From a cult classic of 1960s television to present-day blockbuster, Star Trek has managed to maintain a sizable audience over the decades; and add to it consistently with strategic changes to the formulae that makes it so popular. One of the most prominent reasons for Star Trek's success is its ability to cobble together so many different facets of storytelling into one neat package to appeal to a broad, but not disconnected, audience.

No doubt many of you who have read Aaron McKenna's article on Star Trek fiction know that the extension of Gene Roddenberry's galactic tales in the world of print fiction has provided some of the most succulent fruit Star Trek has to offer (particularly in recent years). Unfortunately, the same can not be said of all of the video games made to represent the series in the digital age.

There is a limited audience still alive that was exposed to the unbridled Kirk-fever that constituted Star Trek: The Original Series... The Board Game. While the market for these turn-based, hexagonal strategy antics has thinned (just a little) since that game's release, there can be no doubt that as technology has developed, so too has Star Trek's long and dubious history with video games.

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Cardboard Backgrounds Work Better On TV

The Original Series introduced us to something new. We saw Kirk adventuring across the cosmos, battling Spock (repeatedly), Khan and an ever-growing cast of ne'er do well space miscreants. From the outset, despite the constraints of budget and acting talent, it was always evident that Star Trek was to be something of a phenomenon. Unfortunately for us, video games would have to wait their turn to bask in the glory of critical and fan success in the Star Trek universe.

There would be no opportunity for us to go gallivanting across the cosmos, battling Romulan Commanders all along for many years. In the beginning, developers struggled to create awe at the sight of Star Trek: The Text Adventure, featuring the USS Enterprise (then represented by the altogether unmistakable "-E-") and ensemble cast. The only hitch? It was a text adventure, natch.

As time and technology moved on it seemed inevitable that we would see a Star Trek game that placed us in that high-backed seat we love so much. We longed to be master and commander of our own Enterprise. The eventual release of Privateer, the space-based adventure game, which opened many doors in the gaming world, seemed almost to portend a Star Trek game of unimaginable magnitude.

Unfortunately by that stage we had seen the evolution of Star Trek into The Next Generation, wherein the crew made the exciting move from "bold adventures in space" (i.e. drinken', fighten' and lovin') to "questioning their moral right to boldly adventure in space" (i.e. non-alcoholic drinks, diplomacy and well, they did have Riker). While this change certainly made interesting viewing on the tube, it undeniably represented a more difficult experience to translate into a video game than the swashbuckling adventures of Captain Kirk.

By the same token, the available technology advanced and the new opportunities presented to developers to produce new and exciting types of games were manifold. But, before we can look at some of the really great games, we first have to look at some of the really terrible ones, which at times, seem to have far outweighed the good.