Whereas I can’t truthfully name myself a diehard MechWarrior fan – I’ve by no means performed the pen-and-paper roleplaying recreation, for example – I’ve loved most of the video video games over time, from MechWarrior 3 to each MechAssault video games on Xbox. I skipped the unique model of MechWarrior 5 as a result of, whereas it was by most accounts a great recreation, its content material was all procedurally generated. It wasn’t narrative-driven. And I like a great story-first MechWarrior marketing campaign.
MechWarrior 5: Clans, then, seems to be precisely what I’ve been asking for: a narrative-led MechWarrior marketing campaign that additionally occurs to provide five-player co-op. It picks up instantly the place 2019’s MechWarrior 5: Mercenaries – itself the primary single-player MechWarrior recreation of any form since 2002 – left off. I obtained a first-look demo of Clans and actually appreciated what I noticed.
Clans casts you as Smoke Jaguar clan in, as ordinary, the Thirty first century amid ongoing clan-based Mech warfare. You’ve obtained 5 teammates to work with: Jayden, Liam, Mia, Nasir, and Ezra. You’ll hear essentially the most from Jayden, the star’s chief (a star is a bunch of 5 Mechs within the BattleTech universe, for those who weren’t acquainted). When enjoying in single-player you possibly can both take direct management of any of them at any given time, or you possibly can concern orders from both a rapidly accessed radial menu or a battlefield map that you could pull up anytime – all of it in real-time with none pausing of the fight. For what it’s value, they appear moderately good at executing these orders for those who depart the pleasant AI to do the work.
Naturally, the entire ordinary MechWarrior options are right here: leap jets, tons of Mech selection (my demo driver was piloting a Shadow Cat, although I’ve all the time favored the slower however harder-hitting Assault class Atlas myself), and loads of weapon loadouts, from weapons to missiles to lasers to gauss cannons. As ever, you possibly can strive to scattershot enemy Mechs with as a lot harm as potential with no regard to the place these photographs land, or you possibly can pinpoint particular areas of every Mech, equivalent to attempting to blow off its arms or inflicting it to topple over by blasting off certainly one of its legs.
Talking of controls, mouse and keyboard enter and output seemed easy, from what I may see, and developer Piranha Video games guarantees slick gamepad controls as nicely, which ought to please of us who plan to play Clans on Xbox or PS5. On that notice, Piranha goals to ship each the PC and console variations of Clans concurrently. Moreover, you possibly can go for a first-person digital camera or see your Mech from a third-person perspective.
Whereas the underlying motion appears stable – as you’d anticipate after Piranha’s already taken a chunk on the MechWarrior 5 apple – it’s the Thirty first-century sci-fi battle I’m most keen to see from the story. I loved seeing orders are available in from Sarah Weaver by means of a picture-in-picture window as you stomped across the battlefield, and I’m keen to see the place this MechWarrior’s story takes us. Gameplay, in the meantime, appears quicker than what I keep in mind from the joystick-preferred older MechWarrior choices on PC, however actually not as speedy because the Xbox’s basic MechAssault video games.
It’s nice to see single-player take heart stage as soon as once more in a MechWarrior recreation, although the truth that you possibly can carry alongside up to 4 buddies in five-player co-op is a pleasant bonus for Clans. It’s due out later this 12 months. I, for one, can’t wait to get again to the long run.
Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s govt editor of previews and host of each IGN’s weekly Xbox present, Podcast Unlocked, in addition to our month-to-month(-ish) interview present, IGN Unfiltered. He is a North Jersey man, so it is “Taylor ham,” not “pork roll.” Debate it with him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan.