Mechwarrior Online: Mismanaging Expectations

This timeline highlights the major events in the history of MechWarrior Online's development by Piranha Games Inc. Please read the following explanation to understand its use and purpose. This is *incomplete* clearly, but since history's become interesting, have a look.

The timeline defaults to the first story. You can click and drag in the main viewing pane to scroll left-to-right in ascending date order, or use the preview bar at the bottom to quickly locate articles and jump around chronologically.;xNLx;;xNLx;Click any news heading to expand it click again to preview related images, pictures, a detailed explanation, and source links as appropriate.;xNLx;;xNLx;As some links to posts or articles may no longer be accessible, transcripts and/or screenshots are provided for historical context -- but may not be complete. Please visit source links for full, original context.;xNLx;;xNLx;Some articles that contain quotes from Forums or Social Media will appear to contain typographical errors and you may see "broken" BBCode or HTML -- no changes, corrections, or edits have been performed. These are source material errors as seen in the original context, and have been retained as-is.;xNLx;;xNLx;Timeline events are sorted by category. Use the wrench in the lower right to toggle display for each category on/off. You can also change the view display mode for more convenient data display.;xNLx;;xNLx;Only one category can apply, so a Twitter post about UI 2.0 would be yellow, not aqua.;xNLx;;xNLx;If you would like to discuss the MWO Timeline, please do so at the official MWO forums at http://mwomercs.com/forums;xNLx;;xNLx;A static "review copy" mirror of the timeline -- periodically updated -- is available at http://partedveil.com/MWO ;xNLx;;xNLx;;xNLx;;xNLx;DISCLAIMER:;xNLx;This is being produced as a fan effort to help organize significant events and chronicle the development out of interest and novelty value, and to serve as a conveniently-sourced collection of notable statements. There is no guarantee of accuracy in the dates and timestamps as they are entered by hand, and non-English sources are machine-translated. Always visit the provided original links for full context.;xNLx;;xNLx;MechWarrior Online and Transverse are developed and published by Piranha Games Inc. and PGI is not associated or involved with the creation or maintenance of this timeline. Promotional media is created for and owned by respective authors, not the timeline creators; it is presented for historical reference purposes and not intended to represent an endorsement or offer. Ghost heat is the worst thing ever but mechs are pretty fun and you need more mechs in your life.

MWO Dev Blog 0 - PGI and MWO The story behind MechWarrior Online's birth and PGI's role

MWO Dev Blog 1 - Community Warfare Paul describes the live timeline, Loyalty Points, player-run organizations, factional warfare, and the conflict map.

Developer Interview 3 "We have to be sure that the game is solid, has the right features at launch" "Does this mean we dumb the game down for the casual, new player? No it doesn't. We just need to make sure the new player has an enjoyable time while they learn" An optimistic start for a game that eventually is known by long-time players and reviewers alike for being dumbed-down despite having a notoriously awful new player experience.

ZAM: Bryan on Key Pillars, New Player Experience, Market for giant robots Bryan describes key facets of the game's design. "We plan to guide new players through a very simple and short series of tutorials designed to give them a basic understanding of how to pilot a `Mech. Once they have mastered these basic techniques, we can expose them to more advanced concepts..."

MWO Teaser Trailer A good piece of red meat showing off the MWO aesthetic, our first good look at mechs, and some good butt rock for the soundtrack.

ZAM: Russ on Pre-Production, F2P, Clans, creating new MW title "[T]he pre-production process for MWO was several years long and because of that we're going to be able to release MWO in 2012 at the quality level we think this game deserves," Russ says.

NaturalPoint: TrackIR Support for MWO! TrackIR and Piranha announce collaboration to integrate TrackIR for the most immersive piloting experience since Tesla Pods.

ZAM: Paul discusses Lobbies, Balance, Key Pillars Will players be able to swap out their Mechs during a live match, or must it all be set up in advance? "[T]here is a staging room/lobby prior to dropping into the match"

Closed Beta Invitations Begin Players begin receiving invitations. A new status bar at the top of MWOMercs.com has players eagerly awaiting their acceptance into the beta program and a change from "Pending."

ZAM: Matt discusses Mech Sim vs FPS, Lobbies, Groups, Modes Will players fine-tune their mech to a particular location? "Definitely. You certainly don't want to be taking large numbers of lasers into battle on a map with a higher ambient temperature," Matt says.

Mech: HBK-4SP, HBK-4J, HBK-4G A new set of Hunchbacks that can hold a different variety of weaponry.

Patch: Closed Beta #1 The first patch brings new variants for the Hunchback, a new weapon, and a new map.

Gear: LB-10X AC A mech-sized shotgun. Not very popular.

Map: Frozen City A chilly-looking city. Doesn't actually have heat changes yet.

PGI: Announcing the Razer Artemis! (Custom Joystick) PGI unveils collaboration with Razer on an immersive new controller for MWO. Fans super excited.

E3: Razer shows new peripherals CapsuleComputers talks to Razer about their peripherals on display at E3 2012, including Artemis.

Razer: Artemis and Mech Lab "We knew that this was the perfect chance to collaborate with Piranha Games to create the perfect control system for MechWarrior Online," Razer says.

Russ: Community Warfare within 90 days of Open Beta! Russ posts an exciting update: "Once fans are completely familiar with creating their 'Mech and pilot trees, the depth of Community Warfare will be added, with the core of the community experience projected to be in-game within 90 days of open beta."

Europeans will be able to transfer accounts to their regional server European fans who have already been purchasing content and playing on the NA servers will have the option to transfer their account to the upcoming EU servers. Awesome!

Patch: Closed Beta #2 Commando is introduced. At this time, light mechs are very fast (over 200KPH on a Commando is common) and the engine cannot cope, so players with high pings see them warping around.

Mech: Commando A new light mech! The Commando (also known as the Metal Baby) zooms around the battlefield, generally being very annoying and very difficult to hit due to its small size and network code issues.

Gear: AMS Introduced Anti Missile System introduced

Gear: AMS Removed Turns out it was crashing the game constantly.

Mech: Centurion A new mech introduced!

Ballistics Improvements: More Ammo, Bigger Hitboxes Gaussapult born: Ballistic ammo increased by 25% per ton. Ballistic weaponry now has a 0.25m hit zone instead of being 0-size particles.

Patch: Closed Beta #3 The third patch, bringing with it ballistics changes.

Map: Caustic Valley A new map! An industrial site on a hot volcanic world is introduced.

ZAM: Dennis talks Mechs weight and scale, art consistency Getting the "mech feel" right is Dennis' priority. "A 'Mech can feel big and heavy next to a larger structure if subtle scaling cues are present."

Mech: Awesome A new mech! Very interesting loadout options available despite vulnerable hitboxes. Capable of going quite fast, making it a good brawler.

Group Teaming Fixed Groups no longer have a chance to split between both sides in a match at the start, and will be on the same team.

Duncan Fisher (George Ledoux) joins in MWO fun The voice actor behind MW4's super-popular Solaris announcer starts to play MechWarrior Online.

Mech: Founders Chassis Added Founders Jenner, Founders Hunchback, Founders Catapult, Founders Atlas are all added to the game. They have a C-bill boost and unique geometry with a pleasing blue color scheme.

Map: River City A new map that takes place in an industrialized city is released.

Weight matching added You will no longer encounter an 8-Atlas wall if you drop with a mixed group. Everybody's happy. Up until this point, the matchmaker did not bother trying to account for team composition.

Economy: Repair & Re-Arm MWO begins to see an economy take form, although some players forget to repair or reload properly. Ammunition and damage cost c-bills to fix up, although some players choose to launch without full refills to save money.

Run Hot Or Die! Fan Tournament Intrepid fans host their own tournament with groups from across the globe participating. Hosted via third-party websites, groups employ "sync-dropping" to catch each other in a match due to lack of lobbies.

Reuters: MWO To Feature Integrated VOIP Solution PGI promises a custom integrated VOIP and text chat, collaborating with Vivox. Groups and solo players rejoice! “Vivox’s C3 platform provides us with a solution we can grow into,” Russ says.

Engine Limits; Rise of Gaussapult Brawling suffers a blow as all mechs are significantly slowed down. Large-but-fast Awesomes are now just a big, slow target for K2 Gauss platforms. Hunchbacks far less effective against heavier mechs.

Economy: Match earnings substantially reduced The C-Bills you earn for a game get slashed dramatically, which makes repair/re-arm begin to sting a little.

"MFT" Mech Fitting Tool is now available for download The first fan-made mech building program is unveiled, allowing players to create and share designs.

NDA Restrictions Removed Until this point, all video and GIFs released was technically against the rules. The floodgates open now that it's allowed.

BlueVision Warrior: Thermals now a solid blue coloration scheme Previous colored heat vision is replaced with glowing blue mechs. Some begin to call the game "Bluevision Warrior."

Run Hot Or Die II Preliminaries A new season for the fan tournament.

CryEngine 3.4 - Breaks everything. Fans demand open beta delay until fixed. The eagerly anticipated engine update ended up breaking quite a bit, leaving the game very difficult to play. Closed-beta fans cry out to delay the open beta, lest a horribly impression be made on reviewers and the public who are waiting with bated breath.

Dx 10, Dx 11, and 3D Vision disabled "temporarily" A big selling feature, still advertised in official materials as of March 2014 despite being conspicuously absent, DirectX 11 graphics were removed very early in development.

Paul Gets Tackled - A lot. At the time, mechs could tackle other mechs (given weight/speed). Paul later goes on the record to state this had nothing to do with collision removal.

PC Gamer: MechWarrior Online open beta delayed "Last week, Piranha Games announced that the MechWarrior Online open beta test would start tomorrow. Then, later last week, Lead Designer Paul Inouye responded to community concerns over instability with the news that the open beta will be pushed back indefinitely."

Gamasutra: MechWarrior Online's unconventional crowdfunding pays off IGP captured MechWarrior's hearts to the tune of $5M, we learn. IGP CEO Nick Foster reports, "The success of the Founder's Program reinforces IGP's vision to help independent developers build exceptional games with the right economic model for the global marketplace." A ringing endorsement for crowdfunding if ever there were.

The Escapist: Mechwarrior Online Beats Kickstarter "The Founders are helping us fund, develop and support the game in order to deliver the best online gaming experience" - IGP Pres. Kelly Zmak