Star Trek Bridge Crew is out now, and HTC is so confident in this VR gateway it's bundling the game with new Vive units
Star Trek Bridge Crew lets you live out some of your most secret, cherished dreams.
Star Trek Bridge Crew is a multiplayer VR game where you and your pals (or online randos) act as the major officers on the bridge of a Starfleet vessel. It's rolling out for PSVR, HTC Vive and Oculus Rift right now
Look, you're either whimpering with longing and delight right now or you're not, and there's very little else that can be said to change matters. Do check out the Star Trek Bridge Crew trailer above, though; it gives you a better idea of how it all works. It puts me in mind of the excellent Spaceteam, but not a joke, and actors from Star Trek have said it's pretty good.
There are two ships available in Star Trek Bridge Crew - new addition the U.S.S. Aegis, or the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701, as it appeared in Star Trek: The Original Series. You can take on the role of Captain, Engineer, Helm or Tactical, and there's a full, ongoing story campaign as well as an Ongoing Voyages mode with randomised missions playable solo or in co-op.
Speaking of which, if you really want to play by yourself Ubisoft is planning a beta sometime in northern summer, during which it will leverage IBM Watson to allow solo players to direct AI crew members via voice command. For everyone else, like all multiplayer Ubisoft VR games Star Trek Bridge Crew has cross-platform online matchmaking, so you've got a good chance of finding a crew.
This is one of those things only really possible in VR, and there's been some loose talk of killer app status. As much as I love Star Trek I'm not sure we're at that stage yet, but HTC has started giving away a free copy of Star Trek Bridge Crew with new Vive units, so it's clearly pretty convinced there's potential here.
Just looking through the replies to this tweet it looks like very recent Vive purchases may qualify for a copy of Star Trek Bridge Crew retroactively, so drop Vive Support a line if you just picked one up yesterday - or purchased yours today through a third-party and didn't get a code.