Still, given my fondness for those first two seasons it was obvious that I'd try a Star Trek rpg campaign some day and so I did. I created my own ship combat system, used HERO System for the characters and the original FASA rpg for support material (we did try their rules for a game or two before ditching them). In total across a span of years we did two campaigns in that setting.
Success was mixed. We certainly had fun, but there are three major problems that IMO makes Star Trek the most difficult rpg campaign to run.
- The resources of a Starship are immense. This is why so often the series (and the new movie) cuts the characters off from those resourse. Sadly this gets old adventure after adventure
- Some players have problems with a formal chain of command, even if they otherwise in practical terms follow an informal one in any other campaign.
- One ship- many players. I have yet to encounter a Starship combat system that can handle this with a degree of fun equal to the normal one character per player ratio. FASA tried and failed IMO, and most games don't even try.
Still I wanted to give it another go because when it works, it works well indeed. But I was outvoted and Morrow Project will be our campaign for a while now. Sniff.
Oh, the movie. Went to see it last night.
Lots of fun, with most of the characters and actors dead on. The Enterprise looked fantastic, and makes me forget about all those horrid A, B, C, D, E and NX ripoffs that were forced upon us.
I could point out many issues with the plot, and otherwise nitpick. But I'll pass, such detaild don't really matter. This is the best Star Trek since 1969.
Ok, one nitpick. Can't resist.
The engineering areas of the Enterprise is a beer factory*? Really? Am I the only one who thinks that looked stupid? Wouldn't have patterning it to look like, oh I don't know- a ship's engineering room had been a better choice
On the other hand, maybe it will help, the secondary hull looked cut off too much IMO towards the aft bottom. A good solid brew should be able to add some weight and fill that out...
*Actually when seeing the movie, the first thing I thought of when seeing the Kevin's engineering/hanger sections was that it was filmed in someone's factory (true) and that the Enterprise engineering/hanger sections was a milk processing plant. But it was beer plant instead.
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I thought the gritty factory look was incongruous with the shopping mall bridge and didn't look like part of a starship, either. That, along with the cinderblock and fire door Starfleet base (that looked like something you'd see in Stargate SG-1) were distracting because they looked too current or out of place. I also wish they hadn't changed the phaser sound. But overall I enjoyed it and was glad I saw it.
I do reviews for www.FlickDirect.com and gave it an 'A'--which was surprising to me. I did not expect to like it nearly as much as I did.
Yes: I thought the "beer plant" was stupid--it was, I think, clearly there for the joke--but Space Quest nailed the stupid-crushy-machines so perfectly years ago that I have to assume it was 'homage' to the basic tenants of Trekdom.
I like how the Enterprise looked when it was firing all its guns at once. I like how Abrams went straight for the "classic" interplay between the characters.
I didn't miss that the moral of the story was missing and I'm glad we weren't treated to a waterboarding scene.
-Marco
@marco: Agreed, the last thing we need was for Star Trek to go PC Preachy on us. That would have certainly ruined the movie.
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