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This game feels boring... and uninspired.
dderidexwarbird
Member Posts: 35 Arc User
I have to admit I have played this game since release, after months of one mission every month. I have completely lost interest in Star Trek: Online. Every mission is the same.
Space/Ground/Space etc.
and its always nice window dressing but absolutely no substance. This just does not feel like an MMO for me. There is no open world feel and the community and PvE queues seem repetitive and hardly existent.
I think this game really does not have any substance. Devs always have time to create new ships but nobody on the dev team has any time to create anything other then the bear minimum of content and it really shows. The story has really suffered too, this story arc has been really boring and feels completely uninspired. With respect to the writers, I could do a better job in my sleep.
It just feels like the devs have lost any passion of Star Trek and are just going through the motions. Using their new shiney ships they sell and new voice talent just to convince people to come back and play but after a while, it just all blurs together.
I am NOT attacking the developers but I genuinely believe they are not putting in enough effort into the game and its suffering as a result. They seem more interested in pumping the game for money then advancing the game or the story.
Space/Ground/Space etc.
and its always nice window dressing but absolutely no substance. This just does not feel like an MMO for me. There is no open world feel and the community and PvE queues seem repetitive and hardly existent.
I think this game really does not have any substance. Devs always have time to create new ships but nobody on the dev team has any time to create anything other then the bear minimum of content and it really shows. The story has really suffered too, this story arc has been really boring and feels completely uninspired. With respect to the writers, I could do a better job in my sleep.
It just feels like the devs have lost any passion of Star Trek and are just going through the motions. Using their new shiney ships they sell and new voice talent just to convince people to come back and play but after a while, it just all blurs together.
I am NOT attacking the developers but I genuinely believe they are not putting in enough effort into the game and its suffering as a result. They seem more interested in pumping the game for money then advancing the game or the story.
Original Author of the "What's the Beef with the Galaxy, Cryptic?" Forum Post
Change can happen - Tier 6 Galaxy... Believe in yourself...
https://taskforcerepublic.tumblr.com/ - Task Force: Republic, Second Life Roleplay Community
Change can happen - Tier 6 Galaxy... Believe in yourself...
https://taskforcerepublic.tumblr.com/ - Task Force: Republic, Second Life Roleplay Community
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My point is, they do not even try. Most of their development team are dedicated to making ships and lockbox stuff rather then helping to improve the overall game quality. We have also had to put up with bugs in gameplay before because the developers do not check their work before proceeding to dump it on live without due care or attention.
But the main problem with this game has been the story recently. Ever since the end of the Iconian War (which was extremely unsatisfying as an arc that had been built up over three years), the story has been bordering on terrible. It is obvious that the writers are forced to write within the confines of Cryptic's slow development cycle because they have to do boring stories like this one with the Lukari, rather then focusing on the meat of the story, such as the state of the Federation and the other major powers in the Galaxy.
I also feel that this game is lacking a lot of features. Certainly things like R&D, Admirality, Duty Officers and Reputation are glorified Facebook Farmville like games, designed to keep people logging in but offer absolutely no interaction outside of clicking a button. That can not be considered content, anymore then Triple Triad could be considered the "meat" of Final Fantasy XIV ARR. Even Triple Triad has a level of interaction and is fun to play. We need more things like that in the game, things that make you feel immersed in the world.
Change can happen - Tier 6 Galaxy... Believe in yourself...
https://taskforcerepublic.tumblr.com/ - Task Force: Republic, Second Life Roleplay Community
Would putting episodes from free to play into the zen store be more appealing to you?
Looking for a fun PvE fleet? Join us at Omega Combat Division today.
No, what I do not like is unimaginative stories and content sacrificed for the sake of making ships and selling them. I completely agree that Cryptic needs to make money. Believe me, I do not personally like the Free To Play model in general but its something I accept as a reality to Star Trek: Online.
However...
There is a point where too much is being released for profit and it negatively effects the content that is being produced. There simply is not enough in the game to keep me interested. I log in once, do the new mission and log out again. I do not believe in having alts because grinding has never appealed that much to me and grinding in this game does not feel the same as grinding in other MMO's as other MMO's flesh out their world more. I feel Star Trek: Online has not done this.
I also feel that Star Trek: Online should take more risks in its storytelling rather then trying to recapture a lot of the glory days from older Star Trek. Gene Roddenberry was all for creating stories with a moral heart that reflect the world as it is today and I believe that there is a lot that Star Trek: Online could do with dynamic storytelling with different mission paths and different decisions to really help make you feel that you are a Captain of a starship.
This is not actually that difficult to do, to create branching storylines as you are capable of doing it in the foundry. There is a lot that Cryptic could do to create interesting and unique stories that can build on themes established in Star Trek's 60 year history. I personally did originally say that Star Trek: Online's launching story was a rehash of Deep Space Nine season 4, with the Undine serving the same role as the Founders to pit the Federation and the Klingons against each other.
The Romulan Republic story-arc, I always felt shared a lot of similarities with one of the best selling games for that year (Mass Effect 2) as The Elachi were very similar to the collectors and it was a very similar story;
- The Elachi lived in subspace, the Collectors lived beyond the Omega 4 relay - Two places, normally inaccessible
- Both were abducting colonists
- Both served a higher race (Iconians/Repears)
Do you see what I mean by uninspired storytelling. I just believe that I personally, could do better then that in coming up with an original story, several of which are on the foundry. I just think this game has so much lost potential now, I'm not upset or anything, just sad.
Change can happen - Tier 6 Galaxy... Believe in yourself...
https://taskforcerepublic.tumblr.com/ - Task Force: Republic, Second Life Roleplay Community
This game lacks endgame content. I think that much is obvious. It seems there are only two things to do once you've the reached max level and got your gear. Space barbie and dps hunt. But it's not like Cryptic didn't come up with good ideas in the past. The Sompek arena, NWS or Kobayashi Maru have been great additions to the game. It's hard to understand why they would remove this content after only a few days.
Other additions that were supposed to be long-term motivators have been broken from the start. They had so many good, innovative ideas for the Tzenkethi Battlezone. But bugs and lack of information makes you wanna rage quit and never play the game again.
Endgame needs some serious attention soon, or the exodus will continue.
Yo, that one is beyond me as well. I'm sure they will be rerun an some point but why they just add them for a single weekend is a bit weird.
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The story missions they release are good fun, but getting a bit repetitive with the usual "go here, kill this, beam here, kill that, scan thingy, beam up, fight x waves of bad guys who warp in". Nothing new being done there really.
And though the ships being released are very nice to look at they are not really pushing the boundaries of gameplay are they? The Miranda looks stunning, but it's just another cruiser. The event carrier is cool but it's just another carrier with some wonky pets.
As to what exactly to do once you max everything, well there ain't much. I could go to a broken BZ but that serves o purpose if it just drives one crazy with bugs or lack of assistance.
And is there really any point in logging in daily to run the same few missions that do pop in the PVE queues (ISA, CCA, HSE), mission I've completed so many times i cannot remember the number.
I know people bemoan Delta Rising but at least it was a good dump of content at one go and added something to the game to keep me interested for a good while.
This is supposed to be a Star Trek game, but for the most part it feels like a chat room with fancy backgrounds where you queue and wait for 30sec-2 min mission runs.
The ships in lockboxes are more limited to get, and are for fanboys/girls or people who want to RP a specific char, or people who wnats to have the newest stuff. The fact that you can play all content without owning a lockbox ship is something I like, no content is hiden behind gambling items (f2p model). Most MMo's especially owned by others in EU would even aquire keys in a gamble method. It keeps the game alive, and doesn't rob me off my money.
To the story telling: story's released here have a great star trek feeling, tieing the ingame stories very well together. Most players don't like long scroll or click next screen (O lord the enemy is killing me with text attitude). Players want to play, and often not read (opinions differ on this).
But most stories are allready told. In books, on film, in games and in comics. The way they tell it and add it to the corrosponding universe is a skill. Some like it, others not. Some are good others aren't.
Example: any comicbook hero; gets a reboot of backstory or a new hero/son to follow up. Fighting in the previous war (WW1, WW2, Korrean war, Vietnam, Iraque, Iraque part 2) Background forms a motive, gives them a reason tomake speecific choices.
Yes, but this is start trek. Well, some like ToS, Movie Era, TNG, DS9, Voyager, Ent. All diferent captains, all different enemies. I prefer the Picard-Cisko-Janeway erra, other the Kirk era and again others the Archer one. You cannot please everyone in a mmo. Some stories i play through, others i enjoy.
Sometimes enemies must come, and they are in service of a higher race, Happend in Lord of the Rings, and it's an old formula of storytelling. Only your own story hasnt happend before if you look at it.
One of the things i enjoy in this game is the Foundry. Made by people who are not bound by any companny. When i have nothing to do, i'll grab some Foundry and often feel in star trek. STO is not a conventional MMO, not a moneymilking companny only. I've gotten much free stuff last year.
When some timeconsuming events are on, or when i've played to much STO in a grind monthly rotuines, ill play umething else in between. I feel sorry that your currently sad about content. I was a bit done with all temporal shennigans, but now we get exploring and a new plot with the Lukari. Hope u can find some fun soon again.
"Anyaway, we don't often see a sense of humor in Section 31."
I mean, you can only patch up an oldie that much to make it pass as something more conteporary. Star Trek Online has been re-fited plenty of times. It's actually pretty amazing.
However, from someone who's returned to something like WoW, you can see how they cater a whole lot to casual gamers. This is just because of the over saturation of the gaming market. You have to hook in people quickly and keep their attention.
I want to think of all the things that go into something like this game and keep everyone happy. Just be grateful they didn't abandon the game after all the investment from players that are diehard fans of the Star Trek franchise.
I also see that they're at least reaching out to the alumni of Star Trek to join in this awesome game.
There's also the point that in a highly competitive market, it doesn't benefit every MMO to go after the same demographics. Games that focus on a casual gameplay and story telling are just as valid as those who focus on hardcore modes and mechanics. It's niche separation.
I'd also like to add to the "take a break" side of this thread. Burnout is a common psychological reaction in this genre and players should try to be mindful of it.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
The reason why everything seems so fluid and easy is mostly because it's been through years of refinement. Bugs or not, you cannot argue that the flow of gameplay has been streamlined to keep you hooked.
I made probably over thirty characters or so over the years, so I know how the gameplay morphed over the years and I'm happy that things like the Admirality system has been added.
Did you mean Cryptic or Perfect World? BioWare has ~800 employees to Cryptic's 100+, but Perfect World itself has 4000+.
Even the release of new reps doesn't make a difference in the queue numbers anymore, with choice marks in the alerts (as if shoveling them like manure out of every event ever wasn't bad enough).
And then it's impossible to play anything else just for fun, because the queues all empty. Even the ones that would be a piece of cake to finish solo, you're still not allowed to start them that way, just because.
But that's a bioware game in a nutshell, I don't think you can hold "long lasting [select your plot, A/B] consequences" as a necessary component for a good MMO, RPG, or a simply good video game.
We had unique items tied to specific queues once (STF gear pre-reputation)....never again please.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!
It's not like other MMOs.I believe the F2P aspect promotes more of a costume party than anything else. It's a shame really because the art is great, the storytelling is fun, and the Star Trek is a rich fictional universe.
But it seems PWE understands many adults like playing fancy-dress with star trek costumes. After all, ST conventions are a thing. Capitalizing on that by selling limited access to 3D models within a basic gaming environment that requires no more complexity than the Unreal engine from 12 years ago is actually a pretty smart business model.
In the same way that as children we held airplane and starship toys in our hands as we zoomed them around the room making rumbling sounds so too do we do the same thing in STO. Pew pew!
Seasons don't consist of a single mission, we've just shifted to releasing the missions over the course of the whole season, rather than doing a Netflix style dump of the whole thing at once, with nothing then being released for months after.
Branching Storylines are great, but they take more time and more development, and only a fraction of your players will see any given branch, which makes it a harder sell. We could split the development up to make more branching story, but even if we just had an A and a B, unless we double the number of content developers, that would mean that from the player's perspective, each mission would be shorter, with less to do.
You say that you want us to tackle current global issues in the frame of Star Trek, just like the shows did. I would argue that the Lukari storyline you are less interested in has been doing exactly that.
Edit: FWIW, I've never understood people's fixation that a given MMO should be the only thing they ever play for the rest of their lives. For my part, I will play an MMO for a while, then lose interest or get distracted by some other new game, go play that, and then come back to that MMO again.
We're here, we're free to play, and we're not going anywhere. Try something else for a bit, and then come back and give us another shot.
Not for years now. The class stories were unique at launch, but the expansions have been shared stories with at most a few mentions of your class. The last two major expansions don't even make sense to play as anything other than a force user. They also cut back on the amount of voice acting, switching to more text like in STO.
Bioware/EA spent a huge amount of money at launch, hundreds of millions. The budget has been cut way, way back after it went free to play.
Players in the SWTOR forums and Duffy site complain about (surprise!) lack of new content, with too much new "content" being (surprise!) new cash shop items.
OP, it sounds like you need to take a vacation and play other games for awhile. No MMO can add enough new content fast enough to keep jaded old-timers happy.
"You say that you want us to tackle current global issues in the frame of Star Trek, just like the shows did. I would argue that the Lukari storyline you are less interested in has been doing exactly that."
Personally, that is one of the things I like about the current story line. What I found amusing is the reactions of some of the players, with the protestations against bringing politics into the game.
Yes, there is none. It's just how the game is set up. Everything is heavily instanced, even within the same mission or location. It's a little like commercials back in the day when people still watched regular tv. It takes you out of things quickly. But unfortunately there is nothing to do about it I guess, except make a new game lol.
The closest to an open world feeling or at least some persistence was the Risa map, You could spend a lot of time on one (gorgeous) map and actually do something meaningful/fun. The death of the day/night cycle didn't help though.
This is exactly what I do. When I'm 'burned out' on STO, I'll go off and play one of my other games. STO is the only MMO that I play, so I'll go to some old ones I have like Oblivion, Skyrim or the DA series. I eventually come back to STO cause I just can't leave my Captains idling forever.
Log in to do the new mission(s) and events as needed... to help with the metrics
I disagree OP...game has been boring and uninspired since day one. Some expansions/updates have been worse than others. This is just a speck considered where STO has been. In short, it used to be worse so this cannot be compared
Original STO beta tester.
I'll point you to Tacofangs reply, since he summed up the team's work on ships rather nicely:
I hate to break this to you, but part of Star Trek is not dealing with the state of the central powers much. It's about uncovering the unknown and make sense of what is going on around them.
The state of the various powers is one that is rather boring to focus in on since any story post Iconian war is mostly about recovery.
- The Iconians (yes, they are a power too) have mostly isolated themselves (with T'ket still being furious with the alliance) so they are in a state of rebuilding and figuring out what is next for them over the next millenia)
- The Federation we know is looking to work with its other galactic powers to continue making an effort to explore space.
- The Klingons have been dealt with a major recovery effort after having been the target of a lot of the attacks from the Iconians. The Klingons play a small but substantial role in the Tzenkethi story arc.
- The Romulan Republic has been through a lot over the course of its founding. Dealing with the Tal Shiar who see them as terrorists, focused damage from the Iconians over the gateway and losses that they took from the fleet that they had, they are in a state of repair themselves. I bet that the Lukari substory kind of hits home with the whole wanting to reunify with a subset of their own DNA (Vulcans and Romulan cousins).
- The Cardassians since they are a smaller galactic force now really don't have much of a focus. They did send a ship (if you saw it in Midnight) but they obviously have been keeping out of any of the recent storylines as a major focus.
- The Tholians we know have had an impact on the story post Iconian War. They've essentially taken it up on themselves to help clean up Temporal anomalies that crop up, especially when they found that there were groups looking to use time travel as a weapon. They feel only they can be trusted to prevent time from being used again as a weapon against them.
- The Breen are still likely doing their own thing after we disrupted them from slaving the Deferi. Not much focus has been on them since.
- The Tzenkethi are the most mysterious group we have since up until the current arc, not much focus has been on them so far, especially since this is the first time they have gotten any development at all. I want to see more about them.
The Lukari actually help to serve a point that the Romulan and Vulcan story of reunification is still very much unresolved. I could see the Romulans having a much bigger relationship with the Lukari and Kentari down the road since it mirrors their struggle of reunification. There's potential to be had.
Immersion is different for everybody, much like people's motivations for logging in. People can feel immersed in the story by itself, or they can find their own way to immerse themselves, either through the foundry or something else. It's up to you to find what it is that makes you want to log in and play the game.
I do have to say something about this bit,
Part of Star Trek deals with the exploration of the unknown, another part deals with the development of central powers and how they interact with each other.
See for example: the Klingons (throughout TOS, TNG, DS9, and the movies [particularly Undiscovered Country)
Whether or not a given element of Star Trek is included in STO is (IMO) a specific writing/development question. Does it make sense to bring thing X up now, and can a good story be made of it? I don't think you can categorically exclude elements (such as introspection on the Federation) from the series, as if the franchise can only be about exploration or only be about contemporary discussion. As we saw in the last FE, the state of Kentari politics was a major element of the episode, even as we explore a region and try to uncover what's going on around it. And as we see coming up, this arc will soon be involving the core of the Klingon Empire (and questioning just who should be leading it, given the fact that a Martok is somehow alive.)
So a lot can happen, Star Trek is an incredibly diverse series. But for the OP, they may not get everything within a short window of time. Different parts of a story arc can focus on different things.
Notable missions: Apex [AEI], Gemini [SSF], Trident [AEI], Evolution's Smile [SSF], Transcendence
Looking for something new to play? I've started building Foundry missions again in visual novel form!