MechWarrior Online has some of the best

feeling mech combat out there in terms of staying true to the

BattleTech/MechWarrior universe. Piloting your mech effectively enough

to be a

genuine asset to your team is a tough challenge and requires hours of

diligent

practice. I can’t count how many matches I’ve been

in over the past year yet there

are times I still feel like a complete noob when I get caught with my

britches

down (meaning I run into a pack of enemy mechs by accident and get

mowed down).

Then there are other days where I get that perfectly timed kill shot

to save the day just before the enemy team completes the takeover of our base. The

game feels

like a proper mech game. The mechs

feel and respond how I feel they should and that’s great.

Most

mechs that you own are fully customizable as they

should be. Why Founder mechs can’t change

their camo pattern

is beyond me. Moving

on though! href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/mwo/mech-customization-guide">The

MechLab is very well done and

allows you to see every

detail of

your mech and its configuration. Min/Max players will have a field day

trying

to squeeze the most they can out of every available ounce of tonnage.

Players

will find there’s a fine balance between armor point totals,

weapon loadouts,

and more. The development team obviously spent a lot of time working on

this

section and it shows.

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There

are currently two modes of combat matches available

for players – Assault and Conquest. Assault is a

straightforward 12 vs. 12

deathmatch mode with the additional option of capturing the enemy base.

Conquest

is all about gaining control over resource points (there are 5 per map)

and

attaining a total of 750 resources. The alternative method of winning

in this

mode is to destroy all the other team’s mechs. Be careful if

you choose this

route. Trust me when I say there’s nothing worse than your

team having 9 out of

12 kills (while our team had 8 mechs still alive) and still losing

because the

other team still gained control of all their required resources.

There

are a decent number of maps, but many of them are

just variations of themselves and can feel repetitive fairly quickly.

For

example, there’s Frozen City and Frozen City Night, or Forest

Colony and Forest

Colony Snow. The maps all vary in temperature which in turn directly

affects

the heat levels of your mech. Cold planets help to keep you cool while

really

hot ones never let you get below 10% max heat. It’s a nice

touch that really

adds to that sense of attention to detail when it comes to how mechs

operate.

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The

Bad





So

why did I only give the Gameplay portion of this

review a 77? Sadly, there are some big issues still plaguing the game

overall.

By this point in time, they should have been addressed or caused the

postponement of the official launch. The players were expecting a

massive patch

on launch day to address such issues as heat balance bugs, the addition

of factions,

and more, yet all they received were a few bug fixes and a change to

disable third-person-view

(3PV) use in the 12 players pre-made group matches.

The

MechWarrior universe lore and history is very deep,

and while you’re teased with that on the forums,

there’s no indication of this

in the launch window or the game itself minus some purchasable

holographic

House (factions) mini-statues you can put in your mech. The game is in

desperate need of a fully fleshed out House/Clan system and the battle

for the

Inner Sphere of planets needs to be known. Without this, the game

quickly

becomes a grinding mill of pointless matches. Sure, you gain cash and

experience

for upgrades, but at the end of the day, what’s the real

point?

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If

you’re a hardcore MechWarrior fan, you’ll get most

out

of the MechLab and the more intricate aspects of mech combat.

It’s exactly because

of this though that those

players will also be the first to see just how many shortcomings

MechWarrior

Online has in terms of balance bugs and missing MechWarrior universe

depth, thus curbing their enthusiasm and fun with the game.

While

the casual crowd will potentially have the

most fun with the game, they’ll also be the ones the most

confused because the

game does a horrific

job of

explaining mech customization and combat to players. In fact, it

doesn’t

explain either one at all. It also does nothing to explain the concept

of heat

penalties for firing too many of the same weapon types at the same time.

This

lack of guiding new players in the absolute basics of the game directly

impacts

the experience they’ll have – and not in a

good way.