For starters... why do you feel the new ground missions are low quality?
Between the VO from the old shows (covered in another thread), I'm also having a large amount of issues with animations and movement. The new VO is bad, the interiors are still way too big, it seems poorly written at the start, it seems like a lot of things are taking too long to load (my clothes being one) on a system which handles GTAV on ultra with no issue. I just have not been impressed by anything Ground wise, minus maybe, the ship wreck on the first mission. Though that was not impressed, but more of an "oh, cool" moment.
I can't see where you're coming from at all.
Old VO is a very small price to pay for getting the (for whatever reason) unavailable cast in the game (ex. DeForest), the new VO is pretty darn good (Chris Doohan did a fine job with Scotty, technically and artistically, and I'd rank Matt Winston's performance in STO above the original Daniels), the animations have taken a step forward from past missions, interior scaling isn't particularly relevant (it's much less pronounced than the original FED interiors and there's a damn good "for gampelay" argument behind it anyway), the writing is MMO top notch (the player character has a strong arc as told through solid individual episodes), the art and detail in the new missions is astounding (specifically look for the detail, that's where this expansion lives), and I don't have a clue about what you mean by problematic clothing load times.
In short, some kind of clarification would be helpful to see where you're coming from.
Whether or not it grabs you is a separate question (I think you need to have some involvement with your character, otherwise you can simplify it as Daniels sending you on disconnected errands across a 70's TV show), but I don't think you can say this stuff wasn't well put together.
A lot of this could be chalked up to day one issues, or the ongoing AMD problems people have been having. Clothes, I'm sure aren't on the highest spot in the load order, but when you beam in wearing nothing but panties and boots, there might be an issue. I've been having multiple kill issues where the enemy dies and doesn't realize it for a moment or two, before taking a comical dive from an imaginary roundhouse, or in numerous cases they actually get up after the death drop only to walk over to me and stand there staring. Once or twice is funny, but at least on in every fight is a bit much. Scotty for me actually wasn't that bad. It's not the old 60's tech, and if you're going to recast, they found a good pick in the Son of Scotty. The older dialog bothers me more in terms of how it's used, which I covered in a different thread. The quotes themselves are fine, but the tone and written dialog following them don't fit with it. Chekov telling me that we went to the academy together like his puppy just ran away was a bit weird in what seemed like more of a lighter "Hey, I remember you". If you're going to pull direct lines, base the new stuff around the old. Like Nemoy's "and suddenly SPOCK" moment after the tutorial. It was random and awkward, but it fit. If they're going to use a quote along the lines of some one sounding sad over someone, it probably should go with a dialog to match, not one of being happier and remembering some one from school. As such, it just sounds more out of place than poorly done. Each interaction with the TOS characters (minus Scotty) shouldn't feel like a really awkward conversation. Although Daniels just sounds a little phoned in for me so far. Sadly, VO acting and Screen acting can be two entirely different animals, so being good at one doesn't make you great at the other. Poor Voice directing could also be to blame though, given prior "never been a strong suit" comment.
Story wise, the newer stuff doesn't seem as good as the older stuff for the game's story. Granted, nothing can be great forever, and old stuff had some terrible while new stuff has some great mixed in, the overall quality just doesn't seem there. It's not fan fiction bad, but it seems more like it's forced rather than being a natural flow of story. If I had it, this would be the place where I would insert a meme gif of some dude punching someone's face on a loop with something that had "Nostalgia" photoshopped on it.
I can understand that they want to be able to keep the camera in motion, or not have you go inside the character model for tight spaces, but if you're going to be a beloved IP game, shouldn't you try to put things to scale? Galaxy vs shuttle arguments aside, interiors should be more to proper scale rather than being a small theater instead of a small control center. The TOS interiors seem to be much better than the older bridges, but isn't it more bothersome that your small shuttle is Who'd out with an interior so big the small shuttle could actually fit inside of it? Or that instead of handing something to your Helm officer, you have to shout just to be heard.
Personal gripes, I know, but valid none the less. I'm not condemning the game, I'm not doomsaying, or badmouthing, but it would be nice to get some of this stuff a bit more like it's supposed to be. Either glaring errors or personal issues... Mine being the Skins for the Borg Captains... that one has irked me since Beta.
Trekkies with "nowhere" else to go saved STO, thats my take on it.
That and how much money and time I've placed in the game are the only reasons I haven't left for the multitude of better space experiences. They're not the Star Trek experience. It's the same story with SWTOR. It's the only Star Wars MMO out there, and much like champions or dcuo they're not even the good one. They're just what's left.
The numbers are out there though, you just need the Mulder/Scully skills to find them. Steam keeps track of them, but Cryptic refuses to put out numbers for very obvious reasons. F2P did save sto, but much like Fox and the X-men series, they just turned around and shot themselves in the foot again. Fox uses time travel to undo all the bad films only to make their next film a bad one... but much like this game, people keep pumping money into it because it's a franchise they love. Which I'm sure is how they finally got the rights to the "Kelvin" timeline. CBS seems just as content on mishandling the IP as Cryptic is, and all of it for money.
If anything, I think Dilithium is the thing they did it with as well. While being able to grind currency that you can use in the cash shop is a great... on paper. Not so great when you're charging so much for a single ship and constant reiterations of that same ship. Imagine if GTA V (which is making good money on selling credit cards ingame) never fixed the hacks that let you get free money? Giving subbers a stippend is a great idea, but allowing people to bypass money just to get higher metrics? Not so much. Butts in seats for small money doesn't equate to a better product which earns more money. Just ask the American school system. If they ships as they are currently were, say, $10 a pop/$25 for a bundle/$60 for the niner, more people would be willing to pay that amount up front. If there were no grind for Zen currency, more people would be willing to pay that (even if begrudgingly) because the value matches the quality. Dilithium grinding is a big draw which simultaneously digs the deeper grave, I think.
"Maintenance" suffers in this game because it's the only Trek game in town, if it wasn't it'd be a different story.
Trekkies arent fools for spending money on the game, PWE/Cryptic are for selling them buggy content, Trekkies have nowhere else to go for "Trek".
This fact is just ignored with regularity.
A. It's not the only Trek game.
B. As for existence of other games radically improving the quality of this one - true story, bro.
By all means point me to the website(s) for this/these other Trek "mmos".
The original inclusion of Temporal Ships could count as this in a minor way, but the latest 'expansion' removes any trace of doubt. The old show-based voiceovers, the TOS ships, together with 31st century ships, and JJ Trek ships... the whole thing is turning into Farek's World of Ships "You want it? We got it!"
To me, this expansion has really brought home in a very big way exactly what we've lost, and the recycling of things like Nimoy's voice really brings home to me how very old and tired the writers for STO are getting - this isn't a new and exciting patch, it's going back to the 1960s for inspiration, because there's nothing "2409-2410" left in them to say. They decided to give us this, rather than say, an expansion focused on "exploring strange new worlds", like a really shiny new exploration cluster series.
So with STO losing itself in the past, and JJ Trek losing itself to its own future (in much the same way the very dark Batman series has lost an opportunity to go back to Batman & Robin's lighthearted adventures), it really does feel like the best of Star Trek is really behind us.
Comments
A lot of this could be chalked up to day one issues, or the ongoing AMD problems people have been having. Clothes, I'm sure aren't on the highest spot in the load order, but when you beam in wearing nothing but panties and boots, there might be an issue. I've been having multiple kill issues where the enemy dies and doesn't realize it for a moment or two, before taking a comical dive from an imaginary roundhouse, or in numerous cases they actually get up after the death drop only to walk over to me and stand there staring. Once or twice is funny, but at least on in every fight is a bit much. Scotty for me actually wasn't that bad. It's not the old 60's tech, and if you're going to recast, they found a good pick in the Son of Scotty. The older dialog bothers me more in terms of how it's used, which I covered in a different thread. The quotes themselves are fine, but the tone and written dialog following them don't fit with it. Chekov telling me that we went to the academy together like his puppy just ran away was a bit weird in what seemed like more of a lighter "Hey, I remember you". If you're going to pull direct lines, base the new stuff around the old. Like Nemoy's "and suddenly SPOCK" moment after the tutorial. It was random and awkward, but it fit. If they're going to use a quote along the lines of some one sounding sad over someone, it probably should go with a dialog to match, not one of being happier and remembering some one from school. As such, it just sounds more out of place than poorly done. Each interaction with the TOS characters (minus Scotty) shouldn't feel like a really awkward conversation. Although Daniels just sounds a little phoned in for me so far. Sadly, VO acting and Screen acting can be two entirely different animals, so being good at one doesn't make you great at the other. Poor Voice directing could also be to blame though, given prior "never been a strong suit" comment.
Story wise, the newer stuff doesn't seem as good as the older stuff for the game's story. Granted, nothing can be great forever, and old stuff had some terrible while new stuff has some great mixed in, the overall quality just doesn't seem there. It's not fan fiction bad, but it seems more like it's forced rather than being a natural flow of story. If I had it, this would be the place where I would insert a meme gif of some dude punching someone's face on a loop with something that had "Nostalgia" photoshopped on it.
I can understand that they want to be able to keep the camera in motion, or not have you go inside the character model for tight spaces, but if you're going to be a beloved IP game, shouldn't you try to put things to scale? Galaxy vs shuttle arguments aside, interiors should be more to proper scale rather than being a small theater instead of a small control center. The TOS interiors seem to be much better than the older bridges, but isn't it more bothersome that your small shuttle is Who'd out with an interior so big the small shuttle could actually fit inside of it? Or that instead of handing something to your Helm officer, you have to shout just to be heard.
Personal gripes, I know, but valid none the less. I'm not condemning the game, I'm not doomsaying, or badmouthing, but it would be nice to get some of this stuff a bit more like it's supposed to be. Either glaring errors or personal issues... Mine being the Skins for the Borg Captains... that one has irked me since Beta.
That and how much money and time I've placed in the game are the only reasons I haven't left for the multitude of better space experiences. They're not the Star Trek experience. It's the same story with SWTOR. It's the only Star Wars MMO out there, and much like champions or dcuo they're not even the good one. They're just what's left.
The numbers are out there though, you just need the Mulder/Scully skills to find them. Steam keeps track of them, but Cryptic refuses to put out numbers for very obvious reasons. F2P did save sto, but much like Fox and the X-men series, they just turned around and shot themselves in the foot again. Fox uses time travel to undo all the bad films only to make their next film a bad one... but much like this game, people keep pumping money into it because it's a franchise they love. Which I'm sure is how they finally got the rights to the "Kelvin" timeline. CBS seems just as content on mishandling the IP as Cryptic is, and all of it for money.
If anything, I think Dilithium is the thing they did it with as well. While being able to grind currency that you can use in the cash shop is a great... on paper. Not so great when you're charging so much for a single ship and constant reiterations of that same ship. Imagine if GTA V (which is making good money on selling credit cards ingame) never fixed the hacks that let you get free money? Giving subbers a stippend is a great idea, but allowing people to bypass money just to get higher metrics? Not so much. Butts in seats for small money doesn't equate to a better product which earns more money. Just ask the American school system. If they ships as they are currently were, say, $10 a pop/$25 for a bundle/$60 for the niner, more people would be willing to pay that amount up front. If there were no grind for Zen currency, more people would be willing to pay that (even if begrudgingly) because the value matches the quality. Dilithium grinding is a big draw which simultaneously digs the deeper grave, I think.
too true...
My character Tsin'xing
By all means point me to the website(s) for this/these other Trek "mmos".
To me, this expansion has really brought home in a very big way exactly what we've lost, and the recycling of things like Nimoy's voice really brings home to me how very old and tired the writers for STO are getting - this isn't a new and exciting patch, it's going back to the 1960s for inspiration, because there's nothing "2409-2410" left in them to say. They decided to give us this, rather than say, an expansion focused on "exploring strange new worlds", like a really shiny new exploration cluster series.
So with STO losing itself in the past, and JJ Trek losing itself to its own future (in much the same way the very dark Batman series has lost an opportunity to go back to Batman & Robin's lighthearted adventures), it really does feel like the best of Star Trek is really behind us.
And all of that makes me very sad.