izigame.me

Finished the campaign. Started the base game campaign since it also includes the new mechs in it. Overally this is probably a 7.5 or 8 \ 10. I will say I am a bit biased as I really like the setting. I play tabletop battletech. Here are a few things to note.
1) If someone isn't much into mechwarrior or battletech, I'm not sure this (and the base game) are worth it outside of a sale. I say that as someone who really likes the setting and wants Battletech and Mechwarrior to get more popular. I view it as just much better than Warhammer, though the two can still exist to fill different wants.
2) Even though the DLC gives you less time to spend with the pilots, they still did a decent job of character development.
3) I have a 3090 and a good CPU and this game ran fine, with no stutters that I could remember. Which tells me if I did stutter, it didn't really affect anything in a meaningful way.
4) The devs are very clearly battletech fans, and I appreciate the work they put into to try and marry in universe lore accuracy, tabeltop nods, and it being a real time first/3rd person mech game. Some of the in universe weapons just don't translate super well to a game like mechwarrior where you can actually aim your lasers (instead of there being a random chance to hit and a random chance to hit a certain spot in the turn based HBS game, or the tabeltop)
5)If you're coming from games like Armored Core, this is very different. It's slow and weighty, dont confuse it with mecha games. I love armored core too, but this is different and I like it for what it is. They focus on it being a lot more grounded in reality. But its still giant stompy robots vs giant stompy robots.
6)Few voice lines are a bit rough around the edges. I assume part of this was the cutting of some of the PGI staff (which sucks). I think they still managed a very good DLC despite these problems. Some of it is barely noticable and doesnt take away from the base story at all.
I will say they also do a good job of showing the difference between both Ghost Bear as a clan, and Smoke Jaguar (the base campaign) as a clan and how they operate and their attitude. There wasn't a lot of exposition dumping though there was a little bit here and there.
As far as negatives, there are only a few minor things. :
1) Missions that have an end boss or an end scenerio that could be the defeat makes re-doing the mission a little bit of a slog.
2) When you run past missions in the simulator, the time it takes to complete shouldn't include the like 60-120seconds of time you spend patting each other on the back while you watch the timer tick down.
3) I know the nervous comstar guy was a choice, but i think it wasn't a very good one. Knowing what comstar is, I'd be surprised they would send someone so nervous UNLESS it's all an act, which they never tease in the DLC. But, in his one defense, if i walked up to a 7+ foot tall mountain of a man (their elemental pilots) who looked at me angry i probably would be a little nervous.
4) That last mission shouldn't have ended in a cutscene or completely in a cutscene. No spoilers, but you know what i mean if you know it.
on the off chance PGI reads these (which i doubt, but some dev teams do) I had a few minor ideas to improve the base game overall. I think the DLC as is, is fine.
1)Make SRMs have a higher through armor crit chance per missile to give them a bit more of a use and nod to their actual purpose in the tabletop\in universe. Give aimed weapons a low to zero chance to through armor critical and give LRMs a low chance. Balance percentages as necessary.
2) Keep doing a great job. I know the industry and the layoffs has certainly made things difficult. Mechwarrior will always be a niche game, but i really really appreciate the care you give to the setting as well as the game. Hell, HBS battletech wouldn't have existed if you didn't go to bat for the franchise when stupid ass harmony gold knocked on your door with lawyers. I will FOREVER be thankful for that act, which you haven't been thanked enough for imo.
3) if you do, in fact, do a tukyyid DLC, you don't have to include the clans that got fucking wrecked in no time as playable. (nova cats, for example) but seeing it all in a cutscene would be cool.
4) after the story dlc is finished, adding a career mode like MW5 would be REALLY great. You already have it as a potential logical step based on the end of the base game. This would give this game life beyond just playing the campaigns once or twice.
5) I love that you support mods. That is the right thing to do. If you ever make a DLC that adds the ability to create and share custom campaigns or missions, that would add SO MUCH REPLAYABILITY to the game while you only really needing to create the framework. Do that if you don't do a career mode to at least keep MW5 mercs and MW5 clans distinct and having a purpose. You could easily add the UI for it in the simulator. (im sure doing it on the back end coding wise is probably difficult. I'm not a coder)