Romulan

Cutting the Cord After last week’s epic episode, “Coliseum”, those of us at the Federation News Service were intrigued to see just how they could possibly top that nod back to the high point of the Star Trek franchise – the very beginning. Maybe they could have stayed in a retro mood, and maybe it would have been better if they had. “Cut the Cord”, the finale of the “Cloaked Intentions” arc, instead took its cues from “Star Trek Nemesis”, the movie that finally killed the Star Trek franchise. Nonetheless, it was still a fun, if literally on rails, experience. ...

Vanity, thy name is Reman shields You can’t think of “Star Trek” and coliseums together without thinking immediately of the original series episodes “Bread and Circuses”, where the Enterprise crew beam into a 20th century version of the Roman Empire, and “Amok Time”, where Kirk and Spock battle to the death on the planet Vulcan. (The director of “Bread and Circuses”, Ralph Senensky, blogs about directing that episode – a must read! Includes bloopers!) ...

In the first episode of “Cloaked Intentions”, the third Feature Episode arc, we visited a semi-abandoned, giant space station called “The Vault” deep within the Romulan neutral zone. There, we met Obisek, a Reman rebelling against the half-human Romulan empress Sela and her scattered empire of refugees. In the second episode, “Mine Enemy”, we followed Obisek’s suspicions to a hidden Tal Shiar (Romulan intelligence agency) base deep within a mining colony inhabited by the rock-like Horta. ...

Mine enemy? Mine enemy is Cryptic, who, for the second feature episode in a row, couldn’t handle the press of people wanting to do the episode the moment it went live. I guess they should make some sort of queue system, somewhere… The swarm of starships outside mission systems is just amazing. This is your money, Cryptic; this is why we play. PLEASE make the servers work on FE day! ...

One lowly shuttle stands between the broken Romulan Star Empire and the rebellion of their ex-slaves, the goblinoid Remans, as their private war threatens to draw the Alpha Quadrant into a conflict that could destroy worlds. More worlds. The Romulans are still feeling a little sore that Spock didn’t save Romulus, even though he PINKY PROMISED! Before I get into the interrupted adventures of the Federation News Service, Cryptic made a teaser for the arc, “Cloaked Intentions”. You will believe Star Trek is still on the air! ...

Yes, desperately catching up on all the posts I should have made this week, but did not. Undine Front: The Return is the second of the two episodes given you by Starfleet as you embark upon Season Two. It opens similarly to the other mission, Undine Front: Assimilation, with a sudden congregation of Borg ships causing some concern in the quadrant. Not only that, but there have been reports of non-Borg ships in the area as well. It would be terrible to lose such a fine crew, Starfleet assures us, but we need to head in and do what we can. ...