Greetings GTribers!
As promised, here is my review of the game BATTLETECH. And without the spoilers.
For those who played XCom and XCom 2 turn-based strategy games, you will adapt to playing Battletech in no time. However, for those who have not played those games or have not played with the tabletop version, you may encounter some learning difficulty at first. The game comes with a very basic tutorial that kind of fails to teach you a lot of the other important details of the game play. I presume… See More
that the developers do want you to discover and learn along the way how the game works. Battletech is a turn-based strategy game that has a story campaign, PVP multiplayer and Skirmisher mode.
Personally with more than 200 hours of game experience, Battletech is a bit more complex compared to the XCom series. You will have to take in several factors besides terrain, cover, hit accuracy and range. There are planets that have Biomes affecting your weapons and heat management. Terrains like water reduces your mech's heat output or small areas in the map that can mess up accuracy. Heat management is important in this game. Too much heat may damage your mech or shut it down for one round. A mech on shut down due to over heat is going to be risky as you will be shot at by the opposing mechs with gusto. You cannot do anything until you reboot your mech.
In this game, you pilot giant mechs and are called Mechwarriors. Unlike hitting or head-shooting an alien, the game expand on that simple premises by giving you "Precision Shots" or "Called Shots" allowing you to target specific parts of the mech...namely the head, center torso, left and right torso, left and right arm and back of the mech. Destroying the head cockpit, center torso and the back center area completely always will be an instant kill. Always keep in mind that the back area of the mech has way lesser armor than in front. Flanking is very effective so be sure not to have your enemy the chance to strike you in the back in return. Battletech also takes into consideration with facing a target. Never get flanked my friend.
Destroying the arm or any part of the body, neutralizes any equipment, armament or weapon integrated in that part. Destroying the right or left torso, not only destroys the arm but the succeeding explosion in that area also damages the center torso. Destroying the leg, reduces the mech's movement and any other built-in equipment. Destroying both legs and the mech is automatically remove from combat. Besides the destruction, you can also salvage parts of the mech if not the whole mech itself. This is based on how many times you injure the pilot, by way of left and right torso explosion or knocking them over after they become unsteady. A pilot may have three to five injury resistance and knocking their mechs again and again, or destroying each of the side torsos, takes away one of those resistance. A single, clean headshot will give you the whole mech (three full parts). Decapitating both legs will only give you two parts while total destruction only gives you one. Simply put, you need three parts of the mech in order to have that mech.
There are four types of mechs in this game that you need to think about. They are based on their total tonnage. Highly evasive Light mechs move fast and jump way further but have lesser armor and limited hard points. Hard Points in this game is the amount of weapons or type of weapons a mech can have. There are ballistic weapons (Autocannons and the fearsome Gauss Rifle), energy (lasers and PPCs), missiles (short or long range ones) and support weapons (small lasers, flamers and machine guns). Medium mechs have better armor and can carry more weapons compared to light mechs. They are more balance in terms of movement. Heavy mechs are slower but have more armor and more weapons. Assault mechs are technically heavy mechs that have extra tonnage. This means they are the most armored among the mechs with terrifying array of weapons. They are also the slowest in movement.
Mech customization is fun in this game. You can set the amount of armor per part and depending on the hard points, you can equip your mech with a wide selection of weapons that can do varying damages, effects and ranges. You can also equip your mech with non-weapon equipment like improving your cockpit, enhancing your targeting system, leg and arm mods, gyros, jump jets, heat sinks and so on. It all depends on you my friend.
On my next post I will be discussing tactics and strategy. For now, I hope you enjoy reading my post.
Game on!