Mechwarrior/Battletech simulator/arcade (mmo?)

[Gelanin]

Dont know if this would be the most appropriate part of the B3D forums to post this, i'll post here, and a moderator can move it to a more appropriate place if needed.

So, what i wanted to know was if you people thought its technically feasible to "construct" something similiar to a Battlemech cockpit, including all the controls in one, so it would be as realistic as possible, and basicly coming up with a Battletech simulator. One way of doing this could be using something similiar to the system Force Dynamics used in their Car simulator (http://www.force-dynamics.com)

The reason i'm asking, is that i've always wanted/dreamed about is going into an arcade/amusement park or similiar(or at home if i ever won the lottery ) with a bunch of friends, and then have our own little private Mech war, or better yet, say a lance of 4 of us, vs a group of 4 other persons. Or if it became really advanced, a group of people playing against some scenarios/campaings with some advanced AI controlling the opposition.

Imagine the endless possibilitys

So, someone (ATI/AMD this is the chance to show what you've made of ) contact Microsoft, get the license stuff settled and get going

If properly done this could also evolve into an amazing new MMO set into the Mechwarrior universe......


Ideas, comments ? and is this something i can hope to ever experience in the next say 20-30 years ?

 

[RussSchultz]

Back in the early 90's, there was a company that was doing that here in the states. They had outlets in several malls.

It was pretty cool, but the coolness factor wears off, and then you go out of business.

 

[AlNom]

It shouldn't be particularly difficult, just expensive. There's already Steel Battalion for the Xbox which features a pseudo cockpit of controls with start-up sequence, eject button....throttle controls, you name it. It'd just be a matter of extending that into a full-fledged cockpit sans Neurohelmet and stuffing a giant screen in there as well. Throw in a thunder chair and a heat vent into the cockpit to simulate the heat-buildup and you've got a Mech-Simulator!

Note: Require 2xGeforce 7950s + 3.2Ghz Conroes for heat . Imagine teh graphics!


Hey... if you've got a few million dollars... Make a lance and a star for any battle starting with the clan invasion.

 

[Gelanin]

Hey... if you've got a few million dollars... Make a lance and a star for any battle starting with the clan invasion.

I wish

 

[Gelanin]

Back in the early 90's, there was a company that was doing that here in the states. They had outlets in several malls.

It was pretty cool, but the coolness factor wears off, and then you go out of business.

Hmmm yeah i guess the coolness factor wears off after a while. I do think it would work alot better today than it did 10-15 years ago, mostly due to the fact that games in general have moved into big business (to get the financial backing), and with popularity of MMO's and the net, you'll have alot of potential customers, alot more than you had back in those days.

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

Hmmm yeah i guess the coolness factor wears off after a while. I do think it would work alot better today than it did 10-15 years ago, mostly due to the fact that games in general have moved into big business (to get the financial backing), and with popularity of MMO's and the net, you'll have alot of potential customers, alot more than you had back in those days.

I doubt it will work as Virtuality or the Battletech Centres tried it. People just don't want to go to arcades to pay games anymore. They want to play at home, use the internet, become clans where they can get good games with regular players, and play in ladders. All for much less money than feeding arcade machines.

Given the power of today's PC and consoles, the ubiquitous internet links and socialisation of online gaming, I can't see arcade gaming making a comeback. if you want a Mechwarrior MMO, it won't happen in an arcade, it will be on PC or XBox live type of console service.

 

[Gelanin]

I doubt it will work as Virtuality or the Battletech Centres tried it. People just don't want to go to arcades to pay games anymore. They want to play at home, use the internet, become clans where they can get good games with regular players, and play in ladders. All for much less money than feeding arcade machines.

Given the power of today's PC and consoles, the ubiquitous internet links and socialisation of online gaming, I can't see arcade gaming making a comeback. if you want a Mechwarrior MMO, it won't happen in an arcade, it will be on PC or XBox live type of console service.

Well, that would be fine with me, what i'd really want was a more "complex" interface to it than a standard mouse & Keyboard. I.e something that would atleast give you some of the feeling of actually controlling a mech, and something that would require some skill/coordination to do.

Ofcourse thats not very compatible with making such a game availible to the mainstream, unless you could make it work with both an advanced interface(mech like), and a standard keyboard/mouse/joystick combination.


I guess what i/we need to do is convince Dave Baumann to convince some ATI directors that making Mechwarrior Online or something similiar would be a perfect opportunity to showcase the (hopefully) awesome power of the R600, and convince Microsoft to start making it
(I can always dream cant i ? )

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

Well, that would be fine with me, what i'd really want was a more "complex" interface to it than a standard mouse & Keyboard. I.e something that would atleast give you some of the feeling of actually controlling a mech, and something that would require some skill/coordination to do.

Ofcourse thats not very compatible with making such a game availible to the mainstream, unless you could make it work with both an advanced interface(mech like), and a standard keyboard/mouse/joystick combination.

Nothing to stop you using a HOTAS. In fact the original Mechwarrior PC games had a more complex interfacte than the Battletech centres, allowing you to use HOTAS, mouse and keyboards at the same time. Combined with today's multiscreen technology, a PC game has a lot more available for an interface than a custom arcade machine will.

If what you really mean by "a complex interface" is a box with a door for a person to get into while they play... well that's something else.

I guess what i/we need to do is convince Dave Baumann to convince some ATI directors that making Mechwarrior Online or something similiar would be a perfect opportunity to showcase the (hopefully) awesome power of the R600, and convince Microsoft to start making it
(I can always dream cant i ? )

It will never happen. An online version of the game running on a PC would be a much more satisfactory and long-lived playing experience, both for the player and the developer.

 

[Gelanin]

If what you really mean by "a complex interface" is a box with a door for a person to get into while they play... well that's something else.

Not at all, what i ment was like dual-control sticks for movement/torso-twisting, aiming etc, foot-paddles for jumpjets etc etc. Perhaps even some controls could be voice controlled or similiar if you had a good enough voice recognision software builtin. (i.e say during a fight you wanted to reconfigure your 3'rd firebutton to fire your 2 Large Pulse Lasers instead of your Gauss rifle or something similiar) A bonus would be if you could get a fysical feedback on it like the force-dynamics stuff, to make it more realistic, but i'd be happy enough without.

It will never happen. An online version of the game running on a PC would be a much more satisfactory and long-lived playing experience, both for the player and the developer.

Well, i agree that a arcade version would never happen, but i certainly hope a pc/console version of "Mechwarrior Online" (or somethign similiar) will arrive. As those who have read a fair bit of the novels or the Mechwarrior/Battletech source-books from the RPG side of things, its a very interresting setting with lots of possibilitys.

 

[Althornin]

Dave and Busters has this already.
They use pods from here:
http://www.virtualworld.com/

This is the same tech that was in bunches of malls, as previously mentioned, but much upgraded.

 

[nintenho]

didn't dreamcast have something like this for Gundam?