This all brings us up to the latest ‘Mech simulation: FASA
Interactive and Microsoft’s MechWarrior 4. It has several
departures from the previous titles in the series, but, at its
core, very little has changed since MechWarrior 2. As can be expected,
the graphics engine has slightly improved since MW3 – the
terrain and ambient objects are more varied, and the ‘Mechs
themselves are more detailed. The player takes on the part of
a young Federated Suns noble, who has returned from his battles
against the Clans to find his Kingdom trashed by vindictive Steiner
forces. The main campaign consists of around twenty missions,
all linear. Unlike Mercenaries, there are no randomly-generated
“side quests”, and the player must complete a mission
in the campaign before moving on to the next. Salvage is fixed
in each mission, a step back from Mercenaries. Damage is also
magically fixed between missions. Finally, there is an instant
action option (missing in StarSiege!) and a multiplayer option
played via Microsoft’s Zone.
There are several changes in MW4 that can be considered positive.
Each is relatively minor, but definitely change the nature of
play as compared to the previous games. First, the weapons have
been tweaked downwards – they do less cumulative damage,
and energy weapons have a longer “recycle” time. The
recycle time on energy weapons also makes heat management less
of a factor – only ‘Mechs firing multiple large energy
weapons all at once will experience heat problems. This tends
to drag fights out at length, compared to the relatively lethal
environment of earlier MechWarrior iterations. Another very significant
weapon tweak involves locking on with LRMs. Long-range missiles
in MW2 and MW3 ruled the battlefield. They are still powerful
in MW4, but lock-on constraints have been severely tightened.
Players will find themselves using slug-throwers more and more
often in close-in dogfights – which, unfortunately, again
tend to degenerate into circle-of-death contests.
‘Mech building has been changed for the good, and the bad.
On the positive side, ‘Mechs are no longer simple “weapons
boxes”, where the player can load any combination of weapons
he chooses on a ‘Mech. Keeping in the spirit with the paper-and-pencil
Battletech rules, ‘Mechs weapon spaces are divided into “pods”,
and each pod can only contain a particular weapon type. For example,
the Catapult, a long-range support ‘Mech, has two missile
pods and three energy pods – resulting in a ‘Mech that
cannot carry slug-throwers at all. This change definitely balances
different ‘Mech chassis nicely – players cannot simply
run around the game using only one ‘Mech for every situation.
(In MW3, example, once a player had acquired a Mad Cat, there
was absolutely no reason to pilot another ‘Mech.) The downside
is that ‘Mech building, beyond weapon placement, feels very
generic now. In the earlier games, a player lovingly placed every
component in a ‘Mech. In MW4, most of this is already done
for the player. As a result, damage tracking in the game also
feels nebulous – while it’s obvious when weapons have
been blasted off, there is no way of knowing if your heat sinks
have been trashed (for example).
Jumping is another change. Earlier MechWarrior games turned jump
jets into hovercraft skirts. In MW4, jump jets propel you straight
up – if one wants to jump forward, one has to be running
forward first. The jumping rules now properly take “Death
From Above” rules into account, although DFA attacks are
mainly “by guess and by God” affairs unless the player
is using an external view.
FASA acknowledged the “legging” problem seen in MW3,
but they went to far in fixing it. Legs seem to be impossible
to blow off. Severe leg damage seems to only result in massive
mobility problems, but I have yet to see a ‘Mech fall over
from leg damage – or any other reason, for that matter.
In summary, the biggest point about MW4 is how very little has
changed from previous designs. The A.I. is more competent than
the drones in MW3, the graphics are better, and the campaign missions
somewhat more varied than the usual seek-and-destroy, but frankly
there is very little new here.
