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[Sensei]

That's right! Ye Olde Mechwarriore. It runs on DOS and there's a version for the Super NES. Today, you will be my crew.



Well, that's not entirely true. If I hire any new members right away, I won't have enough money to give them a mech. We start alone with a Jenner, one of the game's eight (I think) mechs. They aren't customizable, but to make up for it they're all damaged and you never have enough money to repair them all; so you get to choose which weapons work.



The game's structure is sort of like Daggerfall. We have a linear story to complete through a bunch of mercenary contracts, you'll see some other similarities later. I'm told I should watch all dialogue very closely, as well as that there are mistakes we could make which could prevent the game from being completable. In addition we'll have to remember the locations of NPCs; I might end up taking some notes.

We start with this cryptic message...

...before being dumped on a random planet (it's different every time) and left to ourselves. Right now, specifically, Robinson.

I should show you around the menu.

The burning 'A' is for Blazing Aces- that's us. Right now we're a lone pilot. This is our status screen. The crew page shows us our crew members (up to 4 of them) and lets us assign mechs to them (right now it's just me and my Jenner). The News Net will probably contain vital information sooner or later. I've compacted them all into one picture.


The picture of a mech leads us to the mech yard. Mostly we'll make repairs; at the moment at least I'm not buying any new mechs.

Our Jenner has some damage from the get-go, I can't even repair all of it because this planet doesn't have all the parts we need. We will spend much time with the repair screen. Similarly, mechs we buy will have damage too.


The space-egg in the upper right brings us to the travel map. This too is reminiscent of Daggerfall, albeit not randomly generated. We can type in names of planets or view them in lists, by allegiance. The houses are Kurita, Steiner, Marik, Liao, and Davion. Also, there's a fucking lot of planets.


The drink takes us to the bar, a hub screen like the Blazing Aces one with a couple options. The music is pretty nice here.

When we order a drink, the barkeep tells us about local goings-on. Some of what he says could be important. We won't be hiring any crew members right now, but here's the screen anyway.


The MW symbol is just our options menu, so that leaves lastly the contract screen. Here's our starter contract, 150,000 credits for taking out a light mech, in Davion space.

Normally you guys will have a say, but I'm accepting this first one. Later I'll post the fight...

One last detail- after accepting a contract, your only options are to manage your mechs and crew, or go straight to the fight. We can't save or dilly dally once a contract is accepted, nor can we recruit new members having accepted a contract. I'm not sure if contracts are the same if you decline them and go back- if not this will be a bothersome LP to manage.

[Servant Corps]

You only got five years to accomplish your objective...this is going to be hard.

[Sensei]

To the fight! This time I'll make sure not to have the post truncate laterally, I promise!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

This is what a fight looks like. It's actually pretty fun.


...then the game crashed. I'm told this happens when you finish a mission, if you haven't made some config file changes. I thought I did, I'll have to double check...

[Sensei]

Well, here we go again! Not much has changed, since I only did one battle last time. But, talking to the bartender and then going to the mech yards, story happens! Also, we're now on planet Iruzun.


It seems, after another fight, that the "crash" is just what happens when you die. Arguably far more morbid than a fade to black like in most games, if you think about it. But this time I saved, so I'm going to keep bashing my head against light mechs until I come out alive (or maybe, find the config file, since I suspect I edited one from a separate copy of DOSBOX I have tied to a bat script for another game).

[Sensei]

Can anyone running DOSBOX tell me where their DOSBOX.conf is?

[Akura]

Should be in the DosBox folder. Best way to do it, copy the dosbox.conf file and save it as something like mechwar.conf, (I'm not sure if DosBox support >8 letters in the name) and create a shortcut to DosBox and append -conf mechwar.conf to the end of the target box(in Properties->Shortcut), outside the quotes. It should look like:

Target: "C:\<filepath to DosBox>\dosbox.exe" -conf mechwar.conf

Make whatever changes you need to the .conf file, then simply drag the Mechwarrior program icon to the DosBox shortcut. It's the same method the got Daggerfall working for me.

[Sensei]

Dosbox .74 is weird, turns out dosbox.options.bat brings me to the conf file. Then from there, it looks like the bastards moved it to appdata. Not sure what the programming benefits of that are, but I hate trying to find files there.

And then... BEHOLD! Seems like pressing enter when it appears to have crashed does the trick- or did this time. I'm still not sure if the conf file is working. But nonetheless:


Now, because I forgot to load before I started, we're now on Greely, a Davion ice planet. Man, I've not been good about staying in character today...
Anyway, aside from our new location and contractors, everything is EXACTLY the same as before story-wise.


News for today:


As of now, we have 1,319,230 credits, and have gained a positive standing with House Davion for defending their fuel depot, or maybe rescuing a hostage, I don't remember. Our Jenner is fully repaired and reloaded, save for light damage to the life support system (not enough parts). Let's talk again about that contract screen:

Those red numbers can be haggled- more so the better your standing with the contractor. Of course, haggle too much and they'll refuse to give us missions- if we're only haggling on one detail, we can usually see their top offer easily. In this example, we get paid 150,000 credits, with 8% up front. Up front money is only needed if you fail the mission (I imagine you still keep the front-pay, could be wrong) or need it to make repairs before the mission. Salvage can be big money, as you may have noticed last time. That was 6% salvage then, I had haggled it up. Our salvage is worth more if we just blast away a mech's cockpit and kill the pilot rather than crippling the mech. It's also dependent on how many/how powerful mechs we're up against. Just something for you guys to keep in mind, since you'll be choosing our next contract. Also remember that the number of mechs really is approximate like it says, on a bad day I might end up against two very powerful light mechs when it says "1 light mech" for example.


Available contracts are A: that one (Garrison Duty- 150K, 7% salvage, 8% up front, 1 Light Mech, Davion planet)
and B: (General Security Duty- 200K, 7% salvage, 8% up front, 1 Heavy Mech, Davion planet)
and C: (Containment of Security Forces- 100K, 7%S, 8%F, 1 Light Mech, Liao planet)

Bear in mind that we might be ticking off other houses- for example, if we take the one in House Liao space, we might be making enemies of House Liao. This is a Davion contract, so the ones in Davion space shouldn't be a problem, but I'll keep you posted on our alliances.

Now, after that huge text wall: What contract should we take? How should we haggle (if at all)? Later on you guys will get choices regarding equipment, crew, and location, but for now it's just us alone on icy Greely.

[Itnetlolor]

Holy crap. I didn't think the game dated THIS far back. How did I not hear of it back then?

[EuchreJack]

If you think you can win the general security one, haggle the salvage and do it!

[Spartan 117]

If you think you can win the general security one, haggle the salvage and do it!

The Jenner is a light scout mech. We'd be fighting AT LEAST one heavy combat mech.

How about we try A? Davion's cool.

[Sensei]

I tried taking the one against the heavy- first time I couldn't hurt him enough before he blew up the building I was to protect, second time there were two of them and that was pretty much that.

The light one was more successful.
I blew the enemy's cockpit clean off. It didn't last long. Next time I'll try to get more screenshots.



After that I took a mission in Liao space to see what would happen (read: I accidentally pressed accept contract). Sure enough, we've made our first enemies. I'm so proud. You can also see our cash here. Davion still says positive, I'm not sure if we're more positive than before or what. I suspect that it's not going to display anything else given the generality of the terms, but hey, maybe some day it will suddenly switch to "Bros".


Quite a bit of news, I smushed it into one picture.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

After our next contract, we might be able to hire a fellow pilot to fight with us and buy him a Locust. Unfortunately I don't have much control over who we hire, if you decline then you can't hire that person until the RNG finds them again. I can't get a Locust screenshot either because there's none in the mech yard right now.

We are on Greely, a Davion planet, and it is May 3025. Our contracts are:
A: Retrieval of Captured Mechs- 150,000C, 7% Salvage 8% upfront. 1 Light Mech. Marik planet.
B: Rescue a kidnap victim- 200,000C, 7%S 8%F, 1 Medium Mech. Kurita planet.
C: Defense of a weapons factory- 100,000C, 7%S 8%F, 1 Light Mech. Davion planet.

If you guys think we should start travelling and hunting down the story, say so. I recommend waiting until our lance is more powerful though.

[Spartan 117]

A.

B is a good deal, but we don't want Davion as our only contracter.

[Servant Corps]

We must condemn House Davion's illegitimate raid on the Vanderburg Estates. I think. The newspaper articles are rather confusing without context.

Otherwise, A.

[Sensei]

You can find the manual on Abandonia, it adds some lore, though I haven't read it on account of history homework.

Anyway, remember the news article in the beginning? I believe the current fellow running House Vanderberg killed his father for the position and is currently being attacked for it. I think.

The most I can make of the story for practical purposes is that we might want to say "hi" to the Gray Skulls. They're coming up often enough, they might be able to help us with our quest (which involves finding whoever flies a skull and wings emblem).

[Sensei]

I took up the "retrieval of stolen mechs" mission. It was pretty easy. I also bargained up to 15% salvage.
Mind, I didn't actually fight a mech. I somehow accidentally managed to avoid it and grab the building. I will have to keep this in mind for the future.


This had a good effect- namely, we've been raised from "positive" to "confident" standing with house Davion.
Next I chose a fuel dump defense.


With our "confident" status, I've bargained some serious payment:

I may possibly have also grown a beard.

Status:



Now... we have a few options. At the moment, if we want, we have enough money to hire a mech pilot (that's you!) and get a Locust. Which would be, one of these:


We might wait until there are better mechs available to us if you want.

Regardless, we should also choose a course of action. The current contracts on this planet are both in Davion space, with the typical 7% salvage, 8% upfront deal. There's a 150K one with a light mech and a 200K one against a medium. Both on Davion planets.

Our other option would be to start traveling, and hunting down the story. There's some pirates we might be able to talk to on, at my best guess, Caph (from the info we got a while ago from the techie). It might be a good idea to travel regardless, since we're not getting much story information here. But that's up to you.

Also, how're you guys liking the smaller screenshots?