Secret of Vulcan's Fury

For reasons, which I can only attribute to insanity, Interplay cancelled this game, and it was never released.

Several pictures, including the one shown below are avaliable. A preview of the game is given below:

Star Trek Game from Interplay

Adventure game featuring the members of the original Enterprise crew with voices provided by the actual actors. The game employs a point-and-click system and you must explore the different environments.

 

Star Trek: Secret of Vulcan Fury Preview

Interplay is following Starfleet Academy by turning back the chronometer to the age of Classic Trek. Secret of Vulcan Fury is more than a game, with the voices of the original crew and a story scripted by Star Trek author DC Fontana, this adventure is faithful to the series in just about every way, except for the special effects. Here they look good.

A New Look For Old Trek


With Star Trek: Secret of Vulcan Fury, Interplay is decisively abandoning the somewhat awkward adventure-game use/ examine icons and cartoonist, superdeformed sprites of its two earlier Trek titles in favour of high-end photorealistic sets, motion-capture animation, and a new streamlined interface in the click-and-roll vein of that employed by LucasArts' adventure hit Full Throttle. When the cursor is placed over an object or character with which interaction is possible, a click-and-hold on the item or person produces a range of option the player can then 'roll' to. This effectively eliminates unneeded clutter to the game's environments. This is a very good thing because the environments are gorgeous - one particular starship-bridge set is so richly and realistically rendered it looks like a still from one of the films.

The Plot


Secret of Vulcan Fury puts the player in four all-new episodes revolving around the history of the Vulcan race (one of the most popular subjects among hard-core Trekers) and its genetic and cultural offshoots, the Romulans. As in Interplay's two previous Star Trek games, Vulcan Fury lets the player assume the roles of Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock, Doctor McCoy, Sulu, Checkov, and Scotty through a multipart epic concerning the fates of the two races.

In the first act you play McCoy in an almost Quincy-like murder mystery. The second act switches to Scotty and an Enterprise-out-of-control story. In the next section Spock is centre stage and players will get a chance to experience a Vulcan mind meld. The game ends with Kirk, Spock and Chekov in a mission to disarm a super-weapon.

 

DC Fontana


The writer of Vulcan Fury, DC Fontana, is well-know to Trekers for being the producer of the original series, she has also penned numerous Trek novels including Vulcan's Glory. When asked why she wanted to partake in this game she commented, "I've always been a Spock fan, and saw this as an opportunity to explore his heritage more, and to look at how the Vulcans and Romulans became who they are." Indeed DC Fontana was so enthusiastic that she produced too much dialogue. "I wrote all the dialogue ahead of time for more branches than they ended up using."

Motion Capture


In addition to Vulcan Fury's new high-end rendered sets, character actions are now presented through prerendered motion-capture sequences designated for each possible player action in a given situation. Gone are the days of manoeuvring little pixelly sprites around rooms, which gave the short-lived illusion of free will, but gained the player very little most of the time. Extremely detailed character models depict the specific facial expressions and personal mannerisms of the classic TV series - the earnest stare of Captain Kirk, the quizzical lift of Mr. Spock's eyebrow, the resigned I'm-just-the-engineer shrug of Montgomery Scott. Authentic series-era incidental music has also been included, which will make Vulcan Fury the quintessential old-school Trek experience.

The Final Frontier


Vulcan Fury is clearly a character-oriented game, picking up in big, flashy footsteps where Interplay's previous games left off. It seems hard to believe after all this time, but Vulcan Fury may just be the Final Frontier in Classic Trek games - herding the old cast together again and again can't be getting any easier.

| Main Index |