I absolutely agree that they don't need to be mutually exclusive, and in a perfect world, story content would also come with great rewards.
I am puzzled over the extent to which so many people seem (and this may or may not be an accurate impression) to value the rewards over the story. It feels very backwards to me.
There is nothing to be puzzled over. Different strokes for different folks. In other words, different people like different things, and neither side is "right" or "wrong".
A friend/fleetmate of mine told me he was working one of his toons up to VA exclusively via DOffs... and once he gets to VA, then he'll go through all the story missions. The idea is to snag Mark XI versions of all the special gear offered as rewards. (For example, if you play the Klingon War story missions on the Fed side as originally intended, you'd still be only a LtCmdr or Cmdr when playing the Doomsday mission, meaning you'd only get, say, a Mk V Hargh'peng torpedo launcher for your trouble. By saving the story missions until you make VA, you'd get a Mark XI Hargh'peng for playing the same mission.)
I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of others are taking the same approach - not swearing off story missions outright, just holding off until they can get the best possible gear from them.
I'd play more story missions if they were written by someone who knows how to write. Out of the first three story arcs, you can count on one hand the number of missions that are better than outright stupid.
Oh, and I tire very rapidly of being forced to hold the idiot ball in a lot of these missions. As soon as I met that phony Vulcan ambassador, his bad acting told me straight-up that this was no Vulcan. The only questions were, who's hiding under that disguise? and why has the ambassador's aide not clued in on this? Pondering stuff like this while being railroaded into almost handing him his objective on a silver platter does nothing to make me like the writers.
Here's the thing. I think Kestrel knows how to PLOT and is really good at it. I the the content guys know how to make pretty interesting content scenarios.
I think there's a missing step 2. It's missing partly because that isn't everyone's tastes in gaming. I think it's missing partly due to deadlines. I think some really great designers like Jesse Heinig are able to pick up the slack and fill in that missing second step.
It's a bit like having a screenwriter and a good cinematographer but no director. And every so often the screenplay or a really good cinematographer make you forget there's no director, in the best of the missions. But at the end of the day, there's no director.
It also reminds me of comic books that have an artist and an editor but no writer.
I think some really great designers like Jesse Heinig are able to pick up the slack and fill in that missing second step.
Or, conversely, there were folks like Gozer remastering those missions, and he did things like beam Orions onto your ship AFTER you blew up their ship in space. Seriously, that happens in "Stranded in Space" or whatever it's called. Another ship didn't appear. It was Orions beaming over from a ship that you just blew up.
I recall that he made some kind of "story smory" comment back in the day. It's just another example of how things get mucked up.
I will say this: I think Kestrel can be a good writer, judging from the examples of good writing in this game. I don't know enough about the behind the scenes stuff to know how many of the facepalm moments go back directly to her, or whether they're due to other folks. Ultimately, it's a question of who exactly is responsible for Divide et Impera and the mission where we kill bar patrons, let alone all of the other stuff.
But, IMO, any evaluation of STO's writer and how it all got mucked up doesn't change the fact that the clear majority of missions in this game, especially if we throw in patrols and exploration, are so riddled with plot holes, poor characters, and carrying the stupid ball (to be blunt), that we still kind of have to say:
Or, conversely, there were folks like Gozer remastering those missions, and he did things like beam Orions onto your ship AFTER you blew up their ship in space. Seriously, that happens in "Stranded in Space" or whatever it's called. Another ship didn't appear. It was Orions beaming over from a ship that you just blew up.
I recall that he made some kind of "story smory" comment back in the day. It's just another example of how things get mucked up.
I will say this: I think Kestrel can be a good writer, judging from the examples of good writing in this game. I don't know enough about the behind the scenes stuff to know how many of the facepalm moments go back directly to her, or whether they're due to other folks. Ultimately, it's a question of who exactly is responsible for Divide et Impera and the mission where we kill bar patrons, let alone all of the other stuff.
But, IMO, any evaluation of STO's writer and how it all got mucked up doesn't change the fact that the clear majority of missions in this game, especially if we throw in patrols and exploration, are so riddled with plot holes, poor characters, and carrying the stupid ball (to be blunt), that we still kind of have to say:
The writing in STO is bad.
Well, I haven't seen Gozer around to defend himself but he was definitely part of that mentality, part of why I thought they needed to split the content team in two. With Heinig and Kestrel doing story stuff and Gozer focusing on stuff like No Win Scenario and DSEs.
I liked to think of Gozer as the Brannon Braga of STO (and attitude wise, he could be) but after watching some episodes on DVD with Braga's commentary track, I think Braga's plot soup boiled down to too much ambition for a one off episode (something I see in my own Foundry missions, all of which I'd describe as Braga-like) whereas Gozer seemed to reject the idea of things being immersive or episodic and did everything shy of deliberately fight against that, like someone who aspired to be the next David Jaffe.
For more on David Jaffe...
David Jaffe thinks developers shouldn't tell stories in their games, and he spent his D.I.C.E. 2012 session explaining why. He called the combination of cinematic storytelling and gameplay two great tastes that don't taste great together, something like chocolate and tuna fish. The original God of War designer got into games specifically to do that, but he eventually came to think of it as a dead end and ultimately dangerous path to pursue.
In general, I think most of Cryptic is in awe of Richard Garriott. I've had conversations with multiple devs who've cited him and seen them echo his philosophies. The buzz words for him are "interactive storytelling" and "social games." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Garriott
Here's a taste of Garriott:
Then we discovered Ultima Online which was right with the emergence of the internet. We were the first to cross the bow, to really take a major effort behind creating multiplayer game. Ultima Online is credited with being the first Massively Multiplayer game. That became the best place to try to do the best place to do interactive storytelling. With that preamble, here is what compels me about the new era. If you look at why each of these eras became bigger than their predecessors, solo player Ultimas, and solo player games in general, sell to millions players. Always have. But the bestselling MMOs sell to tens of millions of players and ten times the people are willing to play it, not because it?s cheaper, because it?s not, it?s more expensive. Not because it?s easier to get into, because it?s not, it?s actually a lot harder to get into and figure out how to play it. The reason why ten times more people are willing to play it or want to play it is because you get to play with other real people. That?s the power of playing with other people. But in MMOs, the other people you play with aren?t the same people you go to the movies with and out to dinner with generally speaking. You?re playing in an MMO with people you met online in that game who are equally devoted to logging in every night and six-o-clock and going on raids with you, which is still very powerful compared to playing alone. But the magic of new social media and these casual games, I don?t even like the word ?casual?, is really games that operate on top of a ?friends graph?, is that now everyone?s real friends are online with some digital identity, with Facebook or whatever.
I'd say, personally as a follower of games, I'm more influenced by a mix of Richard Bartlett (father of MUDs) and Warren Spector, although I'm a bit less sandbox-y than either one and a bit (just a bit) more BioWare-y.
Here's some Spector quotes:
?Trying [controllers] on a conversation is very hard in the extreme. It doesn?t map very well to pushing buttons. It?s not what we?re doing right now. I find it annoying where people don?t try to solve that problem. But I understand why. It?s a very hard problem to solve...where I am in my life and my career, I want to explore things like, what does it mean to have a brother? How do you form a family??
?We focus a little bit too much on violence, but we all know how to do it. It?s easy. And a lot of players seem to like it. It isn?t all we can do and it certainly isn?t all we should do.?
?And then I?d say, ?Look I?ve made ? I really have lost track, I?ve gotta go back and count, this is either my twenty-second or my twenty-third game, I really can?t remember which ? and every one of them has been about the same thing at its heart, right? It?s about players making choices as they play, and then dealing with the consequences of those choices. It?s about you telling your story, not me telling mine. It?s about you. And, in that way, it?s just like Deus Ex. The content is a little different, I don?t deny that. The tone is a little different, I don?t deny that. But the heart of the gameplay is still about choice and consequence, which is what I?ve been doing since the 80s. So give it a shot; what?s the worst that could happen? We?re not curing cancer here; we?re making games, right? See if it?s fun for you.?
"We've gone too far. The slow-motion blood spurts, the impalement by deadly assassins, the knives, shoulders, elbows to the throat. You know, Deus Ex had its moments of violence, but they were designed - whether they succeeded or not I can't say - but they were designed to make you uncomfortable, and I don't see that happening now. I think we're just appealing to an adolescent mindset and calling it mature. It's time to stop. I'm just glad I work for a company like Disney, where not only is that not something that's encouraged, you can't even do it, and I'm fine with it."
"The thing I'm most looking forward to - and again, I didn't see much so it's very hard for me to say this - it's probably inappropriate for me to say it, but 'Oh my god, there's a new Paper Mario coming to the 3DS!' What could be more perfect than that? Like Disney Epic Mickey, the fact that people responded so well to the game speaks to the desire of people to feel some joy and have some fun and smile when they're playing a game instead of frowning in concentration and adrenalized intensity. It's nice!"
I think Cryptic typically occupies a kind of middle ground between me and Gozer although I'm comfortable saying that the issues I ascribe to him stem from us being on opposite ends of the spectrum.
At the same time, I think he's an insanely hard worker. Just not somebody I'd ever agree with philosophically and I think a plurality of the issues you or I would have with the storytelling here can be chalked up to the kind of approach developers like Gozer took with the material.
Or, conversely, there were folks like Gozer remastering those missions, and he did things like beam Orions onto your ship AFTER you blew up their ship in space. Seriously, that happens in "Stranded in Space" or whatever it's called. Another ship didn't appear. It was Orions beaming over from a ship that you just blew up.
I recall that he made some kind of "story smory" comment back in the day. It's just another example of how things get mucked up.
I will say this: I think Kestrel can be a good writer, judging from the examples of good writing in this game. I don't know enough about the behind the scenes stuff to know how many of the facepalm moments go back directly to her, or whether they're due to other folks. Ultimately, it's a question of who exactly is responsible for Divide et Impera and the mission where we kill bar patrons, let alone all of the other stuff.
But, IMO, any evaluation of STO's writer and how it all got mucked up doesn't change the fact that the clear majority of missions in this game, especially if we throw in patrols and exploration, are so riddled with plot holes, poor characters, and carrying the stupid ball (to be blunt), that we still kind of have to say:
The writing in STO is bad.
In case all that was TLDR, I'd border on saying that the plotholes were borderline there on purpose because Gozer (and maybe some others) have such a diametrically opposed philosophy. And that the sheer number of them are there because the people who operated like that also happened to be hard workers and loyal team members who supported their co-workers, people who put in extra hours on projects... and saw story as somewhere between irrelevant and toxic, something they may have been ideologically opposed to. And that philosophy seeped through everywhere because the people who thought like that touched everything BECAUSE they were hard workers and good team members.
It's a bit like having a Wal-Mart cashier who works the nights and weekends nobody else will work but doesn't believe in department stores carrying groceries and makes a point of his opposition to it, to everyone who checks out.
I think there's a missing step 2. It's missing partly because that isn't everyone's tastes in gaming. I think it's missing partly due to deadlines. I think some really great designers like Jesse Heinig are able to pick up the slack and fill in that missing second step.
It's a bit like having a screenwriter and a good cinematographer but no director. And every so often the screenplay or a really good cinematographer make you forget there's no director, in the best of the missions. But at the end of the day, there's no director.
It also reminds me of comic books that have an artist and an editor but no writer.
Suddenly I'm having flashbacks to the 2800. Awesome set pieces (Bajor, DS9, Facility 4028), Amazing Moments (The space-walk, blasting your way out of DS9), but it had some really dull moments (Of Bajor, hunting TRIBBLE for Farek), and some really weird plot devices (DS9 had to be taken over again? Karu'kan managed to get all of his minions to rebel against the Founders? How?). I'm fairly certain a "Director" of sorts would cure things like that.
It's a bit like having a Wal-Mart cashier who works the nights and weekends nobody else will work but doesn't believe in department stores carrying groceries and makes a point of his opposition to it, to everyone who checks out.
LOL. With what little I know, this fits my mental image.
Suddenly I'm having flashbacks to the 2800. Awesome set pieces (Bajor, DS9, Facility 4028), Amazing Moments (The space-walk, blasting your way out of DS9), but it had some really dull moments (Of Bajor, hunting TRIBBLE for Farek), and some really weird plot devices (DS9 had to be taken over again? Karu'kan managed to get all of his minions to rebel against the Founders? How?). I'm fairly certain a "Director" of sorts would cure things like that.
I think in cases like this, you have to imagine a writer who is told: "Hey we built this set and this set, and the player has to go kill these guys, and, wow, isn't the space walk cool? Make a story out of it."
You gotta work with what you got. Which means, invent hair-brained reasons for x, y, and z.
On the game design point, I think the spectrum goes something like this:
Gozer
--->David Jaffe (Twisted Metal)
--->Most of Perfect World
--->Shigeru Miyamoto (Mario)
--->Richard Garriott (Ultima Online)
--->Most of Cryptic
---> David Jones (Grand Theft Auto)
--->Will Wright (The Sims)
--->Richard Bartlett (MUDS)
--->Me
--->Warren Spector (Deus Ex/Epic Mickey)
--->Katsura Hashino (Alan Wake)
--->Mikael Kasurinen (Catherine) ---> The new "Star Trek" game set between the 2009 film and "Star Trek Into Darkness"
--->Kirksplat
---> Ken Levine (BioShock)
--->Shinji Mikami (Resident Evil)
--->Ron Fish, Nick Arunde (Batman: Arkham Asylum)
---> David Cage (Heavy Rain)
--->Most of Bioware
--->Jennifer Hepler
The spectrum going from pure game to sandbox to social sim to narrative sim to interactive narrative to "Hey! I want to see all the cutscenes! I'm not into gaming!"
Suddenly I'm having flashbacks to the 2800. Awesome set pieces (Bajor, DS9, Facility 4028), Amazing Moments (The space-walk, blasting your way out of DS9), but it had some really dull moments (Of Bajor, hunting TRIBBLE for Farek), and some really weird plot devices (DS9 had to be taken over again? Karu'kan managed to get all of his minions to rebel against the Founders? How?). I'm fairly certain a "Director" of sorts would cure things like that.
Glad I'm not alone on this.
In theatre (European anyway), this is what would be called "dramaturgy," which I just realized is the better analogy.
With new works or very classical works, there's a person whose job is research and massaging scripts in transition from the playwright to the director. Someone who does research that illuminates the script, things that may not be obvious but may pertain to questions the actors and director and costume/set designers might have.
For example... "Is there a kind of body language, dress, or stance that 19th century coal miners should use?" That won't be in a script, typically. And the director is worried about drama, maximizing blocking, movement, voice work. It's something where playwrights do SOME research and directors do SOME research but a good dramaturgue does a good bit and figures out how to "fix" issues with the writing or directing, without getting in the way of either.
Their job is not to modify the script but they may trim it judiciously, balancing production needs with script needs. They may also add things as needed but rarely if the playwright is living unless they have permission. The Royal Shakespeare Company uses some real pros for this. They've actually staged productions where they merged two Shakespeare speeches or added lines but their dramaturgues are so "authentic" that many Shakespeare experts don't notice when watching. This allows them, say, to splice two scenes together for time or explain something that isn't clear. Or maybe just make sure all the extras at the bar have authentic (mostly inaudible) dialogue.
Some playwrights have one as an assistant and some directors have one as an assistant.
What I don't like about the story missions is: There is too much flying and running around. In that time, I'd rather read some dialogues (popup windows) to make the flight time more entertaining. Or, if you could actually command your ship out of the bridge, you could go to your ready room and play a minigame or whatever until you have arrived.
For example one patrol mission is the Seedea system patrol which I always skip even if it pops up every time I pass the system. Why would I want to wait MINUTES for a freighter to catch up after I have defeated all enemies already at a certain point?
Another mission I usually skip is the one where your in-system-warp (full impulse) doesn't work. I know, there are story-specific reasons behind it, butt it's just too time-cunsuming. I work 100% and I want to enjoy my free time by doing something while I'm playing a game, not just by watching a ship limping kilometer for kilometer to it's destination 50 or even 100 km away (Briar Patch for example, I know it's been revised, butt it's still taking too long).
I prefer playing Foundry user generated ****ent. It's a lot more entertaining and it comes from people who KNOW players do NOT want to run around for minutes. So, those stories are usually pretty straight forward, yet have enuff entertaining dialogues to actually READ them. I never read the Cryptic mission texts after having read the first three mainstream missions. I thought ... even one of the worse TV episodes has more spirit in those dialogues and mission scripts. And there is no "red thread" as the Germans would say.
The featured episodes ... yeah, I play some of them. They ARE better than mainstream missions, agreed. Butt there are other things I absloutely do NOT like about them again: Too much running around (Coliseum, played it once, and BANNED it from the list ... not because of the story - which was good - but for this endless running and cutscenes) for no reason, unskippable cutscenes (you know, I do watch them, butt not a hundred times), unskippable puzzles (again, doing a puzzle for the first time is entertaining, butt once you've played the mission once, there should be a skip button for the sake of time) and much more of that sort.
Another example is "Frozen": Once again, no skippable cutscenes. And, you would have to play it three times just to get an accolade worth 10 points. I could go on with "Second Wave" (cutscene horror) or "Operation Gamma" and "The Vault" (too much flying around, cutscenes, AND bugged or bad idea puzzles, and no chance to swap out shuttle and ship easily) etc. etc.
All in all, the Foundry should become the most important source of new ****ent overall. I have also voted for the next thing to do is improve the Foundry even more. Unfortunately, that choice got the least votes in the poll ... I am disappointed about that fact. People really don't care about intelligent ****ent anymore (because they apparently know it's not being delivered anyway), they care more about getting through the levels quickly enuff and grind for the highest achievable gear.
A Romulan faction might help STO as well, so that would have been my second vote ... however, more story missions would definately help even more. And thinning out the leveling. One level per mission ... with that few missions overall, you're leveling too quickly and not really having fun anymore seeing you have actually been promoted ... again? It's been only a few hours when I hit Lt. Commander, and now Commander? Sirius-ly?
So yeah, more story, please. Butt if you do it, with more pop up dialogues, less running around, skippable cutscenes and something nice to make it worth being replayed a lot. For example one story mission I replay often is "The New Link". THAT is a good one.
~ Meowz
"Everything about the Jham'Hadar is lethal!" - Eris
Original Join Date: January 30th, 2010
I USE to play the story missions. After I hit level cap halfway through the Romulan arc (Much to my surprise..) I continued to play through the storyline just for the sake of seeing it to the end. Some of it was a grind and moan, but when I came across the Featured Episodes, i was surprised. Mostly because I only started after Season 5, so I did not get to see these release one week at a time.
This also lead to my great confusion once I got to the end of the Undine arc and everyone is like "OMG, it's the Iconcians." And I am sitting scream at the screen "NO WAY!!! Really? I could have told you that back Brea system..."
And, as others have noted, the first few missions are... lame. They do not explain what happened between the end of Nemesis unitl now. There are many players who go through to VA no knowing that this is a different universe from the JJ Abrhams film :rolleyes: . We have little explanation on why we are at war besides "Klingon-bad, We-good." Which, to anyone who has watched any of the prime-verse after ST:VI, it doesn't make much sense. Our cold war was over after The Khitomer Accords. And during the Dominion war, we were allies. So a bit more IN-GAME INTERACTIVE explanation would be nice. As well as a better tutorial.
But otherwise, after i was done... that was it. There was no reason to play through the missions again unless you want some specific character bound loot. I was excited for season 6, getting to see the Tholians and their piece of the Iconian puzzle.. only to have this war zone that offers a confusing and barely passable story. There is only enough plot to tell you what to shoot next.
However, I have to appirciate that this is an MMO and that if the story is going to change the galaxy, it has to change for EVERYBODY. If this was a single person game, than a game changing event could be added easily. But to have that change unevenly fro everyone in an MMO is not thesible. It could be done.. but not likely.
Live on Earth. Work in Space. Play with Dragons. Join the best add on to STO, the Neverwinter holodeck program! Only 14 GPL a month.
Here is what i experienced in the most storyline missions.
Space:
1. not enough enemies (fights sometimes take not more than a minute)
2. huge distances you have to fly (sometimes) just to get to a group of 5 BoP?s for example (see 1.)
3. its not really spectacular. In the series of star trek, when there was a borg cube, the first thing they normally do is try to hide/run away but in sto,.. well.. a cube pops up, you kill it, you continue. Its not that i am scared of facing any enemy. (missing atmosphere)
4. There is no alternative in killing/disabling an enemy.
5. Space is too small and makes not much fun.
6. Storyline sometimes makes no sense. I am a hardcore star trek fan and i dont like if its deviating too much from what i know.
7. too much species i dont know or have ever seen in any star trek episode
Games that made this part better: Freelancer, Star trek bridge commander, star trek Dominion Wars
there would be more points here but those are the one?s i remember.
Ground:
1. The maps usually all look the same (not in that last FE). I think its a limitation of the engine or something but they are mostly boring, ships looks like churches from the inside (too big).
2. No alternative to complete objects (in almost all missions, i think in the last FE, they gave some options but dont remember).
3. see space point 2.
4. too much species i dont know or have ever seen in any star trek episode
Games that made this part better: Star trek elite force 1/2,Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - The Fallen
This pretty much rounds it up for me. I have played the story with my main char ut found myself rushing/skipping through it at the end; I actuall yonly played one borg mission for the reward the rest didn't interest me although I looked forward to the "real" enemies all the time.
The stories basically don't have much to do with Star Trek, they don't have ANY impact whatsoever on anything and are very repetative. I had more fun in the early seasons to just do the exploration missions and imagine a story as I went on. I could play some kind of open-world Trek game for months straight, I don't need a actual progressing story - but when I want a story arc I play a game like "A final Unity" which has a well written, logical and fun story and more Trek-worthy gameplay
^ Memory Alpha.org is not canon. It's a open wiki with arbitrary rules. Only what can be cited from an episode is. ^
"No. Men do not roar. Women roar. Then they hurl heavy objects... and claw at you." -Worf, son of Mogh
"A filthy, mangy beast, but in its bony breast beat the heart of a warrior" - "faithful" (...) "but ever-ready to follow the call of the wild." - Martok, about a Targ
"That pig smelled horrid. A sweet-sour, extremely pungent odor. I showered and showered, and it took me a week to get rid of it!" - Robert Justman, appreciating Emmy-Lou
And, as others have noted, the first few missions are... lame. They do not explain what happened between the end of Nemesis unitl now. There are many players who go through to VA no knowing that this is a different universe from the JJ Abrhams film :rolleyes: . We have little explanation on why we are at war besides "Klingon-bad, We-good." Which, to anyone who has watched any of the prime-verse after ST:VI, it doesn't make much sense. Our cold war was over after The Khitomer Accords. And during the Dominion war, we were allies. So a bit more IN-GAME INTERACTIVE explanation would be nice. As well as a better tutorial.
See... This has been part of my cry for a new tutorial. I think the tutorial we have is actually one of the better done missions in the game, technically, but I'd push to shuffle it off somewhere else.
Because, frankly, you'd have to go to the website to really have it hammered home that this is 2409. You'd have to go to the website or the wiki or spend days playing a console clicking daily to know what happened to anyone aside from Spock, Torres, Paris, Thomas Riker, and Naomi Wildman. You'd have to play Klingon-side for anything of substance about Worf or Martok.
There is zero initiation into the setting, either Star Trek and its context or history for new players or 2409 as a distinct brand for old players, and the initiation you do get is a weird status update by the disembodied ghost of Spock who shouldn't know any of this.
My best two changes for the initiation I can think of are:
1) You start off as a Captain who gets hit with a memory wipe weapon. The tutorial is you being guided to figure out how to run your ship. At the end, you get a memory flash showing you the history of the Federation and you get busted down, provisionally, to Lt. They still need you to command a ship (there's a shortage of good captains and the war claims dozens daily on each front) but they can't trust you with a security clearance. Every 10 levels, you get a flash of a lost memory, filling in your knowledge of events. Could even become a plot point in some missions. People who recognize you that you've never met or sporadic bursts of memory.
2) You get an opening cinematic of your character at the Guardian of Forever. (And this gets used as an excuse to get a better Guardian voice.) Your character has Fleet Admiral pips and uniform and approaches the Guardian, set to a dramatic score. The Guardian announces it can show you your own history and plays a cinematic of your faction's history. Which for the Feds, covers WWIII through 2409 (for the sake of people only passingly familiar with Star Trek). Each generation is represented IN CONTEXT and IN SEQUENCE by people wearing the uniforms even if characters are not shown.
Your character replies that they know all of this and that they simply have one question for the Guardian: Were all the prices paid worth it? And the Guardian replies that it can show your Captain their own history. Your Captain agrees and the tutorial begins.
Every front that you complete, in place of the promotion ceremony, it cuts back to your character as a Fleet Admiral standing at the Guardian. The Guardian summarizes, indicating that each of the mission fronts were separated by months or years and you get glimpses of things like your crew meeting around a table, a concert at Earth Spacedock, and mounting turmoil such as Hakeev talking to his unseen masters, Shon aboard the Belfast, or a Bajoran pilgrim talking to the Prophets, who tell her that a hand that remains closed is no longer a hand.
First of all, let me just provide this disclaimer - this is not an attempt at social commentary, a bash against Cryptic, or a sneaky attempt at a backhanded statement about the perceived quality (or lack thereof) of the content of story missions. It's simply an attempt to investigate the veracity of a perception I've begun to have regarding the current makeup of the STO playerbase.
I have had the good fortune to find myself employed at a business that permits me to play STO while I am at work, which actually allows me a far more substantial amount of time ingame than I otherwise would have. Because my job is in the evenings (primarily) I am able to interact with people across the globe in multiple timezones, particularly a great number of U.S. players.
One common theme I've noticed, almost across the board, is a huge lack of knowledge among a great portion of the current playerbase concerning the Cryptic-made storyline missions, how they tie into the game, and why they're important. I've run into more Vice Admirals than I care to even think about who have made it to endgame without ever touching a story mission, propelled there by DOFF assignments and the various PvE / PvP events. Interestingly, when I have mentioned the existence of these missions, as well as the community authored content and the dailies, I've been met with general disinterest or an inquiry as to how to get through them as fast as possible.
So I'm putting the question out there to you guys - are we now in an era of STO where the majority of the playerbase does not care about story? Is our leading demographic now primarily composed of button-mashing pew-pew'ers who'd rather blow stuff up than seek immersion in the Star Trek universe? Is it possible that Dan Stahl's concerns that continued investment in story might not be worthwhile anymore actually have a foundation in reality?
And if so, has this been PWE's plan all along?
I welcome everyone's thoughts.
Not me.
I've played every single one of the story missions and still play foundry missions on a daily basis, though I am a bit occupied by another MMO now, story, to me, has always and will always be a very important aspect of every game I play, whether singleplayer or MMO.
I've played every single one of the story missions and still play foundry missions on a daily basis, though I am a bit occupied by another MMO now, story, to me, has always and will always be a very important aspect of every game I play, whether singleplayer or MMO.
I love many of the story missions but there are several obstacles between me and them:
- I have to get a lot of energy credits to buy the new lockbox and lobi store stuff. I have roughly 700m EC and it's not enough to invest, buy the new ultra rare doffs from the cardie boxes, buy the next box ships, etc. It takes me a lot of my game time.
- Episodes rewards are pretty poor. A blue Mk XI armor worth 5000 credits? I'd like to have time to do that but if I want to get new stuff I can't.
- I like even more playing with the Foundry when I get bored with regular grinding.
- Unfortunately, Fleetmakrs won't come effortlessly.
- One of my characters still needs his omega XII set and I still enjoy many of the STFs.
So if playing story missions was worth it with the game requirements to keep up-to-date characters I'd play them happily. I love many of the Romulan episodes, some of the Borg ones and even undines ones (the cardassian ones aren't that interesting, except the FE), but if I stop doing my current stuff I'll never have competitive characters anymore, and the gods know that competitive chars are required since the new content needs fully geared chars if we ever want to pug it with clueless guys.
Oh and BTW my favourite episode is diplomatic orders. Pretty straightforward with an interesing plot.
I think in cases like this, you have to imagine a writer who is told: "Hey we built this set and this set, and the player has to go kill these guys, and, wow, isn't the space walk cool? Make a story out of it."
You gotta work with what you got. Which means, invent hair-brained reasons for x, y, and z.
Sometimes it may work, you can get really interesting missions built around something specific you want to see in it. It's really good when the player doesn't notice that you made this mission for this reason.
The major problem with Cryptic is it's always a half-done job. I think Salaminferno didn't get it when he had to answer the question where a player says that 'unfinished' is the studio's motto.
Let's take the example of the 2800 series. I like this one, but it's DS9. Again. I can't count the number of missions using this overused asset. They had the opportunity to create new maps, new stuff, new assets, but instead of that, they used this old one. Half-done job.
The 2800 could have been really better without the necessity of doing it exclusively on DS9. And on top of it there are many gaps; it's stupid to think that a whole armada could just sit in DS9, waiting for the messiah/player to take it over again.
So the main issue is that Crypric often cut costs on what they consider as details, but details are the most important part of a story. You have to explain everything, to justify why it happens, and how. Sometimes, the story won't require much details, and that's precisely where they are good, but when they try to be more ambitious, it fails. Even if the new game concept is nice, it won't be able to fill the huge holes in the storyboard.
Another good example is the new fleet actions. You always see the same maps, and the space ones are just plain blank space with a starbase in it. Details, again, but a part of the burnout comes from the lack of attention to details, and it's something cryptics is exceptionnaly good at.
A good story isn't about filling the missing part with your imagination, it can only work on the wrap up and it has to be good for that, a good story tells you why and how it happened.
So, good Cryptic stories are:
- Stories with a very simple plot. Someone rebelled/a minor facility is having trouble. Kill the rebels/opponents, fix a few replicators, rescue some civilians, end of the story.
- Stories where the player doesn't handle the vast majority of the war. No one expects a single ship to take back such a huge station as DS9 or a borg armada on its own. The player can do something critical in very specific and secondary areas (good example: romulan front).
It looks like they aren't able to handle something more complex - and it's not a criticism. It's just because they would need someone able to say "no" to the dev team when they come up with an idea to add to the story. Some FE episodes looks like to a huge patchwork with random ideas put together.
They would need someone to say that "no you have to do another map because it doesn't make sense to see this place again" or "there's a huge hole in your plot, add more details in your dialogs" or "we need to see that". Of course, episodes wouldn't be as cost-effective as they are and they would need someone independant from the current producers to make sure that everything makes sense, and it's not going to happen, but one can always dream, just because it's never a good idea to give your accountant the final word on a story.
However, many of the missions are rather boring, and if you run them all in one go, very repetitive. Loved going back in time and meeting the TOS guys though.
I haven't skipped a single mission yet - but I'm still on the Romulan chain, even though I've been VA for a good while now. I'm currently grinding Diplomacy XP from DOffs to hit Ambassador before doing the next story mission, since it's necessary. I was initially annoyed during the Klingon chain that I lacked that option, but I heard that section was majorly bugged anyway.
The fact that I'm also playing Guild Wars 2, Torchlight 2, Borderlands 2, and FTL makes me willing to just DOff until I'm an Ambassador, heh. I still need to finish 2 more DLCs in Fallout New Vegas (after which I'll have done everything and can launch the final mission), I'm drowning in options.
Im on breen. But i jump around. I skipped almost all the cardassian cause i just wanted the jemmi engine. Then did the borg cAuse why not. Then back to cardassia.
You gotta sprinkle em in. Do an stf do a fleet do a mission. Keep it fresh.
I enjoyed the story missions and wish they would take the time to make a de-bugging pass over each of them. Possibly "remaster" a few of them as well.
One of my biggest gripes with the game is the lack of resolution to the main "story."
I believe it could be wrapped up in 10 missions and one three-part FE. One of the MANY possible resolutions could bring a restoration of the Federation-Klingon Alliance in order to stave off the threat of the Borg and Iconians.
That closes out the long-running arc, and allows for the deployment of more of the content that the Devs prefer... short grind-content and the one-off mission.
I've got to admit that I'm not spending much time on story missions at the moment.
Much more time spent doffing and starbase building with 5 Fed characters right now.
But that doesn't mean I don't want more story. Or that I dislike the stories we already have. Most of them I like; only a few I'm reluctant to want to replay.
The only mission I am really ultra-critical of is 'Of Bajor'. Not because it didn't have interesting elements, but because it is the one mission that really cried out for a more freeroaming experience. They proved to us that they could make mission branching work and what did they do with it? They ran us from one end of the map to the other and back like a mouse in a maze. But even there I have to admit that they did some things we hadn't seen before. I'd love to see bits and pieces of those elements in other new story missions.
(I enjoy that social zone a lot more now that I'm not forced to run errands in it )
I am waiting on rewards for Foundry Spotlight to do spotlight missions, since it's due to come out sometime between now and November (I think). I want to play those cool Foundry missions once and then move on to the next.
Would I replay a Foundry Spotlight mission? Sure. But not back-to-back. I've done that for FE's, trying to get all of the cool rewards for all of my alts, but it's exhausting.
My views may not represent those of Cryptic Studios or Perfect World Entertainment. You can file a "forums and website" support ticket here Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
The trend you're seeing, I believe, is shared, globally, by other MMO's and even in other media (such as TV, Movies, Etc.) and relates to an increasingly short attention span in the general public. I've noticed the same thing in other MMO's such as DCUO, DDO and others. Having said that in most of the better MMO's (and, especially, in STO) I see constant effort on the part of Devs to continue to provide content (or to provide something like the Foundry) for those, like myself, who enjoy story content. Unlike some of the posters that have replied I play an MMO for the same reason I watch a movie or read a book so story content is very important to me (with the added bonus that it is interactive to some degree and my actions may affect the way the story plays out). I prefer Space to Ground by far and I prefer story driven content. I do grind for the better gear but only to the extent that it will actually improve my abilities within the story content. I think the Foundry is the best ultimate goal in this game. Once having achieved VA and played what story content I wanted to (I avoid anything to do with Romulans or anything that involves covert activities as I find both detestable) I primarily do the grind missions then devote the rest of my time to the Foundry. But I gather I'm in the minority (no worries... I've been there most of my life heheheh... I'm used to it... I like it )
*STO*Its mission: To destroy strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations... and then kill them, to boldly annihilate what no one has annihilated before!
I will be playing through the story missions on my 16 alts. I am nearly done with getting to 50 with all of my characters and only have story and foundry missions left to do to help with role play.
Several times in this thread I have read someone say that the game needs a director...
Well to my mind, isn't that what the lead developer is supposed to do?
What exactly is Daniel Stahl doing? I don't mean that in a negative way. It's a legitimate question. What is he doing specifically?
My understanding is that he has to manage labor, marketing and business strategy, branding, human resource development, and oversee the team leaders scheduling and get the team leaders on the same page and set parameters.
He's what Rick Berman was to Trek, what Don Murphy was to the Transformers films, what Michael Uslan was to the Batman films.
I'll use Uslan as an example.
Uslan produced Batman, Batman Returns, Batman & Robin, all the animated films, Batman Begins, Dark Knight, and Dark Knight Rises.
There are things Uslan brings to the table. Partly name talent and production quality.
But the guy who produced Batman & Robin was the guy who produced The Dark Knight.
And that guy has a job that corresponds to Daniel Stahl's. Now, I think Dan is a better writer than Uslan, having read Uslan's comic books and being familiar with his brief filmography. Not that Uslan is bad but I'd be VERY eager to see Dan write a Trek novel or episode. But that isn't Dan's primary role, which is more about broad vision and product polish.
You can see the difference between Batman & Robin and The Dark Knight. And the producer didn't make that difference. And I don't think Dan Stahl can either. He's more about ensuring the broad conditions for success and dealing with people and business strategies.
The producer who gave us "The Dark Knight".
The writer who gave us "Fringe" and the screenplay for "A Beautiful Mind"
The cinematographer who gave us "Lethal Weapon," "The Prince of Tides," and "Charlie Wilson's War"
The composer for "Titus" and "Across the Universe"
Heck, it had a director who has been nominated for at least three Academy Awards but the director is what made the difference there.
I've already gotten to the max level on both my first Fed and KDF characters so I'd already completed all the story missions, but there were still a lot of great missions in the lists so, yeah, every once in a while, I'll do some over again.
But I mainly log on to make Foundry missions, check on progress with the Fleet Starbase, collect on [and add more] Duty Officer missions and do the Fleet Starbase Daily mission.
Comments
There is nothing to be puzzled over. Different strokes for different folks. In other words, different people like different things, and neither side is "right" or "wrong".
I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of others are taking the same approach - not swearing off story missions outright, just holding off until they can get the best possible gear from them.
My Foundry missions | My STO Wiki page | My Twitter home page
Here's the thing. I think Kestrel knows how to PLOT and is really good at it. I the the content guys know how to make pretty interesting content scenarios.
I think there's a missing step 2. It's missing partly because that isn't everyone's tastes in gaming. I think it's missing partly due to deadlines. I think some really great designers like Jesse Heinig are able to pick up the slack and fill in that missing second step.
It's a bit like having a screenwriter and a good cinematographer but no director. And every so often the screenplay or a really good cinematographer make you forget there's no director, in the best of the missions. But at the end of the day, there's no director.
It also reminds me of comic books that have an artist and an editor but no writer.
Or, conversely, there were folks like Gozer remastering those missions, and he did things like beam Orions onto your ship AFTER you blew up their ship in space. Seriously, that happens in "Stranded in Space" or whatever it's called. Another ship didn't appear. It was Orions beaming over from a ship that you just blew up.
I recall that he made some kind of "story smory" comment back in the day. It's just another example of how things get mucked up.
I will say this: I think Kestrel can be a good writer, judging from the examples of good writing in this game. I don't know enough about the behind the scenes stuff to know how many of the facepalm moments go back directly to her, or whether they're due to other folks. Ultimately, it's a question of who exactly is responsible for Divide et Impera and the mission where we kill bar patrons, let alone all of the other stuff.
But, IMO, any evaluation of STO's writer and how it all got mucked up doesn't change the fact that the clear majority of missions in this game, especially if we throw in patrols and exploration, are so riddled with plot holes, poor characters, and carrying the stupid ball (to be blunt), that we still kind of have to say:
The writing in STO is bad.
Well, I haven't seen Gozer around to defend himself but he was definitely part of that mentality, part of why I thought they needed to split the content team in two. With Heinig and Kestrel doing story stuff and Gozer focusing on stuff like No Win Scenario and DSEs.
I liked to think of Gozer as the Brannon Braga of STO (and attitude wise, he could be) but after watching some episodes on DVD with Braga's commentary track, I think Braga's plot soup boiled down to too much ambition for a one off episode (something I see in my own Foundry missions, all of which I'd describe as Braga-like) whereas Gozer seemed to reject the idea of things being immersive or episodic and did everything shy of deliberately fight against that, like someone who aspired to be the next David Jaffe.
For more on David Jaffe... http://www.gamespot.com/features/is-david-jaffe-crazy-dice-2012-6350116/
In general, I think most of Cryptic is in awe of Richard Garriott. I've had conversations with multiple devs who've cited him and seen them echo his philosophies. The buzz words for him are "interactive storytelling" and "social games."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Garriott
Here's a taste of Garriott: http://www.gatheryourparty.com/articles/2012/06/08/interview-richard-garriott/
I'd say, personally as a follower of games, I'm more influenced by a mix of Richard Bartlett (father of MUDs) and Warren Spector, although I'm a bit less sandbox-y than either one and a bit (just a bit) more BioWare-y.
Here's some Spector quotes:
?Trying [controllers] on a conversation is very hard in the extreme. It doesn?t map very well to pushing buttons. It?s not what we?re doing right now. I find it annoying where people don?t try to solve that problem. But I understand why. It?s a very hard problem to solve...where I am in my life and my career, I want to explore things like, what does it mean to have a brother? How do you form a family??
?We focus a little bit too much on violence, but we all know how to do it. It?s easy. And a lot of players seem to like it. It isn?t all we can do and it certainly isn?t all we should do.?
?And then I?d say, ?Look I?ve made ? I really have lost track, I?ve gotta go back and count, this is either my twenty-second or my twenty-third game, I really can?t remember which ? and every one of them has been about the same thing at its heart, right? It?s about players making choices as they play, and then dealing with the consequences of those choices. It?s about you telling your story, not me telling mine. It?s about you. And, in that way, it?s just like Deus Ex. The content is a little different, I don?t deny that. The tone is a little different, I don?t deny that. But the heart of the gameplay is still about choice and consequence, which is what I?ve been doing since the 80s. So give it a shot; what?s the worst that could happen? We?re not curing cancer here; we?re making games, right? See if it?s fun for you.?
"We've gone too far. The slow-motion blood spurts, the impalement by deadly assassins, the knives, shoulders, elbows to the throat. You know, Deus Ex had its moments of violence, but they were designed - whether they succeeded or not I can't say - but they were designed to make you uncomfortable, and I don't see that happening now. I think we're just appealing to an adolescent mindset and calling it mature. It's time to stop. I'm just glad I work for a company like Disney, where not only is that not something that's encouraged, you can't even do it, and I'm fine with it."
"The thing I'm most looking forward to - and again, I didn't see much so it's very hard for me to say this - it's probably inappropriate for me to say it, but 'Oh my god, there's a new Paper Mario coming to the 3DS!' What could be more perfect than that? Like Disney Epic Mickey, the fact that people responded so well to the game speaks to the desire of people to feel some joy and have some fun and smile when they're playing a game instead of frowning in concentration and adrenalized intensity. It's nice!"
Here's the heart of it, though, for me:
http://www.1up.com/news/warren-spector-oral-storytelling-games-keynote
I think Cryptic typically occupies a kind of middle ground between me and Gozer although I'm comfortable saying that the issues I ascribe to him stem from us being on opposite ends of the spectrum.
At the same time, I think he's an insanely hard worker. Just not somebody I'd ever agree with philosophically and I think a plurality of the issues you or I would have with the storytelling here can be chalked up to the kind of approach developers like Gozer took with the material.
In case all that was TLDR, I'd border on saying that the plotholes were borderline there on purpose because Gozer (and maybe some others) have such a diametrically opposed philosophy. And that the sheer number of them are there because the people who operated like that also happened to be hard workers and loyal team members who supported their co-workers, people who put in extra hours on projects... and saw story as somewhere between irrelevant and toxic, something they may have been ideologically opposed to. And that philosophy seeped through everywhere because the people who thought like that touched everything BECAUSE they were hard workers and good team members.
It's a bit like having a Wal-Mart cashier who works the nights and weekends nobody else will work but doesn't believe in department stores carrying groceries and makes a point of his opposition to it, to everyone who checks out.
Suddenly I'm having flashbacks to the 2800. Awesome set pieces (Bajor, DS9, Facility 4028), Amazing Moments (The space-walk, blasting your way out of DS9), but it had some really dull moments (Of Bajor, hunting TRIBBLE for Farek), and some really weird plot devices (DS9 had to be taken over again? Karu'kan managed to get all of his minions to rebel against the Founders? How?). I'm fairly certain a "Director" of sorts would cure things like that.
LOL. With what little I know, this fits my mental image.
I think in cases like this, you have to imagine a writer who is told: "Hey we built this set and this set, and the player has to go kill these guys, and, wow, isn't the space walk cool? Make a story out of it."
You gotta work with what you got. Which means, invent hair-brained reasons for x, y, and z.
Gozer
--->David Jaffe (Twisted Metal)
--->Most of Perfect World
--->Shigeru Miyamoto (Mario)
--->Richard Garriott (Ultima Online)
--->Most of Cryptic
---> David Jones (Grand Theft Auto)
--->Will Wright (The Sims)
--->Richard Bartlett (MUDS)
--->Me
--->Warren Spector (Deus Ex/Epic Mickey)
--->Katsura Hashino (Alan Wake)
--->Mikael Kasurinen (Catherine)
---> The new "Star Trek" game set between the 2009 film and "Star Trek Into Darkness"
--->Kirksplat
---> Ken Levine (BioShock)
--->Shinji Mikami (Resident Evil)
--->Ron Fish, Nick Arunde (Batman: Arkham Asylum)
---> David Cage (Heavy Rain)
--->Most of Bioware
--->Jennifer Hepler
The spectrum going from pure game to sandbox to social sim to narrative sim to interactive narrative to "Hey! I want to see all the cutscenes! I'm not into gaming!"
Glad I'm not alone on this.
In theatre (European anyway), this is what would be called "dramaturgy," which I just realized is the better analogy.
With new works or very classical works, there's a person whose job is research and massaging scripts in transition from the playwright to the director. Someone who does research that illuminates the script, things that may not be obvious but may pertain to questions the actors and director and costume/set designers might have.
For example... "Is there a kind of body language, dress, or stance that 19th century coal miners should use?" That won't be in a script, typically. And the director is worried about drama, maximizing blocking, movement, voice work. It's something where playwrights do SOME research and directors do SOME research but a good dramaturgue does a good bit and figures out how to "fix" issues with the writing or directing, without getting in the way of either.
Their job is not to modify the script but they may trim it judiciously, balancing production needs with script needs. They may also add things as needed but rarely if the playwright is living unless they have permission. The Royal Shakespeare Company uses some real pros for this. They've actually staged productions where they merged two Shakespeare speeches or added lines but their dramaturgues are so "authentic" that many Shakespeare experts don't notice when watching. This allows them, say, to splice two scenes together for time or explain something that isn't clear. Or maybe just make sure all the extras at the bar have authentic (mostly inaudible) dialogue.
Some playwrights have one as an assistant and some directors have one as an assistant.
For example one patrol mission is the Seedea system patrol which I always skip even if it pops up every time I pass the system. Why would I want to wait MINUTES for a freighter to catch up after I have defeated all enemies already at a certain point?
Another mission I usually skip is the one where your in-system-warp (full impulse) doesn't work. I know, there are story-specific reasons behind it, butt it's just too time-cunsuming. I work 100% and I want to enjoy my free time by doing something while I'm playing a game, not just by watching a ship limping kilometer for kilometer to it's destination 50 or even 100 km away (Briar Patch for example, I know it's been revised, butt it's still taking too long).
I prefer playing Foundry user generated ****ent. It's a lot more entertaining and it comes from people who KNOW players do NOT want to run around for minutes. So, those stories are usually pretty straight forward, yet have enuff entertaining dialogues to actually READ them. I never read the Cryptic mission texts after having read the first three mainstream missions. I thought ... even one of the worse TV episodes has more spirit in those dialogues and mission scripts. And there is no "red thread" as the Germans would say.
The featured episodes ... yeah, I play some of them. They ARE better than mainstream missions, agreed. Butt there are other things I absloutely do NOT like about them again: Too much running around (Coliseum, played it once, and BANNED it from the list ... not because of the story - which was good - but for this endless running and cutscenes) for no reason, unskippable cutscenes (you know, I do watch them, butt not a hundred times), unskippable puzzles (again, doing a puzzle for the first time is entertaining, butt once you've played the mission once, there should be a skip button for the sake of time) and much more of that sort.
Another example is "Frozen": Once again, no skippable cutscenes. And, you would have to play it three times just to get an accolade worth 10 points. I could go on with "Second Wave" (cutscene horror) or "Operation Gamma" and "The Vault" (too much flying around, cutscenes, AND bugged or bad idea puzzles, and no chance to swap out shuttle and ship easily) etc. etc.
All in all, the Foundry should become the most important source of new ****ent overall. I have also voted for the next thing to do is improve the Foundry even more. Unfortunately, that choice got the least votes in the poll ... I am disappointed about that fact. People really don't care about intelligent ****ent anymore (because they apparently know it's not being delivered anyway), they care more about getting through the levels quickly enuff and grind for the highest achievable gear.
A Romulan faction might help STO as well, so that would have been my second vote ... however, more story missions would definately help even more. And thinning out the leveling. One level per mission ... with that few missions overall, you're leveling too quickly and not really having fun anymore seeing you have actually been promoted ... again? It's been only a few hours when I hit Lt. Commander, and now Commander? Sirius-ly?
So yeah, more story, please. Butt if you do it, with more pop up dialogues, less running around, skippable cutscenes and something nice to make it worth being replayed a lot. For example one story mission I replay often is "The New Link". THAT is a good one.
~ Meowz
Original Join Date: January 30th, 2010
This also lead to my great confusion once I got to the end of the Undine arc and everyone is like "OMG, it's the Iconcians." And I am sitting scream at the screen "NO WAY!!! Really? I could have told you that back Brea system..."
And, as others have noted, the first few missions are... lame. They do not explain what happened between the end of Nemesis unitl now. There are many players who go through to VA no knowing that this is a different universe from the JJ Abrhams film :rolleyes: . We have little explanation on why we are at war besides "Klingon-bad, We-good." Which, to anyone who has watched any of the prime-verse after ST:VI, it doesn't make much sense. Our cold war was over after The Khitomer Accords. And during the Dominion war, we were allies. So a bit more IN-GAME INTERACTIVE explanation would be nice. As well as a better tutorial.
But otherwise, after i was done... that was it. There was no reason to play through the missions again unless you want some specific character bound loot. I was excited for season 6, getting to see the Tholians and their piece of the Iconian puzzle.. only to have this war zone that offers a confusing and barely passable story. There is only enough plot to tell you what to shoot next.
However, I have to appirciate that this is an MMO and that if the story is going to change the galaxy, it has to change for EVERYBODY. If this was a single person game, than a game changing event could be added easily. But to have that change unevenly fro everyone in an MMO is not thesible. It could be done.. but not likely.
This pretty much rounds it up for me. I have played the story with my main char ut found myself rushing/skipping through it at the end; I actuall yonly played one borg mission for the reward the rest didn't interest me although I looked forward to the "real" enemies all the time.
The stories basically don't have much to do with Star Trek, they don't have ANY impact whatsoever on anything and are very repetative. I had more fun in the early seasons to just do the exploration missions and imagine a story as I went on. I could play some kind of open-world Trek game for months straight, I don't need a actual progressing story - but when I want a story arc I play a game like "A final Unity" which has a well written, logical and fun story and more Trek-worthy gameplay
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See... This has been part of my cry for a new tutorial. I think the tutorial we have is actually one of the better done missions in the game, technically, but I'd push to shuffle it off somewhere else.
Because, frankly, you'd have to go to the website to really have it hammered home that this is 2409. You'd have to go to the website or the wiki or spend days playing a console clicking daily to know what happened to anyone aside from Spock, Torres, Paris, Thomas Riker, and Naomi Wildman. You'd have to play Klingon-side for anything of substance about Worf or Martok.
There is zero initiation into the setting, either Star Trek and its context or history for new players or 2409 as a distinct brand for old players, and the initiation you do get is a weird status update by the disembodied ghost of Spock who shouldn't know any of this.
My best two changes for the initiation I can think of are:
1) You start off as a Captain who gets hit with a memory wipe weapon. The tutorial is you being guided to figure out how to run your ship. At the end, you get a memory flash showing you the history of the Federation and you get busted down, provisionally, to Lt. They still need you to command a ship (there's a shortage of good captains and the war claims dozens daily on each front) but they can't trust you with a security clearance. Every 10 levels, you get a flash of a lost memory, filling in your knowledge of events. Could even become a plot point in some missions. People who recognize you that you've never met or sporadic bursts of memory.
2) You get an opening cinematic of your character at the Guardian of Forever. (And this gets used as an excuse to get a better Guardian voice.) Your character has Fleet Admiral pips and uniform and approaches the Guardian, set to a dramatic score. The Guardian announces it can show you your own history and plays a cinematic of your faction's history. Which for the Feds, covers WWIII through 2409 (for the sake of people only passingly familiar with Star Trek). Each generation is represented IN CONTEXT and IN SEQUENCE by people wearing the uniforms even if characters are not shown.
Your character replies that they know all of this and that they simply have one question for the Guardian: Were all the prices paid worth it? And the Guardian replies that it can show your Captain their own history. Your Captain agrees and the tutorial begins.
Every front that you complete, in place of the promotion ceremony, it cuts back to your character as a Fleet Admiral standing at the Guardian. The Guardian summarizes, indicating that each of the mission fronts were separated by months or years and you get glimpses of things like your crew meeting around a table, a concert at Earth Spacedock, and mounting turmoil such as Hakeev talking to his unseen masters, Shon aboard the Belfast, or a Bajoran pilgrim talking to the Prophets, who tell her that a hand that remains closed is no longer a hand.
Not me.
I've played every single one of the story missions and still play foundry missions on a daily basis, though I am a bit occupied by another MMO now, story, to me, has always and will always be a very important aspect of every game I play, whether singleplayer or MMO.
Would that game happen to have the initials TSW?
- I have to get a lot of energy credits to buy the new lockbox and lobi store stuff. I have roughly 700m EC and it's not enough to invest, buy the new ultra rare doffs from the cardie boxes, buy the next box ships, etc. It takes me a lot of my game time.
- Episodes rewards are pretty poor. A blue Mk XI armor worth 5000 credits? I'd like to have time to do that but if I want to get new stuff I can't.
- I like even more playing with the Foundry when I get bored with regular grinding.
- Unfortunately, Fleetmakrs won't come effortlessly.
- One of my characters still needs his omega XII set and I still enjoy many of the STFs.
So if playing story missions was worth it with the game requirements to keep up-to-date characters I'd play them happily. I love many of the Romulan episodes, some of the Borg ones and even undines ones (the cardassian ones aren't that interesting, except the FE), but if I stop doing my current stuff I'll never have competitive characters anymore, and the gods know that competitive chars are required since the new content needs fully geared chars if we ever want to pug it with clueless guys.
Oh and BTW my favourite episode is diplomatic orders. Pretty straightforward with an interesing plot.
God, lvl 60 CW. 17k.
Sometimes it may work, you can get really interesting missions built around something specific you want to see in it. It's really good when the player doesn't notice that you made this mission for this reason.
The major problem with Cryptic is it's always a half-done job. I think Salaminferno didn't get it when he had to answer the question where a player says that 'unfinished' is the studio's motto.
Let's take the example of the 2800 series. I like this one, but it's DS9. Again. I can't count the number of missions using this overused asset. They had the opportunity to create new maps, new stuff, new assets, but instead of that, they used this old one. Half-done job.
The 2800 could have been really better without the necessity of doing it exclusively on DS9. And on top of it there are many gaps; it's stupid to think that a whole armada could just sit in DS9, waiting for the messiah/player to take it over again.
So the main issue is that Crypric often cut costs on what they consider as details, but details are the most important part of a story. You have to explain everything, to justify why it happens, and how. Sometimes, the story won't require much details, and that's precisely where they are good, but when they try to be more ambitious, it fails. Even if the new game concept is nice, it won't be able to fill the huge holes in the storyboard.
Another good example is the new fleet actions. You always see the same maps, and the space ones are just plain blank space with a starbase in it. Details, again, but a part of the burnout comes from the lack of attention to details, and it's something cryptics is exceptionnaly good at.
A good story isn't about filling the missing part with your imagination, it can only work on the wrap up and it has to be good for that, a good story tells you why and how it happened.
So, good Cryptic stories are:
- Stories with a very simple plot. Someone rebelled/a minor facility is having trouble. Kill the rebels/opponents, fix a few replicators, rescue some civilians, end of the story.
- Stories where the player doesn't handle the vast majority of the war. No one expects a single ship to take back such a huge station as DS9 or a borg armada on its own. The player can do something critical in very specific and secondary areas (good example: romulan front).
It looks like they aren't able to handle something more complex - and it's not a criticism. It's just because they would need someone able to say "no" to the dev team when they come up with an idea to add to the story. Some FE episodes looks like to a huge patchwork with random ideas put together.
They would need someone to say that "no you have to do another map because it doesn't make sense to see this place again" or "there's a huge hole in your plot, add more details in your dialogs" or "we need to see that". Of course, episodes wouldn't be as cost-effective as they are and they would need someone independant from the current producers to make sure that everything makes sense, and it's not going to happen, but one can always dream, just because it's never a good idea to give your accountant the final word on a story.
God, lvl 60 CW. 17k.
However, many of the missions are rather boring, and if you run them all in one go, very repetitive. Loved going back in time and meeting the TOS guys though.
I haven't skipped a single mission yet - but I'm still on the Romulan chain, even though I've been VA for a good while now. I'm currently grinding Diplomacy XP from DOffs to hit Ambassador before doing the next story mission, since it's necessary. I was initially annoyed during the Klingon chain that I lacked that option, but I heard that section was majorly bugged anyway.
The fact that I'm also playing Guild Wars 2, Torchlight 2, Borderlands 2, and FTL makes me willing to just DOff until I'm an Ambassador, heh. I still need to finish 2 more DLCs in Fallout New Vegas (after which I'll have done everything and can launch the final mission), I'm drowning in options.
You gotta sprinkle em in. Do an stf do a fleet do a mission. Keep it fresh.
One of my biggest gripes with the game is the lack of resolution to the main "story."
I believe it could be wrapped up in 10 missions and one three-part FE. One of the MANY possible resolutions could bring a restoration of the Federation-Klingon Alliance in order to stave off the threat of the Borg and Iconians.
That closes out the long-running arc, and allows for the deployment of more of the content that the Devs prefer... short grind-content and the one-off mission.
R.I.P
Much more time spent doffing and starbase building with 5 Fed characters right now.
But that doesn't mean I don't want more story. Or that I dislike the stories we already have. Most of them I like; only a few I'm reluctant to want to replay.
The only mission I am really ultra-critical of is 'Of Bajor'. Not because it didn't have interesting elements, but because it is the one mission that really cried out for a more freeroaming experience. They proved to us that they could make mission branching work and what did they do with it? They ran us from one end of the map to the other and back like a mouse in a maze. But even there I have to admit that they did some things we hadn't seen before. I'd love to see bits and pieces of those elements in other new story missions.
(I enjoy that social zone a lot more now that I'm not forced to run errands in it
I am waiting on rewards for Foundry Spotlight to do spotlight missions, since it's due to come out sometime between now and November (I think). I want to play those cool Foundry missions once and then move on to the next.
Would I replay a Foundry Spotlight mission? Sure. But not back-to-back. I've done that for FE's, trying to get all of the cool rewards for all of my alts, but it's exhausting.
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My understanding is that he has to manage labor, marketing and business strategy, branding, human resource development, and oversee the team leaders scheduling and get the team leaders on the same page and set parameters.
He's what Rick Berman was to Trek, what Don Murphy was to the Transformers films, what Michael Uslan was to the Batman films.
I'll use Uslan as an example.
Uslan produced Batman, Batman Returns, Batman & Robin, all the animated films, Batman Begins, Dark Knight, and Dark Knight Rises.
There are things Uslan brings to the table. Partly name talent and production quality.
But the guy who produced Batman & Robin was the guy who produced The Dark Knight.
And that guy has a job that corresponds to Daniel Stahl's. Now, I think Dan is a better writer than Uslan, having read Uslan's comic books and being familiar with his brief filmography. Not that Uslan is bad but I'd be VERY eager to see Dan write a Trek novel or episode. But that isn't Dan's primary role, which is more about broad vision and product polish.
You can see the difference between Batman & Robin and The Dark Knight. And the producer didn't make that difference. And I don't think Dan Stahl can either. He's more about ensuring the broad conditions for success and dealing with people and business strategies.
The producer who gave us "The Dark Knight".
The writer who gave us "Fringe" and the screenplay for "A Beautiful Mind"
The cinematographer who gave us "Lethal Weapon," "The Prince of Tides," and "Charlie Wilson's War"
The composer for "Titus" and "Across the Universe"
Heck, it had a director who has been nominated for at least three Academy Awards but the director is what made the difference there.
But I mainly log on to make Foundry missions, check on progress with the Fleet Starbase, collect on [and add more] Duty Officer missions and do the Fleet Starbase Daily mission.