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| | Publisher: Aspyr Media  Genre: Action | | Mac OS X: Any Version Mac OS Classic: Mac OS 8.6
CPU: G3 @ 266 MHz RAM: 64 MB Hard Disk: 560 MB 4x CD-ROM |
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So, the atmosphere is authentic, the voices come right out of the show, and the story’s pretty tight and makes you want to keep on playing to find out what happens next. My only significant gripe with the story is that the climax is really not in keeping with the style of the show; it’s typical 3D shooting game fare. As is so often the case in these 3D games, there’s a great big, evil granddaddy-baddie to contend with at the end. He seems almost impossible to kill, and will give you a very tough time as you tear around a large arena, trying to knobble him. All the time he’s spouting cataclysmic dialogue in a gravelly, phlegm-ridden voice and demonstrating that he’s graduated with honors from the "Mwah-ha-ha-ha-haaaaa!" school of evil laughter. It may make for a typical denouement in a traditional 3D game, but it’s dreadfully corny and doesn’t sit at all well with the rest of the Star Trek-style story.Of course, given that this is more a 3D shooting game than an episode of Voyager, the story is surprisingly coherent and pervades the whole game to an unprecedented degree, which is all to the good. The events are certainly more linear and single-minded than an episode of the show (and of course there’s no "B-plot" running alongside the main story), but it would have been very hard to do otherwise. As it stands, Elite Force is certainly the most story-driven 3D game I’ve yet encountered, and in this instance it’s a strength more than a straitjacket. In fact, the story-based approach even extends to the game being presented in the same style as an episode, with a teaser trailer to play through before opening credits video with music, the story proper, and a brief video-clip epilogue and end-credit sequence. I was actually very surprised to find that the game’s music (accompanying the opening and closing credits) is not the normal Voyager theme; presumably it must not have been possible to license the regular music. The replacement theme is rather disappointing, as it’s a pale pastiche of the real one. It follows the same structure as the real theme and uses similar musical devices, but it’s not especially well done and doesn’t really work as a piece of music. The background music in the rest of the game is more successful, though. It sounds much the same as the music in any TV episode, and fits the tone of each area of the game well. There’s even a similar musical motif to the "Klingon fanfare" heard in many Trek episodes when you’re on board the Klingon ship. A final gripe about the story is its disappointing epilogue. Remember those really excruciating endings in a few Original Series episodes, where someone (usually Spock) would say something resoundingly unfunny, and the entire bridge crew would collapse in helpless (and obviously forced) laughter? Well, exactly the same thing happens in this game. The laughter even sounds canned! Worse things have happened in TV Trek episodes, though, so I won’t complain too much!The game So, what of the game itself? The story is good, but does the game do it justice?I’m pleased to say that it does. The Quake III engine is very capable to start with, and Raven has extended it with detailed character handling in order to portray crew members in a realistic way — the results are really very impressive. In fact, the graphics are quite outstanding and are perhaps the best I’ve yet seen in any 3D game. Voyager itself is portrayed very realistically, as are the rest of the vessels that we’ve seen in TV shows, and some of the previously unseen alien ships (particularly the Etherians’ semi-organic vessel, seen early on in the game) are stunning. As for the characters you work with on your mission, they all look unique and instantly identifiable, and the computerized versions of the TV actors are recognizable if somewhat polygonal. Their eyes blink, their mouths move correctly in synchronization with their words, and they look at you when they’re talking to you; you really do feel as though you’re one of many individual crew members. They also hold conversations among themselves, so you overhear snippets as you pass by. In fact, these conversations are triggered by your approach, so you’re likely never to miss anything important, but the effect is convincing nevertheless. Unfortunately it does break down when you try to engage the characters in conversation yourself. Unless they have something specific to say (which they’ll eventually say anyway), attempting to talk to them generally results in an irritated “Can’t you see I’m busy?” response, even if they’re just standing around doing nothing! It’s worth mentioning that the 3D engine itself is used for the vast majority of cut scenes that give you orders and advance the story. This is far better than the traditional approach of using pre-rendered video, as it works to the screen resolution that you’ve selected, and appears entirely in keeping with the rest of the game. A small amount of Bink video is also used in Elite Force for ship shots and the like, but this has been done extremely well and integrates nicely.
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