Reviews Collection Thread

Blagg Zear · Sep 19, 2013

Underwhelming â€˜MechWarrior Onlineâ€™ Launch Falls Short of Expectations
Sep 18, 2013 by Rob Keyes

Teased with a concept trailer years ago and officially announced in late 2011, MechWarrior has come a long way since Microsoft gave up developing the franchise with MechWarrior 4 over a decade ago. Developer Piranha Games and publishing partner Infinite Game Publishing officially unveiled the online-focused free-to-play, mech simulation title MechWarrior Online in October of 2011.

In the months following, the first details on MechWarrior Online promised a new type of experience for long-time fans, one that focused on the pillars of role warfare, information warfare and community warfare where players battled on their own or as part of larger mercenary groups and factions for planets across the galaxy. That game, the persistent universe and story, and those features are not exactly what launched yesterday on September 17, 2013 when MechWarrior Online officially dropped its â€œbetaâ€ status.

Since introducing players to the general gameplay of MWO last summer via the closed beta (read our preview â€“ open beta launched last October), the game has always revolved around PvP. It began with 8 vs. 8 team battles where one team wins by killing all of their opponents or capturing their base. Later, a second mode called â€˜Conquestâ€™ was added where one team wins by killing the opposition or by earning 750 tickets by capturing the majority of five bases on the map. Over the last few months, MWO has grown to feature 12 vs. 12 combat, later adding a third-person play option, with the goal of letting newcomers have an easier time acclimatizing themselves to piloting a mech whose torso can twist in the opposite direction of the mechâ€™s feet.

This is where the game â€“ at least from a community and PR standpoint â€“ began to stumble. The developers had initially stated that the game would always be first-person only, later changing their tune and explaining that theyâ€™d add a separate mode for third-person players. The compromise was generally accepted as players could still play in first-person against players also only playing in first-person, since the fear was that the more arcade-like third-person mode would give users an advantage of seeing around corners and seeing light mechs up close behind them. When third-person was added, none of this was the case and the player pools were shared.

On one hand, the perception was that the developers had gone back on their word twice where on the other, the reality is that third-person doesnâ€™t offer any advantage and the devs explained as much in an apology letter to the community which had begun vocally expressing their dissatisfaction with the game and how the situation was handled. Itâ€™s harder to aim and players lose a pair of key HUD features (the map and team status displays) when playing in third-person. Still, judging by the forums, in-game chatter and what the media picked up on, there was a clear misstep in communication between the developers (busy at work) and the players (some who have high expectations after sinking significant amounts of cash into the game based on a set of promised features).

This was just the beginning and clearly wasnâ€™t what PGI (the developers) wanted to deal with in the road leading up to the launch. For a long time now, the launch of MWO was built up to be the long-awaited beginning of the actual meta game, dubbed Community Warfare. This is the big feature set touted, promoted and described in detail in the months following the gameâ€™s announcement in late 2011. We covered it extensively here:

Up until a few weeks ago, we were sure that the official release date of MechWarrior Online would mark the launch of Community Warfare and we were wrong, corrected via a series of mentions on the official MWO forums, in emails to us and even a few comments on our site. How is it we had no idea that the launch of the game wasnâ€™t actually the launch of the game announced two years ago? Why is this even a launch?

As it turns out, the â€œlaunchâ€ is nothing more than a milestone where the â€œbetaâ€ label could be dropped from the official website and game client. Not only is Community Warfare nowhere to be found, even after a year of a playable beta, but the much-needed user interface upgrade (dubbed UI 2.0) is also not here yet. This information on the lack of new features was only revealed less than two weeks before the gameâ€™s release date on the No Guts No Galaxy podcast where PGIâ€™s Bryan Ekman guested for three episodes (beginning here).

Instead, the launch update of MechWarrior Online maintained the status quo and the devs feel the core gameplay mechanics are at a place where they feel satisfied enough to introduce the game to more players. No new mechs, no new map, no new features, no overhauled interface and no beginnings of Community Warfare. The game is the same as it was in the beta, so we wonder why â€“ at a point where the forums are a place of hostility â€“ the game is launching without its most-needed upgrades and without its high-profile features? Should the â€œlaunchâ€ of the game be when the â€œfullâ€ game, as originally envisioned and advertised is ready to go?

â€œOur official launch is a jumping off point for a continuous stream of meaningful content updates to the game. We are looking forward to implementing the next round of major features for our pilots, including an entire new interface, new pilot tutorials, new Mechs and Maps and the long-awaited Community Warfare pillar. This is only the beginning. There is no final product.â€ - Russ Bullock, president of MechWarrior Online developer Piranha Games.

If the forums (here, for instance), reports of forum moderation, user reviews on metacritic (here), Reddit jokes, and the fact that comments are disabled on the official MWO channelâ€™s launch trailer are of any indication, probably. By launching the game now, the bigger issue the devs face is that theyâ€™re inviting publications to review a product thatâ€™s not reflective of the entire game (when itâ€™s truly ready for launch) and worse, new players will be entering a situation where in-game chatter and forums are poisoned with community uproar. The timing couldnâ€™t be worse. We were hard-pressed ourselves to find a match yesterday (launch day) where players werenâ€™t being sarcastic about the gameâ€™s launch and expressing dissatisfaction with the current status of the title. Again, itâ€™s all about expectations.

The good news, is that despite the negativity, those vocal players are still seemingly playing. The bad news is, itâ€™s truly awful to read nothing but borderline trolling when jumping into a new game experience just to have some fun. Developmental hurdles and overcoming the stigma of high-priced goods in a â€œfree-to-playâ€ game is one thing- and trust us, there are sales being pushed on gamers on a weekly basis â€“ but inviting players into an online game thatâ€™s not always welcoming and doing something(s) to upset existing players as much as they seem to be, is another. Itâ€™s legitimately worrisome as much as itâ€™s depressing to read the negativity and it all comes down to the devs managing expectations through communication.

Next week is the official MechWarrior Online launch party where details on UI 2.0 and Community Warfare will finally be discussed. Hopefully that will shed light on whatâ€™s coming and when, and more importantly, get the disappointed fans excited and positive about the game again. The game is a good one, and fans of mechs and team-based PvP will find a lot to like about the gameplay. Thereâ€™s a long way to go however, in making MWO more than that though. Expect our full written review in the coming weeks and for now, check out some gameplay of us playing from the early days of beta and present.

The MechWarrior community is a strong and vocal one â€“ and they can be united for good. Just look at what the devs and players accomplished together in raising money in the fight against cancer with the Sarahâ€™s Mech fundraiser. And they will have to unite again â€“ because the clans are comingâ€¦

Have you tried MWO and if not, will you give it a shot? Let us know your thoughts on the game and franchise in the comments below!

MechWarrior Online is available now (for free!).

Follow Rob on Twitter @rob_keyes.
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http://gamerant.com/mechwarrior-online-launch-trailer/

Blagg Zear · Sep 19, 2013

Mechwarrior Online â€“ Review
Game Reviews, PC/MAC
Posted by Callum at 6:21 AM, Sep 17th 2013

So after many months of beta both open and closed, Mechwarrior Online is to finally to be launched in proper to the public. Displaying far more of the supposedly first person combat aspect than Mechwarrior Tactics, itâ€™s the title fans of the video games will be most drawn to. Having undergone many changes and tweaks over an extended beta, how is the released product?

The story here is set several years prior to the Clan invasion, relatively early on in Battletechâ€™s timeline. With multiple houses in a state of continual war against one another, massive battlemechs scavenged from the technology of old are sent against one another to take worlds or rob their foes of talented warriors. Beyond a few factual points however, the story barely comes into this.

The gameâ€™s big draw is naturally building towering mechs and proceeding to fight others with it. Selecting the one best suited to your skills tooling it up to carry the weapons you can use best and fragging people with them. These it definitely gets right with the sheer variety of weapons and mechs to take.

There are a large number of mechs divided into various weight classes, each capable of carrying out their own set role with different set ups and weapons slots. For example most versions of the Catapult are missile slot heavy, making them perfect for support roles while the Dragons are more varied in their layouts. Thereâ€™s a good deal of flexibility with each one as each slot doesnâ€™t designate a specific weight or class of weapon, only their type. For example, a laser slot could go for anything from a small laser, effective only at close range and very weak, to a Particle Projection Cannon AKA the â€œI just blew your arms of at 800 metersâ€ gun. This has led to many kinds of customisations, such as huge AC/20s being mounted on light Raven mechs for sudden ambushes.

The only real limitation with what you can give a mech are two things: Heat and weight. Heat efficiency is judged by a counter to the right in the mech bay and shows how many times your mech can fire continuously before it shuts down. At that point youâ€™re left exposed, unable to move or fight back for several seconds. The higher your efficiency, the more times you can fire continuously so you need to add as many heat sinks as you can to stay in the fight.

Weight is the obvious one, but everything has a weight value along with a maximum load each mech can take. So long as you donâ€™t exceed that limit you can carry as many big guns as you have slots. More or less all the internal components save for essentials or those in a fixed position can also be shifted around. Storing ammo in a place less likely to cause harm if it explodes is one use of this and even points of armour can be removed to save weight or shunted to one specific place.

Much of the above is basic stuff, present throughout most games set in this universe, but Piranha Games Inc. are sticking with what works in this respect. Further allowing customisation can be made with bonus add-ons like the ability to cap bases faster or consumables like calling in air strikes. Admittedly the latter example isnâ€™t worth the cash though.

The actual fighting environments are well varied and designed. While by no means the most complex of maps, the variation between urban, frozen and volcano locations is decent as is their size. In some brawlers will have a clear advantage while others are so vast that anyone who can pick off people with a gauss rifle will be taking heads. You canâ€™t choose between them specifically and the map you turn up in is completely randomised, which is definitely a good way to force strangers to adapt and work as a unit. Well, sometimes anyway.

The map variety is only further improved by the two game modes of Assault and Conquest, the former emphasising upon combat while the latter relies upon racking up points via capturing various bases. This has gone a long way to solving the cap rushes which once plagued the game and it adds some very welcome additions to the title.

The combat itself is definitely solid as a whole. As each mech has segmented areas to fire upon and specialisations, meaning you can have your arm shot off and keep fighting, but will lose anything you had in that arm. Some are harder than others thanks to higher armour values, others are essential to remaining operational (head, centre torso, at least one leg), but it allows you to stay in the game with horrendous amounts of damage. It also forces you to be tactical with where you are shooting and opt where to hit the hardest in extended fights. A mechanic which never fails to make firefights feel far more enjoyable than the common FPS problem of killing someone with one bullet by shooting him in the foot. With the addition of various capabilities such as the now thankfully balanced ECM, jump jets for additional manoeuvrability and flexibility with all mech designs the most advertised points are definitely very strong.

The unfortunate thing is that the design, planning and good ideas in combat is almost ruined by the matchmaking system. Online runs on an ELO rating system for planning matches and selecting players, which only works in theory and is a very strange choice for a team based game. Originally designed for one on one matches, itâ€™s fine with teams whoâ€™ve banded together but just doesnâ€™t work with individual players. Oh itâ€™s been modified to supposedly account for this, but it honestly just doesnâ€™t work and canâ€™t account for team balance, weight balance or the possibility of greater co-ordination between other players. In fact, the system itself seems to have an adverse reaction to victories.

After youâ€™ve been PUGing for a while hereâ€™s the sort of trend youâ€™re going to fall into: You end up being completely steamrolled by the enemy for a good number of matches. Over time this eventually becomes less and less until youâ€™re losing, but your side takes out almost as much of the opposing force as they do of you. Then you win a couple of matches, two or three at most, and the system promptly throws a fit. It suddenly thinks youâ€™re a god among players and you end up being thrown against players far above your skill, and the cycle starts again. Others might have different experiences, but for myself and those Iâ€™ve spoken to playing individually, this always happens. It ends up just removing a lot of the fun from matches as they become predictable with you losing a good 85% of the time.

Unfortunately for the Mechwarrior Online, its problems donâ€™t stop with matchmaking.

While the core basics of the game are solid, there are a few elements which work against it and other things which need to be accounted for. As itâ€™s an MMO this is namely its friendliness to new players and future developments.

New players are thrown in at the deep end and tend to have an even harder time than other people due to the mechs they have available. Rather than models which have been bought by people and then customised to their needs, players are stuck with stock designs. These tend to have multiple weapon groups already set up, poor heat management and a good number seem to be built to try and be â€œJack of all trades, master of noneâ€. As such you tend to overheat much more, canâ€™t specialise in what you want to do, and have a weapons set up which the tutorials donâ€™t explain very well. The first two points do have their exceptions, mechs designs are cycled every few months to new models, but youâ€™re almost never not going to be fighting an uphill battle with them.

Having stock, ready built mechs would be fine if you were only in games facing people with these pre-built designs but youâ€™re not. Instead youâ€™re thrown into matches where people will turn up with their own tweaked designs intended to rip everyone to bits, like Hero Cataphracts with three Gauss rifles. Youâ€™re just going to die a lot, even ignoring the poorly implemented matchmaking.

Even if you loathe light mechs Iâ€™d still recommend buying one just to have a fighting chance, as the few bonuses are meant to give an edge to new players donâ€™t work. Hell, the implemented gameplay choices intended to make it easier to learn do nothing and often teach the wrong thing. Third person perspective only seems to encourage solo-play rather than co-ordinating as a group as it removes all need for spotters. Not to mention it makes jump sniping tediously easy. Throttle decay is a hindrance more than a help as it feels as if itâ€™s taking control away from you. The only useful one is Arm-Lock for beginners as that helps getting used to aiming, but removes the ability to make precise shots meaning youâ€™re going to want to turn it off after only a short while.

Besides that thereâ€™s the tutorials which effectively just explain the bare basics of the game. You know the barely interactive walls of text which try to ram information down your throat a-la Final Fantasy? Itâ€™s just a step about that. Youâ€™re faced with pop-up screen after pop-up screen with paragraphs of text at a time telling you what to do, then occasionally allowing you to actually act out what is stated. They feel unintuitive and youâ€™d honestly have a better experience learning through trial and error on the testing grounds.

All of this could have been overlooked were it not for one thing: The developer. PGI seems utterly rudderless when it comes to having a focused direction, improving upon problems and above all actually catering to the audience it already has. The problems with trial mechs compared to bought ones is something which has remained unchanged throughout the entire beta. The few additions feel like steps back and when they do follow suggestions like with the tutorials it feels like a bare bones inclusion.

Many problems and balance issues go unfixed for months it seems and are often only solved via making something else unbalanced. Just for example, the Jenner was infamous for being the ubermech during months of the beta. It could cut the other two lights at the time to ribbons, had seemingly no weaknesses and thanks to lag-shielding could merrily take multiple mechs on at a time without much risk of being taken out. The only way to accurately take it out it seemed was thanks to Streak SRMS which could lock on and always hit the centre â€œtorsoâ€ armour. This weakness was going to be removed by giving it ECM until a forum wide poll widely opposed this decision. As a result Jenners began to have some actual competition with the other light mechs, but only because they were armed with the new gamebreaking item ECM.

ECM turned into an â€œI winâ€ button as it prevented target locks, made the mech and any allies nearby invisible, and effectively switched off enemy radar once in range. It turned the game from a tactical MOBA into a borderline Call of Duty rush-brawler as no one took LRM missiles, and light mechs couldnâ€™t be hit by anything. Worse still, for some reason they refused to fix this game breaking problem for months. PGI only agreeing to give very minor tweaks to power and ability before eventually bringing it down to something remotely balanced.

While this isnâ€™t how every patch, addition and update has gone, itâ€™s how too many have gone and continue to go. Thereâ€™s no clear direction to each decision and it feels more like the group is making things up on whims at times than following any concise plan for a finished product. Or it is taking the Star Wars: Galaxies route of ignoring its current community in a desperate attempt to draw in some new unknown audience. This has been an accusation repeatedly seen for some time, and has only gotten worse since the inclusion of a third person perspective.

PGI has repeatedly gone back on its word time and time again to the point of completely contradicting the basic outline of Mechwarrior Online when it was released, even outright lying to its players. This needs an entire article to itself to really examine, but if youâ€™re interested in the problems on the developer side look here, and see an analysis of their response to their latest PR disaster here. For the sake of length: They are unreliable and cannot be trusted in the slightest by its own customers.

Mechwarrior Online is a good game at first glance, but the longer you look and the more you play it, the more problems become evident. For all the issues weapons currently have, fighting against mechs is the most balanced it has been in a long time and can be genuinely fun. Building and customising your down designs is definitely a fun point even given the grinding, as actively fighting other people makes it much more fun. At least when youâ€™re getting between 80-100K per match anyway. Despite that however, there are just way too many problems in the gameâ€™s current form to properly recommend.

If you have friends who all play it or join an active House/Clan/Merc Corp then you might be able to have some fun with this one. The game is designed for teamwork and it really is the only way to properly play the title while having fun (or at least occasionally winning). Otherwise, give it a miss until PGI includes more features they promised, or start to sort out its bigger flaws.
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http://paranerds.com/?p=13325

ahelland · Sep 19, 2013

OUCH!!! I have some complaints about MWO but that was brutal. I did not like the part about throttle decay giving less control of a mech. Could not disagree more. IMO it gives much more control. I am still keeping the faith regardless of the reviews. I love MWO too much to let the details spoil my fun. PGI will get there. Patience patience patience. We have just scraped the surface of the amount of content coming our way. I am going with the attitude that the longer it takes to release content just means that PGI is making sure its implemented correctly (at least thats my hope).

Keep it up PGI and dont let the whiners and ranters control your decisions. Great game with HUGE potential.

Blagg Zear · Sep 19, 2013

September 17, 2013
By Fil5000

This is how the game launches. Not with a bang, but with a whimper.

Today PGI put out a perfectly good patch for MWO - it adds the sort of thing we've come to expect for the second patch of the month: a new mech to buy with cbills (the Orion has been available for MC since last week, but now you don't need real money to own one), there's a new skin ("Applejack", which I frankly don't dare to look at), they've tightened the matchmaking up, nerfed the recently ubiquitous UAC/5 and fixed a load of bugs. Plus, all the trial mechs are now custom "Champion" designs instead of the horrific tabletop designs that new players were previously lumbered with, so now new players won't find themselves overheating every second shot and then getting blown up from inadequate armour coverage. All of this is very welcome.

As a patch, it's really solid and with very little to complain about - but it doesn't stand out from any of the other patches we've had over the last couple of months. That's a real shame, as PGI have declared today the day the game launches. While there's no doubt that the game is in a better state than it has been for months, mostly thanks to the vigorous beating the PPC recieved a short while back, it's still missing the much touted UI redesign and any parts of the persistent Community Warfare. Given the latter was stated as a "design pillar" back before even closed beta started, it's surprising that PGI is prepared to open itself up to reviews when the game isn't really close to being feature complete yet.

In terms of reviews, the Metacritic onslaught has already begun. At the time of writing MWO is sitting at an average user score of 3.6, with the lowest rated review being a badly written diatribe to which punctuation and capitalisation is alien, and the highest ones contain the words "whining", "butthurt" and instruct people to avoid the forums and ignore the low rated reviews. To anyone familiar with the fractious nature of the MWO community this will not come as a surprise. It's likely that the it's going to even out when the bigger fans of the game pause their playing for a moment to throw some more reviews in, but the real test is going to be what the gaming press say. It's difficult to imagine it getting particularly high scores when, by PGI's own admission, it isn't finished.

So nothing to complain about in terms of what we actually got, but certainly a lingering sense that "launch" should have been something more. If you enjoyed it two weeks ago, you'll still enjoy it now, but don't expect earth-shattering change.
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http://themittani.com/news/mwo-launch

Blagg Zear · Sep 20, 2013

MechWarrior Online Review
Tags: in

MechWarrior Online
Anonymous
Reviews

Updated Fri, Sep 20, 2013 by Dalmarus

MechWarriorOnline is a free-to-play futuristic mech combat game that uses a setting created by FASA back in the early/mid 1980s. Though FASA no longer owns the rights to the intellectual property, the universe they created lives on and has a fanatic following. The IP itself has been used for numerous games, including a series of video games that had MechWarrior in the title. MechWarrior Online is the latest and most ambitious title to date. MechWarrior Online officially launched earlier this week in a whirlwind of accusations against the company, with the hardcore crowd crying foul (since coolant flushes are in the game after it was stated they would not be added, third person view being added, and other complaints), and the casual player base rumbling along as normal.

For the sake of full disclosure, I am one of the gameâ€™s Legendary Founders and have been for over a year. Some may feel this means I have an axe to grind, but Iâ€™d like to think youâ€™ll find this review objective because despite what some players want to believe, what we Founders purchased were mechs, in-game currency, early access, and a couple other perks â€“ nothing more. We certainly didnâ€™t pay for the vision of MechWarrior Online the developers talked about at the time. In other words, I got what I paid for and thatâ€™s that.

With that out of the way, letâ€™s get to it, shall we?

Cautions

Since this is an online multiplayer title, Little Johnny may see some language he probably shouldnâ€™t. That being said, I have rarely seen anyone throw a complete tantrum in the team chat. Overall, thereâ€™s not a lot of discussion going on other than that of weapons, mech builds, and tidbits of â€œGL HFA (good luck â€“ have fun all)â€ and â€œGG (good game)â€. In-game, the player base is generally quite well behaved.

That being said, the forums are an entirely different manner. The community team does what it can to keep things reigned to a dull roar, but right now, there is just too much backlash over what players feel are broken promises in terms of game features. I wonâ€™t go so far as to say the forums are toxic, but there are days it certainly comes close to matching that description.

Gameplay

[size=18pt]77 Pretty Good

The Good

The gameplay in MechWarrior Online has some of the best feeling mech combat out there in terms of staying true to the BattleTech/MechWarrior universe. Piloting your mech effectively enough to be a genuine asset to your team is a tough challenge and requires hours of diligent practice. I canâ€™t count how many matches Iâ€™ve been in over the past year yet there are times I still feel like a complete noob when I get caught with my britches down (meaning I run into a pack of enemy mechs by accident and get mowed down). Then there are other days where I get that perfectly timed kill shot to save the day just before the enemy team completes the takeover of our base. The game feels like a proper mech game. The mechs feel and respond how I feel they should and thatâ€™s great.

Most mechs that you own are fully customizable as they should be. Why Founder mechs canâ€™t change their camo pattern is beyond me. Moving on though! The MechLab is very well done and allows you to see every detail of your mech and its configuration. Min/Max players will have a field day trying to squeeze the most they can out of every available ounce of tonnage. Players will find thereâ€™s a fine balance between armor point totals, weapon loadouts, and more. The development team obviously spent a lot of time working on this section and it shows.

There are currently two modes of combat matches available for players â€“ Assault and Conquest. Assault is a straightforward 12 vs. 12 deathmatch mode with the additional option of capturing the enemy base. Conquest is all about gaining control over resource points (there are 5 per map) and attaining a total of 750 resources. The alternative method of winning in this mode is to destroy all the other teamâ€™s mechs. Be careful if you choose this route. Trust me when I say thereâ€™s nothing worse than your team having 9 out of 12 kills (while our team had 8 mechs still alive) and still losing because the other team still gained control of all their required resources.

There are a decent number of maps, but many of them are just variations of themselves and can feel repetitive fairly quickly. For example, thereâ€™s Frozen City and Frozen City Night, or Forest Colony and Forest Colony Snow. The maps all vary in temperature which in turn directly affects the heat levels of your mech. Cold planets help to keep you cool while really hot ones never let you get below 10% max heat. Itâ€™s a nice touch that really adds to that sense of attention to detail when it comes to how mechs operate.

The Bad

So why did I only give the Gameplay portion of this review a 77? Sadly, there are some big issues still plaguing the game overall. By this point in time, they should have been addressed or caused the postponement of the official launch. The players were expecting a massive patch on launch day to address such issues as heat balance bugs, the addition of factions, and more, yet all they received were a few bug fixes and a change to disable third-person-view (3PV) use in the 12 players pre-made group matches.

The MechWarrior universe lore and history is very deep, and while youâ€™re teased with that on the forums, thereâ€™s no indication of this in the launch window or the game itself minus some purchasable holographic House (factions) mini-statues you can put in your mech. The game is in desperate need of a fully fleshed out House/Clan system and the battle for the Inner Sphere of planets needs to be known. Without this, the game quickly becomes a grinding mill of pointless matches. Sure, you gain cash and experience for upgrades, but at the end of the day, whatâ€™s the real point?

If youâ€™re a hardcore MechWarrior fan, youâ€™ll get most out of the MechLab and the more intricate aspects of mech combat. Itâ€™s exactly because of this though that those players will also be the first to see just how many shortcomings MechWarrior Online has in terms of balance bugs and missing MechWarrior universe depth, thus curbing their enthusiasm and fun with the game.
While the casual crowd will potentially have the most fun with the game, theyâ€™ll also be the ones the most confused because the game does a horrific job of explaining mech customization and combat to players. In fact, it doesnâ€™t explain either one at all. It also does nothing to explain the concept of heat penalties for firing too many of the same weapon types at the same time. This lack of guiding new players in the absolute basics of the game directly impacts the experience theyâ€™ll have â€“ and not in a good way.

Graphics

[size=18pt]90 Great

In order for people reading this to have a reference point to judge how the graphics may fare on their systems, here are the specs for the machine MechWarrior Online was tested on:

Processor: AMD Phenom II X2 565 (3.4 GHz)
RAM: 16 GB
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti (4GB)
Operating System: Windows 7 Home Premium (Service Pack 1)
Internet Service Type: Cable

MechWarrior Online does a very impressive job of allowing high resolution graphics while at the same time, not turning matches into a stutterfest. The game has a wide variety of graphic options that can be tweaked and altered just the way you want to get the best out of a wide range of machines. My system is a little over three years old now and I run the game with everything maxed. The good news for the plethora of people out there with better systems than mine â€“ with everything maxed out it runs smooth as silk 95% of the time. There are times I get stutter, but truth be told, Iâ€™m not convinced thatâ€™s due to the game and may very well just be my internet connection acting up.

Playing all the maps with normal vision is fine, but another highpoint of MechWarrior Onlineâ€™s graphics are the other vision modes each mech possesses â€“ thermal and night. The thermal vision system has gone through a couple changes over the past year, and while I agree the previous Predator-movie-style thermal vision was too much of an advantage for players with good aim, Iâ€™m not a fan of the current black and white version. Too much of the time, an entire mech is nothing more than a washed out shadow â€“ so much to the point that I sometimes canâ€™t tell what panel Iâ€™m actually shooting at.

On the other side of the vision mode fence though, Iâ€™m in love with the night vision mode and think itâ€™s perfect in its current iteration. It looks great overall, but I especially love the fact that I get nearly blinded when Iâ€™m getting bombarded with energy weapons, or firing them myself. Why would I be happy about being blinded? Because it makes perfect sense â€“ night vision is nothing more than a system that greatly magnifies the available light. At night, thatâ€™s not a lot but fire a massive laser and you can bet your ass itâ€™s going to be *bright*. I love it.

Sound

[size=18pt]65 Average

The sound in MechWarrior Online is the epitome of what I would call â€œadequateâ€. The sound of the lasers, Gauss rifle, and other weapons are perfect. The sound of everything else is fine, but I canâ€™t help being nagged that there is no form of soundtrack. I realize that sounds stupid to the super hardcore players that want as much realism in the game as they can, but hear me out. Maybe itâ€™s because I watched Iron Eagle too many times in the mid-80s, but I think I should be able to have some music playing in my mech when Iâ€™m going into combat, even if it means strapping a tape recorder to my leg. Whether the development team adds a soundtrack of their own (making it optional to turn off), or plugs in a system similar to Win Amp from back in the day, there needs to be something in addition to just the sound of weaponry and walking.

Multiplayer

[size=18pt]70 Okay

The entire game is multiplayer (minus the Testing Ground which allows you to test out different mech builds against non-moving bots by yourself), so the Gameplay section covers everything pretty well but I will talk about a couple aspects of the game that need tweaking to address match issues.

The matchmaking system the game uses has seen some behind-the-scenes changes with the launch day patch, but there are still issues with it. First and foremost, thereâ€™s still an issue with PUGs (pick up groups) being lumped in with premade teams in matches. MechWarrior is very much a team-oriented game and the advantage premade teams using voice communication through out of game systems cannot be overstated. The term thatâ€™s developed over the months is pug stomping. Itâ€™s not that inaccurate a description. Perhaps the development team feels it all evens out in the end since sometimes youâ€™re a solo player that is on the side of a mostly premade team so you get the benefit of a portion of your team working in coordination. That still doesnâ€™t alleviate the sense of hopelessness and frustration new solo players feel when they get their asses handed to them 8 matches out of 10.

Another recent issue that has been of major concern to players is the addition of a third-person view (3PV) to the game. The fact that it was added at all (to appeal to a broader and more casual audience) caused enough of a stir by itself, especially since the game now defaults to that mode the first time a person logs into the game. As a result, new players may not even be aware they can switch view modes unless they go through the maneuvering tutorial. Right up until the launch day patch, 12-man premade team match players could swap between the two views and the community mushroom cloud bloomed in a horrific demonstration of rage and hate. Do I agree with their actions? No. Do I understand them? I do. In a 12-man premade team match (which by itself is the very definition of hardcore competition), being able to switch to a 3rd person view to peek around corners and buildings was tantamount to cheating. While no longer an issue in full 12-man premade team matches, this is still a problem in all other matches.

Value

[size=18pt]65 Average

The value of any free to play game is always difficult to determine, but letâ€™s see if I can give you some points of interest to help you decide what kind of value MechWarrior Online has for you.

As the game stands right now, if you have any interest in playing a very deep and detailed mech combat game, especially one set in the BattleTech/MechWarrior universe, you canâ€™t go wrong in terms of value if you donâ€™t spend a penny on the game. The game is generally well done (what few parts of it there are) and if it doesnâ€™t cost you anything more than a download and some personal time, youâ€™d be foolish not to hop in and give it a try.

When it comes to spending real world cash, things get a little tricky. On the one hand, players will benefit greatly from buying premium time or Hero mechs with C-Bill (currency earned in-game) and/or experience bonuses. Trying to earn your way through the multiple pilot unlocks to get to the higher tiers takes an inordinate amount of time with bonuses. I canâ€™t imagine how long it would take to do it without those bonuses. That said, I donâ€™t have an issue with the cost of the premium play time if someone wants to purchase it.

The costs of the Hero mechs, on the other hand, are far too high to make them worthwhile in my opinion. Several of them are pretty cheap, but most fall in the range of $20 to $25 dollars. Iâ€™m all for companies making enough money to keep creating new content and even making a healthy profit at the same time. Forking out $25 for a mech is just far too much. If they were in the range of $10 instead, I think the value would be there, but as it stands, I canâ€™t advise spending that kind of money on any of them.

Lasting Appeal

[size=18pt]50 Poor

If the game contained any real continuity or depth of story, this score would be much higher than it is. As it stands right now though, the game is little more than a decent mech combat match grind. The game gets far too repetitive in terms of what you can actually do to give it any real lasting appeal.

The addition of promised features such as a full faction system, Inner Sphere fighting, etc. â€“ all of these would add greatly to the lasting appeal of MechWarrior Online, but until this happens, the score stands.

Pros and Cons

Pros

Wide variety of mechs available for purchase with currency earned in-game
Impressive mech customization
Free trial mech choices are swapped out frequently
Excellent graphics
â€œAuthenticâ€ mech combat gameplay
Free to play

Cons

Does little to no explaining in-game about most gameplay aspects (such as combat)
Hero mechs are too expensive for their worth
Heat scaling bugs still plague various weapon configurations
Lack of a deeper story or faction system
Gameplay becomes repetitive over time

Conclusion

What more is there to say, really? At the end of the day, the game is what it is and thatâ€™s not horrible, but it is average. Looked at face value, MechWarrior Online delivers a convincing mech combat experience. What the game has in single match entertainment, it lacks in overall cohesiveness and reasons for playing long term. It clearly has the potential to be much more than what it currently is, but that potential has yet to be reached. For a free-to-play title, itâ€™s worth the price of admission, but anything beyond that will need to be determined by each individual player.
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https://www.tentonhammer.com/mwo/mechwarrior-online-review?page=2

The Verge · Sep 20, 2013

sound like the game did better than my expectations. I like that.

Regina Redshift · Sep 20, 2013

The "Lasting Appeal" section from 10-ton hammer hits... well, like a 10-ton hammer.

The Mittani review brings up a really good point. The trial 'mechs should always be champion versions. Sending a stock 'mech (even a stock Hero) into the fray is suicide. I hope that the trial 'mechs are always heroes from this point forward.

Cpt Chattahah · Sep 20, 2013

I disagree with a lot of 10THammer's review... I would definitely give sound and value much higher ratings. While I would love a soundtrack for the game in loading and config screens, it would be terrible in coordinated drops. I think the overall is spot on. Mid to high 60s is right where I put it. However, once again, there is such great potential for this game.

Blagg Zear · Sep 24, 2013

MechWarrior Online - Review
Posted: 09/23/13

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLM0dyJ2-HM

The cardinal rule of any shooter is â€œkill or be killed,â€ and though the same is ultimately true of the free-to-play MechWarrior Online, thereâ€™s so much more to think about beyond aiming and firing. The weight of your mech, how much heat it generates, the armor itâ€™s carrying, and weapon loadout are all equally important considerations that impact your performance. As such, MechWarrior Online is the kind of game where youâ€™re constantly learning as you tinker away in pursuit of the perfect metal monster.

Split into two parts, MechWarrior Online requires a balance between preparation and execution. Before jumping into battle you can explore the mech lab where you purchase new mechs or customize existing ones. The freedom given with customization is incredibly generous and itâ€™s surprising just how much you can fiddle with.
Most interestingly, customization involves sacrifice, and itâ€™s impossible to build a mech that can handle every situation. Whether youâ€™re giving up firepower for speed or long-range capabilities for close-range vulnerability, virtually every choice benefits and impedes you at the same time. Want to equip two of the ridiculously powerful autocannons? You can, but expect them to severely weigh you down.

This balancing act is managed within a slot and weight system. Everything you equip adds to your tonnage and takes up a certain number of slots. Typically, the heavier something is the more slots it fills, and vice versa. Itâ€™s a great system for customization that forces you to think about how youâ€™ll mitigate your weaknesses rather than simply making the â€œbestâ€ mech.

Of course, building what you want is a lot more involved than it sounds because of the gameâ€™s free-to-play model. There are two ways to purchase things in MechWarrior Online: C-Bills, which you earn by participating in matches, and MC, which you can only get by spending real money. Many mechs can be purchased with either currency, but several â€œpremiumâ€ mechs are only available through MC. These mechs are very effective, and although you can eventually upgrade a C-Bill mech to a premium level, it takes an exorbitant amount of time. Itâ€™s one of MechWarriorâ€™s biggest problems since youâ€™re stuck grinding for money or opening your wallet to get what you really want.

Another issue is simply learning how to play. Outside of a sparse movement tutorial, thereâ€™s very little that the game directly explains. Thatâ€™s not to say MechWarrior Online needs to hold your hand, just that many aspects are unintuitive and cumbersome. The gameâ€™s launcher does link to various YouTube videos that cover many important details, but it seems like a poor substitution for an in-game solution. Everything feels buried under too many menus, and the things you want are hard to find. The most obvious windows are garish ads that advertise things like cosmetic upgrades or flashy new mechs.

Outside of the customization and free-to-play frustrations, actually playing MechWarrior is generally enjoyable. You always have a role to fill, and knowing that role is imperative for success. If youâ€™re a light-footed mech you should be scouting, capturing control points, or distracting enemies. Heavily-armored mechs should position themselves to take the brunt of your teamâ€™s damage and dish back as much as possible. Another consideration is heat, which you generate by firing weapons. Once your heat reaches 100 percent, your machine will shut down, leaving you a sitting duck. Itâ€™s a lot to stay on top of, but the complexity increases the intensity of fights, knowing that even the smallest mistake can have huge consequences.

The mechs also feel great to pilot. Whether youâ€™re lumbering around as a massive heavy mech or trying to manage the destructive power of an assault mech, each of the various classes are distinct. The weapons convey a sense of power, from the monstrous thud of an autocannon or the searing blast of a laser, the game convincingly brings the hulking, bipedal vehicles to life.
Despite the variety in mechs, repetition starts to sink in quickly. This is partly because there are only two game modes: assault and conquest. Assault is your typical team deathmatch except you can also win by capturing the other teamâ€™s base. In conquest, victory is achieved by conquering five points or killing every opposing mech. With only two modes and no larger framework linking any of the battles together, youâ€™ll soon see most of what MechWarrior has to offer and the pull of obtaining new things wonâ€™t be enough to keep you playing.

MechWarrior Online is a smart game burdened by free-to-play annoyances and unfortunately lacking in things to do outside straightforward combat. The grind of match after match eventually erodes your enthusiasm as you start to wonder what itâ€™s all for. Considering MechWarrior has a rich history to draw from, itâ€™s hard not to feel like somethingâ€™s missing when you find yourself in an endless arena.

Reviewed on PC.

Reviewed by Ben Moore.
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GT-SCORE: 6.0

http://www.gametrailers.com/reviews/x21ldk/mechwarrior-online-review

Blagg Zear · Sep 25, 2013

A stomping good timeâ€“MechWarrior Online review
by Atlas Burke

There was once a time, long before weâ€™d ever heard of â€œfree-to-play,â€ when MechWarrior was one of the flagship simulator franchises. Men and women across the world piloted immense walking tanks with the aid of joysticks, throttles, and flight pedals. The genre died in the early 2000s and laid dormant for nearly a full decade before the next entry in the venerable MechWarrior franchise brought the series squarely into the modern era. Piranha Gamesâ€™ latest entry in the series dispenses with any single-player campaign in favor of a free-to-play multiplayer shooter. After nearly a year in open beta, Piranha have announced that they are officially â€œlaunchingâ€ MechWarrior Online with the patch released on September 17, 2013.

I was a bit unfair earlierâ€”calling MechWarrior Online a â€œshooterâ€ is selling it a bit short. Anybody who tries to play it like Call of Duty is in for a nasty surprise when they realize just how hard it is to score a kill. Even the smallest Spider or Raven will take a concerted effort to bring down. Meanwhile, the exposed attacker will come under withering fire from the smaller â€˜Mechâ€™s allies. While one â€˜Mech will have a hard time destroying another, four or five â€˜Mechs can reduce an exposed enemy to a scrapheap in seconds. Oh, and once youâ€™re down, youâ€™re outâ€”there are no respawnsâ€”so it behooves you to use your brain instead of running out into the open.

Pilots fresh into their â€˜Mech will have to get used to the seriesâ€™ unique motion. A â€˜Mechâ€™s legs and torso move independently, and this will lead newer pilots astray, but after a few rounds the whole concept starts to feel much more natural. Once you get past that hurdle, itâ€™s really easy to sink into your â€˜Mechâ€™s cockpit. Once you get in the groove, â€˜Mech combat feels great. Lasers heat â€˜Mech armor until it glows, missiles arc down onto their targets and ballistic projectiles clang off your armor, shaking the whole cockpit. The whole experience is exhilarating, km with headphones.

If maps feel a bit crowded in MechWarrior Online, thatâ€™s because they are. A recent patch upped the number of players on each team from 8 to 12, and that means that thereâ€™s very little room for one team to out-maneuver the other. Not that youâ€™d need toâ€”the name of the game in MechWarrior Online is â€œconcentration of force.â€ Most matches devolve into a slugging match between the heaviest â€˜Mechs on each team with the lightweights skirmishing on the fringes. Thatâ€™s not to say that the smaller â€˜Mechs arenâ€™t valuableâ€”effective scouting by Light â€˜Mechs can expose entrenched positions, calling a hail of missiles down on the supposedly protected enemies.

Iâ€™ve played on and off since open beta began last year, and the latest patch seems to be one of the better ones. The visual bugs and client failures that plagued earlier builds seem to have vanished, and the balance doesnâ€™t seem quite so plagued by high alpha â€œpoptartsâ€ delivering insane damage while hopping in and out of cover. The much-maligned third-person view is hardly used, and itâ€™s easy to see whyâ€”several UI features are disabled in third-person, making combat much more difficult.

It wouldnâ€™t be MechWarrior without the ability to modify and optimize your â€˜Mechs, and MechWarrior Online doesnâ€™t disappointâ€”the MechLab gives you plenty of control over your â€˜Mechâ€™s loadout. â€˜Mech creation is an art of balancing firepower, mobility, armor, and heat dissipation. Want to add that Gauss Rifle? Better shave off a few points of armor. Need to get to the fight sooner? Drop a bigger engine in thereâ€”but itâ€™ll cost you firepower. Engineering a new â€˜Mech is fun, and itâ€™s always nice to get your favorite vehicle into the fight.

The MechLabâ€™s UI could use a bit of help, though. While itâ€™s nice to see different weapons actually alter your â€˜Mechâ€™s modelâ€”you can sometimes determine a â€˜Mechs loadout by simply looking at itâ€”the weapons and components themselves could use some explanation. Most guns are fairly straighforward, but Piranha could stand to explain the use of C.A.S.E. and NARC beacons to players unfamiliar with MechWarrior and Battletech.
The â€˜Mechs themselves are fantastic. There are about 20 different chassis types, each with several different configurationsâ€”i.e. a Raven 3L has a different weapons loadout than a Raven 4X. Whatâ€™s neat is that each separate chassis feels unique. Some have more open cockpits giving you a better view of the battlefield. Others have low-slung weapons that preclude shooting over a ridge. The level of detail that goes into each new â€˜Mech is awesomeâ€”itâ€™s just a shame that itâ€™s so hard to get new ones.

Combat in MechWarrior Online is a lot of fun, and itâ€™s even more of a shame that thereâ€™s so little to do outside of that. This title has essentially zero metagame. Thereâ€™s very little to compel a player to keep at it except the allure of new â€˜Mech chassis and paint schemesâ€”and those donâ€™t come cheap. If you want to pay cash, a new â€˜Mech will run you between $10 and $25! A truly dedicated player might be able to save enough C-billsâ€”the in-game currencyâ€”to get a new chassis, but they accrue very slowly. There is a lot of grinding to be done in MechWarrior Online, and the payoff might not be worth it.

Piranha has long promised that â€œcommunity warfareâ€ will address this lack of endgame, but that feature has been delayed so often that itâ€™s hard to be sure if itâ€™s ever coming out. Itâ€™s a bit of a shame that thereâ€™s so little reason to keep at MechWarrior Online. The matches themselves are funâ€“and as it is free-to-play, thereâ€™s no barrier to entryâ€“but without any form of metagame itâ€™s hard to stay engaged.

PROS:
Active, passionate community
Audio/Visual presentation is great

CONS:
Very little â€œendgameâ€â€“just more grinding for new â€˜Mechs
UI is not friendly to new players

GAMING TREND SCORE:
Graphics: 80
Audio: 85
Controls: 85
Gameplay: 80
Value/Replay: 50

OVERALL: 77
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http://gamingtrend.com/game_reviews/stompy-good-time-mechwarrior-online-review/

Marec · Sep 25, 2013

In a lot of reviews, MWO is saved by the Cry-Engine with high graphis ratings. Otherwise the average score would be poisonous low.
Well, I'll keep watching tho not playing right now. I find it a rather negative experience ATM.

The Verge · Sep 25, 2013

Marec said: ↑

In a lot of reviews, MWO is saved by the Cry-Engine with high graphis ratings. Otherwise the average score would be poisonous low.
Well, I'll keep watching tho not playing right now. I find it a rather negative experience ATM.
Click to expand...

but we have mechspecs mayhem

come back, we have pritty mechs for you!

Blagg Zear · Sep 25, 2013

Marec said: ↑

In a lot of reviews, MWO is saved by the Cry-Engine with high graphis ratings. Otherwise the average score would be poisonous low.
Well, I'll keep watching tho not playing right now. I find it a rather negative experience ATM.
Click to expand...

I must agree with you on this point. If it's not the fantastic Cry-Engine i wouldn't have given MWO a chance. I'm still playing MWO because it never felt more realistic in a Mech-Cockpit before.

Marec · Sep 26, 2013

Vergere said: ↑

but we have mechspecs mayhem

come back, we have pritty mechs for you!
Click to expand...

I'll drop by when they deliver my Phoenix mechs but right now the idiot matchmaker is just ticking me off. Maybe I'll see some of that "constant stream of improvements" by then.

Blagg Zear · Sep 26, 2013

26 Sep 2013
MechWarrior Online Review | World Of Wanzers

Author:
Jonathan Lester

There's nothing quite like stomping around in an enormous bipedal tank, crushing our foes under tons of steel plate while blasting out more ordnance than an entire armoured column. We used to look to BattleTech and MechWarrior for our fix, whether on a tabletop or glued to our monitors, but the troubled franchise has forced us to go elsewhere over the last few years, to the likes of Armored Core and Hawken. We've had it pretty good, but we still pine for our Mad Cats and Bushwackers. Thankfully, a new hope has finally arrived in the form of MechWarrior Online... and it's free.

MechWarrior Online has a lot in common with Wargaming's World Of Tanks, in that it's a free to play simulation-lite that hinges around constantly improving a colossal war machine and using it to destroy your foes in team-based multiplayer matches. After an extensive beta, Piranha Games' project finally hit v.1.0 last week, meaning that we're clear to strap in, power up the reactor and put it through its paces.

Before we begin, we do have to acknowledge a little unpleasantness. Infinite Game Publishing came under intense fire for disingenuous communication and community management throughout the lengthy beta process, which in turn lead to massive fan backlash over the last few months. However, this is a review, and thus will focus exclusively on the finished article and the new player experience. Know this going in.

As a fan of all things mecha, I'm delighted to report that MWO's absolutely nails the sweet spot between simulation and arcade action, coming down firmly towards the former. From the moment your avatar waggles the joystick, spins up the reactor and peers out from the cockpit, you feel like you're driving a massive weighty vehicle, sitting inside dozens of tons of grinding steel and guns. Typical WASD controls let you control the speed and direction of your Mech, while your mouse independently swivels the torso, bringing your arm, shoulder and weapons to bear. It's a middle ground between Steel Battalion and Hawken, and feels appropriately intuitive.

In two team-based gametypes (essentially team deathmatch and domination variations), you'll stomp around seven expansive maps with eleven Lance-mates, seeking to destroy the enemy force with extreme prejudice and deny them territory. To do so effectively, however, you'll have to know your role. Lumbering Assault Mechs pack a massive punch as they lollop around the battlefield, while nippy Light Mechs dance around them like gnats, picking away at their armour and hopping out of range with jump jets, or cloaking friendly forces with electronic countermeasures. Heavy missile barges throw out volleys of homing missiles, but fall prey to close-range brawlers armed with machine guns, short range missiles and lasers, or snipers hanging out on the periphery with Particle Projector Cannons and Gauss Rifles. Thanks to excellent map design, all of which features a variety of engagement ranges, cover, elevations and visibility levels, there's a niche for everyone.

Once you've learned the basics, that is, since you'll have much more to consider than your garden variety shooter. Mechs are slaves to temperature; every weapon (and even some hotter maps) exerting a thermal stress on your massive walking war machine. Fire away haphazardly and you'll automatically shut down as your Mech overheats, forcing you to pick your shots wisely, or purposefully shut down during lulls in combat. Weapons need to be juggled into specific groups, and working out how best to balance firepower with efficiency takes plenty of trial and error. All Mechs feature numerous armour zones, which you'll need to target to detach enemy weapons or cripple their legs - all while keeping your own vulnerable areas away from incoming broadsides. Simultaneously keeping enemies within your firing arc, balancing speed and vector, keeping your heat levels nominal, remembering which weapons are cooling down and maintaining situational awareness can be overwhelming, but comes with practice.

The recent inclusion of a third person view almost caused a fan revolt, but the end result is impressively well-balanced. A markedly increased FOV is offset by the lack of a radar and other essential features, while your Mech sends up a visible camera drone that gives away your position. Changing between the two modes takes a few nervy seconds that canny foes will take full advantage of. Both perspectives have their uses, though I'd urge you to disable TPV as your default option, since first person view is much more intuitive and useful for the vast majority of engagements.

Put simply, MWO really is fantastic fun from a gameplay standpoint, at least if you're looking for something resembling proper mech combat as opposed to Hawken's slippery hybrid shenanigans. That said, it's clear that matchmaking still leaves a little to be desired, since every so often you'll find well-organised Lances of veterans pitted against rookies, or unbalanced teams in terms of raw tonnage.

MWO also looks sensational, which is largely down to superb art direction and stylistic design decisions as opposed to raw graphical grunt. The visuals are optimised for performance rather than eye candy, lacking DX11 support and fine detail when you get your eye in, but the big picture is superb. Piranha Games have painstakingly ensured that all of the mechs look like real authentic war machines, all armour plating and oversized cannons, pleasingly chunky and believable both in terms of models and animations. Once the lasers and missiles start flying, sending sizzling lurid beams and clouds of fire snarling through the air, it's hard not to be drawn in.

BattleTech fans will be pleased to welcome back some familiar faces: including the Atlus, Catapult, Hunchback, Jenner and more. No Mad Cat, though. Shame. Even though Piranha deviates significantly from FASA's original mech designs in several cases, especially in terms of scale (as an example, the Assault Mechs should be much taller compared to most of the Lighter models if I recall correctly - it's been a few years), almost all of their tweaks are spot-on. Maps also benefit from a rich colour palatte and eyecatching scenery elements such as lava pools or shiny metallic crystals, helping to offset what could have been a mediocre visual experience. Sound design is perhaps less ambitious, but at least contains enough booming explosions and whining servos to satisfy.

However, as any Mech aficionado knows, the real battle will be fought in the customisation menus - known here as the Mech Lab. As you gradually receive in-game currency (C-Bills) for participation, kills, assists and wins, you'll wage a constant war against tonnage, power and heat in an attempt to make a Mech that's both powerful and viable in combat. Whether you're outfitting an ERPPC sniper to chip away at distant foes, an ECM-equipped griefer to disrupt enemy radars, a close-range brawler bristling with Short Range Missiles or a menacing Assault powerhouse, you'll have to constantly make tough decisions in a deadly balancing act.

Lasers dish out ruinous burn damage, but at the cost of serious heat output. Autocannons throw out punishing projectiles, but weigh down your mech and come with limited ammo. Long Range Missiles leave you powerless if foes close on your position, PPCs require incredibly precise aiming with their long recycle times, while jump jets restrict the amount of weight you can realistically equip. Every spare ton, empty hardpoint or module forces you to make an impossible choice: do I equip extra armour? If so, where? What about an extra heat sink? Is my engine big enough to provide enough manoeuvrability, or will a smaller one leave room for more guns? Or jumpjets? Support modules? Sensors? Customisation is just as complex and compelling as it ever was, and is already leading to some interesting builds. Factor in a suite of pilot upgrades and you've got a firm foundation for long-term addiction. This is a review, not an FAQ, so I'll have to leave much of this depth untapped for now.

Engrossing as MWO's customisation is, it does fall prey to a few annoying issues. First up is the customisation menus themselves: cluttered and confusing affairs that induce eye strain and frustration in what should be an intuitive F2P experience. Worse, they totally fail to explain a bizarrely hidden yet supremely important mechanic, known colloquially on the forums as 'Ghost Heat,' that increases the amount of heat output when certain weapons of the same type are grouped together. This extra heat can make the difference between a viable build and a useless walking oven that spends most of its time powered down, yet it isn't factored into the GUI or addressed in any way. The fact that we have to scour the forums rather than learning about it in-game speaks volumes.

The free to play model also manifests in some unwelcome ways. Beyond the inordinate grind required to afford some of the pricier weapons, each variety of Mech exists as several specific models, all of which offer a strict selection of weapon hardpoints. If you want to experiment with a new build, even a slight variation, chances are you'll have to buy the same mech again. And, perhaps, again after that. Though different chassis do come equipped with different cockpits and detailing, it's hard to shake the feeling that MWO is trying to make paying for new mechs with real money a much more attractive option by draining your C-Bills on a regular basis.

Is it possible to pay to win in MechWarrior Online? Probably not, at least in the traditional sense. It's currently hard to exactly pin down, but the fact that powerful Mechs and loadouts can be bought exclusively with premium currency means that it's possible to acquire fearsome hardware without putting in any time. These hero Mechs are identical to the stock versions but earn boosted rewards, meaning that new players can technically get an immediate advantage over other equally novice pilots, but will likely be immediately annihilated by skilled veterans who've put in the time rather than the money. So, basically, you don't have much to worry about on the P2W front.

Now, sadly, we have to start picking apart some of MechWarrior Online's more egregious failings. The new player experience is patently hopeless, dumping you unceremoniously into one of the worst clients ever designed. I just had to take a screenshot - it's a horrendous and confusing mess that even manages to camouflage the movement tutorial within a slew of obnoxiously garish garbage. The two basic tutorials are a welcome introduction to movement and weapon handling basics, but utterly fail to inform you about how to use the customisation suite, ghost heat, the gametypes and the finer points of combat. Your only option is to enter battle against legions of battle-hardened, decked-out veterans who've been grinding for months and quickly annihilate your underpowered trial Mechs in short order. Once again, it's annoying that a free to play game didn't host a proper open beta rather than a cheeky soft launch, making stat wipes impossible.

Stick with it, however, and you'll realise that MWO is trying to ease you into the swing of things in its own hamfisted way. For the first 25 matches, you'll earn massively boosted currency while selecting from some versatile if underpowered trial mechs, which then provides you with a weighty war chest to purchase and customise your first walking tank. These formative matches are more valuable than any tutorial, teaching you advanced tactics and optimal weapon groups while spectating more skilled players. With just a little more optional explanation and hand-holding, the new player experience could be vastly improved. It wouldn't take much, perhaps beyond a totally rebuilt front end. The feeling of accomplishment from buying your first Mech is truly wonderful, eclipsed only by wondering about what to buy next, or what new gear you'll start saving up for.

With only two game modes, no clan or faction warfare, no community warfare and no metagame whatsoever, the experience quickly descends into grinding for grinding's sake, an eternity of very similar battles to gradually get incrementally better gear to take back into even more identical matches, and stomp over new players who are just starting down the same repetitive road. This practice has even gotten a name -- "PUG Stomping" -- and that's literally the only thing you can do. Even with a few friends involved, it's still totally bereft of content and lasting appeal, only good for quickly dropping into every now and again.

The gameplay is sound, nay, it's nearly great, but Piranha has clearly been so obsessed with nailing the details that they forgot to add any meaningful content at launch.

To be honest, MechWarrior Online's biggest flaw is that it isn't MechWarrior 5. It feels like the multiplayer component of a traditional mech sim stripped from its package and hosted for free, lacking content and padded out to encourage premium membership or microtransactions. Years of lore and an enormous universe have been wasted, leaving us wishing that it offered something like Chromehounds' persistent campaign for planetary domination, just something, anything, to keep us invested beyond the grind. Community Warfare would be a good start. There's potential here, but IGP needs to build on it. Fast.

Pros:

Engaging and involved mech combat
Extensive and addictive customisation, room for numerous builds and play styles
Superb art direction
It's free, and undeniably fun for a while

Cons:

Shockingly light on game modes and long-term appeal
No context, community warfare or metagame at launch
Grindy and repetitious, partly thanks to F2P model
Some customisation restrictions and 'Ghost Heat' gripes
Horrible first impressions and new player experience
Confusing, lurid and borderline offensive client splash screen

The Short Version: MechWarrior Online nails the core experience with excellent gameplay and art direction, but wastes it on a disappointingly flimsy overall package. Throwaway fun for mech fans at launch, but exists only as a grind that sorely needs more content and lasting appeal.

MWO is free, and we're inclined to look kindly on a game that offers engaging mech combat without making us pay - especially since there's clear potential here. Sadly, we also worry that there's little reason to stick around beyond the first few days, and hope that it can build on solid foundations to deliver a true MechWarrior experience.
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Score: 6/10

http://www.dealspwn.com/mechwarrior-online-review-155434

Blagg Zear · Sep 28, 2013

MechWarrior Online Review

WRITTEN BY
Leif Johnson

Sep 27, 2013 5:48 pm PDT

MechWarrior Online gets the feel of mech combat right, but its lack of variety taints the experience.

THE GOOD
Numerous options make for deep mech customization
Climate effects enhance the immersion
Satisfying combat sounds
Piloting a mech feels right

THE BAD
Mode objectives are too simple to keep you engaged
Acquiring in-game currency takes an unnecessarily long time
Poor tutorials
Wonky matchmaking

At this point, MechWarrior Online has been in open beta for so long that you could be forgiven for thinking it came out months ago. To be sure, there was little in the way of new content when the official launch date dropped last week; instead, the well-worn "beta" tag at last slipped away and presented new players with essentially the same game others have been playing for months. What we have here is a combat experience that's exciting and intense for many sessions, but winds down once the tedium of the free-to-play model and repetitive objectives takes over.

Conquest mode provides some of the game's tensest moments.

To an outsider, MechWarrior Online may appear to be about little more than hopping into bipedal tanks that resemble RoboCop's ED-209 and blasting the hell out of each other. Sure enough, there's that (and developer Piranha Games usually manages to deliver it), but the MechWarrior franchise also has some deep lore that stretches back to its tabletop origins through BattleTech in 1984. Alas, you see only snippets of it here, chiefly revealed through cosmetic skins and baubles you can buy for your ship's dashboard. It's a nice if ultimately meaningless touch, since currently little else matters besides crushing the mech across the field.

Good thing, then, that Piranha got the actual feel of piloting a mech right. Stomping around in a two-legged tank is every bit as unwieldy as it sounds (and that's kind of a good thing), in part because you have to master the act of turning your cab and steering your rig's legs separately. It feels believable, though, as do other elements, such as the staggeringly complex upgrade system that associates a weight and space requirement with even the smallest pieces of equipment. MechWarrior Online thus demands careful consideration of which role you want to play, because outfitting your mech with nothing but heavy cannons leaves you plodding across the field with all the speed of a massive tectonic plate.

It's best to experiment with multiple roles in the testing grounds, such as jumping into lighter mechs with cloaking abilities that can paint targets for other players, but mastering each still comes down to trial and error thanks to MechWarrior Online's laughably inadequate tutorials that cover basic movement and little else. Want to learn how to toggle the various sight modes? Youâ€™ll have to dig into the official forums or search for YouTube videos. Piranha recently included a third-person view for mechs to ease newcomers into the experience, but cries of possible cheating (by allowing mechs to "peek" around corners with the perspective shift) led to a smart decision to disable the view entirely in 12-versus-12 premade maps. In this way, newcomers can still use the third-person viewing mode to learn the ropes, while focused competitors can still have the purer mech experience they long for.

MechWarrior gives you four trial mechs, which you can upgrade as you wish.

The climate of each of the eight maps has a pleasantly immersive way of affecting your gameplay. If you're battling through the frigid wastes of Frozen City, for instance, you can blast away with near impunity. Attempt the same trigger-happiness in the molten expanses of Terra Therma, and your mech will overheat, leaving you helpless against the enemies prowling about. These little touches, along with night modes that bump the tension of combat even higher, do a good job of making the maps feel distinct from each other.

That combat is usually good enough to make up for many of MechWarrior Onlineâ€™s stumbles. Mechs lumber along with heavy clangs and the whirring of gears, and the constant threat of running across an entire team encourages sneaking around corners and sniping unwitting opponents. One-on-one fights benefit from unrelenting tension as well, and a player who knows all the quirks of piloting a mech will have a clear advantage over the one who doesnâ€™t, no matter how big the size of his or her guns. It helps that the mechs themselves are beautiful in their cold brutality, even if the surrounding landscape doesn't always achieve the same visual intensity. Even so, the sound design does much to make up for it, especially with the satisfying thumps and pulses from the laser cannons. You might occasionally long for some bombastic music to bring drama to battle, but MechWarrior Online doesn't feature a musical soundtrack. This absence, however, does much to capture the gritty, no-hogwash combat vibe Piranha so obviously wants to deliver.

It's a shame that all this attention to detail isn't enough to keep MechWarrior Online from suffering from tedium. Not only does the missing lore lead to a lack of investment in the world, but the two simple combat modes leads to tackling the same tired objectives ad infinitum. Assault amounts to little more than team deathmatch with the admittedly welcome option to also win by storming your opponent's base. In Conquest, on the other hand, you earn victory either by by capturing the resources from five points or by slaughtering all the enemy mechs. Despite the repetition, the model does have its appeal, particularly when you find yourself winning a conquest match alone because the other team was too busy killing mechs instead of capturing points. Alas, that doesn't happen often, due to an imperfect matchmaking system that frequently pits groups of random players against organized teams.

Overheat, and you're a sitting duck.

The lack of extra game modes is all the more surprising once you consider MechWarrior Online's free-to-play model. You're encouraged to buy many specialized items with real cash through the ads splattered over the home UI (including some pricey premium mechs), but you can still build a strong mech with so-called C-bills earned from matches if you have a lot of patience. Again, a lot. Long grinds for earning the same items available for cash are the norm with the free-to-play model, but the time commitment is particularly harsh here. And with only two modes to choose from, the grind soon becomes more tedious than fun, possibly leading you to wonder why you're even playing in the first place.

The answer for most players is likely that this is the best iteration of a long-neglected franchise that we've seen in years, and there's always the possibility it could improve. Piranha constantly drops hints regarding features to come, such as "community warfare" that captures some of the faction rivalry of previous games, yet in its current launch existence, MechWarrior Online is hardly more than a solid arena shooter populated with mechs. If the game had made better use of its assets and given us a reason to care about more than the fleeting pleasures of customization and combat, it might be worth enduring the currency grind. As it is, like its strongest mechs, it runs out of power far too fast.!r
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SCORE: 6/10

http://m.gamespot.com/mechwarrior-online/reviews/mechwarrior-online-review-6415036/

Blagg Zear · Sep 29, 2013

MechWarrior Online Review
A steep hill to climb.
September 27, 2013
by Paul Tassi

My mech weighs 70 tons, and I feel every pound as I plod along the streets of a frozen-over metropolis. It's been a long time since I sat in a MechWarrior gameâ€™s cockpit, and controlling this tank-like mechâ€™s arms, torso, and legs independently feels like trying to pedal a bicycle with my hands. Then I see the other teamâ€™s first volley of long-range missiles arcing over the mountain ridge. They slam into me with a force of a freight train and my alarm systems scream bloody murder in my ear. Itâ€™s all certainly very raucous, and fights are intense at times, but after 20 matches of the same thing itâ€™s become less exciting. Itâ€™s a long, tough road to become an adept MechWarrior Online player, and without more modes and variety, I donâ€™t think itâ€™ll hold my interest long enough to get there.

Multiplayer combat is the sole focus of the free-to-play MechWarrior Online. There's no campaign, only 12-vs-12 matchups that involve a scant two modes of resource collection, base capture, or more often than not, mass mech destruction. Battles have a much different pace to them than what youâ€™d expect from a shooter, and after I struggled to learn the ropes of its slow and complex combat system (with little instruction to guide me,) I found it a welcome change.

MechWarrior Online is smart in how it rewards cautious play, thoughtful weapon use, and using advanced tactics like taking advantage of weather conditions to secure victory. There's no sprinting around the map â€“ you use a throttle to set your speed, which depending on the weight of your Light, Medium, Heavy, or Assault mech, can be quite slow. Mechs feel cumbersome to control initially, and moving through tight spaces can be like trying to navigate a semi truck through a parking structure. While youâ€™re doing that you have to pay close attention to the heat your weapons generate, lest they overload and shut you down on the spot. You also must to keep track of which pieces of your mech have been blasted to bits in combat, or else you'll be trying to take on a foe with a particle projection cannon (PPC) that no longer works and get knocked out of the round. Thereâ€™s a lot more to think about here, and thatâ€™s a good thing.

But itâ€™s inconsistent. Matches swing between fast and furious and long and drawn out, and it can be dull when you and your team traipse around a vast map without an enemy in sight for long periods of time. When things finally heat up, combat is incredibly intense as you scramble to keep yourself intact with hellfire raining down on you from every direction. It's somewhere in the middle where the 12-vs-12 matches really feel like they have the scale and intensity the creators imagined, and you must think on the fly about what kind of opposition you're engaging and how.

Figuring out how to be a contributing member of a team takes a while, with only a very brief movement tutorial and a "free roam mode" as teaching tools (I recommend lots of YouTube videos). It's easy to be turned off by this before you have a chance to get to the meat of MechWarrior Online, as getting blown to pieces shortly after the match started is pretty discouraging. Persevere, though, and itâ€™ll reward you.

MechWarrior Online's most controversial feature is its "noob friendly" third-person camera mode, which allows you to peek around corners and see angles you canâ€™t from a cockpit. To balance out concerns from high-level players, Piranha has given third-person players an easily spotted camera-bot and disabled their minimaps. A newer player, I usually find myself sticking with first-person as the mini-map is too valuable to lose, and honestly it just feels like the mode MWO was meant to be played in. If thereâ€™s an advantage in battle to the third-person perspective, itâ€™s subtle.

Almost more fun than combat itself is the process of buying and building up your own stable of mechs, all of which are graphically gorgeous. Fortunately, when you first start MechWarrior Online you get a currency boost that allows you to rack up in-game cash quickly, and it's a lot of fun saving up for a mech you want and tricking it out with a broad selection of custom weaponry like gauss rifles, lasers, and long-range missiles. Your mech build is far more involved than the simple loadout you'll find in typical shooters, and its where half of the strategy of MechWarrior Online comes in. You must figure out which weapon configurations work best with your mech and your playstyle, and then how to effectively use them in combat. The system felt overwhelming initially, but over time I was able to deduce what works and what doesn't, through a process of many, many deaths. Personally, I prefer catapult-type launchers that siege enemies from afar, rather than up-close brawlers whose combat style results in my destruction more often than not.

Itâ€™s also where the reminder that MWO is a free-to-play game comes in. When youâ€™re buying and building it becomes apparent that a certain amount of machines are locked behind a paywall, though it isn't necessarily "pay to win." The premium mechs (anywhere from $7 to $30 a piece) look cooler than the others and have XP and cash bonuses, but you can buy other machines of comparable power with earned in-game currency if you save up long enough and choose your upgrades intelligently. It's commendable that Piranha has allowed you to build up competitive-quality mechs without paying. Still, itâ€™s frustrating that some of the high-end mechs are only available through real-money purchases, and the freemium content can be a bit in your face at times.

THE VERDICT

MechWarrior Online is a fairly solid entry in the tank warfare genre, which is a welcome alternative to twitch-reflex based shooters, and its strategic combat is well thought-out and implemented. Itâ€™s uneven pacing takes its battles everywhere from impressive heavy-metal slug-fest highs to dull, plodding lows. Once you get the hang of it all, the strategic combat and its required pre-game build strategy and in-game adaptivity is fun, but donâ€™t expect to master its tricky team-based combat and overwhelming upgrade system without a serious commitment.

MechWarrior Online recaptures some former glory, but limited modes and a tough learning curve limits its appeal.

PROS:
+Strategy and tactics
+Customization
+Not pay-to-win

CONS:
â€“ Limited modes
â€“ Poor teaching tools
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SCORE: 7.3/10

http://m.ign.com/articles/2013/09/28/mechwarrior-online-review

Blagg Zear · Oct 2, 2013

MechWarrior Online Review

Warriors, come out to play.
27th, Sep. 2013 | Posted In Article, Reviews | By William Borger

If youâ€™ve been playing games for a while, youâ€™ve seen it. You might not realize youâ€™ve seen it, and if you have, you might not havenâ€™t been able to put a name to it, but itâ€™s there. And if youâ€™re a fan of some older and more niche IPs, like me, then youâ€™ve definitely noticed it.

The video game industry is going through an era of rebirth. Long forgotten IPs are being resurrected, often winning over critics and old friends. The numbers in the last few years alone are staggering. Blizzard finally released the much anticipated StarCraft II after more than a twelve year wait, and Diablo III followed soon after.

Capcom resurrected the Street Fighter and Marvel versus Capcom series, both long dormant after Street Fighter III and Marvel versus Capcom 2, respectively. Hi-Rez Studios revived the Tribes franchise after more than ten years of inactivity with Tribes: Ascend. Square Enix released the first proper Deus Ex game in eight years. Activision remade GoldenEye.

MechWarrior Online
â€œYouâ€™ll pick one of the various â€˜Mechs, tweak its armor, weight, weapons, and inner workings, and use it in combat against other â€˜Mechs. It sounds simple, but MechWarrior Online is an extremely complex game.

And thatâ€™s just the beginning. Arc System Works recently announced a new entry in the Guilty Gear series, Microsoft is working on another Killer Instinct, and Square will soon be releasing the next chapter in the Thief series.

In that light, it only seems fair that MechWarrior gets its turn. After all, the last game to bear the title released in 2002, but despite numerous legal difficulties and studio closures, the MechWarrior series finally has a new curator in Piranha Games, a studio that features key members of FASA Interactive, the studio responsible for developing several entries in the series, and MechWarrior Online, the latest game to bear the storied title.

In many ways, MechWarrior Online is similar to the other games in the MechWarrior series. Youâ€™ll pick one of the various â€˜Mechs, tweak its armor, weight, weapons, and inner workings, and use it in combat against other â€˜Mechs. It sounds simple, but MechWarrior Online is an extremely complex game.

MechWarrior Online
â€œEach â€˜Mech comes equipped with a set number of hardpoints, or areas where you can attach weapons or other useful tools, such as anti-missile systems or scouting drones. Each hardpoint will only allow certain types of weapons, so you canâ€™t attach a gauss cannon to a hardpoint that is designed for missile launchers, or vice versa.

Like other games of its ilk, customization is a key part of MechWarrior Online. Youâ€™ll spend many an hour tinkering in the â€˜Mech lab, trying to build a â€˜Mech that fits your style. Knowing your style is important, because MechWarrior is all about choices. While the game does allow you a large amount of customization, there are limits built in. For instance, you canâ€™t change the general build of your â€˜Mech. An Atlas will always be an Atlas, and a Trebuchet will always be a Trebuchet. You wonâ€™t be swapping out cockpits or trading in your legs for a set of tank treads in MechWarrior Online.

Similarly, each â€˜Mech comes equipped with a set number of hardpoints, or areas where you can attach weapons or other useful tools, such as anti-missile systems or scouting drones. Each hardpoint will only allow certain types of weapons, so you canâ€™t attach a gauss cannon to a hardpoint that is designed for missile launchers, or vice versa. Still, youâ€™re allowed a large amount of customization per â€˜Mech, and each style comes with many different variations, so if you want to build a â€˜Mech with nothing but long range missile launchers youâ€™ll probably be able to, provided it can carry the weight and has the requisite slots to equip them.

Youâ€™ll also have to balance the heat the weapons generate when fired so your â€˜Mech doesnâ€™t overheat and shut down in the middle of a firefight. If this sounds complicated, itâ€™s because it is, and youâ€™ll likely spend hours in the â€˜Mech Lab trying to find the right combination of speed, firepower, mobility, and armor for your metal behemoth, at least once you have enough money to buy your own â€˜Mechs and parts.

MechWarrior Online
â€œUnfortunately, MechWarrior Online does an extremely poor job of teaching you how to play. The in-game tutorial only covers movement, which is frustrating considering the sheer complexity of the game and the number of commands a perspective pilot needs to know to be effective in his or her â€˜Mech.

You see, MechWarrior Online is a Free to Play game, and like most Free to Play titles, there are two forms of currency in the game: C-Bills, which can be earned by simply playing the game and Mech Credits, or MC, which are purchased with real money. Most â€˜Mechs can be unlocked with C-Bills, but there are several premium models that can only be purchased with MC. While you can eventually upgrade a â€˜Mech you bought with C-Bills to a premium â€˜Mech, it takes a very long time.

Since each variation is unique, youâ€™ll have to grind for extensive periods or open your wallet to grab the designs that are locked behind the gameâ€™s paywall. Thankfully, there are always trial â€˜Mechs available for use, and the number of premium â€˜Mechs is relatively small. Unfortunately, thereâ€™s no option to try a new â€˜Mech before you buy it unless itâ€™s a trial â€˜Mech, and the information the game lets you view on â€˜Mechs you have yet to purchase is limited at best, making purchasing a â€˜Mech with weapons you donâ€™t recognize a risky proposition.

Once you select a â€˜Mech, youâ€™ll want to learn how to use it. Unfortunately, MechWarrior Online does an extremely poor job of teaching you how to play. The in-game tutorial only covers movement, which is frustrating considering the sheer complexity of the game and the number of commands a perspective pilot needs to know to be effective in his or her â€˜Mech. The game launcher does link to a number of YouTube videos (which I highly recommend watching if youâ€™re going to play the game) that cover just about everything there is to know about MechWarrior Online, but itâ€™s a poor substitute for a proper tutorial.

MechWarrior Online
â€œClient crashes and disconnects are frequent and while I rarely experienced them, I played more games where I had teammates disconnect than I did where we had a full team. Unfortunately, thereâ€™s no way to reconnect to a game if you are disconnected from it.

This set-up is all the more baffling considering the in-game tutorial doesnâ€™t even teach you how to do simple, essential tasks, such as toggling the â€˜Mechâ€™s various vision modes, grouping weapons, bringing up a large view of the game map, or manually engaging the a Mechâ€™s shut down or override commands. Unfortunately, this problem extends to the â€˜Mech Lab as well, meaning youâ€™ll have to check out those YouTube videos or do an awful lot of experimenting to get things done.

Thankfully, however the game plays very well â€“ when it works. Client crashes and disconnects are frequent and while I rarely experienced them, I played more games where I had teammates disconnect than I did where we had a full team. Unfortunately, thereâ€™s no way to reconnect to a game if you are disconnected from it. To compound this problem, â€˜Mechs that the client still considers â€œin gameâ€ are unusable until that game ends, meaning that if you are disconnected from a game, youâ€™ll have to wait until that game finishes before you can use the â€˜Mech you were using again.

When everything does come together, however, MechWarrior Online is a load of fun. Weapons feel and sounds powerful, the â€˜Mechs move exactly like youâ€™d think they would, and thereâ€™s a surprising amount of strategy involved. The game really sells the feeling of being a â€˜Mech pilot, and the level of immersion on display helps bring MechWarrior Online to life in ways few games accomplish. Thereâ€™s something for each player to take away from each match, so thereâ€™s always a reason to come back to try and better yourself as a pilot.

MechWarrior Online
â€œUltimately, MechWarrior Online is a game that is at odds with itself. Technically, it stills has a long way to go.

Matches consist of two teams of twelve â€˜Mechs squaring off against one another across two modes: assault and conquest. Conquest requires you to capture several key points across the map in order to gain resources, though you can win by wiping out the enemy team, while assault is essentially MechWarrior Onlineâ€™s form of team deathmatch, with a twist: each team has a base, and capturing your enemyâ€™s will result in victory, no matter how many â€˜Mechs they have left on the field. Thereâ€™s also a Training Grounds mode, which will allow you to test out your â€˜Mechs and scout the maps, making it equally useful for testing that autocannon build youâ€™ve been dreaming about, or finding the best way to flank the enemy base.

Ultimately, MechWarrior Online is a game that is at odds with itself. Technically, it stills has a long way to go. As a game, however, itâ€™s well-designed and more than worthy of bearing the MechWarrior title. With a little work, MechWarrior could become the catalyst for revival that the series needs. Thereâ€™s a really excellent MechWarrior game buried here, and a promising future for the franchise to boot. You just have to dig around a bit to find it.

This game was reviewed on the PC.

The Good

Combat is excellent. Lots of customization options. â€˜Mechs are a lot of fun to pilot.

The Bad

Frequent crashes and disconnects. Some content is locked behind the paywall. Tutorial doesnâ€™t do a good job of teaching you how to play. No option to try â€˜Mechs before you buy. No way to rejoin a match once you disconnect.

FINAL VERDICT

MechWarrior Online is great fun when it works, but frequent crashing and a host of other smaller problems keep it from reaching its full potential.
Click to expand...

Score: 6/10

http://gamingbolt.com/mechwarrior-online-review

Blagg Zear · Oct 2, 2013

Posted on September 30, 2013, Dominic Tarason
Mechwarrior Online Review: Grinding Gears

The Battletech universe is one of the more unusually enduring properties in gaming. In the grim future of the Space 1980s, blocky and angular walking tanks circle around each other, trading blows with enormous laser cannons until one finally explodes. Battletech was Americaâ€™s answer to Japanese dominance over all things involving giant bipedal superweapons, and against all odds, it caught on. It has existed in many forms, from tabletop strategy games to full pen-and-paper RPGs, PC and console iterations â€” usually under the Mechwarrior banner â€” and even an awkwardly written Saturday morning cartoon.

The enduring (and ageing) fanbase is a similarly divided lot. Almost every member has a favorite interpretation of the source material, a favored ruleset, and a firm opinion about which videogame adaptation was the strongest. Itâ€™s a tough crowd, but Piranha Gamesâ€™ free-to-play multiplayer â€˜Mech shooter aims to please fans of big stompy war-bots worldwide. It definitely looks the part, but does Mechwarrior Online have what it takes to succeed in an increasingly crowded F2P market?

Mechwarrior Online
Platform: PC (Reviewed)
Developer: Piranha Games
Publisher: Infinite Game Publishing
Release Date: September 17th, 2013
MSRP: Free-To-Play

For those unfamiliar with the long history of the franchise, Mechwarrior Online could best be described as World Of Tanks set in a far-off dystopian future. Though it only features the titular â€˜Mechs (no spacecraft, tanks or planes here), itâ€™s as much an armored warfare simulator as a traditional first/third-person shooter. Two teams of big stompy robots maneuver around complex networks of valleys, hills, streets and other cover, seeking to out-flank each other and â€” ideally â€” score a killing blow against an opponentâ€™s weaker rear armor. The tanks may have legs, and the weapons of choice might be lasers and particle cannons, but the tactics date back to World War II.

Despite the humanoid appearance of many of the â€˜Mechs, they definitely handle more like tracked vehicles, boasting better hill-climbing ability than an anime mecha. None of the melee or precision-piloting skill rules from the tabletop incarnations have been carried over, so this is purely a game of maneuver and gunnery, and a gorgeous one at that. The choice to use Cryengine 3 was a wise one; Crytekâ€™s engine is well-known for its ability to render large open spaces and gorgeous particle-heavy explosion effects. The glowing trails of super-heated metal left after a direct laser hit are always nice to see.

â€˜Mechs are split into four broad categories: Light, Medium, Heavy and Assault. As a new free player youâ€™re given a roster of four pre-assembled trial â€˜Mechs (one of each type) in order to learn the ropes and hopefully scrape together enough cash to buy your own. The lighter â€˜Mechs tend to be vanguards and spotter units, detecting where the enemy team is moving, providing radar data for missile-artillery strikes, and running interference once a proper brawl breaks out. The lighter â€˜Mechs often pack jump-jets as well, letting them boost over obstacles and clear gaps that others would stumble into.

While there are specialized loadouts, the medium â€˜Mechs do tend to fit the â€œmulti-roleâ€ definition better than others, able to move into position, trade some shots, and pull back when needed. The larger â€˜Mechs â€“ especially Assault classes â€” tend to behave more like real-world tanks than anything else. Slow to move, their ideal position is on the front lines, but best placed with a clear line of sight to their immediate target as well as enough cover to shield them from any other sources of incoming fire. You may have the biggest, heaviest Mech on the battlefield, but the other team likely has several equally well-armed and wellâ€“armored units, and you donâ€™t want to take on several of those at once.

Impressively, Piranha have managed to give the lighter â€˜Mech classes a true battlefield role. Unlike earlier Mechwarrior games, theyâ€™re no longer just fodder for the enormous, lumbering 100-ton Assault â€˜Mechs. Itâ€™s quite possible for a single 15-20 ton scout to outmaneuver a heavier foe so completely that the larger â€˜Mech will never get a clean shot off, letting the smaller â€˜Mech distract, annoy and chip away at the softer rear armor of its foe until victorious or driven off by incoming fire from another direction. It takes a bit of practice, but a small, organized squad of light â€˜Mechs can do a terrifying amount of damage through hit-and-fade attacks.

Being giant space-robots, even smaller â€˜Mechs can take a bit of a beating. Under each detailed 3D model lies a complex mess of statistics, armor ratings and internal components. Fully customizable in the â€˜Mech Lab once youâ€™ve scraped together enough money to buy your own â€˜Mech, each chassis comes in several variants with slightly different starting internals and unique configurations of weapon hardpoints. While most components can be placed anywhere, weapons are restricted to where the chassis supports them. While each chassis variant will only allow a certain degree of customization â€” a missile pod will only go where one can visibly fit â€” the multiple base variants mean that on the battlefield, a similar-looking â€˜Mech might have completely different capabilities.

While it is something of a grind to afford your first full â€˜Mech (if you want a larger model, youâ€™re looking at playing upwards of 100 matches, or as few as 20-30 for a light), everything worth speaking of can be bought entirely with in-game funds. While you can pour in some real world money for a boost, itâ€™s hard to say that anything is really worth the cash, with the exception of occasional steep discounts on certain models. Once you do have your own â€˜Mech, itâ€™s at least comparatively cheap to refit it. Outside of the engine â€” the heart of any â€˜Mech â€” no internal component is particularly expensive.

One limiting factor common to all â€˜Mechs is heat, and itâ€™s something youâ€™ll have to factor into any â€˜Mech Lab decisions. All those huge guns run hot, and firing too often will overheat your whole machine, causing damage if left unchecked or forcing an emergency shutdown to cool off. The more heatsinks a â€˜Mech has, the more excess heat it can disperse, and you can speed up cooling further by standing in water if your heat sinks are in your â€˜Mechâ€™s legs. Either way, you need to pick and choose when to fire, and itâ€™s often best to wait until youâ€™re within the optimal range for your weapons and have a clear shot at whichever part of your enemy you want to hurt most.

The environments affect heat as well. A battle through a blizzard may give you poor visibility, but itâ€™ll let you keep shooting for much longer, especially if youâ€™re packing a lot of energy weapons. Conversely, a battle on a volcanic world crisscrossed with rivers of magma forces both teams to be very conservative with where and when they shoot, although this does put solid-shell weaponry on slightly better footing. Environmental conditions also provide incentives to use night and thermal vision modes, which are a standard feature of all â€˜Mechs, and you can often spot enemies outside of your radar range through their heat signature. These factors add a respectable level of depth to the core gameplay.

The cost of all this depth is a learning curve that looks more like a brick wall. The game has little to no tutorial content, and the official site even links to YouTube videos explaining the finer points, rather than letting you learn things in the pilotâ€™s seat. Unless youâ€™re intimately familiar with the series to date, your first dozen or so matches are likely going to end in an embarrassingly swift death and possibly your team heckling you for wasting opportunities, breaking from formation or using your weapons improperly. This is especially bad in lighter â€˜Mechs, which can die in seconds without an experienced pilot. More than any other role, good scouting takes a lot of time and effort to learn.

Serious UI issues hamper enjoyment. The main menu for the game is both weirdly locked to a desktop window and also a cluttered mess, primarily dedicated to advertisements for various cosmetic tweaks or highly overpriced â€œHeroâ€ â€˜Mechs. These unique variants cost a small fortune in real-world cash to buy and only offer a small boost to winnings and a slightly different loadout to their regular equivalents. The â€˜Mech lab isnâ€™t much better in its design; important info and descriptions are often hidden from view, and some text boxes even cut off the ends of sentences. You can find recommended â€˜Mech builds on fansites, but the game itself provides no guidance on what needs to go where.

The variety of the â€˜Mechs themselves is undermined somewhat by the playmodes and maps currently available. In the current build of the game, thereâ€™s no campaign, no faction system and nothing to tie matches together other than an agonizingly slow progression grind to unlock small â€˜Mech-tuning upgrades. As it stands, almost every single match is a 12v12 battle using one of two playmodes: Conquest or Assault. The former is a familiar multi-point capture-and-hold gametype; the latter is lifted almost directly from World Of Tanks. Itâ€™s a straight battle in which you can force an early win by sitting on top of an undefended enemy base for a period of time.

Unfortunately, thereâ€™s effectively no difference between these modes most of the time, as both require a significant time investment to capture a base or win through points, and each player has only one life. Without respawns or some additional incentive to run out the clock, almost every match devolves into a pure team deathmatch, with victory being handed to whichever team managed to stick together best. Even the heaviest of assault â€˜Mechs can be brought down in just a couple seconds of focused fire, assuming enough guns are leveled at it, and every kill swings the odds further in favor of the team with the most guns.

Simply put, Mechwarrior Online doesnâ€™t feel like itâ€™s fleshed out enough to shed the â€œbetaâ€ tag that it has worn for so long. The core gameplay engine is strong, but the business model and lack of content hurts the game badly. While theyâ€™ve rolled out a fair number of new â€˜Mech models in the past few months, there have been few notable improvements to balance, and there are still far too few maps to play on. The recent addition of a third-person mode courted controversy: it feels a little underdeveloped, and it allows you to peek over hills that you wouldnâ€™t otherwise be able to, but itâ€™s also very difficult to shoot straight from this elevated perspective.

Another indicator that the game isnâ€™t quite ready for prime-time is the fact that the only servers are currently located in North America. The lumbering nature of the combat mitigates the issue slightly, but itâ€™s still far from ideal. Thereâ€™s every chance that Mechwarrior Online will improve, grow and fill in the blanks over the coming months and years. The developers have already outlined plans for new playmodes, a refined interface, balance tweaks and more, but until those surface itâ€™s a hard sell even at the base price of â€œfree.

Just a cursory glance at the official forums (and even recent stories Game Front) reveals that the player base is less than happy. Meanwhile, questionable business decisions continue to pile up. Even the controversy over purchasable weapon-cooling consumables refuses to die down; a single blast of coolant costs almost half a matchâ€™s worth of winnings, and there are some harsh allegations from the more competitive players that Piranha are ignoring complaints about high-level balance. At the moment, itâ€™s still quick and easy to find a match, but if things donâ€™t change soon, the well might start drying up.

There is the atomic heart of a great â€˜Mech game beating away within Mechwarrior Online, but the chassis surrounding it is ramshackle, full of holes and plastered with garish advertisements. While MWO may be the only free-to-play title out there to offer the authentic â€œwalking tankâ€ experience the Mechwarrior fanbase has come to expect, there are some very solid competitors out there with more meat on their bones, including the recently overhauled and improved Hawken and historical counterparts such as War Thunder or World Of Tanks. When firing on all cylinders, MWO is an enjoyable sim-shooter, but for all the overheating energy weapons in the world, the current product still feels a little half-baked.

Pros

Gorgeous graphics, including some amazing explosions
Reimagined mech designs look far sleeker their tabletop counterparts
Solid â€˜Mech combat, giving every weight class a real role
All the fundamentals of classic Mechwarrior gameplay updated
Customizing your ride is very satisfying, once you know how

Cons

Vertical learning curve, with almost no tutorial content in-game
Only two playmodes, both of which often devolve into deathmatches
Nowhere near enough maps to support repeated 12v12 matches
No framework to tie gameplay together, outside of tiny XP perks
A huge grind required to get off the ground and into your own mech
Hero mechs and consumables are vastly overpriced for what they offer
Click to expand...

Score: 60/100

http://www.gamefront.com/mechwarrior-online-review/

Blagg Zear · Oct 2, 2013

MechWarrior Online Review
September 27, 2013 5:48PM PDT

By Leif Johnson

MechWarrior Online gets the feel of mech combat right, but its lack of variety taints the experience.

The Good

Numerous options make for deep mech customization
Climate effects enhance the immersion
Satisfying combat sounds
Piloting a mech feels right.

The Bad

Mode objectives are too simple to keep you engaged
Acquiring in-game currency takes an unnecessarily long time
Poor tutorials
Wonky matchmaking.

At this point, MechWarrior Online has been in open beta for so long that you could be forgiven for thinking it came out months ago. To be sure, there was little in the way of new content when the official launch date dropped last week; instead, the well-worn "beta" tag at last slipped away and presented new players with essentially the same game others have been playing for months. What we have here is a combat experience that's exciting and intense for many sessions, but winds down once the tedium of the free-to-play model and repetitive objectives takes over.

Conquest mode provides some of the game's tensest moments.

To an outsider, MechWarrior Online may appear to be about little more than hopping into bipedal tanks that resemble RoboCop's ED-209 and blasting the hell out of each other. Sure enough, there's that (and developer Piranha Games usually manages to deliver it), but the MechWarrior franchise also has some deep lore that stretches back to its tabletop origins through BattleTech in 1984. Alas, you see only snippets of it here, chiefly revealed through cosmetic skins and baubles you can buy for your ship's dashboard. It's a nice if ultimately meaningless touch, since currently little else matters besides crushing the mech across the field.

Good thing, then, that Piranha got the actual feel of piloting a mech right. Stomping around in a two-legged tank is every bit as unwieldy as it sounds (and that's kind of a good thing), in part because you have to master the act of turning your cab and steering your rig's legs separately. It feels believable, though, as do other elements, such as the staggeringly complex upgrade system that associates a weight and space requirement with even the smallest pieces of equipment. MechWarrior Online thus demands careful consideration of which role you want to play, because outfitting your mech with nothing but heavy cannons leaves you plodding across the field with all the speed of a massive tectonic plate.

It's best to experiment with multiple roles in the testing grounds, such as jumping into lighter mechs with cloaking abilities that can paint targets for other players, but mastering each still comes down to trial and error thanks to MechWarrior Online's laughably inadequate tutorials that cover basic movement and little else. Want to learn how to toggle the various sight modes? Youâ€™ll have to dig into the official forums or search for YouTube videos. Piranha recently included a third-person view for mechs to ease newcomers into the experience, but cries of possible cheating (by allowing mechs to "peek" around corners with the perspective shift) led to a smart decision to disable the view entirely in 12-versus-12 premade maps. In this way, newcomers can still use the third-person viewing mode to learn the ropes, while focused competitors can still have the purer mech experience they long for.

MechWarrior gives you four trial mechs, which you can upgrade as you wish.

The climate of each of the eight maps has a pleasantly immersive way of affecting your gameplay. If you're battling through the frigid wastes of Frozen City, for instance, you can blast away with near impunity. Attempt the same trigger-happiness in the molten expanses of Terra Therma, and your mech will overheat, leaving you helpless against the enemies prowling about. These little touches, along with night modes that bump the tension of combat even higher, do a good job of making the maps feel distinct from each other.

That combat is usually good enough to make up for many of MechWarrior Onlineâ€™s stumbles. Mechs lumber along with heavy clangs and the whirring of gears, and the constant threat of running across an entire team encourages sneaking around corners and sniping unwitting opponents. One-on-one fights benefit from unrelenting tension as well, and a player who knows all the quirks of piloting a mech will have a clear advantage over the one who doesnâ€™t, no matter how big the size of his or her guns. It helps that the mechs themselves are beautiful in their cold brutality, even if the surrounding landscape doesn't always achieve the same visual intensity. Even so, the sound design does much to make up for it, especially with the satisfying thumps and pulses from the laser cannons. You might occasionally long for some bombastic music to bring drama to battle, but MechWarrior Online doesn't feature a musical soundtrack. This absence, however, does much to capture the gritty, no-hogwash combat vibe Piranha so obviously wants to deliver.

It's a shame that all this attention to detail isn't enough to keep MechWarrior Online from suffering from tedium. Not only does the missing lore lead to a lack of investment in the world, but the two simple combat modes leads to tackling the same tired objectives ad infinitum. Assault amounts to little more than team deathmatch with the admittedly welcome option to also win by storming your opponent's base. In Conquest, on the other hand, you earn victory either by by capturing the resources from five points or by slaughtering all the enemy mechs. Despite the repetition, the model does have its appeal, particularly when you find yourself winning a conquest match alone because the other team was too busy killing mechs instead of capturing points. Alas, that doesn't happen often, due to an imperfect matchmaking system that frequently pits groups of random players against organized teams.

Overheat, and you're a sitting duck.

The lack of extra game modes is all the more surprising once you consider MechWarrior Online's free-to-play model. You're encouraged to buy many specialized items with real cash through the ads splattered over the home UI (including some pricey premium mechs), but you can still build a strong mech with so-called C-bills earned from matches if you have a lot of patience. Again, a lot. Long grinds for earning the same items available for cash are the norm with the free-to-play model, but the time commitment is particularly harsh here. And with only two modes to choose from, the grind soon becomes more tedious than fun, possibly leading you to wonder why you're even playing in the first place.

The answer for most players is likely that this is the best iteration of a long-neglected franchise that we've seen in years, and there's always the possibility it could improve. Piranha constantly drops hints regarding features to come, such as "community warfare" that captures some of the faction rivalry of previous games, yet in its current launch existence, MechWarrior Online is hardly more than a solid arena shooter populated with mechs. If the game had made better use of its assets and given us a reason to care about more than the fleeting pleasures of customization and combat, it might be worth enduring the currency grind. As it is, like its strongest mechs, it runs out of power far too fast.
Click to expand...

Score: 6.0/10.0

http://www.gamespot.com/mechwarrior-online/reviews/mechwarrior-online-review-6415036/

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