Not only is MechWarrior 5 coming out on 23 September for the PlayStation consoles, on all platforms there will also be a new story campaign and even many free improvements with the DLC Legend of the Kestrel Lancers.
With the release of MechWarrior 5: Mercenaries on the PlayStation 4 and 5 on 23 September, the series is not only returning to Sony’s console for the first time since the 90s. The developers from Piranha Games will also release the new DLC Legend of the Kestrel Lancers on the same day for 20 euros and deliver some gameplay improvements for all players with a free update, so also on PC and the Xbox consoles.
Table of Contents
What does Legend of the Kestrel Lancers deliver?
The most important innovations of the second paid expansion for MechWarrior 5 can be divided into three main features:
- New Story Campaign: Besides Clan Mechs, new hand-built story missions are probably one of the most important wishes of MechWarrior 5 players and so far one of the biggest weaknesses of the action simulation. Legend of the Kestrel Lancers now brings a 14-mission campaign that begins in the year 3026 and leads into the fourth Succession War.
- More in-the-middle feeling: There are even small cutscenes and lots of radio messages in the missions themselves. In addition, the missions are supposed to feel more often like you are taking part in much larger battles
- New side missions: Away from the campaign, there are also seven new quests with 10 new missions that are also supposed to be much larger and offer more hand-built scripted moments. The mission series Stop the Launch from the DLC Heroes of the Inner Sphere was used as a model here.
- New procedural mission types: Many missions in MechWarrior 5 also make use of a procedural mission system during the campaign. And in doing so, there are now new mission types to choose from: Scorched Earth, Objective Raid, Battlefield and Targeted Kill.
However, we have yet to learn exact details about all mission types. Objective Raid, for example, requires you to raid supply depots and secure equipment, and Battlefield will be large battles where you are just one of many lances, similar to the new quest missions or the mission type from a mod available for the PC version.
Do I have to start over for the DLC?
By the way, you can start the new campaign from an existing save game, but there is also a special game launcher that kicks in at the right time and provides you with an appropriate mech squad right away.
New Scenarios
While the first DLC Heroes of the Inner Sphere only delivers a new environment, Legend of the Kestrel Lancers brings three new biomes to the game. There will be a new crystal desert setting and a new jungle environment that, among other things, brings back very tall trees that were only seen in early gameplay videos from 2017.
In addition, there’s dense bushes for you to hide in. The most unusual new environment, however, is the city setting. Whereas previously only small settlements were possible in the procedurally created areas, you can now fight in sprawling metropolises where there is plenty of destructible cover and where the use of jump jets also opens up new possibilities if you prefer to be on the rooftops of cities.
Some of the new graphic elements from the city environments will also appear in other biomes where there will now also be larger settlements. Since the cities can be very hardware-hungry, the new city maps are limited to medium-sized maps, but modders can and will be able to override these limits and create cities that will drive your PCs to the brink of despair.
There are no completely new mechs this time around, but over 20 new mech variants are included. As with the first DLC, only the main player needs the expansion in co-op mode, while up to three other players can take part in the missions without the add-on. In addition, cross-play is still possible between all platforms, i.e. also between PC and consoles. Mods, however, are only supported in the PC version.
Note on mod support
As with the release of the last DLC and the big May update, the new DLC and update will likely make some, perhaps all, mods temporarily incompatible. However, mod developers usually update their works within a few days or weeks, at least if they are still active. The Coyotes Mission Pack, for example, provides even more procedural mission types that can also appear in the campaign and even let you set up a large Union landing ship in the Rescue missions. Unfortunately, this is still not available in the normal game – at least not with a competent landing.
What new features does the free update provide?
In addition to the 20 Euro DLC, a patch for all platforms will also be released on 23 September, which will deliver a few exciting new features:
- Melee: For the first time in the MechWarrior series, there is now dedicated melee combat. You will be able to strike with the left and right arms of the mechs, but there are not yet dedicated melee weapons or mechs designed for melee combat, such as the Hatchetman.
- Mech Switching: You can now switch between the four mechs in your unit at any time during a mission, which opens up a whole new range of tactical play possibilities.
- New HUD design: The hub will also be revised with the new update. For example, the radar moves to the bottom centre. This is exactly where many HUD mods had already moved it many times. Since the mods are not supported in the console versions, players on Xbox and PlayStation will also be able to enjoy this improvement.
We do not yet have a complete list of the new features in the patch. Among other things, there will also be more gamepad profiles.
Looking back at the big update for the release of the Steam version in May 2021, you should expect that there will be improvements again this time that don’t even appear in the official feature lists. Although the developers emphasised in an interview that there won’t be quite as many small adjustments this time as with the Steam launch and the simultaneous release of the Xbox versions and the first DLC Heroes of the Inner Sphere
Why is this DLC so important?
When MechWarrior 5 was released via Epic Story in December 2019, it offered a solid foundation but also left many fans wanting more. The campaign was rather boring and was too often interrupted by random missions, there were performance issues and AI weaknesses. Own and enemy mechs did not use jump jets, for example.
This has since improved a lot with free updates and the first DLC. The core gameloop of MechWarrior 5 is a real action spectacle and actually all aspects of the game have been noticeably improved since release. In addition, there are numerous mods that enable even more tactical depth on the PC, further improve the graphics or simply unlock many more building options on the mechs.
But the biggest weakness so far is still the story missions. There are simply too few of them. Although we now get some background information on historical events in the normal campaign and the campaign start has been revised. In addition, side quests provide a few special events, but the really big hand-built mission highlights came up short.
The new DLC is supposed to close exactly this gap and it also shows that the developers have meanwhile improved their basic game to such an extent that they can concentrate more on this nevertheless often very time-consuming content. If we get new story campaigns on a regular basis in the next few years that also integrate seamlessly into the ongoing game, MechWarrior 5 will probably end up being exactly what many series fans have always wanted. In any case, the game seems to be on exactly the right track. All that’s missing now is the clan invasion!
