In part, I admit, because I really want to continue Kitsune & Kawaii, as that was just getting started and I had several more episodes half-done. I want to continue her adventures, and see who she turns into.

So, into the black again…hopefully as not such a terrible noob this time. :)

For a while there, you got the occasional tribble that would buff you.  I wasn’t lucky enough to get one, so I decided to start breeding tribbles in my bank.

You see, tribbles + food = more tribbles. It’s the only use I ever found for the disgusting alien food that you pick up along the way (snail steaks, blood pie, etc.), so it’s a win-win situation. I had lots of bank space, so I piled some tribbles and tons of food. A few days later: a metric buttload of tribbles!  Tons of tribbles in every conceivable colour, a veritable passion pit of headless furry animals.

Unfortunately, none of the tribbles are the buff tribbles. They’re all normal tribbles, of use to no one.

I’ve tried giving them away in front of the station canteen – I piled them in a box that said “Free Tribbles! Take One! Take Two!” but nothing happened except for some joker throwing some food in there. You guessed it…more tribbles.

Anyone want a tribble?

In Star Trek Online I had a really nicely-done questline today, which truly felt like the original show and the City on the Edge of Forever episdode. The guardian’s voice, the time travel, going back in time to help Spock – it made me feel quite nostalgic.  Lovely, simply lovely – even though I actually had to run through it twice in order to actually receive the quest reward. (I took the engine, but I was sooo tempted by those blue shields…)

Sometimes the IP really works for immersion in the game, rather than restricting gameplay. This was perfect.

I finally hit level 11 last night (friends and fleetmates are now some unimaginable level, like 220. Ok, what is it Raz – 21? 22? *sigh*) Anyway, green-eyed monster aside (just kidding), I reached the point where I could claim a shiny new science ship and a lot of new toys.

I do miss the gorgeousness of the ships in EVE. It’s part of the reason I played Amarr, even though they do have a stick-up-the-wazoo racial that isn’t pleasant. Their ships are rich, shaped like birds of prey or marine animals done in gold and bronze. Lovely. I suppose STO ships are an inevitable consequence of the way that a strict IP will limit design. But anyway, I do love my new Lollipop.

The servers have been very stable since launch, which I very much didn’t expect from the headstart problems. Some of the Genesis missions are still bugged. Overall, however, it’s going very smoothly. I’m liking it. :)

Hmph. Well, on the bright side, I have played a lot of Warcraft this weekend. Cryptic is staying mum on what the problem actually is, and that is disappointing. I hadn’t realised until I played Aion how much really terrible customer service affects my enjoyment of a game. I got the feeling that NCSoft cared nothing for their players, and respected them not at all, and Cryptic is going the same way.

That said, if I worked for them I would hate and despise every one of the players who are currently venting on the forums. The threads about the servers being down go on for hundreds of pages. And you wonder WHY I’m antisocial?  Why I hate grouping with people I don’t know? People are horrible, immature and mean.

But you know…I agree with one thing. It would have been nice to actually play this weekend.  :(

]]> http://www.ravven.com/blog/2010/01/servers-down/feed/ 1 http://www.ravven.com/blog/2010/01/star-trek-online-headstart/ http://www.ravven.com/blog/2010/01/star-trek-online-headstart/#comments Sat, 30 Jan 2010 10:52:51 +0000 Ravven http://www.ravven.com/blog/?p=2238 The first night of headstart went quite smoothly, aside from some initial hiccups where people couldn’t authenticate. This morning it’s been a bit unstable, with a lot of rubber banding, missing crew members, and so on. They’re bringing the servers down now for maintenance. Overall, a very smooth launch (I do realise that I’ve probably just jinxed it).

Initial thoughts:

• Being able to take a screenshot of your beta character and then apply all of those options to your new character is wonderful – what a great feature. I’d created an alien character that I quite liked the look of, and you can never successfully re-create those exact features a second time. So being able to load all the options that I wanted from a screenshot was wonderful.
• Turn off general chat, people are idiots. One of the first things that I did was create a new chat channel that had all the same options, except general chat was turned off.
• I’m really hating the “go back to WoW” fanbois. This isn’t specifically a Star Trek problem, of course – it was actually a lot worse in Aion. But every time someone points out a feature that is currently bugged, or makes any criticism of a new game, you always have tons of idiots chorusing “go back to Wow, noob”. As if that was easier than this one, which so far is extremely easy and new-player-friendly.
• Being dumped in groups with people is quite uncomfortable. I very much liked the public quest feature from Warhammer, and thought that STO would work like that. But this is like a LFG tool that dumps you in small groups without warning (unless you change your settings). I would have preferred something less personal. Remember, I’m a real antisocial type.  :)
• As rabid a Firefly fan as I am, I wouldn’t be caught dead with the name Mal, flying in Serenity. Not in a million years.  I like my good ship, the USS Lollipop.  lol…

Hmmph. I started some missions on my newly-created Klingon, Kitsunetsuki, and was promptly slaughtered. Several times. Is it my imagination, or are the starting ships and equipment on Klingon side totally gimped?

Maybe I just fail.

Anyway, I have logged off in a snit. :D

On the other side, there was a very cool planet mission, on a planet with constant dust-storms. Visibility was almost nil, and there was a great feeling of nervousness…I felt as though I was going to fall off a cliff, or get attacked by something bad-tempered, at any moment. Great stuff.

Oh, and Raz? You TOTALLY need to stick with EVE for a bit. I’ve always thought that you would really like it. It’s worth sticking with during the learning curve.

The game is fun, and it will be something that I’ll enjoy – especially since pvp is supposed to be great fun. Will it be a main MMO? No, I’m pretty sure that it won’t – but it will be a nice change. In the limited time that I’ve been allowed to actually play, it hasn’t felt as much like a universe as EVE does…and that bothers me a bit. As inpenetrable as EVE can be (figuring out for yourself the right kit to train for and buy – even down to the type of ammo to use and when, it’s quite difficult to get a grasp of what choices you should be making), it still feels like a real place. As nice as the interiors and ships are in STO, at the moment it doesn’t – and that is what I play for, the total immersion in an environment.

Part of that is the multitude of loading screens. Especially when there is a lot of lag, you seem to spend a good portion of your gametime staring at loading screens. Games with high levels of instancing, that have very slow loading screens, tend to really bother me. Again, it’s an issue of immersion and feeling that you are in a real, seamless environment.

But this is very early days, and I know I haven’t been able to play much with the servers being up and down like a bride’s nightie (such lovely expressions they have here in the UK!). So I will cross my fingers and hope to be able to spend some serious time in my starship this weekend.