@Stueymon: In the interview, they specifically mentioned the Steel Battalion controller as something they want to avoid as they try to utilize the Xbox 360's controller for a Mech. Sorry man.
@Ed Grabianowski: Damnit, and that controller is so awesome. I'm not gonna be immersed in a mech game if i've still got my white plastic 360 controller in my hands. unless mechs in the future are all designed by unimaginative microsoft nerds
Along with Ed, I was/am freaking out with GLEE! as my avatar might hint at. The "In Game Footage" watermark on the pics is wrong, this was a trailer built in the Unreal 3 engine.
/Late comment courtesy of borked IE commenting that started today with this post. (Not complaining.)
Been a BT/MW fan since before there were any computer games for it, just tabletop. When MS bought the rights, they totally destroyed it with the craptastic arcade style.
I still have my Mechwarrior game discs from the first DOS game too.
@littlewade: Looks like this will take place before then, during the Succession Wars - which will probably be a welcome sight for Original Classic BT (tm) players as well as New Classic BT (tm) players.
Still won't bring back my beloved pre-lawsuit Marauder.
How does the Mechwarrior world explain how these giant war machines deal with air-support? They seem pretty slow and weak on countermeasures, so it seems like a few tactical strike planes or bombers could pretty much take these out from higher altitudes without fear of reprisal. Heck, the giant laser it was shooting (or plasma cannon, I'm not really sure) couldn't hit a relatively immobile enemy one block from him the size of a 6 story building, it'd hardly be able to take out air targets.
I know that giant robots are hardly the gold standard for believability, but most mecha series make the giant robot the be-all-end-all war machine, and I'm not as convinced by this iteration.
@kagekiri: If you read deeper into the Battletech background, you'll find lots of talk of point-defence lasers, computer-targeted gatling guns, huge racks of guided missiles, pickets of much smaller, faster mechs loaded with jump-jets and dedicated anti-air mech platforms.
In the games themselves... Well, the helicopters you come up against of occasion move really slowly... ;)
@kagekiri: My memory is fuzzy on the details so please bear with me. As far as I recall, Mechs are only the ultimate war machine in ground combat and air strikes are very devastating (I am going along with the tabletop game here). The reason why there are not more aircrafts is simple: Low Tech. Mechs can be patched up really easy by crafty greasemonkeys but aircrafts not so much, especially not those who can yield enough weaponry to hurt a mech. In the initial phases of an invasion there will be fierce air battles but later on the number dwindles down significantly, especially since there *are* antiair Mechs specialised in taking down aircrafts (I think the Warhammer is one example, long range autocannons instead of arms). Also, an aircraft has lesser armor than a mech so even an unlikely hit can turn your precious, precious aircraft into a pile of unsalvagable garbage.
@kagekiri: In the original Battletech universe the level of technology was pretty low. Mechs are expensive and old. Factories for smart munitions, etc. are gone. So an airplane would need to use area bombardment in order to take down one mech. And due to the insane amount of armor, even missiles that hit directly on target would do only minor damage.
In addition there would be aircover on your side as well, protecting you. There are even air mechs.
MW has never relied on the one-mech-beats-all concept that is prevalent in asian mech series. In fact, secondary units (tanks, comm convoys, VTOLs, etc) play a very important support role in more recent MW board games. Now, to go into specifics of your question:
* The weapons have a certain range, making tactical air strikes less desirable, particularly since that puts the planes into the mech's missile range. The mech, being heavily armored, can survive several hits - the plane or VTOL is toast with one hit from a long-range missile (LRM) (which, by the way, do lock on target).
* Many of the mech combats begin with an orbital insertion into (or near) urban areas. Tactical strikes are less desirable in urban settings since they destroy secondary assets (a defending force is more welcome if it doesn't blow up your entire town every time there's an invasion).
* To address your concern of accuracy, in MW lasers, autocannons and short-range missiles (SRMs) do not lock on target. You shoot where you aim, and in close-quarter nearly every shot lands on or near target. It's not that they're not hitting each other - in fact, the trailer shows many scenes where direct hits are happening. It's just a matter of armoring. The Atlas (skull-headed mech from the screenie above) has 1 1/2 the tonnage than the Warhammer (from whose POV you're seeing the clip), and to top that it's a frontline mech. There's a scene where you can see the bullets from the gatling gun just ricochet off that monster's heavy plating as the Warhammer is backing away. The particle cannon, too, definitively scored a hit. The last hit practically tore off the Atlas' left arm.
@kagekiri: They didn't. Aerospace fighters were a very large part of the Battletech universe, and fiction often has them performing merciless strafing runs on Mech positions, causing large amounts of damage with little done in return. Mech's had various weapons that could annoy them (in particular, LRM missle launchers were the bane of them) but relied on Aerospace support to clear the skies. In short, Mechs were nothing more than really big tanks, and filled the same roll really big tanks do--they dominate ground-wars but rely on parts of its military for support. This is, however, beyond the scope of this game. In game terms, Pulse Lasers and Autocannons were the bane of Aerotech ships, to say nothing of tageting computers.
Yeah, Nerd, the game changed considerably: Aerotech was added, as well as rules for Choppers and VTOL style craft. The mech you're referring to, the Phoenix Hawk LAM was a piece of crap.
Also, as someone said: The best defense against Aerospace fighters (which were relatively lightly armed and armored compared to a battlemech) was the HUGE amount of punishment they could take. Think about it: Your average assault-mech typically had something like 14+ tons of armor, and carried a massive amount of weaponary--even 'early mechs' of its time, such as the Marauder, boasted two PPCs (long-range, single-shot plasma bursts), four medium lasers, and an autocannon 10--and that's a dedicated groundpounder. I think the heaviest aerofighter in the game has like 3-4 tons armor, 1 PPC, pair of medium lasers and a missle rack. Assuming it didn't nail the Marauder with a PPC EVERY run (tougher than it sounds), it could shrug it off for a while.
Explain to me how Harmony Gold or the Macross franchise isn't suing the life out of them for ripping off their mecha designs again? Although, since they'll never bring a Macross game state side I suppose I have to settle for the franchise I love to hate and love a little more.
FASA sues Playmates, 1 of 3 [1994 DEC]: http://alex.kaempen.org/fasa_v._playmates.html
FASA sues Playmates, 2 of 3 [1995 JUN]: http://alex.kaempen.org/fasa_v._playmates2.html
FASA sues Playmates, 3 of 3 [1996 JAN]: http://alex.kaempen.org/fasa_v._Playmates3.html
You will find the list of disputed toys in #3 above. I believe the picture I have scanned from the Playmates toy catalog mentioned in that document.
HG sues FASA, Nail in the "Unseen" coffin: http://alex.kaempen.org/harmony_gold_v._fasa.html
Whoops! You weren't supposed to get those documents: http://alex.kaempen.org/harmony_gold_v._fasa2.html
@HamlinEuropa: They weren't ripped off. They were originally licensed. Catalyst Game Labs has secured the rights to re-implement the so called "Unseen" as mentioned above. (There could probably me a mini-series of posts on how the whole thing transpired over the 25 years of BattleTech's life thus far.)
I'm glad to see a reboot of the franchise, but in this day and age, that seems like a death sentence. To be honest, the promo piece was really boring and unexciting. The animation and action didnt' look much evolved past the 90's. Coupled with a console release as well, I fear our beloved mech-sim will be watered down to the point of lethargy.
@SaheliOrion: Yeah, this really reminded me of Heavy Gear or Heavy Gear 2 (only played one Mechwarrior sim game, felt a bit slow after Heavy Gear), but with a lot less maneuvering and some use of cover. No flanking, no use of anything besides dumb-fired weapons at the distance of a block (it was like a duel at 10 feet), etc. I almost expect the port opening at the top of the mech to release an indirect-fire missile or something, but no luck there.
@kagekiri: Heavy Gear and Heavy Gear 2 were largely scaled down Mechwarrior, came out later, and used a heavily inspired system and design aesthetic. Many critics cited the Heavy gear series as a Mechwarrior ripoff, despite shrinking.
Keep in mind this is an early build from a company that doesn't even have a publisher yet. It's very limited in scope. If it's anything like the old games, flanking, terrain, and other weapons will make a HUGE difference. Unfortunately, the time period the game takes place in precludes the use of indirect-fire LRMs/arrow IVs (no Tag lasers. Which is fine, because they could be broken in a small-scale skirmish style game anyway).
Also important things to note about this game that change things up: No universal Radar that magically tells you where everybody is, and you lose targeting when you lose LOS, which makes using terrain, ideally, VERY important.
anything that brings back the feeling of the old MW games and none of the feeling of the Xbox games is okay in my book. Since MS bought FASA, and then closed them down, Catalyst has taken very good care of the IP. it's *far* from a dead brand now.
07/15/09
I would Kick pregnant mothers out of the way to get this if it comes out with a similar Giant controller to the one released with Steel Battalion
07/15/09
07/16/09
07/15/09
07/15/09
The "In Game Footage" watermark on the pics is wrong, this was a trailer built in the Unreal 3 engine.
/Late comment courtesy of borked IE commenting that started today with this post. (Not complaining.)
07/15/09
07/15/09
Been a BT/MW fan since before there were any computer games for it, just tabletop. When MS bought the rights, they totally destroyed it with the craptastic arcade style.
I still have my Mechwarrior game discs from the first DOS game too.
07/15/09
07/15/09
07/15/09
07/15/09
Curse you jade falcon
07/15/09
Still won't bring back my beloved pre-lawsuit Marauder.
07/15/09
07/15/09
07/15/09
07/15/09
I know that giant robots are hardly the gold standard for believability, but most mecha series make the giant robot the be-all-end-all war machine, and I'm not as convinced by this iteration.
07/15/09
I used to "pilot" one, the heaviest was 45 tons, and would be worked in a normal battle.
It's been 20 years since I played, however, and the game might have changed considerably since then.
07/15/09
In the games themselves... Well, the helicopters you come up against of occasion move really slowly... ;)
07/15/09
07/15/09
In addition there would be aircover on your side as well, protecting you. There are even air mechs.
07/15/09
and were lifted from Macross/Robotech
07/15/09
MW has never relied on the one-mech-beats-all concept that is prevalent in asian mech series. In fact, secondary units (tanks, comm convoys, VTOLs, etc) play a very important support role in more recent MW board games. Now, to go into specifics of your question:
* The weapons have a certain range, making tactical air strikes less desirable, particularly since that puts the planes into the mech's missile range. The mech, being heavily armored, can survive several hits - the plane or VTOL is toast with one hit from a long-range missile (LRM) (which, by the way, do lock on target).
* Many of the mech combats begin with an orbital insertion into (or near) urban areas. Tactical strikes are less desirable in urban settings since they destroy secondary assets (a defending force is more welcome if it doesn't blow up your entire town every time there's an invasion).
* To address your concern of accuracy, in MW lasers, autocannons and short-range missiles (SRMs) do not lock on target. You shoot where you aim, and in close-quarter nearly every shot lands on or near target. It's not that they're not hitting each other - in fact, the trailer shows many scenes where direct hits are happening. It's just a matter of armoring. The Atlas (skull-headed mech from the screenie above) has 1 1/2 the tonnage than the Warhammer (from whose POV you're seeing the clip), and to top that it's a frontline mech. There's a scene where you can see the bullets from the gatling gun just ricochet off that monster's heavy plating as the Warhammer is backing away. The particle cannon, too, definitively scored a hit. The last hit practically tore off the Atlas' left arm.
07/15/09
07/15/09
07/15/09
Yeah, Nerd, the game changed considerably: Aerotech was added, as well as rules for Choppers and VTOL style craft. The mech you're referring to, the Phoenix Hawk LAM was a piece of crap.
Also, as someone said: The best defense against Aerospace fighters (which were relatively lightly armed and armored compared to a battlemech) was the HUGE amount of punishment they could take. Think about it: Your average assault-mech typically had something like 14+ tons of armor, and carried a massive amount of weaponary--even 'early mechs' of its time, such as the Marauder, boasted two PPCs (long-range, single-shot plasma bursts), four medium lasers, and an autocannon 10--and that's a dedicated groundpounder. I think the heaviest aerofighter in the game has like 3-4 tons armor, 1 PPC, pair of medium lasers and a missle rack. Assuming it didn't nail the Marauder with a PPC EVERY run (tougher than it sounds), it could shrug it off for a while.
07/15/09
07/15/09
FASA sues Playmates, 1 of 3 [1994 DEC]: http://alex.kaempen.org/fasa_v._playmates.html
FASA sues Playmates, 2 of 3 [1995 JUN]: http://alex.kaempen.org/fasa_v._playmates2.html
FASA sues Playmates, 3 of 3 [1996 JAN]: http://alex.kaempen.org/fasa_v._Playmates3.html
You will find the list of disputed toys in #3 above. I believe the picture I have scanned from the Playmates toy catalog mentioned in that document.
HG sues FASA, Nail in the "Unseen" coffin: http://alex.kaempen.org/harmony_gold_v._fasa.html
Whoops! You weren't supposed to get those documents: http://alex.kaempen.org/harmony_gold_v._fasa2.html
07/15/09
07/15/09
07/15/09
I.. DIG ... GIANT ROBOTS!
YOU.. DIG ... GIANT ROBOTS!
WE.. DIG ... GIANT ROBOTS!
CHICKS.. DIG... GIANT ROBOTS!
... nice!
07/15/09
07/15/09
07/15/09
Keep in mind this is an early build from a company that doesn't even have a publisher yet. It's very limited in scope. If it's anything like the old games, flanking, terrain, and other weapons will make a HUGE difference. Unfortunately, the time period the game takes place in precludes the use of indirect-fire LRMs/arrow IVs (no Tag lasers. Which is fine, because they could be broken in a small-scale skirmish style game anyway).
Also important things to note about this game that change things up: No universal Radar that magically tells you where everybody is, and you lose targeting when you lose LOS, which makes using terrain, ideally, VERY important.
07/15/09