If you've been browsing through Xbox Live Marketplace lately, you've probably stumbled upon the new content for Star Trek: Legacy.

We trust you've been having fun playing the game since it hit the shelves last week, and Bethesda is making sure that you won't get tired of the game anytime soon. So, to accomplish this, they're releasing various content on XBL Marketplace that XBL users can now purchase.

The following game goodies are available in all regions except Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Singapore, and Taiwan:

Romulan Gamer Picture Pack
Price: 100 Points
Dash Details: A Romulan-themed picture pack featuring ships from various eras and the Romulan Empire icon

Klingon Picture Pack
Price: 100 Points
Dash Details: A Klingon-themed picture pack featuring ships from various eras and the Klingon Empire icon.

Borg Picture Pack
Price: 100 Points
Dash Details: A Borg-themed picture pack featuring ships from various eras and the Borg Collective icon.

Federation Picture Pack
Price: 100 Points
Dash Details: A Federation-themed picture pack featuring ships from various eras and the Starfleet icon

"Original Series" Theme
Price: 150 Points
Dash Details: A Star Trek Legacy theme featuring ships from The Original Series.

"Enterprise Era" Theme
Price: 150 Points
Dash Details: A Star Trek Legacy theme featuring ships from the Enterprise era

"The Next Generation" Theme
Price: 150 Points
Dash Details: A Star Trek Legacy theme featuring ships from The Next Generation

And so the list of Star Trek titles from Bethesda Softworks is now complete. The developer happily announced today that Star Trek: Legacy is finally shipping to our favorite alien hubs, err, retail stores. It would be remembered that the game should have come out earlier if not for the recent invasion mounted by the Klingons.

Like the other Star Trek titles on other platforms, Legacy puts players in command of a few selected star ships into battle. Not only that, this strategy game also features a fully customizable skirmish mode. More interestingly (at least for this blogger), there is also a single player mode that takes players not only to the whole of the Star Trek universe but to infinity and beyond.

Star Trek Legacy is just one of the many Star Trek titles that were recently launched for various platforms. The PS2 got Encounters, while handhelds DS and PSP have Tactical Assault. If you happen to get one of these copies, just update us if William Shatner's voice is still as pristine as it used to back then.

Buy: [Star Trek: Legacy for Xbox 360]
Buy: [Star Trek: Legacy for PC]

Calling all Trekkies! With the release of Bethesda's Star Trek: Legacy for the PC and the Xbox 360 just around the corner (December 12, to be exact), Bethesda has just released this batch of screenshots for fans to inspect before hopefully grabbing a copy of the game within the next few days.

A strategy game based on the highly-popular Star Trek series, the game features a completely customizable skirmish mode, as well as a single-player campaign which spans storylines from the original series, to The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager and Enterprise. So with such a vast timeline, players will surely be running into Captains Kirk, Picard, Sisko, Janeway, and Archer, as well as battling against the forces of the Romulans, the Klingons, and the Borg Collective (whether the lovely Seven of Nine will make an appearance is unknown).

As for gameplay, this title derives its roots from Star Trek: Bridge Commander, but further realism is achieved thanks to superior graphics.

Kahplah!

More screenshots after the jump!

"That famous Shatner humor is still in high gear!" That's what fellow QJ-er Chris Coker said about William Shatner, the actor who played James Tiberius Kirk on Star Trek.

GameSpy interviewed him about what it was like to voice Kirk in the Bethesda Softwork Star Trek games: Star Trek: Legacy (for Xbox 360 and PC), Star Trek: Encounters, and Star Trek: Tactical Assault (for DS and PSP).

How did Bethesda manage to convince Shatner? "I didn't want to do it," Shatner said, "But they kept coming back to me... It was the groveling that got me. It broke my heart." Although Star Trek: Legacy impressed him ("cool" was how he described the game, and with the best graphics among Star Trek games, yeah it's cool).

Is it hard work to do voicing for a game?

GS: Have you ever been doing a voice for something and had the director say you're sounding too Kirk-like?

Shatner: No. But you have to explain that to me: What's Kirk-like?

GS: Well, Kirk is very commanding, very authoritative…

Shatner: No, there's no such thing. I just say the words. "NO!" Was that Kirk-like?

GS: Yeah.

Shatner: But that's also how I ordered dinner last night.

Anyway, Legacy is coming out on November 21, while Tactical Assault has already been released. Shatner said, "Star Trek is coming back, you can feel it in the air." We QJ Trekkers and Trekkies agree.

Comment: There hasn't been a good Star Trek game in ages. There will never be one. Unless it's an MMO.
Max F.: Hope springs eternal. The graphics and attention to detail, the story (award-winning writer), and the hard work they're putting into the development of this game all make us hope it'll be good. And there is an MMO.

Comment: I heard all the captains are voice acting in it. The game will span the Original Series, Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Enterprise.
Max F.: We don't mention the disappointing Enterprise series. *old-school Trekkie giggles* Picard forever!

Comment: Star Trek: Legacy is just a rip-off of Wing Commander.
Max F.: Hmph. There wouldn't have been a Wing Commander franchise if it weren't for us Trekkies. Hmph. And the last Wing Commander game was, when, way back in 1996, right? Just kidding (I'm so gonna be flamed; please don't flame me).

We'll see who's right (or if I have to eat my Trekkie heart out) when this Mad Doc Software and Bethesda Softworks game comes out November 21. So let's move on to the remaining screenshots courtesy of WorthPlaying. If you're curious, the images alternate Xbox 360, PC, Xbox 360, PC, etc., starting from the images above. Just thought you'd like to see them side-by-side.

Too bad they didn't show the debris and sparks from damages, and it's not clear if this is multiplayer or single campaign.

Pre-order: [Star Trek: Legacy for Xbox 360]
Pre-order: [Star Trek: Legacy for PC]

Hum a few bars of the by-now classic Star Trek theme song by Jerry Goldsmith and you're bound to be replied by the equally classic "live long and prosper" hand gesture. (Conversely, hum a few bars of "Faith of the Heart" and some Trekkies will suffer a headache. What? I liked Enterprise.). Music is a big part of space opera. If it doesn't sound Star Trek, a Trekkie told me once, it ain't Star Trek enough.

So the composers of Star Trek: Legacy's OST, Rednote Audio's Rod Abernathy and Jason Graves, had some big shoes to fill. It helped that they were Trekkies themselves, they tell TeamXbox. A lot of Legacy's OST are variations on classic and familiar themes by Trek composers Alexander Courage, Jerry Goldsmith, and James Horner. At the same time, Bethesda gave them the freedom to create their own themes for the game.

Expect to hear the leitmotifs of Captains Archer, Kirk, and Picard. The three were picked by Rod and Jason because each represented their specific era through which the game will play out. At the same time, each race has its own theme as well - Federation, Romulans, Klingon, and Borg (I guess the Borg is where the "electronic" and "techno" elements Rod mentioned fall under). They've designed the OST so that these themes blend into each other (Jason says they actually "battle" each other) in the background.

As a Trekkie myself - even one who likes ST: Enterprise - I'm looking forward much to the fruits of their labor. Much like the PC's Homeworld, the OST is an integral part of creating the right "feel" for space opera. "If a score has strong thematic continuity, we feel it has a strong soul and can contribute the emotional impact and weight needed for grand-scale space combat," says Jason. Our ears will find out soon enough on November 21.

I wouldn't mind hearing "Faith of the Heart" one more time, though.

Pre-order: [Star Trek: Legacy]

We'll dispense with the "To boldly go where no man has gone before" nonsense because someone's probably gone that way before. Instead, let's make a reference to the Kobayashi Maru battle simulation.

Imagine that Ubisoft and Bethesda are the incoming warships, the Star Trek fans and game players represent the captains and the ships who are trying to save the Kobayashi Maru, and my fractured sanity represents the damaged ship we're trying to save.

Unfortunately, the combined forces of Bethesda, who are developing three different Star Trek games across the various game platforms, and Ubisoft, who will be publishing the three games, are irresistible. Nothing will stop them from destroying my sanity and making sure you buy at least one version of their upcoming Star Trek games.

Yeah, you lose the scenario, but you were meant to lose it (unless you cheat like Kirk). Luckily for you, this kind of loss doesn't seem so bad since you still get Star Trek goodness on your favorite console. In addition to the already released Star Trek: Encounters for the PS2, you can also wreck some warp cores in Star Trek: Tactical Assault for Sony's PSP (released October 24) and Nintendo's DS (October 26). Lastly, you can surely wait till November 21 (yeah, it's a delay) for the coolest version of them all, the one with the original cast members playing their voices, in Star Trek: Legacy for the Xbox 360 and PC. Just one question: Kirk or Picard?

You all might have noticed that Christmas is just around the corner, and game developers and publishers probably noticed this too. And here's another hint that the holidays are so near: great game releases. And there's enough to get every gamer excited.

If you ask us though, gamers who fancy the sports games will be the ones who'll find it very hard to sleep at night especially with this list of titles that will be released in the coming days, weeks, months... Just be sure you won't be cranky in the morning for lack of sleep from anticipating - or playing - the games.

So here's the list of Xbox 360 games' European release dates:

September:
22:  Just Cause
30:  Mad Tracks
TBC:  LMA Manager 2007
TBC:  World Snooker Championship 2007

October:
6:  Import Tuner Challenge
6:  Open Season
20:  Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Double Agent
27:  NBA 2K7

November:
3:  Need For Speed: Carbon
10:  WWE SmackDown vs. RAW 2007
17:  Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Vegas
TBC:  Cars
TBC:  Eragon
TBC:  Football Manager 2007
TBC:  Pro Evolution Soccer 6
TBC:  The Sopranos

Click "Full Article" for the complete list.

Kahplah'!

Just recently, hundreds of Star Trek fans trooped over to the Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame in Seattle to celebrate the 40th year of one of the most-beloved science fiction television programs of the century, Star Trek.

Boasting six television series, 10 full-length feature films and numerous novels, comic books, video games (including titles for the next-gen consoles and handhelds!) and various merchandise, the official birthday of the Star Trek franchise is on the 8th of September, when it aired its first episode and enthralled audiences everywhere in 1966. Forty years later, the mark of the Enterprise and all the people and races who have ever boarded it remains strong.

The Star Trek 40th Anniversary Gala Celebration & Conference was a three-day event where fans, actors, scientists and entrepreneurs gathered to pay homage to Gene Roddenberry's creation as well as marvel at how Star Trek may have changed the world. For one thing, one of the attendees was the man who watched a Star Trek episode who was so inspired by the show that he later on came to invent the thing that we now know as the cellular phone.

Having ingrained itself so deeply into society, the influence of Roddenberry's fictional universe in real life is undeniable, as everyday, inventors and creators work to try to achieve or emulate something that they may have seen in the series: badge communication devices, a gadget that one can scan over a person to do a complete medical analysis, maybe even an actual, functioning tricorder. In a way, they are the people who seem to have taken the mission to "go boldly where no man has gone before" to heart.

With games such as Star Trek: Legacy for the Xbox 360, as well as the MMORPG Star Trek:Online on its way, truly, there's no stopping this title just yet as fans still clamor for more and more each time, and each time, developers (who are most likely fans themselves) are more than happy to oblige.

So, take that bat'leth off the wall, stand tall, stand proud, and don't let any p'tahk convince you otherwise.

Mad Doc Software associate producer Gary Conti, has a special treat for Trekkies out there. Coinciding with the sci-fi franchise's 40th anniversary, Conti announces that all five TV captains will be contributing to the voice action of Star Trek: Legacy. "It started out as a crazy idea, and at first it was very slow going, but just as we were about to give up, it all came together. Now that it's over - I can tell you it was completely worth it!" says a very excited Conti.

He also reveals that the five actors - William Shatner, Patrick Stewart, Scott Bakula, Avery Brooks, and Kate Mulgrew - were very friendly and professional. And when asked if they had a hard time channeling their TV alter egos, he said they were so familiar with their roles that they immediately became the characters.

There were also rumors of historical battles becoming available as downloadable content for the game. However, these rumors were thwarted by Conti. "No word on that yet, we’re still hard at work here locking the game down, adding a sparkling layer of polish, and practicing our Deathmatch skills so we’ll be unbeatable on Xbox Live when the game ships this fall."

Unfortunately, we'll have to wait a little longer before we can get to hear the famous "Beam me up Scottie!" line as Mad Doc Software currently has no plans of releasing a demo just yet.