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Star Trek Armada II
By Jim "Twitch" TittleArticle Type: Interview
Article Date: November 08, 2001
A while back I reviewed the Activision’s real time strategy (RTS) game Star Trek Armada (STA). And since the world wasn’t awash in combat sims it was some diversion from careers and score keeping of historical simulations. It was simple: you kill every enemy to win. I had a good time with it. And that is what entertainment software is all about—it should entertain you.
The following for the game was huge with active fans sites too. One of the reasons is that STA is very simple to modify for those with that passion. Even if you don’t want to do that you can find literally hundreds of mods for the game at the fan sites.
Doug Pearson is the producer of Star Trek Armada II (STA2). I had some questions about the game that is scheduled to be released for the Christmas season 2001.
Jim Tittle: I reviewed the original STA and had so much fun I'm still playing it and making mods. Let's see what this next STA generation of RTS play will be like. STA2 should be in stores by November 2001, right?
Doug Pearson: We're anticipating that it will be on the shelves by the end of November .
The Enterprise
J.T. So along with Federation, Klingon, Romulan, and Borg we'll have playable Cardassian and Species 8274 as well, for a total of six now. What non-playable races will there be?
D.P. The only non-playable race that you'll encounter will be the Ferengi.
J.T. Will gameplay goals be generally the same as before: begin with limited resources, build ships and stations, acquire more resources and fight the enemy?
D.P. We've been able to broaden the gameplay goals even further with the introduction of a pretty deep trade/economics model. There are more types of resources available, the ability generate more resources through trading between trade stations that you create, and the ability to trade with allied players. The 'topography' of the game has changed, as well, with the addition of planets, new nebula types, etc., allowing the designers to add new goals and mission types to the three campaigns.
J.T. We had to mine dilithium in order to build things. Will that stay the same and how will latnium figure in as a currency i.e., how will the player obtain it?
D.P. As mentioned above, Star Trek: Armada 2 has a richer resources model with dilithium (primarily for ships), metal (primarily for stations), latinum (primarily for research and trade), bio-matter (used by Species 8472), and crew (from starbases and planets) all available to develop an economy strong enough to support a powerful armada.
Dilithium is mined from moons; metal is taken from planets via Orbital Processing Facilities; latinum is mined from Latinum Nebulae; bio-matter is converted by Species 8472 from the other forms of resources; crew is available from starbases (as in the first game) and now from planets, which can be colonized.
J.T. We know the Ferengi are there and with a neutral trade station with items that players can purchase with latnium. Will that include selling ships like used cars?
D.P. We've introduced Trading Stations to the game, and they serve multiple roles: building a trading station allows the player to buy and sell dilithium and metal for latinum, so resource management has that added capability. Also, a Trading Station will attract the Ferengi, who will automatically trade with the player, generating latinum for the player.
Allied players can send specific resources to one another via the cargo ships that can be sent between trading stations (so if your buddy gets hammered by an attack, you can send him a load of dilithium to help him get a new fleet started, for example). Placing down pairs of trading stations and sending cargo ships between them will generate latinum, as well. The farther apart they are, the more latinum they generate.
The trading is limited to resources so while you couldn't purchase a ship there, you could quickly trade for enough dilithium to start cranking ships out at your shipyard.
The Borg don't trade- they take!
By the way, the Borg and Species 8472 don't trade. Their style, of course, is just to take! To balance that, they are able to extract resources from moons, planets, and nebulae a bit more efficiently.
J.T. As it stands, how many ships and how many stations will each race have and how many are new?
D.P. The first game had 44 ships and 40 stations—STA2 has 93 ships (49 brand new) and 71 stations (31 brand new). It varies a little between races, but each race has 13 - 16 classes of ships and 13 types of station (with Species 8472 having 6 types of mobile organisms similar to stations). There are additional 'hero' variants of the ships as well, so that Martok, Picard, and the Borg Queen (whom you play in the single player campaigns) each have their own special ship.
J.T. How many weapons are there average per race and how many are new?
Romulans taking on Klingons
D.P. We've added nearly two-dozen brand new special weapons to the game, divided among the races—each race now has between 10 and 17 special weapons available to them. They look spectacular, too. Our artists did a great job on them!
J.T. Will any other race have multi-target weapons like the eight joinable Borg Cubes we've heard about?
D.P. We don't want to give it all away but there are some awesome multi-ship weapons available.
J.T. Fans have mentioned that some of STA's weapons were not really all that useful. Have the old weapons been re-assessed or improved and have any been deleted?
D.P. We've made sure that all the special weapons, whether new or from the first game, are useful. Since they can really make the difference between winning and losing, we've made them easy to use and powerful. A few from the first game were tweaked to make them more effective/more balanced, but none were cut.
J.T. Many fans have made ships able to launch "fighter" sized vessels. Will anything appear like that as "standard" in STA 2?
D.P. We don't feature any fighter-sized vessels. (Though the Cardassians do have a special weapon that will certainly irritate enemies in a similar fashion…)
J.T. The close-up tactical mode of STA 2 looked great at E3 in May this year but the normal combat mode looked no more detailed than before. I personally have no complaint with that but some do. Will graphics be better in the release version?
D.P. Since E3 (we hadn't even hit Alpha by then), the ships have all been polished and fully textured, the backgrounds redone, bump mapping added, etc. STA2 is looking fabulous now. Players of the first game will be pleasantly surprised, I believe!
J.T. Will a more powerful graphics board make any difference?
D.P. The game looks great now—and the better the resolution the more gorgeous it looks.
A sprearhead of Klingon ships
J.T. Have all the old ships, stations and objects been reworked visually?
D.P. Every ship from the first game has either been entirely redone (the Borg are all brand new) or retextured. We've also changed the nebulae, asteroids, backgrounds, starfields, and interface.
J.T. Planets will have shields and orbiting defense turrets. What part will colonizing planets now play since they were mostly just background graphics before?
D.P. Actually, we decided against orbiting defense turrets (though we do have orbiting metal processing facilities). Colonizing planets gives you a steady increase to your crew pool. Also, planets can be used strategically to defend bases since all warp-capable ships are forced out of warp when they enter a planet's 'gravitational well,' so building bases near planets prevents enemies from warping in and nailing you before you even know what's going on! Again, the artists did a great job. The planets rotate, and have moving atmospheres.
J.T. We know that ship formations will be highly adjustable and more three-dimensional. Hopefully they will move around objects easier. Was this accomplished by changing the floor and altitude of the combat map?
D.P. By adding depth to the map (approximately the height of four of the largest planets stacked one on top of another), we've eliminated the potential of having your fleet bottleneck in certain parts of maps. Also, the formations can spread out their firepower more effectively, be used to defend ships, allow more effective targeting of enemies, etc.
J.T. Will combat then have a bit more of a 3D air and function?
D.P. Absolutely. In fact, the entire game can be played in the Tactical Mode. Everything works in that mode. One of our favorite parts of the Star Trek shows and movies have always been the big battles and with the 3D Tactical Mode, we think we've captured that excitement! The difficulty we've had with some fully 3D games has come from the difficulty of navigating or battling in a full, free 3D mode. It's easy to get confused, or move ships into spots you hadn't wanted.
In STA2, we have a canonical North, South, East, and West on all the maps, and the limited height of the maps (we refer to it as a 'deep dish pizza box') keeps the advantages of 3D while not letting those sorts of problems crop up.
J.T. Damage effects have changed from STA to include ship and station breakups of their various components, which will ultimately dissipate so as not to clutter the screen. Will lesser damage be visible at least in tactical mode?
D.P. The damage modeling and improved explosions are new, but Tactical Mode doesn't feature special lesser damage.
J.T. Menu icons will be familiar but will there be any new menu buttons and what will they do?
D.P. As I mentioned earlier, we've redone the User Interface entirely with an all new look and feel, more screen real estate for the action, and new buttons for every feature. You'll see new ship and station buttons, new special weapons buttons, new resource displays, new system-damage models, ship displays, new commands—all with a new, more polished look.
J.T. What differences will the campaign mode have in STA2 over STA?
D.P. We've got more missions: 30 missions spread over three campaigns (as opposed to just 20 missions in STA), with a deeper, more compelling story arc. Additionally, all the new features (new resources, new races, new ship types, new stations, new planets, etc.) have really let our designers put together a wider spectrum of mission types that bring the story to life.
One of our goals with STA2 was to really differentiate the races. And with the new ships, special weapons, resource model, etc., we've done that. You get a different experience playing as the Borg than you do as the Klingons, the Federation play much differently than Species 8472, the Cardassian have different strengths than the Romulans. In the single player campaigns, you really feel this. Each of the campaigns plays with a different tone (first as the Federation, then Klingon, and finally Borg). Again, this has let our designers take the individual missions into new territories.
J.T. Will the player be able to now save single games they are playing against the AI as they can in campaign mode?
D.P. Yes they will!
J.T. We assume eight players can still battle via modem. Will anything in modem play be new or different?
Romulans hitting Klingon ship
D.P. Our plans are to support up to eight players via LAN, and we're teaming with GameSpy Arcade to provide a matchmaking service on the 'net. We've got over 30 new multiplayer maps, including several new game types—Capture the Flag, Collect Latinum, Colonize Planets, Defend Planets, and Assault—in addition to the standard multiplayer team and alliance games.
J.T. We know you and your team read the fan site message boards after STA kept going and going and going. Will some of the fans' wish list stuff be in STA2? If so, what?
D.P. It's been remarkable to see how passionate and creative the STA community has become. Being pretty big fans of the game ourselves, we were really excited about implementing many of the same sorts of improvements and additions to the new game that fans on the boards were hoping for. The game should make folks happy—we've really taken it to a whole new level.
J.T. The infinite mod-ability of STA is what kept it viable and "new." Your concept of keeping the file structure user friendly was a stroke of genius and foresight. You know the list of modifications and add-ons is very lengthy. I heard that STA files will work in STA2 since structure is pretty much the same. The .SOD file, equaling the wire frame shape, will be a bit different but I heard that integration to use an STA .SOD in STA2 will work by adding a couple of lines with a text editor. Is that still so?
D.P. The conversion process will be easy.
J.T. Will .TGA format still be used for "skins?"
D.P. Yes.
J.T. Will anything in STA2 be backwards compatible to STA?
D.P. No. We've added too many features to maintain backwards compatibility.
J.T. A downloadable map editor will be available for STA2. What graphics program were the shapes created in and will we have something like the downloadable Storm 3D to rework them?
D.P. You can use 3DS Max or SoftImage to edit ship models.
J.T. You must know that STA created many problems to users unable to install and set up even the standard game without crashes. Certainly many add-ons can over tax the game engine, but add-ons are the beauty of it. I've found STA fragments the hard drive faster than any game or simulation I've ever run and is very sensitive to that in operation.
I know it was mentioned that sounds will not all be .WAV files, which used up a lot of memory and may have contributed to crashes. What have you done to make STA2 more bullet proof both normal and heavily loaded with third party add-ons?
D.P. Extensive testing, and we're looking into different pack-file formats.
J.T. Why was STA2 not made to run on Mac platforms as well as PC?
D.P. We're just the developer! We don't make those decisions. :)
J.T. Being that STA was playable on a modest system, will that generally hold true for STA2?
D.P. Absolutely. Check out the main STA2 sites for more info on Min Spec.
J.T. I speak for many when I say thanks for the fun you've provided with Star Trek Armada. We look forward to Star Trek Armada II.
