Recent reviews by Electrospeed

I'm not even halfway through and this may be the sickest game ever created.

The 7 hours I do have were years ago, as of today it crashes constantly, I'm unable to play at all.

never before have i enjoyed something that im so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ bad at

my computer crashed opening the store page 10/10

If you enjoy playing games, you will probably enjoy this one. Just be prepared to die... a LOT!

If you need a 1-4 local player party game, this is the game for you. Not only is the game incredibly easy to get into, but it actually has a fairly high skill ceiling, meaning there are dozens of different ways to win a round and no round plays the same.

10/10 best quacking simulator in existence

Just for context, I played well over 300 hours of this game years back, when it was a relatively unknown, Pay-2-Play game, but got into shooters, and just a few weeks ago saw that it was on Steam. This review will be for the game in its state right now.

Graphics
Phenomenal. There is not an MMORPG that I've played with better visuals. Space combat is extremely visually pleasing. Different beam weapons have different looks (and sounds!), and each looks amazing. Torpedoes, cannons, and beam weapons all have their own amazing special effects. Not to mention, the ships are detailed, and reflections are realistic. Ships are varied, customization (covered below) has depth, and all lighting/shadow quality is top-notch. Ground characters are very detailed, with each character potentially looking completely different from the last (see customization for more detail). Textures, while not modern AAA quality, are high-quality, especially for such a large game. Easily the best looking MMO I've played


Gameplay
Gameplay is for the most part fun. Combat can be grindy at times, but it is an MMORPG, after all. Space combat is fun, controls are responsive and easy to learn (basically hold both mouse buttons to guide your ship and spam the spacebar to fire your weapons), and defeating enemies can pose a great challenge, but not too difficult to be impossible, lending a great sense of accomplishment at the end of a long, intense battle. Ground combat is lackluster, but manageable. The ground levels are sometimes quite large, but the game discourages exploration, in favor of more linear levels (which are sometimes not that linear), with set objectives you have to reach (go to X, defeat Y amount of enemies, etc.) but for the most part, it is doable. Generally, story missions are pretty funneled, so while the map may be large, much of it is inaccessable, and simply put there for the visuals, which is not a bad thing, as the ground visuals are, at times, gorgeous. It is an MMO, so something with programmable macros is recommended, though it's still very much playable with a standard 3-button mouse and QWERTY keyboard.


Story
Story is somewhat disinteresting, mostly due to the fact that any communication to the player is made through text (they've got voice actors for the newer episodes, so it becomes a little better in the later stages of the game). The gameplay style is at odds with much of the story, though, because most of the gameplay involves taking out enemies, when the game tries to push something a bit deeper, it just comes off as boring, though that might be my attention span at work. There's a fantastic little storyline in Drozana Station, which involves time-travel, that I found quite interesting, though, as well as a spook level, complete with maniacal laughs, and creepy poems, so that part was cool.

The new(-ish) story, surrounding Romulus and the Romulan faction (now playable!) is fantastic as well. I don't want to give any spoilers, but if you're looking for story, start out with a Romulan character. You won't be disappointed.

Customization
Extremely versatile. One of the most in-depth customizers I've seen in terms of characters, and the only customizer I've seen for vehicles in an MMO. For characters, you can choose a race (i.e. Human, Betazoid, Vulcan, etc.) or Alien, which pretty much means "go wild." You can spend half an hour perfectly tuning the decals on your Klingon-Vulcan cross's forhead, and then you hit "Body" and it starts all over again. You can tune brow protrusion, eye width/depth/spacing/size/color, jaw width/height, and much more, and on the body, there are just as many options for leg or arm scaling, body shape and size, and yes, even breast size (hehehehe). After that, you choose the uniform for your character. You can stick with the classic uniforms (though TOS uniforms are pay-only), or go with the new uniforms created for the game, all of which offer tons of customizability and options. You can pretty much choose any color scheme for your character. There are uniform packs, such as classic uniforms (Enterprise Mirror Universe uniforms) or uniforms for specific characters (Seven of Nine or T'Pol, for instance). It's very easy to get lost in the customizer for lengthy amounts of time.

Canon
As you should be expecting, this, while still maintaining the storyline from the TV series and movies, does contain quite a bit of original story, but it isn't half-bad. A lot of it is focused around war, the main gameplay element being combat, after all, and in the later game focuses on the Borg and Undine, which makes for some cool missions. It's not nearly as off-canon as JJ Abrams' Star Trek, but it's unique enough to be interesting.

Pay
Do not listen to anybody who says that this game is "Pay 2 Win" because it isn't. Here's what happens:

Get a free ship.
Advance to level 10
Get another free ship.
Advance to level 20
Get another free ship.

etc. through level 50. The end-game ships are not given to you, but the last ship you get (at 45 I believe) is still very competitive. Each ship is better than the last. Customization options are taken from three variants of the same ship, which you can pick and choose which parts to keep and which to change (i.e. Nacelle's from a Cheyanne class, but Saucer from the Dakota class). Paying, though, does not let you skip the grind to 50, which I think is absolutely amazing of them. When you do pay (which you will, if you like Star Trek enough) you will be rewarded with ships of previous levels with upgrades to make them competitive with newer ships, as well as some with fun gimmicks (like a Galaxy class that will separate into two sections) and they aren't very expensive at all. In the end, you're supposed to spend money, just because you want that one ship so badly, and it looks so cool.

Economy
In-game currencies are plentiful. There are different currencies which can be used to buy specific items, or there's an Exchange, which allows players to sell obtained items for Energy Credits, which are the main currency. Loot drops are VERY common, and you can get very good items from those loot drops, and the best part is, those loot drops didn't cost you anything, so if you don't need them, you can either discard them for some energy credits, or try to maximize your profit on the Exchange, and either way, you'll be making money.

Also, yes, there is a method of exchanging in-game currency, for paid currency, though the rate isn't favorable (which you shouldn't expect it to be), but it's there.



Overall, I'd give this game a solid 8/10. Very appealing visuals, combined with a good F2P model and okay storyline make this a great game for trekkies and general sci-fi fans alike.

Quite a fun game for killing time. I've got my library family shared, and my little brothers are loving it. Graphics are great (and easy to run, great for family laptop gaming), boards are varied, and the best part about it? It's just straight pinball, no gimmicks at all. Just start 'er up and play!

I want to start this off by saying I've played this game for well over two years, before it was launched, and when it used to be called Ghost Recon Online. I have a TON of gear accumulated, I have a TON of experience, and I know the game pretty thouroughly.

The recent patch (1.2.4) added in several cool features, all but one of which were requested by the community. The features are somewhat important, but not as important as the seeming turnaround of the developers listening to the community and coding their requests. Previously, there was (and still is) almost zero communication between the devs and the players, outside of the Community Managers/Game Masters/ATHENA Council (a team of community volunteers whose purpose is to relay community opinions and provide feedback on changes, and which I was a part of for about 9 months), but almost every change until now was not made due to community request, but rather to developer vision. The changes were mostly made to make the game more accessible, as before, the game had a very, very high skill curve. It still does have a high skill curve, but is now much easier to get into.

Is this game Pay-2-Win? I don't like the term, but for what it is, yes, it is Pay-2-Win, however, some people seem to think that the terms Pay-2-Win and Free-2-Play are mutually exclusive, and they're not. This game is as free as it gets. You can get gear in somewhat reasonable amounts of time without paying. The game gives you like 150,000 AC (in-game currency) while you level up each class to level 10. There's a queue made SOLELY for beginners. If it's difficult to get into the game, and you find yourself crying "P2W!!!" before you've put even 10 hours into it, this game is just not for you.

The gunplay can still be amazing, with a good team, you can get incredible amounts of coordination going in order to push onto the point and recapture it at the last second. The mechanics are solid, the cover system is ABSOLUTELY INCREDIBLE. It is literally the best cover system I have EVER seen. It's snappy and responsive, not dull and clunky like most games. And the best part is, if you get to know the game well enough, players that are entrenched in cover become easier and easier to take out. If you get to know the game even better, you can stay entrenched in cover, and beat back entire waves of enemies.

Gun balance is okay-ish. The guns are balanced against similar tiers, and not against higher tiers. This would not be a problem, except that power creep is starting to show itself now that the new Tier 9 (which is Tier 11 in the grand scheme of things) has come out, and matchmaking can be horrendous at times, but for the most part, guns have one specific advantage, and are easily defeated when they're out of their comfort zone. And SMG will 99% of the time take down an LMG in CQC, but it will go the other way at 70+ meters.

Like I stated in the paragraph above, matchmaking can be terrible, putting much higher skilled/geared players in matches with lower skilled/geared players. I am a General 5 (highest rank) and I will sometimes get put with Captains and Majors (lowest two ranks in main matchmaking). These matches are fun for nobody, including me, and I generally just sit back and try to provide support while using lower tier guns. However, in this new patch (1.2.4), they've added Private Matches, WHICH IS PHENOMENAL. We just had a community driven private match event last night, and it was the most fun I've had playing this game in a year. Getting with a whole bunch of your buddies and playing this game is just absolutely awesome. This is one of the community requested features that has been wanted for the longest time, and it's finally here, and it pays off.

I think the best part about this game is that no content is money-only. By content, I mean no game-modes, no maps, no devices, no weapons, and almost no armors. There's no "exclusive map-pack DLC" or anything like that. They are starting to put in more and more cosmetic options that are money only, and fewer things that have an impact in game. In the new patch (1.2.4) they finally added an armor camo system, to go along with the weapon camo system. Yes, these are cash-only, but actually, there are monthly events which reward a small amount of in-game cash. Yes, it would take two months of completing each of the three objectives, but you don't have to wait to get a camo to spend it. You can spend it on grenades, or XP/AC boosts (which I would recommend).

All in all, you will love this game, if the game is for you.