275 replies to this topic

[TrentTheWanderer]

@Aeik Lornes

The way Heavy Gear Assault is being developed in relationship to the TT game is interesting and different from other approaches that i've seen in the past. For one thing, the game is being based on the "Heavy Gear Arena" ruleset, which is a bit different from either the RPG or Blitz! (wargame) rules that are most often played. Also, John Nguyen of Stompy Bot (one of the VPs for Heavy Gear Assault) is actually a former employee of DP9 who worked directly with the tabletop game rules.

Because they are working with one of the "offshoot" rulesets from the TT they have a bit more flexibility in their implementation to stay true to the spirit of the source material without having to struggle to find ways to implement turn-based rulesets in a real-time action game, and because they've got staff on hand who are intimately familiar with the game they don't have to go pouring through sourcebooks looking for info or rules- there are living sourcebooks there constantly to provide them with all the info they need!

In the end it's a bit like having your cake and eating it too, because you'll have a product that is recognizable enough from the TT game to please the purists, and at the same time is a unique experience that is totally distinct from playing table top in the same setting. Other games that have been based on table top game settings haven't had the benefit of this kind of a setup before, so it shows a lot of promise for the collaboration.

[Davers]

The best part about this thread is how it shows up as Mektecks Heavy Gear Ass.

[TrentTheWanderer]

LOL... Dat Ass tho...

[Wolf486]

The just put up the prize packages for the Heavy Gear Assault Tournament! Check it out! http://heavygear.com/tournament

[EpicWarrior202]

Lol i was going to post about heavy gear ass too

[Vassago Rain]

TrentTheWanderer, on 24 January 2015 - 08:48 PM, said:

@Aeik Lornes

The way Heavy Gear Assault is being developed in relationship to the TT game is interesting and different from other approaches that i've seen in the past. For one thing, the game is being based on the "Heavy Gear Arena" ruleset, which is a bit different from either the RPG or Blitz! (wargame) rules that are most often played. Also, John Nguyen of Stompy Bot (one of the VPs for Heavy Gear Assault) is actually a former employee of DP9 who worked directly with the tabletop game rules.

Because they are working with one of the "offshoot" rulesets from the TT they have a bit more flexibility in their implementation to stay true to the spirit of the source material without having to struggle to find ways to implement turn-based rulesets in a real-time action game, and because they've got staff on hand who are intimately familiar with the game they don't have to go pouring through sourcebooks looking for info or rules- there are living sourcebooks there constantly to provide them with all the info they need!

In the end it's a bit like having your cake and eating it too, because you'll have a product that is recognizable enough from the TT game to please the purists, and at the same time is a unique experience that is totally distinct from playing table top in the same setting. Other games that have been based on table top game settings haven't had the benefit of this kind of a setup before, so it shows a lot of promise for the collaboration.

They have the full support of dreampod9 as well. The IP owners are working with mektek to create the best game possible.

[TrentTheWanderer]

@Wolf486 That's hundreds of dollars in prizes... pretty big deal! I'll definitely be in for that, could use a new SSD

[mogs01gt]

Wolf486, on 22 January 2015 - 06:34 AM, said:

It's a new old thing called buying the product! OMG kinda like when us old timers use to actually go to a store, walk in, use paper money and pay for a game in a box!! I started when they were on disc but many others started when they were on 5.25" floppy!! Holy cow!! Now MekTek is actually charging you a one time price to buy the game outright!! No need to pay real moneys for anything else after you buy the game....gasp....you pay once!! OMG!!!!!!

MIND BLOWN!!

Nice sarcasm... Shows how unintelligent you are. Im actually one of the older players on this board. F2P games are the current model and future of online gaming.

P2P games for PCs are simply a failure and have zero value vs F2P games.. Look at ESO, they are removing their monthly subscription.

[Wolf486]

mogs01gt, on 29 January 2015 - 07:33 AM, said:

Nice sarcasm... Shows how unintelligent you are. Im actually one of the older players on this board. F2P games are the current model and future of online gaming.

P2P games for PCs are simply a failure and have zero value vs F2P games.. Look at ESO, they are removing their monthly subscription.

Wow, shows what you know....Buy to Play...you buy the game not subscribe to it. You can BUY the game for $39.95 if you just want the lower package and NEVER have to spend extra money if you choose not to. So rather then me going over all this how about you try to just listen to this Kong Kast and stop being so anti whatever. Listen to the entire thing.

http://hwcdn.libsyn....a55831f58e3c82a

Edited by Wolf486, 30 January 2015 - 10:33 PM.

[Silversynch]

Mektek just extended the second alpha wave deadline to the 9th of March.

Quote

The Alpha 2 deadline has been extended to March 9, 2015.
This was done to accommodate requests from various members of our community for more time due to Valentines and GDC.

That is all.

[Wolf486]

Silversynch, on 01 February 2015 - 11:31 AM, said:

Mektek just extended the second alpha wave deadline to the 9th of March.



That is all.

Yes this!!! Thank you Silversynch!! I hope to see you in the Arena on Terra Nova!

[Wolf486]

The Tournament was a lot of fun!! MekTek learned a lot and collected a ton of data. They are going to put it all to good use right after they attend GDC 2015 in March! So much win in what they are doing and how they treat us over there.

[990Dreams]

Heavy Gear is more elemental-like gameplay than Mechs.

[Heffay]

I watched a couple hours of the tournament. It's very fast; a twitch based game. It'll be interesting to see it develop over the year.

[Strum Wealh]

DavidHurricane, on 26 February 2015 - 10:03 AM, said:

Heavy Gear is more elemental-like gameplay than Mechs.

Personally, I've always thought the ProtoMechs were BattleTech's closest analogues to Gears.

• "ProtoMechs weigh two to nine tons and stand on two legs anywhere from four to six meters in height."
  
• "Like battle armor and BattleMechs, ProtoMechs such as the Roc can mount jump jets which further increases maneuverability."
  
• "Weapons such as the ER Micro Laser and Light Machine Gun were initially developed by the Smoke Jaguars for ProtoMechs, though they have since spread to other combat units."

Admittedly, ProtoMechs tend to be substantially faster on-the-ground than most similar-weight Gears (even with the Gears' SMS being considered).
Both are capable of mounting Jump Jets (see here and here).
Both tend to carry similar caliber weapons. For reference, see Nebfer's post here for BT weapon calibers; average BT MGs are in the same caliber ranges as average HG LACs, average BT AC/2s are in the same caliber ranges as average HG MACs, average HG HACs are in the same caliber range as the smallest-caliber AC/5s, average HG VHACs are essentially equivalent to BT RAC/5s, and BT LRMs/SRMs (as ~70mm rockets; see Wolves on the Border) are the same size as the projectiles fired from HG Medium Rocket Packs.

[RaptorRage]

Here is the video archive of the first HGA Tournament on the StompyBot Twitch channel.

StompyBot - Past Broadcasts

[Heffay]

Anyone know what is going on with HGA? Website has been down all morning.

[Keira RAVEN McKenna]

they are away at some GMC event. They will be back in a few days then things will be back up.

[TrentTheWanderer]

I got to meet all the MekTek guys who are working on HGA at GDC. The team was incredible, more than once when an issue popped up they dug right into the code there on the show floor and fixed it right away. Seeing how skilled and passionate the MekTek team is about their game was humbling, especially compared to all the other developers at GDC who couldn't answer simple questions about their game.

[Wolf486]

TrentTheWanderer, on 08 March 2015 - 10:07 PM, said:

I got to meet all the MekTek guys who are working on HGA at GDC. The team was incredible, more than once when an issue popped up they dug right into the code there on the show floor and fixed it right away. Seeing how skilled and passionate the MekTek team is about their game was humbling, especially compared to all the other developers at GDC who couldn't answer simple questions about their game.

Man that's awesome! So cool to read stuff like this! I wish I could have attended but it just wasn't in the budget to go from eastern time zone to pacific time zone. Maybe in the future!