TREKCORE > GAMING > STAR TREK ONLINE > DESIGNER DIARY > Development Update

PUBLISHED: September 29, 2005
AUTHOR: Daron Stinnett

It's been a busy month and I'd like to give everyone a brief update on our progress:

* We're growing! STO now has 10 team members with recent additions including: Ira (Character TD), Eric (Systems Designer), Todd (Server Lead), Lorien (Production Assistant), Jesse (Level Designer), with more new additions coming soon. And we've recently moved into a great new office space that the STO team will call home. I should also mention that we're looking to fill a Reference Artist position. It is an entry-level position and a great opportunity to get into the business. I suspect there are a few of you in the community that know someone who could be our expert at compiling and cataloging Star Trek visual reference material from the web and other sources. Please see the Perpetual website for more information.

* Glen and Eric have been hammering through a lot of major design issues. You've seen the result of some of their work with Eric's recent economy post. Other significant accomplishments include ground and space combat designs. I'm really pleased with their results and I expect that we'll be revealing more about these systems in the next few months. One particular challenge was how to translate the traditional Star Trek roles (aka player classes) into meaningful roles for an MMORPG. They came up with a great system that will allow for a lot of variety with the ability for players to specialize within a few selected departments. The issue of player classes was a good example of where the mechanics of the series doesn't quite align with the good game design. I'm really pleased with how they've solved this dilemma for great gameplay without compromising the spirit of Star Trek.

* Ian is making great progress on our client engine and we're starting to see early examples of our real-time graphics. My short remark here doesn't begin to pay tribute to the significance of this piece of progress. We should be flying a camera around some sample interiors soon and having a character walking around is not too far off either.

* Ken and Ira have been playing around with ship interior construction techniques and most importantly, determining interior space proportions that both feel right and are 3rd person camera friendly. This is a tough issue and I can't say we've figured it out yet. But we're making progress.

* The design team is busy mapping out the interior of a Galaxy class starship as our first test of how we'll design a major hub. The challenge is to create a space that serves all the necessary functions of an MMO, is intuitive to navigate, consistent with canon, and offers the chance to see referenced, but never before seen places on the ship. It is amazing to me that we have the honor of being the first to create a functioning starship that will go far beyond even the movies and shows in realizing the true nature of these moving cities.

That's it for the quick update. We'll be rolling out some more new information and images soon.

Daron Stinnett - Executive Producer