I was pleased that the game started out explaining that Voyager was seventy light years away from earth. The game seemed to be taking an episode right out of the Voyager series and have included most of the crew from the Voyager. The game went on to explain that the senior officers have created a small elite force of crew members with the abilities for handling extreme crisis situations. Lt. Tuvok is in charge of the team, which includes you as a member. The team has been labeled the Hazard Team. As Ensign Munro, you will be second in command of this team. One of the first things that you will need to do is to choose your gender. As male you will be Alexander Munro, or as female you will be Alexandria Munro. In the game it really does not matter because you are addressed by the unisex abbreviated term of Alex. 

The game play starts with you aboard a Borg ship with the mission to rescue your fellow Hazard Team members that have been captured by the Borg. You begin by receiving orders from Tuvok. As you go from deck to deck in search of your crew members, you are forced to make some choices about what to do. These choices can severely affect the way this mission comes out, as well as influencing the remainder of the game. You will need to think, as well as listen to your surrounding and other team members and be observant when moving from level to level. This type of activity happens throughout the game. Some of your most vital information will come from your other team members.

I found the interface to be very simple and straightforward. There are very few controls to learn as in the case of most FPS. One of the nice advantages of the game was to be able to press the tab button to display your current mission goals. There is support included for additional game controls. The game is installed in two parts, single player and multiplayer. I have not had the chance to try out the multiplayer to the extent that I would like to yet. One thing I noticed was that the settings for single and multiplayer are stored separately. That means that you have to devote excessive time to set up each element. The screen lay out was simple and uncluttered. It was easy to maintain information flow as to how much ammo you have or how healthy you are. With the press of the escape button, you will bring up the same familiar menu design that is found in other Activision Star Trek titles.

The actual game play was very good. The game had a credible plot and made you believe you were an actual crew member in the series. After the missions, you could go to the mess hall and join friends or go try out new weapons in the Holodeck. Once you had rested, you were off onto the next mission. 

The AI of your team members was excellent. You could actually rely on them to help you succeed in the mission. They would do the more mundane task such as opening a door or download computer information while you protected them. They almost never got in the way and would actually help you destroy the enemy. They would help keep you informed and cover your back if necessary. The AI quality of the enemy would vary, with the most of the intelligent, having human like quality in their behavior. They would move around and hide behind things to make it very difficult to kill them. 

The graphics of the game was impressive. The action was very smooth on my Celeron 500 system. The scope of all the missions was huge. The mission could take place anywhere, from the Voyager to a Borg vessel, or any other enemy ship that the Voyager might run across. The new enemy that was brought out in this game was equally impressive. As with all the Star Trek series, there was thought and imagination involved with the development of the aliens. 

Great detail was given to movement of individuals. One could watch the person actually move his head in the direction they were firing. You could watch your enemy move around jumping and hiding behind objects. An added bonus for Star Trek Voyager fans was the likeness of the characters to the actual actors. One thing that really helped was the Hollywood personality doing all his or her own voice-overs for the game. 

Overall I was impressed with the game. I have had many hours of enjoyment and it was a fun way to relieve stress at the end of a long day. The only thing I would like to see change in the game is more missions and better graphics of the characters to permit them a more life-like appearance. 

The programmers did a wonderful job of AI in this game. It is the first game that I could allow my team to do battle with the bad guys for me. I could sit back and cover them from time to time. This has come in handy when I have been low on health or beer. I am very happy to have paid the nineteen dollars and ninety-nine cents that COMPUSA was asking for the game. I am eagerly awaiting the next episode to hit the display rack.

System Requirements: PII 233 with 64 MB RAM and a 3D card. I bought Star Trek Voyager Elite Force from CompUSA for $19.99.