Steel Battalion: Heavy Armor

Steel Battalion

...Why must the mechs look so ugly?

And where is Hai Shi Dao or the Pacific Rim Forces?

What about my old controller?

WHY DO THE MECHS LOOK SO UGLY?!

This is not the Steel Battalion I remember.

They look pretty much how I'd expect a functional bipedal mech to look. Not exactly 'realistic', but more so than, say, something out of Armored Core.

That said, iffy about it, especially with the loss of the gimmick that made it interesting in the first place.

edited 1st Nov '10 2:06:10 AM by Miijhal

It has an all-new gimmick: it's a Kinect game.

Steel Battalion is two games though, this one and the precursor for the Xbox.

The original Steel Battalion had much better looking VTs that were tall and sleek.

...Not stout and ugly.

I'll still play it though because I'm a die hard mech fan.

edited 1st Nov '10 1:49:19 PM by CommandoDude

They're so ugly because Capcom didn't bother to hire Junji Okubo again.

I hate these things. All the impracticality with none of the Rule of Cool. At least Okubo's were still beautiful to look at.

@JAF: Which isn't quite as appealing or interesting. And I doubt anywhere near as immersive, either.

Thread necro goooooooooooooooooo!

See, originally, I thought SB's mechs were ugly, but after watching SB footage, I have to say I'm at the least intrigued by the aesthetic.

I was in favour of these chunkier mechs originally, but if they all look like two-legged boats (with legs on either side of the machine) like the one displayed in that trailer....well, I'm againsti t.

And of course, there's the issue of the planned Kinect control.

OK, apparently, the new Steel Battalion will have both a MASSIVE controller as before, AND utilize Kinect, both motion and voice recog.

Where'd you hear that?

A bunch of sources.

"A bunch of sources."

XD

This was 2 months ago, it was from magazine sources, and I really don't remember exactly who. It makes sense, tho.

Right now, I'm treating Heavy Armor as its own game, basically In Name Only. The setting's too different, for a start. No more microprocessors just two years after the original game's setting? No mention of the PRF or HSD? Squat Walking Tank things that don't resemble what I know as Vertical Tanks, yet are still called that anyway?

It'll probably still be a good game in some respect (this IS From Software we're talking about, even if they're not Nude Maker / Platinum Games), but it won't be Steel Battalion. It's not just the controller that sets the original apart. If you've ever played Line of Contact, you know that the combat style is different from pretty much any other mech game out there.

... No words.

Kotaku article.

lol, I knew they would require a controller.

So what is kinect used for? HIGH FIVE SIMULATOR.

What gutter trash.

I'm still kind of intrigued here. It's obviously a Spiritual Successor at this point, giving me more reason to treat Heavy Armor as its own game.

And at least they had the sense to bind the most critical controls to a gamepad. Granted, a custom controller still would've been cooler, but people think non-standard peripherals like Kinect are expensive enough as is.

I'm still not sure I want to support Capcom after some of the utterly stupid shit they've done lately, but it's still interesting to see what From Software does with the concept, as radically different from the established Steel Battalion as it is.

Oh, and 39 seconds into that trailer, the names shown are apparently names of actual Steel Battalion fans.

edited 16th Aug '11 4:05:22 PM by NamelessFragger

Hm... would be interesting if they made 1st person walkaround sections that use Kinect for NPC interaction and switch to the control array for the mech portions. Sort of like walking to your cockpit after setting up.

My take on the new legged Mark IV designs is that they suit the 'hard realism' aspect a lot more than the kibble-laden light frames of the original but that's just me. Aesthetics should always be the last consideration in military hardware.

edited 16th Aug '11 8:04:17 PM by Recon5

I'm just intrigued by the Zeerust in which semiconductors are gone so you have to use gauges, etc.

I'm more curious as to why they choose the point where you no longer have computers to build robots, but that's just me.

Wake me when FS is done with this and starts Lost Kingdoms 3.

Curious why the loss of silicon-based computers led to the resurrection of the steel-pot M1 helmet, despite the Fritz-shape being superior. Not to mention, no Kevlar?

Other than that, pretty cool.

Well, I could see the pilots not having kevlar, since it might get in the way. I'm more curious about the manual loader.

Still not enthused about the Kinect support, though it's definitely an extremely novel control scheme.

I also have concerns about the gameplay, as the combat doesn't look like it'll be anything like Steel Battalion. These mechs are a little TOO gears-and-grease; They hardly look like they move (and in fact, would topple over with each step thanks to that horrendous height-to-leg-spacing ratio). Also, if they're as sturdy as WW 2 tanks (as implied by the trailer ending) then we're going to have "World of Tanks, but weirder". Then again there wasn't any actual gameplay in that trailer and I didn't see the mechs doing much of anything, so...

edited 23rd Aug '11 3:20:45 PM by Barcode711

Explained.