History VideoGame / StarTrekStarfleetAcademy

The second and more renowned version was released for the PC in 1997. This game, released at the dawn of the 3D Acceleration era, featured much improved graphics and far better space battles. Moreover, it included {{live action cutscenes}} with several ''Series/{{Star Trek|The Original Series}}'' actors (including Creator/WilliamShatner, Creator/GeorgeTakei and Creator/WalterKoenig) playing their characters. There were a lot of similarities between this game and its console forerunner (the character names were mostly the same, for instance), though it was quite different structurally. An expansion pack, ''Chekov's Lost Missions'', was released the following year.

There have been two games bearing the name ''Star Trek: Starfleet Academy'', both by Creator/InterplayEntertainment. The first game was released in 1994 for the UsefulNotes/SuperNintendoEntertainmentSystem and the [[UsefulNotes/SegaGenesis Sega 32X]]. On the former system it was moderately well received and quite a technologically advanced game for the SNES, while the Sega 32X version was a bit less well-regarded due to some control issues, and being a slightly less impressive title by the standards of that system. Neither version set the world alight in terms of sales however, and the console version was soon forgotten.

The second and more renowned version was released for the PC in 1997. This game, released at the dawn of the 3D Acceleration era, featured much improved graphics and far better space battles. Moreover, it included [[FullMotionVideo live action cutscenes]] with several ''Series/{{Star Trek|The Original Series}}'' actors (including Creator/WilliamShatner, Creator/GeorgeTakei and Creator/WalterKoenig) playing their characters. There were a lot of similarities between this game and its console forerunner (the character names were mostly the same, for instance), though it was quite different structurally. An expansion pack, ''Chekov's Lost Missions'', was released the following year.

* AmbiguousDisorder: Robin suffers crippling anxiety about any sort of social interaction and prefers to work on engineering equipment.

* DifficultySpike: The first two years of the console version are pretty easy, with the main difficulty coming from the occasional GuideDangIt. ''Then'', the first mission in the third year makes you take on the ''Phoenix'', an incredibly powerful Romulan warship with a ton of armaments and a habit of decloaking, sucker-punching you with three or four plasma torpedoes and then cloaking again. The only thing that makes the battle easier is that the ''Phoenix'' loses shields when it cloaks, which lets you cause major damage if you can hit it. After that, you get a near-identical mission where you have to take down an ''Excelsior''-class ship, which has near-identical armaments to the ''Phoenix'' and ''doesn't'' cloak.

* FriendlyFireproof: Averted. If you don't believe it, try randomly firing at a target where a friendly ship is in the way. Or worse, just try just firing at a starbase for fun. Commandant Rotherot (or Sulu, Chekov, or Kirk) will not be amused.[[note]]In all fairness, you have no chance against the starbase as they will blow you away in the simulation. In the dressing down you'll get, no
one bothers mentions the usual fact that your ship was lost, which is itself, normally a cause for simulation failure on its own.[[/note]]

* ShoutOut: The Kobayashi Maru scenario takes some cues from the 1989 Pocket novel ''The Kobayashi Maru'', including its depiction of Kirk's "unique" solution.

* WhatTheHellPlayer: If you fire weapons at the starbase in the PC version, the mission instantly aborts and Rotherot chews you out, saying that "Starfleet is an institution for adults, not children."

* {{Cutscene}}: The PC version was one of a host of games in the mid-late 90s which used live-action actors in the cutscenes.

* BlueBlood: M'Giia is a Andorian noblewoman and the son of ambassadors.

* BigGood: Captain Kirk is this for the entire Federation, natch. Sulu also serves as this.

* TakeThat: An in-universe version with one of the training simulations being a partially disguised recreation of the Battle of the Mutara Nebula in ''Film/StarTrekIITheWrathOfKhan'' which Kirk sheepishly admits begins with the lesson that when a ship is approaching you and refusing to communicate, you are supposed to take a defensive posture and ''raise your shields''.

* AGodAmI: In an early mission in the PC version, you come across an alien cult leader who has gained immense psychic powers from a close encounter with the Galactic Barrier. As you can probably guess, his message isn't one of peace and enlightenment.

* BittersweetEnding: An odd version happens if you get the best ending in the console versions. One by one, you read about the illustrious careers that you and your classmates had... only for the last screen to inform you that a year after graduating, your science officer died when the ship he was serving on was destroyed while investigating a subspace anomaly.
* {{Bowdlerize}}: The recreation of the climatic battle from ''Film/StarTrekVITheUndiscoveredCountry'' in the SNES game changes Spock's line "If I were a human, I would tell [Starfleet], 'go to hell'," into him uttering a Klingon insult instead, likely because Creator/{{Nintendo}} still weren't allowing games on their systems to use the word "hell."
* ColonCancer: The full title of the SNES and 32X version of the game is ''Star Trek: Starfleet Academy: Starship Bridge Simulator''.
* TheComputerIsACheatingBastard:
** The console version is based on a heavily modified version of the game engine from Interplay's ''Star Trek'' adventure games, and shares its annoying habit of the AI-controlled starships being able to make turns and speed adjustments that no human can possibly hope to match. This essentially means that if an AI starship manages to successfully lock into a pursuit from behind your ship while on the hardest difficulty mode, ''you're dead''.
** In both versions, the Kobayashi Maru simulation will keep spawning Klingon ships until you eventually get destroyed, thus technically also making this an in-universe example.
* {{Cutscene}}: The PC version was one of a host of games in the mid-late 90s which used live-action actors in the cutscenes.

* DifficultySpike: The first two years of the console version are pretty easy, with the main difficulty coming from the occasional GuideDangIt. ''Then'', the first mission in the third year makes you take on the ''Phoenix'', an incredibly powerful Romulan warship with a ton of armaments and a habit of decloaking, sucker-punching you with three or four plasma torpedoes and then cloaking again. The only thing that makes the battle easier is that the ''Phoenix'' loses shields when it cloaks, which lets you cause major damage if you can hit it. After that, you get a near-identical mission where you have to take down an ''Excelsior''-class ship, which has near-identical armaments to the ''Phoenix'' and ''doesn't'' cloak.

* {{Interquel}}: The PC version is this to ''Film/StarTrekVTheFinalFrontier'' and ''Film/StarTrekVITheUndiscoveredCountry''. Notably, it has Sulu newly promoted to captain, and working at the academy while he waits for the USS ''Excelsior'' to have its failed transwarp drive torn out and replaced with a more conventional model.
* MatryoshkaObject: Chekov uses this as a metaphor during a MissionBriefing to suggest that there's more going on than there initially seems.

* RedAlert: This is actually the name of one of the tracks from the PC version's soundtrack. Naturally, it tends to play when the shooting starts.
* RoaringRampageOfRevenge: One mission pits Forrester against a duplicate of himself who's out to avenge his uncle, who was killed in battle against the Klingons.
* RougeAnglesOfSatin: The PC version is ''full'' of typos. Fortunately, none of them are so bad that they make the game any harder to complete, but it's surprising to see so many in a game made by a major developer.
* SchmuckBait: In one of the console game's missions, you are sent to a star system whose sun is about to go supernova, and have the choice of rescuing either the residents of a Federation colony, members of the system's native species, scientists aboard a research station, or a stricken freighter which claims to be carrying royalty and will give a handsome reward to whoever saves them. If you choose to save the latter, it turns out that the freighter is actually captained by a con-man, and you end up having your mission score heavily penalized for being an easily fooled idiot. And if you try to save ''two'' sets of people, you get rewarded by having your ship instantly vaporized by the supernova, earning you a score of zero.
* SequelHook: During the course of the PC version, you meet Chekov as he is working on some new simulation scenarios for the Academy. These eventually form the basis of the ''Chekov's Lost Missions'' expansion pack.
* ShoutOut:
** At one point between missions in the console version, your comms officer makes a comment about possibly fighting World War I-era biplanes in a simulation. The ''Star Trek'' game ''VideoGame/JudgmentRites'', which Interplay released the previous year, had Kirk and crew '''actually''' face such a situation, courtesy of the classic villain Trelane.
** The Kobayashi Maru scenario takes some cues from the 1989 Pocket novel ''The Kobayashi Maru'', including its depiction of Kirk's "unique" solution.

* TakeThat: An in-universe version with one of the training simulations being a partially disguised recreation of the Battle of the Mutara Nebula in ''Film/StarTrekIITheWrathOfKhan'' which Kirk sheepishly admits begins with the lesson that when a ship is approaching you and refusing to communicate, you are supposed to take a defensive posture and ''raise your shields''.
* WhatTheHellPlayer: If you fire weapons at the starbase in the PC version, the mission instantly aborts and Rotherot chews you out, saying that "Starfleet is an institution for adults, not children."

* WhatTheHellPlayer: If you fire weapons at the starbase in the PC version, the mission instantly aborts and you get chewed out by your supervisor, who tells you that "Starfleet is an institution for adults, not children."
* WhereAreTheyNowEpilogue: The console version includes this, with the results varying on how well you did across the course of the game. At worst, everyone flunks the academy and ends up working in various dead-end careers across the galaxy, and there are various different endings that go all the way up to the player character becoming the first captain of the USS ''Enterprise''-B.

* ArtisticLicensePhysics

* [[SequelHook Expansion Pack Hook]]: During the course of the PC version, you meet Chekov as he is working on some new simulation scenarios for the Academy. These eventually form the basis of the ''Chekov's Lost Missions'' expansion pack.

* MultipleEndings: Featured in the console version; averted in the PC version, which has a set storyline to play through.

* ShoutOut: At one point between missions in the console version, your comms officer makes a comment about possibly fighting World War I-era biplanes in a simulation. The ''Star Trek'' game ''VideoGame/JudgmentRites'', which Interplay released the previous year, had Kirk and crew '''actually''' face such a situation, courtesy of the classic villain Trelane.

** In the same vein, the fact that starships handle basically like airplanes in their ability to change direction. This may be an AcceptableBreakFromReality, since few would want to fly a a starship that moves realistically.

* DifficultySpike: The first two years of the console version are pretty easy, with the main difficulty coming from the occasional GuideDangIt. ''Then'', the first mission in the third year makes you take on the Phoenix, an incredibly powerful Romulan warship with a ton of armaments and a habit of decloaking, sucker-punching you with three or four plasma torpedoes and then cloaking again. The only thing that makes the battle easier is that the Phoenix loses shields when it cloaks, which lets you cause major damage if you can hit it. After that, you get a near-identical mission where you have to take down an Excelsior-class ship, which has near-identical armaments to the Phoenix and ''doesn't'' cloak.

* {{Interquel}}: The PC version is this to ''Film/StarTrekVTheFinalFrontier'' and ''Film/StarTrekVITheUndiscoveredCountry''. Notably, it has Sulu newly promoted to captain, and working at the academy while he waits for the USS Excelsior to have its failed transwarp drive torn out and replaced with a more conventional model.

** The PC version does have a GoldenEnding that requires making a number of correct decisions throughout the game to be able to access the non-simulator final mission where you get to pilot the real USS Enterprise-A. Said mission also has multiple endings.

* WhereAreTheyNowEpilogue: The console version includes this, with the results varying on how well you did across the course of the game. At worst, everyone flunks the academy and ends up working in various dead-end careers across the galaxy, and there are various different endings that go all the way up to the player character becoming the first captain of the USS Enterprise-B.

* RecycledSoundtrack: Most of the in-game music in the console version is taken from ''VideoGame/StarTrekIITheWrathOfKhan'', with a few extra cues from ''VideoGame/StarTrekVITheUndiscoveredCountry''. The PC version also borrows a few cues that its composer, Ron Jones previously wrote when he was working on ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration''.