Late in August we had the chance to talk with Cryptic’s Executive Producer for Star Trek Online, about the upcoming major update to the game - Season 11: New Dawn. After publishing our interview, readers had a host of opinions and comments about Season 11, and the direction Cryptic takes when creating content for Star Trek Online. So we reached out to Ricossa to get some answers for our readers.

The trailer for Season 11, and our initial interview with Ricossa, explained that captains will return to their roots and start exploring again. However, there will not be any new exploration system. Initially Ricossa told us that there had been some whiteboard discussions about a new exploration system, but that we wouldn’t see a new one in Season 11. He also explained that the initial system had bugs and problems that didn’t suit the game in it’s current state, especially since the team had started revamping many elements of the game. Ricossa didn’t have much more to say during our follow up interview except:

“We know how important the theme of exploration is in the Star Trek universe, and it’s something we want to take the time to make right. We don’t give time frames for when a feature will actually make it live, it is something everyone on this team is committed to.”

It’s no secret that in some way or another every series has played with time travel in one way or another. One of our readers said “Time Travel has been done to death in Star Trek.” We asked Ricossa if time travel would come into play in Season 11, and if he himself felt that time travel is tired.

“Time travel will definitely come into play with Season 11, and will be a part of the story arc that takes us through 2016. This theme may be prevalent throughout the “Star Trek” television shows and movies, but some of my personal favorite storylines come from the time travel themes. “City on the Edge of Forever,” “Timeless,” “Time’s Arrow” (Parts 1 and 2), “Cause and Effect,” “The Visitor,” “Little Green Men,” and “First Contact” are all amazing time travel stories that I’m happy to watch again and again. That being said, time travel is something that hasn’t been explored outside of a couple of episodes in Star Trek Online and the team is looking forward to taking that theme and running with it.”

Another reader felt that Cryptic kept “rehashing” material from the TV & Film verse. “When are they going to stop rehashing and move onto more original stories with original (not [Original Series]) characters?” Ricossa explained in our initial interview that he felt that people were playing Star Trek Online because they wanted to experience the Trek universe with ties to the series and films. However he did elaborate a bit more in our follow up interview:

“We regularly add new characters to our content, though we always like to keep our stories rooted in something from Trek history. There are so many episodes with unresolved conclusions, a meaningful story that may continue after the episode ends, or hints of what the future may hold that we want to include and explore. We definitely like to tell our own stories, but again, we want to keep them in the established universe of Star Trek.”





The final question I had for Ricossa was about Cryptic’s relationship with CBS. Some readers have asked or talked about CBS overseeing and even vetoing material for Star Trek Online before it is put into the game. However, Ricossa explained that it isn’t a "Big Brother" relationship, rather it is a partnership between CBS and Cryptic to create content that is true to the Star Trek canon, while still expanding upon it.

“We have a fantastic relationship with CBS, and we work closely together whenever we feel there is a story that may be controversial. In general, we have a great amount of freedom when it comes to the stories we want to tell, but if we’re introducing something that could significantly change an established canon or impact a major character we always discuss it with them first."



We also told Ricossa about some of the speculation made by our readers, for season 11. Such as who the new bad guys may be, and what missions they may play through. We asked how much of that speculation was true, but he only said “We always love seeing the speculation!”

If anyone has any questions about the upcoming season you can always learn more on the Star Trek Online website, Twitter, and Facebook page.