9 replies to this topic

[Trontastic1]

As a new player to Mechwarrior 5 and its DLC, I decided to post a review on Steam of my experiences so far with the game. Obviously, other player's experience and opinion may differ.

Review:
Mechwarrior 5 is an exercise in single player frustration. There is a good game waiting to be found but that is buried underneath horrible AI behavior that cancels out much of the fun factor of MW5. I can only recommend picking the game up for the co-op career mode to play with friends.

Example AI Issues:
1. AI teammates are constantly running through objects and are slow to respond to attack orders, sometimes breaking off and running in the opposite direction of the enemy that are tagged for attack for no reason.

2. Friendly fire. The teammate AI can inflict more damage to the player mech. A option should be included to turn friendly fire off. (There is a mod on Nexus and Steam Workshop to fix this)

3. The enemy AI will ignore your AI teammates and focus fire on the player, not disengaging until significant damage has been inflicted by the AI teammates.


Minor Issues and gripes (updated 6-02-21):
1. To unlock Co-op you must play trough a portion of the single player campaign. Luckily its only a few missions before that occurs.

2. Randomly the game stops at a loading screen when traveling to a plant and will never progress. The game must be force closed and restarted.

3. The Mech Lab is streamlined to the point of being overly restrictive and crippling one of the reasons Battletech is a popular IP, freedom to create unique customized variants of a mech. Weapons are now assigned to particular slots that only supports a particular size of weapon. For example: Small Energy, Medium Energy, Small Missiles, Large Missiles, etc. The fact that PGI didn't design the MW5 Mech Lab around their existing Mechwarrior Online Mech Lab system is perplexing.

4. NPC Enemy Mech weapon loadouts are too similar. (Why do all the Urbanmechs have burst AC weapons?!)

5. Travel between planets is far too expensive. (There is a mod on Nexus and Steam Workshop to fix this)

6. Cosmetic customization is lacking for the Inner Sphere DLC. Limited Mech patterns, the inability to add custom merc company logos, the "Commander" portrait cannot be changed or customized and the dropship color cannot be changed. Hopefully the community will mod these in, but it shouldn't have to.

7. The NPC characters on your dropship have a creepy mannequin stare, don't move and have the lip sync quality of a ventriloquist dummy.

8. No photo mode or ability to hide the UI. The game is begging to be visually captured and shared.


Positives:
1. MW5 has been streamlined from a hardcore sim to balanced accessibility for newcomers, which will expand the fanbase and hopefully renewed interest in the franchise on a wider scale.

2. The planet environments are varied and stunning to look at.

3. The battlemechs are satisfying to pilot and the tonnage difference is felt in game.

4. The weapons are also satisfying to use.

Edited by Trontastic1, 02 June 2021 - 06:29 AM.

[Anjian]

Trying it on my Xbox One. My general feeling about it is underwhelming.

[Vellron2005]

Actually, I find HOTIS has significantly improved on the bad A.I. from the MW5:Mercs base game..

I've often had my own lancemates draw fire from the enemy (mostly because I tell them to and move away), but I've also seen the A.I. enemies actually torso twist now, and behave much smarter.

Playing HOTIS feels like I've stepped up my difficulty levels really..

As far as stomping through a base you're supposed to protect - I simply position my lance outside the base, and keep them there. If we have to move to the other side, we move around the base, not through it.

I've played several defense missions in HOTIS so far, and every time, the base was kept at 85-95%..

Trontastic1, on 31 May 2021 - 05:52 PM, said:

6. Cosmetic customization is lacking for the Inner Sphere DLC. Limited Mech patterns, the inability to add custom merc company logos, the "Commander" portrait cannot be changed or customized and the dropship color cannot be changed. Hopefully the community will mod these in, but it shouldn't have to.

7. The NPC characters on your dropship have a creepy mannequin stare, don't move and have the lip sync quality of a ventriloquist dummy.

8. No photo mode or ability to hide the UI. The game is begging to be visually captured and shared.

Agreed. I expected some more customization options, decals, pilot faces, sounds and such.. but since those were never properly implemented even to MWO, I understand..
NPCs are completely useless, manikin-like if you play the career mode. They have no interaction with the player while in the dropship, and this is a big missed opportunity.

As far as the things I love about HOTIS:

1) I love the new weapons,equipment and mechs. Thanks for that.
2) I absolutely LOVE the beachead missions. The ones when your own forces join you feel like larger battles, and that's awesome.
3) Love the new biome - don't understand the spinning asteroids though, but they look cool.

[Aidan Crenshaw]

I'm sorry, but most is just false here:

Quote

2. Friendly fire. The teammate AI can inflict more damage to the player mech. A option should be included to turn friendly fire off. (There is a mod on Nexus and Steam Workshop to fix this)

Friendly fire from AI is not a thing. It's literally been turned off since the first launch on EGS. AI can only damage other AI (that includes FF)

Quote

3. The enemy AI will ignore your AI teammates and focus fire on the player, not disengaging until significant damage has been inflicted by the AI teammates.

The player is often posing the greatest thread, because of the damage he inflicts.

Quote

3. There is no indicator that informs the player which way his torso is pointing. PGI has this in Mechwarrior Online but, didn't think to add this option to MW5.

Maybe replay the tutorial and listen carefully. Ever wondered what that white cone on your minimap was for?

Quote

4. NPC Enemy Mech weapon loadouts are too similar. (Why do all the Urbanmechs have burst AC weapons?!)

These are lore-based loadouts for the particular time you are playing at.

Quote

5. Travel between planets is far too expensive. (There is a mod on Nexus and Steam Workshop to fix this)

I disagree. But that's a matter of opinion. Never had any issues with CBill-management.

Quote

6. Cosmetic customization is lacking for the Inner Sphere DLC. Limited Mech patterns, the inability to add custom merc company logos, the "Commander" portrait cannot be changed or customized and the dropship color cannot be changed. Hopefully the community will mod these in, but it shouldn't have to.

Ok, the paint-jobs are copy paste from MWO, still gives you a lot variety in my books.

Quote

8. No photo mode or ability to hide the UI. The game is begging to be visually captured and shared.

Free-cam is a thing. https://static.mw5me...ra_Controls.pdf

Edited by Aidan Crenshaw, 01 June 2021 - 02:26 AM.

[Wildstreak]

Trontastic1, on 31 May 2021 - 05:52 PM, said:

3. The enemy AI will ignore your AI teammates and focus fire on the player, not disengaging until significant damage has been inflicted by the AI teammates.

You can get around this by not moving too close to enemies and especially if you plan out your lance + learn to control AI Lancemate behavior, part of previous MW titles.
1 - Take a LRM Mech for yourself and order individual Lancemates against certain targets.
2 - Take a long range Mech and order individual Lancemates against certain targets.
3 - Take any Mech and order individual Lancemates against certain targets.

Trontastic1, on 31 May 2021 - 05:52 PM, said:

1. To unlock Co-op you must play trough a portion of the single player campaign. Luckily its only a few missions before that occurs.

Not heard this until now, sad if true, not done Campaign or Career yet.

Trontastic1, on 31 May 2021 - 05:52 PM, said:

6. Cosmetic customization is lacking for the Inner Sphere DLC. Limited Mech patterns, the inability to add custom merc company logos, the "Commander" portrait cannot be changed or customized and the dropship color cannot be changed. Hopefully the community will mod these in, but it shouldn't have to.

Sometimes when devs make a game that is moddable, they know modders will make changes so they do not have to put effort into everything especially if they are a small company with limited staff and budget.

Trontastic1, on 31 May 2021 - 05:52 PM, said:

Positives:
1. MW5 has been streamlined from a hardcore sim to balanced accessibility for newcomers, which will expand the fanbase and hopefully renewed interest in the franchise on a wider scale.

Would be nice but it does need quite some fixing.

Anjian, on 31 May 2021 - 07:43 PM, said:

Trying it on my Xbox One. My general feeling about it is underwhelming.

It is a mixed bag with good and bad points, seems in my view not enough people have really gotten into both sides of that.
I am on PC but read there are issues with xBox controls, not seen any xBox user post about using M+K.

Aidan Crenshaw, on 01 June 2021 - 02:24 AM, said:

These are lore-based loadouts for the particular time you are playing at.

But most Mechs have several variants so for example, if I am fighting 2 AI Spiders why do they both have to be the same variant? Why is every Locust I see a 1V given there are several variants available? Etc. There are 4 different stock variants of UrbanMech.

[GARION26]

I'm a new player this week.

AI really hasn't been a problem for me. Yes they are limited but it's AI, it's not as good as a human player on a pretty complicated game like MW.

There is a good reddit thread I found on AI in MW can't pull it up on this computer. It's suppositions with some testing by the poster that appear to indicate how the AI is programmed.

[LordNothing]

i played this one mission where the rain was so thick that you couldn't see100 meters in front of you. i live in a rainforest and never saw rain that thick.

[Aidan Crenshaw]

Wildstreak, on 01 June 2021 - 06:39 AM, said:

But most Mechs have several variants so for example, if I am fighting 2 AI Spiders why do they both have to be the same variant? Why is every Locust I see a 1V given there are several variants available? Etc. There are 4 different stock variants of UrbanMech.

Different Variants of mechs are used by the different Houses or other Factions, so you'll see other mechs and variants fielded by Kurita for example than those used by Marik. This is very lore accurate btw.

[GARION26]

GARION26, on 01 June 2021 - 11:57 AM, said:

I'm a new player this week.

AI really hasn't been a problem for me. Yes they are limited but it's AI, it's not as good as a human player on a pretty complicated game like MW.

There is a good reddit thread I found on AI in MW can't pull it up on this computer. It's suppositions with some testing by the poster that appear to indicate how the AI is programmed.

this link has a link to a video by TTB with info about how AI works (around 2 minute mark) and a link to another thread where someone worked through the AI process https://www.reddit.c...utm_name=iossmf