User Reviews (21 - 23 of 23)

Show these reviews first:

Highest Rated
Lowest Rated Newest
Oldest Most Helpful
Least Helpful

An excellent computer game now that its been patched

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: May 10, 2001
Author: Amazon User

Okay... sure... it was tough to play, but now that its been patched, this is an excellent computer conversion of the wargame Star Fleet Battles. If you like deep yet exciting strategy plus Star Trek this game has endless replayability. I recommend without hesitation.

XP

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: December 17, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I used to have this game on my old computer and i thought it was amazing. Somehow the game got thrown away and i just recently purchised another, and i now have a new computer with XP it and the game wont install. Any ideas?

Improved computer version of STAR FLEET BATTLES

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 0 / 0
Date: July 10, 2008
Author: Amazon User

Second installment of this excellent Star Trek tactical level wargame which tests your ability to think, not the speed with which you can click the mouse or hit buttons on the keyboard.

The Star Fleet Command series of games are a brilliantly executed computer version of the Task Force Games & Amarillo Design Bureau Star Trek boardgame, Star Fleet Battles.

If you have ever played the boardgame, and enjoyed it, this has almost identical ships, races, and rules, but with the computer dealing with all the tedious Energy allocation, combat results, etc. So instead of filling in forms, rolling dice, looking up tables and trying to remember which phasers you've fired you can concentrate on how your starship can defeat the enemy.

This game does not require any ability to hit the right part of the screen with mouse or joystick, nor lightning-fast reactions, nor the ability to repeatedly press any computer control with RSI-inducing speed. It is a test of tactical ability and particularly of using your intelligence to set up situation where your ship's weapons will be more effective than those of your opponent. (There are also a few scenarios which can be solved by using diplomacy or by appropriate use of ship systems other than weapons.)

You can opt to fight single-ship battles, command a squadron of up to three ships, or fight a campaign game set at the time of the "ISC Pacification Campaign."

In the "Star Fleet Battles" history the Organians mysteriously disappeared in the 2260's, between the original "Star Trek" TV series and the first "Star Trek" film, and the Klingons took advantage of their absence to launch a major war which rapidly spread to engulf most of the races in the galaxy. The Organians returned and stopped that war, but encouraged a new power, the Interstellar Concordium, to impose peace on the galaxy. The attempt to impose a "Pax ISC" provides the backdrop and context for the campaign game.

The six Star Trek nations which you could play in the first Star Fleet Command game were the Federation, Klingons, Romulans or Gorns, and Lyrans or Hydrans from the boardgame. The Orion Pirates appear as a non-player race in the first two games (there is a later expansion in which you can play them.) This second game adds the ISC and re-introduces the Kzinti ships and systems under the name Mirak.

It is with some trepidation that I explain this, because a letter I wrote making a joke on this subject to a games magazine generated an avalanche of hate mail from Star Trek fans.

Larry Niven's Kzinti from his "Known Space" series also appear in the "Star Fleet Battles" universe: when Niven wrote some of the episodes of the animated Star Trek series many years ago, he adapted his own short story "The Soft Weapon" as a Star Trek tale, complete with Kzinti. So Task Force games allocated them a place in the Star Trek galaxy complete with a unique set of ship types and tactics. Larry doesn't seem to have been at all bothered by this, he certainly never sued TFG or the Amarillo Design Bureau, but for legal or contract reasons the people who put out the first version of the computer game decided that having the Kzinti in it was asking for trouble.

However in this second version of the computer game, they put a new race in the same part of the galaxy which the Kzinti occupied in the boardgame, flying exactly the same ship designs which the Kzinti used in the boardgame, so the wargamers who loved having those ships in their games were happy, but they called the replacement race the Mirak, and the graphic of a Mirak captain doesn't look like the Kzin in Larry Niven's books, so the lawyers were happy.

The other new thing in this second game is - CARRIERS AND FIGHTERS! Only the Hydrans had fighter shuttles in the first computer game, but in this one just about every carrier design in Star Fleet Battles from the mighty Federation Space Control Ship (my favourite ship in the game) down to light carriers is available.

There are two new campaign games - one available to all races which covers the history of the ISC Pacification campaign, and one resrtricted to the Mirak, Lyrans, Hydran which involves finding ancient technology and using it to defeat your enemies. The campaign games incorporate almost all the scenarios in the boardgame, from patrol and convoy actions to base attack/defence, and "the surprise reversed." There are also a range of battles in the campaign game which feature various space monsters new ideas like hostage rescue, and the campaign game knits together into an entertaining storyline.

For reference, there are currently four "Star Fleet Command" computer games

1) The original "Star Fleet Command" set in the general war

2) This game, "Star Fleet Command II, Empires at war" set about a decade later during the attempt by the Interstellar Concordium (ISC) to impose peace on the galaxy.

3) Star Fleet Command "Orion Pirates" which is a free-standing expansion for the second game, and you can play as any of the eight empires from this game or as one of eight clans of Orion pirates.

4) Star Fleet Command III, set a century later in Picard's time, and you can play as the Federation, Klingons (now allied to the Federation), Romulans (still enemy) or Borg.

So if you want to play the Orions, get the third expansion, if you want to play as or fight the Borg, get Star Fleet Command III.

Review Page: 1 2 3 

Actions