- Original Release: 2000
- Developer: 14 Degrees East
- Publisher: Interplay
- Platform: PC
Unfortunately, I couldn’t fully enjoy the full extinct of this game due to my colourblindness. The interface colours, while fitting in with the Klingon style, makes it almost impossible for me to read any of the words in the HUD. Even lowering the resolution to make the HUD appear larger didn’t help, so I had to refer to the manual for the list of button presses I needed for the interface system in order to play.
Klingon Academy a follow on from Starfleet Academy, with similar gameplay. The bridge view is removed, instead offering a first person or third person view of the ship. While it was nice to look at, it was better playing in the first person view anyway. Klingon Academy introduces a “Verbal Orders System”, which uses all the number keys to give a large list of commands, requiring 3 or 4 button presses. It’s not very easy to do while in the middle of combat using a joystick to fly around. You can order your helm officer to fly, but they’ll crash the ship.
It’s a shame as there’s a lot of advanced tactics buried deep in this system. You can send marines to capture enemy ships overload shields and weapons for a short boost but risking damage and subsystem targeting – this feature would be better refined in Bridge Commanded, aided by your officers not being awful at piloting the ship.
The piloting issues also extend to the enemy. While Klingons are known for ramming as a last resort, the Federation (well, simulated Federation) in this seem to love it, with collisions running a lot of missions. You have even more options available to you by using nearby phenomena such as gas giants and planetary rings to your advantage. It’s a shame that there’s so much depth, yet most battles end up slowly pummelling each other while circling close with you trying to avoid getting rammed.
Throughout the game you’ll be treated to a ton of live action clips starring Christopher Plummer and David Warner as Chang and Gorkon, who do a wonderful job and the game gives a great insight into Klingons, as well as serving as a prequel to The Undiscovered Country. There’s a lot to like about Klingon Academy, it’s just a shame about the interface and enemy AI.
Where to get
How to play Star Trek: Klingon Academy on Windows 11
- Mount the DVD ISO from MyAbandonware
- Navigate to “setup.exe” and run as administrator, follow instructions. You don’t need to install the additional options.
- Download the unofficial patch.
- Install the unofficial patch.
- Load up the game, the updated launcher will give you options such as resolution.
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The only star trek game (I think) that let you fly your ship into gas giants and gave a really accurate representation of planetary rings. The maps were huge and gave a real sense of scale 😍🖖🏻
One of the few games I didn’t have! Can’t remember why. Probably money
I remember getting the demo of this before its release and having hours of fun as I liked ships into the corona of a star, diverting all power to shields and repairs and watching NPC ships explode.
It was a brilliant game. I hope it gets re-released officially in the future.
So many games followed on from the Wing commander format, both Starfleet and Klingon did it well.
Let’s talk about this game. It is also in my hall of fame of Star Trek games. Potentially ahead of its time and with great ambition just like SFA. The story is more interesting nonetheless
Huh so these games do have unique vessels in them? The freighter behind the Connie doesn’t look familiar.
I deeply enjoyed this game. I loved battling in planetary atmospheres and ring systems.
Okay so I played this a lot when I was a kid. Not through the story, I would mostly play custom games to check out different ships and explore. One thing I remember in particular was a bug where warping to Saturn knocked the planet out of orbit.
I remember in the summer of 99 (or was it 2000s? I don’t remember), I was checking a Trek website dedicated to it to check news everyday all over the summer because I was so hyped! Then they released the demo with the romulan ship, it was so cool!
The damage effects was what drew me in. I didnt really play the campaign as much as Starfleet Academy. Theres some great mods especially Next Generation Academy
why no one is doing a sequel…
Such a potential, wasted