Want it?

This is a FAQ for the folks who don’t have the game, and would like to know more about it. I wrote it to dispell a lot of the misinformation that’s going around ruining everybody’s idea of what this wonderful game is really about.

I’d want to play the game, but it’s like 500 bucks. What’s up with that?

The release price of the game was only 200 dollars. There’s both a lot of confusion about this, and a lot of complaining about it; but the actual release price was 200 bucks. That’s basically 50 for the game, and 150 for the controller. If you ask me, 150 dollars for a controller of this size and quality is better than decent. I’ve seen steering wheels / arcade sticks / flight sticks for over a hundred dollars; why be surprised at a 150 dollar item that includes the complexities of this controller?! It has BLINKY LIGHTS!!

Can I play the game without that freaky controller?

No. You can’t. Neither can your friend who claims they can. They are lying.

What’s the story with losing your game saves?

Yes, it’s true — if you get killed and don’t hit the “eject button” (the button with the transparent plastic protective cover over it) in time, you’re screwed. You die, and you lose your game save. This sucks, and adds an element of realism and intensity to the game, that though awful, kinda rocks in my opinion ’cause you really freak out. And let’s face it — the more you play these levels the better, so starting over ain’t so bad.

Where’s the tape player?

When defining the armaments of your mech, you can activate the “boom box” and listen to some funky, creepy lo-fi music while you play. LoC supports Custom Soundtracks, and that’s freakin’ rad!

Why aren’t there any seagulls?

Shut up.

Why isn’t my mech moving very fast?

Mechs by their nature move quite slowly. Though they lumber around step by step, the action can get REAL fast because of the nature of the camera and crosshairs. These two things can move incredibly fast, and completely independantly. This makes for some seriously intense combat potential. Looking one way, firing in another, and walking in another. Pretty sweet, eh?

The “strafe” pedal shouldn’t be called a “strafe” pedal.

Please form your questions in the form of a question. But yes, you’re right. The strafe pedal doesn’t modify your movement the same way a strafe modifier does on a keyboard — it makes you quickly jump forward, left, right, or backwards depending on the position of the gearshift, and the direction the left joystick is pushed during the pedal depression. If the gearshift is in N, 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 you jump forward. If it’s in R, you’ll jump backwards. If you move the left joystick left or right while depressing the strafe pedal, you’ll jump left or right. You can also do diagonal movements with combinations of gas / strafe directions.

When does my pilot need to eat?

This is a sim, but not that much of a sim.

Why’s the screen all GRITTY loooking?

Imagine this: you’re sitting inside a completely enclosed metal cockpit inside the mech. There is no windshield or glass or anything — you look at “tv screens” inside the cockpit to see what’s going on outside your mech. There are cameras placed on the outside of the mechs which feed their signal to the interior screens which you look at. So the quality of the image you look at is a sort of … video resolution, and when it gets jarred (from a fall or when you’re going over rough terrain or whatever)it distorts, and when it gets dirty it needs cleaning, etc. I think it’s a pretty sweet effect, and adds another level of realism to the game.

How can I take on more than 1 mech at once?

All you need is to keep moving, use the radar to keep an eye on incoming shells, and utilize all the tools the mech gives you. Chaffs are handy, strafing is handy, and the fact that you can look one way, move another way, and fire your weapons another way comes in handy too. And don’t panic. 🙂

Do I need a third hand to control this biyatch?

No, but it certainly would help.

It’s big. In fact; these are the measurements. Below is the newer iteration of the controller; which is identical to the old one except for the blue coloration of the lights.

Here is a photo of both the old and the new controllers so you can see the subtle visual differences. Click the image to zoom in; you’ll see that the new controller has a grey matte finish to the metal plates rather than the black of the old controller.

Other than the button and metal color differences, the connecting wires of the new controllers look a bit beefed up as you can see in the photo below. Click to zoom. Another difference between new and old is the stenciled lettering on the left side of the center block. The old one said “P.R.F. Army 7th Special Panzer, blah blah” whereas the new one doesn’t say P.R.F … it just has the blah blah. I’m guessing that’s ’cause some people will be in factions other than the PRF, and boy would I be steamed if I was with the Right Brothers and it said PRF on my VT! (A small oversight on their part, or not wanting to recast the footpedal block; the new footpedals still say PRF army. Take that!)

The Controller for this game is half the fun of it. So much so, that it certainly deserves to be spelled with a capital C.

I took the center block of the controller apart just for kicks, and this is what it looks like. Okay; I lied. I got mad and smashed one of the buttons into itself and had to do emergency repairs; but this way YOU get to benefit from my stupidity!

Controller Functions (from left to right):

*5th gear in Line of Contact puts you in “wheel mode” where you fly along on secret hidden wheels on your VTs toes propelled by jets at very high speeds. It makes a great sound.

**These switches actually have a purpose in Line of Contact. When you shut them all off it’ll turn your VT off, and make you invisble to radar and unable to be locked onto. Good for ambushes. Bad if they find you.

***In Line of Contact, F1 is the ‘sniper mode’ button, F2 zooms in on your top submonitor, and F3 zooms in on your bottom submonitor. If you push both F2 and F3 simultaneously it zooms in on the main screen. All are very handy.