This was by far the best ship simulator game that I've gotten a chance to play in a long while. Which is why its so frustrating to have such a great game ruined by such awful bug checking.

The story is pure Star Trek. A star in a region of space goes nova thousands of years ahead of schedule, prompting you to investigate, encoutering Romulans, Klingons, and Cardassians in a very well delivered. Star Trek TNG cast members make various entertaining cameos that add a little bit of novelty without feeling like you're in an episode as an observer.

Gameplay is unique. You interact with several crew members directly, ordering scans, directing navigation and targeting weapons. Controlling power and targeting round out combat, which consists of turning shields and weapons to various targets to cripple or destroy them. This is the best part, as you can take direct control to win your battles or trust your weapons officer to know what hes doing, which for AI it does actually quite well. Missions are challenging but not impossible, at least at lower difficulties.

The main, almost sole detraction is the fact that it's completely broken. There are two critical missions that the game can fatally crash at, and because of the save structure, is impossible to recover room, meaning you can be on the final mission of the game, and have to completely start over because of a glitch that doesn't allow the mission to end. I'm unaware of a patch or workaround to correct this, so you have to make it to the final mission, then jump over to youtube to see the closing cinematics. That alone takes this from 4-5 stars to 3.
This was by far the best ship simulator game that I've gotten a chance to play in a long while. Which is why its so frustrating to have such a great game ruined by such awful bug checking. The story is pure Star Trek. A star in a region of space goes nova thousands of years ahead of schedule, prompting you to investigate, encoutering Romulans, Klingons, and Cardassians in a very well delivered. Star Trek TNG cast members make various entertaining cameos that add a little bit of novelty without feeling like you're in an episode as an observer. Gameplay is unique. You interact with several crew members directly, ordering scans, directing navigation and targeting weapons. Controlling power and targeting round out combat, which consists of turning shields and weapons to various targets to cripple or destroy them. This is the best part, as you can take direct control to win your battles or trust your weapons officer to know what hes doing, which for AI it does actually quite well. Missions are challenging but not impossible, at least at lower difficulties. The main, almost sole detraction is the fact that it's completely broken. There are two critical missions that the game can fatally crash at, and because of the save structure, is impossible to recover room, meaning you can be on the final mission of the game, and have to completely start over because of a glitch that doesn't allow the mission to end. I'm unaware of a patch or workaround to correct this, so you have to make it to the final mission, then jump over to youtube to see the closing cinematics. That alone takes this from 4-5 stars to 3.