Mechwarrior Q&A
Local Ditch Gaming > Mechwarrior > Questions & Answers
You’ve got questions, we’ve got advice that’ll deeply confuse you. Wait, that’s not right. Anyway, here’s the deal, if there’s a question about the site, about the games on the site, about games I’ve talked about on the site, about the world, or if you feel like threatening me in the form of a question, just contact me and I’ll answer it here.
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Q&A: Taking questions and sharing knowledge with the Mechwarrior historian that runs the Art of Battletech archive!
Hi Localditch, I’m so happy to see you are back up and running again. This is by far the best site on the internet regarding knowledge and research on mech games, especially Mechwarrior. My name is Emil and I’m the guy who’s running the Art of Battletech and Mechwarrior archive and doing all of the modding for Mechwarrior 5 Mercenaries (and soon this week Clans). I have a very deep interest in the history of the games and your resources have been an absolute godsend over the many years. I also work as an academic and I’m looking to detail the history of mech sim games a bit more. I actually have a research paper being presented in September about the history of the mech sim genre and I will definitely make more use of your work. I can also reveal that I’m embarking on doing a remake of Mechwarrior 2 in MW5 Clans. I already have Silent Thunder up and running (and previously I did Pyre Light as a demo / prototype in MW5 Mercs in case you haven’t seen it). I really want to establish some sort of contact with you and hear more from you or even ask some questions, because you clearly know a whole lot about many things 🙂 I’d love to know more about your background and how you got to know so many things about the games, and if there’s anything I can provide you with – e.g. some of my archived work on the Mechwarrior games that I’ve gathered over the years, including original MW2 and MW3 renders by Scott Goffman and Eric Chadwick that they sent over.
Hey, great to hear from you and thanks for reaching out! The Art of Battletech is frikkin’ awesome. I’m so glad you’re archiving this stuff. I may have nicked an image or two here or there for the site, haha. It’s really cool to hear you’ve got a presentation on mech sims. Feel free to use any info you need off of the Local Ditch. I unfortunately started the site a long time ago, so things are not quite cited as well as they could’ve been, though I try to do better on more recent info and updates. I did see a video of your Mechwarrior 2 level in MW5. Looking forward to the MW5: Clans versions. All us old timers will love it!
As far as my background goes, I’m just a fan running a hobbyist website that’s basically just outlived a lot of others. I started playing MW2 as a kid and would periodically revisit it, usually having to figure out how to get the the thing running again. Some of the old info was common knowledge of the time. Some of it (well, probably a lot) was copying it from sites of people that knew more than me. Some of it was reading a ton of video game magazines and sites, then trying to make a coherent story on all of it (especially the MW2: The Clans info).
Feel free to ask about anything. If you have anything cool that you feel should be on the Local Ditch, send it my way and I’ll put it up!
Also, image courtesy of the Art of Battletech, of course.
I found an Original MechWarrior game 1989. What would be a good resale
price.
I just did a quick completed listings search on ebay and one went for $50
just a few days ago. Another went for $87 at the beginning of June. Both
were on floppy disk and in excellent condition.
You can also check out Mechwarrior at Price Charting to see how the game is selling.
Found your site through a search for MW2 resources. Great articles, it’s all put together in a nice format. Really enjoyed reading them!
Sorry for the super-late response, but I just wanted to say “thanks” for the message!
Hi. I stumbled upon your site looking for some info.
Two things:
1. Why no recent updates? I know there are a lot of “classic” games sites, but you sire have depth of coverage of some of my favorite games found no where else.
2. I will have to test your Clans demo when I get home tonight, but I if it’s truly the “second” one, I believe I have the first. Still on floppy. Played it for HOURS.
Let me know if you are interested.
Great to hear from you! I run the website as a hobby and so I tend to slack a little (sometimes a lot) before I get in gear and update the thing. No worries, though: Mechwarrior Online is coming out soon, so I’ll have a ton of stuff about that coming up when the game is available.
The demo that I’ve posted on the site can be tricky to get running. The last time I ran the thing, I was using Windows XP. Even with XP, I still had to reboot in DOS mode or use DOSBox to get it going. Can’t remember exactly what I did, since it’s been several years ago.
It might be even trickier in Windows Vista or 7. I’d try to run it in DOSBox first and see what happens.
If the demo that you have is even earlier, I’d love to see it and if possible, post it on the localditch.com. That’s a great find.
On the “Powerhits: Battletech” CD, I have uncovered a copy of the original trailer for “Mechwarrior 2: The Clans.” I checked YouTube, and nobody had uploaded it, yet, so I uploaded it myself. I do not know whether or not your site has the original trailer, but if it does not, I can either send it to you or link you to the video that I posted.
I’d definitely like to see it! Either send me the video and I’ll post it on the website or send me the link and I’ll link to it instead.
I haven’t run across it before and it sounds like a great piece of Mechwarrior history.
(Update: Watch it on Youtube or see it while you read Local Ditch Gaming’s deep dive into Mechwarrior 2: The Clans.)
I have the same disk as you and tried following your instructions, but I couldn’t get it to work. I need help with the glide. How do I configure it? Also, I could only get my hands on the beta 2 version…
Ok, first question: Can you run Mechwarrior 2 in Windows without applying any of the Glide patches? If you can’t, then be sure to get the game working. After that, copy over the 3dfx files. To install dgvoodoo, just copy its files into the Mechwarrior 2 directory. As far as the particular options go, play with them a bit and see what types of effects they may have on your system.
I’m offering no guarantees that this’ll work for anyone else. But, I did manage to get the game running that way and maybe someone else out there can use the info as, if no other reason, a starting point.