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Hello all!
As you (probably don't) know, I'm Team Liquid's self-appointed HBS fanboy.
Who is HBS? They're a video game company founded and operated by Jordan Weisman, the handsome fellow who created the Shadowrun and Battletech IP's.
HBS has funded three Shadowrun games in the past three years, including a Director's Cut of the much beloved Dragonfall campaign. If you haven't played them, I highly recommend it; they're some of if not *the* best CRPGs I've ever experienced.
Today they announced the return of Battletech, also known in the video game community as Mechwarrior. The world of Battletech is one of political intrigue in the distant future, where mercenaries pilot battle mechs (surprise!) and jostle for power and prestige.
It originated as a tabletop game (which I've played and can confirm is great) and went through several incarnations as a PnP roleplaying game, an arcade-style multiplayer game, and the tactical combat games such as Mechcommander and Mechwarrior. You may also recognize the IP by Microsoft's bastard-lineage called Mech Assault.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/Ln7o8lW.jpg)
See how cool that picture is? Isn't it FUCKIN SWEET?
What, you need more convincing?
Remember the Double Fine fiasco? Have you ever been let down by a lackluster Kickstarter?
HBS is a different animal. HBS *delivers.* What they promise, they give. What they advertise, they produce. And they do it in a timely fashion that often exceeds expectations. They've averaged about a game per year since they've been a studio, and have received much deserved love from critics and fans alike.
Plus mechs.
Here's the link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/webeharebrained/battletech
They've been up for less than a day and already funded three of their Stage 1 goals.
So, like, give them your disposable money.
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The Kickstarter has reached the 1,000,000 dollar mark in 24 hours and some change. For those of you who haven't checked it out, that means the game officially has a single player campaign, and Stage 2 goals will be unlocked shortly.
My guess is that one of those mini-goals will be the game editor, but we'll see.
From their twitter page:
Harebrained Schemes @WeBeHarebrained 10m10 minutes ago
WOAH. Just over $1M! We're all so excited (there was cheering). We're furiously working on a full KS update, so stay tuned!
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2.5M the dream, multiplay please :|
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I'm really excited about this.
I wasn't part of the kickstarter funding for the Shadowrun games but I bought them all and Dragonfall and Hong Kong were absolutely amazing.
Also I believe they already mentioned that a Shadowrun-type in game editor was not something they were looking to include in Battletech, but could be a possibility in (if there is) eventual sequels
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PvP with ladder or gtfo.
No, but seriously, mech series deserves love and I hope they do well. Looking forward to the game.
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Since they didn't have early bird tier I told KS to tell me when it is 48h until end and I will back it then :D
Turn based party game in the vein of new Xcom but with customizable giant Mechs and pilots with skills? YES PLEASE!
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ALLEYCAT BLUES50118 Posts
HBS at least delivers on their kickstarters so I'll consider backing this.
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unity. *groan*
I just hate that games use this T_T
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I love batthetech but I don't dig the choice to go turn-based at all, and honestly combat in Dragonfall was crappy enough for me to be rather pessimistic about the future of this game. MechCommander games were amazing as squad-RTS; I'd really much rather see a modern Mech Commander game than... this. 
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On October 01 2015 18:30 nanaoei wrote:
unity. *groan*
I just hate that games use this T_T
Unity 5 is supposed to be a good version.
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On October 01 2015 18:56 Salazarz wrote:I love batthetech but I don't dig the choice to go turn-based at all, and honestly combat in Dragonfall was crappy enough for me to be rather pessimistic about the future of this game. MechCommander games were amazing as squad-RTS; I'd really much rather see a modern Mech Commander game than... this.
I guess you also didn't like Xcom ?
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On October 01 2015 19:03 -Archangel- wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2015 18:56 Salazarz wrote:I love batthetech but I don't dig the choice to go turn-based at all, and honestly combat in Dragonfall was crappy enough for me to be rather pessimistic about the future of this game. MechCommander games were amazing as squad-RTS; I'd really much rather see a modern Mech Commander game than... this. I guess you also didn't like Xcom ?
The new XCOM game was a big let-down in many ways, especially if compared to the original. Still a fun game (just like Dragonfall, overall, was a fun game), but it was far from what I would have liked it to be.
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On October 01 2015 19:37 Salazarz wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2015 19:03 -Archangel- wrote:On October 01 2015 18:56 Salazarz wrote:I love batthetech but I don't dig the choice to go turn-based at all, and honestly combat in Dragonfall was crappy enough for me to be rather pessimistic about the future of this game. MechCommander games were amazing as squad-RTS; I'd really much rather see a modern Mech Commander game than... this. I guess you also didn't like Xcom ? The new XCOM game was a big let-down in many ways, especially if compared to the original. Still a fun game (just like Dragonfall, overall, was a fun game), but it was far from what I would have liked it to be.
So you think new Xcom would work better as a real time game?
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well who played xcom apocalypse and who used the turn based style and who used the real time style ? :p
Most people like turn based in tactical games. Though Battletech could easily be made real time in a frozen synapse kind of style. Since the table top kinda works that way.
Maybe they actually do employ the Battle tech everything moves at the same time rule system. To bad its 3025 though I like 2750 the most haha. Catapult :<
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They said it will be like Xcom but without a cover system. Mechs in cover, that would look funny :D
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On October 01 2015 23:45 -Archangel- wrote:
They said it will be like Xcom but without a cover system. Mechs in cover, that would look funny :D
Original Battle Tech has partial cover in its rules.
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On October 02 2015 00:35 mahrgell wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2015 23:45 -Archangel- wrote:
They said it will be like Xcom but without a cover system. Mechs in cover, that would look funny :D Original Battle Tech has partial cover in its rules.
The creator of the rules is making this game, he said the game will not follow rules to the letter but by its spirit. 31 years ago there were no computer games like this.
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On October 01 2015 20:14 -Archangel- wrote:Show nested quote +On October 01 2015 19:37 Salazarz wrote:On October 01 2015 19:03 -Archangel- wrote:On October 01 2015 18:56 Salazarz wrote:I love batthetech but I don't dig the choice to go turn-based at all, and honestly combat in Dragonfall was crappy enough for me to be rather pessimistic about the future of this game. MechCommander games were amazing as squad-RTS; I'd really much rather see a modern Mech Commander game than... this. I guess you also didn't like Xcom ? The new XCOM game was a big let-down in many ways, especially if compared to the original. Still a fun game (just like Dragonfall, overall, was a fun game), but it was far from what I would have liked it to be. So you think new Xcom would work better as a real time game?
Where are you getting that from? Xcom was built as a turn-based game from the start, and was very well thought-out and produced as such. This is why I had such a problem with the new Xcom game -- because they ditched a lot of great design decisions from the original game in favor of 'new' mechanics which simply don't work as well -- at least in my opinion. Like, having any type of 'cover' give a flat % modifier to whether you can be hit by a weapon or not is very dull, as is constantly seeing people literally shoot through walls etc, as is lack of different firing modes, removal of time units in favor of the 'two click' system and so on and so on.
Could Xcom work as a real time game? Definitely, but it would be a very, very different game. They tried slapping on a real-time mode in Xcom Apocalypse and it didn't work very well. There were also the afterlight / aftermath / aftershock games, and the real-time approach worked much better, because the game was actually built around being played in pausable real-time from the get-go -- so of course either can be fun, just needs the right approach.
Now back on topic, I am not saying that a BattleTech game won't be good because it's made turn-based instead of real-time. All I'm saying is it has a great predecessor in MechCommander 1/2, both of which were amazing games for their time and worked very well as squad-based RTS games. The logical thing to compare them against would be the DragonFall games (as those were made by the same developer), and in my opinion, combat mechanics of DragonFall are not nearly as interesting as those of MechCommander games, and wouldn't translate very well to a BattleTech game.
It remains to be seen whether they will make it work or not of course, I just can't justify preordering the game without having seen any real gameplay details as, in my opinion, the combat in DragonFall games wasn't interesting enough to make a 100% combat focused game using same or similar mechanics be worthy of a pre-order.
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not sure about turn based setup either, but I'm going to buy this anyway.
always had a soft spot for this universe/ setting.
Loved mechcommander 1 + 2, as long as i can get a Mad Cat i'll be a happy camper.
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Let's be real, actual combat mechanics in mechcommanders, especially 2, were boring as fuck. Each mech was basicly just a weapon turret that could move and there was little reason to field anything but the biggest turrets you could. In MC2, with sensors being far more limited in mechs, there was more call for having a scout mech in your drops, but later on even that could get replaced by an assault with sensors.
And in MC2, enemies tunnel visioned the first unit you showed to them, until it or they died. Doesn't matter if they could actually reach the thing they saw, they would try anyway.
Mech building in MC1 was horrible, as they did away with heat and used a load value instead, which literally just meant how much space a mech had for weapons. What this effectively did was make any ammo based weapon nearly obsolete from the get go, because the difference between an energy weapon and a ballistic weapon was that the first doesn't run out of ammo. In real mech simulation, heat is the equilizing factor between an ammoless and ammo based weapon systems. The only ammo based weapon that had a role in MC1 was LRMs, due to their ability to fire over obstacles to very long range.
MC2 brought in heat after a fashion and made the actual mech building a little more interesting, but the AI tunnel vision problem meant that what you actually put into mechs meant little in actual combat. It's hard to pretend you don't know how the AI works once you figure it out and not abuse it at any point in the game.
Now, I do love both games, still have my original discs right there on the shelf, but mechanics wise both games were quite disappointing.
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EPT
