Mechwarrior Online

[Yskonyn]

How is MWO evolving? Does anyone here still plays it actively?
Is there any sign of the Galactic War being implemented in the near future yet or is it still going to be DM style gameplay for the foresseable future?

[RooksBailey]

Ack!  Double post!  Sorry about that.  Mods: feel free to delete!  :-[

[RooksBailey]

How is MWO evolving? Does anyone here still plays it actively?
Is there any sign of the Galactic War being implemented in the near future yet or is it still going to be DM style gameplay for the foresseable future?

I am concerned about the future of this game.  I enjoy playing it, but the game hasn't made any real improvements since I've been playing it the last few months (i.e., still no meta-campaign, no clan warfare, UI2.0 has yet to be released, still only deathmatch skirmish).  And now we got this announcement a day or so ago that really concerns me:

MechWarrior Online Preorders

Infinite Game Publishing has launched Project Phoenix, a preorder program for MechWarrior Online in advance of the official launch of the MMO mech game later this summer. Here's word:Starting today, fans can pre-order up to four different Project Phoenix BattleMech packages with prices ranging from $20 USD up to $80 USD for the top-of-the-line ‘Overlord’ package that includes a whopping 12 `Mechs!

Each of these unique Project Phoenix packages will be delivered on October 15th and come fully equipped with:

Unique Project Phoenix BattleMech(s)* featuring:
30% C-Bill Boost
10% Loyalty Point Boost
Exclusive Custom-Designed Exterior
Two Bonus Standard Variant `Mechs
Up to Four Faction Cockpit Medallions
Custom In-Game Title and Forum Badge
Matching Mech Bay slots
Plus more! Full details and FAQ can be found at www.mwomercs.com/phoenix

*Dependent on package.

This concerns me because I just don't see how it is possible for this ambitious online game to be ready by late summer/October. As it stands now, MWO is just a rudimentary pvp skirmish system at best. I would expect the far less ambitious Hawken to leave OB by then but not this game that is promising a meta-campaign with a 1:1 time scale based on official MechWarrior lore. Maybe they have been keeping a lot of good stuff under wraps, but I fear we might see a crash and burn on launch situation developing as this game is nowhere near the level it needs to be to actually deliver on the promises the devs have been making (in the past I estimated that Hawken is 65% complete to MWO's 40%).

Furthermore, while I have not spent money on MWO - but I have on Hawken, which should tell you something about the comparative state of the two games - I agree with the comments that this is like a royal screw to the early payers who purchased the "Founder's Package". It's like they are now offering a Founder's Package Part II to get some more money out of their loyal fans. I think they might be facing a revenue crunch, something I suspected from all the "hero mechs" they have been putting on sale despite the fact that the mech content is already outpacing the actual in-game content.

No, I don't see this as a good sign. I hope we don't lose one of the few mech games out there at the moment as I have become a big fan of the genre.

Edit: I found this quote on the official forum and I think it is spot on:

These packages will never be made available again because this game is going to sink before they get any sort of opportunity to offer them (or anything else) ever again.

Congratulations, PGI. Instead of shifting the game back into a role-defined team-oriented combat simulator using giant robots, you're giving us shiny new toys. So which one of them can cram the most PPCs, AC20s or LRMs on it? Because thats what this game's victory conditions come down to. Whoever can boat the most high-damage alphas.

This game is Call of Duty with giant robots. I challenge PGI to fix gameplay balance first -- or at least offering some kind of sign that gameplay balance is being addressed in a logical fashion... then maybe I'll lay down my cash for one of these packages.

Until then, this is just a shiny new distraction to keep people from remembering that MWO at this point is all about high-damage alphas and to hell with any sort of team-oriented tactics. 8-mans are horrible because it just consists of which team has the most ERPPC snipers.

Fix the game first, then ask for my money. I promise you I will pay you money if you at least give us an indication you're trying to steer this game back into the right direction it used to be in.

The problem I have with MWO is that even though this game has far more detailed mechs, with far more upgrade options than Hawken, combat always comes down to who deals out the most damage per second. MWO feels more like a destruction derby where the premium mechs dish out stunning amounts of damage on the free2play mechs. The balance definitely feels off to me in this regard. Even worse, though, is the disconnect between performance and result. Win or lose in Hawken, I always have a sense of why the result of the match was what it was. Not so in MWO. When a game ends, I am never clear just why my team won or lost. Maybe this is because I don't grasp all the details related to the various models of mechs, but even so this would indicate a design flaw where the player who isn't a MechWarrior veteran is left clueless. What is more, the game gives poor feedback on personal performance. Hawken is like Call of Duty in that it is always telling you when you earned XP because of something you did. MWO doesn't do that at all. It just dumps a bunch of XP/credits in your lap without explanation at the end of the match. And while Hawken makes it intuitively clear why you should be trying to level up your mech, or why you should be trying to earn as many credits as possible for that special piece of hardware that will buff one of your stats, MWO XP system is lackluster as best (and practically invisible), and the equipment is so nuanced and varied that I am never clear why I should buy one piece of equipment over another. I am always hungry for more money in Hawken, while I often have piles of cash sitting around in MWO. Again, this indicates a serious design flaw (especially seeing how there is far less to buy in Hawken! Sometimes less is more, MWO!).

Lastly, Hawken just looks so much better. In Hawken, you feel like you are in a multi-ton war machine because you can see your mech knocking over street lights, and kicking small vehicles out of the way. What is more, the maps all look different and interesting. The terrain in MWO, on the other hand, in bland, unimaginative, and lacks any sort of destructible terrain that would indicate that you are strapped inside of a massive war machine.

I think MWO has a lot of promise, but right now it remains a confused and under-developed game. So I find myself agreeing with that poster (however, I disagree about the CoD reference - MWO would be a far better game if it WAS more like CoD, something Hawken, ironically, understands). I know the MWO crowd likes to bash Hawken as not being a "real" mech game, but get a clue guys: those devs have developed the better mech game to date.

[Nefaro]

They've only added some mechs that I see.  Which is good, of course, but the game's extended future really hinges on the promised overarching faction warfare layer.  I'm not sure if they'll ever see that through, or if they do, whether it'll be anything near what we're hoping.

[jomni]

Tried it and got bored. In not good at this game. There's no sense of satisfaction.

[Kushan]

Purchasing the Legendary Founders package is the only purchase I regret from last year. I played a lot at first until it became apparent that only bigger mechs were actually worth using, and that the developers had little or no intention of fixing any balance issues.

Sounds like the developer is about to run out of money if they haven't already.

[RooksBailey]

The bad thing about MWO going down is that it might bring MechWarrior Tactics down with it seeing as they both have the same publisher.  Really, I never understood why MWT was going with a F2P model anyway.  As a turn-based strategy game, I think they would do far better by just releasing the game as a regular paid product, and then release periodic expansion packs with new maps and mechs for $15-20.  Matrix would have been the ideal publisher. 

[jomni]

Jagged Alliance Online is turn based F2P

[Martok]

Thanks for the update on the game, RooksBailey, including (and especially) your take on it. 

It's a bummer to hear, but not terribly surprising given what I've heard about MWO elsewhere. 

[Nefaro]

The bad thing about MWO going down is that it might bring MechWarrior Tactics down with it seeing as they both have the same publisher.  Really, I never understood why MWT was going with a F2P model anyway.  As a turn-based strategy game, I think they would do far better by just releasing the game as a regular paid product, and then release periodic expansion packs with new maps and mechs for $15-20.  Matrix would have been the ideal publisher.

I can deal with MWO taking a nose-dive.. even if I've actually purchased a mech on there before.

But MW Tactics taking a fall would be extremely disappointing.  I want that one to get finished and get out there.

[RooksBailey]

Thanks for the update on the game, RooksBailey, including (and especially) your take on it. 

It's a bummer to hear, but not terribly surprising given what I've heard about MWO elsewhere.

Don't mention it.  Just a gamer trying to help other gamers.   :) 

Wish I could be more upbeat, though.  Eh, who knows, maybe they will turn things around.  It took Eve a long time to get off the ground, too. 

Jagged Alliance Online is turn based F2P

Good point!  But, to be honest, I don't expect JAO to last two years as a F2P. 

I think this F2P methodology is being misused by many gaming publishers.  To me, making a shooter F2P, for example, makes sense.  Why?  Because the two shooter goliaths, Battlefield and Call of Duty, are so ultra-popular that they suck the oxygen right out of the room; the only way to get a new shooter community off the ground is just to give the game away for free.  Likewise, games with a solid branding angle, such as STAR TREK Online, LORD OF THE RINGS Online, and DUNGEON & DRAGONS Online, can benefit from F2P since the franchise has such high name recognition that most people hear "Star Trek" and immediately head on over to give it a try and subsequently get hooked.  F2P makes sense in both these cases (and, needless to say, where the game is going to go under anyway). 

But with those exceptions F2P just doesn't make sense to me, especially when it comes to turn-based strategy games that have a SP mode!  Turn-based gaming is now so niche that I just don't ever see a large enough F2P community popping up to support it without the devs nickel and diming the community to death.  And even then I am extremely suspicious that the game will make as much money as it could have by being sold as a traditional pay to play game with periodic expansion packs.  When I look at Mech Warrior Tactics, I see a great turn-based game that could have been a Slitherine/Matrix best seller.  Such a game would have been a natural for the tactically minded SP community.  Add in PBEM++ support for MP games, and so much the better.  Assuming the game is as good as it looks, I would have gladly paid $30-50 for such a game, and another $20 per expansion pack (assuming we would get a nice amount of new maps and mech per pack).  As a F2P game I suspect most people will play completely for free, and those who do pay will probably spend well below the $30-50 price tag I set for it as a P2P title (something that seems to be true for Hawken - hence the recent word that Meteor Entertainment has begun laying people off  >:(). 

I think Notch Persson, the phenom behind MineCraft, sort of validated this conclusion with his new game, Scrolls.  If you look at Scolls, you would think this would be a natural F2P game:  it's a collectible card game (check), has a strong MP component (check), encourages the trading of cards (check), allows you to spend real money to get more cards (check) and it even has a SP component.  But Notch deliberately ruled out F2P and made it a P2P game.  I think that says A LOT about the viability of F2P for a turn-based strategy game.

[Yskonyn]

Necro!

MWO seems to be going strong still and it seems like about Fall next year it will be the game I might be very interested in afterall!

http://mwomercs.com/forums/topic/145200-2013-state-of-the-inner-sphere/

Massive post with timeline for updates, explanation of features, etc.
The only thing I cannot ignore is that the guy who wrote the post is named Bullock .. ;)

[Nefaro]

Ugh.  They're adding a bunch of Clan stuff?  I'm not sure how they plan to implement the stuff but there's gotta be an obvious question about balance and making the current stuff obsolete.  I wasn't a huge fan of the Clan addition & backstory in the tabletop for a couple reasons and this is looking all too familiar.  At least MWO doesn't have much focus on backstory so I don't need to complain about that one.  :D

I wonder how they're gonna handle it when they implement faction-based planetary invasion.  Why wouldn't everyone just pick Clans to fight for since their equipment is so much better?  The devs certainly have some challenges to deal with.  I'd be surprised if they actually had the planetary invasion stuff in by October as they're projecting.  ???

[Martok]

Ugh.  They're adding a bunch of Clan stuff?  I'm not sure how they plan to implement the stuff but there's gotta be an obvious question about balance and making the current stuff obsolete.  I wasn't a huge fan of the Clan addition & backstory in the tabletop for a couple reasons and this is looking all too familiar.  At least MWO doesn't have much focus on backstory so I don't need to complain about that one.  :D

I'll admit to being interested.  But then, I did start playing Mechwarrior/Battletech around the time the Clans were introduced to the game universe. 

I wonder how they're gonna handle it when they implement faction-based planetary invasion.  Why wouldn't everyone just pick Clans to fight for since their equipment is so much better?  The devs certainly have some challenges to deal with.  I'd be surprised if they actually had the planetary invasion stuff in by October as they're projecting.  ???

Well in the game's lore, the Clans generally invaded planets being outnumbered 2-to-1 by the IS defenders.  So I'm wondering if Innersphere forces will get "free" mechs/vehicles to augment their strength?  I dunno. 

[GDS_Starfury]

Clan mechs ruined Battletech.  >:(