Elite Force II Preview
The follow-up to Activision's Quake III-powered Elite Force will take place in the same universe as The Next Generation.
Released in the fall of 2000, the original Star Trek: Voyager Elite Force was hailed as one of the few Star Trek games that was actually a good game in its own right, with or without the multimillion-dollar license attached to it. The game was developed by Raven Software, whose experience in the FPS genre helped craft a solid action game that put the Quake III Arena engine to good use. A sequel was sort of inevitable, but with Raven tied up with work on the just-released Jedi Knight II and the in-development titles Soldier of Fortune II and Quake IV, Activision had to find a different developer for the game. For that, it turned to Ritual Entertainment. Like Raven, Ritual is no stranger to the genre. It created the first mission pack for the original Quake and followed that up with SiN and the third-person title Heavy Metal: F.A.K.K. 2.
Anyone concerned about the switch from Ritual to Raven can take some measure of solace in the fact that like Raven's team, Elite Force II's is composed of hard-core Star Trek fans. Level designer Kenny Thompson summed up the team's approach to the game: "We are going all out on the game and taking Elite Force to the next level. The environments are awe-inspiring, massive, and extremely detailed. We plan on having as many key moments and true Star Trek experiences as we can pack in. We want Star Trek fans and gamers alike to walk away from the game as psyched about Star Trek as we are."
But the developer isn't the only major change since the original--as the title reflects, the game no longer takes place exclusively in the Voyager portion of the Star Trek universe. Thanks to Activision's exclusive license for all things Star Trek, Elite Force II will take place in the space occupied by Star Trek: The Next Generation. Fortunately, the concept that Raven created with the original game wasn't tied to just one series and is much more flexible than it would have been had the game centered on a particular member of the Voyager crew. Instead, the first game centered on a Starfleet hazard team assigned to the USS Voyager. Just like in the first game, players will take control of Alex Munro, but they won't have the option to play as either Alexander or Alexandria--this time around, there's just the male character. In Elite Force II, Munro will move from Voyager to Starfleet Academy before being assigned to the USS Enterprise, where he'll be under the command of Jean-Luc Picard, voiced by Patrick Stewart, who of course played the role on all seven seasons of TNG and the movies that followed it.
Just because Picard is being voiced by the original actor doesn't mean he'll be relegated to a minor cameo appearance. Indeed, we were told by an Activision representative that he is "a prominent character in the game and will have a major role in the story not only as the Enterprise Captain but also as a mentor to Munro."
The Starfleet Academy portion of the game will be more than just a pit stop on the way to Enterprise. As anyone who has seen the place depicted on the show will tell you, Starfleet Academy looks wildly different from any other locale in the Star Trek universe, with its bright colors and lush foliage. We were told that the portion of the game that takes place there is "part training, part story progression, and part looking around at [a] gorgeous environment no Trek shooter has ever explored."
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- Activision
- Ritual Ent.
- Sci-Fi First-Person...
- Release: Jun 25, 2003
- ESRB: Teen
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