Star Wars / Star Trek Discussion (SciFi In General)

[MusicallyInspired]

Also, in Star Trek Online they do away with the captain-in-rank-only approach and you start off with your own ship as an ensign because of the war and hostilities that have arisen (after the opening tutorial/introduction sequences where you prove your worth as a good commanding officer). The head admiral says something along the lines of "it's not like in the old days anymore" and "we need good people commanding starships". This is how they allowed every player to captain their own starship regardless of what level (rank) they are at. And it worked really well for gameplay. So it's kind of neat to see that that's sort of how real life works, even if it's not realistic to go from ensign to captain.

Also, JJ did the same thing with starship phases which are also supposed to fire constant beams. There was something more dynamic about that straight into TNG/DS9/VOY that having every single weapon go "pew pew".

[DeadPoolX]

Also, in Star Trek Online they do away with the captain-in-rank-only approach and you start off with your own ship as an ensign because of the war and hostilities that have arisen (after the opening tutorial/introduction sequences where you prove your worth as a good commanding officer). The head admiral says something along the lines of "it's not like in the old days anymore" and "we need good people commanding starships". This is how they allowed every player to captain their own starship regardless of what level (rank) they are at. And it worked really well for gameplay. So it's kind of neat to see that that's sort of how real life works, even if it's not realistic to go from ensign to captain.

I actually played STO for a while. I think I got up to LCDR before I lost interest in the game.

While you'd almost never see anyone below the rank of LT commanding a vessel in real life, the concept STO went with was pretty good, and like you said, it allowed everyone — regardless of their rank — to command a starship.

One thing I always liked about ST is that they used real world Navy ranks (at least the ranks used in English-speaking countries) instead of making up their own nonsensical concoction. Probably the biggest offender of this is the Mass Effect series, where they can't even keep their own rank system consistent.

Have you played Star Trek: Bridge Crew? It was originally designed with VR in mind, but it can be played on a normal monitor. I haven't tried it because I've heard the single player aspect is sorely lacking and I have no interest in playing with random a-holes.

Also, JJ did the same thing with starship phases which are also supposed to fire constant beams. There was something more dynamic about that straight into TNG/DS9/VOY that having every single weapon go "pew pew".

I already mentioned how the entire "pew pew pew" thing annoyed me in an earlier post. JJ handled huge starships like they were small, agile spacecraft blasting each other, when the original idea was more like WW1/WW2 naval battles between battleships, cruisers, and destroyers.

Despite how much I dislike JJ's ST, I still think it was better (that doesn't mean it's good, however) than Star Trek Discovery.

[MusicallyInspired]

Yeah, I was responding to your post about the pew pews.

As for Bridge Crew, I've been dying to play it but I thought it was VR only! But I think the whole point is to play it in VR and anything else kind of misses the point. Especially since there's not a lot to do in it like you said. I was hoping for a TNG bridge too.

I wonder how it compares to Bridge Commander which is an older captaining game that I heard was really good but I havent yet played. There's a lot of Trek games that missed me actually. I've been really interested in playing Legacy which combines every era and apparently has great space combat. Missed other games like Starfleet Academy and Klingom Academy too. And I still want to play through A Final Unity.

[Collector]

Regardless, it still doesn't address the dumb decision to make Kirk the captain of a heavy cruiser given his inexperience and previously-held low rank. But I guess I shouldn't be surprised when there are TV shows where 24 year-olds hold multiple PhDs and are considered the "experts in their field,"

Agreed. This is one of the reasons that the Jar Jar "reboot" fails. It is yet another way that shows they made these movies for a different target audience than the Trek fan base. Go after the coveted younger demographic with the mistaken notion that it would be larger than the established fan base at the expense of the built-in audience. I guess they didn't know about the huge Trek conventions world wide.

[Collector]

And I still want to play through A Final Unity.

I am a bit surprised that you have never played it, given that it is TNG turned into an adventure game.

[MusicallyInspired]

I do own it and started it a long time ago but was scared off in that so many stories seem to collide at once and as a kid it kind of overwhelmed me and scared me off. Tackling that now wouldn't be a problem. Does it still have issues in DOSBox though? I heard it was one of the few games that have problems and don't run smoothly.

Also, I haven't actually played an adventure game in ages. I guess the first couple of decades of my life burned me out on them. I've been playing more action-oriented games lately like Dusk, Amid Evil, and Ion Maiden. My interest in adventure games is on the rebound and has yet to circle back around. I still love them I'm just not actively engaging in them at the moment. I go through everything in phases and can't keep a consistent interest in any one thing. This is also partly why I haven't touched any SCI projects in a while. I think the last adventure I played through to the end (besides Mage's Initiation) was the first Deponia and that was years ago now.

[Collector]

No, it works pretty well in DOSBox these days. In fact I have an installer for it in the Non-Sierra Installers and Patches thread. http://sierrahelp.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=3925

[MusicallyInspired]

Excellent.

[DeadPoolX]

As for Bridge Crew, I've been dying to play it but I thought it was VR only! But I think the whole point is to play it in VR and anything else kind of misses the point. Especially since there's not a lot to do in it like you said.

Bridge Crew can definitely be played on a normal monitor, but I imagine it's better in VR. You probably get the whole feeling of "being there."

I was hoping for a TNG bridge too.

The link I made for Bridge Crew (in a previous post) shows that there's a TNG DLC that was released a little while ago in mid-2018.

Agreed. This is one of the reasons that the Jar Jar "reboot" fails. It is yet another way that shows they made these movies for a different target audience than the Trek fan base. Go after the coveted younger demographic with the mistaken notion that it would be larger than the established fan base at the expense of the built-in audience. I guess they didn't know about the huge Trek conventions world wide.

I remember hearing a lot of fans of the JJ reboot claim that the original Star Trek (and by "original" they mean anything pre-JJ) was boring.

Star Trek was never about action. It sometimes had it, but that's never been the focus. Somehow that concept got lost when making the newer films.

[MusicallyInspired]

There was a time when Star Trek was just too "not fun", though, and was rejected. The original pilot had pretty stale characters. It took William Shatner's swashbuckling action to liven it up to get a go-ahead. Kelvin-verse did miss the point, though. I wouldn't mind all the action and even things like the phaser changes if they incorporated SOMETHING into the story that was "Star Trek-ish". Some concept, some factor. But it could have been any sci-fi movie as far as the classic revenge plot goes. It just happened to involve characters from Star Trek. And it's a shame too because I thought the whole cast was perfect for each character.

The link I made for Bridge Crew (in a previous post) shows that there's a TNG DLC that was released a little while ago in mid-2018.

:O

[MusicallyInspired]

Here's a really interesting video on how and why Star Trek was rebooted under the Kelvin timeline (it wasn't just a creative decision, it was a legal requirement due to rights issues). Also, the CBS CEO Les Moonves (who dislikes sci-fi and didn't understand the difference between Star Trek and Star Wars) was the one who screwed up Discovery's development and also cancelled Enterprise just when it was getting good. Moonves is fired now apparently, so that's good. However, one of the writers of the 2009 Star Trek and the Kelvin timeline in general (the other writer was a big Star Trek fan, not him) has been brought back to basically become the Kevin Feige of Star Trek. Given Discovery's abysmal failure in its first season and its struggling attempts to course correct in season two, it remains to be seen what he'll do with Star Trek going forward.

There's also some details on the Picard series coming out and how they want to strangely and bizarrely combine the Kelvin and Prime timelines into a brand new timeline with the express intention of wiping out the Prime timeline altogether (because of the rights issues). It's all very complicated and disappointing, but interesting to see what's going on behind the scenes with Star Trek lately. Also, apparently before Seth Macfarlane created the Orville, he was one of many who approached CBS with ideas for Star Trek. Obviously they rejected his idea and he went on to make Orville.



EDIT: A more recent video on developments since August:

[MusicallyInspired]

Some more details on the rights issues, timeline differences, the "alternate Star Trek license," and how what CBS calls "Prime" is not actually the original Star Trek canon but they really don't want Star Trek fans to know that. This is fascinating stuff. I wasn't aware of most of any of this.

[Tawmis]

I was going to watch the "Rights" video... but 49 minutes?

That's entirely too long.

And... that intro sounds VERY close to the Stranger Things music....

[MusicallyInspired]

If you watch it on 1.25x it would only take about 35ish mins. lol

[BBP]

Today I found the Star Trek Interactive Movie, is anyone familiar with that?