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The Game Archaeologist: Perpetual's Star Trek Online
If you're among the legions of Trekkies, then you are almost certainly aware of Cryptic Studios' Star Trek Online. Since early 2010, players have boldly gone where no one has gone before in this MMO that blends spaceship battles, ground combat, and faithful tie-ins to the long-running franchise. Star Trek Online appears to be thriving following a free-to-play adaptation and two expansions, and some see it as the only official continuation of the TV series right now. But what players encounter in Star Trek Online is not what it originally started out as. You may or may not know that STO began development under Perpetual Entertainment, which handled the game for several years until it went bankrupt and passed the license and art assets to Cryptic. It's another tantalizing historical "what if?" scenario to think about what this game would look like if Perpetual had taken it to launch and beyond. But what did this version of Star Trek Online look like? Let's investigate.
Star Trek Online dev team laid off yesterday
According to WarCry's sources at P2 Entertainment, yesterday was the last day at work for the members of the Star Trek Online development team. We already heard that some of the team went over to Cryptic Studios for job interviews, but we didn't hear what they might be working on. It might be STO if Cryptic are the ones who purchased the license and content from P2.Everyone at Massively is anticipating specifics about the fate of STO, but the internet community is sitting in the dark for the time being. While we wait for the lights to come back on, we want to wish all the STO refugees the best of luck as they boldly go to whatever strange new worlds await them.
Star Trek Online MMO switches to new developer
P2 Entertainment -- formerly known as Perpetual Entertainment -- will no longer be developing the Star Trek Online MMO. Instead, the IP has been passed on to an as-yet-unnamed California-based studio, who will be continuing development while P2 refocuses on the casual games market.WarCry reports that the unnamed studio will be receiving rights for the Star Trek IP, and the game's content, but will not have access to the code previously developed at P2. This will inevitably slow development of the MMO even further, as the new studio must start from scratch with the title's back-end.Star Trek Online was the only title currently in development at P2, following news of Gods & Heroes: Rome Rising being placed on "indefinite hold." P2 is also embroiled in a legal battle with former PR firm Kohnke Communications, who are suing for finances owed them after the effective cancellation of Gods & Heroes. Coupled with news of Spacetime's MMO cancellation, we're beginning to think that it's not a good time to be a MMO developer (unless, of course, you're Blizzard).[Via Massively]
