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Does anybody else think the winter wonderland is the closest to "real" Star Trek?
angrytarg
Member Posts: 11,001 Arc User
I mean it, seriously.
Between all the shoot and kill missions, I really feel the winter wonderland is something that could have been in the show with some changes. It reminds me a bit of "shore leave" which is by itself a terrible episode mind you, but imagine your away team gets trapped in winter wonderland, fights animated snowmen - of course not because it's fun but because you discover some omnipotent being is toying with you and puts your and your crew's very life in danger, the gingermen are actual transformed colonists, and at some point you'd have to talk some super computer to death. A few changes and it could be an episode of TOS or even TNG
Between all the shoot and kill missions, I really feel the winter wonderland is something that could have been in the show with some changes. It reminds me a bit of "shore leave" which is by itself a terrible episode mind you, but imagine your away team gets trapped in winter wonderland, fights animated snowmen - of course not because it's fun but because you discover some omnipotent being is toying with you and puts your and your crew's very life in danger, the gingermen are actual transformed colonists, and at some point you'd have to talk some super computer to death. A few changes and it could be an episode of TOS or even TNG
^ 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
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I'd love to see some more of these "less serious" missions on a smaller scale, perhaps accessable through our ship's or starbase's holodeck, year-round.
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But it's fun! Just like the battlezone!
Agree from the non-lethal standpoint. Always liked the Q episodes
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Yes, people often forget that.
As for the game itself, we have space dinos with lasers on their heads, and Klingon tagging space rabbits to be friend with Romulan, so I guess the winter event is not really out of place compared to the rest of the game.
I have imagined similar plots and considered suggesting that next year, Cryptic considers a couple of missions to actually introduce the Winter Wonderland and then do something with the brainwashed merchants/Q/colonists.
Yeah. The intreresting thing for me is, this all still feels odd for Q (Q was usually trying to make a philosophical point, not just mess with people). But the tone reminds me of DS9's Ferengi episodes which they deliberately did 1-2 of a year. I feel like if the comedy writing was just a bit punchier (a bit more one liners somehow), it would be very much in keeping with the Ferengi eps.
Maybe if this were a Ferengi Q trying to teach us about commercialism...
That would be a rather fun twist on the event, really. Quark discovers holiday commercialism and becomes a fan. Q gives Quark his powers. We face all these things created by Quark, who gives us challenges to work for our money. At the end of the event, we remind Quark of the other meanings of the winter holidays, teaching him a lesson Q hoped we'd teach the temporarily all powerful Quark all along.
In a way, Sphere of Influence also had a more Trek feel to it than many missions.
While I'm always up for a bit of fun pew pew, I'm also very happy to see a smattering of these differently paced activities.
This Q isn't the John de Lancie Q. This Q is the Keegan de Lancie version (Q Junior) when he's all grown up. Considering how juvenile Q Junior was in Voyager, I think this Winter Wonderland is within his character.
That said, the whole "real" Star Trek argument has been a fallacy for quite some time, and is commonly known as the "No True Scotsman" argument.
Noone can arbitrarily decide what is "real" Star Trek and what is not. We can have opinions, but the only opinion that matters is CBS Studios. Since they have oversight of STO, and they own the intellectual property -- sorry, but everything in STO is something they consider to be "real" Star Trek. If they didn't, Cryptic would remove it or wouldn't be able to create it to begin with without their permission.
I am simply going to requote myself.
I believe someone said many threads ago that if Voyager had dinosaurs with lasers on their heads in one of the episodes, it would have been called one of the best episodes of Star Trek and people would have loved it.
Likewise with the Winter Wonderland. If they had that kind of budget, people would enjoy something light-hearted and goofy like that.
I think a lot of people forget that Star Trek had a lot of intentional humor, including outright farce. It wasn't all srs bsnss 24/7.
Shame no one else does.
One complaint is they didnt add a whole lot of new content, much is the same as the first one and the second one. In three events there should be more than an hours worth of continual activities. Right now you can be done doing everything in a half hour. A few scavengar hunts like the summer had and a 10-15 minute dance floor wouldve rounded it up to an hour. Then there are mission types from the other adventure zones that couldve been included in some way, such as the jump maze accolades from Nimbus or coaxing pink octopus things back to it's mother from New Rom but instead of the pink things how about mini gingerbread characters back to a normal sized one.
"I'm drunk, whats your excuse for being an idiot?" - Unknown drunk man. :eek:
That's exactly what I'm talking about. Yes, there were goofy episodes but in the end that was a big piece of Star Trek. Strange new worlds, unpredictable adventures and twists and turns on human moral.
I don't mean that the wonderland in it's current form would just translate to an episode, but the setting is so refreshing that I'd like to experience an away mission that confronts me with the unknown in such a lighthearted way until I get to the bottom of it. I am so fed up with this militaristic "Sir, yes sir, shoot to kill!" mentality that STO forces upon the source material and which is so gladly accepted by so many people.
I didn't want to ride around on what "real" Star Trek is. I just used that term to say that it is something I could imagine bein the theme of an episode on TV. Whereas the neverending shooting wouldn't
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Trek has had plenty of weird things. im not sure they ever would have done a gingerbread man episode, but its really no stranger than the robin hood episode or whatever the hell was going on in move along home.
but regardless of whether it would have appeared or not, its still a game and i play it as a game, not a literal translation of the tv shows. so its all in good fun.
I think that's a nicety.
You can define "real Trek" in certain ways (even between the series) the same way you can identify a Russian folktale and a Chinese folktale.
The fact that you could is why you have series bibles, script editors, and licensing overseers like Van Citters.
Now, that doesn't mean STO can't or shouldn't deviating but it's not impossible to ever say that it is deviating. It may deviate -- with good purpose -- but it's not impossible to deviate.
Well, here's one of the things we get into:
Is STO (or any Star Trek game) supposed to be:
1) A Star Trek life simulator, including tasks that the camera would cut away from on the shows.
2) A game with Star Trek branding, like a pinball machine.
3) A Star Trek combat simulator.
4) An episode simulator, meaning it has an obligation to focus on what an episode would focus on, omitting details of daily life or duty.
5) A graphical chatroom.
6) A co-op game.
I favor #4 most of all but can see room for SOME of all six. You need some of #1 for illusion of depth, some of #2 because it needs to be repeatable, lots of #3 (though I'd dispute all combat needing to be lethal or armed) to keep it exciting, and some of #5 and #6 because you're in a space with other people but also because that's what drives the value of C-Store purchases.
Russian/Chinese folktales are different because they're in the public domain, are not copyrighted/trademarked, and are the sole creation of those particular cultures.
Star Trek on the other hand is an intellectual property owned/copyrighted/trademarked by CBS Studios. "We" as Star Trek fans do not get to decide what is 'pure' Star Trek and what is not.
If Star Trek is a property (even an intangible property), then property can be done with as the owner pleases as long as it isn't illegal.
This isn't the case for things in the public domain (like Shakespeare, or the folktales you mention which are reimagined in numerous ways and passed down from generation to generation with numerous edits and revisions), which nobody owns.
If I own a house and decide to paint it the color red, nobody has the right to tell me that if I "really" liked my house then I'd paint it blue -- and then expect me to do as they say. And then if I continued to leave my house the color red while the rest of the public says that I don't own a "real" house unless it's painted blue, I can continue to do as I please because those other people don't own my property.
They can certainly petition city council or file public nuisance orders or write me angry letters telling me to paint my house blue, but unless I'm court-ordered to paint my house red... I don't really have to do anything some random stranger (or group of strangers) say.
And if they came over with blue paint buckets, then I have the right to call the police and force them off my property.
Lo, i this sounds so rediculus it could be true, especially if you consider that it is Q who is creating winter wonderland "for" us.
The only thing i would miss is somekind of cynical irony, but that wasn't always present in TOS or TNG. (but if they where made today i bet it would be pepperd with a lot of tongue-in-cheek critics of your society, if done well)
But to be honest i never gave winter wonderland much of a thought, but now...
...anyway, you made my day, sir!
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No. "We" don't. But there are objective standards used by folks in licensing. It isn't timey wimey creative whimsy.
In many cases, they published those objective standards and they form outlines for the kinds of stories and approaches Trek does and doesn't do, what technology does and doesn't look like, etc. And in addition to published rules, the work of specific authors can be analyzed. You can tell a David Gerrold story from a Brannon Braga story. They have motifs that can be analyzed.
I know a guy who is constructing a science fiction motif index like people do for folklore (think: the academic equivalent of TV Tropes) but, really, you could do that for just Star Trek. There is a certain variation on the Hero's Journey common to almost all Trek with each series having its own variations on that. There are rules that can be observed and then recorded for what makes certain kinds of stories.
And CBS can change that on a whim because they own it, yes. But, again, that would be a deviation from an observed trend, same as when Sleeping Beauty got sanitized. And then that new variation would be recorded as a variation with its own motifs, quirks, and rules.
Rough hypothetical example: "In 2013, CBS changed the basic formula of its Star Trek shows so that the Captain became a supporting character, adjusting motifs 234A to 523Z such that they now applied to the Chief Engineer character, who became the star."
It doesn't erase the old formula but is simply a different formula being applied.
Watched AFFoD the other day. Sadly DS9 isn't shown in my region.