Let’s get disclaimers out of the way, as they’ll undoubtedly make it easier for Trekkies to dismiss what follows as pure Star Wars fanboyism. I am, unashamedly, a huge fan of Star Wars. Love the Original Trilogy. Hate the prequels. Han shot first. Tentatively love The Force Awakens, unless Episode VIII proves that all Disney wants to do is carbon copy the OT. Yeah, that guy.
In terms of Star Trek, I guess you’d say I’m a casual fan. J.J. Abrams' Kelvin Timeline reboot was the first time I saw any Star Trek property from start to finish, and I really like the first movie (plot conveniences notwithstanding) and I dug the sequels. So after recently going hands- and heads-on with Star Wars Battlefront Rogue One: X-wing VR Mission, the most convoluted title in gaming history, and Star Trek: Bridge Crew, I was obviously expecting to like the Star Wars experience more.
Bridge Crew has you on the deck of a Starfleet ship, dependent on the actions of other players (or AI) for success, while X-wing VR Mission has you fully in control of your ship and how you react to the action around you.
And that’s what happened. But it’s not like I didn’t enjoy the Star Trek experience; it’s just that X-wing VR Mission is a better game, even with fanboyism pushed right to the side. Here’s why.
Both demos were about 15 minutes in duration, although X-wing VR Mission felt decidedly shorter than Star Trek: Bridge Crew, most likely because of the pace at which it plays out. They’re two different games, sure, but in terms of VR experiences, especially when the tech is relatively new, X-wing VR Mission is more a game, and Bridge Crew is, well, more of a button-pressing simulator. In this respect, Bridge Crew almost requires you to have, at the very least, a casual interest in Star Trek because the gameplay isn’t terribly exciting.
X-wing VR Mission, on the other hand, throws you in the cockpit of a Starfighter: you don’t need to love or even know Star Wars to appreciate that. Both games embrace the VR fantasy by having the player’s avatar sitting in the game world, just like the player is doing in reality. But Bridge Crew has you on the deck of a Starfleet ship, dependent on the actions of other players (or AI) for success, while X-wing VR Mission has you fully in control of your ship and how you react to the action around you.
I played in the Tactical role for Bridge Crew, which meant I was in charge of shields, scanning, firing phasers, and launching torpedoes. For everything else, I was utterly dependent on my flanking crewmates: Helm for controlling the ship; and the Engineer to warp the survivors from escape pods that I’d scanned, or granting me more power to phasers so I could engage threats at greater range. In the cockpit of my T-65B X-wing starfighter, I was in control of everything.
Because X-wing VR Mission’s developer Criterion has lifted the controls directly from core game Star Wars Battlefront, it’s a cinch to control, too. Left stick controls throttle up or down, with the added benefit of boosting the damage of laser cannons when flying at slower speeds, and right stick controls the direction of the aircraft. Outside of this, there’s a single button to control whether S-foils are locked in attack or boring position, and obviously separate buttons for launching proton torpedoes or firing those glorious-sounding laser cannons.
In Bridge Crew, my role amounted to using Oculus Rift Touch controllers to manipulate my avatar’s hands into pressing buttons, tapping on a targeting panel, or moving sliders. That’s it. Of the four roles in Bridge Crew, that’s what three roles amount to, albeit with controls over different parts of the U.S.S. Aegis. If you want to play as Captain, all you get to do is talk and, as evidenced in my demo, those other roles are free to ignore those orders.
Even the opening segments of each demo were a stark contrast to each other, with Star Wars coming out on top. Criterion has even made the calibration splash screen exciting in X-wing VR Mission, with a towering AT-AT walker that stomps over you as you calibrate the comfort of the PlayStation VR headset and get your view of the game world just right. The next section lets you teleport to key points around the X-wing starfighter you’re about to pilot, marvelling at the immaculate attention to detail and digital recreation of a recognisable screen icon.
For Star Trek: Bridge Crew, the opening section is on board a shuttle on its way to the U.S.S. Aegis. The Aegis is certainly beautifully rendered, but look over to the right at futuristic planet Earth and you’ll notice a strange absence of New Zealand. Attention to detail that is not.
When you’re aboard the bridge of the Aegis, what you can see of space is limited to a restricted viewscreen. You can press a button to jump to an airliner-like tail-cam view of space, but this can feel jarring to the first-person fantasy of being aboard the ship. Back aboard the X-wing, you can spin your head to practically track Imperial TIE fighters through the infinitely more transparent cockpit as you dogfight with them.
The expanded view and full control over the direction of your ship isn’t role-dependent, like in Bridge Crew, which means you can also use this viewing freedom to ogle friendly starfighters, capital ships, or asteroid belts, if flying space rocks are your jam.
I want to go to there.
Ultimately, though, it’s the control that was the determining factor for me in making X-wing VR Mission more enjoyable. During solo play in Bridge Crew, you can reportedly switch between the four roles, but you’re still reliant on AI to take care of things when you’re at one of the four specific stations. The same is true of co-op play, in that you’re reliant on others for your success or defeat. In X-wing VR Mission, whether you succeed or fail is totally up to how well you fly and shoot.
While both accessible, X-wing VR Mission boasts strong game mechanics that make for exciting gameplay. Star Trek: Bridge Crew prioritises authenticity to the point where the accurate portrayal of your particular role arguably requires a certain degree of fandom for the prospect to be considered compelling. For everyone else, you’re quite literally just pushing buttons and moving switches.
"Look! It's the Good year blimp!"
On top of this, it helps that X-wing VR Mission is even easier to get, assuming you own the requisite PlayStation hardware (it’s a PS VR exclusive) and a copy of Star Wars Battlefront. It’ll be a free download for Star Wars Battlefront that’s expected to drop later this year. While the lack of a price tag is certainly indicative of its play length (it’s around 30 minutes, according to devs), I’d wager a Hutt’s bounty that the core player base for Bridge Crew that will embrace it for extended sessions will be the hardcore Star Trek fans.
If you’re more of a Star Trek fan than Star Wars admirer, you’ll likely gravitate more towards Bridge Crew, because you’re exactly the audience for which Red Storm Entertainment is aiming. The same is true of the other end of the spectrum. But if you’re in the middle – either unattached to Star Trek or Star Wars, or equal fans of both properties – X-wing VR Mission provides the better gameplay experience, putting you at the heart of the action, and not just a button-pressing officer reliant on the work of others for success.
Nathan Lawrence is a freelance writer based in Sydney and shooter specialist. Track him down on Twitter.
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