To boldly go where Cryptic is going

Cryptic has released a gameplay trailer and a webcast from their presentation at a Star Trek convention in Las Vegas.

Pretty interesting material. While I cannot say I am a huge Star Trek fan (or pyjamas SciFi in general) I do enjoy watching TV episodes from time to time.

It seems that combat may be a significant part of the game, although perhaps not the dominating activity – which is good. But most likely more prevalent than in some of the TV series; the PvP aspect of the game will be between Klingon Empire and Starfleet, with more factions coming later. But the game will not be a PvP focused game, which makes good sense.

Neither will it be a level-based game or any “traditional” (read fantasy-oriented) classes/professions, but there will be specialisations for the captains/commanders – and everyone will command their own ships.

I am not surprised that they are not aiming for high end machines, that casual play times should be fine and that it should be playable by “children of all ages”. Cryptic is one game company that gets that part I think. And I guess the parents for the most adorable person asking questions in the webcast are happy also

Since I play a fair amount of Guild Wars nowadays some of the elements described of selecting and recruiting your crew and gaining information on explorations sounded at least in concept similar to Guold Wars skill managment. Especially since the crew you select to bring on missions may be important for the outcome. That is certainly a welcome aspect of the game.

Diplomacy do not seem to be in the game yet, but considered – they were still discussing how to translate that into game play. Trading seems it will be a significant part of the game also, with conflicts around resources. Main focus for conflicts will not be resolved through combat as I understood it, which is inline with Star Trek in general.

In addition to be given missions from central command there will also be events; one event that was indicated was Borg invasions – which also was part of the game trailer. This sounds a bit like the Rikti invasions in City of Heroes/Villains, remains to be seen how that turns out.

Their preference is to get everyone to play in the same single universe and they can support that from a technological perspective, but no promises are made in that regard.

If I heard it correctly, there is a /demo_record command (or similar function) in the game, which I am quite happy to hear. I have used it fairly often in City of Heroes/Villains and it is a great function to record in-game play.

They have a planned date for when the gamer will be ready, but not public. They did say “less than 3 years” though. Jack Emmert pointed out that this is less time than it takes for many previous MMOs and that part of that due to their toolset. While this is certainly a big deal from a development perspective I think that this is only to be expected from decent game companies.

Make your first MMO – lots lessons learned from mistakes and better understanding of what is involved. Second MMO – refine the toolset and way of working, take the time to make it right. Third MMO – start to reap the benefits from what has been made before.

This seems that this is the case for Cryptic here. Similarly this is what may be the case for Funcom and their Secret World MMO. Other game companies with a number of titles behind their belts (SOE, NCSoft, Turbine etc) – I am not so sure. But that is a whole other topic.

Right now I am just curious to see how Star Trek Online evolves. But as I said, I am not a huge Star Trek fan so I do not have that much opinion on how it should be. I am more interested in how they will solve their design challenges.

It is official now – Star Trek Online

The countdown is done and the Star Trek Online web site with Cryptic look (i.e. generally same format as for Champions Online) is in place.

A few details are provided:

• You can/will play as captain of a starship, either from the Federation or Klingon empire. You can customize the ship; recruite and train your own crew.
• Gameplay should be a mix of exploration and combat – in space, on the ground or on starships.
• Both for PC and console (did not say XBox 360 explicitly though)
• Player generated content options (ship customization part, other things?)

They are obviously taking advantage of features they have when developing the tools used for Champions Online – it would be silly not to do that.

Will people only play as captains, or can/will they play as other members of the crew? How much will be NPCs? Will away teams be multiple players, NPCs (henchmen, pets)?

Cryptic seem to be going for the same format to run the web site, which means there will be Q&A sessions, probably some “meet the devs” posts etc. The Champions Online web site has a nice format I think, so this should be good.

There are some screenshots posted on the web site – only environment views, but looks pretty nice. They will show the first gameplay footage at a Star Trek convention in Las Vegas on August 10th – with a webcast for those that are not attending.

It is probably at an early stage, but that they will show something is good news I think.

Cryptic + Star Trek = true

It seems there is an early confirmation that the counter counting down at Cryptic Studios is indeed for Star Trek Online. WarCry had discovered that a game career E-zine contained an ad for Cryptic, where Star Trek Online was explicitly mentioned as an upcoming game.

Worth noting is also that the ad says “developer and publisher” and “launching publishing operations around the world”. Which of course makes sense if they are going to do the publishing themselves, they would certainly need something to handle European countries and different parts of Asia, if they intend to go there. Champions Online is going to be published by 2k Games, but maybe Star Trek Online will be handled by Cryptic themselves?

2009 – the year of SciFi MMOs?

Many blog discussions and topics seem to have been centered around some fantasy games and expansions from Mythic Entertainment, Funcom and Blizzard this year. Not that many and not something I share a few others excitement for.

Next year seems to have potential for more interesting prospects though and this in the SciFi area of MMOGs:

• Stargate Worlds seems to be aiming for an early 2009 release. Based on the Stargare SG-1 TV series, one of the things they emphasize is their strong story content. They are taking beta applications, over 150000 has reportedly signed up so far.
• Jumpgate Evolution is space oriented SciFi MMOG, where NetDevil has based it on their old Jumpgate game and then work to make an improved and evolved version of it. Seems much a combat and trade oriented game with player driven economy. They are taking beta applications.
• Black Prophecy seems also to be a space oriented game, from Reakktor – creators of Neocron/Neocron 2. I have not seen much information abouth this game. Screenshots on their site looks spectacular. They are taking beta applications.
• Earthrise is a game with a postapocalyptic theme from Masthead Studios.  Character development is purely skill oriented, promises player driven economy and extensive crafting and territorial PvP.
• MechScape is a new MMO from JagEx, creators of RuneScape. It will likely be a browser-based MMORPG like RuneScape

Depending on who you ask, some would also put superhero games like Champions Online and DC Universe Online as SciFi games, both which seem to be aiming for 2009. So far there has only been two games released in this area and these have been siamese twins with each other, so one may argue that they are just one game. SciFi has a broad definition, so it certainly can include these games as well, although it may not be what everyone thinks of when talking about SciFi.

Some other SciFi games being developed have not had any release plans announced yet. Fallen Earth developers says it is ready when it is ready. Cryptic Studios will likely announce a SciFi game in development in a week, which many belive may be Star Trek Online. BlackStar is the game from Space Time Studios which may still be looking for a publisher. These may not be released during 2009 though.

It does show some potentially exciting future in the area of MMORPGs, at least for us who would be very happy to play more SciFi oriented games rather than the fantasy themes that are currently dominating.

I would not be surprised if there are more games than these, but these were those that I could think of right away that I have seen mentioned.

MMOGs and media cross-overs

Is taking the lore and story lines from other media and adapting it to the MMOG sphere a successful approach?

There has been a few attempts so far – Star Wars Galaxies, Matrix Online and Lord of the Ring Online comes to mind. The two former mainly coming from the movie business and the latter from fantasy litterature.

The Star Wars and Matrix efforts have probably less than the expected playerbase today. Lord of the Ring Online seem to be do fairly good at least, but I think it is still to early to judge.

There are some more coming up, like Marvel Universe Online, Star Trek Online and Stargate Worlds and probably a few more which I do not know about of have forgotten. Then we have some that might fall somewhere in between, like God & Heroes which is based on perhaps primarilyRoman mythology but likely have used some creative freedom in adjusting the stories to adapt to the gameplay.

Where am I going with this? I must say that I am a bit sceptic when it comes to media cross-overs like this, in particular when there is a strong control factor in favour of the non-MMOG medias. I think this has been the case with Star Wars Galaxies and is a situation that Turbine faces with Lord of the Ring Online as well.

Just as most movie adaptations of books often tend to be a bit of a disappointment for readers, this can probably happen when moving to MMOG space from other media as well. A key here I think is when moving story lines and lore to MMOG space is to continue to develop the lore in that space, together with the previous media. The MMOGs cannot just adapt to fit within the frames of the existing lore from the other media, it must be developed further in MMOG space.

Lucas have a quite strong control element in what happens with the Star Wars brand and I am not quite sure they have been that interested in moving the lore and developing it in the MMOG space. This is by far not the only problem SWG have had, but I think this has been a contributing factor to the troubles the game have had.

For Matrix Online I think there was an effort to develop the lore within the MMOG space as well and that game has still not been doing well. But the lore cross-over factor is just one factor.

I think the longevity of LotrO might potentially be a problem as well. JRR is not around to help develop the story line and while there is much material to work from, Turbine is still restricted in fitting it in the existing litterature. It may last for a while, but I think it may have trouble sticking around for as long as other games with original lore. Ultima Online has been around for 10 years, Anarchy Online for 6 years and Everquest falls in between. All of these games will likely be around for a couple years more. If they are shut down it is not because of the lore, but for other reasons (outdated graphics and game mechanics comes to mind).

Of the later coming games it seems that at least Stargate Worlds and Marvel Universe Online are going in the direction of developing the lore within the MMOG space, which I think is a good thing and that these games may end up successful also in the long run.

Will this be different for different markets also? In the Western hemisphere PvE and lore focused gameplay have had more success, while it is more PvP oriented in the East and possibly also less focus on the lore. Going for existing players/customers, the cross-ver development is probably being more important in the West. But will it be for future potential players/customers as well?

What do you think?