Elder Scrolls Developer Holds Star Trek License

Gamasutra reports that Bethesda Softworks will have the rights to make Star Trek games on all the platforms available. From the article: "The move follows the high profile legal confrontation between previous license holder Activision and Viacom, in which Activision accused Viacom of letting 'the once proud Star Trek franchise stagnate and decay.' The disagreement was apparently brought to an amicable conclusion in March of last year, at which time it was implied that Activision would retain the license until 2009. However, following Bethesda's unveiling of new game Star Trek: Legacy, from Empire Earth II and Star Trek: Armada II developer Mad Doc Software, Bethesda has now confirmed it owns the game license for all television and movie incarnations of the science fiction series."

Comments

MMO.

[FalconZero]

Does this affect Star Trek : Online already under development by Prepetual?

Re:MMO.

[faloi]

From TFA:
Though not specifically mentioned, it appears that Bethesda's acquisition of the license will have no effect on Perpetual Entertainment's currently in development Star Trek Online massively multiplayer role-playing game. Many multiformat media licensors, such as Marvel, have treated massively multiplayer online games as a separate issue in the past.

So it looks like probably not. It sounds like Bethesda will have plenty on their plate without it. I just hope the games are worth something.

Re:MMO.

[Jaruzel]

Oooh, I didn't know about STO, but now I do! Thanks for that!

-Jar.

Re:MMO.

[Schemat1c]

ST:O will never see the light of day - so it doesn't really matter.
--
Do my referral for a free game - I paypal you $10.

Is this just a cheap comment to post your spam on a high traffic site or do you have some information to back up this claim?

Re:MMO.

[MBraynard]

Just business logic. I look at the developers track record, the market, how much it costs to successfully market the game, the appeal of the liscence, etc.

This MMO is a marketing ploy that was borne of looking at the success of SWG and maybe WoW and thinking ST was more popular than it was and handing the job off to a mediocre company.

If Blizzard or EA was developing the title, I would have more confidence in it actually making it out of the gates. But this one is just doomed. Want to make a bet? I'll put a C note on the game never making it to retail by the end of 07.

Re:MMO.

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

I can't wait to get a phaser that takes 5-6 shots to kill a rat, or to be a Vulcan, 10 times as strong as a human male, and have a tough time beating up a human ruffian behind Harcourt Fenton Mudd's bar.

Or to have to get to level 200 before I learn the Vulcan Neck Pinch, which will only work 1 of 10 times on humans, and even that'll get nerfed to never work ever on "boss humans".

Or to have to get to level 50 before I can go somewhere without having to run there on foot, from the only teleporter in the entire city to the other side of the city. And even then, my, umm, motorcycle I get for eight gazillion bars of gold-pressed latinum only moves about 2x the speed of a running human.

Yeah, I can't wait. /petition The ship went into warp and because of lag I got left behind in space and died.

Re:MMO.

[Ayaress]

I hope (doubt, but hope) they take a route more like EVE Online does. I have few good things to say for Eve aside from it looking really good, but on the other hand, Star Trek, at least from a combat standpoint, has always been about ship. All the ground fights have been pretty lame and unimpressive. What I wouldn't mind is having to make a senior staff - not just one character, but captain, commander, science, tactical, engineering, the whole nine yards - and then having each one represented in certain aspects of your ship's function.

Re:MMO.

[snuf23]

Check out the FAQ. They expect the ship crew complement to be consistent with the series. I wonder how they are going to pull that off.
Ground combat is supposed to be real time.

Impressive

[mendaliv]

Up to this date, I'd always thought of Bethesda as just "the guys who made the TES series", but this is really pretty cool and will, I hope, push Bethesda even higher in the ranks of the developers.

This is also good news for me because, honestly, I haven't been particularly pleased with Activision's ST games. They can blame Viacom, but they can't exempt their own developers... like in Star Trek: Bridge Commander; in one mission, your chief engineer suggests by tweaking the matter/antimatter intermix ratio to do some kind of super warp jump. Of course, if you watched enough TNG, you know that there's only one proper intermix ratio, 1:1, and otherwise should have destroyed your ship.

Re:Impressive

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course, if you watched enough TNG, you know that there's only one proper intermix ratio, 1:1, and otherwise should have destroyed your ship.

I've watched (and rewatched) more TNG than I care to admit, and the nerdiness of this post still knocked the wind out of me. I'm going to have a bruise on my chest.

Re:Impressive

[Anonymous Coward]

Hrm, why exactly is that? Can thier drives not handle the buildup of matter/anti-matter particles? Afterall, if you have a lopsided ratio, you'd end up with either extra matter or extra anti-matter, right?

Don't see why having more of either would actually be a good thing anyways. But I also can't see why having more of either would be so horribly catastrophic either.

Re:Impressive

[Ayaress]

There was that one episode where Wesley points out that 1:1 is the only valid ratio. However, there's at least one episode (it was on either Spike TV or G4 just this week) in which Geordi orders the matter:anti matter ratio set to 3:1 (I can't remember for sure, but I believe this was the same episode when the alien probe used the computer virus that destroyed the Yamato and crippled the Enterprise and a Romulan Warbird).

Re:Impressive

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

Oh yeah, well, umm, well the wrong cabin number of Yeoman Rand, as listed in teh famous Saturday Night Live skit was Y-390!

The maximum sustainable warp of Voyager at the start of the show was 9.997.

The interaction between Tuvok and Kleenex on that space elevator episode was intentionally homoerotic.

There have been two saliva-string lesbian kisses, one between Jadzia Dax and her former huband's guest star new female body, and Evil Ezri-Dax and Evil Kira.

There, how's that?

Re:Impressive

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

Indeed, more regular matter would ensure the complete annhilation of the antimatter without leaving any extra behind to mess things up later.

Besides, we all know it's the correct temperature that's more important, although a controlled cold start implosion can propel the ship through normal (not warp) space faster than the speed of light, thus sending you backwards in time. This was when time travel on Trek was cool, before the bastard, illogical "slingshot" method was introduced. Sigh. I'll never forgive them for that.

Re:Impressive

[Drakin030]

I for one really enjoy the TES series from Bethesda. Their on my top list for creating quality games that I would gladly dish out 50 bucks for. I am no fan of star trek star wars or anything with "Star" in it. But if Bethesda makes it...I'll give it a shot.

Some confusion there

[brouski]

I'd have to let that complaint slide, since they weren't consistent on that point even on the TV show.

I think the technical manual hedges it by saying the 1:1 ratio only applies to Warp 8 and above.

Star Fleet Battles

[Anonymous Coward]

What sort of exceptions are in there for Star Fleet Battles? It's obviously a Trek-inspired game, and it got the rights to exist way back before TNG was made. Do future computer versions of it come under this mantle, too?

Re:Star Fleet Battles

[MaxQuordlepleen]

The excellent Star Fleet Command game circa about 1999 was a very faithful reproduction of SFB. It's still available on e-bay and is well worth checking out if you missed it back then. I used to play SFB in high school with my buddies, when we discovered SFC we were overjoyed. I recently bought my third copy of the game to replace worn-out media..

Re:Star Fleet Battles

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget Star Fleet Command 2.

Very playable.

Go ahead and ignore SFC3, it ignored the Star Fleet Battles rules and catered to the simplistic minds of those who grew up watching StarTrek:TNG, instead of the original star trek series. For those not informed, Star Fleet Battles was based on the original Star Trek series (with some changes . . .)

Re:Star Fleet Battles

[werewolf1031]

Speaking of the original board game...

For those not informed, Star Fleet Battles was based on the original Star Trek series (with some changes . . .)

Such as the inclusion of the cat-like Kzin from Larry Niven's 'Known Space', among other decidedly non-Trek items. I can deal with minor techno-babble inconsistancies, that's par for the course (and rather entertaining in its own right), but something like introducing a race from a completely unrelated fictional universe always seemed absurd to me. Don't get me wrong, I like the Kzin, even read three Man-Kzin Wars novels, but I still have to wonder... why?

Sorry, end of rant.

Re:Star Fleet Battles

[Feneric]

The Kzinti were in the Star Trek cartoon series. They also made cameos in some of the movies that were based on the original series (although they were never referred to by name in the movies, and I forget which movies offhand -- I believe they appeared in two of them, though). They also served to explain why Klingon ships were described in Trek literature as being heavily outfitted with drone defenses when the Federation et al weren't described as using drones -- the solution was to make the Kzinti ships heavily armed with drones.

Keep in mind I'm saying this as a Dr. Who fan who used to play SFB -- I'm sure a Trek fan could provide more (and better) details.

Re:Star Fleet Battles

[werewolf1031]

You're right of course about the animated series, I'd forgotten all about that - never saw it, but read about it and of the appearance of the Kzinti in that series. But still...

They also made cameos in some of the movies that were based on the original series...

I'm a (formerly) VERY avid Trek fan, having seen all the movies multiple times (especially those based on TOS characters), and I don't ever recall seeing a Kzin or heavily Kzin-like character in any of the films, unless it was a very bit part and it went right by me (unlikely, but certainly possible). If anyone can point out the film and time index of this appearance(s), or at least the specific scene in which it occured, I'd greatly appreciate it. And remember -- webbed ears, ratlike tail; not just any feline humanoid species will suffice. :)

Thanks in advance.

Re:Star Fleet Battles

[Feneric]

AFAIR they are "blink and you'll miss it" appearances. I recall watching a scene from one of the movies (although I now forget which) just because a fellow SFB player told me that he had read somewhere that they had put a Kzinti in it as a nod to the animated series, and because of the link with SFB.

Remember though the Kzinti of SFB aren't 100% the Kzin of Niven; they're based on them but they did have some changes along the way (probably in part due to legal issues, and in part due to the regular changing of details as a message gets passed from one person to the next). You have to compare against the Kzinti pictures in the various SFB materials, not the pictures of Niven's Kzin. The Kzinti in the movies are based on the ones in the cartoon series and SFB, not the ones in Niven's books.

7 of 9 comments

[A Brand of Fire]

I thought that was kind of interesting, when linking from the main page to this article, that there were 7 of 9 comments on an article with a Star Trek subject.

Having seen some of the screenshots, I'd have to guess (or hope) they're at an early alpha stage, seeing as there's no shadows being cast and some of the texturing looks rather dated. While I acknowledge that great graphics do not always make for great games, I'd expect that a company like Bethesda or Mad Doc (who is doing the actual work on the Legacy title) wouldn't skimp in the graphics department, either. Of course, I'm probably spoilt by the gorgeousness found in EVE Online.

That said, Legacy looks like it'll be a fun title. Large-scale combat in a 'Trek game can be fun; I just wish Birth of the Federation wasn't so poorly made as to make such conflicts nigh impossible. Speaking of which, that game is in sore need of a remake (hint, hint, Bethesda).

Re:7 of 9 comments

[Red Flayer]

"I thought that was kind of interesting, when linking from the main page to this article, that there were 7 of 9 comments on an article with a Star Trek subject."

And you had to go and ruin it for the rest of us... 7 of 10? No significance at all.

Bastard. :)

Re:7 of 9 comments

[TheSenori]

Given Oblivion's graphics, I don't think we have to worry too much about whether Bethesda will try.

Re:7 of 9 comments

[A Brand of Fire]

While Oblivion does look quite gorgeous, it is Mad Doc Software that is doing the actual work on Legacy with Bethesda publishing the title (as it is Bethesda which now has rights to the publishing and creation of 'Trek-based games). This article at Eurogamer sheds a little more light than the Gamasutra entry, and from how it sounds, the preliminary game concept reminds me a bit of Deep Space Nine: Dominion Wars -- an okay game, but not a great one, with a look similar to the screenshots provided. We'll see what happens, though.

Incarnations

[HTH NE1]

Bethesda has now confirmed it owns the game license for all television and movie incarnations of the science fiction series.

So the game license for stage incarnations is still up for grabs?

Star Trek: The Interactive Musical !

Re:Incarnations

[dangitman]

So the game license for stage incarnations is still up for grabs?

I heard that William Shatner is making a spoken word version of a Star Trek Game. He found a way.

Patrick Stewart?

[deltagreen]

I think it's likely that Bethesda will hire Patrick Stewart for voice work on some of the games. After all, he's just worked for them on the upcoming game Oblivion (http://www.elderscrolls.com/news/press_093005.htm ).

Re:Patrick Stewart?

[Ayaress]

As long as they don't use him as a unit voice in another RTS. I had to turn off unit speech because of that. The (n+1)th time I heard the words "Mr. LaForge, set maximum impulse speed," I was about to break my speakers to make him shut up.

Re:Patrick Stewart?

[dangitman]

Not only does he do a good voice-over, if you rub is bald head, you get good luck and ship on time.

Good news everyone

[Jarlsberg]

If anyone can revive that shoddy franchise, it's Bethesda. They made the only good game based on the Terminator license back when T2 was big, so this is good news indeed :)

Re:Good news everyone

[Qzukk]

If nothing else, Bethseda will have no problem recreating that one ST:TNG episode where parts of the ship were phasing in and out, and people were falling into the floors.

Re:Good news everyone

[Photon Ghoul]

Touché, Qzukk, touché. You seem to be the only one here who remembers the first Elder Scrolls!

Sequal to "Starfleet Academy"

[jameskojiro]

I hope they make a sequal to Starfleet Academy, that was a total kickass game that totally rocked!!!! I loved the story and i loved the whole create your own mission part, even though it kinda sucked. I loved fireing at the starbases, LOL

Hubert, Is That You?

[kaellinn18]

Did anyone else read the subject of the parent post with the Farnsworth voice saying it in their head?

Fallout

[Anonymous Coward]

They also own the Fallout licence.. (Not for the MMO, Interplay (hah!) retained that part.