KickStarter BattleTech Pre-Release Thread

[Agesilaus]

What did people say about BB? It has some of the best tbs combat in any game, ever.

 

[Cael]

What did people say about BB? It has some of the best tbs combat in any game, ever.

Nobody here had a bad word about BB's tactical layer, which everyone agreed is brilliant. All complaints were about the strategic layer (mid/late-game grind) and modding (virtually impossible), the latter related to inability to resolve the former.

Which is roughly analogous to Battletech's issues, except it's the opposite of grind.

Complete opposite, actually.

People are not complaining about the modding as the developers themselves are saying modding will fix the issues people ARE complaining about. In other words, it would be easy to mod, and the devs are fully expecting to push out a half-completed game and let the modders complete it for them.

People are also not complaining about the mod-late game grind simply because by that time, money is going to be a non-issue due to the way salvage is done. You should be overflowing with 'mechs and therefore C-Bills. Heck, you could probably face the entire Clan Invasion by yourself after completing the campaign simply by launching 'mech pieces at them via a mass driver a la Pirates of the Caribbean's fire everything cannon. I must admit the idea of Leo Showers getting killed when a 'mech hand complete with raised middle finger comes flying through his bridge is hilarious.

People ARE complaining about the tactical layer because it actively encourages a certain game play and makes entire categories of 'mechs useless by intentional design. And they ARE complaining about the salvage rules. And they ARE complaining about the utter hash HBS made of the gameplay.

 

[ColonelTeacup]

What did people say about BB? It has some of the best tbs combat in any game, ever.

Nobody here had a bad word about BB's tactical layer, which everyone agreed is brilliant. All complaints were about the strategic layer (mid/late-game grind) and modding (virtually impossible), the latter related to inability to resolve the former.

Which is roughly analogous to Battletech's issues, except it's the opposite of grind.

Complete opposite, actually.

People are not complaining about the modding as the developers themselves are saying modding will fix the issues people ARE complaining about. In other words, it would be easy to mod, and the devs are fully expecting to push out a half-completed game and let the modders complete it for them.

People are also not complaining about the mod-late game grind simply because by that time, money is going to be a non-issue due to the way salvage is done. You should be overflowing with 'mechs and therefore C-Bills. Heck, you could probably face the entire Clan Invasion by yourself after completing the campaign simply by launching 'mech pieces at them via a mass driver a la Pirates of the Caribbean's fire everything cannon. I must admit the idea of Leo Showers getting killed when a 'mech hand complete with raised middle finger comes flying through his bridge is hilarious.

People ARE complaining about the tactical layer because it actively encourages a certain game play and makes entire categories of 'mechs useless by intentional design. And they ARE complaining about the salvage rules. And they ARE complaining about the utter hash HBS made of the gameplay.

Are these devs taking a page out of Bethesdas book and letting the mod community complete their game?

 

[Cael]

Are these devs taking a page out of Bethesdas book and letting the mod community complete their game?

To quote Oasis789:

live feed from the hbs forums

I've lost all sympathy for these people. They deserve whatever it is they get.

 

[ColonelTeacup]

I agree with winnie though. Mods fixed skyrim.

 

[Cael]

I agree with winnie though. Mods fixed skyrim.

By which time I have taken so many arrows to the knees that I have stopped caring...

Spoiler

Just joking. I never played Skyrim. Heard the stories and never bothered.

 

[ColonelTeacup]

But what about Endaril?

 

[Cael]

But what about Endaril?

Never got the game, so mods aren't going to help

 

[Jenkem]

Any codex impressions yet?

 

[Cael]

Any codex impressions yet?

 

[Urthor]

Enderal fixed Skyrim as much as it was possible but the base Skyrim combat feels a bit too inane and dull. Even when I finish my Enderal playthrough when the expansion arrives I can't say it's got a fundamentally good gameplay loop like Fallout 4 does for its action RPG combat.

 

[Jason Liang]

So how is it

 

[Bocian]

I assume we're all going to have to become emotional because some guy is pretending to be a girl in the dev team.

BETA MALE

 

[Morgoth]

First review:

Review: BattleTech
2018-04-24 02:01:00by Chris Carter

Mechs and minions

It took me a really long time to dive into the world of BattleTech. Nearly everyone has heard of MechWarrior, the series that exists within the same universe, but ever since the announcement that Harebrained Schemes would be handling an adaptation of the former, I've been doing a lot of research into its wide world.

As is the case with its many tabletop iterations, decades of lore is quite a lot to take in. Thankfully the BattleTech game eases you into it without making it feel like you're drowning.

BattleTech (PC)
Developer: Harebrained Schemes
Publisher: Paradox Interactive
Released: April 24, 2018
MSRP: $39.99

The world of BattleTech, specifically in its early years that this new PC iteration takes place in, isn't the tale of a dystopian hellscape; rather, it's a royal power struggle not unlike some popular fantasy novels -- but with giant mechs.

Carving a nice spot so early in the universe, Harebrained Schemes is free to explore a lot of new ground while keeping the classic designs of beloved mechs intact. A beautiful score and lots of vibrant artwork help keep the story moving, something a lot of other smaller studios fail at when adapting such a big property. A lack of big-budget cutscenes and the like doesn't hurt BattleTech's step one bit.

Again, a lot of the developer's angle is introducing people to this world, but the dialogue isn't overly expositional to match. The campaign peppers you with little factoids like "The Mackie was the first BattleMech ever built" and so on: digestible, relatable stuff to help connect you more with the world.

BattleTech operates on a turn-based combat system where cover matters, as does positioning. You can jump jet down heights to get a better vantage point, seemingly menial environmental factors like water cool down an overheated mech, and sprinting (a standard top-down strategy mechanic) grants evasion charges. Nearly every facet of BattleTech has its own rules, but its secret sauce is that none of those rules are overly complicated.

For instance melee has its own parameters (it uses piloting skill, ignores evasion, and removes guarded), which is a specific answer to a specific problem. Hits and range also matter depending on your mech's loadout (something you'll know going in at a glance), and stats can go down on a whim. You'll need to know the kit of each mech to solve any problems that arise, but that comes naturally after just five mission or so.

Once you've got the basics down you can start doing things like having one of your weaker mechs use abilities like sensor lock, draining a hiding enemy's evasive charges, so you can hit them with heavier weaponry. BattleTech never quite reaches the absurd JRPG listicle level of abilities, it just has enough to allow for a degree of decision making each turn. Tooltips ensure that even new strategy game players aren't completely lost. It even gets as granular as "25% damage reduction to the front and side). Saving during combat is also a nice crutch to have if you have to dip in the middle of a raging battle.

There's a lovely dance of destruction going on at all times. Cameras will dynamically change to show mechs running up and socking robot limbs off, and the baked-in lore of these mechs being semi-shoddy only helps. These things have character, like the Blackjack, whose limbs kind of flop around as it runs. You'll also tango with lesser creations like tanks, which you'll gloriously stomp with your mech feet.

BattleTech is simmy, too. There's menus upon menus as you make your way across the galaxy. The idea is that you're slowly building up your mercenary force and dealing with issues both petty and serious. Beyond a full campaign, skirmish mode is likely where you're going to be spending most of your time, with the option to pit light and heavy mechs against each other with different styles of play, as well as customizable maps and seasons. Multiplayer is also in, but requires a Paradox account -- I was also unable to test it out for the purposes of this review.

If you're into tweaks BattleTech doesn't really have a full mod suite on-demand, but there are a decent amount of options. You can turn off in-mission cinematics entirely (or just enemy animations). You also have near-complete control of the camera, as well as resolution support for up to 4K, full keybinding, and 14 different advanced video toggles. In my experience BattleTech is also well-optimized. I never encountered a crash or hiccup.

I'm still tooling around in skirmishes in BattleTech, and it's done its part in getting me interested in the bigger picture. Harebrained Schemes should be proud, as it's mostly done right by the various tabletop licenses it's worked with for the past five years or so.

[This review is based on a retail version of the game provided by the publisher. Only the single-player portion is reviewed in this assessment.]

Battletech reviewed by Chris Carter

8
GREAT

 

[pbrand]

Prelocked and preloaded. It's heartening to see so many reviews giving it at least an 8 considering I don't usually buy games on release day

 

[Cael]

First review:

Review: BattleTech
2018-04-24 02:01:00by Chris Carter

I really don't know what to say.

1. He called 3025 "early years" when it is pretty much the default starting point. MW1 is 3025 and MW2: Mercs started pre-3050. Both Crescent Hawks games started 3025 or so. The most famous and enduring book trilogies are 3025-era. Starting in 3025 is not early. It is standard.

2. "... stats can go down on a whim." How is this good game design?

3. How is a sensor lock from one 'mech supposed to affect the firing ability of the other 'mechs? This is an ability that BTech did not introduce until post-3060 (closer to 3067 with 'mechs coming into service around then) with C3 computers.

4. "25% damage reduction" is not granular. It is very specific. Granular is when you have jumps in a range of something. A single point cannot be granular.

5. "Saving in battle is a nice crutch..." Newsflash! You could save in battle in The Crescent Hawk's Revenge. It is not a feature, it is a frakking GIVEN.

6. "...baked-in lore of these 'mechs being semi-shoddy..." Say WHAT? Say who? A look through the 3025 TRO shows that most of the individual 'mechs listed are in bloody good condition. Sure, you might not have the factory issue LRM5, but you had a LRM5 of another make in its place (e.g., Minobu Tetsuhara's Vindicator that he got on loan from Wolf's Dragoons). They might even have another weapon in the place of the factory specs. But they are not SHODDY, ESPECIALLY when those 'mechs belong to a professional armed forces.

7. "...doesn't really have a full mod-suite..." CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! What's that, Rick? Alarm bells?

8. "...Harebrained Schemes should be proud, as it's mostly done right by the various tabletop licenses it's worked with for the past five years or so..." Considering all the stuff you raved about (evasion, sensor lock, melee rules, sprinting, etc.) were never in the tabletop to begin with, I find your comment, sir, to be absolute BOLLOCKS.

 

[Infinitron]

Looks like that review leaked out before it was supposed to.

 

[ArchAngel]

First review:

Review: BattleTech
2018-04-24 02:01:00by Chris Carter

I really don't know what to say.

1. He called 3025 "early years" when it is pretty much the default starting point. MW1 is 3025 and MW2: Mercs started pre-3050. Both Crescent Hawks games started 3025 or so. The most famous and enduring book trilogies are 3025-era. Starting in 3025 is not early. It is standard.

2. "... stats can go down on a whim." How is this good game design?

3. How is a sensor lock from one 'mech supposed to affect the firing ability of the other 'mechs? This is an ability that BTech did not introduce until post-3060 (closer to 3067 with 'mechs coming into service around then) with C3 computers.

4. "25% damage reduction" is not granular. It is very specific. Granular is when you have jumps in a range of something. A single point cannot be granular.

5. "Saving in battle is a nice crutch..." Newsflash! You could save in battle in The Crescent Hawk's Revenge. It is not a feature, it is a frakking GIVEN.

6. "...baked-in lore of these 'mechs being semi-shoddy..." Say WHAT? Say who? A look through the 3025 TRO shows that most of the individual 'mechs listed are in bloody good condition. Sure, you might not have the factory issue LRM5, but you had a LRM5 of another make in its place (e.g., Minobu Tetsuhara's Vindicator that he got on loan from Wolf's Dragoons). They might even have another weapon in the place of the factory specs. But they are not SHODDY, ESPECIALLY when those 'mechs belong to a professional armed forces.

7. "...doesn't really have a full mod-suite..." CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! What's that, Rick? Alarm bells?

8. "...Harebrained Schemes should be proud, as it's mostly done right by the various tabletop licenses it's worked with for the past five years or so..." Considering all the stuff you raved about (evasion, sensor lock, melee rules, sprinting, etc.) were never in the tabletop to begin with, I find your comment, sir, to be absolute BOLLOCKS.

Tell us where did the big naughty HBS touch you?

 

[Spark Mandriller]

1. He called 3025 "early years" when it is pretty much the default starting point.

It is early though. Any time significantly before 3025 is pretty much backstory. Around 3025 is the start of the period people actually play in, and it continues on from there. It's as early as it gets. It's also early compared to when most of the video games are set, since most of them are Clan Invasion era or later. Out of all the things to complain about, I have no idea why you'd pick that.

 

[Cael]

1. He called 3025 "early years" when it is pretty much the default starting point.

It is early though. Any time significantly before 3025 is pretty much backstory. Around 3025 is the start of the period people actually play in, and it continues on from there. It's as early as it gets. It's also early compared to when most of the video games are set, since most of them are Clan Invasion era or later. Out of all the things to complain about, I have no idea why you'd pick that.

Default is not early. Something to wrap your head around.

Of the 10 BTech games (2 Crescent Hawks, 4 MW, 2 MW: Mercs, 2 MechCommander):
4 were 3025-era (MW1, MW2Merc, both CH games)
1 was 3050-era (MW2)
2 was 3060-era (MW3, MechCommander1)
3 were 3067-era (MW4, MW4Mercs, MechCommander2)

HBS' shit makes it 5 3025-era, although I wouldn't call it a BTech game.

QED for default.

 

[Kem0sabe]

No modding tools, simple game design, no complexity, fucked up campaign with no hook.

Yep, seems like HBS will continue their trend of selling less copies with each new release until they fade into obscurity.

 

[Mark Richard]

Anyone new to this game might find it useful to check out this 11m video before playing, excellent summary that gets to the point and includes a lot of little tips (eg: using multitarget and low% weapons to remove evasion) that take some new players a long while to think of.

This is helpful, thanks. I thought evasion points were a finite resource and didn't realise they were generated by movement.

 

[Bohr]

https://www.pcgamer.com/battletech-review/
(85)

https://www.gamewatcher.com/reviews/battletech-review/13020
(9.0)

Not that scores matter much, expect most to be in that range "some flaws but I liked it"

Haven't seen the RPS one yet but apparently it wasn't too favourable

 

[Spark Mandriller]

Default is not early. Something to wrap your head around.

Of the 10 BTech games (2 Crescent Hawks, 4 MW, 2 MW: Mercs, 2 MechCommander):
4 were 3025-era (MW1, MW2Merc, both CH games)
1 was 3050-era (MW2)
2 was 3060-era (MW3, MechCommander1)
3 were 3067-era (MW4, MW4Mercs, MechCommander2)

It's both the default and early. It's the earliest part of the playable setting. You start at 3025. Other eras come later. 3025 is earlier than Clan Invasion. 3025 is earlier than FedCom Civil War. 3025 is earlier than Jihad. 3025 is earlier than Dark Age. It's as early as it gets without having to go into backstory events like the early Succession Wars or the Pentagon Civil War or whatever. I have no idea why you'd even think it wasn't early. It's the start and then other things happen later. That's the definition of early.
Also MW2 Mercs and Crescent Hawks Revenge aren't purely 3025 (last time I checked Clans didn't count as 3025), and you're ignoring all the console games. MechAssault may be shit, but it still exists. And I figure the expansions for MW2/3/4 should count as at least 33% of a game each, so that's another game set after 3025.

 

[Infinitron]

Haven't seen the RPS one yet but apparently it wasn't too favourable

Looks like it's not exciting enough for them: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2018/04/24/battletech-review-pc/

Wot I Think: BattleTech
By Alec Meer on April 24th, 2018 at 11:00 am

I was perplexed to discover that my partner, also a home-worker, was wearing earplugs as she sat at her computer. There was, for once, none of the thunderous din of new kitchens or loft extensions being built in one of the adjacent terraced houses, and nor was my own PC’s volume set high as I threw stompy tankbots at each other in XCOM-meets-Mechwarrior turn-based strategy game/boardgame adaptation BattleTech. Stony-faced, she informed me that listening to me sporadically bellow “Oh god, it’s so boring” every few minutes is not terribly conducive to work.

I don’t like calling things boring. It’s an aggressively dismissive criticism, and often says as much about the accuser as the accused. I’m stuck on that word though. I’ve returned to BattleTech repeatedly, in different moods and with absolute determination to find the fun, but I keep winding up in the same place: bored. And then hating myself for feeling that way.

It’s not that I don’t like what BattleTech is doing – turn-based strategy skirmishes between squads of giant, human-piloted mechanical walkers, in very much an industrial rather than fantastical vision of science-fiction. There aren’t many videogame elevator pitches that would appeal to me more. It’s precisely because of that that I’ve kept on blaming myself, rather than BattleTech, for how bored I’ve often felt. How could I notenjoy a game that might as well have been made just for me? Eventually, though, I had a moment of minor epiphany.

You have, I trust, played a Civilization game or six in the past. Y’know how thrilling it is in the early and even middle stages of a campaign, where the majority of your decisions feel meaningful and the ratio of you doing stuff vs you watching stuff happen is very much on the side of the angels? And you know how, in most Civs, so much of the late game collapses into a slow-motion war of attrition, these gigantic empires slugging away at each other with all the energy of a 58-year-old boxer in the eleventh round? And how that essential ratio inverts, until ultimately far, far more time is spent observing than doing?

A BattleTech battle feels like that from the first turn of each battle. The scales are tipped massively, maddeningly in favour of watching rather than acting here. Every animation is too long, each action is followed by numerous ticker tape-slow stat and status updates, automated camera pans have all the speed and grace of a shopping trolley with four rusted wheels, and the entire game lapses into unexpected motionlessness for a few seconds as frequently as the exhausted pusher of said trolley. My heart sinks when new enemies lurch into view – not because of the (significant) threat they represent, but because more units means more waiting.

I don’t think that redemption is impossible. Patches to my review code have tamed some of the pre- and post-action pauses already, and there’s no reason to think that more delays still can’t be crushed underfoot over time. Some tough decisions need to be made beyond that, though.

For instance, a Mech gracefully arcing its five different weapons and a stream of missiles through the sky sequentially, rather than simultaneously, is like watching industrial ballet the first time it happens, but multiply the several dead seconds involved by (on rough average) 12 mechs over 12 turns over dozens of battles. So many passive, tortured hours of waiting for the results. Same goes for the stomping – we all want stomping from a mech game, obviously, and high-speed stomping would just look silly, so an unhurried, AT-AT-like approach seems welcome. But 12 mechs, 12 turns, dozens battles: oof.

Clearly too, we want our Mechs to be heavily-armoured engines of death, not tissue-paper-thin ‘bots that crumple after one hit. In practice, the super-armoured approach taken is less like watching titans duel to the death and more like watching two people take turns to disinterestedly fire water pistols at each other.

The stuff you really want to see, like gun-arms being blown off, mechs collapsing to the ground as their legs are blown out from under them and death-from-above jump’n’stomp attacks, is in here. Such pay-offs have to be built up to only after several units’, and usually several turns’, worth of slow hitpoint attrition, with only minimal sense of consequence or tactility.

It is satisfying to see a tough enemy’s missile-launcher hand disappear in a shower or sparks, or to slam two car-sized feet into its chest if you’ve knocked it down, but getting there is such a slog. On the other side of the coin, sitting through six enemies queuing up to lazily pepper your most vulnerable unit with as many as two dozen individually-fired guns is hellish, when all you want to know is if your lad lives or dies at the end of it.

Smart tactical thinking and a smattering of novel TBS ideas underpin BattleTech; it is not at all a mindless slugfest, and it is not afraid to be challenging. Positioning and range and weapon type and heat management and exposed flanks and permadeath and all that good jazz is here. I wish I could tap directly into it, bypass all this damned time-wasting.

I like almost everything BattleTech does, but not so much how it does it.

BattleTech’s boardgame origins are self-evident, even if the finer detail of its rules are different from its venerable, physical source material. Two meatbags locked in deadly competition over the space of a couple of hours is a thrilling time, but the subtle differences inherent in playing against voiceless AI, adding animations to every action and reaction and keeping the fight alive for dozens of hours changes everything.

A certain kind of pep is needed to re-inject the drama – your heart needs to be in your mouth almost every time you commit to a decision, VO and music need to build a sense of crisis, new enemies need to arrive at the worst possible time, rather than simply as a tedious matter of course. You need to never be more than a few moments away from taking the situation in-hand yourself.

BattleTech feels so functional in all these regards, going through the motions turn after glacial turn, and particularly failing in the matter of making enemies’ turns fast, vibrant and scary. My new mouse has already gained grey-brown stains where I’ve spent the past few days impatiently drumming my fingers upon it while I watch and wait and wait and wait for the fleeting opportunity to move a small distance, then shoot with almost invisible effect again.

Even the user interface feels flabby. Essential concepts are badly-conveyed by the tutorial, and the screen is drowning in arrows, meters and icons. I welcome complexity and variety, and mech-specific concepts like managing your tankbots’ heat or trying to carve away specific parts of your enemies appeal deeply, but here it’s poorly-taught and clumsily-presented. ‘Slog’ is the word that keeps coming to mind about BattleTech – even sussing out what’s going to happen when you move there or shoot that lacks the necessary at-a-glance ease. It’s not impenetrable: it’s just a slog.

The abundance of slog could have been offset by a big personality. There are well-written and performed, lore-heavy cutscenes in between storyline missions (which you do not need to follow slavishly – there are plenty of narrative-light sidemissions, which you’ll need to do to pay the bills in any case). These don’t outstay their welcome, even if they are a little listless, and they do on occasion lend some humanity to this cold, muted war of machines. By contrast, almost all is silence in-mission, outside of intro and outro dialogue.

I don’t want my pilots or their enemies babbling away while I’m trying to think, obviously, but BattleTech’s gone too far – it feels like no-one’s there at all. Just some long past caring robots duking it out in a dead world. It doesn’t even play to giant mech strengths all the much. Most terrain’s not deformed when your squad stomps over it, trees are not toppled by the weight of a 60 ton machine slamming into them, there are no puny humans to squish… The closest BattleTech gets to cannonfodder are more conventional yet still bullet spongey tanks, while I feel like I’ve seen its rather lifeless environments in two dozen other games.

I wish the Mechs themselves felt more distinctive, too. There’s an impressive range of different walker-types in here, which will thrill Battletech vets, but in practice most feel interchangeable – light/medium/heavy designation and short or long-range weapons is what matters most, and precious few mechs are immediately recognisable at a glance. I’d like to feel desperately proud and protective about my favourite mechs, but here it’s hard to care about them on a level beyond repair cost.

I should point out that BattleTech is not all battles. There’s also a base mode with its own inelegant and baggy interface, in which you can repair, upgrade and buy mechs, choose missions, unlock pilot skills, chat to ally advisors and so forth, and most importantly worry about having enough money to do any of that. If I were an awful person, I might say that it feels a lot like this whole section of the game borrowed too liberally from XCOM then tried to hide it with unnecessary sub-menus.

In fairness, it is a lot more involved in terms of managing damaged/hurt units and having to field a B,C,D or worse team while all your best guys are getting welded back together. There’s no shortage of meat on these bones, which is why I’m reluctant to part ways with Battletech despite how often it’s making my poor partner suffer my banal bellowing.

There is something great glinting just below BattleTech’s dour and crusty surface. So much now depends on whether future updates will dig for it or not – I pray they do. I’ve put an inordinate amount of time into playing Battletech, even starting the campaign over at one point, so convinced was I that I must be missing something or playing it wrong, but now I have reached an inescapable conclusion. If you want a picture of BattleTech, imagine a giant robo-tank silently firing an ineffective laser at another giant robot-tank – forever.

BattleTech is released today, via stores including Steam, GOG and Humble, for $40/€40/£35.