History: Star Trek was one of the few series from the ’60s that most of us remembers. Paramount certainly remembers their cash cow that they canceled, which came back to develop a cult following in reruns, series spin offs, feature films, and perhaps even the Paramount cable network. The fans of star trek called "trekkies" or "trekers" encompass more than one-half the population of the United States.
Over the years computer games have tried to cash in on the Star Trek
mystique, but they severely neglected the game play and story line of
these games. They felt why spend money on a sure bet, people will buy
it no matter how bad it is. The Interplay series of two animated
graphic adventures was different with excellent stories, good interface,
and just a lot of fun.
Summary: Eight classic Judgment Rites episodic adventures are newly programmed on two CD-ROMs filled with explosive cinematic scenes and cuts, beautiful story transition sequences and loads of sound effects from the original TV series.
Plot: The approach to the eight well scripted stories is to recreate short adventures similar to the original ’60s television series, starting with the original credits, music, sound effects, and voices from that show. The animation resembles the animated series that resurfaced shortly after the original series was cancelled. Everything including the stories written by famous science fiction personalities and professional writers familiar with the show and Gene Rodenberry, the series creator, television show writing guidelines.
Voice actors: The actual voices of the entire original Star Trek cast: William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelly, James Doohan, George Takei, Walter Koenig, Nichelle Nichols, and, for the first time, in the Macintosh version, Majel Barrett, the voice of the U.S.S. Enterprise Computer!
Special Collectors edition: The boxed set will include: Star Trek: Judgment Rites CD-ROM, The Making of Star Trek: Judgment Rites CD-ROM Video, Interviews with Leonard Nimoy and Gene Roddenberry, A VHS Copy Of City At The Edge of ForeverTM, Limited Edition Collector’s Pin, and Exclusive fold-open, gold foil embossed packaging.
Not only does the Collector's Edition premier the highly anticipated CD-ROM version of the popular Judgment Rites adventure game with fully digitized speech of the entire Star Trek crew, but for the first time ever, you will enjoy a rare collection of Trek memorabilia in addition to interviews with Nimoy and Roddenberry.
Interface: Within the graphics are hot spots that you click on to
manipulate objects and communicate with non player characters in the
game. Functional icons that are used to perform a multitude of
functions. Easy-to-use and learn, attractive, interface makes the game
fun and provides a myriad of interesting choices.
Getting around is easy simply click on the doors and the open for you to walk through. An auto-mapping and automatic travel utility would have saved a lot of walking through repetitive areas.
There are a number of items that you need to collect, combine, and use at the correct time, place, and way. Some arcade sequences are present, but they can be limited or turned off, in the case of the interesting Star Ship Enterprise dogfighting sequences. (We will not discuss the physics and aerodynamic, or space-o-dynamic, characteristics of the ship - Ed.)
Graphics and animation: The graphics and animation is two dimensional hand rendered images that are attractive and functional.
Sound effects and Music: Authentic sound effects and music from the original television series including the opening music and sound track are fabulous blasts from the past.
Multi-player: no multi-player features.
References:
www.websoft.be/startrek.htm
www.macplay.com/website/titles/stjr.html
Peter Olafson, PC Games, volume 3, number 9, September, 1996, B, (85%).
www.interplay.com/website/sales/salestjr.html
James T. Kirk sing along page: www.loskene.com/singalong/kirk.html