|
Preview:
Star Trek Elite Force II

Due Early 2003 for PC.
Check out our latest
preview of EF2 here.
|
Its been a while
since I last played Activisions Elite Force, which to this day is still the reigning
champion as the best Star Trek game ever made. The first person shooter based in
Roddenberrys world of spaceships, Klingons, and Qs was atmospheric, eloquent, and
captured the elements of Star Trek to the core. Its only flaw, and it was a forgivable
one, was that it was based not on the Next Generation, but instead on the decks of Captain
Janeways less successful Voyager. When it was able to separate itself from the
series and leap instead into the heart of the universe the Next Generation helped build,
Elite Force served up a steaming dish of everything that made NG one of the best loved TV
phenomena of the radiation boxs ambient existence. It was off-ship that you found
the precious moments: trudging about a paralyzed Borg vessel full of smoke, the unblinking
eye-lasers ignoring you, the horror of the biomechanics. It was to my great joy when I
heard the fellow at Activisions booth confess that Elite Force II would be taking
place, at least partially, in the Next Generation.
"I can tell you that at
some point the team transfers to the Enterprise," he said. My eyes lit up and my
heart started to beat faster. I wanted to leap onto the nearby stage and scream, "out
of the way, peck!" at the top of my lungs before charging into a hopeless phaser
fight against a pack of other sentient and civilized beings. Instead I saved myself the
embarrassment of mixing my movie lines and compressed it all down into my gut.
"Cool," I said with such calm and distant reflection that I would have made a
Jedi proud. That night I dreamed I was rescuing Counselor Troy from an aggressive Tribble,
fighting alongside Madmartigan with a phaser rifle and a pocket full of acorns. Go
figure.
Aside from the shift in commanding officer, we can hope to see the reappearance
of some of the same old bad guys. The Borg, one of the creepiest and most ominous enemies
ever to show their pale complexion on a TV screen, is promises to make another appearance
as the Enterprise travels the universe with its newly acquired kick-butt special forces
team. Youll once again find yourself in the role of Ensign Monro, a part of the
Hazard Team, a special combat unit put together on the Voyager to deal with threats that
less skilled rookies would probably bungle. After an outstanding (no, really, I was that
good) performance seeing Voyager through to the end of her lost wandering days, you and
your team find themselves investigating two new races and a lost civilization at the outer
reaches of the galaxy. If it follows the bricks laid by Elite Force I, you can expect a
whole lot of alien bad guys to depolarize, or whatever a phaser pistol does to them.
Romulans, the pointy-eared Vulcan siblings without the "live long and
prosper" mantra, are set to make an appearance for sure, as well as a variety of
others that will no doubt be unusual and interesting in their appearance and politics.
When it boils down to it, this is a first person shooter, so we can expect whatever
benevolent plans the Enterprise may have to pretty much go to crap. Carnage will ensue.
Itll be fun. Trust me.
The
graphics are shaping up nicely, with some very pretty outside, planet-based scenery
gracing the levels we saw. It gave me that familiar rush watching my team mates storm a
steel door in the outside weather conditions of some hostile planet, only to see them
vaporized as the bridge they were crossing was set upon by alien beings. Makes me sad
again that NG is gone forever from my weekly schedule. If The Simpsons disappears now,
Ill give up watching TV entirely, and instead spend my days caught in the tractor
beam of my computer monitor. At least for now, that computer monitor seems to be the best
place to look for good old-fashioned NG action (and Im not talking about downloading
the movies, you naughty people). Activision looks to be delivering something all of us
Star Trek fans have been longing for when Elite Force II hits the shelves in winter of
2002. If its as good as Elite Force I, this one-way ticket to an incredible future
will be on my wish list, thats for sure. See you there.








Aaron
Stanton (06/15/2002) |
|
|