MusicallyInspired

The last few comments on the update have actually been refreshingly positive.

Impressive. Most impressive.

AGI or remake? ;)

You're overstating things. I never really had a problem with them in any way, just that there were so many of them.

Yeah, there are threads that they pick up on (aka extend) when you didn't expect them to come back, but I don't consider them whole story arcs like in X-Files or Stargate (where you DO expect them to come back).

What I thought of with these shots:

Not really, besides two-parters. The only time a story arc was connected by another episode was Too Short A Season and Conspiracy where an old Admiral friend of Picard's was paranoid about a corruption taking over the Federation. But it never went any further than that. There were reoccurring characters (like Lore and the Borg), but they were self-contained and not really arcs. Wil Weaton actually was looking forward to continuing story arcs, especially with Conspiracy, but was sad that it never really happened. They didn't start that kind of thing until DS9.

Yeah. Basically every sci-fi except TNG lol.

TNG doesn't have a story arc. I'd liken this to something more like X-Files. Which is alright in my book! Telltale haven't really done a good job with the self-contained episodes, having abandoned it for just straight continuing serial stories.

I've got so many things keeping me busy I don't have time to notice how long the development is. I'm fine with them taking all the time they need (short of 5 years or something).

Yeah. The Two Guys have never had a problem with making games we like when they were at Sierra and not getting any fan feedback of what they wanted to see in the next game...unless there's something I don't know. True it's been a while since they've made a game, I choose to not worry. Feedback is good, but it can also be detrimental. If they try to appease everyone's desires they're not making a game they love in the end. I hope they take our feedback with a grain of salt and trust their instincts for the most part. If it flops, well it flops. But we all backed them to see them bring their brand of gaming back to the industry. We wanted to see the ability to make games that they had back then brought back in today. We backed because we loved their games and want them to do it again. That's why I backed, anyway. Let em do it, I say.

It's just too early to tell, I think. This is supposed to be a full length adventure. We know that this station explodes shortly after the events of the demo so we can be fairly sure that it's a fairly short part of the game. We also know that there's a lot more to see and do as evidenced by that mysterious character peeking through the glass at the airlock and by Chris Pope saying there wasn't time to put him in. Plus we haven't seen the whole station yet. It could be huge with lots of things to look at. I wouldn't think there would be very many interesting things in a few hallways and a janitor's closet. Who knows what they've got planned? We've given them feedback already as well about these kinds of things. The Guys know we love our SQ style interactions. Plenty of reasons for me to have faith. Though, like I said feedback is important. So giving them that is all we can do.

Well, I can understand if he wants to have more interesting things to interact with. I don't think that's an unreasonable request to make. Style or not. I just don't think it's anything to lose faith over.

The alpha demo was exactly that. Alpha. Severely unfinished. Something the team only usually gets to test. Backers got to play it because they were nice and let us. Also they asked us to find any bugs we might/will see. It wasn't meant for public consumption. At least, that was my impression. Requesting more props is fair enough but I don't think there's anything to lose faith about at this stage.

With the level of detail you can get from prerendered backgrounds just by the nature of how they're created, getting that from a handpainted image is a completely different workload. To say nothing of the artist's ability and/or style.

My point is it would take far longer to put the level of detail that's in a prerendered image into a painted background.

Those screens are 3d rendered and hand painted on top. Mark's artwork is not prerendered. Its either handpainted, digitally painted, composited, or all three. Which is pretty good compared to 3d. I like it.

Nice.

Pre-rendered screens or full 3d worlds? Sprites or models? Looks good!

Maybe. I thought he was better than SQ4's Roger, though. Never liked the neanderthal-ish nasaly "speech-struggling" Roger voice.

Seriously, what's with all the drama lately? Lol

Wow. We must have vastly different tastes because I thought Ep3 was the best of the prequels.

See, I don't agree it HAS to be about deeper stories. Wrath of Kahn certainly wasn't very thought-provoking. Neither was First Contact. Yet both are revered by fans as the ultimate Trek movies. Motion Picture and Final Frontier were as deep as they come and both are reviled by many. I'm sorry, I just think most people's hate on Abrams' Trek is based on the fact that he's a newcomer, he's a well-known and successful director (so automatically he "doesn't get it"), and that it had lens flares. Sure it's not the same Trek, but that doesn't make it bad. It was a well made flick and I really enjoyed it. Just because the focus is on (good) action storytelling right now doesn't mean deep sci-fi is dying. It doesn't deserve as much hate as it gets when you judge it on its own merits. But too many people look at Star Trek as untouchably sacred. I just don't think it's worth the time and energy to hate it for that.

Oh I'm no stranger to the awesomeness of Kahn. Great movie. I have all the special and director's editions of all the Star Trek movies on 2-disc DVD (the gray cases). I've binge-watched them all and all their special features over the course of a couple weeks one time. But that was a while ago and we tend to only remember the good of something, unless it was a truly terrible film. I'd have to watch it again to remember the bad. Not really a biggie, but they DID infer that Chekov was present during the events of Space Seed when in fact he wasn't even on the show yet.

Interesting. I disagree about the handling of Data's death. I was definitely moved. I thought it built up nicely to it throughout the film as well. With his continued illumination of what humanity is all about, offering Picard advice on his humanity, and then ultimately performing the most human act he has ever done: sacrificing himself for his friend. Sure he SAID he would do it many times before, but he actually ended up doing it this time. And that following the previous conversations they had, all that went unsaid in that last moment made it extremely meaningful and powerful to me. It didn't feel like it was just some android that blew up, it felt like losing a human. A member of your family. It felt like that to me, anyway. The epilogue was fantastic as well, with still leaving a glimmer of hope at the very end that even though Data was gone and would never return, part of him survived and existed in somebody else, a perfect metaphor for humanity when we lose someone we love. At least until Star Trek Online revived Data through B4, but I like that too. And it's not necessarily that I think each and every film all has pros and cons. Kahn would be the pro while Frontier would be the con, for instance. But even Frontier has pros. Fantastic score, for one. Probably the best in the series. I don't think any of the films are a resounding con and I'm sure if I looked hard enough I could find something wrong with Kahn, however small, as I haven't seen it in a while.