Star Trek Online Hands-on

Star Trek Online is set during the original series timeline of Star Trek history, and takes place twenty years after the events that sent Spock back in time (a facet that played a large role in the recent Star Trek film). This is a universe in chaos, with Romulus being destroyed, the Cardassian Union fragmented, the Borg having returned to assimilate worlds, and the Federation and Klingon Empire are on the brink of war once again. Into this tumultuous time, players choose to be either a Federation or Klingon captain, fighting and exploring through the galaxy as they see fit. Like other MMOs, players won't be forced to complete the main storyline of the game, but those choosing to see the story of their side play through will experience a series of adventures that Cryptic is calling "episodes," with content similar to the older television shows. This means that you'll participate in tasks such as delivering an ambassador to a planet, beaming down to ensure their safety, and then returning to space to potentially repel incoming raiders from nearing the planet to kidnap the VIP.

You're a Star Trek fan, you've probably wondered what it's like to explore the final frontier at the helm of your very own ship, following or breaking the Prime Directive as you sail across the universe. However, most Trek games have given players pre-set characters and ships, restricting the feeling of leaving Starfleet Academy and rising through the ranks of the Federation to become a respected captain. The same could be said if you wanted to play as another race, rivaling Starfleet for control of the galaxy. Seeking to fulfill these fan wishes, Cryptic Studios has been hard at work on Star Trek Online, their upcoming MMO based on the classic sci-fi franchise. At a recent press tour, I commanded my own vessel and an away crew mission to see what it was like in the captain's chair. While I saw an early version, Cryptic Studios is hard at work making sure that the experience is ready for Star Trek fans when the game is launched in February 2010. There are still a number of questions that I had which couldn't fully be answered, such as how guilds will operate within the confines of Starfleet or the Klingon Empire, as well as some of the trading and crafting elements, but I was told that those answers would be coming rather soon. For now, however, Star Trek fans should start to imagine how boldly they will choose to explore space, as their skills will soon be needed.

Each episode is tuned for up to five players to group together and complete (scaling difficulty based on the "fleet" or party that is taking on a mission), and eventually culminate in a major milestone at a galactic hub known as a season ender, which frequently require larger groups of fleets to accomplish, which is known as a fleet action. For example, repelling a Borg Cube or two from entering Sol and attacking earth is a large scale fleet action for the Federation.

But before you can engage in these activities, you have to build your ship and select your path. Every player will start out with a light cruiser, but will quickly be given the option to determine what kind of ship they want to command, from a cruiser, science or escort vessel. From there, they are given the ability to manipulate their ship's configuration, down to the placement of the nacelles, material that it's made from and its overall geometry. These decisions impact some of the elements regarding the direction of your character: choosing to specialize in being a cruiser captain doesn't prevent you from flying the other classes, but it does give you some advantages to commanding those ships.

The decision of which ship you want to command also affects the crew that you can have manning your ship. Each ship has slots for Science, Engineering and Tactical officers, although based on the class, a ship may have more use for a particular "seat" that another. For example, a science vessel will have multiple science seats, perhaps an engineering seat or two and maybe no tactical seats at all. Seats are important because they allow crewmembers to use their skills (or powers) to affect the performance of your ship, such as providing a beam that can strip away an enemy ship's shields, faster photon torpedo firing or faster impulse power during combat. I was told that there would be hundreds of these skills to match the hundreds of potential recruits that you can acquire over the course of your adventures.

I had a chance to check this out as I was able to control a vessel in battle against a group of raiders, who were trying to destroy a Federation space station. Controlling the cruiser under my command was slow, even at full impulse power; however, I was told that this was to allow me to tactically determine how to use my phaser arrays and photon torpedoes to strip away enemy shields for a lethal strike. Maneuvering was controlled with the WASD keys, while the mouse could be used to allocate power for your systems in battle. For example, if you're going into battle against faster ships, you may want to sink a lot of power into your phasers so you can respond to their quick maneuvers with fast weapon fire. On the other hand, if you're facing off against slower, more powerful ships, you may want to power up your forward shields to defend against direct assaults. You can control these factors with basic presets, or continually boost your weapons on the fly as the battle commands.

After blasting through the vessels and beaming aboard, I was able to take on four other crewmembers to help me explore the station and see if there were any survivors. The crewmembers were interesting because not only was I able to direct them individually in battle (like a pet from other MMOs), but I could tailor the crew to my own specifications. See, every player will have the ability to select a crewmember from the various known alien races in the galaxy, like Trill, Bajoran or Vulcan, but you can choose to abandon these standards and choose to create your own species, creating their look, history and other features. From there, you can save and send out your newly created aliens to other crews, allowing them to populate the universe. On top of that, you can adjust their individual "kits," profession specific traits that give then different abilities in battle, like a Bones kit that lets them heal nearby characters, or a Kirk kit that gives attack bonuses. These can be further manipulated by weaponry, allowing characters to engage in what Cryptic calls their expose and exploit system during ground battle.

The system plays out like this: players can use one of their weapon skills to potentially expose a weakness in an enemy's defense. For example, my captain held a rather powerful photon gatling gun that could hit multiple targets at once and instantly stun them based on proximity. This would instantly leave the enemies vulnerable for a follow up attack from my captain or a crewmember. That led to the exploit phase, where characters could cause critical damage and potentially end the battle faster. What I discovered is that some battles would require these tactics, as you'd be forced to fight against large numbers of enemies at once (again, scaling in number and difficulty based on the number of human players in your party).