My biggest quip of the game, the difficulty settings don't mean a darn thing. I have changed the difficulty settings so many times to try and make the game easier, but there is no noticeable difference in gameplay. For example, in easy mode, there are no fewer ships, no greater fire power on your ship, nor can your own ship sustain greater damage.

My next biggest quip: except for the earlier levels (currently in level 6) you are the only fighter and the dang Excelsior doesn't help in fighting, even when other capitol ships fly in and start shooting at it. Currenlty, in level 6, after I play it for over 1/2 hour, I fought over 60 enemies, with the player being the only ship fighting. How does that make sense?

My third problem with this game is that the targeting system does diddly. I have aimed at the "lead the target" area and the phaser bolts (the only weapon, which you do get as well as torpedos and phasers, you can do this with) usually don't hit the enemy.

All in all, this game sucks. Levels are too long, almost 30 mins, making it a terribly frustrating and ungratifying game. There just isn't much to this game that I wish I had known about, except for the beautifully rendered graphics, before laying money down for this game.

"Decent, But Needs Something ...", SPOILERS

I nearly peed my pants when I saw this game sitting on the shelf in the store. I couldn't believe it: A Star Trek flyer!

I've been a fan of the Colony Wars games pretty much since they came out, and I was surprised at how similar the engine was in this game. The effects of environment added a fun twist to the handling of the vessels (stormy nebulas and star clusters).

The ships are all beautifully rendered, as well as the various space phenomena encountered throughout the game. Who wants to play against BLACK throughout an entire game? The most exciting aspect of the game was finally being able to take on those capitals I watched on the TV show. It was like living out a childhood fantasy! The selection of ships is diverse and upgradeable, and the Romulan Shrike even has a cloaking ability!

It was very fun to be able to go back and take on nemeses from the original series: the M-5 computer, the Doomsday Machine, even that big germ from "The Immunity Syndrome"!

Flak and capital accuracy keep you on your toes: slow down or cease evasive maneuvers, and you're space dust!

This is a fun game to play, but minor details tend to bring the overall experience down.

The weapons lock system is confusing and erratic: when an enemy vessel is destroyed, next lock seems to be randomly based. Cycling between targets was a pain: "NEAREST RETICLE! NEAREST MY RETICLE! AAARGH!"

Stop! Stop! Why can't I hold in one place? AGH!

While I enjoyed the challenge, the game was impossibly hard in parts. Early in the game, I had to set it to easy just to get past the fourth mission.

Control setup was difficult. I could have easily remedied what problems I had with the setup, were it not for the limited selection of controller presets.

During in-game cinematics, it certainly would have been courteous to add some kind of protection for the player's vessel. For example, when a capital ship is breaching, the POV switches from cockpit/3rd to the exploding ship. However, the player is still in control of the fighter. The vulnerable ship will continue to move, and the player has no idea where it's going! What is to prevent one from flying straight into the firing range of a group of enemy capitals? Removing the ship from combat temporarily or "cinematic invincibility" or even doing away with the unnecessarily long camera switch would make gameplay a little more fair.

I loved how the designers put Sulu and Chekov into the starring roles this time around. But even these two had a hard time brightening up the script (How many times does Sulu say, "With a little luck, ... "?). Cinematic quality was greatly underwhelming, if not disappointing. If other games have near life-like motions inside game play, why do the interludes look like something that came from the middle ages of PS1?

Overall, it was a fun game to play! But the cinematic quality and other small details diminish what could have been a great game.

"A Waste of Time, and Money", I love Star Trek, but this game did not cut it. Belongs to the rentals. I had hoped to fly capital ships, decide whether I use up all "auxilary power" for the shields, or phaser banks, or for the warp core. This game was even cheaper than a "Star W**s" game. Flying with a small fighter, and the Klingon Bird of Prey was so small!! small as the little fighter we had to fly. The Bird of Prey did not even come close to the size of the capital ships. I am sorry for the people who authorized this production, and for the quality control testers, you did a bad job. Try this game, by renting it. Not worth buying.

"I loved it!", Well, I read the user reviews and went ahead and got the game anyway, and I'm glad that I did!

This game is a fun shooter with a great Star Trek story around it. It starts out with an accident that sends your ship, with Capt. Sulu at the helm, into the mirror universe (introduced in the episode where Spock had a goatee.) The rest of the game is basically about your efforts to get back to the "normal" universe. Right off the bat, the one good thing about this setting is that you get to go up against all the federation ships, since the federation is your enemy in the mirror universe! You ultimately have to make friends with the Klingons and the Romulans who'll in turn help you to get back to the "normal" universe. The story includes a lot of references to the original series, so I really enjoyed it.

As for the graphics, all the ships in the game look exactly like I remember them from the show and the scale is dead-on accurate. The backgrounds are nicely done, not just dull black space, but a lot of nebula's, planets, and stars to add to the whole feel of the game. As for sound, the music is OK, but what I really liked was playing the game on my surround-sound system. It's great to hear photon torpedoes coming at you from behind!

Where the game falters a bit is in the physics, which are very rudimentary (you pretty much just bounce of other ships) but for me it didn't distract much from the game. The controls are also standard space-combat fare.

"Please someone make a good ST game!!!!", I have been an avid fan of ALL of the Trek shows, I read the books and collect the merchandise. Now with that being said I believe Paramount has made more than enough profit from all the combined shows, movies, syndications and books to put someone on the job to finally create an awesome game for the FANS. If it was not for us they would have a lot less moola. I'm not going to go into tearing this game to pieces over my dissapointment, I'll just say it was not worth it and I feel that Paramount owes me and the rest of the ST fans around the world a good game. So Paramount here is my challenge to you, Can you finally make a game worthy of the Fans that have made you more rich than you would have been without us. Get off your duffs and do something.

Lloyd E. Gardner
Former "Staff Sergeant" USMC