Star Trek Generations (game)

Real world article
(written from a Production point of view)

Star Trek Generations
Publisher:	MicroProse
Developer:	MicroProse
Released:	20 May 1997
Stardate:	48650.1 (2371)
Platform(s):
System Requirements:	IBM PC 90MHz Pentium compatible or faster, 16MB RAM, 4×CD-ROM drive, Hard drive (75MB free), High color graphics for 640 × 480 × 16-bit color (2MB video RAM minimum and must be compatible with DirectX), Mouse, DirectX-compatible sound card
Rating(s):
Reference #:	ASIN B0002SDZ3E (US) ASIN B001G3Q62Q (UK) ASIN B000Y35GZ2 (Germany)

Star Trek Generations is a first person shooter with adventure game and strategy game elements by MicroProse, based on Star Trek Generations, the seventh film in the Star Trek film franchise.

Story

The plot basically is the same as the film: Captain Jean-Luc Picard and the crew of the USS Enterprise-D discover the ruins of the Amargosa observatory and send Riker down to investigate.

Once there, he finds Dr. Tolian Soran, an El-Aurian scientist and madman bent on returning to the Nexus, a paradise dimension. Unlike in the film, the Amargosa system can be saved by forcing Soran to transport [presumably] to the Q'Urash (a nearby Klingon Bird-of-Prey) and diverting the weapon to either a planet, the Enterprise or deep space. If the player does not figure out how to redirect the weapon, the Amargosa sun will be destroyed.

Soran easily escapes aboard the Q'Urash and the Enterprise goes on various missions to try and find him. To achieve returning to the Nexus, Soran intends on destroying stars in order to cause the Nexus (due to loss of the stars' gravity) to pass through Veridian III. Throughout the game, Soran will continuously attempt to destroy one of three stars: Amargosa, Bersus, and Galorndon Core. Soran can destroy any of these stars should the player fail to divert or disable his weapon.

Throughout the game, the Enterprise crew can also stop Soran from building another weapon. He will travel to various other planets in an attempt to create trilithium from various natural resources. Soran will journey to an ancient mining facility on Arvada II, a secret renegade Klingon outpost on Halee II, Antilios I (which is actually a living entity), and a Chodak outpost on Epsion II to synthesize trilithium. He will also try to gather trilithium in other systems, while on board a ship. The Enterprise can engage Soran's ship, along with whatever other ships are with him. By forcing him to retreat, it delays him from getting the amount of trilithium necessary for one of his weapons.

Other space battles can occur after he has gained the trilithium, and is either preparing to head to the location of a star to destroy it, or is planning to destroy the star in the system he is in. By stopping him in these battles, it delays his attempts to destroy the star. If he is delayed long enough from destroying a system, whether it's from stopping his attempts to destroy the star, or if it's from preventing him from getting the trilithium, the energy ribbon reaches a point where the destruction of the star won't affect its path, thus forcing Soran to seek out other stars that will cause the necessary effect on the ribbon's path.

Even though Soran can use a ship to destroy a star, he will only ever destroy the Amargosa star from space (and Bersus, provided that certain conditions are met). His launch sites for Amargosa are the Observatory, and the Q'Urash (Certain conditions must be met for the Q'Urash attempt to happen). He targets the other stars from a planet in the system, his launch sites being an island on Bersus V, the weapons cluster of a hidden Romulan base on Galorndon Core II, and a mountain top on Veridian III.

Eventually, Picard will come up with the theory that Soran is planning to guide the Nexus to a specific planet. By simulating the destruction of the three stars that Soran has already tried to destroy, it shows the Nexus path passing near the Veridian system. By adding in the destruction of the Veridian star, it is discovered that the energy ribbon will intersect Veridian III. The game ends in one of two ways:

• If the Enterprise delays Soran from gathering enough trilithium for the Veridian III missile, Soran will become desperate enough to gather a fleet at the Veridian system. He will be on a Vor'cha-class attack cruiser escorted by another cruiser, three Chodak dreadnoughts, three Romulan Warbirds and three Birds-of-Prey. If Soran's Vor'cha is disabled (which is very difficult to achieve), the fleet will disperse. Picard hails Soran and tells him to prepare for boarding. Before action can be taken however, Soran activates a self-destruct sequence that destroys himself and the ship. The Enterprise then proceeds to a nearby starbase for repairs.

• The other ending plays out as an extended version of the canonical ending, and will also occur if the Enterprise fails to disperse the fleet at Veridian (provided the Enterprise retreats and isn't destroyed). After Soran's probe on Veridian III is destroyed, thanks to both Picard and Kirk, Soran will transport to the stardrive section of the Enterprise. He causes a warp core breach, thus forcing Riker to separate the ship in order to protect the crew. Picard then follows him (Kirk is already dead). Soran seals himself inside the torpedo bay, and manually prepares to fire a torpedo into the Veridian sun. Before doing so, he launches a few torpedoes at the saucer section, forcing it to crash land on Veridian III. To stop him, the captain of the Enterprise focuses all the deflector shield power to where the torpedo launcher is. He then returns to the torpedo bay and gives Soran a chance to surrender. Soran of course refuses, and Picard watches as Soran tries to launch the torpedo. The torpedo bounces off the overpowered deflector shield and destroys the room Soran is in, killing him. Picard then makes his way to an escape pod. Seconds after the pod clears the ship, the warp core breach destroys the Enterprise stardrive section.

Apart from being based on the original film, the game is also a semi-sequel to Star Trek: The Next Generation - A Final Unity, since the non-canonical aliens from that game, the Chodak, make an appearance.

Gameplay

The game tries to combine many computer game genres in one, not distancing from the main non-linear philosophy of alternate paths to complete the game, followed in other Star Trek games.

The major portion of the game occurs in a Systems Holomap (also appearing in the movie, although only for some minutes) where the player plans their next moves, the main opponents being time and Soran. This part of the game includes the strategic part where the player has to calculate and guess where Soran could be, in order to travel there and stop him. If the player fails to find the system in a certain time frame, the game will automatically destroy the system. In order to work out what system/planet Soran is on, the Enterprise crew will give the player hints. In some circumstances, intercepted transmissions from Soran will also reveal the location of his weapon or synthesis station.

The main gameplay is when a crew member beams to a planet or space station where the game switches to first-person action/adventure. The main objective of every away mission is finding and fighting with Soran, who beams seconds before being killed by the player. Depending on the mission itself, the player will have completed the mission with just beating Soran, or they will have to also stop Soran's weapon to complete the mission. However, not all away missions need to be beaten to win the game. Should Soran succeed in destroying two systems, the Enterprise is called off the mission and the game ends.

Some enemy ships can also be encountered while in space. The game then switches to pure tactical/simulator where the player will control the Enterprise against the enemy ship(s). The fighting system is simplified and improved over the extremely difficult tactical part of A Final Unity.

Bugs

• On the planet organism, Antilios I, when Dr. Crusher makes a remark about an orifice being "smaller than a Jefferies tube", while the player needs to get through this orifice, a bug in the game's programming makes it impossible. The bug is caused by the speed of a modern CPU, which is much faster than CPUs of 1997. Using a program to slow down the CPU makes it possible to get through the hole, by holding the up arrow key and the crouch key while jumping over and over.

Voice cast

• LeVar Burton as Lieutenant Commander Geordi La Forge
• James Doohan as Montgomery Scott
• Michael Dorn as Lieutenant Worf
• Jonathan Frakes as Commander William T. Riker
• Walter Koenig as Pavel Chekov
• Malcolm McDowell as Tolian Soran
• Gates McFadden as Doctor Beverly Crusher
• William Shatner as James T. Kirk
• Marina Sirtis as Counselor Deanna Troi
• Brent Spiner as Lieutenant Commander Data
• Patrick Stewart as Captain Jean-Luc Picard
• Majel Barrett as voice of the USS Enterprise computer
• Thomas E. Benkert as Klingon / Romulan computer
• Ivor Biggun as Engineer #2
• Dave Henry as Engineer #1 / Klingon computer / Romulan
• Bill Krauss as Chodak computer / Chodak / Klingon enemy / Romulan centurion
• Michael Mancuso as Scientist
• Lani Minella as Amargosa computer / Arvada Computer / B'Etor / Cmdr. Tala / Henchman / Lursa
• Paul Mogg as Romulan guard
• Suzanne Onodera as Chodak computer
• Jason Rossilli as Romulan
• Sylvie Schmid as Admiral / Female Klingon enemy / Romulan guard/ Klingon voice
• Andy Valvur as Klingon / Romulan / Romulan prisoner / Scientist
• Kip Welch as Klingon
• Erin Whitcomb as Narrator
• Joseph White as Chodak controller / Soran's launcher

Additional cast

• Pauline Olsen as Starfleet security
• Dan Young as Klingon #2

Crew

• Simon Ffinch – Director / Producer / Production Designer / Co-Writer
• Charles L. Hughes – Production Designer
• Guymond Louie – Director
• David McGrath – Art Department Artist
• Suzanne Onodera – Art Department Artist
• Erol Otus – Production Designer / Art Department Artist
• Rick Rosay – Director
• Jason Rossilli as Production Designer / Art Department Artist
• Naren Shankar – Co-Writer
• Dan Young – Co-Writer

External links

• Star Trek Generations at Memory Beta, the wiki for licensed Star Trek works
• Star Trek Generations at TrekCore