Star Trek: Elite Force / RPG-X: How to remedy the broken neck syndrome

The difference between using the mouse and the camera controls when observing your vicinity in RPG-X.

Sometimes -- once every few years I guess if I calculate the average -- I enjoy a good role-playing session. I'm not a fan of role-playing games such as D&D where you bring up the dice and the character sheets and stuff, or with BatMUD where everyone just mines for experience points and explores the game but does not really role-play, but I have always liked the concept of serious RPs where each player is an actor, and they together contribute towards a plot and make it as believable experience as possible for all the other players. For that, I recently discovered this RPG-X modification of Star Trek: Elite Force -- a game I have never heard of before and frankly not been really interested either -- and one of the thriving online communities built around it, The Last Outpost.
In an example RPG-X session, you might be playing a medic aboard the starship, developing medicines and scanning odd lifeforms while treating patients coming in for various injuries. Because none of that is really provided by the game mechanics -- for example, all of the supposedly injured player characters are usually in perfect health -- it is up to the players' imagination to create all the plot. It is a big game of pretend, and an entertaining one at that. The game engine does provide with authentic looking audio & visuals that enhance the experience. For example, when you're scanning the supposedly broken energy conduits in the walls with your tricorder, it looks exactly the same as if any character from actual Star Trek TV series was doing it. Aside from the fact that you're not really getting any readings whatsoever, nobody could tell that you're not really doing what you say you're doing. Then there is an extensive set of emotes that are simply choreographic macros your character might perform, to portray emotions, reactions and actions. Some macros include sounds, for example all the console-macros include console button pressing sounds, that are emitted regardless of whether you use the emote at a console or not.
It's kind of hard to summarize the whole experience and the attraction in few sentences though.

I guess this video is mostly targeted at TLO members, but I made it public so that others, whom it might interest, can possibly learn of the concept.

The purpose of this video is to teach the benefit of using the camera controls rather than moving the character's head around when you, as the player, want to see something without the intention of portraying the character as doing that.

The video was recorded with CamStudio. Bad framerate, I know, cannot help it.

Category:

Gaming

Tags:

• Star Trek
• RPG
• online
• camera
• view
• keyboard
• hotkey
• tutorial
• Fiction
• Video Game
• Space
• Sci-Fi