The Admiral’s Log: My Journey Through ‘Star Trek Online’ – Part XIII

Written by John Edward Betancourt 

Welcome to ‘Age of Discovery’

Well, after many weeks of voyaging through wonderful memories involving Star Trek Online with all of you fine geeks and nerds, today is a red-letter day for The Admiral’s Log. Because on this fine Friday, there is no more reflecting upon a year’s worth of experiences in the game, we are finally going to talk about current events if you will. For Tuesday saw the launch of the brand-new expansion pack ‘Age of Discovery’, and now I get to geek out about it will all of you and well, I’m pretty excited to talk about this today because it’s Trek, but also to discuss all the awesome surprises that I found when I first logged in.
 
Because it would seem that the update that hit my Xbox One included a new graphics upgrade, since I noticed some new lighting and shading and depth when it comes to the characters and the cutscenes, adding new life to something as simple as communications via the viewscreen and I also couldn’t help but notice that the Mission Journal received a brand new layout, with some missions for me to replay down the line and a brand new set of Task Force Operations missions to toy with as well, meaning that there is going to be plenty to do once I finish up this initial run of Discovery themed missions and well, that’s just lovely. But alas, while it was supremely cool to find all of these treats waiting for me, I had one thing on my mind, those new missions.
 
Now, getting into that, took a little bit of effort on my part, because I had a tough decision to make. Do I go into the character screen and create a Captain from the 23rd Century, and truly enjoy the new world that was created for the players, or do I roll with my current crew and the missions presented to me in the 25th Century? And well, after a brief debate in my mind, I simply chose the latter of those two options simply due to the fact that I’ve invested so much time into the Galactica and my current character that it just wouldn’t be right to get a new ship and start new adventures with another crew and another vessel, so I opted to just hit play on ‘Secrets’ and well, in the end I’m pretty satisfied with my choice.
 
Because this ‘season premiere’ allowed for the crew to take part in a simulation of a mission from long ago, one involving a powerful foe named J’Ula, who just so happens to be the sister of the late T’Kuvma and well, I’ll say no more on the plot so that I don’t spoil it and instead discuss the wonder of being aboard a Discovery era vessel. For in this episode, you get to step aboard the U.S.S. Glenn (NCC-1030), sister ship to the U.S.S. Discovery (NCC-1031). to help them deal with J’Ula and man, it is cool to face off against Klingons from this era and walk the halls of a Crossfield Class starship and well, once again, this expansion delivers since it sets up quite the plot for the future and it’s just a blast to play.
 
Normally though, I have a tendency to just power through as many missions as I can when it comes to this game. But this time around, once I finished ‘Secrets’, I opted to pace myself going forward, so that I can properly savor these missions with all of you, and really take my time in enjoying the story. So, that’s really all I have to geek about today, but believe me when I say, I am stupid excited to play the next mission and review it, because it would seem that the next chapter is going to chronicle one of Starfleet’s darkest hours in the First Klingon/Federation War since the Galactica will be plunged into the midst of a battle over Earth, and a fight to save Starbase One… 

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