But they become about as good as locusts or commandos from mid-game on, perhaps worse because of a dearth of long range weapons. The Javelin is kind of okay at close range, at least early in the game. Other things gained in the DLC include two new battlemechs. The urban environment is great fun, with endless opportunity to separate and eliminate your opponents with clever strategy. That forced the catapults to come forward for direct line of fire shots, whereupon I promptly cored them using accurate long-range laser fire as they stuck their noses out. I felt kind of bad bringing down an entire high rise to get at one mech, but as the building crumbled he fell and shattered both legs, knocking him out of the combat. I had a low chance to hit the speedy bastard, but an easy shot on the building he was standing on. One time an enemy Javelin, one of the new light mechs that came with the DLC, jumped up and was spotting for LRM barrages from catapults hidden in some back alley somewhere. Using jump jets to vault onto the top of a tall building can give you line of sight right down the gullet of your enemies, but also puts you on a destructible platform. Unfortunately, the cars don’t move, so it does seem a little static, but I like to think that everyone got out and ran for cover when the mechs dropped in.Įverything in the city is destructible, which can be a blessing or a curse depending on how you use it. There are billboards with advertisements for various products from the game’s lore, corporate buildings sporting their logos, fountains (which count as water spots for extra cooling), parks (which count as forested tiles) and streets lined with cars and trucks. They are very detailed compared with the other more woodland or desert plains type of maps. Once installed, cities can pop up as battlegrounds for missions either in the main storyline or the career mode. The biggest addition is the urban environment as a combat zone.

But players are probably going to get it anyway, and love at least some parts of it. And it total, it provides a lot less of it than Flashpoint did. In truth, the amount of content is probably not worth the $20 price tag. I bring up the love and hate thing here because that easily applies to the latest DLC, Urban Warfare. And we also hate BATTLETECH because of its shortcomings, which include a lackluster main campaign, a very limited supply of mechs, a low number of maps, absolutely no reference to any of the vaunted clans and their supped-up mech designs (no Mad Cat?!?), and some serous optimization issues on anything other than the latest and greatest hardware. Many of us, myself included, have also enjoyed the tactical battle game, which I played with a great group of friends in college gathered around a hex map into the late hours. Love because it’s set in a world that many of us adore, with a rich backstory of human expansion, fierce clans and provisional governments, backstabbing, intrigue and of course giant robot death machines stomping around. And it didn’t stop thousands of gamers from voting for it and helping it win the GiN 2018 Strategy Game of the year.īATTLETECH is a game that fosters both love and hate. That hasn’t stopped me from playing it for almost half a month of real time. But even so, BATTLETECH has never gotten close to being a five GiN Gem Game. Granted, the Flashpoint DLC was a nice addition that added some much needed excitement away from the “help the princess” main storyline. And all this for a game that I described as a little bit lackluster in my original review of the core title. If this trends continues, I may overtake my Skyrim hours.

At last check, I had put in over 300 hours playing BATTLETECH, which is highly unusual outside of a deep role-playing game.

Battletech urban warfare release