Bridge Commander

Bridge Commander is a starship simulator video game based in the era of the Star Trek: The Next Generation series. The player acts as the captain of a Federation starship, carrying out missions and engaging in battle.

Summary
Taking place sometime after the Dominion War, this game introduces the Maelstrom, a section of space inundated with strange solar radiation, which makes colonization of planets almost impossible. It is located near Cardassian Union space over the borders from the Romulan Neutral Zone and the Klingon Empire.

The pre-game cut scene shows the vessel USS Dauntless in orbit of Vesuvi III on a re-supply mission for the Dreagos research and terraforming station there. Captain Wright takes a shuttle craft down (The game's manual shows that he had a bottle of Romulan Ale to take to his son-in-law at the station), when suddenly the Vasuvi star begins to explode! The planet and the shuttle are lost in the shock wave, and the Dauntless barely escapes, taking damage to its warp nacelles. Just as they get out, the science station officer records an object warping away from the sun...

The Dauntless makes it back to Space Dock for repairs, with a opening credits sequence showing the Dauntless being repaired...

The story's premise, shown in cinematics, is as follows: you play the role of the first officer of the USS Dauntless, a Galaxy-class starship. While your captain is out in a shuttle, the system's sun destabilizes and explodes, damaging the Dauntless and killing your Captain. The explosion also endangers nearby colonists.

You must take control of the ship and solve the mystery. Your mission is to discover what caused the stellar explosion and keep it from happening again. During the game you will interact with Cardassians, Klingons, Romulans and other races, including a new one created just for the game. Several Star Trek alumni provide their voices to the game, such as Patrick Stewart and Brent Spiner.

Storyline
The Dauntless enters orbit around Draegos colony or Vesuvi 4 and a shuttle piloted by Captain Robert Wright heads for the Vesuvi IV terraforming station. The captain chose not be beam down because he is carrying Romulan ale for his son-in-law Ralph Sersons, which would be detected by the transporter logs. As he calmly flies on he decides to update his personal log where he outlines the new first officer's progress and the Dauntless' current mission.

On the bridge, science officer Diaz reports that he is detecting very unusual readings from the star. Before he can analyze them, an emergency transmission is received from the captain. The star’s core is destabilizing. Wright order the first officer to get the ship out of the system immediately. The first shock wave destroys the orbital stations and the shuttle Icarus 2 and turns the surface of the planet into a fiery inferno. Caught in its wake, the Dauntless cannot engage its warp engines.

Ensign Lomar diverts power to the impulse engines and the ship escapes just as the planet explodes behind them. Fragments from the planet impacts the ship starboard nacelle, and Diaz reports that an object is warping out of the system but that he is not able to get a good reading on it. The damaged ship heads for Starbase 12.

The Dauntless undergoes extensive repairs at Soho station. Different views of the ship are seen as repairs progress. Finally it is ready and it departs for its next mission: The Vesuvi system.

The repaired Dauntless, with a new captain, a new first officer, and Captain Jean-Luc Picard as a visitor, departs Soho Station for Starbase 12 to pick up supplies and relief teams for the Haven and Geki colonies.

Haven is threatened by several rogue stellar fragments ejected from the Vesuvi star. The fragments must be destroyed before they impact the planet.

The ship is then diverted to Tevron II to escort the Sovereign. A skirmish with two Romulan Warbirds ensues. After the Romulans are sent packing, Captain Picard transports to the IKC RanKuf for Biranu Station.

After re-supplying the Geki colony, the Dauntless comes to the aid of a Cardassian freighter under attack by a Romulan Warbird. The Romulans claim it is carrying contraband as the ship's cargo is concealed by a dampening field. The Cardassian Gul claims they are carrying relief supply for an outpost.

The Dauntless is then tasked with investigating Ferengi smuggling activities at Serris. Along with DaiMon Pragg's ship it is attacked by Cardassians who do not want the Federation to find out that they have been illegally receiving military equipment and supplies. Concerned by this, Admiral Liu diverts the Dauntless to Biranu Station where Captain Picard is a guest lecturer. Contact with the station has been lost and it seems that the Cardassian and Klingon ships at the station are on the verge of open conflict.

Picard orders the Dauntless not to intervene if a skirmish breaks out. Starfleet is neutral and not involved. Sure enough, the Cardassian and Klingons begin fighting each other. Suddenly during the course of the battle the Cardassians turn on the station, inflicting massive damage. The Dauntless must then team with the Klingons to defend the badly wounded station. After two Cardassian ships are destroyed the remainder will flee to Biranu I. The player can choose whether to hail Captain Picard or chase the Cardassian ships. Either way more Cardassians arrive later and resume the attack on Biranu Station.

Having returned to Starbase 12, the crew of the Dauntless is transferred to the Sovereign. They take their new ship on a shakedown cruise to Savoy to work out any glitches and technical bugs. The USS Geronimo, commanded by Captain McRay, arrives and challenges the crew to a friendly war game. Then the Klingons arrive and want to participate too.

After the war games the Sovereign heads to the Vesuvi dust cloud to assist the USS Berkley in investigating the Vesuvi event. Lieutenant Commander Data comes on board. After wading into the dust cloud and scanning fragments ejected from the star surface, Data determines that the explosion was not a natural event. Then, suddenly, the Berkley is attacked. The Sovereign gives chase but attacker gets away. Much to their horror, the crew finds that the Berkley's mysterious attacker was also responsible for the destruction of a Romulan Warbird. Matters are worsened when two Romulan warbirds arrive on the scene.

Following the attack on the Berkley, the Sovereign is assigned to patrol the Itari Voltaire and Xi Entrades systems, where it ends up protecting Ferengi and Romulan shipping under attack by Cardassian forces. Hostilities with the Romulans are also ended. Though the player can choose which systems to travel to s/he will always encounter Captain Torren, DaiMon Pragg and Captain Terrik in the order listed.

Having completed its patrol, the Sovereign receives a distress call from a Klingon task force led by Captain Korbus. They were attacked by an unidentified craft. They won't say who it was but confirm that it wasn't the Cardassians and the Romulans. The Sovereign helps them locate the derelict IKV Gon'dev, a missing Bird-of-Prey for which the Klingons came searching. Suddenly the Cardassian arrive and attack the wounded Klingon force and the Sovereign must fight alongside the Klingons. After the Cardassians have withdrawn or been destroyed, the crew surmises that they are the ones responsible for instigating the attacks. Korbus tells the Sovereign's captain that he is in his debt.

The Sovereign is tasked with locating and destroying Cardassian outposts. It arrives at Riha and assists Captain Draxon of the RanKuf in attacking a Cardassian convoy, but unfortunately the freighters escape. The Sovereign tracks them to Cebelrai II where it destroys a Cardassian outpost and its defenders. It then receives a message from Captain Korbus asking to meet in the Belaruz system. Here the player should decide whether to meet with Korbus or track the enemy freighters to Nepenthe.

Captain Korbus is here to repay the Klingon debt of honor. In defiance of the high council orders he provides information on a mysterious ship that the Klingons sighted in this region of space.

Tracking a group of ships to the Nepenthe system, the Sovereign is able to spy on a meeting with the Cardassians and the Kessok, a previously unencountered alien race. Just as Legate Matan is about to seal a deal between the Cardassians and the Kessok, the Sovereign is spotted by a Galor-class vessel commanded by Gul Sek.

Acting on information acquired in its last mission, the Sovereign, accompanied by the Enterprise, penetrates deep into Cardassian-held territory and destroys a shipyard at Chambana I. There they find several hybrid ships of Cardassian-Kessok design. Unfortunately, all the ships self-destruct, leaving nothing to salvage once the Cardassian shipyard is destroyed.

The Sovereign is assigned to intelligence gathering missions. Tasked with completing the Geronimo's mission, it discovers an abandoned Cardassian intelligence outpost at Prendel III. This, in turn, leads them to a crash site in the Alioth system. They arrive to find the system swarming with Cardassian ships and satellites and must locate an alien device without being detected. Unfortunately, the device has crashed on an highly inhospitable planet and only Data can go and investigate it. As Data find the device, the Sovereign is suddenly detected by a huge Cardassian fleet. Consequently, the crew has no choice but to leave him behind.

Legate Matan's forces finally declare war on the Federation and launch an all-out offensive, attacking Arturus and Ona. Fighting a losing battle, the Sovereign and her fleet retreat to Savoy where they must ensure that the station is successfully evacuated.

The Sovereign escorts the hospital ship USS Nightingale behind enemy line to rescue survivors who have escaped the destruction of their vessels. Among these is the Dauntless.

Starfleet must stop the Cardassians from using Savoy station as a forward base of operations in the Maelstrom. The Sovereign must also prevent the Cardassians from destroying the station once the enemy realizes that they cannot hold it.

The Sovereign is tasked with finding the location of a Cardassian command and control base near the front lines where it must also see how well a Kessok light cruiser fights(you could also scan the ship to find out that no one is on the ship(or so it appers)).

Now that the Cardassian base has been found, the Sovereign must assist the USS Khitomer and her fleet in destroying it. But they haven't bargained on heavy Cardassian resistance and Kessok reinforcements(If you scan a Kessok ship, you will find out about its weapons). The assault has to be aborted and the fleet barely flees for its life.

Separated from the Khitomer's fleet, the Sovereign returns to Starbase 12 where it must defend the base from a combined Cardassian and Kessok attack(Scan another Kessok to know about the shields and repair device). Luckily, the USS Geronimo and the USS Enterprise arrive to help. After defending the starbase a second time against Kamakazi freighters, the Sovereign is fitted with sixteen phased plasma torpedoes.

Ambassador Salek is attempting to negotiate an alliance with the Klingons and Romulans and directs the Sovereign to Lya Station at Albarea III. A surprise Cardassian assault forces the Sovereign to diffuse a volatile confrontation between Captain Korbus of the IKC Jon'ka and Captain Terrik of IRW Chairo.

Before an attack on Alioth can be launched, the Sovereign must destroy all the Cardassian sensor posts at Arturus, Geble, Serris and Poseidon as well as the resupply depot at Ascella. En route, it must also rescue the USS Geronimo, which has been ambushed. The Geronimo then joins the Sovereign in its mission, having been ordered to join a strike force to retake the Alioth system.

The allies finally attack Alioth, destroy the Cardassian station Litvok Nor and rescue Commander Data, who provides valuable information on the Kessok device. The Enterprise is also there to help. The device regulates the fusion in a star, but tampering and misuse resulted in an accident, causing the Vesuvi star to go nova.

Horrified by the discovery of the device's destructive potential, Admiral Liu teams the Sovereign and the Geronimo with the USS San Francisco and dispatches the task force on a search, locate and destroy mission. She also extends Commander Data's assignments on the Sovereign, as he is the only one who has the most extensive knowledge about the Kessok devices.

Battling through Kessok forces, the crew of the Sovereign is able to destroy two of the devices. They are also astonished that the Cardassians have acquired a Romulan cloaking device. Admiral Lius later informs them that the Romulans have admitted to losing two devices.

At Belaruz I the Sovereign is confronted by an unshielded Kessok heavy cruiser. When hailed, the ship's captain demands for Data to be sent over. Ultimately, Data is successful in establishing a peaceful contact with the Kessok, you find out about why the scanners say no one is on a ship and other new information about the Kessok, and the commander, Captain Neb-lus, allows the Sovereign to examine the device and verify that it is actually a solar-forming platform designed to reform suns to make a star system more hospitable for colonization. Depending on the player's choice, this mission ends with the destruction of the third solarformer and its escorts or peaceful first contact with the Kessok in which one of the ships accompanying the Sovereign in the next mission will be the Kessok heavy cruiser.

Intelligence reports from the Klingons and Romulans indicate that the last Kessok device is orbiting the sun of the Omega Draconis system, site of a new Kessok colony. The Cardassians have also activated large tachyon emitters, preventing communications and warp travel. Paired with two other ships (one will be the Neb-lig if the player tries to hail the Kessok ship in the previous mission), the Sovereign must establish communications with the Kessok colony at Omega Draconis III and inform the Kessok that they have been betrayed. But they haven't reckoned with deadly hybrid vessels.

The vengeful Matan swears to destroy the Omega Draconis star and taunts the crew to stop him. Stopping him won't be easy since he has the codes to the solarformer's program and his ship is cloaked. Data could be beam over to the device or the crew could scan Matan's Keldon, after disabling it of course.

The crew of the Sovereign is unable to rescue Matan. His disabled ship crashes into the sun and explodes. Badly damaged herself, the Sovereign maneuvers away a safe distance from the sun, and after effecting repairs, it rendezvouses with the Enterprise and a Kessok cruiser. Captain Picard congratulates the Sovereign's captain on a job well done and informs him that diplomatic relations with the Kessok will be opening soon.

Game Play
Throughout the game, you will be called upon not just to fight, but engage in diplomacy (for instance, lowering your shields in the face of hostility to prove that you are peaceful), engage in espionage (hiding in astroid belts at reduced power to listen in on enemy ships undetected), finding clues and sending out away missions. However, many times, the game will end if you make a "wrong choice" or you perform a task incorrectly. On one hand, it makes the game very linear, on the other hand, if you "fail" in combat, that's game over anyway. Speaking of...

Combat
In combat, the player has the option of commanding Lt. Savali using a wide array of tactics while Kiska manuvers, or, you can hit the space bar and go into "tactical mode", controlling the ship's actions directly while using a 3rd person view of the ship. Your ship has different phaser arrays which light up when a targeted enemy is in their range, and deplete over time, but recharge quickly. Torpedoes are best fired when the green lines in your targeting reticle line up with one another. You must take into account your shield strength, power settings and damaged systems via Chief Brex's Engineering menu, while maneuvering your ship from danger, and keeping an eye on the enemy's sub-systems to see if any weaknesses open up. Combat opens up even further when other ships require orders from you... sometimes they do fine by themselves, but oftentimes you need to pool your resources and have your fleet attack a single target.

In most cases, you can set your phaser fire to "full" or a "low". The lower setting is good for disabling specific sub-systems with longer, but weaker phaser fire once you've gotten through an enemy's shields... and it won't rip apart the enemy's hull, which is good for the few times you have to "disable" someone and not destroy them outright. You can also set your phasers to "manual" and use your mouse to direct where you fire.

There are also different photon torpedo types, some of which vary by ship. Federation ships have normal torpedoes, but the Sovereign and Akira classes have Quantum torpedoes, which are faster and stronger. The Kessok/Cardassian hybrids, as well as your Sovereign late in the game, get plasma torpedoes, which have a tendancy to go through shields. Normal Kessok Torpedoes are large mounds of energy with superior tracking... but they're also very slow. Klingon and Romulan torpedoes are a bit faster and track good... while Cardassian torpedoes are quick, but lack tracking or maneuverability.

Each ship has its strengths and weaknesses. Ships like the Galaxy and Nebula class are best used by slowly rotating the ship and draining your phaser banks, while firing torpedoes when they line up with an enemy ship. Some ships, like a Klingon Bird of Prey or Romulan Warbirds, work best when they can cloak, get behind an enemy, decloak, and fire off all their forward weapons... however, cloaking and decloaking lowers the shields, while keeping the ship visible and targetable.

A ship is destroyed when any of its critical systems fail (its hit points go down to 0). In most cases, these would be the Warp Core, The hull, or the Bridge. The only ship that's an exception is the Klingon Bird of Prey; if it loses its Bridge, it won't detonate and can still fly. This is to make up for a modeling design bug that allows the neck and forward section to be blown clean off in a couple hits.

A system or part of the ship won't take much damage unless the shields protecting it are weakened or taken down all together. And each section of shielding (Fore, aft, port, starboard, top and bottom) on each different ship has different levels of protection. For instance, the Klingon BoPs have very strong forward shielding, but the rest of their shields are mediocre. And the Kessok Heavy cruisers have superior shielding all over.. except their bottom, which has the weakest shields in the game. In fact, with the Warp core of a Kessok ship also being on the bottom, it is possible to take out a heavy cruiser with 4 well-aimed photon torpedoes and a few seconds of phaser fire.

Various targetable systems include the sensor array (A ship will have a very difficult time fighting if this is taken out), Impulse engines (will slow a ship down or stop it outright if disabled or destroyed) warp nacelles (prevents warp-outs by disabled ships, but in most cases, a ship will warp out before these are destroyed), various weapons systems (phaser arrays, torpedo tubes, shield emiter), tractor beams (Enemy AI ships rarely use these, though you need to use yours in the campaign, so make sure these don't get destroyed) and some ships have targetable cloaking devices.

With some ships, it is pertinent to take out the weapons systems before going in for the kill, such as the Cardassian Galors, which will likely detonate once you've whittled down their last weapon... but most of the time, you are better off just trying to destroy the ship by targeting its (usually) under-protected warp core. The Romulan Warbirds fail easily if you take out their impulse engines and maneuver around them. Federation and Kessok ships have too many weapons (8 phaser banks and 6 torpedo bays on a galaxy class, for example) to want to take out all at once, but usually a sustained attack to their rears, which usually only have torpedo launchers, will allow you to prevail. While back there, take out their impulse engines. However, sometimes a series of sustained torpedoes can destroy their forward torpedo tubes and damage their sensors.

Federation characters

 * Admiral Alice Liu
 * Commander Matthew Graff
 * Captain Jean-Luc Picard
 * Lieutenant Commander Data
 * Commander Saffi Larsen
 * Chief Petty Officer Brex
 * Lieutenant Felix Savali
 * Lieutenant Commander Miguel Diaz
 * Ensign Kiska Lomar
 * Captain Gregory MacCray
 * Captain Elizibath Ziess

Klingon characters

 * Captain Draxon
 * Captain Korbus

Romulan characters

 * Captain Torren
 * Captain Terrik

Cardassian characters

 * Legate Matan

Other characters

 * Daimon Pragg
 * Neb-Lus

Cardassian ships
unnamed Keldon-class starships • Kyria  • Karoon (Groumall-type)

Klingon ships

 * bird of prey : IKV • IKV • IKV • IKV • IKV • IKV • IKS • IKV
 * attack cruiser : IKV • IKV

Federation ships

 * Federation transports : Adams • Cambridge • Inverness • Shannon • unnamed Federation transports
 * other: unnamed Federation freighters (Federation freighter)

Starfleet ships

 * : USS Devore • USS Geronimo (NCC-69302) • USS Thunderchild


 * : USS Adelphi • USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-C) • USS Excalibur (NCC-26517) • USS Zhukov (NCC-26136)


 * : USS Challenger (NCC-71099) • USS Dauntless (NCC-71879) • USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-D) • USS Galaxy • USS Odyssey • USS San Francisco • USS Venture (NCC-71854) • USS Yamato (Galaxy class) (I) • unnamed Galaxy-class starships


 * : USS Bellerophon (NCC-62048) • USS Berkeley • USS Hawking (Nebula class) • USS Khitomer • USS Nightingale (NCC-60805) • USS Phoenix (NCC-65420) • USS Prometheus (NCC-71201) • USS Sutherland (NCC-72015) • unnamed Nebula-class starships


 * : USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-E) • USS Sovereign (prototype)


 * type-6 shuttlecraft : Icarus II • USS Khitomer shuttlecraft 1 • USS Khitomer shuttlecraft 2 • USS Khitomer shuttlecraft 3 • USS Khitomer shuttlecraft 4 • unnamed Federation shuttlecraft


 * others : USS Arapaho • USS Baltic • USS Defiant (prototype) • USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-A)  • USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-B)  • USS Lionheart (24th century) • USS Mohawk • USS Pegasus (NCC-53847)  • USS Persival • USS Prometheus (prototype)  • USS Strongbow

Ferengi ships

 * marauder: Kravis

Romulan ships

 * warbird: •  •  •  • unnamed D'deridex-class starships

Kessok ships
Kessok light cruiser • Kessok solarformer • • Neb-lig (Kessok heavy cruiser)

Locations

 * Ascella Supply Depot
 * Biranu Station
 * Cebelrai Outpost
 * Chambana Shipyards
 * Geki Facility
 * Goralis
 * Haven Facility
 * Litvok Nor
 * Lyra Station
 * Maelstrom
 * Prendel Outpost
 * Soho Station
 * Starbase 12
 * Alioth
 * Alioth VI
 * Vesuvi
 * Vesuvi Dust Cloud
 * Serris
 * Savoy
 * Itari
 * Belaruz

Races and cultures

 * Cardassian
 * Human
 * Kessok
 * Klingon
 * Romulan

Technology and weapons

 * Phaser
 * Photon torpedo
 * Quantum torpedo
 * Phased plasma torpedo
 * Antimatter torpedo
 * Positron torpedo
 * Solarformer
 * Romulan cloaking device
 * Regenerating shields
 * Kessok Torpedo Launcher
 * Kessok Repair Device
 * Tachyon emitter

States and organizations

 * Cardassian Union
 * House Arterius
 * Klingon Empire
 * Romulan Star Empire
 * United Federation of Planets
 * Starfleet
 * Starfleet Corps of Engineers

Background

 * The Romulan's Terrik and Toren in the game are all addressed as "Captain," even though it has been well established that Romulan military rank equivalent to a Starfleet Captain is "Commander." Therefore the it should be Commander Toren and Commander Terrik, and not Captain.