Play Star Trek - The Rebel Universe Online

Game Overview

Star Trek: The Rebel Universe is one of those weird, ambitious early DOS games that tried to do everything at once—bridge simulator, space combat, text adventure, all wrapped in a chunky 3D wireframe aesthetic. You start on the Enterprise’s bridge with this clunky but kinda cool "Multivision" display, clicking through different stations like you’re actually handing off control to the crew. Sulu’s screen lets you plot warp jumps on a star map, Chekov’s turns battles into this janky 3D targeting minigame where you pick weak points on enemy ships, and Spock’s scans give you cryptic hints about planets.

Speaking of planets, that’s where things get messy in the best way. You beam down with an away team, and suddenly it’s like a stripped-down text adventure—wireframe rooms, inventory puzzles, and crew members suggesting wildly different solutions to obstacles. McCoy might say "blast the door," while Uhura insists on diplomacy, and picking wrong can get someone hurt. Half the time you’re backtracking across star systems because some random neutral planet has a gadget you need to progress. There are 4,000 planets, so good luck without the later version’s item checklist.

It’s janky, slow, and occasionally frustrating, but there’s something charming about how hard it commits to the Star Trek fantasy. You really feel like you’re juggling a starship’s logistics while stumbling into bizarre planetary mysteries.

Each game uses different controls, most DOS games use the keyboard arrows. Some will use the mouse , "Alt" ,"Enter" and "Space bar".