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Posted By ChaosD1 about 4 months, 3 weeks ago
MMO Grinder: Mechwarrior Online, 
The long running “walking tank” franchise, “Mechwarrior” makes its online-only debut with Mechwarrior Online. Prepare for battle as you face off against enemy players and get ripped apart in your worthless “trial mech”. Happy Explosion Day!
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So much for me ever trying this game.
Recently the motherfuckers behind Mechwarrior Online forced the development of Mechwarrior: Living Legends to cease. There is an official statement on MWLL’s site stating otherwise, but it’s a lie whose purpose is to avoid a cease-and-desist order so that update .7 could be released. Read through the forum threads related to the announcements to uncover the truth.
MW:O will never get a cent from me now!
Trial mechs? oh THATS why I keep exploding upon being hit by anything larger than a rock. =/
Also, I didn’t play this for very long because this is basically all PvP. I played the previous MW titles for the story, cutscenes, and voice acting. =(
Hmm…didn’t the table top Hunchback have jumpjets ?
Trial mechs aside, it was an interesting watch. Lots of good information. Thanks for the heads up, and the entertaining review, but, I think I’ll stick with the Mechwarrior: Living Legends though.
have you thought of also reviewing HAWKEN its currently in open beta and is also a mech game with the tanky style mechs but is more fast paced,also that note, have you thought of reviewing DOTA 2 the other big MOBA on the market, while it is in closed beta it really is finished with all the features already there except for some small features. (i can give you a key if you need it)
I only just started getting asked about Hawken, and I did recently download it. I’m probably going wait a few episodes before I look at it, seeing as how I just did this one, and I have one or two scheduled for the next round already.
I was curious about this game as I heard about its entry into closed beta a long while ago. The combat seems kind of boring despite the complexity of the combat. I’m going to stick with Hawken’s beta.
I forgot:
Hero Mech’s are Basis Chassis Mechs with changed Hardpoints and they perform around 95-110% of the normal C-Bill payed Chassi. But they have a big C-Bill earning Bonus, so as with the Loewe driving them gets you rid of the need to pay for Premium.
And changes in the Matchmaking will come in the next Patch in January: Then Elo will be introduced for Matchmaking, so that unexperienced players won’t be set against Battle Hardened Founders all the time.
A revised on the review in 3-4 Month when the current Roadmap is worked through would be nice as lot of the mentioned Problems are allready adressed and on the Roadmap.
Again for the newplayer: The Help is currently very weak, the Game complex. In Forums General is a list of Teamspeaks.. go on one and you will get help.
I am a Founder of MWO but i have brought some players to the Game as well.
First of all the review is quiet good but there are some problems in it. First of all MWO is a hard Game to learn with little Help and only sparse Tutorials, as it is an to early launched Beta. Lot of the Problems discussed here had been called in the CB and are on the Developers todoo list ( Music will be around in february as instance)
So a new review in 3-4 Month would be nice.
One Mistake in your explanation: the Circle is for targeting your Arms, the Crosshair is for targeting your Torso mount weapons.
The Mechs aree sorted in several play difficulties which every Chassi give and you should go to one of the Teamspeaks and ask experienced players for it. The Trial Mechs gives a taste of the 4 types from easy to hard play Chassis, the Problem is simply that for example Heavy class has the hard to play Dragons, the Easygoing Missles Boat Catapults and the Medium hard to play Catapult-k2 and STF modells. The same goes for every Class, there are hard to play and easy going Mechs.
To the Trial Mech: they are not crap but all hard to play as they don’t have Double Heatsinks which means that you need to use them Carefully.
My Tip for Beginners: get 2,5M Cbills together ( around 10 Games lost or 5-6 carefully survived and won)
get yourself a Commando-2D, slap an ECM on it ( it’s one of the 4 Chassis that can carry one) change the SRM’s to 3x SSRM2 it, upgrade the Structure to Endo steel and putt 2 tons SSRM ammo in it.
All together around 2,5M
This is the smallest ‘Mech to get, with the Cadet Bonus
you get plenty money out of it ( Around 350k-400k ) as you get many Kill Assists, spotting Assist etc with him.
And as one of the four ECM Chassis you are a big support to your game as long as you stay with the others and hunt down light and mediums with your Ssrm’s.
2,5M is now easy to get luckily. You can end your cadet time with around 6M C-Bills swapping to the Commando early and thats half the way to an assault. And you have fun in this little Mech as your weapons are not toys, you can bring down with the Commando-2D in this configuration
2 Atlas Mechs! Then your Ammo runs out.
Take this with a grain of salt. Especially the last sentence.
Commandos die VERY easily as they are the lightest chassis and if you don’t tweak it so you go around 140 km/h you’re cannon fodder.
And SSRMs are good vs light mechs but you will get shot to pieces vs an Atlas if you don’t know VERY WELL what you’re doing.
When you started talking about the mechanics of the game, I started reminiscing about the long hours I spent with Mechwarrior 2/3 (more 3 than 2, but still a good amount on both). Managing the heat levels, cycling through weapon groupings for various ranges, aiming for certain sections on enemy mechs (leg shots were way OP when in close quarters combat), handling acceleration, torso twist, arm aiming, etc. Good times, good times.
I do have a query though, is the cash shop similar to Tribes: Ascend? I’ve watched a *lot* of coverage of that game (mostly by TotalBiscuit), and just wanted to know if this one has a similar thing with the purchasing of new classes (or mechs in this case) and weapons.
It is absolutely true, trial-mechs will get shot to pieces in seconds. I almost wanted to smash my PC in rage because I kept dying a minute or so into the game against players with superior mechs. It’s like letting kindergardeners play ice hockey against a professional NHL team. Watch the South Park episode “Stanley Cup” to see how that goes…
But at least you can test this game for free or at least pay only a little money to see how you fare with it. I shelled out 50 Euros for Battlefield Vietnam back in the day and played it for a week or so. Money wasted. And it lets you see if this game will really run on your PC. If not, then at least you didn’t spend money on a doorstop.
But this is also the reason why a lot of F2P (“Free to Play” or “Pay to Win” if it sucks) have a lot of dead accounts.
First, having to pay money to any chances at all is a downer. That’s why I enjoy games like UT: every gamer is equal, there is no player out there wiping the map because he/she shelled out a hundred bucks on epic gear and perks.
Second, the motivation to play a game you spent good money on is far higher than when you’re playing a game you only started for shits and giggles. I started WoT on a whim, got annoyed really fast and stopped playing. I’m one of those dead players.
And I played the Mechwarrior games, so I’m fairly well versed in the universe of Mechwarrior. I can’t debate for hours on the perfect loadout, but I know the mechs, their advantages and disadvantages and where to use them. And this game is deep enough to reward knowledge like that. It’s not perfect yet, but this is an open beta and props to the developer for letting us take it for a joyride.
No mention of Battletech? That’s a shame because Mechwarrior branched off of it.
There did not seem to be any of the support weapons in the video. Are they in the game? By support weapons I mean all the various tanks, LRM/SRM carriers, or little bitty clan suits.
I’m pretty sure you have to go play MWLL for that.
Sooo… Daishis are off limit unless you p(l)ay a lot, right?
There are no Daishis yet as this game takes place in 3049. No clan invasion forces as of now. Dire Wolfs (Daishi) were first seen 3050.
Clan mechs are planned but not announced yet.
Good review but as a seasoned MWO player I have to “correct” you on a few things.
1) The crosshairs : The cross indicates where your torso mounted weapons are aiming and the circle indicates the aim of your arm mounted weapons. This is crucial as most mechs can aim their arms in totally different directions than their torso.
2) The trial mechs aren’t worthless. They are actually the “standard” loadout of the given mech(variant). They have a major disadvantage : You can’t customize them. This results in less specialized mechs and sometimes bad heat containment. But if you know what you’re doing, you can do VERY well in those mechs. But most new players don’t know how to handle them and that’s the problem.
The major advantage is that since the economy update those mechs earn you ~8 million credits in the first 25 matches, allowing you to purchase at least one or two new mechs for your mechbay.
Still I agree with you that the trial mechs weren’t the brightest of ideas but they are NOT less armored and/or carry less weapons. You just can’t tinker them towards your playstyle.
3)The pilot skills aren’t that much of a deal making the matchmaker not as bad as you state. Yes, you can run faster, shoot more often and turn faster but it’s all in the ~10% range, resulting in 1 more shot before overheating and so on. It adds up but most people don’t deploy in fully skilled mechs.
I think my confusion over the crosshair stems from the fact that every mech I was able to pilot has the missiles mounted to the torso and the energy and ballistic weapons mounted to the arms. However, I did neglect to mention that some mechs HAVE no arms, and you can even see one in action during one of the many spectator mode showings of this review. Bit of a derp on my part, but still a fairly common practice in game. Thanks for clarifying that.
Personally, I found I lasted way longer in the purchased Dragon DRG-5N than the trial version of the exact same mech, and as I stated I technically made it WEAKER by switching out my Medium Laser for a Small Pulse, and modded nothing else. I was fired upon by 5 different mechs when trying to cap a point and took far less damage than I did going one-on-one with ANY mech as the trial version.
The matchmaker issue I speak of has far less to do with pilot skills (but a slight advantage is still an advantage) and more to do with premades getting matched with PUGs. A group of 10 friends on Skype or Ventrilo are going to wipe the floor with a group of 10 solo-queued players that will probably never bother to communicate with each other. World of Tanks realized this as well, and while I still think letting you join only 1 or 2 friends in a match is a bit harshly limiting, especially when that match consists of 20+ people, I completely understand WHY they did it, even if they could probably get away with at least 4 friends in a queue. SMITE adopts the same formula, allowing only 3 friends to group for a random match, and forcing friends into a 5 player match if they wish to bring more, matching them only with other five player groups.
That’s where the real issue lies.
The PUG problem you speak of isn’t in the game anymore. Or only in a weaker World of Tank-ish form.
First of, it’s 8 vs 8, not 10 vs 10 but that’s besides the point.
If you group with 7 other people you only play vs other premade 8 man groups. There are no PUGs. And those matches are REAL competitive as those groups tend to exploit every weakness in the game. (Like deploying with 8 x ECM Atlas as in those matches the usual balance rules aren’t implemented)
So you play with 3 friends because the maximum group size for “public” matches is 4. Resulting in a team of 4 premade mixed with 4 PUGs or other teams of 2+ people. And those teams aren’t rare, making the matches somewhat unpredictable and fun.
BUT : you will allways have a better chance in any game when playing with friends. And since 4 man groups are half a team in MWO (unlike WoT’s 15 vs 15 matches), you will often easily win when playing vs 8 PUGs.
12 vs 12 is planned as far as I know, making the team-problem even less an issue.
Hey. At least that voice isn’t saying, “Where did you learn to fly?” every 5 seconds.
Good review. Disappointing to hear about the whole trial mech thing. I was thinking about trying this but that could be a deal breaker.
I’m curious as to whether you’ve played (or even heard of) Mechwarrior: Living Legends. It’s not an MMO, but it is a Mechwarrior game on Cryengine. It’s a total conversion mod (requires Crysis Wars) that looks and plays much like MWO, except that it also has airplanes, VTOLs, tanks, hovercraft, artillery, and infantry. Since you seemed to enjoy this, you might want to have a look if you have the time. Mechlivinglegends.net.