13 replies to this topic

[Registerfault]

I've always wanted to have a pacific rim/michael bay level cinematic scene take place as a battle between mechs, with multi-million dollar level CG/practical special effects to garner the most awesome battle scene ever. I one day dream of a time in which battletech is significant enough to have a major movie made about it. I want all the pew, dakka, zorch, pshew, and clang depicted by the best special effects and sound artists possible, with hans zimmer scoring the battle music.

In my fantasy, I want to see everything, but of the most, there are two things I really want to see:

A battle scene where in the chaos of everything, a shadowcat mascs into an atlas, and the atlas, death's head staring down at the arrogant clanner, engages his actuators and slams his arms into the sides of the shadowcat, firing torso lasers and ac/20, and lifting the shadowcat off of the ground and tossing the crumpled clanner to the side and continuing his assault.

A duel between a Highlander-IIC-C and an atlas, beginning with a missed highlander burial (that the pilot adjusts to without falling over) and turning into a massive mech on mech brawling match as they fire off their weaponry and smash their fists into each other, destroying and crippling limbs, until a decisive AC/20 shot finally blasts through the highlander's center torso, eviscerating the engine and causing a violent outgassing as the pilot ejects and the highlander, unpowered and unpiloted, falls back onto the ground in an earthshattering slam, leaving a devastated, nearly wrecked atlas standing in ferocious defiance of the odds.

what other hypothetical battletech scenes would make your inner child giddy with excitement to see in full cinematic special effects glory?

[Karl Streiger]

The issue in telling a story full of action and full battle might be okayish for a Action SicFi popcorn film.

But serious for BT I would rather like to have a mix of the desperation of ant like humans facing those metal menaces "War of the Worlds" style (the new not the top down old one)
Consider those first Novels - a Mech even a pity Stinger or Wasp were messengers of death and destruction.

To make it clear a "good" and "serious" BT Film need to drop the "action gundam, macross" behavior.

So the "cinematic" battlesecene would be a squad of infantry laying in an alarm-post; they should stop enemy infantry or maybe platoon of mechanized infantry - or at least alarm the main line of defense that there are troops inbound.
(Price of Glory - Ramage)

Zoom on dialogs first.
Start to get to know those guys, in a film you don't have much time. But I think its possible for a good film to personate those characters somehow with the viewer.

Show the desperation in their faces when they hear the faint sound of metal grind on metal - the sound of a closing Mech.
And then they see just a single Stinger
The heavy machine gun position of the troop starts hammering bullets into the armor - seeing sparks bouncing of the gleaming armor. And a single MJ blast of the Medium lazer vaporize the gunner and coocks of the ammor. Bullets flying around - another man get a hit to the chest and tumbles some meters away.
The grinding sound of the both heavy machine guns - sand sacks exploding - a single trooper crying and going full auto with this auto grenade launcher - another red mist - target of the lazer.
You see that all from the perspective of a single trooper.... going prone when the shooting starts.... you see his face full of mud and gore, the gleaming white in his eyes when the ground start to shake and the Stinger is closing.
HIs hands are digging in the ground it looks like he want to dig a hole to hide...but then he pauses... his hand closing around a rocket launcher. The Mech passes and you see the hope in the eyes of this man.

In a perfect move he get to his knees line up the launcher and fire a rocket right into the back of the Stinger.
But after the smoke clears you only see a single dent in the armor.... and the Stinger is circling around.

Now its time for the "intro" - in the 31st century humankind did not evolve. Warlords and Rulers didn't learn the history of their ancestors and so humanity fighting each other day by day, for ground that doesn't have any value, for industry that products can be bought on the market, for glory that is shallow.....

Edited by Karl Streiger, 01 May 2017 - 10:53 PM.

[Registerfault]

I'm not gonna lie, you've convinced me that this is _actually_ the way to go with a battletech movie

[Khobai]

Instead of a live action movie, Id rather see a retro anime style film like this tie fighter animation. I think that style fits battletech better since battletech was born out of macross/robotech.

[Metus regem]

Khobai, on 02 May 2017 - 01:34 PM, said:

Instead of a live action movie, Id rather see a retro anime style film like this tie fighter animation. I think that style fits battletech better since battletech was born out of macross/robotech.

Not to mention that the animation that was done for that short was top notch....

[Registerfault]

What do we need to do to get a new battletech animation/show/movie/anything visual going? I would throw all of measly money and possessions I can get my hands on for this to happen.

[Karl Streiger]

Registerfault, on 02 May 2017 - 01:15 PM, said:

I'm not gonna lie, you've convinced me that this is _actually_ the way to go with a battletech movie

Oh it don't need to stay with infantry. But it is important to get the scale right.
Look in MWO your mech behaves like a tank on leg but feels like being part of an infantry squad.

You have no scale and no idea how big your Mech are.
Problem is a tank on legs would have only the effect of damaging enemy morale and being able to be used on all terrain.
But to be effective it must provide something a tank can not do.

You can also make the movie a conventional fight at first - infantry holding the ground vs Demolisher and vonLuckner heavy tanks but getting pasted when a single light Mech appears.

When you center the narrative around Mechs only, you end with the Transformer toy line feel.
There was nothing wrong with the first Transformer trilogie - good action cinema
(but i really thought that the start of the second was utter bullcrap)

BT is more serious business - mech jockeys coming from a fight are exhausted - mentally and physically, have minor wounds (spall damage) and some bruises. And those are the lucky ones fighting in top notch equipment with sensor and computers that do 90% of the work.

[Naglinator]

Look at the last 20 min of rogue one. That's the style of battletech. Well minus Vader....

[Karl Streiger]

Naglinator, on 03 May 2017 - 09:28 AM, said:

Look at the last 20 min of rogue one. That's the style of battletech. Well minus Vader....

Indeed -

Spoiler

was totally blasted that there was no "uber" Rebell move to resque them and allow the love story to happen.... nice ending
AT AT in the mist pure beauty

Edited by Karl Streiger, 08 May 2017 - 04:04 AM.

[Naglinator]

I was upset that any rebels survived. also the death star flaw plan was still dumb. Very good movie otherwise.

[Beaching Betty]

I want to see MWO cinematic! I sometimes do a search on youtube on Mechwarrior Cinematic, I mean, wouldnt it be awesome to see a cinematic of the mechs fighting, etc.

[Metus regem]

Naglinator, on 03 May 2017 - 09:28 AM, said:

Look at the last 20 min of rogue one. That's the style of battletech. Well minus Vader....

I really liked that they showed that the Rebels did nasty stuff, like the insurgency (Saw Gerrera) with IED's and ambushes (Saw Gerrera)... using child soldiers (Cassian Jeron mentions that he had been fighting the empire since he was six) and assassination (Cassian Jeron). It showed them to not be the white knight heros every seems to think they are, but rather the terrorists that they actually are.

[Nesutizale]

Karl Streiger, on 01 May 2017 - 10:53 PM, said:

Zoom on dialogs first.
Start to get to know those guys, in a film you don't have much time. But I think its possible for a good film to personate those characters somehow with the viewer.

Show the desperation in their faces when they hear the faint sound of metal grind on metal - the sound of a closing Mech.
And then they see just a single Stinger
The heavy machine gun position of the troop starts hammering bullets into the armor - seeing sparks bouncing of the gleaming armor. And a single MJ blast of the Medium lazer vaporize the gunner and coocks of the ammor. Bullets flying around - another man get a hit to the chest and tumbles some meters away.
The grinding sound of the both heavy machine guns - sand sacks exploding - a single trooper crying and going full auto with this auto grenade launcher - another red mist - target of the lazer.
You see that all from the perspective of a single trooper.... going prone when the shooting starts.... you see his face full of mud and gore, the gleaming white in his eyes when the ground start to shake and the Stinger is closing.
HIs hands are digging in the ground it looks like he want to dig a hole to hide...but then he pauses... his hand closing around a rocket launcher. The Mech passes and you see the hope in the eyes of this man.

In a perfect move he get to his knees line up the launcher and fire a rocket right into the back of the Stinger.
But after the smoke clears you only see a single dent in the armor.... and the Stinger is circling around.

Now its time for the "intro" - in the 31st century humankind did not evolve. Warlords and Rulers didn't learn the history of their ancestors and so humanity fighting each other day by day, for ground that doesn't have any value, for industry that products can be bought on the market, for glory that is shallow.....

So you mean something like the first part of the Intro to "Universe at War"


I still think this was so far the best introduction into the BT Univers that I have seen in a very short cinematic way.

Edited by Nesutizale, 10 May 2017 - 10:01 AM.

[Karl Streiger]

didn't know that but yeah similar but much smaller scale