What Kind Of Star Trek MMO Do You Want?

Via Gamecloud, a Nielsen survey on the Star Trek Online site giving some interesting insight into what kind of game people want. From the article: "Another surprise was that the Borg is the most appealing opposing player faction. We knew the Borg would be a popular enemy, but we didn't expect that actually playing as a Borg drone would be so appealing. Though it was a surprise, I think we can understand why they would be a popular player faction. In fact, these results would appear to contradict the overall conclusion that faction value is marginal. One explanation is in the wording of the question. We asked people to select their favorite opposing faction. I can only guess that this wording had the effect of swaying people away from the Federation. Still, this point clearly deserves more research." Interesting to see some thought going into player reaction to development plans.

Comments

Forget the massive multiplayer stuff...

[Stormwatch]

Give me a single-player, Shenmue-like action adventure game set in the Star Trek universe, and I'll be happy.

Forget other players. Here's what I want.

[RogueyWon]

The difficulty in creating a Star Trek MMO is that you're dealing with a much less combat-intensive universe than is normal for a franchised MMO. With Final Fantasy, Star Wars, the Matrix etc, combat has always been the most notable aspect of the universe, so having a game based heavily upon it is understandable. Of course, this also means that you end up with the Galaxies situation of having to spend weeks running around hitting wamp rats with a stick before you can do anything interesting.

The challenge for Star Trek Online, or whatever they call it, is to break out of the traditional MMORPG mode by balancing combat more evenly against other game elements and offering new modes of progression. My own suggestion would go something like this:

Players start out by picking an affiliation to one of the game's factions. Probably Federation, Romulan, Klingon and a couple of other races if the devs have time. I'm not really sure Borg would work. Players start out with a 1 man shuttlecraft, the bare minimum of skill to find it and a couple of whatever resource unit the game decides to use as currency (which is a major issue in itself). From here, players can choose to develop their character (who would start as a blank template - no class selection) through their actions. Participating in exploration, combat, trading etc would all increase the player's stats in that field. So far, so Galaxies. You've got people running around on planets exploring, encountering monsters, trading with eachother and so on.

However, where the Star Trek franchise really has the potential to turn into a great MMO is in the social and interstellar sections of the game. What I'd really like to see, and what would make me vastly more likely to buy the game, would be some kind of co-operative ship-control system. Make it so the smallest ships, shuttles and whatnot, can be flown by a single player, but also make it so that they're fairly useless except as runabouts.

However, make it so that controlling a starship requires a team of players, each with their own specialisations. So, for example, a specialist helmsman would be able to turn a starship more efficiently and execute more complicated manoeuveurs. Make it so that master engineers could coax more speed from a ship's engine and repair shields faster. For the stuff that doesn't directly involve turning or shooting a ship, use minigames whose difficulty scales depending on the player's skill level. Remember Paradroid for the C64? The minigame you played to take over an enemy droid? Have stuff like that for engineering, sensors and whatnot, with the difficulty scaling depending on both the player and the size/type of the ship. Imagine fighting a battle between two capital ships where not only do you have 1 player turning and one shooting, but you've got other players in the background doing their own thing to keep the ship functioning effectively.

Now extend it so that you can do more than just fight each other ships. Add appropriate minigames etc to incentivise research, exploration, negotiation etc and, most importantly, MAKE IT FUN.

Now add in an optional military command system (I'd have players start as Civilians with the option of joining their faction's military) and you've got a game I might consider playing.

The moon on a stick would be nice, as well.

Re:Forget other players. Here's what I want.

[Jerf]

Now extend it so that you can do more than just fight each other ships. Add appropriate minigames etc to incentivise research, exploration, negotiation etc and, most importantly, MAKE IT FUN.

Or you could just play Puzzle Pirates today, and just use your imagination to make it space-themed.

couple of whatever resource unit the game decides to use as currency (which is a major issue in itself)

Yes... especially as it's pretty clear if you actually look that the Federation is communist. (What human, operating within the law, has ever been shown to actually own anything like a shuttlecraft? I admit the linked essay surprised me, but the evidence is simply overwhelming, post-TNG. I'd much rather live now than in the Fed.)

But the MMO can just ignore that, fortunately.

Re:Forget other players. Here's what I want.

[Kazzahdrane]

"Make it so that master engineers could coax more speed from a ship's engine and repair shields faster." I actually believe that this is the sort of thing that they are putting into the game. Have you seen the LCARS video? It shows what an engineer character will be able to do with a computer console on a ship in the game. You can change the flow to the quantum gravaton matrix (if that's an actual ST gadget then go me!) and everything else they do in the show. The warp core is yours to tinker with, or at least that's what the video suggests. It can be found here http://startrek.perpetual.com/images/gallery/shock wave/movies/1.dir

How would I do a Trek MMO?

[foxtrot]

No one player should be able to drive a starship. MMOs already lend themselves to 'guilds', so why not build this into the game? One guild can be the crew of a given starship. A starship needs various crew, from weapons officers to helmsmen to a Captain to an engineer, and guild members can fill out these positions.

Hm. Actually, let's take that a step further: As I collect experience points, eventually I'm going to eclipse a certain total. Once that happens, the game will offer me command of a pretty ratty ship. I can either take the command, or continue on with the ship I'm currently on. I can put in for a transfer to another guild if I like-- it'll become pretty obvious which ships are the elite ships in the game, but the other guild has to accept me.

As my XP increases, Starfleet (or whoever's side I'm on) would offer me better ships. I get promoted, as opposed to "gaining levels". The way you get around the "Everyone wants to be Captain Kirk" problem is you _let 'em_. A few hours of play would net you enough XP to be offered a garbage scow or something like that. Rank n00bs, who need a ship to be crew on to gain XP, will happily join you. If you suck as a Captain, you wind up in command of this garbage scow for a good long while, where a good Captain will keep a good crew and pick up XPs and be offered command of better vessels.

But if you suck as a Captain, you're not stuck there, and you don't have to be one. Sign on with a "guild" (read: some other ship's crew) and you can collect XP and get bennies doing one of the other jobs available on a starship.