From Gamedreamz:
Ill be honest with you gamers. While the Hedgehog immensely enjoyed every millisecond of my time with Halo 2, looking back on PAX it wasnt my favorite game of the show. Simply because I just didnt have enough time with Halo 2 to really get a feel for it, the minute my Single Flag CTF round was up I was ejected from the chair and one of another hundred eager gamers took my place. Now with Mechassault 2 however, I was able to sit down for some nice long slogs, play it multiple times and come away from the experience with a newfound yearning for the games December release, and a ton of info on the game for you!
AN ALL NEW GAME-
While I reported on MA2: Lone Wolf at E3 I didnt have enough time to get a real sense for just how much the game has changed, for the better of course. The build we were offered at PAX was also a new one and had a lot of new features, modes, and maps available than at E3. I played on 3 different maps in 3 different modes, two of them brand new, and loved every minute of it!
MA 2 is now much more about team tactics now rather than your mechs individual strength. Remember all those chumps whod pick nothing but Madcats and Ragnaroks in the multiplayer mode, then proceed to thrash anyone who chose a smaller mech, well no more. Sure those big mechs are still on the battlefield, and they are just as lethal as ever but now youre going to have to work for them! By starting everyone out on foot, the game becomes one about making the best use of what you have, rather than just grabbing the biggest gun available. You may start out with nothing but a Hatchetman and a Rommel tank next to you, what are you gonna do now huh Big Foot?? The other big change is the shear level of tactics and crazy dirty tricks you can pull thanks to all the new non mech weapons on the battlefield. Youve all hear about the VTOLs, Battlearmor, and tanks, but until you actually get into a good team game you really have no idea just how deep the uses for them goes!
Lets start out first by telling you about the new modes and maps I was able to indulge in. One game took place in a large barren round map, with plenty of ravines, chasms and ridges making for some excellent ambush locales. The mode, Domination, a type of gameplay made famous by Battlefield: 1942 in which you have to capture and hold objective markers and keep them out of the enemys hands. In this game type and on this map use of the VTOL is vital for quickly ferrying Tanks and Battlearmor to hotspots to quickly secure the objective points. Whys that you ask? Because the land speed of the Battelmechs has been significantly reduced! Even the faster mechs like the Puma now feel like their servos were lubricated with molasses compared to the previous game, and big honkers like the Atlas can take forever to cross the battlefield! Why would Fasa do this you ask? To give smaller mechs and vehicles a fighting chance of course. One battle I fought with me in an Atlas and an opponent in the new Raptor mech lasted for over five minutes simply because I couldnt turn fast enough to track the little mother. In fact had the player made better use of the Raptors stealth abilities I might not have won that fight at all, which just shows you how big a handicap speed has become on the larger machines. Big ass mechs still have their moments however, as I said I did win the fight against the Raptor, and once I got to an objective marker I was able to easily dispatch all comers who tried to take it, supplied as I was with dropped ordnance from a VTOL! Still, this speed damper has given smaller mechs more value, especially when hunting the nimble tanks and Battelarmors which are dam near impossible to hit in a larger mech! Before I tell you about the second new map and mode I might as well detail the other major changes to the Battlemechs that I managed to pick out. First off yes, PPCs still home, though thankfully not nearly as much as they used to so smaller mechs and vehicles can dodge them if the pilot is good. Also the cloak effect now prevents tracking weapons like missiles and PPCs from locking onto them even when the cloaked mech is firing, further increasing the value of smaller mechs and the tanks!
Okay onto the other new mode on my new favorite MechAssult map, Rush Hour! I didnt catch the name of this mode but it plays perfectly into the underlying theme of the MA series, which is blowing shit up! Basically we had two bases, a Red base and a Blue base with a sprawling urban environment between us. Our mission, to vaporize the enemys base into its component atoms before they did the same to us! This map is awesome and I see it being the next River City, with plenty of skyscraper buildings and tight alleyways too small for mechs to pass through along with plenty of vantage points for Battelarmors to drop down onto the back of a mech from. As I said our objective was to blow the enemies base to rebar, which is not as easy as you might think. Unlike other MA buildings the HQ building is a rock solid fortress, too tough to go down to bombs or rockets fired from a VTOL, and too well defended for a lone tank dropped from a VTOL to take out. Toping it off, Rush Hour has one main road snaking through its tight district streets connecting the two bases, hence this road quickly became a killing ground as the larger mechs of both sides met in the center of it trying to push their way into the others base. So how did General Hog solve this quagmire and win Victory for the Blue team? Simple, I jumped in a VTOL and got two of my buddies to hop into Battlearmors and hitch a ride on my bird. With our fourth guy manning a deadly new Blood Asp, with its lethal Omega Strike attack, left behind to guard the base we set out to ruin Reds day. We started out by heading for the Reds deployment zone, the place where all their vehicles spawn. Nimbly dodging fired from their defense turrets, we proceeded to thoroughly trash all their shiny new rides parked on the curb! Battelarmors gain fully powered level 3 Pulse Lasers when attached to VTOLs and with my own rockets adding to the onslaught all the potential mechs the Reds would have the next time they respawned wouldnt be worth the recycling bin let alone the Death Road that ran right through the city, HAHA arent I a sneaky little rodent! We then went back and loaded up in the biggest mechs we had and with one of our guys providing supplies via his VTOL we easily overpowered the thrashed enemy mechs and then proceeded to finish off their HQ building for the win!
BRAINS OVER BRAWNS-
If you havent figured it out yet let me lay out real simple for you grunt. The tactical gamer will rule the battlefield that is MechAssault 2. Every machine has a vital role to play in MA 2 and the ways you can use them are nearly endless. While I was waiting patiently in line for my second bout, I saw a kid pick up an empty tank with a VTOL, he then proceeded to head for a huge bout going on between a group of mechs. With a look of utter glee the little rascal dropped the now rechristened bathtub bomb on top of an enemy mech blowing both of them up in a spectacular display of unconventional warfare! Another occasion when I was in Rush Hour the opposing team using some brains for a change used two of their Mechs as Trojan horses. Advancing into battle with Battlearmor equipped comrades hidden on their backs, and were it not for my opponents complete inability to push Face buttons faster than me I would have lost a perfectly good Catapult to the sneaky little weasel!
Even when youre on foot youve got tactical options. It hasnt been touched upon by other previews Ive read, but there are mannable turrets in MA2 and these turrets are equipped with a devastating new weapon. The POV Missile, a user guided mega bomb that can knock off a Battlearmor in one shot if used correctly! A teammate situated in one of these turrets along with some smaller mobile ones deployed by a VTOL provided excellent defensive fire in a round of CTF I played later in the day! In addition to manning stationary guns your little pilot can also lay down some good old C4. What goods that gonna do you ask? Quite a bit of good actually, especially when you plant a charge right underneath your flag or at the foot of a Mech that a would be enemy pilot wants to clamper into!
So as you see the depth of MA2s gameplay is staggering and its flexible enough to allow for some really creative and varied strategies. This leads me to my favorite moment in MA2 and one that really signifies just how crazy this game can get. While in a VTOL during our Domination game, I spotted an enemy tank advancing down a ravine, being the sick little creative bastard that I am I decided to harass him. Little did I know that when I got really close to the Rommel and accidentally hit the action button, I then latched onto the enemy tank and took him for a joy ride! Amidst all the hooting and hollering from along the line of gamers I tried to think of the sickest thing I could possibly do to this poor sap in such a situation. I think you all know where Im going with this, OH come on I know you do? Yeah thats right, I tried to Bathtub Bomb my captured Tank onto one of his own teams mechs! Sadly I missed, but you can definitely get the vibe for just how insane a game MA2 can be!
SHINED TO PERFECTION-
MA2s graphics are simply incredible. Sure the build we played on still had its share of glitches, framerate drops and graphical mishaps; but the games still 3 months from release so Im not worried one bit. While the polygons havent been upped dramatically nor the games geometry made overly complicated, what Fasa and Day One have done is up in every conceivable way the games special effects! Lets start out with the lighting because its probably the most dramatic thing that will hit your irises when you first hit the battlezone! Every building in the Rush Hour map was bathed in Neon lights that gave off a soft bright glow on everything that got close to them. The lighting effects are further enhanced by the new wax job all the mechs and machines have gotten. Every mech now shines and has armor plates that reflect light, not just lighting being cast by buildings but its own fireworks displays as well.
The weapons and ability effects is the other dramatic graphical improvement. The cloaking effect in particular has gotten a massive upgrade. While it was pretty tame in the original, the cloak now has that signature rippling effect that would make the Predator himself jealous. All the energy weapons also give off ambient lighting which is reflected by the machine thats shooting them and onto the machine or object receiving them! A myriad of other effects have been added alongside these additions, the list runs from new heat blooms for the Jump jets, to Shell casings being spit out by machine guns, put it simply MA2 looks as good as it plays, and as Ive already told you it plays very very well!
Ill be honest with you gamers. While the Hedgehog immensely enjoyed every millisecond of my time with Halo 2, looking back on PAX it wasnt my favorite game of the show. Simply because I just didnt have enough time with Halo 2 to really get a feel for it, the minute my Single Flag CTF round was up I was ejected from the chair and one of another hundred eager gamers took my place. Now with Mechassault 2 however, I was able to sit down for some nice long slogs, play it multiple times and come away from the experience with a newfound yearning for the games December release, and a ton of info on the game for you!
AN ALL NEW GAME-
While I reported on MA2: Lone Wolf at E3 I didnt have enough time to get a real sense for just how much the game has changed, for the better of course. The build we were offered at PAX was also a new one and had a lot of new features, modes, and maps available than at E3. I played on 3 different maps in 3 different modes, two of them brand new, and loved every minute of it!
MA 2 is now much more about team tactics now rather than your mechs individual strength. Remember all those chumps whod pick nothing but Madcats and Ragnaroks in the multiplayer mode, then proceed to thrash anyone who chose a smaller mech, well no more. Sure those big mechs are still on the battlefield, and they are just as lethal as ever but now youre going to have to work for them! By starting everyone out on foot, the game becomes one about making the best use of what you have, rather than just grabbing the biggest gun available. You may start out with nothing but a Hatchetman and a Rommel tank next to you, what are you gonna do now huh Big Foot?? The other big change is the shear level of tactics and crazy dirty tricks you can pull thanks to all the new non mech weapons on the battlefield. Youve all hear about the VTOLs, Battlearmor, and tanks, but until you actually get into a good team game you really have no idea just how deep the uses for them goes!
Lets start out first by telling you about the new modes and maps I was able to indulge in. One game took place in a large barren round map, with plenty of ravines, chasms and ridges making for some excellent ambush locales. The mode, Domination, a type of gameplay made famous by Battlefield: 1942 in which you have to capture and hold objective markers and keep them out of the enemys hands. In this game type and on this map use of the VTOL is vital for quickly ferrying Tanks and Battlearmor to hotspots to quickly secure the objective points. Whys that you ask? Because the land speed of the Battelmechs has been significantly reduced! Even the faster mechs like the Puma now feel like their servos were lubricated with molasses compared to the previous game, and big honkers like the Atlas can take forever to cross the battlefield! Why would Fasa do this you ask? To give smaller mechs and vehicles a fighting chance of course. One battle I fought with me in an Atlas and an opponent in the new Raptor mech lasted for over five minutes simply because I couldnt turn fast enough to track the little mother. In fact had the player made better use of the Raptors stealth abilities I might not have won that fight at all, which just shows you how big a handicap speed has become on the larger machines. Big ass mechs still have their moments however, as I said I did win the fight against the Raptor, and once I got to an objective marker I was able to easily dispatch all comers who tried to take it, supplied as I was with dropped ordnance from a VTOL! Still, this speed damper has given smaller mechs more value, especially when hunting the nimble tanks and Battelarmors which are dam near impossible to hit in a larger mech! Before I tell you about the second new map and mode I might as well detail the other major changes to the Battlemechs that I managed to pick out. First off yes, PPCs still home, though thankfully not nearly as much as they used to so smaller mechs and vehicles can dodge them if the pilot is good. Also the cloak effect now prevents tracking weapons like missiles and PPCs from locking onto them even when the cloaked mech is firing, further increasing the value of smaller mechs and the tanks!
Okay onto the other new mode on my new favorite MechAssult map, Rush Hour! I didnt catch the name of this mode but it plays perfectly into the underlying theme of the MA series, which is blowing shit up! Basically we had two bases, a Red base and a Blue base with a sprawling urban environment between us. Our mission, to vaporize the enemys base into its component atoms before they did the same to us! This map is awesome and I see it being the next River City, with plenty of skyscraper buildings and tight alleyways too small for mechs to pass through along with plenty of vantage points for Battelarmors to drop down onto the back of a mech from. As I said our objective was to blow the enemies base to rebar, which is not as easy as you might think. Unlike other MA buildings the HQ building is a rock solid fortress, too tough to go down to bombs or rockets fired from a VTOL, and too well defended for a lone tank dropped from a VTOL to take out. Toping it off, Rush Hour has one main road snaking through its tight district streets connecting the two bases, hence this road quickly became a killing ground as the larger mechs of both sides met in the center of it trying to push their way into the others base. So how did General Hog solve this quagmire and win Victory for the Blue team? Simple, I jumped in a VTOL and got two of my buddies to hop into Battlearmors and hitch a ride on my bird. With our fourth guy manning a deadly new Blood Asp, with its lethal Omega Strike attack, left behind to guard the base we set out to ruin Reds day. We started out by heading for the Reds deployment zone, the place where all their vehicles spawn. Nimbly dodging fired from their defense turrets, we proceeded to thoroughly trash all their shiny new rides parked on the curb! Battelarmors gain fully powered level 3 Pulse Lasers when attached to VTOLs and with my own rockets adding to the onslaught all the potential mechs the Reds would have the next time they respawned wouldnt be worth the recycling bin let alone the Death Road that ran right through the city, HAHA arent I a sneaky little rodent! We then went back and loaded up in the biggest mechs we had and with one of our guys providing supplies via his VTOL we easily overpowered the thrashed enemy mechs and then proceeded to finish off their HQ building for the win!
BRAINS OVER BRAWNS-
If you havent figured it out yet let me lay out real simple for you grunt. The tactical gamer will rule the battlefield that is MechAssault 2. Every machine has a vital role to play in MA 2 and the ways you can use them are nearly endless. While I was waiting patiently in line for my second bout, I saw a kid pick up an empty tank with a VTOL, he then proceeded to head for a huge bout going on between a group of mechs. With a look of utter glee the little rascal dropped the now rechristened bathtub bomb on top of an enemy mech blowing both of them up in a spectacular display of unconventional warfare! Another occasion when I was in Rush Hour the opposing team using some brains for a change used two of their Mechs as Trojan horses. Advancing into battle with Battlearmor equipped comrades hidden on their backs, and were it not for my opponents complete inability to push Face buttons faster than me I would have lost a perfectly good Catapult to the sneaky little weasel!
Even when youre on foot youve got tactical options. It hasnt been touched upon by other previews Ive read, but there are mannable turrets in MA2 and these turrets are equipped with a devastating new weapon. The POV Missile, a user guided mega bomb that can knock off a Battlearmor in one shot if used correctly! A teammate situated in one of these turrets along with some smaller mobile ones deployed by a VTOL provided excellent defensive fire in a round of CTF I played later in the day! In addition to manning stationary guns your little pilot can also lay down some good old C4. What goods that gonna do you ask? Quite a bit of good actually, especially when you plant a charge right underneath your flag or at the foot of a Mech that a would be enemy pilot wants to clamper into!
So as you see the depth of MA2s gameplay is staggering and its flexible enough to allow for some really creative and varied strategies. This leads me to my favorite moment in MA2 and one that really signifies just how crazy this game can get. While in a VTOL during our Domination game, I spotted an enemy tank advancing down a ravine, being the sick little creative bastard that I am I decided to harass him. Little did I know that when I got really close to the Rommel and accidentally hit the action button, I then latched onto the enemy tank and took him for a joy ride! Amidst all the hooting and hollering from along the line of gamers I tried to think of the sickest thing I could possibly do to this poor sap in such a situation. I think you all know where Im going with this, OH come on I know you do? Yeah thats right, I tried to Bathtub Bomb my captured Tank onto one of his own teams mechs! Sadly I missed, but you can definitely get the vibe for just how insane a game MA2 can be!
SHINED TO PERFECTION-
MA2s graphics are simply incredible. Sure the build we played on still had its share of glitches, framerate drops and graphical mishaps; but the games still 3 months from release so Im not worried one bit. While the polygons havent been upped dramatically nor the games geometry made overly complicated, what Fasa and Day One have done is up in every conceivable way the games special effects! Lets start out with the lighting because its probably the most dramatic thing that will hit your irises when you first hit the battlezone! Every building in the Rush Hour map was bathed in Neon lights that gave off a soft bright glow on everything that got close to them. The lighting effects are further enhanced by the new wax job all the mechs and machines have gotten. Every mech now shines and has armor plates that reflect light, not just lighting being cast by buildings but its own fireworks displays as well.
The weapons and ability effects is the other dramatic graphical improvement. The cloaking effect in particular has gotten a massive upgrade. While it was pretty tame in the original, the cloak now has that signature rippling effect that would make the Predator himself jealous. All the energy weapons also give off ambient lighting which is reflected by the machine thats shooting them and onto the machine or object receiving them! A myriad of other effects have been added alongside these additions, the list runs from new heat blooms for the Jump jets, to Shell casings being spit out by machine guns, put it simply MA2 looks as good as it plays, and as Ive already told you it plays very very well!
