Boldly going where no Keen has gone before…

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… at a whopping 240kb/s! I’m downloading Star Trek Online’s open beta client right now and it’s going to take about six more hours. I snagged a key during the Massively.com giveaway instead of pre-ordering the game.

Graev and I will both be playing tonight if this download finishes. We plan to play from a Ferengi perspective, even if the Ferengi remain out of the Open beta (they were apparently in Closed Beta). We plan to roleplay it up big time.

Remember the 218th Rules of Acquisition: Always know what you’re buying.

We’ll let you know our first impressions of the game tonight and follow it up with more detailed analyses tomorrow.

  • Even if my install was finished, I don’t think I could play right now since people seem to be not even able to log on at this time because of the server load.

    This was to be expected I suppose 😛

  • Good luck Keen, keep us posted. I’ll be interested to hear if STO is actually worth the effort.

  • Hope you guys enjoy it as much as I have. Also they are adding two more factions 🙂 Look on their website under factions to find out which ones!

  • Prepare to brace for ‘map is not accepting login because it is full’! 🙂

    Apparently there are things named as “Ferengi Tatoo” in character creator – I found them when I was creating my own species via ‘Unknown’ race choice. I think one might try to create a Ferengi character via this option.

  • Really on the NDA for GA? I haven’t bothered to check for one. They are letting anyone with a pre-order in, so I would have thought the NDA was down. Either way, I won’t comment on it to be safe for your site.

    I’m pulling at about 200k /s from the STO torrent. Not that great. Maybe I’ll look at it tomorrow.

  • just starting to DL now. So i figure after the download completes in 4 days, it patches for 2 more days, and the servers come back up ill have about 3 minutes to make a character before OB is over……

  • …230kb/s is slow for you guys? Wow… I’m at 340kb/s cap here and things download so fast already. I guess I just don’t know better huh…

  • It’s not very stable (but who can expect stable for an MMO pre-launch…even immediately post-launch) but it’s veerryy pretty and if you grew up on ST (as I did) you’ll be nerding out the whole time. It’s pretty fun.

    If you get that annoying Map is Full bug, move your ship a good bit before you try to warp again, log in and out once or twice…be persistent and…bring a book 😉 The load times need work.

  • @Russel

    I see a Romulan logo on the faction page.

    Mark my words,

    Me on the birdge of a D’deridex warbird

    Been playing STO for the past hour, space combat is fun and fluid. Cant wait to have a more capable ship with skilled officers.

    nerdgasm

  • Agree with @thade – if you take your time, move some (I had my best luck when I moved away from Earth station), you CAN play the game a little. That said, I had the hardest time getting my first toon into the intro, and MUCH better luck loading in afterwards. The game MIGHT just be playable- it’ll be interesting to see how much the opening day patch will improve things.

    @keen – Are you downloading via a torrent, or using the launcher?

  • Note: if you’re someone who hates the use of instancing to separate modes of play, STO will probably drive you crazy. If, like me, you like the use of instancing for story-driving purposes, STO will feel very comfortable.

  • Servers are down as of 7PM PST. ETA 1-2 hours

    Once i was logged, everything ran smooth. But when i changed mode it “loads” and then i would get kick.

    First night of open beta, ive seen worse. At least when i played everything was fine and gave me a good experience. One i cant wait to continue 😛

  • 9:30 CST, my launcher is downloading a new, 148mb patch. Not sure if servers will be up after, but.. 🙂

  • I can tell you really want this game to be good by the way you have been aggressively down-playing its likelihood to succeed in your blog, kind of like someone psyching themselves down for a blind date. I hope it turns out to be a lot of fun!

  • A friend hooked me up with a faster download ;). Download will be done in 15 minutes.

    Personally, I don’t like the instancing stuff at all. I despise it. Yet I am one of the biggest Star Trek fanboys out there. I’ve spent the past 2 years doing nothing but watching TNG, DS9, and Voyager over and over. We watch 2-3 episodes a night.

    Should be interesting to see how the blending of game mechanics I dislike with an IP I love affects the overall experience for me.

  • Well, that patch worked. Things are SURPRISINGLY faster than before, maybe because I was in full out beta mode and a-ok with the overall crappitude. 🙂

  • Arrrgrglrglrglrglrgrl!

    A 2 gig patch. Not going to get this done tonight. Impressions will have to wait until tomorrow.

  • Wow.. this new patch at 10pm east really changed everything for me. Everything is sweetttt lagless and i just got out of my first open group fleet battle. OMG. sweet. First guy that went in rambo style got destroyed in like 10sec.. we were like uh ok.. lets work together guys. You cant solo an Orion fleet 😛

    oh man.. 1am. its gonna be a long work day tomorrow. cant wait to continue that patrol mission.

  • I managed to get it at over 2MB/s from my ISP server, took about an hour =D. Patching it now but it’s a lot slower.

  • I like the instancing in STO. Star Trek is pretty much a solo experience in the shows after all.

    You’re not forced to solo and can use the automatic teaming feature. That sorta takes away from the instanced feeling.

  • Based on Tobolds review I’m really pessimistic about STO right now. Interested to hear how the Star Trek fanboys feel about it.

  • I played in the closed beta for a while, but I was pretty disappointed with STO. The only thing I did like is space combat, and that is mostly because it reminded me of Starfleet Command. Other than that… zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

  • Yeah the Tobold’s review is fairly damning. I also pulled this from a reader’s comment:

    “There is a recent Cryptic Studios interview that descibes ST Online will be following the Champions Online template. That tells me triple dipping for money, buy the box, pay a monthly fee and purchase items in game. Purchasing in game items will not come out for two months into release.”

    Can anyone substantiate this?

  • @ vp: that seems to depend on who answers you. I have played both and they didn’t feel or seem alike to me at all aside from having a global chat, rigorous character customization, and instancing. Gameplay wise they feel like very different games, like Turbine’s DDO and LOTRO.

  • @vp: Yeah I would totally agree with Random here, the two games are nothing alike.

    Also as for these instances. I too HATE instances but the way it’s done in STO makes sense to me. Why? Because you are warping all over the place and beaming up or down here and there. How else would you do that if not for some type of a transfer? I can’t quite put my finger on it but it really does not bother me here.

    How they have the star bases instanced in certain areas annoys the &*#^(^@!! out of me but I think that is because of the graphics and the customized characters….too much lag I guess.

  • Review: Space=TOP, Ground=FLOP. And the game is still in some kind of alpha state. Quite sad, the game has potential and the “open group” feature is a very nice way of grouping/group finding.