Hawken – The mech combat you always wanted
Hawken is the perfect example of a game I didn’t know that I needed to play. I was genuinely unaware that arena combat between large mechs was missing from my life. While I had heard buzz about it while I was running around at PAX Prime 2012, I never quite found myself over at the booth. Clearly this was an oversight on my part as this should definitely have been one of my favorite games of the weekend. Thankfully I signed up for the closed beta and have had the pleasure of finding out exactly how much fun rampaging through a post apocalyptic landscape while hunting down other players in a giant mech can be. One of the best parts about it is that Hawken is free to play and goes live on December 12th, so you won’t have to wait long to come crush my mech into dust.
I didn’t think I would like it this much.
With very few exceptions, straight up pvp games are not my bag. I don’t know what it is, but I tend to take them a little too personally and usually end up just rage quitting. So even though I had heard good things about it on PAX and the Hawken website is covered in quotes about how awesome it is, I just wasn’t sold. However, I hate to waste a closed beta key. When I first loaded up Hawken and jumped into a team deathmatch I fell in love. Apparently something about this game just pulls at some long dormant childhood desires. Visions of Mech Warrior and Robotech began swirling in my head and with my first kill I started beaming. This actually makes for a really good mix of the two ideas in that you’ve got the big lumbering mech that can suddenly be quickly weaving between structures and firing volleys of bullets and missiles. It’s not quite to the fast paced level of Unreal Tournament, but something about firing my assault rifle and rocket launcher arms while dashing around and knocking over light posts more than makes up for it.
What a mech combat game should feel like.
Customize that wacky mech. Go nutty.
Every second of play screams mech combat awesomeness. The cockpit design with the reinforced roll cage bars, the gauges, and the HUD immediately immerse you in the environment. It’s a perfect use of the first person perspective while solving the issue of foreground indicators like health and ammo being a little out of place. Even the cracked glass effect when your mech is heavily damaged only adds to the feeling of immersion. The jarring movement of giant hydraulic legs treading heavily over uneven terrain is perfectly conveyed. Dashing by using the giant jet thrusters on your back can be just as sudden and disorienting as it should be. On top of everything else, your mech has unlimited ammo. Firing your weapons generates heat and firing continuously will cause them to overheat and require a cool down period. Of course dashing and firing weapons is what is going to ping your heat signature on the radar of your enemies. You can’t engage or escape without consequence. If you can manage to escape, there is a small repair drone that can fix the damage taken in your fight for supremacy. However, even that is dangerous since you need to put your mech into a non-functioning state while the drone does its job. Yep, even healing can be exciting.
Tons of upgrades
Hawken is full of customization options for each of the mech configurations. You start with a basic model, of which there are currently 9. From there, it’s off to the garage to purchase upgrades to tweak and customize your rig using either Hawken credits (earned from playing matches) or Meteor credits (purchased with real dollars). Everything from armor plating, weapon cooling systems, and support items to cosmetic things like a new paint job is available to players. The garage is also where you will assign tech points to the optimization trees – similar to talent trees in popular MMORPG games. Tech points are earned by gaining experience with your mech and leveling up. With time you will be able to build a mech uniquely suited to your combat style.
I cannot recommend this highly enough
Hawken is exhilarating arena combat at its best. I’m personally fond of using the Brawler mech with a machine gun turret to distract my opponents while I swing around and take them out with my flak cannon. Of course, it’s the kind of strategy that gets me pretty beat up before I take out someone else and then I need to run for cover to repair before anyone can find me. Either that or use the Brawler’s special ability to convert to a self-healing, but very slow moving turret (more like a tank) mode. Other people seem to enjoy the Rocketeer mech with its ability to lock on and fire salvos of missiles while others favor the Sharpshooter with its long range sabot rifle. Regardless of your play style (unless you like being the medic – none of that here) there’s some sort of giant robot rampage fantasy for you in Hawken. If we had a metric rating system, I would give this a 9.5/10.
