Voyager's problems results from Technical Issues, Graphical faults and any lack of any sufficient Multiplayer.
Platform: PlayStation 2
Developer: Pipedream Interactive
Publisher: Codemasters
Genre: Sci fi First Person Shooter
Age Rating: 11+ ELSPA
Release Date: August 2nd 2002
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Game Score: 4.0/10
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Summery:
Voyager's problems results from Technical Issues, Graphical faults and any lack of any sufficient Multiplayer.
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The Star Trek series series has had it's impressive trend on the Television series but it's license in video games has a fare share between decent and downright awful games. Voyager Elite Force that was once released and well praised on the PC in 2000, 2 years later it gets a release port on the PlayStation 2 where it's poor ported effort makes the Fans of Star Trek brace themselves for some horrible impacts.
Elite Force follows a specially Trained Group called the Hazard Team who also have had their relationships in the series. You play as Alex Munro who is second in command of the team. It starts out with a failed simulation Test following a Star-ship battle which results with Voyager and it's crew being transported and trapped in a star-ship graveyard. With the ship heavily damaged and stranded Voyager's crew and the Hazard Team to find out about their whereabouts, repair their ship and find their way back on course to Normal space. As you expect from the series Voyager's crew is full of talented voice-work, each voiced by the exact cast as the TV series. There's plenty plenty to explore about the environments that fans remember and getting to know about the cast through their Bio.
Before starting you'll have a chance to play either the Tutorial Level before setting off on the main game through 4 difficulty settings, Voyager Elite Force's main campaign will take you around 6 different vessels throughout the storyline each with different story-pieces and action sequences you'd need to follow. You'll fight your way through a Borg cube with 7 of 9 Infinity Modulator, go convertally inside a Scavenger battleship and to fight your way to the control to stop a Harvester ship. Missions mostly involve taking a team with you into gunfights either against Scavengers, Hostile Robots or Aliens. In between these events you'll always get chance to explore Voyager and interact with it's crew. Other then occasionally do a puzzle or 2 during the Level there really isn't much mission variety since the game mostly focuses on simple gunfights which later on start to wear thin. The games campaign will take about roughly 5 to 6 hours from start to finish. If you ever die then you'll have to restart from your last save but luckily upon going to a loading screen you'll be given a prompt to save your progress which is helpful for what you'll going to get throughout this version.
Aside from the 6 hour long Single Player experience you also have a Multiplayer mode where up to 4 Players can compete against each other through 30. The main disappointment is that there's no A.I Bot support and also there's only Pointmatch dispute the fact that some of the maps are from the CTF mode and for some reason only some are only for 2 Players dispate being big enough for more. To say the least the Multiplayer is quite disappointing especially for a PS2 port so at nearly full price the feature set won't impress much.
The combat in Elite Force on the PC was alright back then but on PS2 it's mostly problematic. You carry up to 9 different guns from your Hand Phaser, Compression Rifle, Scavenger Rifle, the Infinity Modulator. Unlike with most shooters the games Ammo types are shared in between 3 types unlike in Multiplayer where every Weapon has their own Ammo type. The controls work the same mapping position as Quake 3 on PS2 but also the game has compatibility with USB Keyboard and Mouse. You can lean around corners and even zoom for Sniping. You can set up the controls to how you'd like it to be but it won't help much against the problems you'll soon face.
Ultimately the moments in the game are ruined thanks to the studding frame-rate issues which can cause the controls to react poorly leading you to your death. In some battles you and your teammates will go up to nearly 5 or more enemies and during these fights the game chumps down in framerate badly. The issue gets worse when your team sometimes gets in your line of fire which will cause you to fail your mission and sent back to your last save. In 1 or maybe 2 segments they may take cover from enemy fire but most of the time they end up in between you and the enemy which makes them a huge annoyance. You'll may find Health and Weapon recharge stations as well as Energy crystals hidden throughout vessels but unless you're playing on the Easiest setting you'll going to end up taking quite a lot of beating because of the terrible frame-rate making your fights nearly unmanageable.
If the studding frame-rate wasn't bad enough there's some faults with the graphics in comparison to the PC version, specially for when it's running on the Quake 3 engine. All the texture details look weaker and unimpressive and can flicker randomly when you walk up close, Terminals are seen with lines to make it look ridiculous and models look dated as well as blend animations. Effects on the other hand don't look to bad from explosions to guns you use. The soundtrack is solid fitting nearly moment of the game as it did in the series but upon some speeches the track can accidentally skip itself and restart the track again which is weird. The voice-work is what creates every brilliant dialogue moment of the show into the game wonderfully along with the solid writing.
Voyager's problems results from Technical Issues, Graphical faults and any lack of any sufficient Multiplayer. There are much better First Person Shooters choices on the PlayStation 2 like Red Faction and it's port of Half Life which does what FPS titles does better. Even if you are a Star Trek junkie then to say the least Elite Force on the PlayStation is nothing more then a bad port that needs to be assimilated.
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The Pros:
1. You're able to explore Voyager and interact with it's cast and crew
2. Story-pieces works as much as the Television series
The Bads:
1. Technical issues and graphical faults
2. AI characters get in your way which makes them an annoyance
3. Disappointing Multiplayer set-up with no AI Bots
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Reviewed by: Anthony Hayball (BlaZer91)
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