this post was submitted on 30 Jul 2024
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Just some useless factoid: MechWarrior is Battletech. There is the MechWarrior (mostly first-person shooter with some RPG mechanics) series and a Battletech (Turn-based Strategy game with RPG mechanics) video game too of course but both come from the Battletech tabletop.
I think it's really easy for people to not get that.
I first came in contact with the Battletech franchise when my dad bought a Microsoft Sidewinder joystick that came with a copy of Mechwarrior II: 31st Century Combat for Win 95. I played it, I had a lot of fun with it, I had no idea it was from some larger property. I mean obviously it was a sequel to Mechwarrior 1, a game that apparently even existed. But they really didn't make it clear that this is one facet of a larger franchise. I had no idea that the tabletop game, or the novels, existed. Mechwarrior 4: Vengeance also failed at this, because if you don't know the lore, it feels like it's full of careless fuckups. "It used to be called a 'Star,' now they're calling it a 'lance.'" "Mad Cat? That's clearly a Timber Wolf." etc. It wasn't until I started playing MW4's multiplayer that I learned that it's actually a fairly large franchise.
That's pretty much how I got into it too. I had that Sidewinder joystick with the old "game port" cable for a long, long time. I think a demo disc or something got me hooked and then I bought the game a few years later. My dad bought me the Sidewinder for Jane's Advanced Tactical Fighters.
I still have mine.
My understanding is even though the Sidewinder 3D Pro plugged into the Game port, it didn't use it the way it's designed. The Game Port is designed to basically be two Kempston ports, designed to support two 2-axis analog joysticks with I think 4 buttons each, but the Sidewinder joystick doesn't use that, instead it implements its own weird digital data protocol over some of the pins. I don't know if a driver for it was ever incorporated into Linux, I have no idea what a Linux machine would do if you plugged one in. I've never owned a Linux PC with a game port, though I have the facilities to build one.
An upshot of this is a generic Game Port to USB adapter wouldn't work with the Sidewinder because I don't think it can implement that weird driver through USB. I am aware that at least for awhile there was a special adapter just for Game Port Sidewinders.
Anyway I got a full copy of MW2: 31CC with that joystick, not a demo disc. And in my household it was Jane's AH-64D Longbow.
That's funny you bring that up. I had an issue I dug into with the Sidewinder Gamepad and came to the same conclusion about the pin-out. I had assumed it was because it allowed you to daisy chain more gamepads together -- One connect to the game port. Second connects to the first's other built-in game port and so-on. I had assumed it was using something to multiplex the data. If that's the case, I wonder if the Sidewinder stick driver intended to do the same thing but they never actually implemented the built-in game port.
EDIT: Oh to add about the Linux thing. The Sidewinder game port driver is a part of the Linux kernel, so it probably works with the game port even now.
I've never managed to get the Mechwarrior 4 games running on a Linux box, and I would LOVE to play them again. Wine just shits itself.
I think I have a PCIe sound card around here somewhere...
MW4:Mercs would be my goto now, I have to try getting that to run, I loved that game, just don't bother with MW5, it's the most infuriating game ever.
The AI of your lancemates is so bad it actively prevents you from having fun in most battles (even with AI mod). Most missions are supremely boring auto-generated and even the story missions are mostly not interesting. And there are popup turret emplacements and tanks spawning out of nowhere all over the maps.
Almost no tactics possible.
I've also failed to hitch horses with the "Battletech" game that's out there. I think it's supposed to be a translation of the tabletop game's mechanics to a computer game, but I slid right off it like a cow pat on a kitchen window.
Part of it is that I generally don't care about some random little mercenary company on some little world somewhere in the periphery, and that's what this story is. It hits you with this HUGE cut scene that plays every time you launch the game, it takes a LONG time to get through menus and cut scenes to get to the tutorial, and then the game is simultaneously giving you how the controls work tutorials in text, while characters hit you with story dialog, and then I didn't want to play anymore.
Just fyi, MW1 was pretty great (I mean, simulated 3d via vector lines, 16 colors, maybe like 5-10 frames per second) - one of my favorite DOS games in the 386 days
I've seen a couple screenshots but I've never seen it running, and god help you get a copy and actually run it these days.
MW2 was just...such a beginning. I was fairly young when that game came out and had no idea that Battletech was a thing even after playing Mechwarrior for a few years, so this is a genuine question: Did Battletech feel and sound the way it does before MW2? Every Battletech-related soundtrack I've been exposed to reminds me of MW2's, That intersection between tribal drums, overdriven guitar and bombastic strings that just IS how Battletech sounds, did that exist before MW2?
no, iirc there's no music during gameplay... in fact this may be the only music in the game - when you visit the bar to get clues and recruit mercs. https://youtu.be/C5y60Hi97MU?t=94
it was a primitive time.
Oh my god that's so bad I love it. I can only imagine the PC speaker trying to bleep that out if you didn't have an Adlib card.
I knew there was some connection between em but wasn't sure if it was by the same people, or based on it like Robotech, or a knockoff, so I just left it out. Thanks for clarifying.
Yeah no problem. I just figured it was maybe an interesting piece of trivial information you might like. I didn't intend it to be like an ACKTUALLY moment or anything.
OK, so I know this because I used to watch it before school and when I was trying to figure out what that weird show was many years later, it turns out it is actually Macross but butchered up for American kids and tells a different story. Then I was like "wtf is Macross?" This is pretty much the same thing that happened when I found out MechWarrior is Battletech. I've never played the tabletop but I've played most of the video games from both now.
I think maybe I'm a Mech nerd. If I end up going out and spending hundreds on Battletech pieces I'm blaming you!
Battletech plastic minis tend to be way cheaper than most (like Warhammer). People definitely spend more than hundreds, but you can get the box set with the game rules and 8 minis for $60.
I'll take the blame off chatokun and link it right here: https://store.catalystgamelabs.com/products/battletech-a-game-of-armored-combat
I'm going to see if my oldest son would be interested too. If he is, then I'm going to do it.
got into macross from robotech childhood, learning how macek / harmony gold rebranded and repackaged those properties is interesting, but then you learn about all the IP fuckery they were involved with, preventing macross from US audiences, but also, claiming sole ownership of mech designs that forced Battletech to retire/retcon classic designs and other shit - ugh. Just awful behavior.