Some of you may be aware of a little game that launched ealier in the year (well last year) called StarQuest Online (you can find out more about it at mmorpg.com). This game is its "own" (as in it copies but not enough to infringe on license) version of Star Trek set in a MMO game world. The game was made by a small group of developers and has low end graphics yet it reaches for the stars... almost literaly.
So to get to he main point I wanted to bring up the concept that the new Devs of STO could learn a TON from SQO, in game mechanics down to lagistics of how to have a
full player crew with Player Ship Interiors (PSI). So let me start out by telling you how SQO works, its ups, downs, and all arounds:
You'll start off creating your character... a fairly common start for any good mmo, in this you chose which school you graduated from and what you graduated in, be it tactical, medical, engeinering, and many other possible choices. The school you chose will shape your job choices in the future... aka after you finish creation (though things can always be changed post-creation), so if you graduated the Starfleet acadamy (yes they are called Starfleet... well I know they spelled it differntly mabey Star Fleet) you start out as an Ensign in Star Fleet (unless your a doctor which you then start as a Lieutenent). Civilians have it harder, they start out on their home planet and must find a civilian captain to take them on.
Now your probably starting to ask... what you need to be invited onto a crew? Yep thats right if you haven't played the game this'll be a new concept for you. All ships are fully rendered interiors and exteriors, and every station must be crewed by an actual player. So one person on tactical, another on command, one on comms and so forth and so on. Even engeiners will find themselves running around the ship as sections are damamged in a frantic attempt to repair things before its to late. So that gives you the scope of the game, it is what everyone orgionaly theroised STO would be... a fully player crewed ship, and more than one. The two major fleets in Star Fleet roughly 8+ ships are all player crewed, with around 15-30 active players... thats on a good day mind you.
Now to get into some debate now that you have an idea of what SQO is (keep in mind you can read more about it at mmorpg.com) I prupose that the devs of STO realy look into this game, as it is quite ground breaking in its deisgn. Back when STO was first announced in 2004 people begain theorising that STO would be a very similar game, with 50+ players on one ship, with a player captain and a fully player crew doing everything from bridge command all the way down to the ensign on deck 12 in stellar cartography. SQO has proven that this can be done... and they did it with only a hand full of programers.
Now this sounds great and all but I must point out that SQO has its downfalls, and they are quite crippling to the game and prevent it from holding a large ammount of subscribers (including myself... though I'd like to go back with some friends, but thats a topic for another thread). First off ships are perma-destroyed, if it blows up in combat its gone. This leads to captains being ultra protective of their ships and making it so that only senior crew can take the ship out when the captain is offline. I found many a day where I was board out of my mind because we were stuck in space dock waiting for the captain or a senior officer to get on and take us out on a mission or patrol.
Other issues included skill grinding, if you've ever played UO then you'll know how SQO works its skills, you basicaly have no levels you just grind a skill percentage 0-100.0% though you can go over a 100 its not highly recomended as you have a finite amount of points to play around with (skill cap). When the captain was offline I found myself doing a repetative grind, just camping on a terminal and pushing the "fire" button to train up my tactical skills (of course with the wepons powered down). So if our unkown developer is reading this obviously somthing needs to be done about enjoyment levels when it comes to working up skills or levels.
The other main issue with SQO is that most of the game is focused around the bridge. To often ships would have issues of having to many crew members, and this lead to people sitting battles out on the sidelines because the bridge only had so many seats. This could be fixed but it would take a fair ammount of concept work and some realy "out of the box" developers.
The upside of SQO is that every concole is done in simulation goodness. The tactical station is made to look and feel like a massive ships tactical display, the helm plots out your current system and has all the speed and heading buttons you can think of, every station is well thought out and has all the functions that you'd expect. This lead to complaints about needing a better titorial because of the complexity behind the controls, but if you got on a good crew they'd teach you everything you'd need to know within a few days of playing.
So here is a list of things that I think STO could do to fix all the issues of SQO and make an amazingly deep Star Trek experience for major fans and random game players as well:
-Ships
-No perma-death for ships. I say this because many people don't like real risk, and loss of hard work that is ment to be enjoyment
-Highest ranking officer is in command, even if its Ensign Noob, that way players can always have fun even if the captain is away
-Standing Orders: Let the captain leave orders for the crew so that they have somthing to do while the captain is gone
-Random missions, if no standing orders let them go on patrol and find random missions, like a distress call or anomaly
-Freetime and Grind
-Have a highly detailed holodeck with tools that let players creat stuff (Will Wright is a huge fan of this, and he is an amazing designer)
-Make even the smallest tasks fun, that is when your fixing somthing mini-game it (Puzzle pirates is a great exmaple, but not one to live by)
-Make grinding fun, skill building or level building should always be fun even if your doing "menial" tasks.
-Rank
-Don't make it impossible to gain a command, it shouldn't be an endgame type thing (Like Jedi in SWG)
-Make admiral playable, it could be like a stratagy game tons of fun but in a new and differnt way
-Crew
-Just because your ship is a ghost town dosn't mean you shouldn't be stuck in space dock... NPCs can crew you if no one is on!
-Have all forms of crews, from small shuttle like crews to massive battle ships. The variaty would be amazing and change the gameplay
Those are just some ideas and just the tip of the iceburg in a matter of speaking. The major point to get is that SQO has proven that a full player crew with full PSI can work. With a massive team like any "AAA" development studio has it could be easy to build on the concepts that SQO has layed out and make a truely amazing game that will draw people in and keep them there.
Will Wright mentioned in his latest interview about Spore and his own gaming history, that the markets current folly is not being open to risks in development, and going with the "genre" that makes money... as in following WoW because it works, or making a GTA game because people bought it in huge droves. Lets not let STO be just another MMO, make STO a "sandbox" where players can live out virtual Star Trek lives. I know alot of people are affraid of the concept of a "simulation" but simulation dosn't mean no fun, just look at the game Spore, its a life simulation and its one of the most anticipated games of 2008. STO can be immersive and fun all at once!
Some screens of SQO:
