We find out why the Klingons have their own chunk of Cryptic's new Star Trek MMO...

What were the reasons for giving the Klingons their own section of the game?
We wanted players to have another faction that they could play besides the Federation. Even though they’re predominantly PvP focused it still creates that fun atmosphere of two opposing sides going at it. That, and since the Federation and Klingons are at war in our timeline, it wouldn’t make much sense to put them right next to each other.

Klingon ships promise to add another dimension to space battles...

What are the main elements of the Klingon section?
They’re mostly PvP focused. We do plan on adding more PvE content for the faction after launch, but we still want them to feel like a more visceral, dangerous faction. Some other cool elements that I love are that every Klingon starts with a Batleth and you can cloak. I mean there’s really nothing cooler than coming up from behind on your enemy them not even knowing you’re there and then unloading your phasers and torpedoes on them.

How much fan service is in the Klingon portion of the game?
We try to make Qo’noS feel like home for Klingons. You’ve got your fighting pit where you have to do battle in order to earn your Bridge Officers’ respect, for instance. Additionally, the Klingons do speak in Klingon, but obviously your dialogue with them is in a more standard language.

There are already a number of races in the game - could any others get the specialist treatment?
Sure! We want to continually add more content for both Federation and Klingon, but we also want to have more playable factions. Which ones we do next will largely depend on what makes an interesting playable race and what the fans would really like to see.

The Klingons and the Federation are at war in the ST:O timeline

What did Cryptic make of ST:O's beta popularity?
We’re really excited about it. To be honest it kind of took us off guard because we knew that there would be extra fan support this being such a well known title, but what surprised us was how many people were redeeming their beta keys and then continuing to play once they had tried the game. Usually you send out the keys and a lot of people don’t even redeem the keys they receive. We had both a good redemption rate and players returning to play throughout the beta.

We even had to get more hardware to support the amount of people playing. So we’ll continue to monitor this throughout launch and if it’s something again where we have to get more hardware then we’ll be glad to do so.

Can you tell us about any ST:O post-launch plans?
You bet! So we have plans for more PvE content for Klingons and exploration content. More ground fleet actions, more ship customization, and more playable species. We’ll also have Raid-i-sodes which are high end episodes. These are just to name some of things, but there will also be more and more down the road.

Check out the Star Trek Online site for more news on the game's upcoming content...