I would say absolutely NOT! I like my friendls ... and I would like for them to keep liking me! DR is incredibly unfriendly to casuals and fresh 50s. Not sure what they were thinking ... except forcing us to pay for upgrades.
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
No way, I even wrote up a review today advising people not to play this game. I just don't think it's right to advise people to play something that I know full well is of poor quality and is only going to keep going that way.
Ten soldiers wisely led will beat a hundred without a head. - Euripides
I no longer do any Bug Hunting work for Cryptic. I may resume if a serious attempt to fix the game is made.
One of my best friends, I talked him into playing STO. When I finally got my friend to start playing it was at the time of season 8. At that time I believed that Cryptic had a good F2P model where even tho they still had thier dilithium sinks. It wasn't all that bad. I also felt that the game offered a even serveing of Free playable content mixed with a fair time element. Now unless you buy zen and transfer it into dil to help out with crafting and upgradeing it just takes to long to get a decent set of items. Why would anyone (especially pvpers) spend months grinding out dil just so they can have a set of weapons. If anyone is going to spend months playing a game. It absolutly should not be grinding. Cryptic has robbed STO of its fun. For example, if I play the game for 3 hours. I find myself grinding and crafting at least 2 hours of that. To me that makes a very boring game. If something doesn't change soon, I hate to say it but I may actually move on from STO.
To answer the OPs question. Before season 8.5 absolutly, the game didn't have as much as it does now but when you played the game, you actually played the game and had fun. From Season 9-9.5 and Delta. No, I want to keep my friend and not potentially make a enemy. If cryptic fixes some of the dil sinks and stops nerfing every other dil outlet and buffs some of the rewards in the game to help out more with crafting materials (like rare ones, not a bunch of greens). Then maybe, that would be a good start in renewing some of the playerbases lost faith. If I see that cryptic is sincere in trying to make sto a good game again and not filling thier bosses pockets with hundred dollor bills then I will start recommending the game to friends and family. As of right now. I don't tell people to play STO. As a matter of fact. I tell them not to and I explain why.
I had one of my friends approach me a couple months back, wanting me to show them the basics and ease them into STO.
I knew there were big changes coming and told them everything I knew about those changes and proceeded to spend a few hours helping them get used to the feel of the game. Since then, I've not seen them log in even once. His life is pretty hectic right now, so I haven't given it much thought.
Now, if he were to ask me if he should find time to give the game another shot, I would tell him not to bother. The game has become very unfriendly to new players as well as longer term casual players. If you weren't already near the 'top of the food chain' as far as having decent gear, good luck getting it now.
I never went for the end-game gear before, and now I'm paying for it. I could have gotten the gear, but I just didn't see the need for it. Grinding isn't fun so I played the way I felt comfortable with and while I was never top tier, I could run some elite content and actually contribute, even with less than top gear.
Rep gear always sounded nice but again, I never saw the need so I never pushed myself to get it.
After the crafting update, crafting was pretty easy and a way for folks to get fairly good gear *IF* you wanted to spend the time (or Dilithium) leveling it up. I decided that maybe now was the time to start looking into some better gear so I started leveling the schools with some alts. I figured I had plenty of time to do it so I just have been running the 20 project and doing a little crafting here and there for new alts I'm leveling.
Post-DR however, most of my crafting aspirations have gone out the window.
Where I could do decently well in the old Elite missions, now I struggle to do Advanced. I ran several Advanced queues after the update and never was successful in any of them. So many people got fed up with the obscene HP increase the NPC's got, they simply quit the mission.
Normal was better, but there were still some that just gave up, though not on the scale I was experiencing with Advanced. Finishing Normal, while not difficult really, it still felt like an accomplishment. Sadly, with the cut in the rewards and with Normal not rewarding any VR crafting mats or rep doodads needed for better gear, well, obtaining better gear at this point simply isn't going to happen for me it seems.
How is a player supposed to get better gear when the gear they currently have can't cut it in missions that will reward things needed to create/buy better gear?
Experienced players don't want newbs playing on Advanced until they know what they are doing and can contribute. But they can't contribute until they not only learn the basics, by playing on Normal, but get better gear. Which they can't do by running Normal.
It's the old 'chicken and the egg' situation.
TL;DR
If any of my friends asked me if STO is currently worth getting into, I would tell them "Hell no, stay away." And I would most definitely NOT recommend the game to anybody either.
I'm here for now, but only because I have so much invested in the game. I will run some endgame content, on Normal, maybe pushing myself from time to time to see if my current gear/skill can get me through the occasional Advanced and if so, maybe I'll get me some rep gear or even craft some gear if I get enough doodads/VR stuff to make it worth it.
Hello. My name is iamynaught and I am an altaholic.
I would no longer recommend this game to a friend. I use to, and I have on many occasions failed to get friends to come play this game with me. Either because my love of Star Trek blinded me to it's failings, or becuase I stuck around through things that in ay other IP I would have ran the other direction from, those real life friends have all but abandoned the game now.
Sadly, I would not recommend anyone new come to this game in it's current state, leveling a new character with the current state of XP is a chore at best, and a nightmare at worse. Klingon characters have big blanks in they're XP progression, and everyone has a huge chunk of problems post 50.
We have Devs wiping people progress if it happened too fast, a lead developer who has deemed to speak to us lowly gamers all of twice since he took the riegns, and in general just a toxic community relations situation with the company.
Sadly, No I will not be recommending this game to anyone, friend or foe, till they fix they're issues, and get they're **** straight.
If I wanted to recommend this game to a friend, I'd have to have a reason other than, "Because it's Star Trek!". Please do not misread what I've posted. I'd like very much to able to suggest a friend or two play this game. The eye candy is quite good and some of the missions are fun to play and enjoyable. I only can remain hopeful someone will grow a backbone and make things right someday. But it seems the monetization concept has begun its inevitable takeover. The T6 ships are more expensive, the new gear requires more than a reasonable amount of Dilithium and there are many other things which are minor individually but in total detract mightily from the game.
Why am I still here? Hope things will improve and this game will become better. Not all is dark. Some things are very much better than they were when I first started playing STO. But the quality is uneven and the attention paid to repairing things or making a QA pass over the entire game seems beyond the abilities of the Dev Team. I can only wish they would respond to things which have been broken over a year or two as quickly as they did to the tiny fraction of the playerbase who were exploiting a loophole the Dev Team created.
TL;DR version: Heck no! I like my friends.
Why do I still play STO? Because I am too lazy, too stupid, and too addicted to everything Star Trek to stop playing.
A six year old boy and his starship. Living the dream.
Yes. I'd say "play up to lvl50, then stop, and uninstall". Or maybe play 1 character of each faction up to 50, then uninstall the game.
That's the only fun part, everything else is a massive grind full of timegating and cash grab.
I would have before Delta Rising. Making everything hard where STF's are nothing but a ghost town and endless non incentful grinding, makes for a poor game. If the game remained the way it was before, then i would recommend friends to play. As it stand now, that would be a Hell No!
Not anymore. I was quite excited by Delta Rising (no I didn't play on Tribble) but the insane level fo grind for XP, the "Hello old friend" power creep, and the thinness of the actual storyline outside of mindless patrols means that the game is no longer enjoyable for me, and I can't see it being terribly accessible to new players either.
Considering the grind in this game is NOTHING compared to many other MMOs, and the whole not listending to players thing is normal for a MMO as well. Yes, I would, it is a fun game that might have serious problems, but it is still fun, and that is what matters.
No, not anymore... i did invited my friends long time ago, but they left over time due to lack of PvP Content, and with the broken promises for new Real PvP Content since Season 2... i guess i've have to continue to wait for PvP Content next season, again...
I would not recommend this game to any new player, because they have already lagged behind veteran players overall in traits and specializations, and it will take them a very long time due to mutiple long-term grinds... enough grinds that many veteran players even stop grinding with alts and focus only on 1 or a few toons
I am not really the type of guy to recommend games to friends. Especially MMOs. Too time consuming often. Also, it doesn't really seem my friends share my taste in gaming.
BUt if they'd ask, I'd recommend trying it out for themselves, but strongly recommend not to spend any money on the game until they reached endgame and feel like they know what they are doing. (I'd be happy to give them tips).
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
The combination of HUGE bugs not being fixed, collective punishment for dev errors, the nerf cannon being indiscriminately, the menial tasks to keep up on (R&D, rep, etc.)and the huge cost increase in the game has crossed the line. I no longer consider it to be "fun" it is now more of a "job", and almost everyone has too much of that. The fun to cost ration has become ridiculously skewed, and cryptic seems to have lost sight of and appreciation for it's customers.
Space the final frontier. These are the voyages of [your name here] on a five year mission to gain one level after the delta rising xp nerf.
This game was recommended to me by a friend...who has since left.
The game was fine back then.
There was PvP.
There was a Klingon Faction (though that had to be unlocked).
Far from perfect, but fun in spite of it.
My how things have changed.
The answer to the OP is a resounding NO.
Cryptic is to blame for this mockery of what was a fun game.
I'm holding out hope that they will shift from catering to the single Fed main players to fostering a multi-factioned PvP game.
NO to ARC RIP KDF and PvP 2014-07-17 Season 9.5 - Death by Dev
first off, most of my friends who are avid gamers know to stay away from cryptic games.. they give me greif all the time for sticking with sto for some silly reason (I still havnt figured out why, though my time per year spent in game is dropping more and more).
that being said, a few of my friends who have played this game, but quit a while ago, always ask me when there is a new release if its worth coming back.. and I always tell them, no, it isn't.
the truth sucks, but in the world of gaming cryptic is pretty much the pitts.
I tried to get into nwn as I am a huge r.a. Salvatore fan, love the forgotten realms. but the game released and felt like it was 12 years old already. sto looks awesome, but doesn't play anywhere near as good as most games on the market.
like I said in another post. I think the biggest problem cryptic/pwe has, is they don't dedicate to just one or two games. cryptic is on the verge of having what, 4 or 5 games running at the same time, and pwe seems to have the record for amount of games one developer has out at once.. while that sounds awesome, it really isn't. this means they invest a lot less into each individual game to support having multiple games. which in turn lowers the quality of the games under their development.
cryptic is essentially the bargain basement retailer of games.. you walk into their store, everything is chinsy and cheap, there is no customer service anywhere as they try to save money by not hiring the needed employees. sure, its inexpensive, but the quality is TRIBBLE. its not built to last.
I wouldn't recommend sub par product to someone (ie, bargain brand stuff) and I wont recommend a sub par game. I actively tell peeps who ask me about the game to stay away, not just from sto, but anything with the cryptic/pwe tag on it.. visit a lot of the other forums, they all basically have the same problems. the same things are being complained about, and the same issues are popping up in most of them.
Pre DR I was recommending it to all my friends. Now im warning people to stay away.
I wouldn't have minded the expansion if it hadn't ruined STFs and character progression then started punishing players for playing patrols which ironically appears to be the majority of the expansions content
No, not as things are right now. I'm still hoping they can turn things around, but I can't see myself convincing a friend to play when I can't even convince myself.
If something is not broken, don't fix it, if it is broken, don't leave it broken.
I tell people the truth - it's the worst game I've ever played.
Actually they rank #2 in that category the worst Trek game ever made though was that one with shatner voice overs that walmart after 12 hours of it being on the shelves many years ago they reduced the price from 50 to 5 dollars lol. I think it was called Star Trek Legacy.
As far as recommending this game I would not on multiple fronts.
1. Besides grindy reps from season 7 the game hasn't changed its all about grind them out before ppl lose interest and the ques for that rep become dead.
2. The way they advertise this game it would be bigger if it was a KDF view point which they will never do. The part about federation and nice loving romulans just does not fit with a combat oriented game.
3. The disconnection between the Company(Devs) and the Players is so far apart I don't think it will ever become as close as it once was. Its just become a nerf what you gained in the last update/season and grind it again with more shineys bait and switch to keep the grind up.
4. The starbases and holdings I can see were needed but the aspect of an end game sort of is still lost with this game. A good game designer would design aspects of a game to where the reason behind grinding up this gear is to be able to use it in some aspect after completing reputations. Instead what this games reputation system does is after you don't need the gear that is when the final pieces are available to purchase to complete the sets. Its just part of a grindy mentality of inserting the chicken and egg dilemma. Most mmorpgs out there would and most of the time will do is insert a pvp team to handle this where they come out with newer pvp and pvx(Pve + PvP content). The not having a dedicated PvP or PvX team of people who are not in other roles of only what is needed are the people Cryptic does not have and is mostly going to be their downfall which depending on who you ask the majority of the player base might say that downfall is what you would call LoR and DR inserted into the game together.
5. I would have to have a friend first to be able to not recommend it to them so Cryptic might be safe.
Pre DR sure - i was looking forward to the new content. I even bought the Operations Pack and dropped $100 on dil for upgrades.
Post DR - no. Massive buyers remorse.
My friends are leaving. The queues are empty. They (Cryptic) actually had to do a special event DURING the launch to keep people interested, and even those queues are practically empty.
Comments
- Judge Aaron Satie
To answer the OPs question. Before season 8.5 absolutly, the game didn't have as much as it does now but when you played the game, you actually played the game and had fun. From Season 9-9.5 and Delta. No, I want to keep my friend and not potentially make a enemy. If cryptic fixes some of the dil sinks and stops nerfing every other dil outlet and buffs some of the rewards in the game to help out more with crafting materials (like rare ones, not a bunch of greens). Then maybe, that would be a good start in renewing some of the playerbases lost faith. If I see that cryptic is sincere in trying to make sto a good game again and not filling thier bosses pockets with hundred dollor bills then I will start recommending the game to friends and family. As of right now. I don't tell people to play STO. As a matter of fact. I tell them not to and I explain why.
"No no no no no ... yes."
(old guy -- I don't remember his name -- at the church meetings in "The Vicar of Dibley")
I knew there were big changes coming and told them everything I knew about those changes and proceeded to spend a few hours helping them get used to the feel of the game. Since then, I've not seen them log in even once. His life is pretty hectic right now, so I haven't given it much thought.
Now, if he were to ask me if he should find time to give the game another shot, I would tell him not to bother. The game has become very unfriendly to new players as well as longer term casual players. If you weren't already near the 'top of the food chain' as far as having decent gear, good luck getting it now.
I never went for the end-game gear before, and now I'm paying for it. I could have gotten the gear, but I just didn't see the need for it. Grinding isn't fun so I played the way I felt comfortable with and while I was never top tier, I could run some elite content and actually contribute, even with less than top gear.
Rep gear always sounded nice but again, I never saw the need so I never pushed myself to get it.
After the crafting update, crafting was pretty easy and a way for folks to get fairly good gear *IF* you wanted to spend the time (or Dilithium) leveling it up. I decided that maybe now was the time to start looking into some better gear so I started leveling the schools with some alts. I figured I had plenty of time to do it so I just have been running the 20 project and doing a little crafting here and there for new alts I'm leveling.
Post-DR however, most of my crafting aspirations have gone out the window.
Where I could do decently well in the old Elite missions, now I struggle to do Advanced. I ran several Advanced queues after the update and never was successful in any of them. So many people got fed up with the obscene HP increase the NPC's got, they simply quit the mission.
Normal was better, but there were still some that just gave up, though not on the scale I was experiencing with Advanced. Finishing Normal, while not difficult really, it still felt like an accomplishment. Sadly, with the cut in the rewards and with Normal not rewarding any VR crafting mats or rep doodads needed for better gear, well, obtaining better gear at this point simply isn't going to happen for me it seems.
How is a player supposed to get better gear when the gear they currently have can't cut it in missions that will reward things needed to create/buy better gear?
Experienced players don't want newbs playing on Advanced until they know what they are doing and can contribute. But they can't contribute until they not only learn the basics, by playing on Normal, but get better gear. Which they can't do by running Normal.
It's the old 'chicken and the egg' situation.
TL;DR
If any of my friends asked me if STO is currently worth getting into, I would tell them "Hell no, stay away." And I would most definitely NOT recommend the game to anybody either.
I'm here for now, but only because I have so much invested in the game. I will run some endgame content, on Normal, maybe pushing myself from time to time to see if my current gear/skill can get me through the occasional Advanced and if so, maybe I'll get me some rep gear or even craft some gear if I get enough doodads/VR stuff to make it worth it.
Losing faith in humanity, one person at a time.
I would no longer recommend this game to a friend. I use to, and I have on many occasions failed to get friends to come play this game with me. Either because my love of Star Trek blinded me to it's failings, or becuase I stuck around through things that in ay other IP I would have ran the other direction from, those real life friends have all but abandoned the game now.
Sadly, I would not recommend anyone new come to this game in it's current state, leveling a new character with the current state of XP is a chore at best, and a nightmare at worse. Klingon characters have big blanks in they're XP progression, and everyone has a huge chunk of problems post 50.
We have Devs wiping people progress if it happened too fast, a lead developer who has deemed to speak to us lowly gamers all of twice since he took the riegns, and in general just a toxic community relations situation with the company.
Sadly, No I will not be recommending this game to anyone, friend or foe, till they fix they're issues, and get they're **** straight.
NO!!!!!!!!
Why am I still here? Hope things will improve and this game will become better. Not all is dark. Some things are very much better than they were when I first started playing STO. But the quality is uneven and the attention paid to repairing things or making a QA pass over the entire game seems beyond the abilities of the Dev Team. I can only wish they would respond to things which have been broken over a year or two as quickly as they did to the tiny fraction of the playerbase who were exploiting a loophole the Dev Team created.
TL;DR version: Heck no! I like my friends.
Why do I still play STO? Because I am too lazy, too stupid, and too addicted to everything Star Trek to stop playing.
That's the only fun part, everything else is a massive grind full of timegating and cash grab.
Cryptics actions are the reason.
Right there with you. Had a fleet of family and RL friends. They all bailed after last season.
I would not recommend this game to any new player, because they have already lagged behind veteran players overall in traits and specializations, and it will take them a very long time due to mutiple long-term grinds... enough grinds that many veteran players even stop grinding with alts and focus only on 1 or a few toons
It will be a cold day in hell before i recommend this game to ANYONE!!!
BUt if they'd ask, I'd recommend trying it out for themselves, but strongly recommend not to spend any money on the game until they reached endgame and feel like they know what they are doing. (I'd be happy to give them tips).
The combination of HUGE bugs not being fixed, collective punishment for dev errors, the nerf cannon being indiscriminately, the menial tasks to keep up on (R&D, rep, etc.)and the huge cost increase in the game has crossed the line. I no longer consider it to be "fun" it is now more of a "job", and almost everyone has too much of that. The fun to cost ration has become ridiculously skewed, and cryptic seems to have lost sight of and appreciation for it's customers.
The game was fine back then.
There was PvP.
There was a Klingon Faction (though that had to be unlocked).
Far from perfect, but fun in spite of it.
My how things have changed.
The answer to the OP is a resounding NO.
Cryptic is to blame for this mockery of what was a fun game.
I'm holding out hope that they will shift from catering to the single Fed main players to fostering a multi-factioned PvP game.
RIP KDF and PvP 2014-07-17 Season 9.5 - Death by Dev
that being said, a few of my friends who have played this game, but quit a while ago, always ask me when there is a new release if its worth coming back.. and I always tell them, no, it isn't.
the truth sucks, but in the world of gaming cryptic is pretty much the pitts.
I tried to get into nwn as I am a huge r.a. Salvatore fan, love the forgotten realms. but the game released and felt like it was 12 years old already. sto looks awesome, but doesn't play anywhere near as good as most games on the market.
like I said in another post. I think the biggest problem cryptic/pwe has, is they don't dedicate to just one or two games. cryptic is on the verge of having what, 4 or 5 games running at the same time, and pwe seems to have the record for amount of games one developer has out at once.. while that sounds awesome, it really isn't. this means they invest a lot less into each individual game to support having multiple games. which in turn lowers the quality of the games under their development.
cryptic is essentially the bargain basement retailer of games.. you walk into their store, everything is chinsy and cheap, there is no customer service anywhere as they try to save money by not hiring the needed employees. sure, its inexpensive, but the quality is TRIBBLE. its not built to last.
I wouldn't recommend sub par product to someone (ie, bargain brand stuff) and I wont recommend a sub par game. I actively tell peeps who ask me about the game to stay away, not just from sto, but anything with the cryptic/pwe tag on it.. visit a lot of the other forums, they all basically have the same problems. the same things are being complained about, and the same issues are popping up in most of them.
I wouldn't have minded the expansion if it hadn't ruined STFs and character progression then started punishing players for playing patrols which ironically appears to be the majority of the expansions content
Actually they rank #2 in that category the worst Trek game ever made though was that one with shatner voice overs that walmart after 12 hours of it being on the shelves many years ago they reduced the price from 50 to 5 dollars lol. I think it was called Star Trek Legacy.
As far as recommending this game I would not on multiple fronts.
1. Besides grindy reps from season 7 the game hasn't changed its all about grind them out before ppl lose interest and the ques for that rep become dead.
2. The way they advertise this game it would be bigger if it was a KDF view point which they will never do. The part about federation and nice loving romulans just does not fit with a combat oriented game.
3. The disconnection between the Company(Devs) and the Players is so far apart I don't think it will ever become as close as it once was. Its just become a nerf what you gained in the last update/season and grind it again with more shineys bait and switch to keep the grind up.
4. The starbases and holdings I can see were needed but the aspect of an end game sort of is still lost with this game. A good game designer would design aspects of a game to where the reason behind grinding up this gear is to be able to use it in some aspect after completing reputations. Instead what this games reputation system does is after you don't need the gear that is when the final pieces are available to purchase to complete the sets. Its just part of a grindy mentality of inserting the chicken and egg dilemma. Most mmorpgs out there would and most of the time will do is insert a pvp team to handle this where they come out with newer pvp and pvx(Pve + PvP content). The not having a dedicated PvP or PvX team of people who are not in other roles of only what is needed are the people Cryptic does not have and is mostly going to be their downfall which depending on who you ask the majority of the player base might say that downfall is what you would call LoR and DR inserted into the game together.
5. I would have to have a friend first to be able to not recommend it to them so Cryptic might be safe.
Post DR - no. Massive buyers remorse.
My friends are leaving. The queues are empty. They (Cryptic) actually had to do a special event DURING the launch to keep people interested, and even those queues are practically empty.