STO Guidelines

In our latest Q&A with STO executive producer Craig Zinkievich, we ask about the post-development lessons learned from Season One, and how it might influence future content and gameplay mechanics.
The last time ZAM spoke with Star Trek Online executive producer Craig Zinkievich, in early February, the MMO had just launched and thousands of fans throughout North America were finally getting their first glimpse of the new persistent-world ‘Trek universe. After our initial previews of STO’s ship and avatar gameplay, ZAM’s last Q&A with Zinkievich dealt with many of the community-related issues raised by fans on STO’s own forums. In addition, he provided a few clues about new content, some of which culminated in last month’s “Season One” patch update.

It’s been almost three months since Star Trek Online’s official launch and we’ve seen a variety of new features, updates and fixes introduced since then. Special Task Force missions are released every few weeks and “Season One” marked the MMO’s first major content update. Several other new features, like the “Tribble” public test server, is helping STO overcome many of the post-launch issues it originally faced.

In today’s Q&A, ZAM goes back to Zinkievich to learn more about “Season One” and beyond. What insights did Cryptic’s development team glean from the recent content update and Special Task Force missions? What’s in store for future “Season” updates, and what can max-rank players look forward to until then? We also ask about the upcoming “death penalty” and “difficulty slider” features that players requested, and learn that the developers are working on a new mini-game based on “Dabo” (the casino-like game referenced many times in the TV series). Check out the full Q&A after the jump for these details and more.