From: willday@rom.oit.gatech.edu (Will Day)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action,alt.games.mechwarrior2,rec.games.mecha
Subject: Re: MechWarrior: Mercenaries suppose to be out. Review please?
Date: 1 Oct 1996 18:22:06 -0400
Message-ID: <52s5ie$aab@rom.oit.gatech.edu>

A short time ago, at a computer terminal far, far, away, wrote:

>>2. It appears that you can only take your lance into combat and use 
>>your aerotech pilot in the "mini-campaign" missions.  
> 
>Not sure.  The purely mercenary (non-storyline missions) 
>let you take all your troops.  But many of the early one-shot 
>missions set a distinct limit:  zero or at most one wing mate 
>allowed.  And even some of the sub-campaign missions put 
>you out there by your lonesome, like the ice-ship cave 
>mission (see more below). 

I haven't reach this in the game yet, but this seems really stupid, not to mention downright unrealistic. What employer is going to say to me:

"We'll pay you to take this mission, but we'll only allow you to take _one_ lancemate with you."

What is this, Clan Batchall?!?

"We've got this other merc unit that says they can do the mission with _zero_ lancemantes. What's your bid?"

>>3. Salvage Rights - These are predetermied in advance, and have 
>>nothing to do with how the actual battle went.  
>>  [snip] 
>>trying to make any money without salvage is a pain in the ass.  
>> 
>>        Also, I definitly miss the old contract negotiations from 
>>Mechwarrior I.  

Me too. Overall, the player seems to have very little, if any, control over his own mercenary life. I don't like that.

>>4. Related to #3 is the role of the Unit's Reputation. 
>
>Yes.  Unit reputation added to the atmosphere.  Also, 
>in MW#1, your team members could gain in experience 
>and abilities as they fought.  So,
>you could stick with an inexperienced (but basically mature
>and reliable) pilot and see that person's abilities (and
>monthly cost) flourish.

Right, I loved that! I especially remember learning to be very careful who I chose to hire. There'd be some extremely skilled pilot (A/B), but who had a very erratic reputation...when we got to the battlefield, he would outright refuse to follow any order I gave him! He'd just sit there, and wouldn't attack who I told him to, or would run off in some wrong direction. Worse, there'd be the "death-wish" guy who would madly run straight into battle with the biggest thing on the field, and promptly get torn to shreds. I learned very quickly not to hire these types. :-) But it was very impressive how they modeled that. And then, of course, the entirely unskilled pilot you find on some backwater planet, but who had a very loyal reputation, and who quickly matched her skills to yours and rose right up to excellent/excellent. It always took me several trips around the 'sphere to find her. ;)

>Also, *you* as a mech warrior had a rating, as well as a  
>reputation.  When you started off, you were rated "average" 
>or "below average" in gunnery, etc.  And as you proved 
>yourself, your official rating would climb. 

And you had to be careful to choose who you fought for - you had to also know the reputation of your _employer_. One house would give you great pay, but dangerous missions, but you told you that up front. Another would give you easy missions, but wouldn't pay very high. A third would give you moderate pay for moderate missions, but they had very poor intel, so they often ended up being very _dangerous_ missions. Others would just lie to you up front, knowing they were sending you on quite dangerous missions, and quite underpaid as well.

Plus, there'd be one house who would generally offer very good salvage percentages, so the better you were the more you could make in those missions. The only sore point here was that you couldn't _type_ in your negotiation offers. It sometimes took longer to hold down that up key than it did to finish some of the missions.

And you had to be careful who you fought for, and who you attacked, as they then wouldn't hire you later. It was quite impressive a game system they had modeled.

>These are all the nice "little" touches that add depth and 
>richness to a game.  Such little touches represent maybe 
>5% to 10% of the development effort (especially compared to  
>developing something like a 3D engine), but they account 
>for 20% to 30% of a game's perceived quality.  But it's 
>this extra level of effort that Activision seems reluctant 
>to expend. 

Yep. They depend too much on the scripted storyline, and don't give the player enough freedom to choose his own actions.

>>6. No map or travel like there was in Mechwarrior I.  
> 
>Another "atmospheric" element that helped flesh MW1 out. 

Definitely. You could even make money buy buying mechs and arms on central planets, and then selling on back-water planets. It was a very well done system.

I wonder where those programmers and designers are now? Maybe we can get them hired by FASA Interactive to work on MW3. :-)

===
Will Day