Rating: 
Summary: So much potential.
Review: A Master of Orion type game set in the Star Trek Universe! When I first heard this game would be coming I was thrilled and impatiently waited for the day it would be released. Unfortunately waiting for the game was the most exciting thing about it.Now don't get me wrong it is a "good" game but it is not great or fantastic in any sense of the word. If it had been released a few years ago it probably would have been received better but the truth is that this game is simply Master of Orion with Star Trek names and graphics. There was no real improvement or innovation in this game. Star Trek's rich background and history are given short thrift. The Diplomatic system is shallow and uninspired. The combat system held the most hope but it simply becomes a battle of the strongest fleet wins, with little chance for tactics or strategy. One of the worst features is trying to navigate around the map. You can't simply scroll with the mouse pointer like in MOO but have to zoom and unzoom between different map settings. In the end if you really love Star Trek and simply can't get enough this game will probably interest you. But if you are a serious gamer looking for new challenges, wait for this game to hit the clearance rack.
Rating: 
Summary: Not without flaws...but good none the less.
Review: Although this game could have been better in many ways, I spent hours playing it and enjoyed it quite thouroughly. I would definitally buy any kind of a sequal, add-on, or similar Star Trek game.
Rating:
Summary: good, but slow, game
Review: Being from the Master of Orion camp, and having not enjoyed MOOII very much, I was expecting great things from this game. It is a good game--better than MOOII. However, the game has some faults. For the ST fan, there are some problems with the races (the Federation is fairly aggressive when playing as another race, for instance), the play is SLOOOOOW (on a 450 PII, 96MB RAM), and the micromanagement of systems takes a long time to get the hang of (but not nearly as bad as Star Wars: Rebellion). All in all, a good addition to the strategy minded--campaigns can last for days. However, there's still no beating MOO as the best space stategy game.
Rating: 
Summary: Very Enjoyable
Review: Birth of Federation is a really neat strategy game set in the Star Trek theme. Like many great microprose games they did a great job with this game too. The game is very dynamic allowing you to play either the Federation, the Klingon Empire, Romulan Star Empire, the Cardassians or the Ferengi, plus whoever you play you are able to interact with a variety of many minor races. Minor races can be won to your empire through diplomacy or conquered and in one of these two events the minor races resoures are added to your own as well as starships, and territory. The management of empire must follow through with the governments philosophy or morale will suffer. For example if you act like a Klingon while playing the Federation your people will loath you and the federation will come to grinding halt. On the other hand if you are a Klingon and remain to stable without war and dishonor your promises your empire will come to grinding halt. The game requires you to find the balance in whatever empire you play. Space combat is great, setting you up in a "OK" 3D looking environment where task forces of individual ships duke it out while giving you feedback on their status during battle. Ships can range from simple science ships to the heavy escort which is the defiant class. The only thing I found irritating about the game is when your empire is growing in size that micro managment becomes nessacary as you manage each star system's economy and production. Furthermore newly colonized planets start at the lowest technology level despite having researched higher tech levels. If that is not bad enough you have upgrade everthing one level at a time as the game becomes a constant tedious excercise of mouse clicking back and forth. The game in my opinion as it is stands could use additional features to achieve 5 stars. More minor races, more ships classes, more variety of sound clips for each race, start new colonized planets at the current tech level and an easier management system to cut down on all the mouse clicking.
Rating:
Summary: It had the chance...
Review: Birth of the Federation seemed like a reasonable purchase at the time -- but it's long since migrated off of my hard drive. Microprose has a solid history with Masters of Orion behind it, but they just didn't do justice to that game and Star Trek at the same time. The game continues along a similar vein to MOO2 complete with a pretty reasonable combat environment. Like MOO2, though, it becomes a lot of micromanagement for not a whole lot of return and the computer just doesn't seem up to the task of truly defeating you. If you're a Star Trek fanatic, you likely "have" to own this game and will enjoy it simply because of the universe (be warned though: it's all Next Generation due to licensing). If you're a turn-based strategy fanatic my suggestion is to stick with MOO2 or look elsewhere. If you do purchase the game -- make sure to download the update from Microprose.
Rating:
Summary: Good, but . . .
Review: Don't get me wrong, I like this game. I've only played it in it's pre-patch form, but I rather enjoyed the slow pace of expanding and fighting. The major flaw this game has, is the Borg. Regardless of the race I play and how powerful I am, the Borg are virtually invincible. If by some miracle you can beat the ship they send to your homeworld, they send two ships, and so on. They are so persistent and make the Antarans of MOOII look like sissies who don't try hard enough. If you could turn off the Borg, or if a patch makes them less godlike then buy this game, if not, look elsewhere.
Rating: 
Summary: Star Trek Birth of the Federation
Review: For those who have never heard of Star Trek: Birth of the Federation, don't worry. Your not missing much at all. But just so you know more about the game, I'll tell you a little more about it. In the game, you can take command of five different species. These species include the Federation of Planets, Klingon Empire, Romulan Star Empire, Ferengi Alliance, and the Cardassian Union. Along with these major species to start off with, their are many minor races which you may remember if you watch any of the Star Trek tv shows or movies. These minor races can build ships, declare war on you, join your faction, or many other things, which are all controlled by the AI. With all turn based strategies, this one comes with no story line at all. This is of course because your supposed to play, and the story is created as you go along, giving you a different experience every time you play. Sounds good, but with this game, that's NOT the case at all. And trust me, you won't be impressed by the turn based Starship battles. It has some nice features, like choosing an attack sequence, and the replay, but quickly becomes boring fast, and one of the main reasons people like Star Trek is because things blow up, right? I was very frustrated at first, because of how confusing the game was. So I thought "Maybe I should load the tutorial" (I was thinking load, because sadly they didn't write one in the instruction manual.) So I loaded the first tutorial, and their was just a normal game. So I pushed a lot of buttons, screwed around for a couple hours, and finally got the hang of it. And was the time spent worth it? Not a chance. Then I read what it said in the instruction manual, I had to print the tutorial out. I would think after spending 50 dollars, they would be able to print out a couple pages, rather then tell me I needed to do it. Once you finally get to learn the game, and play it, in about 50 game turns, the game gets so repetitive it's very boring. This gives you 30-60 minuets of partial fun and enjoyment. The only real good part about the game is that it has just about everything you'll remember from the many Star Trek series and movies. Infact all of the minor races are seen in the Star Trek tv shows. From the Bolian's to the Vulcan's, they weren't made up during game production, but all from before. With a poor interface, bad ship battles, and a quickly boring game, this might not be the best game in the world. I did find some enjoyment by forcing the other species to pay me tribute, and conquering minor racers however.
Rating: 
Summary: Great visuals, slow pace
Review: I am a huge fan of both Star Trek and sci-fi empire games (like Master of Orion 1 and 2) but I was disappointed by BOF. It feels a lot more like Star Wars: Rebellion than the classic Master games. The ability to choose which race you play is excellent--each race has its look and feel as well as game mechanics. Unfortunately, it gets boring fast. You must micromanage each and every system, ship, tech advance, other races, pretty much everything. Also, once you get a bit ahead, the computer-controlled races have no chance. And if the Borg show up, forget about it. I'll stick with Master of Orion 2
Rating:
Summary: Never give a Cardassian an even break
Review: I LOVE this game! There are not enough hours in the day for me to play. My only wish is that the galaxy were bigger and there were more places to go and more races to deal with.If you like Star Trek so much the better but it is still a great game that I would recommend to anyone.
Rating:
Summary: Tough to get the hang of
Review: I received this game as a second-hand gift from a friend, who told me he was having too much trouble understanding it. I was able to figure it out, but I've played Civs 2 and 3, so I'm used to this game format. Overall, it's a fun game, though I have yet to actually win. Also, some of the technilogical advancements are pretty bland, with level increases being denoted by number (automated farms 6 as opposed to automated farms 5, etc.) Ship level increases are similarly uncreative (increased with the "II" denominator). Not a bad game, but I'm told it's expensive.
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