Star Trek Online is holding its first-ever Trial Weekend from May 7-10, hoping the just released Season 1.1 Update will wow former subscribers back to the game.
Season 1.1 Update introduced the Difficulty Slider that enabled players to choose between Normal, Advanced or Elite difficulty for their missions. Increased difficulty improves the loot rewards, but those who undertake Advanced or Elite quests run the risk of costly treatments under the new Injury System.
Captains who become incapacitated in ground or space battle suffer injuries or stat-lowering debuffs. Injuries heal themselves after 30 minutes, or can be removed via vendor-bought regenerators (for ground injuries) or components (for space injuries). The Injury system adds a depth of danger to the higher difficulty settings and forces captains to plan ahead.
The Season 1.1 Update also implemented the convenient weapon Auto-Fire, which lets us focus more on tactical maneuvers than mindless button-mashing. Former subscribers can try out these new features during the Trial Weekend by logging on to the Star Trek Online website. Have your retail key at hand, and be sure to download the STO game client if you already deleted the old one.
Returning Trekkies can also look forward to the Season 1.1 supplemental out by next week that brings us Special Task Force: Undine Terradome and a revamp of Memory Alpha. While the former will give 5-man raiders more content to finish, the latter is a good baby step to make crafting far less frustrating than it currently is. The Trial Weekend won’t showcase this, but it might be enough to convince STO deserters to test the waters for a month or two.
Trial Weekend will run from Friday, May 7, 2010 at 10:00 a.m. Pacific until Monday, May10, 2010 at 10:00 a.m. Pacific.