It’s true. According to developer Pirahna Games in conjunction with Smith & Tinker, the clock is about to be turned back for a prequel to the much-loved MechWarrior and MechAssault series that spawned from the BattleTech universe. According to an October 15th, 2007 news release from Smith & Tinker, the coveted rights have been licensed for the MechWarrior franchise.
Flashback to 1997. I logged into AOL to find an announcement of a new service that AOL was offering to its members while it was preparing to buy out it’s growing competitor CompuServe. There was a list of games that they were offering. Among them was BattleTech:Solaris. I have been a fan of robots and robot warriors since childhood as well as a BattleTech RPG player in its early days. The idea of playing a video game against another live player intrigued me as I easily tired of the computer constructs that were being passed off as AI’s in computer gaming at that time. Being the proud owner of a brand new Pentium Pro w/ MMX, a Matrox Millenium video card, dual Hayes 56k Modems and two phone lines I was hooked deeply into a world of competition that was exciting and stimulating.
Alas, the trappings of adulthood began to take a higher priority in my schedule and time for online competition was not as available as it once was. With this I moved into spending more time with playing MechWarrior 3 and MechCommander on my PC. I followed the MechWarrior PC franchise avidly. When MechWarrior4 came out, I was once again hooked with the idea of on-line play against other players. I was also intrigued by a video ad that came with one of my expansions for MechWarrior 4. It had this steady four on the floor metal guitar driven sound byte with graphics of a Mad Cat armed with PPC’s side strafing as it circled a Raven. It was an ad for the launch of MechAssault. The launch was to coincide with the release of a new gaming service tied into Microsoft’s new gaming console the Xbox scheduled for November 15, 2002.
While I was not able to take part in the initial launch of the game, I jumped on board and got active just months before the release of MechAssault 2: Lone Wolf . I was an avid member of the MechAssault community until spring 2008, when I read an article stating that a Microsoft Gaming VP had publicly announced that Microsoft “did not find it to be a good use of resources to invest in further developing the MechWarrior franchise”. I angrily cancelled all Xbox Live accounts my family had. If they didn’t find it a good use of resources to develop another game, I did not find it a good use of resources to keep paying them my annual subscription fees. Yeah, I laugh at that now too. My paltry $49 per account wasn’t really making a dent in Microsoft’s bottom line enough to make an impact on their decision but it sure made me feel better. Recently, we upgraded our Xbox to a 360 and I felt the pang of wanting to play in some matches with some of my old pilot buddies. That’s when I found out that Microsoft was scheduled to discontinue support of all classic Xbox Live games. MechAssault 2 was officially no longer supported by Xbox live as of April 15th, 2010. Tax day of all days.
I eventually reconnected with some of my old gaming buddies. We talk about the fun times we had “back in the day” and use the skills we developed in that arena to occasionally spread some pwnage. So, with the news that a new console game in the franchise is in production I am as excited as a kid in a candy store with a $20. Until then, I am just going to have to make due with this until it arrives (click the word this).
If you have never heard of BattleTech, here are a few links for you to check out:
