WHAT IS MECHWARRIOR ONLINE?
MechWarrior Online is a
massively multiplayer simulation game World of Tanks clone with robits, developed by
a sentient mass of incompetence and ill will Piranha Games. Set in FASA's venerable BattleTech universe, MWO puts players in the role of the eponymous giant robot pilots, allowing them to
re-enact battles involving the houses of the Inner Sphere and mercenary corps, both player-made and canonical throw themselves into an endless meat grinder of decent-ish mechanized combat, grinding for Neo-Shekels to buy the parts they need for the next flavor of the month ‘Mech build. Community Warfare promises to let players align themselves with a canonical House or mercenary corps. This feature is coming
soon soon-ish eventually when Hell freezes over.
- MechWarrior Online is supposedly a simulator first and an action game second, but there are no upkeep costs associated with ammo or repairs and you’re free to jump out into a “balanced” third person camera that was implemented in all game modes against the community’s wishes.
- The battles are purposefully paced but brutal, and you'll have to
coordinate with your lance, exploit your enemies' weaknesses, rush out into the fray to core some dudes and/or get torn apart by missiles and think on your feet to succeed lose the match to make sure the game doesn’t raise your Elo rating and match you up with tryhards.
- The basic gametype consists of three lances (groups of four BattleMechs) pitted against each other on large maps. The battle ends when a team is completely wiped out, or when one team captures the other's base, whichever comes first.
- Actual 'Mech warfare is a combination of classic MechWarrior games, faithful depictions of BattleTech canon from the tabletop game and novels, in addition to some newly introduced elements. It’s also at the mercy of updates that nerf the most popular strategies in bizarre and unintuitive ways in addition to breaking random shit that may or may not get fixed eventually.
- 'Mechs come in all shapes and sizes, from 20 ton Light 'Mechs that specialize in scouting and evading enemy fire, to the 100+ ton Assault class decked out with weapons and heavy armor. Some of them are laughably bad and useless, though, and matchmaking revolves overwhelmingly around whatever’s been nerfed the least by recent updates.
- Players have a pilot skill tree that allows them to unlock modules that can modify the performance of any 'Mech, and can also progress through a skill tree to improve the performance of each 'Mech and 'Mech variant they pilot. This equates to a massive grind for general XP to unlock good modules, which can be conveniently acquired by paying real money to convert ‘Mech-specific XP to general.
- MWO includes
full support for joysticks, throttles, pedals, and gamepads, but you’re horribly handicapping yourself
- There is a MechLab, which is actually pretty neat and offers pretty respectable customization options.
- MWO is powered by CryEngine 3, so expect
eye-pleasing mediocre visuals and respectable iffy performance on modern machines.
F2P? P2W? FREEMIUM? A BOOT STOMPING A HUMAN FACE FOREVER?
MechWarrior Online is
free to play! This means that the game forces you to grind for many hours to unlock stuff with in-game credits unless you feel like buying mechs with real money and/or paying for premium time. If you’re worried about "pay2win" shenanigans,
stay worried, because there are some ‘Mech variants that can only be purchased with cash, though not all of them are overpowered.
WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE LIKE THIS?
