Activision Redux: Gears Revisited

Activision should have felt bad about Heavy Gear. Whether or not they did, they took the steps to ensure that the sequel would be a completely different game, “Rebuilt from the Engine Up” as they said in their prerelease ads. A lot of talent was poured into HG2. So was a lot of time. Too much time, in fact – by the time HG2 was polished to a high sheen and ready for release, it was obvious that Activision management had lost interest in the project. HG2 was supposed to compete directly with MW3, but the latter had stolen much of HG2’s thunder. As such, on its release in 1999, it had very little support from the company, and faded quickly.

This was a shame. While this writer did not prefer the scale of Gear combat, it was obvious that HG2 was a superior simulation. The graphics engine in HG2 was worlds better than the kludged dreck used in HG1 , the game play was quite different from the usual “circle of death” ‘Mech fights, the A.I. was quite capable, and the scenarios interesting and varied. Gear combat itself became the fast and deadly, the way it was supposed to be – one good smack from a heavy cannon could knock a Gear out fast; therefore, problems like “legging” did not arise. Terrain use was paramount in HG2, something not found in any MechWarrior game (beyond hiding behind a large building).

For ‘Mech enthusiasts, this is definitely a sim worth buying. It can be found in the bargain-bin in two versions – either the discounted box version, or a shovelware version containing other, older eye-candy. HG2, while different, is worth the effort. As a side note – the “Dark Engine” used for HG2 was also the engine for the disastrous Interstate ’82, but, unlike the MW2 engine, was used no further.

StarSiege: Retooling the Dark Horse

Sierra wasn’t finished with its own lengthy rebuilding of its EarthSiege universe. A professional writer was hired by the company to tie in the turn-based in-the-distant future MissionForce games with the EarthSiege struggle. The result was StarSiege – not only were our distant ancestors fighting a newly resurgent Cybrid threat, but there was a nasty civil between the humans, as well.

In terms of gameplay, StarSiege was not very different from the earlier EarthSiege games; the story background, however, was infinitely richer, and multiplayer was introduced. The controls were made different, as well: HERCs did not have torso twists this time around; players controlled weapon aiming from a fixed torso, instead. This made the controls somewhat similar to Heavy Gear 2, and made the action somewhat more like a first-person shooter. StarSiege did reasonably well, but much of the air had gone out of the big robot genre at the time of its release. It was also eclipsed by its sister game, Tribes, a solid team-based multiplayer shooter. In any event, StarSiege is still available in the bargain bins, and is well worth playing.