It’s actually happening! In a Kickstarter update released to backers today, Harebrained Schemes LLC announced an April launch date for the turn-based Battletech game that they’ve been working on for the past two years!
While the surprise was slightly spoiled by someone hitting the button a few days early to show the pre-order options on Steam, the Mad Cat is officially out the bag now. Steam pre-orders have officially opened, with all pre-orders, and Kickstarter backers at the Recruit and higher levels, receiving the Special Edition Shadow Hawk skin. A Digital Deluxe edition is also available for pre-orders, and includes a digital Art book, soundtrack, 4K wallpapers, and exclusive forum avatar.
Turn-based, or even real-time strategy Battletech has been away from PCs for a very long time. The last tactical Battletech game was MechCommander 2, which was released in 2001. This new BATTLETECH game, simply named BATTLETECH, aims to return the series to its roots.
Developed by series creator Jordan Weisman and Hairbrained Schemes LLC (Shadowrun Returns series, NECROPOLIS among others) the game takes place in the 3025 time-frame, an era familiar to series fans, but which has received scant attention from past games. Placing the game here puts it before the (infamous) clan invasion that has been the starting point for every video game since MechWarrior 2. Some BATTLETECH purists prefer this era, and there’s no doubt that removing the need to balance Clan and Inner Sphere technology makes for some slightly less complex development decisions. It also leaves plenty of room for the clan invasion in future games (which we sincerely hope will be the case)
With a new single-player MechWarrior 5 sim also in development by Piranha Games (current developer/publisher/maintainer of MechWarrior: Online), 2018 is shaping up to be an excellent year for BATTLETECH fans who’ve been starving for content for much too long.
