23 replies to this topic

[Angel of Annihilation]

FupDup, on 09 July 2014 - 10:39 AM, said:

This game's control scheme is probably too simplistic and basic to be a "real" simulator. Giant robots in the year 3050 are probably complicated and intricate machines... Just putting you in first person view of a mech does not a simulator make, or else Hawken would be considered a sim.

Here is a more accurate example of a simulator:



I'm not saying this is a positive or negative thing, I'm just laying out definitions and stuff.

Actually I bet they are quite a bit more simplistic that you might think. Keep in mind that almost all the movement and balance is basically controlled by brain waves transmitted through the neurohelmet. Much of the skill involved has to do with that man machine interface. Basically those able to use their brains to control their mechs are the better pilots.

[Heeden]

FupDup, on 09 July 2014 - 10:49 AM, said:

MWO has also been described as "a thinking man's shooter" in the past, and on the front end splash page it says "a AAA shooter experience."




Currently, the only direct control we have over the pilot is holding the CTRL key to move our head around to look around the cockpit. Otherwise, you are in fact directly controlling the robot in MWO.

That's possibly the worst definition of a sim I've heard, unless for you a sim is something where you control a person and operate the mech by clicking on controls in the game world (which is an intriguing idea admittedly).

Think of the actions you perform in a regular FPS and the actions you use in MW, and consider how they relate to the actions of a person inside the game.

In a regular FPS you push down a key, whereas the person inside will be moving their feet. You use your right hand to move a mouse, whereas the person inside the game will be rotating their body and looking around. You click a mouse whereas the person in the game will be pulling a trigger (using a control pad gives a more realistic action as you usually use the trigger buttons to shoot).

In Mechwarrior you're sitting in a seat, just like the pilot. The controls on your keyboard and mouse replicate, in a basic way, the controls the pilot would be using in a battlemech. You're not just holding down the run key and imagining the pilot is doing something clever to get the throttle right, you actually set the throttle of the vehicle you are in. Funnily enough moving the pilots head with Ctrl+Mouse is the least simmy part of it

I'm not saying that Mechwarrior is particularly complex or realistic in its simulation, but the key point to me is it gives the experience of piloting a battlemech rather than moving one around with standard FPS controls.

[Heffay]

Even DCS doesn't make you wiggle the flight stick with your mouse to climb and turn...

[80sGlamRockSensation David Bowie]

If it were to be labled, it would be


Mecha Action-Sim