[Starman01]

Hello Battletech Fans !!!

It's time for our next update - the second MCO release. We wish to thank all the people who downloaded and played MCO's first release. Special thanks to all of you that playtested and reported bugs and other problems. Many of the problems and bugs found in the first release were fixed and there are many new features in the current build. We are very happy about receiving so much positive feedback and the interest you people still show into that yewel of a game.

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We would like to outline 4 very big changes in this new build :
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- Texture resolution for in game objects (mechs, vehicles, buildings) and terrain detail texture is now 256x256 (was 128x128)  (To clarify : It's now possible, but not changed everywhere already )
- Memory allocation for game and Editor is changed and that fixed many issues.
- New maps 140x140, 160x160, 180x180 and 200x200
- 15 (!!!) new mechs added to the game


(Click to enlarge)

Also, the following changes and additions have been made:

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Features included in this download are :
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- Texture resolution for in game objects (mechs, vehicles, buildings) is now 256x256 (was 128x128)
- Memory allocation for game and Editor is changed and that fixed many issues.
- New maps 140x140, 160x160, 180x180 and 200x200
- Activated ALL 4 weapon nodes for turrets.
- Max object texture resolution changed to 256x256.
- 3 wide resolutions supported; 1920x1200, 1680x1050 and 1440x900.
- reduced number of buildings and trees that can be rendered by the distance from camera (to prevent crashings or polygon overload).
- shadows will not render if distance from camera is too long.
- New maps 140x140, 160x160, 180x180 and 200x200
- Turrets and gates are free of object2
- Starmans Autocannon, LargeLaser, LRM and Calliope turrets included.
- Memory alloc fixed. Maps 180 and 200 are not crushing on exit now.
- All MC1 pilots are in MCO (by ThorC).
- New mechs Grizzly, Cicada, Crossbow, Ranger (by Magic)
- New Mechs  Sunder, Hellfire, Redesigned Mist Lynx, Blood Kite, Naga and Mad Cat Mk3 (by Karl),
- New mechs Uziel, Argus, Thanatos, Owens (by Karl, models by Starman)
- New mech Champion (by Karl - model by RavenIIC)
- Mobile Turret Control vehicle and Mobile AC Turet (by Starman)
- New MRM turret, MRM popup and camo turets and LRM camo turrets (by Karl).
- New/fixed ABL and brain file functions (check the moddb download description for more details on this issue)

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What's NEW in editor:
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- Max number of pilots doubled to 128.
- More skys added to editor up to 36.
- Editor mem alloc changed.

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Campaigns included (more will follow soon):
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Magic's Exodus Campaign (vers.2.0)
A rebalanced version (a little harder) of the old Carver 5 campaign which uses the new units.
MW2 Mercs as a fully playable campaign with the duration to the end of Solaris games.

New campaigns are in the work and old ones are in state of being ported over, we will release them in time and step by step.

So, without anymore talking, here you can find the download (click image)
(Note : It could take up to 24 hours after this news posting before the download will be available due to the authorization procedures on moddb. Deeply sorry for that).



Have fun !

If you haven't already, be sure to check out our Moddb Site and the sweet images being uploaded there, which will give you an impression what the new look will be.

Here is an example, what you can find over there and what we are planing for the new game :

   

(Click to enlarge the images)

You can find the Moddb-Page right here: http://www.moddb.com/mods/mechcommander-omnitech If you have an account there, be sure to sign up as watcher of this project, so you will be automatically informed about any changes we made there.

Be sure to check out our recruiting post as well (see our forum stickies). A really big cudos at this point to Magic, our lonesome warrior coder He would be very happy to double the size of his department, so if you have any skills in C++ and/or XNA; be sure to contact us if you want to help us out.  Also, UV-Mappers are always welcome at the party. If you think you can provide some skills (and not only the before mentioned), send us your "batchall"

Cheers
The MCO-Team

[Timerlane]

Looking forward to it coming online.

Possibly stupid question, but I figure it may come up: I do presume we should uninstall the previous Alpha first, and not attempt to install over it?

[PsychoLandlord]

Sweet. I look forward to running through it.

[Starman01]

Possibly stupid question, but I figure it may come up: I do presume we should uninstall the previous Alpha first, and not attempt to install over it

Exactly. I made some explanation in the description of the download over at Moddb. It's just placed there, because we cannot seduce the HLP Server for the download

[Timerlane]

It's up!

Downloading now.

[PsychoLandlord]

Badass, Downloading now.

[Patriot]

Yay, downloading.

And eh, Starman, if you're having trouble seducing something, drug it

[Boundless]

Downloaded, still playing.

Was the difficulty tweaked in some way? Not that i'm complaining but the game seems harder now (currently playing through Carver 5 again). Might just be i'm trying new mech combos, not sure.


Congrats and thankyou to the MCO team for another wonderful release.

[Starman01]

And eh, Starman, if you're having trouble seducing something, drug it

Will do Have fun playing guys

Regarding Difficulty, I don't know if Magic has tweaked the AI, at least he didn't mentioned it 

[Patriot]

Hmm, after some testing today i found out the procurement wasn't done yet for this version.

Any idea when the revamped version will be here? Cause getting more than 1 weapon of the same type would be nice without having to resort to cannibalizing mechs

[Starman01]

Sorry, but since the new logistic is currently in the works, we haven't altered the old files for the obsolete version. I wanted to do it for convinience, but we simply lack time / manpower for such a task

You can alter that easily in the purchase files :

In order to have more than one item/mech available, you will have to double the entry in the purchase file like this :

l Component20 = 124      //SRM
l Component21 = 124      //SRM
l Component22 = 169      //Small Laser
l Component23 = 169      //Small Laser
l Component24 = 168      //Small ER Laser
l Component25 = 168      //Small ER Laser

That will give you two of each type. Just watch that you have the number after "component" being increased by one in the correct way, same for mechs.

[PsychoLandlord]

Running through Carver V campaign again as well, have yet to hit any significant changes over the first release, save for the Texture Changes (and the game looks so much crisper with them, I might add.)

I'm wondering if you guys ever plan on implementing a 720p Resolution. I normally don't dick with the res too much, save for this time around, but all the available Widescreen resolutions (while miles better than stock, obviously) still leave black bars on either side of my screen. I'm on a 720p TV, so I figured you simply don't have one at that size yet.

I'll report back with anymore stuff I find as I get deeper into the game. Great work, as always.

[Patriot]

That'll be the purchase.fit file?

[Starman01]

Yes, there is one for each mission. The ones just called "purchaseXY" are for the Carver V campaign.

[Patriot]

Heh, anyway i can change my starting funds? xD

[Timerlane]

I'm not sure, but I got the feeling you tweaked the minimum ranges a bit, so longer range weapons can be more useful at closer-end medium range.
p.s. the Blood Kite is awesome. LRMs seem to keep firing up to a little before the SRMs take over, and the ERLL seems similar.

I think the AI on harder levels is less likely to fixate on a single target now, which was something I noticed in the last version. It seems a good bit harder to get a good backstab session going on an engaged enemy.

Heh, anyway i can change my starting funds? xD

Yup.

[General]
l VariantCount = 3
l PilotCount = 108
l InventoryCount = 15
l IComponentCount = 0
l PurComponentCount = 0
l PurMechsCount = 0
b FirstTimeResults = TRUE
st CampaignFile = "data\campaign\carver5.fit"
st CampaignName = "Carver 5"
st PlayerName = ""
l CBills = 12300000
l Group = 1
b BigMoviePlayed = TRUE
st MissionName = "Reacquisition: Base Gemini"
st MissionFileName = "mc2_02"
l CompletedMissions = 0

I added a few zeros...

[Patriot]

awesome, this is in which .fit file?


EDIT: Also a list of weapon numbers would be handy, so i can update later missions with ER Lasers and Clan versions :3

[PsychoLandlord]

The high level AI is much better about target selection now. I have tried to lure them into ambushes three times so far on elite and all attempts have failed (though they still walk right past fuel tanks without a care.)

Whoops, Timerlane got to it first.

[Timerlane]

awesome, this is in which .fit file?

Save your game(I like to call mine 'h4x', i.e. 'h4x.fit'), then find the file in the MechCommanderOmnitech\data\savegame folder, and open it in Notepad or some other text editor(you can ALT-TAB out and do it without closing the game). Once you're done, load that game, and you'll have the extra money.

You can drop in lots of cool stuff this way, once you understand how it works, though I don't know all the weapon codes, either. I just add other Mechs that have the weapons I want on them, strip them, and make the variants in-game that way. I do that in another save, then copy-paste it back over to the main file to keep things neat.

That was pretty much all that kept my interest going in the original MC2, particularly with the generally very predictable, poor AI: Playing with some of my favorite BT toys and blowing stuff up.

[Starman01]

EDIT: Also a list of weapon numbers would be handy, so i can update later missions with ER Lasers and Clan versions :3

Check compbas.csv in Object folders for the numbers. But note : Messing around with the values makes us supporting very difficult, so only change when you know what you do