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Star Trek Online's Foundry is back online, sort of
Star Trek Online Executive Producer Dan Stahl has just posted his latest state-of-the-game letter to the official site, declaring that Season Six marks the perfect time for a new player to jump in, thanks to its streamlined mission structure and brand-new starbases. Here's the juicy bit: Current players know that The Foundry, the game's player-generated content system, has been offline for quite a long time as a result of tweaks made to it by the Season Six patch. Stahl notes that the team is still working on the issues but has finally brought part of the system back online: Season 6 also introduces some nice improvements for our Foundry. As some may have noticed though, we have yet to turn on these new features yet. The QA team is working diligently as they continue to sort through some specific bugs with previously existing missions. Once those bugs are sorted through, we will then open up the editor – as of today, we have turned on the ability to play existing, republished missions. Stahl finishes with a quick mention of the dreaded lock boxes, the Star Trek convention in August, and plans for Season Seven. Check out the entire state-of-the-game letter at the official site.
Captain's Log: Star Trek Online celebrates 25 years of The Next Generation
Star Trek Online's Season Six is in full swing! My fleet is extremely close to reaching tier one of its new fleet starbase (in all three categories), and people seem to be having a pretty good time as they team up to take on fleet missions to earn the merits the starbase is starving for. I have to admit, our Ventrilo channel hasn't been this busy in a long time. Rarely do I log in to see fewer than 20 names active in the channel. This week we were told that a new version of the infamous lock box is being released. Part of the announcement also addressed the fact that Cryptic Studios has decided to make some tweaks to the Lobi store. The Foundry has been kept offline since the Season Six launch and remains shut down. Capping off the week, Star Trek Online began a weekend-long celebration of the 25th anniversary of the first airing of Star Trek: The Next Generation! Join me after the jump to learn a little bit more about it.
Captain's Log: Star Trek Online launches Season Six
Season Six has finally made its way to the Star Trek Online live servers! It was pushed to the Holodeck server last Thursday after a day-long maintenance period and a couple of patches that followed into the wee-hours of the morning on Friday. By Friday afternoon, the majority of issues seemed to be resolved, and players, especially those who belonged to fleets, crowded into the game to begin construction on their new starbases. Others jumped in to play against the new Tholian enemy in a hostile environment. Most now seem very happy with the new content and are eager to work with their fellow starship captains to create and defend their fleets' bases. Join me after the jump as I go over more of the new stuff!
Champions and STO lifetimers to receive Neverwinter beta invites
Lifetime subscriptions get a lot of flak in MMO comment threads (likely including this one), but they do occasionally feature fringe benefits. In Cryptic's case, one of those fringe benefits is a beta invite for its upcoming Neverwinter title. If you're a lifer for either Champions Online or Star Trek Online (or both!), look for an invite via the email address associated with your account, as Cryptic will be doling them out "over the course of the test." Neverwinter is a new MMORPG set in the Forgotten Realms. It features traditional fantasy combat as well as Cryptic's Foundry player-generated content tool suite.
Captain's Log: It always floods after a drought in STO
Over the course of the last week, Star Trek Online fans have been swimming in the flood of information that has been released regarding several missions and features of the game that are expected to be released either just before or as part of Season Six. We still have no formal release date for Season Six, nor have we been given any hint as to when we will see it appear on the STO test server, Tribble. Yet several announcements have been posted by Cryptic on the STO website, some of which have rejuvenated the deflated playerbase. Fleets were given even more information on the anticipated release of the fleet advancement system; Foundry authors have been celebrating the tool's first significant patch in over a year; endgame players got some good news about two new five-person team missions, and a couple of promotions have made at least a few players smile. Join me as I attempt to analyze all the new information!
E3 2012: Hands-on with Neverwinter combat
Neverwinter MMO. Action-oriented combat. Free to play. How perfect does that sound? Pretty perfect, which is probably why Perfect World Entertainment's handling it. In fact, Perfect World and Cryptic Studios are doing such a good job that some of the game's art and lore is being worked in as canon! Go on, you can use that as a talking point to get your friends to read this article at your next pen-and-paper Dungeons and Dragons game. Massively's own Eliot Lefebvre took on the game at PAX, so follow on past the break and I'll try to work off of his observations based on my experience at this year's E3.
Captain's Log: A new perspective on STO's endgame
For a veteran Star Trek Online player, it can be very easy to get mired in the game's seemingly soulless endgame. From restricted (time-gated) play to lackluster PvP to grinding strategic task force missions and dailies, sometimes it's difficult to find reason to log in at all, let alone on someone else's schedule. There are always a few options, however. Of course, these ideas aren't going to be everyone's cup of raktajino, but they're a start, and I want to take some time to discuss two possibilities that may help to provide a distraction while we all wait for fleet starbases, Tholians, and Ferasan (the new cat-like species to be released for the Klingon faction).
Star Trek issues Foundry Challenge to all captains
Star Trek Online's Foundry has been a powerful -- and tricky -- tool for players to create missions for others to enjoy. To encourage starship captains to create the best possible Foundry missions, Cryptic has issued its first Foundry Challenge with a top prize of 500 Cryptic Points for the C-Store. Creators have three weeks (until March 7th) to make a mission revolving around the murder of a diplomat on Risa, after which players will field-test the results and vote on the best one of the bunch. Only one winner will be selected for the prize. This is intended to be the first of many subsequent Foundry Challenges, each running the span of a month. There are several rules for each entry, including length and story topic. Cryptic is encouraging players to discuss the created missions on the forums in their quest to disseminate the cream of the crop. In other STO news, Cryptic's adding a Deep Space 9 bundle to the game that includes a bridge set, special Duty Officers, costumes, weapons, and a Type-10 (Chaffee) shuttlecraft. The bundle will set purchasers back 1800 CP.
Dan Stahl beams back aboard Cryptic Studios
Dan Stahl couldn't stay away from Star Trek Online for long, and now the former executive producer is back in the fold to head up the Foundry team for Cryptic Studios and parent company Perfect World Entertainment. Stahl, who left STO for Zynga in September, posted on the o-boards earlier this evening announcing his return. "There is something magical going on at Cryptic these days and I'm very happy to be back working on the MMOs that I personally love to play," he said. The Foundry is Cryptic's suite of user-generated content tools that is currently available in Star Trek Online and slated to appear in the company's upcoming Neverwinter title.
Rings and words of power: Going inside LotRO's Update 5
It's been a couple of days since the news broke that Lord of the Rings Online's Update 5 is going to be bigger than previously thought, with not only a new instance cluster but an additional book in the epic storyline and an Instance Finder system. As Update 5 goes up on the test server for the remainder of the week, we got in touch with Turbine to talk about the details of this mountain of content heading our way, including an epic confrontation with Rise of Isengard's big baddie himself, Saruman. It wouldn't be a conference call without a few notable surprises as well, and Adam Merskey, Aaron Campbell, Jeff Libby, and Joe Barry were eager to share what the team has been working on for the first update after the expansion. It's time to wave goodbye to the Rangers, stop putting off instance runs, and take the fight to the bearded dude himself. It's time for Update 5. Get all the skinny after the jump!
Neverwinter was 'almost ready to ship' before F2P MMO retooling
Last month, we reported that Cryptic Studios and Perfect World Entertainment were changing gears to render the upcoming D&D Neverwinter game more of an MMO than originally planned, complete with action combat and a cash shop to dispense vanity items and perks. Today, MMORPG.com published an interview with Neverwinter Lead Producer Andy Velasquez, in which he notes that the original title was "almost ready to ship," but the revision is nevertheless for the best: The change from CORPG to a full action RPG F2P MMO is a change that just made sense for us. Perfect World wanted to go big. Expand everything. Do more. Do better. Take your time. Really blow it out. Pushing into 2012 allows us to make these changes. Transitioning into a full-featured action RPG, free-to-play MMO allows us to reach a whole new audience of people. Never underestimate barriers to entry. With a free client, anyone can play. Try it. Where's the harm? It's better for the game, better for us, better for D&D and infinitely better for fans and gamers. With Neverwinter, we're going to prove that F2P does not describe a type of gameplay -- it only describes the fundamentals of a business model. Velasquez also discusses user-generated content and the challenges of working with a famous IP. "A ton of effort is also being made to make sure that we produce an authentic D&D experience," he says. Head over to MMORPG.com for the full interview.
Some Assembly Required: Issue #1
Hello folks and welcome to the preview issue of Some Assembly Required. Massively has a whole host of MMORPG-specific columns for your perusal, as well as a few general jaunts that veer off the beaten path to examine several different aspects of our crazy hobby. Some Assembly Required falls into this latter category, and every two weeks either myself or MJ Guthrie will be taking you on various deep dives into the world of player-generated content. What's player-generated content? Well that's part of what makes this venture so exciting. Player-generated content is often seen as some sort of nebulous activity exclusive to sandbox games. Others take it to mean roleplay. Still others see it as unrestricted PvP and the metagame machinations surrounding it. For our purposes, player-generated content encompasses all of these as well as anything and everything that showcases the creativity of both individual players and entire communities.
Ask Cryptic hints at shared Foundry functionality for Star Trek Online, Neverwinter
There's a new Ask Cryptic in town, and this month's Star Trek Online update finds producer Dan Stahl fielding a plethora of community questions that cover a wide range of topics. While many of the questions (and answers) are straightforward one-liners, Stahl does go into a bit of detail about STO's Foundry functionality. He mentions that the content creation tool will be getting a round of bug fixes as well as new map hookups (including Star Fleet Academy) for the library. Stahl also says that Cryptic's Foundry team is currently hard at work on Neverwinter's player-generated content toolset, and the fruits of its labor will eventually be seen in STO as well. "One thing I continue to stress is adding the ability for more acting and blocking features so that players can create their own dramatic scenes," Stahl explains. Head to the official STO website for the full text.
Community Detective Issue #21: Star Trek Online
Be gentle with me, Trekkies, for I have a confession to make: I've always found Star Trek to be pretty unwatchable. Whether it was because of the low-budget sets or the drunken TV writers prone to cramming every episode full of nonsensical techno-malarkey, I boldly went to another channel. Logging into Cryptic's Star Trek Online a couple of weeks ago, then, wasn't something I was looking forward to. I'd penciled it into the Community Detective schedule a while back and frankly put it off several times. I'll do it eventually, I kept telling myself. Upon logging in, I found that STO's source material is the worst thing about it, and in fact the game itself is quite well-made and a ton of fun (particularly the Foundry; I'm completely in love). In fact, I normally leave games behind when a particular issue of Community Detective is in the books, but with STO, I find myself logging in more and more each day during my off hours. I've renewed my sub beyond the free 30 days, and thoughts of the lifetime option have crossed my mind. Enough of all that, though; you're here to find out about my community and customer service experiences, amirite? Warp past the cut and we'll get started.
Star Trek Online Ask Cryptic talks starbases, ground combat, and more
How would you feel about a cover system and/or first-person-shooter elements in your daily Star Trek Online diet? Producer Dan Stahl tackles the feasibility of both of those features -- and a host of others -- in the latest Ask Cryptic. The STO version of the community Q&A feature went live last night on the game's official website and boasts a large number of subscriber-generated queries ranging from integrated voice chat to a time table on the ground combat revamp to the addition of starbase functionality to the Foundry. "We anticipate the next major feature to the Foundry being the ability for fleets to design and run their own starbases. This is a monumental addition to the Foundry, so don't expect it right away, but it is the next big thing for that feature," Stahl says. Check out the full list of questions on the official STO website.
Star Trek Online answers a fleet's worth of questions
The one-year anniversary for Star Trek Online is just around the corner, and the game has quite a number of irons in the fire to go along with that milestone. Player-generated content and weekly episodes are two of the game's big features on deck for the near future, and the latest installment of Ask Cryptic certainly addresses those, but that's only the tip of the iceberg. With nearly three dozen disparate questions answered, this month's offering covers everything from Vulcan ships to an open PvP environment. Among the more interesting answers is the fact that the development team is looking into ways to model rather unique ship traits such as the multi-vector attack mode of the Prometheus class. The team is also hoping to give players the ability to fly shuttles and yachts, along with reasons to do so. The next minigame after dabo is still on the table, but at the moment the team is focused on more meaty content. Take a look at the full rundown for all of the Star Trek Online questions for this month -- there's plenty of information to be found within the lengthy answers.
STO's Dan Stahl fields 30 questions about the Enterprise, Tholians and more
As Star Trek Online grows ever-closer to its one-year anniversary in February 2011, fans of Cryptic's space saga have burning questions about the future of the game. In swoops Executive Producer Dan Stahl to keep the flames under control with a whopping 30 answers in the latest STO Q&A session. As usual, there is no overriding theme to these questions, which range from whether we'll be seeing the 2009 Star Trek movie's Enterprise in the game (only if Paramount gives permission), whether Cryptic is working on more voice-overs for missions (yes), and when we'll be seeing the Tholians (probably not until after Season 4 releases). Stahl emphasizes that the STO team's prime directive is, simply, "More Like Trek," and the devs are working hard to infuse more of a Star Trek feel into every aspect of the game. Meanwhile, the Foundry -- the player-created mission system -- briefly went into beta on the Tribble test server yesterday, but was quickly taken down due to issues with the infrastructure. Stahl has great hopes for it, however: "In all -- the Foundry will open up the ability for the community to create some great (and let's be honest -- not so great) missions that you'll be able to play just like any other mission in the game."
Star Trek Online Season 3 starts Dec. 9, adds mission creation beta
As we all know, the third season of The Next Generation was a real doozy. We mean, "Sins of the Father?" "The Bonding?" Oh, man -- they're classics. We've got understandably high hopes for the third "season" of free downloadable content for Star Trek Online, an update which will go live December 9, adding a mission replay option, unlockable Borg technology and a beta for "The Foundry," which allows players to craft their own episodes. This, of course, means that someone needs to go through and recreate all the episodes from season three of TNG. Heck, how about all the episodes from TNG? We're not sure those wacky Holodeck episodes would be possible, but we're sure players can kludge something together.
Replay episodes or make your own with STO's Season Three
It's fitting that Star Trek Online's third major update is entitled "Genesis," because in several ways, it feels like a new beginning for the game. In a preview of December's Season Three, Cryptic reveals a trio of significant re-dos: a revamp of the visually lackluster sector space, the ability to replay your favorite episodes, and the beta of STO's player-created mission feature, The Foundry. While Cryptic is uncertain whether The Foundry will go live by Season Three, the studio does promise that players will at least be able to tinker with it on the test servers by then. The Foundry is one of Cryptic's answers to STO's perceived lack of playable -- and original -- content, allowing gamers to construct their own stories and episodes using STO's robust editor. "Using The Foundry, you can construct Episodes and share them with your friends. If you're not interested in designing missions, you'll still benefit from The Foundry: Player-created missions will be available to you to play and enjoy, right alongside the Episodes you know and love today." Cryptic has a number of other features on deck for the game following Season Three, including customizing Gorn characters, new uniforms and ships in the C-Store, ground combat improvements, and Klingon-specific updates.
Star Trek Online to incorporate player-made missions
Cryptic Studios already enabled City of Heroes players to create their own missions from scratch successfully -- now it's planning on adding the feature to the rest of its MMO catalog. Star Trek Online players can now apply to beta test the "Foundry" toolset, which allows them to create entire Episodes, customizing mission objectives, characters and scenery, which other Captains will then be able to play through. There's no telling how powerful the Foundry will be until we get a chance to check them out, but we've got our fingers crossed that our Captain Riker/Tribbles slash-fic masterpiece will be able to be realized using these new tools.
