Reviews: Star Trek Legacy (X360)

Boldly goes part of the way, where no game has gone before.

As a self confessed fan of the series, I had been looking forward to this game for some time. The prospect of piloting the starships from all 3 eras got my geeky parts tingling. The game has received some mixed reviews, some good, others bad. Much like Star Trek itself, it divides opinion.

The basic premise of the game is to pilot a small fleet of Star Trek starships and complete a given mission. The game setup is similar many mission-based games, where you have both Primary and Secondary objectives that need to be balanced. Once on-route you will encounter various enemy ships and engage them in one on one combat or as a coordinated fleet.

The gameplay is very reminiscent of the home computer series “Elite” (Elite, Frontier, Close Encounters), where the combat is very much focused on manoeuvring your ship into the best position and then letting loose with everything you’ve got; then making a turn, and doing the same again. Much like naval combat, it is fairly tactical and slow paced; “X-wing-vs-Tie-Fighter” it is not. I really loved the Elite series, so I find this style of gameplay quite familiar and enjoyable. It also represents the style of combat found in the series and films: think of Wrath of Khan and the fight in the Nebula and you get the idea. For me, as a fan of both Trek and Elite, it works well and feels just right for these big interstellar ships.

The game, however, is not without some significant problems; most of which can be attributed to a lack of polish or a rushed delivery. These problems don’t ruin the game, but they are a little frustrating:

Beware; the difficulty curve is very steep. You’ll probably struggle with completing the missions quite early on in the game. The tutorial feature in the game doesn’t really help much, and you have to persevere a little. The missions are also quite unforgiving: You might fail a mission 20 minutes in and have to replay the whole thing again.

Another problem is the dodgy physics. Your ship will bounce off other ships, objects and even planets! It is a shame, as this could have been implemented using some kind of collision damage or other form of avoidance rather than a lame “bounce-off” effect. The planets are also woefully out of scale: When you fly close they just become big balloons in space. Again, it is a shame that some method of obtaining orbit or scaling the object wasn’t employed; even just having the planets in the background would have been better.

The graphics range from quite brilliant to a bit naff. The ship models, textures, and backgrounds are outstanding. You really feel like you are controlling the ships from the series. As a fan it almost brings tears to your eyes. Unfortunately, when the ships break apart they do so in an N64 style. They basically fall apart, into a half dozen chunks, like a neatly sliced sponge cake, and then fizzle away. It looks so cheap compared to the amazing model itself. There are no significant smoke or particle effects. The impression is of a product that was rushed to market. You feel “Legacy 2” would have all the graphical effects to match the stunning ship models.

The sound effects in “Legacy” are spot on, with satisfying phaser and torpedo effects. The voice acting is OK. It is not up to the Oblivion standards, but it is nice to hear the real captains speak. The music is genuinely Star Trek-esque, with some nice orchestral melodies to accompany the scale of the battles.

The game itself is quite lengthy and is good value for money if you like Trek. A slightly tacked on, but functional, multi-player extends “Legacy’s” life further, but I expect it is one for fans only. The achievement points seem fairly distributed and attainable, although the high difficulty may make some of them very tough indeed.

In Summary, Star Trek Legacy is a competent tactical space combat game played with large, heavily armed, starships that have big turning circles. If you like Star Trek and you have always wanted to play a game that featured the ships, then “Legacy” is fun enough to warrant a purchase despite its flaws. If you are not fussed about Star Trek and hated games like Elite, then you might want to give Legacy a wide birth. My hope is that any “Legacy 2” game fixes the flaws and will give the fans the complete package that they richly deserve.

6/10

5/10 - if you don't like Star Trek.