I recently started playing Battletech by Harebrained Schemes. I've been a fan of Battletech since I was in grade school. Though I never formally played it, I've always been reading novels and playing video games of it.
It was a relative no-brainer for me to pre-order the game. In fact, I got the deluxe digital content edition as a sign of support for the developers.
Overall I'm happy with the game. My biggest issue is with the random number generator, or RNG.
It's pretty funny that most of the games I like depend so heavily on RNGs. Fallout 1 and Fallout 2 featured this heavily. So did Assassin's Creed: Rebellion on mobile. Battletech also relies on this system to determine successes, failures, and critical hits.
Anyway, what's my issue? The random number generator is too random. And oftentimes favors the AI. It has been a common theme for me to save my game after almost every turn so that in the event that the enemy "crits" me, meaning he does devastating damage to my team's mechs, I have a fallback save to load. This happens. A lot.
Don't get me wrong, there are times when the tables are turned and I do the devastating damage. It just so happens that it occurs more often for opposing AI than my team and I.
It would have been nice if they came up with difficulty sliders. Make the easiest difficulty a guarantee that the user will have a higher factor of scoring critical successes than the AI. This would be great for people who just want to play the game to know the story. Then you can ramp up the difficulty with both sides having equal chances of getting crits. Then for those who really want a challenge, make the AI have more chances to crit.
Then again, I wouldn't call that difficulty. I would call it frustration levels.
There's no strategy involved in Battletech. I tried doing the higher ground maneuver and I still missed my attacks. The AI calmly blasted my head next turn. The only strategy I honestly can find in this game is knowing when to move during your turn or reserve your moves so you can attack the AI in a more favorable setting.
Aside from the RNG issue I'm happy with the game. The animations are nice, the VFX works, and the sounds are great. Mechs are cool. I don't mind if some of the mechs I knew growing up are "unseen" and not available in the game.
Would I recommend this game? Yes. I'm pretty sure other people are more patient than me.
Out.
