Star Trek: Resurgence

I can honestly say that I know very little about Star Trek and everything around it. Most of what I know I have learned through The Big Bang Theory and the question I asked myself before I started was how much knowledge you needed to have to keep up with the game. The short answer to that is that you don't have to know everything beforehand, you learn a lot along the way and can keep up well even without any special prior knowledge, but to get the most out of this, it is probably an advantage if you are a fan before.

One of the first things you always notice every time you take on a new game is the graphics and here the first impression is not very good. It's definitely not a good looking game by today's standards, it both looks and feels like an Xbox 360 game in most respects. I understand, of course, that the budget you had to work with cannot be compared to larger games and it does not cost as such, but I still expect a little better than this, after all, it is 2023 and not 2005.

We switch between a couple of characters throughout the game, but the ones who are clearly the game's primary protagonists are Commander Jara Rydek and Officer Carter Diaz. Jara is the first of the two that we get to know. She is apparently very competent with strong leadership skills and has recently been promoted to Starfleet on the U.S.S Resolute from the Academy. Early on in the game she gets a lot of heat and is forced to make some tough decisions. These are often quite uncomfortable ones, for example, should she sacrifice several people to save one? Or sacrifice one to save the rest? As I said, there are no easy decisions to be made and all your choices affect the ending, so you have to think carefully, the moral gray areas are many. The other protagonist that you play is Officer Carter Diaz and through his part we get a different perspective on the story, he does not have much to do with the decisions made by Jara and the rest of the fleet but mainly resides on the lower deck where he performs service and repairs and flirts a lot with his colleague. Jara clearly has the heavier responsibility of the two and she also has her hands full with being a newcomer to stay on good terms with everyone else on the U.S.S. Resolute as best as possible and try to broker peace between the Hotari and Alydian races (two brand new races in the Star Trek universe) who have ended up in a very intense conflict that now risks breaking out into full-scale war, something we obviously want to avoid. As so many times before, valuable resources are being fought over and sharing the spoils is proving difficult. So it's up to Jara and the rest of the fleet to try and prevent war from breaking out, and attending these peace talks is a very popular and iconic character.

The cutscenes are numerous and just like the rest of the game not very pretty, the facial animations are certainly not very flattering, it's stiff and expressionless. It works pretty well on a stiff old guy like Spock who barely moves his mouth at all, but not so well on other characters who actually try to convey emotion in some form. As with the voice acting, it's a shame that such strong and interesting characters feel so lifeless in the performance, it unfortunately drags down the overall impression and makes it harder to connect and feel something for them.

Although I find the voice acting to be as stiff as the animations at times, there is no denying that the characters are fundamentally strong and very well written. There's a lot of dialogue in Star Trek Resurgence and it's a good story, so it's a shame that the voice actors can't really bring them to life and give them more personality. It is generally uneven, but there are a few too many in the ensemble who read the lines by heart or without empathy, while some others are clearly approved. It goes without saying then that with all the dialogue that the game contains, it gets pretty tiring pretty quickly.

There is not much you need to actively play, long moments I can just put the controller down on the couch and mostly just follow the dialogue and what is happening. From time to time I also needed to press one of three dialog choices that appear. It is probably the most passive gaming experience I have had in my entire life if I am to be completely honest and without exaggerating the slightest, I was just like that for at least fifteen minutes. The pace is thus very slow and when there are interactions of any kind, it is usually in the form of quick time events or that you get from point A to B to meet up with someone or perform some kind of task, depending on which of the characters you control at the moment. Nothing strange in itself as it is very clear that it is the story and the characters that are in focus here and the rest is more secondary. There are a few moments where there is actually some action and you even get to shoot a bit, but they are not as frequent as I would have liked.

Star Trek in game format has often not been synonymous with quality and unfortunately this time it is not a hit either. The story is interesting and the characters are generally colourful and well written. However, it is hard to give these characters more life and we have to deal with the stiff animations and the weak voice acting unfortunately. If you also add that the pace is far too slow and that most of it is very self playing, it doesn't end up being very good. The feeling is also that this is not a game that will appeal to those who are not already fans of Star Trek very much. In the end, I'd describe it as a rather frustrating experience, mostly because I can't shake the feeling that this could have been really good, but that it was wasted. It's not bad by any means, but at the same time it never takes off.