Stompy Bot Productions is publishing Heavy Gear Assault, which is currently in development by long-time mech gamers Mektek, most recently known for re-releasing Mechwarrior 4.

Following the path of Mechwarrior Online and Hawken, Heavy Gear Assault will be a free-to-play online battle, with additional content available for purchase.

I’m pretty pumped to see the Heavy Gear series make a return. If anyone knows how to do this series justice, it’s the Mektek team. With all of the recent offering popping up in the genre, now is an excellent time to be a fan of fighting robots.

You clould remake again a Interstate’82 Page since its no more dead. !
;) My name is DJ_edyo and i am the founder of the Interstate’82
Vigilante’s association ! www.i82va.com

we have a game patch that works and we still play online ! :D haha
have a good day !

Nice! I’ll spread the word.

Update #13 saw the introduction of a new map: Tourmaline Desert. I’m pretty happy with it. It’s a big map, littered with jaggering scenery that provides ample areas to both hide and ascend. The map is bright; there’s a lot of light bouncing around in it, which gives the mechs a nice sheen.

The size does create some problems with capping, though. It’s disheartening to stomp your way to the middle of the map, only to see the “Base is Under Attack” warnings pop up and know that, even though your Jenner does 152 kph, there’s no way you’ll make it back in time for any defense. I’ve seen a broad gentlemen’s agreement form in some games, where the deal seems to be, “We won’t cap unless you do it first.”

A Catapult and Awesome avoid LRM fire on Forest Colony.

That update also brought a pretty hefty increase to the damage in missiles, so for a few days after the patch, LRMs were everywhere. It made TAG pretty useful. I had a lot of fun running a stock Raven and just tagging things. Since everyone had missiles, it really helped make tagging worthwhile. I had to join in with the missile party, too, and throw some LRMs on my Jenner.

Naturally, reaction is always mixed when things like that happen. I realize there is a lot of balancing to be done to the game still yet and that some patches will break that balance. It happens. It’s happened a lot already. It’ll happen a lot more. I just try to have fun with it. If missiles are the way to play for a week, then that’s what I’ll do and try them out. Why not? A game is defined by its rules, and if the rules change for a few days, play to them.

PGI has since temporarily removed splash damage from missiles, which seems to have put them at a similar, or maybe perhaps lower, damage class than they were before. It does seem that before that, SRMs were very popular. The splat Cat seemed to have been replaced by the splat Stalker. I haven’t seen nearly as many since then.

Consumables have also made their arrival in these last two patches. The pre-talk on the forums seemed to imply that this would be a game changer, but honestly, I haven’t noticed much, if any effect. Cool shot provides a once-per-match method of flushing heat, but at a cost of C-bills or MC, while the strikes allow pilots to call in support from either aerospace or artillery. Their effectivity can be increased with additional pilot skills. I saw the artillery/air strikes a few times as people tried them out after the patch, but not much since then. I’ve spotted a few coolshots secondhand, viewing other players after my unfortunate early demises in matches, but I can’t say that I feel like it’s been the game-changer that some of the forumers had predicted.

An Atlas and Cataphract exchange blows on Tourmaline Desert.

The Highlander and Heavy Metal hero Battlemechs have made their arrival, too. The craziest part? The Heavy Metal plays music when you score a kill. PGI had been talking about adding music… just didn’t think it’d be like that.

The night vision and thermal modes have been re-worked. Night vision is uglier, but a whole lot more useful. Thermal is not a mandatory, near-necessity for fighting at distances now, as it cuts off around 700m or so. It’s also ghost white, which is supposedly closer to modern-day thermal optics. I find it way less useful. There’s been a pretty interesting solution to the thermal vision problem in MWo on the official forums. I quite like the idea and would love to see it tested.

On the downside, bugs have been popping up galore. I’ve had major HUD issues since these patches, usually missing a mini-map, the HUD entirely, IFF indicators, targeting info, paper dolls… You name it. If it’s been on the HUD, I’ve run a game without it.

Also, the netcode/connection stability has seemed to drop dramatically. While aiming has generally improved over the last month or two, rubberbanding and teleporting are gradually working their way back into the game. I’m not sure if this is an issue with the code, or problem of overloaded servers. With the wonderful weekend bonuses as of late, it’s given a lot of people more of a reason to play, myself included.

A Cataphract fires its medium lasers on Tourmaline Desert.

Last week, it was a double-XP weekend. Seeing as general XP is pretty hard to come by, I played the shit out this game. I used it as an opportunity to work up Spiders and Ravens. A bit on my style: I like my mechs fast and ferocious. My main two rides are a Founder’s Jenner and a Cicada 2A. So, sticking with the lights seemed pretty natural.

The beast – and the bane of my Jenner’s existence, my mech-matchup kryptonite – is the Raven 3L. ECM, Streak SRMs, speed, and a couple of lasers. It’s hard to hit at speed, the ECM gives too much stealth, and those goddamn streaks just don’t miss. I thought I’d love piloting the thing. Instead, I couldn’t help but miss the Jenner. Even though I spent the time to Elite out all of the Ravens (had to get the Speed Boost efficiency), they just didn’t quite fit me. I liked the ECM on the 3L, but I was never able to put on the pressure with the streaks that others have done to me. That, and I think everyone hates these bastard mechs so much that they’ll single them out first.

The 2X was more fun. I loaded it with four pulse lasers, and it had enough of a punch that I could do some damage and sting my opponents. In the 4X, I just couldn’t get much going with it, and ran it pretty close to stock, rocking the dual MGs.

Look again or you may miss it: A Raven captures a base in Conquest mode at Tourmaline Desert.

I like machine guns, in theory: They look cool in the game. They’re now supposedly to be crit-seekers. They can unload rounds and rounds of shells. But… they don’t do shit damage-wise. Really, there’s not reason to even fire them unless all the armor has been stripped off a section of the mech. And if all of the armor is gone, it’s still pretty rough to score a crit. Sure, you might knock out a weapon. But you would’ve just finished that entire section with any other weapons. On rare moments, my opponents have unfortunately been gutted with an ammo explosion from my MG fire. It’s great when it happens, but so rare that it’s not worth packing them. I think the other issue is that right now, MWO doesn’t count critical engine hits. In Battletech, three crits to an engine put it out of commision. If that were the case here, I think the MGs would be way more useful, especially against the assault mechs that can take a while to finish, even after all of their external armor has been removed from the center torso.

After get my Ravens up-to-snuff, I decided to focus on the Spider. Now, I already had a couple of them, mostly due to my irrational love/hate relationship with machineguns and small mechs. I so badly want the Spider 5K to be useful. I really do. When PGI first made the MGs crit-seekers, I rocked quad-machine guns on the 5K. It was fun, but it really didn’t do much. After apparently pissing enough people off with that build, I started to play around. I dabbled with a dual AC/2 config, which seemed like I sacrificed too much armor and speed to get going. I settled, eventually putting on an AC/2, medium laser… and tri-MGs. It’s really hard to get offense with these.

Speed is my salvation in the Spider. That and being a tiny target. But, as much as I love to run around in lights, I want to fight. I feel like the Spider, particularly the 5K, just can’t get enough 1-shot punch to be a large contributor to the battle. The name of the game is still Mechwarrior. Even in Conquest mode, I want to see battle. Some may be content to run from base to base the entire time, but I need some combat action.

The other Spiders, with their multiple laser hardpoints, can yield quite a bit more damage. They’re just as dainty, but at least they’ll make their opponents worry a bit if they get hit.

just want to begin my question with saying thanks to you for having this site set up, its great for the small i76-community, its a special place for small numbe of people out there who like the groove.

Q: im playing on GOG-version of interstate 76 and everythings nice except that the framerate is too high so i wont be able to make the jump in the end of mission 5, even with nitro. any clues on fixing this? can tell you im really not the only one with this problem… basically everyone who buys the gog-version has it.

thank you,
speed is your limit!

Thanks for compliments. This has been a problem plaguing all versions of I ’76 on modern systems. Good news: I do have a fix, at least for NVIDIA cards. Within the NVIDIA drivers, it’s possible to set up a custom game profile and define a max FPS limit. To do so, you’ll need to track down and use a piece of software called the NVIDIA Inspector, which will allow you to set some options that the drivers allow, but do not display.

You can find more info in the Interstate ’76 FAQ.

For a while, I’ve been wanting to get a more uniform look for the site. The news and I ’76 section were already blended a bit, while the Mechwarrior branch had some commonalities with the two.

I’ll probably get the I ’76 section to match the new look next, then get the front page up to snuff. After that, my plan is to get the Deus Ex and Heavy Gear sections matching.

Also, I’d like to get some MWO online info up. I’ve been playing the thing since June of last year, so you’d think it’d be about time for me to ramble on about the game. Should be happening soon.

As usual, I hack every computer in sight when there are no enemies to pester me. More e-mails hinting at Illuminati connections and even more putting a very anti-augmentation spin on their news articles. In my information search, I almost forget to visit the armory. There’s a robotic turret guarding it, just waiting to put a few pounds of lead into someone. I intend to make sure it knows that won’t be me.

I crouch behind the bot, following it for a bit, then pull into a small room. The robot finishes its patrol loop and comes back. From here, I sneak into the armory. The door is locked, but only opens easily using the code I found from the computers I hacked moments ago. I raid the armory, jacking their ammo and weapons. Then I see another door. One I could’ve used to avoid the robot entirely. Oh well, such is life.

I do a bit more searching, eventually working my way to Eliza Cassan. I cross a couple of guards and another robot along the way, but a key takedown, some hacking, and a modified security system later, all of the problems are behind me.

A few thoughts about Eliza Cassan thus far: I’ve seen her all over the place in Detroit: She’s on all of the billboards and people talk about Picus quite a bit. A thought had crossed my mind when I first wandered the Detroit streets. Is she human? I mean, I’ve read Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. Buster Friendly, the perpetual voice of the TV, was always on 24/7. It didn’t seem humanly possible. He was and android. Eliza may be an android, although I haven’t seen any in the Deus Ex world. Also, her voice acting is horrible. She sounds like an auditioner for a high school play reading from a script. It’s that bad.

So, without further ado, I meet Eliza. She’s not human. She’s… like Helios, an AI. Imagine a not-evil SHODAN. That’s what we have here. A large screen with Eliza’s face is in the center of the room while two physical existences are on either side. But, we’re not alone. Shades of the boss fight from System Shock 2 cast over me. Oh, no, I can feel it coming. Federova, an augmented mercenary that broke into Sarif Industries all those months ago has crashed my party with Eliza. Here we go again, another boss fight.

Eliza calmly tells me how to defeat the boss while I’m running around trying to avoid getting shot. “She recharges after the claymore.” “Electricity will cause her cloaking device to stop working, but the ground is water, so you’ll be hurt, too.” I put about 20 shotgun rounds into the Federova before she rips my augmented eyes out of my skull. I learned my lesson with Barret. I set the difficulty back down to the easy mode. I’m not wasting another thirty attempts on a sucky boss.

With the lower difficulty, I try again, and eventually, I get lucky. I’m able to use a couple of EMP grenades to slow down Federova, then when she’s not moving, I unload just about everything that I’ve got on her – shotgun shells, combat rifles, heavy rifles, pistols, the whole shebang. By the time the fights over, I’ve got almost no ammo left whatsoever. Did I mention the boss fights suck? She’s not anyone. No background, no story, no real reason for her to be a boss. Doesn’t matter. She’s dead. Eliza gives me some fine parting words, “Everyone lies.” Time to go back to Detroit, which has somehow gotten even shittier. (Sorry, Detroit.)

“No,” Jensen interrupts. “Montreal.”

Pulling the power move, Jensen sends the pair en route to Montreal, to check out Picus Media, a big-ass news, telecom everything group that has littered Human Revolution so far. They’re on every TV in the game. Their literature is around on tables. People talk about what’s on their TV stations in e-mails to each other. Montreal is the center of the communications world, it seems. I guess that’s what happens when you lower your taxes to promote videogame companies to put their studios in your city. What?

The mission is to speak with Picus lead news reporter Eliza Cassan. Megan and the others aren’t dead, and she seems to hold a few answers to their whereabouts. I sneak in the building, busting a wall in the process. I crouch and cover around each corner, but there’s a big problem: For a 24-hour news center, this place is empty. A moment later, Pritchard pops up on the info link sharing the same news. Good job, genius.

There’s plenty of computers and I can’t resist hacking each one of them. A few things to note: Picus definitely has an anti-aug, I mean, uh… pro-human, slant. Morgan Everett and Nicolette DuClaire work there. I’m confused. Wasn’t Nicollete the daughter in Deus Ex? Is she even born yet? No matter, time to find Cassan. Off to room 404 where there will obviously be some type of error. Let me guess: Cassan not found.

Cutscene time and Cassan pops up. She yabbers for a bit, and then disappears. Damn, it’s a holo-projection and a setup. Security is on our ass. Got to get out alive and find a stairway. There’s a ton of guards. I suck at not getting shot. Come to think of it, I still suck at a lot of aspects of Deus Ex: Human Revolution, most notably stealth and combat. I’m good at hacking and reading e-mails, though.

Anyway, I decide it’s easier to sneak past the guards than to take them on. Well, that and after a several unsuccessful attempts and a few reloads, I’ve learned my lesson. As I lurk behind banisters and cubicles, I find a another conveniently-placed human-sized airduct and travel through it. I go upstairs, where I sneak behind desks to avoid the detection of guards. Finally, I make it past all of the guards and it seems like I’m in the clear, when I meet the end of the line at a broken elevator. Wait, that’s right, Icarus landing system – that’ll save me. I leap through the elevator shaft, gently land, gain a nice bonus of experience points, and find myself at the studio.

So, this is where Ms. Cassan works. Fancy place. It’s a TV studio with cameras and a new desk. I’m curious as to why they keep guns and ammo with the cameras, but other than that, a neat location. More failed attacks from me and more reloads, so I opt to stick with sneaking. Then, I see it: a security computer. Lucky me, it’s attached to a turret. I hack it, set that turret to eradicate any enemies on the spot, and that’s it: game over for the local security guards. I hack all of the computers and absorb their knowledge. On my way out of the room, I notice the turret is selectable. I can pick it up. A portable killing device? Can it be? Hells yeah.

The turret is My Buddy™. Wherever I go, he goes, too – My Buddy and me. (Obscure reference, I think.) It works… better than I thought. I can drop the turret wherever I like, but it’s sometimes slow to react. I basically have to alert enemies to my presence. If that doesn’t work, then I have to coax them into shooting the turret. Once they connect, though, that bad boy goes apeshit on them.

I”m trying to find the Funicular – another word for a big-ass elevator. My Buddy and I go work our way to it and end up in the basements of the Picus building. Pritchard pops up on the infocom to let Jensen know that we’re (turret and I) to find a hidden room. Ok, off we go. Fresh off the elevator and there’s a security camera and a laser grid. I throw My Buddy™ in the laser grid, setting off the alarm, then I destroy the cam with my handy shotgun.

My Buddy™ wastes the guards and even turns the other robotic turrets to rubbish. What a great investment. I can’t believe it’s worked this long. If I can keep it up, the rest of the game will be cake. I may never have to fire another shot.

In the basement is large Illumaniti statue, very reminiscent of the opening scenes of the original Deus Ex. A hand around a globe; that can only mean trouble ahead. Speaking of trouble, some angry guards come after me, so I let My Buddy™ the turret kick their ass while I go to an airvent. The airvent takes me upwards, where the sound of turret fire stops. Uh oh. Those bastards EMPed my turret. He’s no more. Sad to see him go. Those bastard are also cloakers. They’ve got cloaking technology, which means I have to shoot them based on the blasts of their weapons. I see some augmentation upgrades in the future. For now, though, I need some time to regroup.

I’m struck. Not by a bullet, but by the view. It’s a modern palace up here. Blade Runner inspirations abound, as a a soft warm light radiates through the windows and onto large polygonal statues. As beautiful as the place is, I have a sinking feeling; there’s no way that there’s a big open space with conveniently placed hiding spots unless a fight is coming. It’s got to be a boss fight. I walk slowly, prepared for an ambush. I hack a couple of computers, head through the top door and… cutscene.

It’s Zhao, Tai Yong’s VP. Jensen gets a hold of her and shoves one of the fancy retractable blades out of his elbow and onto her neck. He makes a critical mistake, choosing to let her live. She starts yapping and caressing his chest. Jensen, having completely forgotten about Meghan and his entire motivation for the game, is completely and utterly manipulated. Listen, if any strange girl starts to come on to you after you threaten her life, she’s manipulating you. Poor Jensen is played the fool and she escapes, setting off every alarm in the building.

Time for a firefight

The guards come running through the previously serene grand hallway. I toss a few grenades – a flashbang, a couple of gas grenades – to the center. Anyone left standing gets picked off one by one. I’ve come to use cover more and more, mostly because I don’t get shot when I’m holding down that cover button. If I just hide behind a banister, occasional shots graze me, and I can only take about three before I’m dead. So, I hide. When they stop firing, I toast them. I use my combat rifle, and when I’m out of ammo, I pick them off with the pistol. The sniper rifle is almost useless. There’s no way to silence it. What? (Oh, unless you’ve purchased a specific edition of the game. Screw that.) So, every time I fire, I attract too much attention. I’m still carrying it, though, hoping I can sell it for a cool 1500 credits later.

After turning the hallway to a bloody mess, it’s time to get to the hangar and get the hell out. If I make it to the hangar, Malik can pick me up in her shiny helicopter. I go to the hangar preparing to get the hell out of Tai Yong, but it’s never that easy. There are two bigass robots in there and the hangar doors refuse to open until the robots are disabled. These things look like giant caterpillar bots, both the in the sense of the earth mover Caterpillars and the the shimmying movements of the caterpillars that wander the earth.

I start sneaking to the left. I see a stairway on the right, but I don’t think I can make it without becoming botfood. With liberal use of cover, I eventually make it to some stacked crates. First thoughts: Stack them correctly and I can get to the top. Second thoughts: stacking sucks. I give up on my grand stacking idea and instead dash to the other side of the room. Really, in a way, the sneaking can be kind of boring. There’s a lot of waiting. Wait until Robot 1 can’t see you. Ok, wait until Robot 2 can’t see you. Damn, now Robot 1 is back. Ok, GO! Sprint for five seconds and then do it all again.

Sprinting is done by holding down the shift key, a la every game since (and maybe before?) Half-Life. I reach the other side, then crouch and sneak up the stairways. This is security room two, but it won’t let me override the bots. I dash to security room one on the other side, do a little security hacking and disable the big caterpillars. Back to room one to open then hangars, and now it’s time get the hell out of China.