KickStarter BATTLETECH - turn-based mech combat from Harebrained Schemes

[Jimmious]

The worst part for me about the story is that you have discussions where you are asked questions and basically you can answer in one way. What the fuck is the point of me clicking then? Make a couple of cinematics and let me chill out
For example when Lady Arano asks you to do a specific mission in a specific way, you can't say NO I'LL DO STH ELSE... you can only say yeah in different ways. There is literally no point for the whole dialogue system, at all. Complete waste of time

 

[PanteraNera]

They should have done the campaign like Battle Brothers

 

[Jimmious]

Well... yeah ,probably, since everything story related seems like a weird patch-work of random elements.
For example they sat down and rendered relatively detailed character models for NPCs who basically are .... upgrade menus for 95% of the game. But for whatever reason in conversations they don't even move their mouths, but the camera zooms in on them? I mean... why? I don't get these choices
All this work on dialogues and character models could've been scrapped for a couple of cinematics and a more "juicy" sandbox campaign and everyone would be happier..

 

[PanteraNera]

And seriously, I think what makes the game so un-enjoyable to me is: it is supposed to be about mercenaries (Battle Brothers had nailed that with their writing) but it does absolutely not feel like I am leading mercenaries (or for that matter, leading), at all!
It is Princess Angry Faces and the White knight gang. To the rescue, for justice, for honor. No questions asked.

 

[Jimmious]

I enjoy the game when I completely ignore whatever is happening story wise. Some of the story combat scenarios are pretty challenging actually and that's the only "salvaging" part of the story campaign

 

[PanteraNera]

I enjoy the game when I completely ignore whatever is happening story wise. Some of the story combat scenarios are pretty challenging actually and that's the only "salvaging" part of the story campaign

Heh, kinda true.
Without the story I would enjoy the game way more. Like the last mission I played, rescue of black "lord", well I just really didn't care for him to rescue him. And than Victoria is all like "I broke his jaw, I will make him suffer" and I am like "do as you wish, I do not like him as well" :D

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

I really do wish that they would expand skirmish mode, so that one could do variety of mission types or scenarios on it instead of just lance vs lance fights on too few maps.

 

[agris]

I'm guessing the only reason we have a story at all is that HBS knows its audience. This game is essentially the combat system, and that's it.

 

[Mark Richard]

And seriously, I think what makes the game so un-enjoyable to me is: it is supposed to be about mercenaries (Battle Brothers had nailed that with their writing) but it does absolutely not feel like I am leading mercenaries (or for that matter, leading), at all!
It is Princess Angry Faces and the White knight gang. To the rescue, for justice, for honor. No questions asked.

Games where you're serving under the real protagonist of the story are incredibly annoying.

 

[fantadomat]

It says a lot when even more "inclusiveness " tolerant people like Jimmious are shitting on the story.

 

[Galdred]

And seriously, I think what makes the game so un-enjoyable to me is: it is supposed to be about mercenaries (Battle Brothers had nailed that with their writing) but it does absolutely not feel like I am leading mercenaries (or for that matter, leading), at all!
It is Princess Angry Faces and the White knight gang. To the rescue, for justice, for honor. No questions asked.

Why not have the player be from her own house then? It would have made much more sense to be forced to stay loyal, whatever your liege is doing.
Or they could have gone JA style and offered a contract for the whole thing at once.

 

[Cael]

And seriously, I think what makes the game so un-enjoyable to me is: it is supposed to be about mercenaries (Battle Brothers had nailed that with their writing) but it does absolutely not feel like I am leading mercenaries (or for that matter, leading), at all!
It is Princess Angry Faces and the White knight gang. To the rescue, for justice, for honor. No questions asked.

Why not have the player be from her own house then? It would have made much more sense to be forced to stay loyal, whatever your liege is doing.
Or they could have gone JA style and offered a contract for the whole thing at once.

You mean like someone else did for MechCommander, where you were Zulu company of the 1st Davion Guards, or MW4 where you were the son of a murdered Duke, nephew of a murdered Knight, brother to a murdered child and you will have your revenge, in this life or the next?

HBS can't even come close to the Microshite level of writing, which is saying a hell of a lot.

 

[Cael]

I'm surprised at some of the warm reception.

Combination of lower-than-console standards and paid shilling. To some, the prospect of a free game is like finding unlimited manna from heaven.

 

[Drakron]

. But, and it's a big but, the core loop of run missions for cash and salvage -> upgrade and tweak mechs -> repeat is compelling and fun.

And Mechwarrior 5 Mercenaries is hoing down that route without the shitty story and characters, it will just had the universe events happening as the timeline progresses.

It seems to me they were more focused on the story and characters that anything else, you dont need to have a complex story and characters when the universe it set already provides then, in fact they cannot go against established events so they might as well build their game around what will as it happen instead of building around what will happen but they cannot change. The fact they had to create a story OUTSIDE the established lore events just shows they really wanted to tell a story that would be against Battletech own lore. Its like instead of having a WWII game based on the D-Day invasion they create a fictional landing on southern France because they wanted for it be composed of entirely Afro-Americans and African Colonial Troops.

 

[Cael]

And Mechwarrior 5 Mercenaries is hoing down that route without the shitty story and characters, it will just had the universe events happening as the timeline progresses.

Something that MW2M already did back in the day. If you don't take the main story contracts, guess what? You can! The world will continue moving without you

It seems to me they were more focused on the story and characters that anything else, you dont need to have a complex story and characters when the universe it set already provides then, in fact they cannot go against established events so they might as well build their game around what will as it happen instead of building around what will happen but they cannot change. The fact they had to create a story OUTSIDE the established lore events just shows they really wanted to tell a story that would be against Battletech own lore. Its like instead of having a WWII based on the D-Day invasion they create a fictional landing on southern France because they wanted for it be composed of entirely Afro-Americans and African Colonial Troops.

Worse. Said Afro-Americans would have a full Nimitz-class carrier battlefleet behind them, complete with nuclear weapons, A6s, F14s and cruise missiles, plus an entire embarked Marine regiment with their own full landing fleet plus air support.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

Also most of the mercenaries characters are actually out of character the whole time, cheering shit like "Yay Lady Arano, we will fight the good fight, yay!" Especially this brazilian guy acts like her fucking lapdog instead of an mercenary. Mercenaries are basically portrayed as white knights in this game. And as the player you often have no other choice like three different variations of "Oh noes justice! We have to stop these villains" (wasn't at the beginning video the question raised if the "player" was in the war for glory/justice or money? The answer seems for JUSTICE!!)

The Brazilian ex-leader of your mercenary band had mismanaged your group into an insurmountable mountain of debt, which Princess Kamehameha promises to pay off in its entirety when she's restored on her throne. Which is actually a reasonable justification for why your group follows her goals as slavishly as you do, although this doesn't compensate for the atrocious dialogue writing and bland, one-dimensional characters.

Not only that, but the plotting of the main series of missions is off at times. For example, there's one mission on a planet being reconquered by the enemy, where your goal is merely to defend a base so that dropships can evacuate civilians, yet somehow succeeding in this mission results in the world being successfully defended. Or that forgotten Star League base filled with invaluable battlemechs, where your mercenaries apparently can't be bothered to take any of the Star League battlemechs for themselves when they have the chance and neither does anyone else on your side except for Kamehameha herself and two of her cronies (she then gifts you one of the 'mechs they escaped with).

 

[Cael]

The Brazilian ex-leader of your mercenary band had mismanaged your group into an insurmountable mountain of debt, which Princess Kamehameha promises to pay off in its entirety when she's restored on her throne. Which is actually a reasonable justification for why your group follows her goals as slavishly as you do, although this doesn't compensate for the atrocious dialogue writing and bland, one-dimensional characters.

Not only that, but the plotting of the main series of missions is off at times. For example, there's one mission on a planet being reconquered by the enemy, where your goal is merely to defend a base so that dropships can evacuate civilians, yet somehow succeeding in this mission results in the world being successfully defended. Or that forgotten Star League base filled with invaluable battlemechs, where your mercenaries apparently can't be bothered to take any of the Star League battlemechs for themselves when they have the chance and neither does anyone else on your side except for Kamehameha herself and two of her cronies (she then gifts you one of the 'mechs they escaped with).

Which is great, except that you can, you know, disband the group, take the 'mechs and, oh, I don't know, trade down 1 of the 4 for money for passage off into the Inner Sphere where it is heating up towards the 4th Succession War. And good luck the Periphery debtors chasing you all the way to the Inner Sphere to claim against a group that is not only disbanded, but belongs to some other dude who was your EX-EMPLOYER.

This is the first time I have heard of employees getting enslaved by the actions of their (former) employer, although why you can only be various shades of brown or black is suddenly making a hell of a lot of sense.

 

[PanteraNera]

The Brazilian ex-leader of your mercenary band had mismanaged your group into an insurmountable mountain of debt, which Princess Kamehameha promises to pay off in its entirety when she's restored on her throne. Which is actually a reasonable justification for why your group follows her goals as slavishly as you do, although this doesn't compensate for the atrocious dialogue writing and bland, one-dimensional characters.

Princess Kamehameha :D

Well yes, it is a valid point and does make sense.
But, big BUT in my eyes it does not justify that the mercenaries are all "Those villains", "For justice!", "Yay Princess Kamehameha", "We'll be your knights in shinning armor!" shit.

Also since you brought it up, again a game were it is poorly executed how the player gets into power (of a whole mercenary group).
But we can keep it short, the writing, story and characters just suck big times.

For example, there's one mission on a planet being reconquered by the enemy, where your goal is merely to defend a base so that dropships can evacuate civilians, yet somehow succeeding in this mission results in the world being successfully defended.

I was puzzled by that as well, I think there were other instances where the same happened but I haven't took close enough attention / the writing is to forgettable.

Or that forgotten Star League base filled with invaluable battlemechs, where your mercenaries apparently can't be bothered to take any of the Star League battlemechs for themselves when they have the chance and neither does anyone else on your side except for Kamehameha herself and two of her cronies (she then gifts you one of the 'mechs they escaped with).

This is so far the most stupid thing I encountered in the game! Like Cael pointed out it is against the Ares treaty which is a fucking big deal!
Even if it was not against any treaty, it would be just the most stupid thing to do, we are talking about stuff that is not build anymore, which is so fucking rare wars are fought over it. And they just destroy it. Insane. Unbelievable.

 

[PanteraNera]

I'm guessing the only reason we have a story at all is that HBS knows its audience. This game is essentially the combat system, and that's it.

But what puzzles me, Shadowrun Dragon Fall was so much better written, with out thinking to hard I can remember Eiger who served in KSK, Glory a "witch" that good rid of her magic by getting the most essence drawing cyberware into her body and this anarcho-shaman. Damn I even remember a lot of the missions. Same goes to a lesser extend to Shadowrun Hong Kong (this ghoul samurai and that russian rigger that put his aggressive personality parts into his drone).

And than THIS it is just ... what the fucking fuck.

As Cael had pointed out, they were not following the TT rules to closely, or the lore, I was expecting that (plus I was not hyped for the game at all). I thought it had at least an interesting story. Nope.

The game-mechanics are not bad, I enjoyed it for the first couple of hours (probably 10-20 hours) but it has so many flaws, like the un-skip-able JumpShip scenes, salvage system (which is kind of nice but often to much of a gamble) especially in regards to random missions that talk about "heavy mech" (springing the trap) and you are, "Yay new mech" just to find always a fucking heavy TANK, and accordingly going all salvage in the negotiation just to get nothing of value in return.

 

[Spark Mandriller]

This is so far the most stupid thing I encountered in the game! Like Cael pointed out it is against the Ares treaty which is a fucking big deal!

Ares Conventions are actually unrelated. Not only are they not in effect anymore (the Star League cancelled them when they wanted to invade the Periphery and didn't feel like holding back), but they don't say anything about lostech anyway. They were written way before the Succession Wars started, so there's nothing about leaving lostech alone since at that point lostech didn't exist (and half the things that would become lostech hadn't even been invented yet).
Though yeah, that doesn't matter, since it's incredibly stupid even without that, like you said. I don't understand how nobody on the team noticed how bad it was. Everyone who plays the game and has a clue about Battletech instantly realises how stupid it is. Why didn't the devs? Either they weren't paying any attention at all, or they know nothing about the setting, and neither of those options reflect well on them.

 

[PanteraNera]

Ares Conventions are actually unrelated. Not only are they not in effect anymore (the Star League cancelled them when they wanted to invade the Periphery and didn't feel like holding back), but they don't say anything about lostech anyway. They were written way before the Succession Wars started, so there's nothing about leaving lostech alone since at that point lostech didn't exist (and half the things that would become lostech hadn't even been invented yet).

Tbh I didn't know that, my knowledge of BattleTech is very limited as I played the tabletop game twenty years ago.
Cael brought the Ares Conventions up and as he seems very knowledgeable about the lore I thought this was correct.
I just googled it and found this link so yes you are right about LosTech not being covered by the Ares Conventions. (thought it states "Despite being considered no longer binding, the Ares Conventions continue to be seen as the guide for civilized warfare.").

I really really really hate it when some idiots use any setting (historical or fictional) and do not follow the established lore, contradict it or just come up with the own fucking shit.

 

[Cael]

This is so far the most stupid thing I encountered in the game! Like Cael pointed out it is against the Ares treaty which is a fucking big deal!

Ares Conventions are actually unrelated. Not only are they not in effect anymore (the Star League cancelled them when they wanted to invade the Periphery and didn't feel like holding back), but they don't say anything about lostech anyway. They were written way before the Succession Wars started, so there's nothing about leaving lostech alone since at that point lostech didn't exist (and half the things that would become lostech hadn't even been invented yet).
Though yeah, that doesn't matter, since it's incredibly stupid even without that, like you said. I don't understand how nobody on the team noticed how bad it was. Everyone who plays the game and has a clue about Battletech instantly realises how stupid it is. Why didn't the devs? Either they weren't paying any attention at all, or they know nothing about the setting, and neither of those options reflect well on them.

Although the ORIGINAL Ares Convention was not in effect, its successor code is the Honors of War, which people IN UNIVERSE refer to as the Ares Convention. Read any of the CBT novels and the Ares Convention is all over the place.

You can use sophistry and all that in your usual attempt at gotchas, but even in the Sarna.net article on the Ares Convention, it was mentioned that there is a descendent set of rules, and the novels makes it clear that the people in universe refers to this set of rules as the Ares Convention. The descendant rules do include not attacking things that are considered LosTech. In fact, I believe that it was first brought up in the first BTech novels ever: Michael Stackpole's Warrior Trilogy.

Once again, your lack of knowledge and 30-second google look up betrays you.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

How viable is full melee?

 

[PanteraNera]

here is the relevant quote from sarna.net

Sheer necessity caused the development of an informal code called "Honors of War" during the Third Succession War. This code, based on the Ares Conventions, was created in an age of ever-decreasing technological knowledge and manufacturing capability, necessitating a code of conduct which would ensure the survival of both knowledge and the increasingly irreplaceable 'Mechs and JumpShips. While created with different aims and lacking the means for oversight and less violent conflict resolution, both were successful in preventing further massive civilian death tolls.

 

[PanteraNera]

How viable is full melee?

It even has a Crushmaster Highlander!