Complete with Robert Picardo opera voiceovers? *l*

(Rant warning: No person in particular is targeted here, as this is more a voicing of my opinion.)

I've got to agree though. It's nice to be able to walk through what parts of the ship we can, but it seems so... static. Engineering is ALWAYS the same for every class, when it shouldn't be. (eg: Defiant vs Galaxy), as is Sickbay (see previous example.) The Engineering Lab, seriously, what use is there for this, other than the obviously explainable feature (that we never see) of our Duty Officers "using" it for the Prototype Fabrication missions?

I could keep going on and on about how the whole copy-pasta (yes, I know it's paste...) approach is just wholly wrong, and cite what to fix and how, but I don't think that'll do any damn good.

I know it takes server resources to pull of different interiors, and that multiple interior maps might bog down the servers, but that has a simple solution - take all this money from the C-Store and put it into upgrading the server throughput. Maybe even just getting new servers.

It seems to me that people want better things, not just more crap. Am I right in guessing this?

Immersion in this game is seriously flawed, and probably will be so until the nuances of ship interiors and the "little things" like Holodecks and things of the like are fixed, if ever at all.

I Agree. +1.

There is no immersion in this game. Nada. It starts with the complete lack of uniformity of STARFLEET, not only amongst players but also amongst the NPCs, continues through the static game world, the generic and in terms of Star Trek ridiculous killing quests and so and so forth.

As a Star Trek experience, the game fails. Yet, I cling to it. Something must still be there, but it os not that much. Everything really immersive is either half-arsed (ship interiors), completely removed (diplomatic/exploration missions) or changed to the worst (LOADING SCREENS - I didn't know the ones posted here, they have Star Trek written all over them. Why threw them out in favour of generic screenshots?).

My only guess is that "immersion" is nothing the game actually wants to achieve. It has become and is now a fast-paced arcade shooting game, living from shiny things you can buy. Maybe the DEVs had a vision, once. But this went obviously out of the window a long time ago.

My only theory to this would be that the lack of immersion truly stems from the corporate whirlwind that caused ownership of the game to get thrown about like a rag doll. While the devs might have had a vision, what their vision is versus what the publishers want and can provide is where the impasse begins.

I mean I have to give the Cryptic crew credit for continually working on their project, despite what the PWE engines cause in terms of game and idea limitations. In an ideal world, I'm almost too certain that Cryptic, if they had the proper technological, logistical (staff) and financial backing, would jump at all of these brilliant ideas scattered amongst the forums in order to make the game truly a one-of-a-kind epic.

I also feel pity for them as well, since it's not their (Cryptic's) fault that PWE absorbed them, causing a severe staff shortage, which in turn causes all of the negative rep/feedback flame and hate threads.

I mean, if I could offer anything to help make some of these ideas come to fruition, I would. However, I lack a lot of the applied technical, business, social, and educational skills that would be needed to lend such a hand. I've always wanted to get into game design, but I've got an aversion to coding, issues with doing graphic design and layouts, and anything that essentially involves an applied skill. (All due to various complications of my cerebral palsy, like seizures, spasms, migraines, etc.) I don't really know of anyone in the gaming development field that is solely hired for their mind, unless there's a think-tank out there in hiding somewhere.

Anyhow, before I get any further off-topic, perhaps what we as a community need to do is ask the development team is what they need from us, the players, in order to begin the process of molding the game to the desired image, even if it takes time. I mean unless the game's investors pull the plug, it'd be pretty safe to say that we'll have quite some time to hash out ideas and have them eventually and systematically implemented into the game.

Wow I had totally forgot they had those loading screens. I want them back.

I liked those old loading screens too.

Another, unrelated quibble, is the Deuterium Surplus items. Klingon ships should use a different fuel to "burn" since their engines use a tritium intermix (tritium/antitritium) rather than a deuterium intermix (deuterium/antideuterium). It was made a pretty big plot point in season 7 of DS9 as to why the Breen energy dissipater weapon eventually didn't work against the KDF after they adjusted their intermix chambers.