14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Voyager: Elite Force, August 29, 2000
This review is from: Star Trek Voyager: Elite Force - Collector's Edition (CD-ROM)
Since I have played the demo, talked to most of the developers and know more than most people about the game I am forced to say that this will be better than Half-life. Josh Weier(the AI guy at Ravensoft) has informed me that there will be advanced USA Army squad sized tactics used by the AI. Let me cut and paste, Here is what he said,"I've added suppressive fire, retreating, finding cover, and a point man to the tactics of the enemies. If you surprise the enemies, the point man will drop to a knee and provide cover fire while the rest of the Scavengers scatter to find cover. Once they have, they begin to attack while the point man retreats. Shooting enemies can cause them to retreat behind cover, and enemies will take turns moving to better positions. I was even thinking about some flanking code... All in all, should be a lot of fun for people."
Furthermore the game sports maps of Voyager and OTHER Federation ships. Have you ever wanted to walk the corridors of ships from other Alpha quadrant races? You can in this game. I don't want to ruin the game for you but there are many surpises in the Game. If you are a Trek Fan this game is an absolute must. It'll be the first time you were in an actuall episode. You'll also get to hear the voice talents of Tom Willson (Biff) from "Back To The Future." He will have dialog that will be on par with Bill Paxton's (Alien 2 fame),"Well put her in charge.." and "Game over, man game over.." Get this game and find out which of Tom's one liners will become famous.
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
You are not playing the game. You are part of the show!, October 26, 2000
This review is from: Star Trek Voyager: Elite Force - Collector's Edition (CD-ROM)
So close! You could almost imagine your name in the credits. The set, the scenario, the ambiance, everything feels... well... "Star-Trek"ish!
The game does make a known universe come to life. It is nothing short from authentic. You do not feel like going on an unknown adventure while the rest of the crew concentrate on doing the TV show (like Star Trek: Hidden Evil). You ARE part of the crew. You ARE part of the show. You ARE part of the story.
While this is a "First-Person-Shooter", it is accessible to the beginners. It is not overly complicated. This can be a problem for experienced gamers, who might finish this game in 15 hours tops.
But then again, there is still the Multiplayer. I never play online, so I cannot comment much about this feature, although I heard that people appreciated the various "awards" given to players based on their performance (i.e. Efficiency: Greater than 50% accuracy; Untouchable: Player never killed; Logistics: Player used a high number of power-ups; Demolitionist: Killed a LOT of players using explosives). Some "awards" are not kill-based. I might give it a try...
During the single-player game, friends in the Hazard team help you. Wow! Talk about teamwork. Where other games failed to provide adequate friendly AI and usually send you on a solo mission, this games almost always sends you WITH you team, and they actually look like they KNOW what they are doing. The "ally-blocking-a-path-in-a-narrow-corridor" syndrome is quite rare. And they NEVER will shoot you by accident. They look like they actually HELP you. And you actually get attached to them. Really.
On the down side, the characters appear a little rigid. They seem to move around on preset "tracks", like a train. This is during in-game-ending cutscenes. And their facial expressions are limited to two or three (I never saw a "happy" face).
But this is but a tiny stain in a sea of wonders.
About the Collector's Edition, I feel it was worth it. There are three special items.
The comic book included is actually a two-in-one booklet. The first is a story based on the game... which could be bad, since both stories (comic and game) are somewhat similar. The second comic is a "Seven-of-Nine" story. Not the best I've seen though, story-wise.
The Collector CD is actually a hybrid. You actually have the game's soundtrack on it. Since the music is already excellent, this is just fine with me. The CD also contains artists' sketches during the design stage of the game, as well as promotional posters and a demo of "Return to Wolfenstein" (I may have spelled that wrong!)
And finally, this special edition comes included with a pin. This was somewhat of a letdown, since the pin is NOT the Hazard Team Communicator, but a shield with the logo "Star Trek Voyager - Elite Force". Not exactly what you would wear on a Star Trek uniform (No, I don't have a uniform!).
Put it this way: unless you HATE Star Trek, or consider the violence level of the series too high, you cannot go wrong with Elite Force. It is fun, well done, authentic.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good Use of Star Trek License, October 5, 2000
This review is from: Star Trek Voyager: Elite Force - Collector's Edition (CD-ROM)
Ok, by far, this is the best use of the Star Trek license. It has come a long way since the first ST game came out for the PC. Gaming companies tried everything from point and click adventures to real time sims. Well, looks like Raven did their research well and came out with an FPS using ST license. If you're wondering how the game looks like, well there are 2 sides of the coin with this game. In the single player game, the game really doesn't show the full potential of the Quake III engine. I got the feeling that for the single player they used a toned down version of the Q3 engine. However, when you get to the Multiplayer (called Holomatch as Paramount does not want to promote online violence games so they used the world Holomatch instead of Deathmatch), this is where the Q3 engine finally kicks in. So lets split this review into two parts: Single and Multiplayer. Single Player: Really the story is just your average alien incursion into your damaged ship. The story though very generic still is carried along because of the action that it involves to push the story on. Multiplayer: Ok, multiplayer here rocks. Most of the levels look like they've been cut out of the Quake Arena levels. I thought it was Deja Vu. Even the lighting and the level structure looks almost like Quake III. So Quake players shouldnt have any problems making their mark online with this game.
As far as system requirements are concerned, this game is OpenGL so it is quite friendly with mid performance computers. However, the game does require a 3D accelerator. OpenGL is by far still the friendliest API out there when it comes to measuring frames per second on mid performance computers. The only I would recommend to players is to do a full installation of the game for increased disk performance.
A bug that I did notice in this game are the clipping and tearing problems. From time to time you can see the other side of the area thru a wall if you position yourself at an angle. But it's not a lot and it won't distract you from playing this game.
Pick up this game.
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