13 replies to this topic

[razenWing]

... (omg i pulled a trump with his unnecessary double ...) that how he has such a stronger grasp of mech scaling than PGI... and by extension, all past Mech games.

As I always advocated, Mechs SHOULD be that size. They should be personal, they should tell stories of warriors, mercenaries, soldiers. They are not Gundams. You are not role playing MechaGodzilla. Like, there are real value to this concept where Mercenaries are Nolan style gritty instead of just 80's campy machoism.

But alas... we get Mech 5 preview where an Atlas is 90% of the dropship height, other armored vehicle barley reaches the ankle of a shadowhawk,,,

Sigh...

This can still be a gritty franchise with realistic scaling, where you are a knight, not a foot soldier. Your ability to overcome adversaries are still legendary, but you still face danger at every turn. Because you are not larger than the environment, but the environment can feel enveloping at time.

So please. Take a page from Geofrey Gerber. Make Mechwarrior great again by making it not a rehash of 90's campy robit game, but a fresh reboot of the franchise.

(O who am I kidding, PGI is probably like 70% done by now... we are going to live through another 2-3 years of unimaginative rehash of mech2/3/4 with zero new things on the table, sigh...)

(at least the fanbois that hated everything new about "The Last Jedi" will be happy...)

[Verilligo]

I'd be fine with a reboot of MechWarrior and Battletech in general that ditches the baggage that has built up with years of crap lore, poor decisions, and inconsistencies layered atop an 80s tabletop game. But that's not what MW5 is about. That's not what MWO is about. And frankly, that's not what PGI is about. And if any of these things were about rebooting the IP, the cacophony of the fan outrage would be absolutely incredible, even if the results turned out much better than things were before. And you'd probably still need to clear it through Microsoft first.

[MischiefSC]

Verilligo, on 27 July 2018 - 11:48 AM, said:

I'd be fine with a reboot of MechWarrior and Battletech in general that ditches the baggage that has built up with years of crap lore, poor decisions, and inconsistencies layered atop an 80s tabletop game. But that's not what MW5 is about. That's not what MWO is about. And frankly, that's not what PGI is about. And if any of these things were about rebooting the IP, the cacophony of the fan outrage would be absolutely incredible, even if the results turned out much better than things were before. And you'd probably still need to clear it through Microsoft first.

No, what you'd want to do is have a lot of money. Buy the IP from Microsoft and then work out a clear deal with Topps (which is a polite term for 'give them a crap ton of money to make the risk of rebooting worthwhile') and then....

yeah. You could do a reboot. The smartest possible option is rework balance mechanics, then have the Clans come back with Star League era tech but better piloting/gunnery skills and the 'omnimech' concept that makes mechs cheaper to create originally but vastly easier to repair in the field, letting them sustain smaller armies over longer supply lines. You also give them a working stockpile of Warships. Then have what we consider 'Clan Tech' to be 'New Tech' being developed in pieces by both sides in an arms race. Clans get the better lasers first, IS, ballistics first, etc. though the concept is that both are going to end up with them as a result of the tech advances during the war.

This lets you keep lore remarkably the same. You'd need to rework Clan Battlemechs but this system would work both for tabletop and computer games.

It's doable. It's just a huge investment with no promise of payoff. The business case is viable but even a 10 year ROI is tough to sell. The biggest strengths would be in the concept of building toward a 'whole universe' MMO situation 5+ years down the line when the tech is available; essentially everything from infantry up to Warships. The game universe has a huge amount of already created content, mechanics and lore to support it. That's a huge chunk of development time and cost already available. Easy AF to monetize - well done cosmetics could make a great, balanced revenue stream along with expansions and updates and you can sell SP/coop campaign missions played via the same engine.

Ironically the success (or failure) of Star Citizen as a huge multi-player open universe going from person on foot to big warships is going to play big in your ability to sell the concept. However the potential for a Battletech 'reboot' leading to a massive game using next gen networking tech exists and HBS actually showed that fans are happy to get a bit of a reboot (huge changes to mechanics) if the lore/story/setting is great.

[Nightbird]

What Mischief is saying is that it's doomed to failure

[razenWing]

I have no idea what mischief is talking about...

[MechaBattler]

Basically the IP is in the hands of several disinterested parties. Who are content to camp on the IP rather than do anything with it. If you wanted to really reinvigorate the franchise you'd need to buy out Topp's rights, Microsoft's, and whatever the current TT rights holder is. TV rights, merchandising rights, video game rights, novel rights, etc, etc. It's all over the place. : /

[Novakaine]

The lack of serious "LORE" is what make this game taste like a bag of generic tater chips.
Which in my opinion is PGI's biggest mistake.


Oh wait a minute what's the difference now between Davion and Kurita?
None now.

[Tetatae Squawkins]

MechaBattler, on 27 July 2018 - 02:42 PM, said:

Basically the IP is in the hands of several disinterested parties. Who are content to camp on the IP rather than do anything with it. If you wanted to really reinvigorate the franchise you'd need to buy out Topp's rights, Microsoft's, and whatever the current TT rights holder is. TV rights, merchandising rights, video game rights, novel rights, etc, etc. It's all over the place. : /

I believe Topps owns everything but video games and miniatures. Which are owned by Microsoft and Iron Wind Metals.

And yeah we need some rich ******* to come along and buy them all out to unify the franchise.

[MischiefSC]

MechaBattler, on 27 July 2018 - 02:42 PM, said:

Basically the IP is in the hands of several disinterested parties. Who are content to camp on the IP rather than do anything with it. If you wanted to really reinvigorate the franchise you'd need to buy out Topp's rights, Microsoft's, and whatever the current TT rights holder is. TV rights, merchandising rights, video game rights, novel rights, etc, etc. It's all over the place. : /

Well, it's not so bad as that.

You'd want to buy Microsofts rights. Then negotiate a reboot with Topps - it's in their interest as well because if it's done reasonably well Topps gets a ton of new content they didn't have to create and an excuse to sell a crap ton of new books to a market that's been prepped by the other half of the IP. It's about time that process goes the other way.

Game engines are rarely something you have to make from scratch anymore. The bulk of embedded cost in games anymore is content creation. It's why the push toward PvP games - players are the content and as such they're cheaper to develop.

Battletech has a huge supply of ready content and lore and the raw mechanics to turn into the scale of massive open world wargame/universe that technology is moving toward.

You could license it from Microsoft but to do a full reboot or a project of this size you'd need to give Microsoft so much control it would be absolutely doomed to failure.

Novakaine, on 27 July 2018 - 04:23 PM, said:

The lack of serious "LORE" is what make this game taste like a bag of generic tater chips.
Which in my opinion is PGI's biggest mistake.


Oh wait a minute what's the difference now between Davion and Kurita?
None now.

So you find HBS Battletech to be terrible? Because it tosses the stats/weapon/mech building lore out the window completely. Far more so than MWO has.

[Novakaine]

No man it's not the weapons.
It's the whole flavor of the game.
Is all.

[My Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ]

Novakaine, on 27 July 2018 - 04:23 PM, said:

The lack of serious "LORE" is what make this game taste like a bag of generic tater chips.
Which in my opinion is PGI's biggest mistake.

How would you go about solving such an issue then? Beyond themed events I don't see how you could reasonably inject lore into the game.

[Novakaine]

Well a few things offhand.
1. IS vs IS or Clan vs. Clan turned back on again.
2. Various factions had their premier mechs they should get a C-Bill bonus when you run those.

[My Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ]

Novakaine, on 28 July 2018 - 05:59 AM, said:

Well a few things offhand.
1. IS vs IS or Clan vs. Clan turned back on again.
2. Various factions had their premier mechs they should get a C-Bill bonus when you run those.

1. How does that add in lore? I agree that they should allow it again, but it doesn't achieve your goal
2. That'd be a bad business idea since you'd remove the value of champion mechs

[Novakaine]

A simple addition to the c-bill amount for the champions.
And a modest amount for faction mechs if you are allied to a particular faction.