You know, MWO has it's problems, but I honestly don't think it has anything to do with the game mechanics. The little tweaks that are always happening with the matchmakers and weapons haven't had a significant effect on me. The only real change in gameplay, I find, comes from the effectiveness and prevalence of LRMs, with which comes the importance of scouting and spotting, and whether or not you bring AMS.
But even before MWO came out, I knew about MW:LL, but while there are a lot of people who sing it's praises, I was put off by what I saw. Whether these changed or not in that window of time, I'm not sure, but when I was doing my research, these are the points that turned me off of it.
- Adherence to Mechwarrior 4 and Mech Assault, not Battletech
I initially got introduced to Battletech through the Mechwarrior series of games. Mechwarrior 2 came first, then GBL, Mercenaries... I doubled back and did the Crescent Hawks series and Mechwarrior 1, and then got my hands on Mech Comamnder, Mechwarrior 3, and Pirates moon. All of these tried to adhere to the Battletech mechanics, and emulate the canon designs. Suddenly, Mechwarrior 4 comes out, throwing the Battletech mechanics out the window, bastardized many of the loadouts of canon designs, and even threw in a bunch of mechs that up until that point didn't exist. My first exposure to the online gameplay soured my stomach immediately, Besides the fact that MW4 multiplayer was "Jumpsniping Assault Mechs Online", there was no real point to it save for winning a match and moving up the leaderboard. In the end, I decided that all I really wanted was a single player game.
Later, when I would pick up Battletech tabletop, I found that many people who were initially interested in trying Battletech were immediately put off of the record sheets. The reason why is because they were unfamiliar with them. How could Battletech have done so well, but then when 2001 rolls around, suddenly, it's the most confusing thing out there? It's because video games are probably the best marketing tool for tabletop, and if the experience is too different, they are alienated. MW4's modules system just left people confused when they tried to transition to tabletop.
When I saw the videos for MWLL, I saw more of the stuff I didn't want to see - Weapons Modules instead of a critical system, What was more, the selection of mechs, I felt, was not trying to explore anything new. Much like Mechwarrior 4, it was just a collection of whatever was popular. Bushwackers, Ravens, Maulers, Timberwolves and the lot - not really even adhering to the canon variants, either, as they tried cramming in the modules systems. It felt like a hodgepodge of "Whatever's Cool", and didn't feel thematic in the least.
- Driving a mech in Battle Armor:
One thing that I was really hoping to experience was Battletech from outside of a mech, as foot infantry, desperately trying to avoid getting shot by the giant war behemoths stomping around in order to get back to safety. MWLL almost went that route, but instead of putting you on foot as a mechwarrior, they put you in... Battle Armor? Which you're still wearing when you're piloting a 'mech? AND a tank? AND an aerospace fighter? All you do is jump-jet up to it and...?
The whole look of that was really off putting to me, as it looked way too much like Mechassault 2: Lone Wolf. If you're a Mechwarrior, you have a 'mech. If you're a tanker, you drive a tank, if you're an aerojock, you fly an aerospace fighter, or maybe a VTOL. The whole "playing a match and if you're a good player you get to buy better stuff" thing was really off putting to me back in Counterstrike, as it was just a "The rich get richer" mechanic. Also being able to just hop in and drive anything really didn't do much for my suspension of disbelief. Sure, people liked Battlefield, but Battlefield is just a kill-everything-sandbox. I want a simulation of the Battletech setting. At the very least, they could have made Battle Armor a different kind of vehicle, and the default being in a more conventional mechwarrior jumpsuit with a sidearm. Imagining a person in a one-ton jetpacked suit of armor crammed inside of the cockpit of a 'mech is just ridiculous.
- Nothing for Single Players
As with so many mod packs these days, nobody even seems to attempt doing AI, Voice acting, scripted scenes... While I'm sure these are all quite difficult, I'd far rather play a game with a good story and compelling missions with bad AI, then just another multiplayer game. Having something connecting each mission to the next, and overall just having a REASON to want to fight, is something I need to have any enjoyment in a game. Multiplayer games are notorious for either giving you no or petty reasons to fight (You can totally show off how badass you are on the leaderboards! OH SNAP!), or just offer you detatched and unrewarding reasons to fight (If you spend the next 12 hours grinding demon walruses, you can return five rare golden tusks to get a golden tusk hat, which doesn't actually do anything worthwhile at all). MWLL wasn't breaking this mold. Sure, you got to drive around in a bunch of different vehicles, but there was no reason to want to kill each other. No story, No characters, No attachment. Yes, a single player game eventually ends, but there's that feeling of fulfillment that will make you want to pick it up and play it again later. You don't get that from a multiplayer game... just join, kill, and die. Join, kill, and die. Also some edgy thirteen year old might go around questioning everyone's sexuality and scream some profanities he'd just learned over Voicom.
- Requirements of some Crysis mod.
Sure, they wanted the game to look nice, granted, but they also managed to pick the absolute most processor-heavy game engine of its' time, and it sure didn't look like they were doing anything to dial things back for players with low-end systems. What was worse, is that in order to play the mod, I had to buy a game that I didn't really even want, nor had the processing power to play. Compound the prior issues above with the fact that they wanted me to buy some AAA CPU game, only to mod it, when my computer at the time could only just barely play Oblivion at minimum settings - meaning I'd have to buy a whole new computer in order to play... a fan made mod?
No dice. If they'd made their mod with the Steam engine or something, we'd have been in business.
When I saw the advertisements for Mechwarrior 3015, I was ecstatic. Finally, a Battletech universe, story-driven experience, after nearly a decade since our last one. When that venture seemingly turned into vaporware, I was happy to find out that they had re-emerged, but when the Atlas Mozaic's final piece was added and I saw the "online", my heart dropped. Online means nothing but people abusing mechanics, meaningless matches, and lack of story. As things were announced that would help to negate the blow: It's PC only, It's going to use the Battletech Criticals System, but with some limitations to keep 'mechs still vaguely similar to their variants, repair and rearming mechanics, and most importantly, the inclusion of a community warfare system, MWO sounded like it might be the online game that would make me stop hating online games.
As the game started, Spirits were high. Suddenly, Mechwarrior and Battletech was on all PC Gamers' minds, and even at my LGS, former Battletech players and new recruits started coming out of the woodwork. Where I had previously only one person to play against, maybe once every two weeks at best, I now had games nearly every week on both Saturday and Sunday, sometimes with even four-way matches. The only reason, I believe, that I'm not still getting those games in is because I left the country and went half way across the world.
As for some things that MWLL seemed to do right, they had some genuinely beautiful looking levels, the attempts to include a more combined arms approach (though how they went about it isn't to my tastes) was commendable, and the greater openness to community input and inclusion of fan-made content was also good.
So while there were some people that genuinely liked MWLL, I'll grant them that much, but to this day, although MWO has it's very, VERY large failings, I'd still be more sold on it than LL. MWO started foundationally trying to bring the Battletech feel back to the Mechwarrior franchise, and though it seems to have shifted to catering to the "1337 MLG PRO" e-sports types, at it's core (With the exception of coolant flushes) it's keeping to the feel of the Battletech setting. MWLL, however, still feels to me like it was made by Mechwarrior 4 fans who've never even dabbled in the Battletech setting outside of that game, or who have perhaps rejected it in favor of whatever game mechanics were in vogue at the time.
tl;dr: MWO is lacking, but might eventually deliver. MWLL has never offered, nor was slated to offer, the Battletech universe immersion am looking for.
As for what MWO needs to do to fix itself? Pretty simple. - Release community warfare so that each game feels like it counts towards something more than just more C-bills.
- Make non-shooty roles more worthwhile in terms of C-bill rewards, so that players are just as likely to want to play with lights as they are to want to play with heavies.
- Make the Company Command console ( B ) something that players will actually want to use.
- Reintroduce the repair and rearm system so that not everyone is in a race to get the XL engine and double heat sinks the moment they buy a new mech. Give greater C-bill rewards to those who field cheaper designs.
Edited by ice trey, 05 August 2014 - 06:37 AM.
5
