I spent five years waiting for this?
As seems to be typical of Cryptic, the RPG system in Star Trek Online is unintuitive and convoluted. Skills are poorly (or not at all) explained, many abilities seem downright pointless, and there is no concept of scale behind any ability or buff - just what does "+5" mean?
Cryptic stated towards the beginning of development that they already had the engine in place, so it wouldn't take long to develop Star Trek Online. It turns out that they meant they were virtually copy-pasting the City of Heroes / Champions Online experience into STO's ground experience. In City of Heroes, you walked around an area that was littered with clumps of enemies all creatively named "thug" or "brute". In Star Trek Online, imagine my shock when I beamed down to my first ground mission and saw clumps of enemies standing around, all of them named things like (I kid you not) "thug" and "brute".
Cryptic also said they were going for a "fantastical" look, not a "cartoony" one, but the distinction is apparently too fine for me to discern.
Finally, there's the customization. This aspect of the game was harped on from the beginning by Cryptic, championed as the game's crowning achievement and promised to be epic in its scope. Well, there's customization alright - too much. There's a delicate balance between good gameplay design and sufficient customization, and Cryptic seems to have decided to not even attempt to strike that balance. Players can choose their profession (tactical, science or engineering), but the chosen profession has almost zero impact on your gameplay, as you can choose any kind of ship you want (escort, science or cruiser). Furthermore, you can populate your ship with whatever bridge officers you want (even buying them from other players or from vendors), and give them whatever skills you want (also simply buying them from a vendor). This dilutes the uniqueness of any given player and makes any choices you make utterly meaningless - any player, at any time, can simply buy a new ship, crew, and skills to become a carbon copy of any other player. "Class" distinction is non-existent. Cryptic wants you to be completely free to do whatever you want; unfortunately that is a terrible gameplay decision and does not gel with their claim that Star Trek Online is primarily a game, not a simulator. Too much customization is a bad thing, and it's a concept Cryptic seems unable to master, despite offering huge amounts of it.
Star Trek Online's space combat is its only redeeming quality, and that is fun in small doses. The game in general is a half-finished shell that I grew tired of within a week. My recommendation is to not waste your money, but Cryptic has developed a track record that has begun to bias me against them anyway. I know this game was meant to attract people who aren't Star Trek fans, but I think this game will do more to damage the franchise than to help it.