Other pictures of the FPI system

Here's what happens when you install Windows on your UberBattleships-Faster-Than-Light Main Computer:

This one was..... slightly edited. This is one of the Klinshayan trophy rooms inside their castle at Klinshay. One of the forum players decided it needed to be more festive. Merry Christmas everyone!

-removed-

Well, i guess it could have been worse,the "god-like" race could have been named "Walmart"

Or it could have been "Bill Gatians."

I played the trial for this game. Now the concept is great and some of the ship functions are first rate but this is not a game that should be in release. The client is barely a closed beta level. I have played alot of bad games but the bugs and lack of functioality in this game is stiffaling. The interface is like trying to move through molases, movement/camera control is a total joke. The client would CTD repeatedly and new players are completely lost-if there are any. Which is to bad because the concept and features of the game are truely innovative and if it survives with constant improvement then it may be ready in a year or so. I understand that they need money to keep going but Im not paying $10 for a alpha/closed beta product that is 50% functional full of bugs in the game content hoping in the relativly near decade it will get better- its a game not an IPO.

Mr Styij, the camera control was just updated.

May I ask what you found was hard to use with it?

I have to completely disagree with the previous poster.

SQO in my opinion has been the game I have been looking for sometime.  Im an older player and flashing pretty graphics at me isnt what hooks me on a game.  Its the enviroment and complexity that gets me.

Sure there are CTDs and bugs...but name one MMO that doesnt.  The game is an inependantly developed product.  Meaning that while the game gives to shits about competeing in the race for the best in graphics.  its the quality of content that keeps people.  I kept hearing that STO is going to make SQO jump in its grave...but in reality the game is closer to old school trek than what I have ever seen put out.

While it caters to players who have the pateince to learn the game.  It wont get the 12 years running their dadies credit card bills up like WoW does.  But it will definately pick up the people that STO has and will continue to disappoint.

The scroll wheel rotation of the camera did work fine but I found it to be totally alien, no pun intended. So I changed the settings to use the left click and drag feature to rotate the camera. It rotated in the opposite direction of mouse movement so I found the reverse setting and turned it on, then the problems started. The camera would move as intended and then switch back to reverse of mouse movement then back after after few trys. No matter what I turned on or off the bug persisted. When near a wall for instance because it was one solid color with no texture you couldnt tell it was rotating opposite until you were lost, had to stop and zoom out. This occured constantly and was maddening! I use a Logitec MX518...alot of people use this mouse and it is run of the mill with no problems in any other game.

Then there was the movement. Ok click to move...perfectly acceptable interface. Except that diagonal path finding is "crunchy" at best and none existant frequently. Example-Moving accross a hall way to reach a door and the toon moves up out of line of travel and steps on to a convaer belt taking you in the opposite direction! Very counter intuitive. Running was a new adventure everytime. Hold shift and right click...perfectly acceptable interface. Problem is half the time you click and your toon stands in place and runs...and keeps running until it thinks it is where you click regardless of anymore commands given it. So click and watch toon run in place for awile then try again and hope it works then.

There are other problems as well. The chat cuts of the bottom of lower case letters so "g"s look like "a"s. There are practicly no signs or indicators-is this the duty officer or the bar tender I don't know since they both look alike and only have three colors between them. The NPC convo system...OMG..."Hello"-"yes"-"I have orders to deliver"-"i dont understand"-"orders delivery"-"i dont understand"-"Mission Orders"-"i dont understand"- jump forward a half hour-"For the love of everything holy I have orders here to deliver to you moron!"-"i dont understand-"Where is my M87 pistol"-"i dont understand"...you get the point and they are ALL like that.

Of course the graphics are not so hot but that is acceptable if the game blows your socks off.  So there are some examples of stuff I was talking about. Yes, the game has a high learning curve like Eve but even Eve has tool tips and popups to help. Maybe these seem like just personal issues to some of you but If I feel this way I'm sure alot of other SQO noobs arnt playing anymore because of the same and that cant be helping the income situation for the developers.

I think it is great that these people love what they do so much that they are trying to bring their vision to us and I do hope it works but I'm not going to say I had a great time in a great game when I didn't. I think the starship crews and interactive stations are great. The wide open universe with away teams and all very Star Fleet Battles feeling is a reality; but the bugs and maddening interface and content problems are ruining the experience for me. Like I said A+ for innovation and making a scifi game happen but it is still not ready for the masses. Of course as with any opinion it is just my 2 cents and your milage may and  will vary.

Originally posted by Styij

1. The camera would move as intended and then switch back to reverse of mouse movement then back after after few trys. No matter what I turned on or off the bug persisted. When near a wall for instance because it was one solid color with no texture you couldnt tell it was rotating opposite until you were lost, had to stop and zoom out. This occured constantly and was maddening! I use a Logitec MX518...alot of people use this mouse and it is run of the mill with no problems in any other game.

2. Then there was the movement. Ok click to move...perfectly acceptable interface. Except that diagonal path finding is "crunchy" at best and none existant frequently. 

3. Problem is half the time you click and your toon stands in place and runs...and keeps running until it thinks it is where you click regardless of anymore commands given it. So click and watch toon run in place for awile then try again and hope it works then.

4. The chat cuts of the bottom of lower case letters so "g"s look like "a"s. There are practicly no signs or indicators-is this the duty officer or the bar tender I don't know since they both look alike and only have three colors between them.

5. The NPC convo system...OMG..."Hello"-"yes"-"I have orders to deliver"-"i dont understand"-"orders delivery"-"i dont understand"-"Mission Orders"-"i dont understand"- jump forward a half hour-"For the love of everything holy I have orders here to deliver to you moron!"-"i dont understand-"Where is my M87 pistol"-"i dont understand"...you get the point and they are ALL like that.

6 .....but even Eve has tool tips and popups to help. Maybe these seem like just personal issues to some of you but If I feel this way I'm sure alot of other SQO noobs arnt playing anymore because of the same and that cant be helping the income situation for the developers.....

 

@1- Thats a bug we didn't know existed. It will be fixed ASAP.

@2- "Crunchy" is rather vague. To put it simply, it doesn't take the shortest path. Correct?

@3- Major bug with the grid system that will be fixed shortly. Its also causing a "black screen" when going down the shopmart stairs.

@4- Chat is in the middle of being upgraded.

@5- There is a "template" you must use when talking to NPC's. Your normal everyday colonists will only reply to "~name~ Where am I?". Other NPC's like ones that are used constantly (vendors, objectives, officers) can have many variations, as long as it fits the template. "Ticonderoga teleport me" "Ticonderoga port me" "Tic port me" for example. This template is as follows:

First word(1. Must be a ships name that is within range. 2. Must have the first letter capitalized. 3. Must have the first 3 letters in the right order)

Second word(must either be "teleport" or "port")

Third word(always has to be "me")

These templates are listed in the Game Manual. I believe the problem here is confusion that can EASILY be solved by your "tooltips" suggestion.

@6- Tooltips. These are being added. I'm just a lowly veterans player, so I don't know how soon. Your suggesting them will add to the vote, and they will be in quicker because of it.

Thanks for your input!

So using my example of delivering orders to the duty officer what would be the template example of that? Tooltip popups would make introduction to every aspect of the game so much easier for new players.

I did see the template in the game manual but couldn't figure out how to apply it in differing situations. For such an indepth complex game the manual is a bit sparce without in game tooltips don't you think. I couldnt figure out how to get back to the Tico till I read the forums for a while.

I hope they continue rolling out patches that fix the interface and accessability of the game for new players. Just running around the bridge of the Tico checking out the control stations was increadable. Weapons consoles, ECM, three dimensional space helm control, full engineering console with damage and power manipulation, internal sensor and intruder detection. Its like each ship is a microcosom.  

Hi guys - I am really quite enthusiastic about trying this game but cannot seem to connect to any of the

websites linked, on this or other sites, which are related to this game. Internet explorer just comes up

with the screen you typically see when you are offline. Does anyone know if the official starquest

website is up?

If not is there anywhere I can download this game?

Thanks

Macius

Being a small indie company, castlethorn only owns the game servers. For the website they use 1&1 web hosting. The web server is having hardware issues and apperently 1&1 doesn't have any techs over the holidays.

Castlethorn apologizes for this inconvenience, but there is nothing they can do about it until 1&1 fixes the hardware issue.

It will be back up shortly.

((The game servers are owned by Castlethorn. As far as I can remember, it has only been down maybe a day in its 2 years of operation. This does not affect the game.))

Website is back up