[General Battuta]

No, Battletech is for the mature and politically savvy rather than gloomy heavy-metal teens.

[Scotty]

And our guys are cooler.

C'mon, they're GIGANTIC WALKING TANKS, spewing death at each other over the battlefields of hundreds of worlds [cackle]!!!!

[Mongoose]

Every comeptent commander in the history of war is rolling in his(her?) graves at that statement.

Hey, it worked perfectly up until World War I.

[Colonol Dekker]

nam. . . So when's 4 getting released for free, i've looked at mektek and no joy.

[Cyker]

Hmf, I had never really been a BT fan because I don't use Joysticks and MW is impossible to play without one, but having read up on that wiki that got posted earlier I learned I proceeded from a false assumption based on my MechCommander experience.  I always assumed that the Inner Sphere forces were the de facto "good guys" in the BT universe, with the Clans being some "faceless" oppressor force killing to kill or sommat.  Now I find out that from a perspective of the survival and improvement of Humanity, the gods damned Clan is the good guys.

Huh? I played every single Mechwarrior with mouse and keyboard like any other shooter.

Yup. It actually plays pretty well the way I have it set up: Mouse twists torso, W/S accelerates, A/D turns the mech. Up until then, I had never really laterally twisted at the torso; fighting had just consisted of me running up to the bad guys, then walking back, and so on and so forth until one of us were dead.

Yeesh, I never could play MW2 or 3 with keyboard and mouse. It'd be liked playing TIE Fighter with a mouse - Possible but... weird. (Although I had a friend who beat my my Interceptor, Defender and Advanced lap times using a mouse... )

Sidewinder 3D Pro all the way for me; Much faster reactions and can circle-strafe forever

Only downside is you loose out on long-range accuracy, but I only piloted heavy-mechs and lower (Assault mechs are just too damned slow!) so most of my tactics involved running round shooting people in the back
(As you can guess I wasn't very good in urban combat...)


Oh, and MW4 wasn't the first to do the mech reactor explosion; MW3 was - Watch the (awesomly fantastic and still unbeaten) intro sequence where the Atlas and Mad Dog shred the Timber Wolf - "He's going critical! Ejectiiiing!"

Actually, watching the MW5 vid, it almost seems to pay homage to that scene!

I just hope MW5 is more like 3 and 2... MW4 was more like playing Heavy Gear or Shogo; Far too arcady and felt more like you were piloting a Fischer Price My First Plastic Mech than a 75 Tonne war machine!

[NGTM-1R]

BT is what 40k would look like if it were actually plausible.

...no wait, that's Rifts.

There are different scales of evil. Word of Blake is off there sitting at the far religious-fanaticism possibly-wipe-out-the-human-race end, the Clans are, for the most part, somewhere towards the far end for their social structures, the Capellan Confederation ain't terribly evil but likes to push the limits of acceptable behavior disturbingly often, the Draconis Combine is more backwards in their society but more acceptable in their intentions, the Lyran Alliance is sitting in at the near end for widespread corruption, and the Federated Suns is tucked in with the evils of modern society. The Free Worlds League would be too, except for being in bed with Word of Blake.

The only totally pristine organization is probably the Com Guards, but even for them politics gets in the way a lot.

[mxlm]

The only totally pristine organization is probably the Com Guards, but even for them politics gets in the way a lot.

After the coup, sure. Prior to Waterly's overthrow they were pretty evil. For the uninitiated, 3015 is well before ComStar became sane. Likewise, since it's well before the WoB exists, FWL am good it am.

MW4 was more like playing Heavy Gear or Shogo

Er? Heavy Gear or Shogo? HG wasn't anything like Shogo. Actually, Heavy Gear, particularly the second, was much more sim-ish than MW4.

[Commander Zane]

Heavy Gear 2 was hardly sim-ish, they removed weight, individual components, individual armor, parts compatability, and segment destruction.

[NGTM-1R]

After the coup, sure. Prior to Waterly's overthrow they were pretty evil. For the uninitiated, 3015 is well before ComStar became sane. Likewise, since it's well before the WoB exists, FWL am good it am.

3015 is before the Com Guards went public, to boot. Still, this is Comstar under Julian Tiepolo, not Myndo Waterly; it's a largely benevolent organization. Also, it's a dead ringer for the FWL Civil War, so no, actually FWL is currently getting ripped apart between bastards, one of whom happens to have Wolf's Dragoons. (Scratch that theory on the identity of your unit for MW5.)

[StarSlayer]

And our guys are cooler.

C'mon, they're GIGANTIC WALKING TANKS, spewing death at each other over the battlefields of hundreds of worlds [cackle]!!!!

I generally tend to think comparing "verses" is a bit silly but in terms of violence and destruction 40K is certainly a dead ringer.  40K has plenty of faults but it is all about ridiculously over the top grim dark combat on a galactic scale.  Even an assault mech probably only comes up to a Reaver Titan's greave armor.

[General Battuta]

Definitely true. Part of Battletech's appeal is that it still feels grounded in the real world. It has a different aesthetic than 40K.

[Liberator]

I meant to the outside observer.

But yeah, once you start comparing Battletech is more "real", it's only about 1000 years from now.  40k is so far in the future you could say that the ocean was purple with green air and not be wrong potentially.

[SpardaSon21]

BT is BT, and 40K is 40K.  BT is a plausible depiction of the 31st Century, and 40K is set in the grimdarkness of the far future where there is only war and mankind is completely ****ed, either by the Imperium, Chaos, the Tyranids, the Necrons, the Dark Eldar, the Eldar, or the Tau.  Comparing them is like comparing apples and oranges.  Sure they both have giant walking death machines, but that's about it.

[Wanderer]

After the coup, sure. Prior to Waterly's overthrow they were pretty evil. For the uninitiated, 3015 is well before ComStar became sane. Likewise, since it's well before the WoB exists, FWL am good it am.

3015 is before the Com Guards went public, to boot. Still, this is Comstar under Julian Tiepolo, not Myndo Waterly; it's a largely benevolent organization. Also, it's a dead ringer for the FWL Civil War, so no, actually FWL is currently getting ripped apart between bastards, one of whom happens to have Wolf's Dragoons. (Scratch that theory on the identity of your unit for MW5.)

Well.. reading either Sarna (battletech wiki) pages like http://www.sarna.net/wiki/ROM and or what i have heard from the 'brush wars' the CS was not exactly benevolent at any stage... less hostile and more covert perhaps but not benevolent. Also i thought i read some reference saying that CS pretty orchestrated the whole FWL civil war - real benevolence there...

[NGTM-1R]

The FWL Civil War was going to happen anyways. They might, perhaps, have orchestrated the part where Jaime Wolf's brother got killed, resulting in the Dragoons kicking the ass of any Marik military unit that even looked at them funny on the way to their appointment with Anton Marik's death. ComStar and the Dragoons traditionally do not get along.

ROM was never a nice bunch of people, and honestly never will be (although we do meet at least a few ROM Adepts who seem reasonably well-adjusted folks), that's part of their charm, but Tiepolo as a Primus was much less interventionist then many, and he DID let Hanse Davion make the only significant military gains any of the Succession Wars ever achieved rather than shut things down right away when it became clear that Hanse was actually accomplishing something. He also realized that Myndo was crazy and out of control, so he can't have been terribly bad.

[Roanoke]

I'm glad to see MW still on the go. Like Lucas Arts Point 'n' Clicks, or ID FPS; I've always thought as them as defacto PC games. Like they've been around since the start.

[Sarafan]

The only totally pristine organization is probably the Com Guards, but even for them politics gets in the way a lot.

If things go unchanged till the Dark Age, I bet Comstar will become the cliche evil corporation.

[mxlm]

3015 is before the Com Guards went public, to boot. Still, this is Comstar under Julian Tiepolo, not Myndo Waterly; it's a largely benevolent organization. Also, it's a dead ringer for the FWL Civil War, so no, actually FWL is currently getting ripped apart between bastards, one of whom happens to have Wolf's Dragoons.

I completely forgot about the FWL's civil war and the Com Guards', um, non-public existence.

Part of Battletech's appeal is that it still feels grounded in the real world.

To an extent, sure. The fact that we have better weaponry--well, better guidance and propulsion systems--now than they do in the year 30wtfever is a little off putting.

Though not nearly so off-putting as the prevalence of melee combat in the year 40k.

[Colonol Dekker]

By vectrons unyielding armpit hair. Comparing these two is nothing to do with the new game. I demand a split!
 
Although titans and broadside battlesuits are freakin cool I loves my vulture mech.

[Liberator]

Yes, I agree, the Vulture is one bad ass mech.