet and having negotiations with the locals to provide a solution to their issues but yet all have great rewards :) Don't get me wrong a fair amount of missions are combat related as well - but not to the point to where that's all you spend your time doing... in less your Kligon !! haha


4) Wrap up

Even though the game is in BETA still I will admit the bugs aren't bad. most are minor while some are related purely on stress testing like server full, loading slow, things like that of course are going to pop up in these stages since you have 10000 people hitting the servers hard trying to play haha

I am impressed very much with the game and I think it was worth the wait. I can't wait for the official release to get all that content unlocked and playable I think this game is well worth the price and you will have countless days of fun playing this game even in the beta I can't stop playing.!


p.s. the graphics are great too


My ship the USS ARROGANT
Note: All screenshots were taken from my crappy laptop which still even runs this game good - so the requirements are obviously not too intense I never really got any lag or graphic slow down