CHROMEHOUNDS - GOOD NIGHT SWEET PRINCE
 

So, yeah. Sega fucked up with Full Auto. But maybe they can come back and be awesome with CHROMEHOUNDS.

It's also got that whole persistant world thing like Mechassault 2 had, where you fight to control territory as you join a faction and fight in 6 on 6 battles. Different armies can advance and gain territories as time goes on, and so forth. It was a great idea for Mechassault, although there was a few army balance issues with that.

There is also supposed to be a kajillion different customization options, much like Armored Core, so each mech will be different and unique. Which will be a nice change of pace form the likes of games like Mechwarrior 4 or other "Model" based mech games wehre everyone picks the heaviest and hugest robot possible and just plays with that.

The whole "commander" idea for a clan is also pretty sweet. It should allow for a much better and streamlined team effort if the team works well together. I dunno how many of you have played Line of Contact, but a lot of groupss had "commanders" in that too, only that wasn't really a feature, just an added thing the players did. It made for a good experience, so I hope this does here too.

The mecha designs is also pretty neat looking, as you can see form the below screens

http://xbox360media.ign.com/xbox360/...0005333245.jpg
http://xbox360media.ign.com/xbox360/...0005336089.jpg
http://xbox360media.ign.com/xbox360/...4010310201.jpg

You can also see some of the customization from there too, as you can choose any sort of movement method you want. 4 legs, 2 legs, hovercraft, wheels, treads, etc.

Anyone else interested in this? We could get a GFF squad going or something if enough people are gonna pick this up when it drops on July 11th.

My friend is pretty pumped up for this game. He and I were big fans of the original mech assault when it came out as a launch title for xbox live. We were really disappointed by mech 2 though with its lack of mech selection before the game. I know he's gonna try this game out.

Sadly, I don't have a 360, wanting to save up to move out.

MA2 was not without it's faults, this is true. But it had some pretty spiffy ideas. The jacking of mechs was kinda unbalanced though as it was an instant kill, and experienced players just stayed in the damn power armour the whole match.

Anyway, does he post here? If so, he could be a part of our group if/when he gets the game.

So far, this is one of the only games that interests me on the 360. I like the idea of Persistant Worlds MP.

like stealth this one of the few games that may make me buy a 360 (but surly not anytime soon)

it look fun and I too find the mech design very cool

Hahahahaaha that is so funny because he used to be a part of this community but he didn't like the fact you have to search (just in case a similar topic was already posted) before posting a topic.

Ummm but ya I'll tell um that there might be group waitin for um when the game comes out.

I love Armoured Core and always wanted a multiplayer mech game with that level of customisation so I'd love to get this. Looks damn pretty too...

Does anyone know if this is more simulation or arcadey? Although a good setup is important in AC multiplayer, hovering and flying about skills count for a lot too.

The other potential problem with a game of this sort is if you have to unlock mech parts offline in order to use them online. In Blazing Angels, you have to unlock and upgrade planes offline in order to use them online which meant after a couple of weeks of it coming out, if you didn't have the upgraded Hurricane II or 109M, you couldn't compete.

Balance of weapons and parts can make or break games like this in my opinion.

I don't actually know if it's more arcadey or simmish. The gameplay trailers make it look like a mix of the two. I doubt we'll have to worry about gyros and stabilizers like this were Steel Battalion, but I hope we have more to worry about than pointing and shooting like this was Mech Assault or something.

Now, there have been interviews with the devs and such and they mention that each part affects the mech in different ways, as you can even upgrade your reactor to burn more effiecently and what not. The way they worded it makes it seem like there will be a bit more complexity to the controls than just walking forward and putting a missile in someone's face.

At least, that's what I hope. They need to drop a demo on live or something. That'd be extremely helpful.

The name sounds rather homosexual, but the screens look nice, and it sounds like a cool game. I guess I'll try it out once a friend gets it, but I really don't see myself buying this. Mech games are really overused, and I didn't even find them that fun to begin with. But, then again, who knows? Maybe this will change my mind.

What particular mecha games do you not like Capo? Or is the entire genre a turn off for you? I'm sure I can recommend something you'd like.

I mean, I played Mech Assault, and a few others, and the genre is really just kind of stale. Dunno. :/

Looks like it could be fun.

Care to expand on that a little? What about it makes it look fun? Do you like the graphics? The customability? The name?

What I'm getting at, is that posts like that contribute nothing to the discussion and are basically spam. If I see any more posts like this from you I'll delete them and you'll get a warning for spam. Consider this a friendly heads up...

Well the Xbox forum is pretty dead most of the time so I just wanted to add my opinion. To be honest I hadn't really be following the game, but from the screenshots and description, I'll probably check it out when it's released.

Voicing an opinion is fine. Doing so using a nothingy, one-liner isn't. If you don't have anything worthwhile to say in future, please keep quiet.

Doesn't these robots look shiny? More than they should, I mean?

Anyways, I enjoyed Mech Assault 2 (I think it was) and was massively 'meh-ed' by the suit, but enjoyed stomping around making buildings collapse and the earth shudder. I hope this game'll give me a slice of stomping and collapsing fun, without the boring sodding around in a weak suit. I want hardcore destruction. All the time.... Okay, I'll try relaxing now;_;

A list of achievements for this game has been released.

Doesn't look like you can squeeze easy points out of this one. I also dislike that almost all of them give a measly 20 points, as some are obviously going to be a lot harder to achieve than others, and the points should reflect that.

Almost looks like the shiny effects going on in Oblivion? Anyone know what causes this, or if it's some new kind of rendering technical doo hickey?

Not really, a majority of them are basically accumulation type achievements. Get a certain number of this, or do that X times. Since they don't seem progressive (like the ones in PDZ) it doesn't seem like it's so bad to split them up and make them all worth the same amount of points like that.

WIth luck it'll be balanced though, unless something like hovercraft legs aren't useful that often or something.

Right now I haven't bothered with X-Box Live. I can't stand the control scheme on Blazing Angels, I hate Perfect Dark Zero with a passion, and Elder Scrolls: Oblivion is a single player game. Thus I only have Dead or Alive 4 to play online which isn't worth it to me. I've been watching Chrome Hounds with interest. If I do get this one it might be what tempts me to finally bother with getting my 360 online. I've always been fond of mech games although I have to admit that I consistently suck at them(well the ones where you pilot them anyways....I'm pretty good at the strategy games). You'd laugh at how poor I am at Mech Warrior or Zone of the Enders. On the other hand as long as my team doesn't mind watching lots of terrible deaths or mind the fact that I tend to be online at odd hours I'm a fan of multiplayer gaming. This and Gears of War are probably the two games I'm most looking forward to at this point.

Blazing Angels is a terrible game, and I agree with you on PDZ.

But Live is extremely cheap. It works out to something like 5 bucks a month. That's basically the price of one game a year. Just the ability to download arcade games is worth that much, let alone the multiplayer for games like Burnout and PGR3, and the downloadbale content for ES4. This'll sound like an ad, but Live is fucking awesome and I heartily recommend it.

Also, if you decide to get CHROMEHOUNDS be sure to let us know. So far I haven't been able to raise much....uhhh...enthusiasm for it. So I dunno if I'll be able to get a GFF clan or group together. The more the merrier.

Behave, Blazing Angels is an awesome game.

This'll definitely be on my list of games to get. To be honest, I'm more likely to get this than pretty much anything else out there at the moment. I love a decent Mech Game but sadly, very few get released over here.

To me Blazing Angels had the potential to be an awesome game. Two things ruined it(well three but I haven't personally come across #3 because I don't play online).

1. The control scheme. I was expecting it to control like Crimson Skies. But it doesn't and more than once I've gotten myself killed by the control scheme.

2. The voice acting. *Shudder* This isn't that big to me but it annoys.

3. I can't vouch for this but I've been told online that you have to fly one of two different planes or you can forget about any hope of winning.


On the other hand if they do a Blazing Angels 2 with a fixed control scheme plus better plane balance I think they'll have a real winner.


As for Chrome Hounds, I'll let you guys know if I get it. A lot of my friends IRL have 360's....unfortunately I'm the only mecha lover in our group so it's looking like none of them will be getting Chrome Hounds.

1. Yeah, it's not ideal but I kinda got used to it.

2. Absolutely shocking, I agree.

3. True to some extent but if you know what you're doing you can get some decent kills with some of the others. For example, using the heavy German fighter sounds like suicide but the tail gunner catches a lot of people out...

Back on topic, does anyone know if this will be 360 only or if there'll be an Oldbox version too?

I'm actually in a really similar boat concerning the state of Xbox Live. Dead or Alive 4 is probably the only game that I actually spent a good deal of time online. I'm not too hyped about Chromehounds, but I'm definitely looking forward to Gears of War.

If you didn't have to pay extra for arcade games then I'd agree. The current ones just don't interest me enough to warrant the extra cost. Hopefully Street Fighter 2 will change things, but if it costs over $10 US, there's no way I'm paying that much for it. Especially with the shitty Xbox 360 d-pad.

The problem being I don't like the arcade games they've got available(plus you have to pay for them seperately from Live anyways) and the games you mentioned being great are from a genre I don't enjoy(racing). The limit of my racing enjoyment are F-Zero and Mariokart.

But like I said, as more games come out that make Live worth it, I'll probably get it. Chrome Hounds is a solid step in that direction and I'll bet Gears of War will be as well.

I would be interested in teaming up with people to blow shit up. :D

The graphics and the gameplay details so far seems amazing. Hopefully the finished product deliver. I'll put it on top of my Gamefly list and hope for positive reviews.

I also hope it's more sim than arcade. Hopefully there is a strategy in the mech design, where you target your weapon damage and what. The game play should be thoughtful and deliberate not finding the nearest mech, turboing to him and spamming right trigger. :)

Hey, if you guys put together a clan let us know if you go with Tarakia, we're always looking for some new allies so I've always got my eyes peeled when I'm surfing for more Chromehounds enthusiasts.

If you don't end up doing a clan on here give us a look see.

Also, for the guys who are interested, the official site is up on sega.com and there's a pretty awesome fan site at www.chromehound.com

I'd never heard of the site here before so I guess your little discussion paid off. Neat place you have here, think I'll stick around :lol:

CHROMEHOUNDS is a 360 exclusive.

Arcade games, for the most part, aren't bad deals. UNO and Marble Blast, for example, are well worth their price as they are riots to play with other people. Even if you only play one game online the cost seems fair, as I'd be willing to pay 5 bucks a month for the ability to play something like Burnout or CHROMEHOUNDS (considering how aweosme the online component looks).

Point taken. I suppose since the content (or at least, a majority of the awesome stuff) requires MSP, Live costs can rack up. Even then, I find the prices reasonable. But I can understand how others can find it to be a waste. I just feel that Live, for the most part, is the backbone of the 360. If it wasn't for it I wouldn't enjoy the thing NEARLY as much.

Also yeah, I'm a racing whore. ;_;

So so far we have you and me, and a few potentials, depending on who else picks this sucker up. We have a number of rentals, at the very least.

Also I wholeheartedly agree with your sim comment. There needs to be a demo for this.

Sure, I'll let you know. However, I assume "us" is the website link you provided? I would much rather build a clan here (seeing as how attached to this community I am) but if there just isn't enough interest, I might give you a dingle.

Art of War and Chromehound.com

Nah, the link is to a huge fansite full of people of varied mech gaming backgrounds. A lot of MA2 guys, who can be ridiculously annoying, but some old school MPBT frequent the boards along with some Steele Battalion guys. It's an interesting mix. I put it up not to draw away from the guys here because you all seem like a pretty dedicated group, but to give you a huge additional resource for game news. Also, if you make a clan for the site here it may behoove you to troll for members over there as well.

Our clan is Art of War. The link is in my signature actually. We're a group of hardcore fans who formed immediately after CH was announced last September. I can say unequivocably that we're the largest and most organized clan out there for the game. I'm always trying to find some new Tarakian allies to ensure that Tarakia does well at launch.

Fortunately it seems like a lot of people are going with Morskoj to start, I suspect because they have the heavier weapons. Tarakia will be balanced and Sal Kar will be focused on mobility. I guess the nice thing is that tactically-minded players seem to be choosing Tarakia because of its even-handed approach to Hound design.

Sim vs. Arcade

The game will be extremely sim-like in feel from all indications. Weapons will not lock on, ammunition will be limited, there will be no ability to repair in the field, location-specific damage will be in play, and variations in terrain will force players to design multiple Hound variants to stay competative.

There will be no crossaire in 3rd person perspective and every reviewer has remarked on the "sometimes plodding" pacing of movement within the game given the expansiveness of the maps (2 sq. miles in many instances). I think the third person view was instituted to let people appreciate their Hound designs and to attract some of the Mech Assault demographic because, although most of us would like to dismiss it as a blemish on serious mech games, it had a relatively large following, particularly among console junkies.

Perhaps the most exciting feature will be the online Neroimus war. I have a feeling that it will make or break this game. Built-in currency support, trading of parts, the need to purchase parts to access them, clan support for squads of up to 20 with full stat tracking, etc. will be amazing.

Finally, the customization in this game will be on an un-precedented scale. I don't have the link on me, but I think that xboxyde or someone just put up a 10 minute vid. of how the customization process will work.

I've watched it at least 30 times now...

That video ties in with my initial point by the way, it was uncovered by a member on chromehound.com and then disseminated.

Some interesting articles on Chromehounds from Teamxbox
http://previews.teamxbox.com/xbox-36...romehounds/p1/
http://previews.teamxbox.com/xbox-36...romehounds/p1/

It looks and sounds pretty exciting. Just hoping it doesnt disappoint.
Clan's are also limited to 20 players from what I've seen.

Oh, my bad. I thought "us" referenced the site because I didn't see the link in your sig. My bad. I will have to check out your website at a later time to see what's going on.

I'd also like to play a bit of the single player game with the different sides to see who I would prefer to stick with in the online war, myself.

And yeah, the sim like feel is what I get from the videos as well. It looks like everything you mentioned will be a facotr, but a demo is still the best way to tell for ourselves what it's like. Unfortunate that one does not exist.

I wonder how the online war will work as far as it ending goes. An achivement you can unlock talks about winning the war. So if it's over I wonder if it starts all over again or what.

Yes, the war goes until one of the faction completely wipes out the other two. Players for factions who have been wiped out have two choices - they can join another one of the factions, or they can attempt to re-instate their faction via guerilla warfare.

How tight is that?

Speaking of tight, here's the customization video:

http://xboxyde.com/leech_2700_en.html

It's in Japanese, but I think that you'll agree, it's well worth it!

Well it looks like the game has gone gold and the release date is set for July 7th in Europe and the 11th in the US (Thanks to our games coming out on fridays we get global releases a few days early now it seems) which is sadly likely to be toon early for me to afford a 360.

Anyone want to lend me a couple of hundred quid?

It's a shame that's still more than two weeks away. It's been hard enough getting by with this release drought that we've been going through this summer, but the closer it gets the happier I am.

Maybe Over G will be good enough to tide me over. Eh'.

Did you guys ever play MA 1? If so what was your clan name back then?

It looks to be like Mechassault but with Armored Core's customization possibilities. I was hoping it'd be faster like Armored Core, but I enjoyed Mechassault when I was first getting into Live, so I may have to pick it up. Count me in on the GFF clan.

God knows I'm in dire need of some SEGA lovin, so Chromehounds will hopefully fix me there.

And I'm sure a demo will be released for this game; it's just that with the superb timing we've seen thus far on demo releases, it'll likely be out around 5 months after the game has been released :D

I wonder with the game having such a high simulation level, if SEGA would possibly consider releasing a joystick similar to the one that was released for Steel Battalion. We can all dream, can't we?

Am I the only one who didn't like that unwieldy mass of a controller for Steel Battalion? Sure, the idea is cool, but I never even touched half of the buttons. And the startup sequence got old really fast. Give me the simplicity of the Virtual On joysticks any day.

You bring up a great point WolfDemon. Those Virtual On Twin Sticks are pretty much godly.

And now you've made me sad, as the likeliness of seeing any Virtual On on the 360 is next to none. Though it would make my life complete if SEGA were to announce a new Virtual On for the 360. Hell, they can just port over Virtual On: Oratorio Tangram and I'll never complain again in life.

Ok, well that may not be entirely true...but I'll be a real happy camper!

Unfortunately there has never really been a GFF Live clan of any kind, really. The people here who own Xboxes and Have Live tend to have a rather diverse taste in things, so there was never enough players to really get anything going in the past.

At least with CHROMEHOUNDS there seems to be enough interest to have at least a few people in a small clan. If we've only got like...3 or 4 people though we might have to integrate into a larger clan so we can get some bigger games going.

As for the Virtual On sticks versus the SB..umm...behemoth, they served completely different purposes. VO was hardly a hyper realistic sim, although I'll admit the sticks were pretty much the greatest control scheme ever for a game of that kind. I must admit though that I love SB to death, even though I suck major MAJOR balls at it. It's not even funny.

And a VO for the 360 would be the coolest shit EVER. Never having to fight the computer again because of Live would be LOVE, especially if they released another twin stick home unit. <3

Ah so I guess I would not have played with ya then in MA 1 cause I was in a lot of clans (4 I think) and got to know a lot of good players. Thought maybe one of them are here.

There might be, it's just that we didn't have our own clan and it definitely wasn't me, as I didn't get an original Xbox any time near it's launch.

Well, the Chromehounds demo is out:

Though it may not be out on American or Canadian soil just yet, I'm sure you all know the work-around for this. I just got back from work, so I haven't had a chance to d/l the demo yet.

From what I've read though, the demo is fairly short and simple, but gives you a good feeling for the overall gameplay. I'm guessing it'll be raw Japanese though -sigh-

That is a crock of motherfucking shit.

I also can't get a signup for the other regions right now because LIVE SIGNUPS ARE CLOSED. Fucking load of shit right there.

Yeah, I'm having the same problem trying to download Halo 3 (Mongolia region only).

Hmm, that sounds nice. I'm gonna download it now. Perhaps it's less shiny in motion. And I really need a mech kick right now.

Edit: So, I've played both missions in the demo, and it's good fun. Both missions are extremely short, which is a pity. The Sniper mech is fun, though I'd have loved faster reloading.
The graphics aren't as shiny as I feared. The fit in with the rest of the world, which has a WWII feel to it.

Yaaaaaaaaaaargg.

Mr Kilroy, can you describe the experience and compare it to other mech games, console or PC, so those of us unfortunate enough to not be able to download it at the moment? And is it at least partially translated into English or other non-Japanese langauges?

My Chromehounds Demo Mini Review:

The demo is all english text and dialogue.

Out of all the mech games I've played, Chromehounds is the most similiar to MechWarrior. The movements of the Sniper and Front line hounds are pretty slow. It takes time to get where you are going but there is a real distinction between how each hound handles. The Sniper hound does a massive amount of long range damage but has a really long reload time on weapons. The weapons loadout is a large long range rifle, a medium range rifle and a low caliber machine gun. I imagime some scout mech with fast firing weapons at close range would completely own the sniper hound. The Front line hound is equipped with a short range rockets, short range shotgun and a medium ranged rifle. The front line hound walks up to foot soldiers, tanks, buildings and just razes them with sheer firepower. Artillery and sniping hounds seem to be the key in taking these bad boys down. So far, none of the weapons have lockon. It's all aiming/deflection shooting and takes a fair amount of skill to hit things that are not point blank. The game is not about turboing to the nearest hound and spamming right trigger. Positioning is pretty key and you have to pay attention to your weapon cooldown times. I've found myself constantly switching among the three weapons to maximize my firing time.

The quality of the single player missions are soso. Just enough voice acting and story to give you a reason to blow shit up. The mission design also does not seem very inspired - just a means of teaching you how to play each hound. Online play is what the singleplayer is trying to teach.

Where this game will be at is the hound design. You couldn't do any custom designs but scrolling through the 'borrowed' hound there are TONS of hardpoints. Each part has roughly 20 attributes which can let you build some interesting designs. It's not just picking a type of weapon but also factoring in the cooldown time and ammo capacities. It favors a pretty balanced design as I can imagine people will want to build an all shotgun mech or an all rifle mech that would just get their shit ruined.

Graphics: So-So. Not prominently next gen from what I've seen. Still easy on the eyes and the low poly count per model will probably allow for more objects overall on screen at once.

Sound: No comment yet. Doesn't pop out at you nor does it distract you. Seems to do the job, voice acting again doesn't annoy you but doesnt inspire you.

Gameplay: Pretty fun. It's nice to tear stuff up in a mech and requires some skill in the process. Most of my gameplay impressions are up on top.

Intangibles: Nice feel overall. This is a game I would like to definently play with an organized group of people. Would be fun to work out tactics, who builds what kind of hound, etc.

Going to remove Chomehounds from my gamefly queue and adding it to my pre-order list. :)

Yeah, I just downloaded it and gave both missions a run.

Tony is spot on for the most part, I'll just mention stuff I think he didn't touch on or I disagree on.

There is no direct COCKPIT view. There are individual weapon views which is basically a camera on each weapon. That's awesome and all, but a dedicated camera view with a HUD and the whole works would have been better.

And the music is terrible. Thank God for custom soundtracks. For an action game, it's got VERY plodding tunes. I'm sure better music would ramp up the excitement a fair bit.

But for the most part he's right. There is no dumb fire and lock on BS, you have to aim using the weapon view. This is nice for once. The pacing is slow enough and the mechs feel like there is an actual WEIGHT to them. I just hope the single player campaign fleshs out a bit and gets more interesting, as unlocking the SP achivements will suck if all the missions are so short like this.

The multiplay should be a blast though.

Even though I suck ass at the demo mainly the sniper mission, i am still getting the game. It seems like it will be a lot of fun online especially that you can have up to 6 players on a team instead of Mech's 4 per team.

I hope the map size in the demo is equivalent to the size of the multiplayer maps. cause otherwise the sniper mech won't be able to do much.

haha was cruising around top360tag and noticed a few folks are already getting achievements for it.

For those here who want to play together, should we try and decide on a faction ahead of time? While haven't played any of the factions in detail, Tarakia is what I'd like to learn towards for even handed hound design.

Also makes it easier for us to play with what Fever is doing if we can't get any traction with a GFF based effort.

Also any idea on what preferred style everyone wants to play? I'm leaning towards Sniper or Defender but willing to play whatever works best for victory. :)

Just purchased the guide and slapped down my preorder for tommorow. Anyone else picking this up on launch day and want to try and get some multi going?

Launch day for Canada is THURSDAY, so I lose out on it until then. Seriously counting away the hours until launch. I'll probably get 150 GP in Frogger or something just trying to kill off tomorrow.

And before we decide on any mech classes, I think we should go through the or at least take a stab at each type. We can't really decide what we want to do based on only playing two classes from the demo, right?

Of the two I've tried though, I prefer the Sniper. However, I really wanna try the Commander. So let's see what each plays like first, eh?

So has anyone played the full version yet? It's been out since last friday here in the uk but my main 360 owning friend refuses to believe there's any other games apart from Oblivion. If my car sale goes through I should be picking up a 360 in the next week or so and I plan to get this with it, if it's as good as it looks.

Eh, I've been hearing mixed reactions about this game. It's either pretty good, or boring as hell. But I still want to check it out, since I'm a fan of mech games. I guess it would probably help if they released the damned demo all ready. But doesn't look like that's going to happen for awhile...

I didn't pre-order it but if they have a copy when I check the store later today I'll probably pick it up. If not I'll probably get it whenever I happen to see a copy in.

Sounds good to me. To be really competitive in MP anyways people will have to spend sometime in singleplay racking up S ratings on all the missions.

I can post my impressions later but I am sure by tommorow all 283578387 internet gaming sites probably have some review or another. Did your friend at least download the demo Shin?

I am sure the vast majority of Halo 2 gamers thinks Final Fantasy 7 is slow and boring as hell. :) Like I said earlier, whether you like Chromehounds or not will depend if you are a part of the arcade or simulation camp.

If you like to just turbo to the nearest hound, spam right trigger and try and rack up 80 kills an hour, Chromehounds is not your game.

If you think that spending 3-4 minutes walking to an objective, planning out your attack strategy, testing out your lego design against someone else's lego design and reliance on teamwork to win, then Chromehounds might be your game.

One source says that the avg time for a match seems to be 15 minutes for 6 on 6. (No respawns)

Get the Japanese one. You'll need a Japanese hotmail account to do it, but tha't snot hard. Just make a new one, set your region to Japan, and then get a free Silver account. The demo's all in english so it's no worries.

You make a good point. And I am looking for a more methodically paced Live game.

Hah, thanks. I'll definitely try that.

Ok, I haven't heard much about this, but if you can NAME your clan, then ROCKIN. We're gonna be the XELIUM HIGHGUARD in that case. If we can't, then oh well.

Here's the big question though. What nation are we picking? Here's a rundown to help you think about it.

I'm thinking Sal'kar sounds interesting. Not only because of the look and feel of it, but because the part load out sounds pretty neat. In addition, I fear almost everyone will gravitate toward Tarakia. I don't want anything unbalanced like what happened with Mechassault 2 there for a bit.

Well, having played through the Soldier RT campaign and 4/7ths of the Sniper RT, I can say that Chromehounds is a fun game to play.

Unfortunately, most Internet review sites seem to be giving Chromehounds a poor to average review. Also, from reading the guide and trying out a bit of the RT's many reviewers do not know what the hell they are talking about. You can play a level of Call of Duty 2 and get a feel for what the game will be rated. You can also play 60 minutes of Madden 06 and then be able to assign it an accurate score.

IGN gives it a 6.9/10 which is "passable".

Posting some of my favorite tidbits that I've seen.

Yes, the Chromehounds tutorial mission plotlines have the complexity of a Dr. Seuss book. So does World of Warcraft questing. Quests serve to teach you how to play your class and hopefully advance to Molten Core, Blackwing Lair, etc. Chromehounds at it's heart is an online game meant to be played over XBox Live. They sooo were not trying to make CH Front Mission. And my motivation for S ranking is to be an ass beater. :)

How about the maps are big? If I see you on the radar, I can get to you in 20 seconds which is not bad. Again, you don't see stuff in Mech Warrior move at Sonic the Hedgehog speeds either. Sim style versus arcade style people.

Try going against my hound built with Anti Missle defenses. But I bet he'd never played enough of the game to even know about the existence of such parts. That and missles are short to medium range and requires aiming to hit.

Don't make/play a hound that is burdoned by huge gigantic cannons that requires heavy legs to support them then? Heavy Gunners are artilary hounds meant for long range suppression and bringing down stationary bases. You want a Scout who LOL's his way to your base and levels it?

What a dumbass. You bitch that destroyed hounds don't leave flaming wreckage when you blow them up and then compliment how smooth the frame rate generally is? You then complain that when there are a lot of exposions around, the frame rate does drop a bit? So an additional 11 independently animated burning hulks would improve performance in this area?
I will ignore the last sentence as he lost all "technical" credibility with me.

Lamepro:

<sigh>

I don't know anyone who would get Chomehounds to play 7 * 6 tutorial missions and then shelve the game away.

Gamebrink

Yes, the Neroimus war can potentially be a bust if no one has the game. So as a reviewer who got the game hopefully a few days before the rest of us... what are the odds of you fielding a 6 on 6 match when all the people who have it are game reviewers? Also, how about people like me who want to play through the entire tutorial before I venture online?

TeamXbox's review is probably the most accurate as the author seems to of actually played the game, understands all of the game modes, the customization and the role types.

However for reasons I explained earlier, the TeamXbox reviewer is off on this point:

I conceed that the audio sucks and the single player "story mode" is a glorified tutorial but other than that - Chromehounds owns.

----

Really on Tarakia? I figure they would be #2. Morskoj with it's most powerful weapons I would think would be #1. Btw, if you are as good at CH as you are at Frogger I will be scared. I got my shit ruined in Frogger but doing ok on getting the S ranks so far. :)

Reviewers have been dropping the ball recently. It's pathetic. If you think Chromehounds got a bad rap, you should see Over-G Fighters. Reviewers are playing it on easy mode with the bad control scheme and complaining it's not an accurate sim. How stupid do you have to get?

Anywho. My guess would have been Tarakia. I could be completely wrong however! Hopefully there will be an ingame population meter or something telling you what country has the most players. I guess I'll have to wait another 2 hours and see.

And hahaha. Thanks for the compliment, but I'm not really THAT good at Frogger. Tube's better than I am, with another achievement over mine. Luckily that game gets a LOT easier with practice. So I'm sure you'll be able to do good too. =oo

Alas, they only had pre-order copies. I'll get this eventually. Most likely as soon as I actually see a copy of it in somewhere. From reading the book on it I saw at Gamestop I'd personally probbly like either Sal-Kar or Morskaj. Obviously I've got to get the game to confirm my inclinations but I suspect that I'll probably either enjoy the role of scout, heavy gunner, or defender the most. Sniper and Commander are definate no's for me and soldier is just a maybe.

UPDATE:

Tarakia has been wiped out ALREADY. That didn't take long. Oh well, after one of the other groups wins this war it'll restart. So that's all good.

Anyway, I signed us up for Sal'kar under the Squad name "XeliumHighguard". No spaces because 15 characte rlimit = :( . Anyway. I picked a generic mech and am working my way through singleplayer so I can build some other ones.

Of the ones I've tried. I really like Commander, Scout, and Sniper. Soldier's pretty rad too. Heavy Gunner is hard and I havne't got the hang of eyeballing distances yet. And I haven't tried Defender yet. But so far so good. =oo

Gonna pick the guide up shortly for collection purposes, (God I'm a whore).

Double Post:
Well, Tony and I won our first match against people after losing horribly to the computer a few times!

We gotta get better communication though, because one of those times Tony blew me up thinking I was an enemy. ;_____________________;

Picked up the game about 20 minutes ago. I'll be trying it out soon.

I also just picked up this game. Haven't tried it yet though.

Hah, I did not think Chromehounds would be the first 360 game I would pick up. I actually thought it would've been that table tennis game!
Anyway, my first impression of the game was actually a good one. It was a very slow start borrowing mechs on every mission but after the sniper arc things started get interesting, sorta.

From what I've tried so far I'm really liking the Sniper, Soilder, and the Heavy Gunner. Yeah, I like the slow yet powerful types :tpg:. I guess I'll try the other mech designs once I start buying/winning more parts.

Being squad-less sucks. Do you have room for one more? I'm still getting the hang of the gameplay here but if you don't need a newbie person in your squad I perfectly understand :).

Ok, its back to the tutorials exciting story mode.

LOL. We need a color/decal scheme to apply to our hounds. :)

Looks like Season 1 of the Neroimus war is over with Morskoj as the winner. Some Japanese squad put some serious beatdown with their week in advance. Morskoj has a slight lead over Tarakia with Sal-Kar being owned with 22% of territory.

Ugg I suck at Heavy Gunner. I get B rank on the tutorial. <sigh> Hopefully with some practice I can actually eyeball and hit something on a regular basis.

So far it's just me and Colonel. Plenty of room I am sure. :) Up to 20 per Squad.

I just completed all the tutorial missions so I am more than happy to share mission advice or any info. Hit S rank on all missions except for 3 Heavy Gunners.

General Tips:

1 - Assault Rifles (I think anyways) are the best weapons in the game. Pointblank - Distance shooting. Less than 1 second cooldown. Decent damage, almost instant hit and the shots don't obscure your vision.

2 - If you have trouble with getting S-Ranks on missions, design your own hound strictly around what you have to accomplish. A Soldier RT loaded down with assault rifles and rocket launchers can achieve the majority of the HG requirements. Another example is a Soldier can replace a Defender on some of the escort missions.

3 - Mobility is key. Lots of the missions involve keeping allies alive or preventing the enemy from reaching a certain point. Need a quick hound for those. :)

Was wondering informally what RT everyone wanted to do if we could all get online. Maybe someone can prove me wrong but in general I don't like Heavy Gunners and Defenders. Tactics Commanders are pretty awesome but you'd want at least 4 or 5 people before you consider using it as a spot. A Tactics Commander/Scout hybrid would be completely gimped for fighting but would own the information department. They can run around and expand their own NA network.

You can create and store a couple of hound types but my current online one is configured as a Soldier RT type.

Speed 73
Weapons: Triple Morskjov RFZ-3 Assault Rifles w/ added ammo and RFZ double stacked rocket launcher.

This game makes more tempted than any other 360 title to go out and buy one. I'm forcing myself to wait till the Wii and PS3 come out for the price drop. Not to mention that CH itself costs $120. :eyebrow:

$120? Wait, what?

I'm guessing you're Aussie, HazelGuy? Because that's how much it is here. One hundred and twenty wacky Kangaroo fun buuuucks.

The game shouldn't cost $120 unless you're getting the limited edition faceplate with it.

Even then that's asking WAY too much. Hell, I bought steel battalion for fifty bucks more and that came with a fucking huge controller.

Microsoft vehemently denied that there will be a price drop this year for the XB360. The XB360 Premium Package at $400 is less than Sony's stripped down PS3 at $500. That and the Wii is in it's own corner with Gamecube strength hardware.

$120 US? Should be $50-60$.

No, when I signed up it seems I ended up with a US flag instead of an Australian one. So, yeah, $120 for Chromehounds. I think it'd be in Microsoft's best interests to have a price drop at the same time as the PS3 comes out, but if they decide not to then I'll just be picking up a Wii instead of both.

Right now I'm definately getting a Wii and either a PS3 or 360. The problem is the sheer insane pricing here for consoles and games. No game here is less than $100. Which is ok, I've gotten used to paying that much for games this last generation. But $120? $140? Thats where I have trouble justifying it.

A 360 here at the moment for the high end version is $650. The good PS3 will be $1000. And this is before you get any other parts, controllers or games. Kind of harsh, don't you agree?

Which is why I'm sort of leaning towards a Wii, its the only console being released that will have a reasonable price, solid launch games, complete backwards compatibility and the VC to boot. That and it'll be the greatest console to play while drunk with friends ever. =D

You can change your flag with the User CP up above, then Edit Options. It's right down the bottom of that. =o

http://img87.imageshack.us/img87/933/flagthingsq4.png

Thanks Monkey, I'm all fixed up now. Thats the first time I've realised I had the wrong country.

Been playing a bit. Still not very far in(I've been busy) but at least I've gone through some missions. I always seem to end up with damaged legs. Do they just like to shoot you there or something? All in all I'm having fun. Instead of doing it in order, I think I'll try out mission one for each role just so I can get a feel for it. I'm getting impatient as I've only been using the soldier type. Want to see what fits my personal taste for combat.

Because A) It's going to stay at the same price, but more will be added, or B) They don't want people waiting for the price drop, thus hurting sales.

Or maybe because of the announcement of the PS3's price, they don't think they need one?

It's interesting. For once, a gamespecific faceplate doesn't look like compelte trash. It's a shame there were so few and that the markup on eBay is crazy high. I'd pay maybe 40 bucks for one tops, not this 200 dollars some people are charging.

kairyu, yes, don't worry, we can add you to teh squad. The squad can hold up to 20 people, so we got room to SPARE coming out the ass. Right now we don't have enough people to really start assigning dedicated RTs, but me and (apparently) Tony are not very good at it, so if you wanna take along the huge guns, go for it. We can try out various strategies on the individual missions and such.

Hopefully we'll get a few more squadies as time goes on. I know Mo0 will join when he gets his 360 fixed, and Tails might when he gets a 360 down the line, so the more the merrier.

Anyway, yeah, I figured since we're GFFs in a squad here, we should be blue. I created a squad emblem that you can apply to your hound as you see fit. Should make accidental deaths less common if we all go by one colour scheme. Check the "Squad colours" and "Squad emblems" when you're in the squad to pick the same colour scheme.

As for weapons, Assault rifles are good but I am far more of a fan of the machine guns. Takes down emplacements and smaller vehicles retardedly fast and acts as a very good distraction during hound fighting. If you can keep the peppering up you can blow off weapons off the other hounds pretty easily.

Anyway, lastly, as for RTs, When I'm by myself I really pretty much have to use a Soldier or scout RT type to actually find and keep up with enemies, but when I was with Tony last I tried out this Commander/Sniper Hybrid that worked out pretty damn well actually. It has 3 machine guns, two sniper cannons and an N/A maker on a 4 legged chassis type. Slow but able to defend itself and particpate in battle and still give extremely helpful radar telemetry. If we start fielding 3 man or larger groups I'd like to use it more often.

That would be quite the pompous decision on their part. MS knows Sony's still in the game, no matter how much the PS3 will cost. Whether they feel the PS3's arrival warrants a price drop or not isn't the only point they're considering. It's also an easy way to sell a ton of additional consoles, which MS will greatly appreciate.

Had a chat with Kairyu yesterday and he couldn't join our squad because of a two week wait since he went from Morskoj to Sal-Kar. Guess what ever faction we choose, need to stay constant for now until everyone can join up.
The Neroimus war season 2 seems pretty even now. Looks like its a Tarakia and SalKar alliance on Morskoj.

If you saw my PS3 thread, Sony announced that games at the minimum will be $60US and potentially up to $99. :(

Not neccessairily due to arrogance that they won't drop the price. Remember that Microsoft is losing quite a bit on each console sold already. Even though M$ is a multi billion dollar corporation they still need to ship profitable products.

There's a complicated cost equation with factors into how many more consoles Microsoft would sell going from 400 to 350, how much additional loss they would take and whether a sale at this point would profit over the lifecycle of the 360.

Oh it's not apparant.. I definently suck at Heavy Gunner. I hit S finally on all the HG missions but none of them were completed by using a HG model. ;)

Yeah, CS's Commander/Sniper was a pretty wicked design. The NA radar really helped us track stuff down.

I don't see much need for HG type unless it's maybe the final spot in a 6 man and you practically require a commander RT as a spotter. (The HG uses the grids to rain down fire on a semi accurate basis)

I love the Commander RT so much that we'd have to try to succeed with it even in 2 man situations. :) Any time another 2 man gets seperated, they are toast. I figure I move with you in the soldier RT and capture NA's around us. We spot anything, you open up with Sniper fire and if they close in I defend. If they run away I can chase them down as the biped has decent speed and you can always keep sniping. Not sure how to handle 2 Soldier RT's charging us together though.

Sounds great, then. Now to wait out the crazy 2 week rule.

Mo0 and Tails will be joining in the fun? Haha, this is going to be great =p.
As for the color scheme, I'm all for it.

Heh, oh yeah the machine guns. Damn they are useful! I used a custom RT on the last soldier mission that had those pepper guns. And they were insanely effective, especially if you can do circles around the slower hounds. Its equipped with 4 of those machine guns, 2 sniper rifles (the one with the long charge time), and 3 heavy assault rifles on a reverse leg chassis to handle the load. It wasn't too slow, if I remember correctly it had a speed rating of 126.

As for experimenting with RTs, I think I'm becoming more partial with the more mobile hounds. I'm trying to combine sniper, soldier, and scout parts to create fast yet long-range attack hound. Its probably a futile idea but one can dream ;).

Comeon peeps. Pick this game up. Need more squad mates to blow shit up with!

I'd willing to join your squad, I sent you a pm, maybe we could organize something.

Yeah, me and Tony haven't managed to get together in a little while. We're always on at the wrong times. The more the merrier though.

New Chromehound parts are on Marketplace at rip off prices. Before anyone buys anything perhaps we can strategize.

I hear you can unlock a part, buy it in a store and then trade it to others.

I guess I can distribute them to people then, since I bought them all. There is one spacer there that's quite nice, and some of the other stuff is good. The Generator is also rad.

I guess it's not THAT much. Don't want to cause you problems so I'll probly purchase them. Just riding the Major Nelson bitchfest.
Finally have a weekend to myself for some time so lets kick ass!

Unfortunately I'm working this weekend, but I can play either really late (after midnight) or right around noon time, but that'd be about it.

And if I can trade them, don't waste your money. I bought them because I'm a sucker for this sort of shit.

Chromehounds Update:

Primary Adjustments

• Adjustment to arms power and usability
• Adjustment to mobility base characteristics

Adjusted Items

• All Light Arms parts
• All Heavy Arms parts
• Some parts for Legs
• Some Assist parts
• NA maker

Major changes are as follows:

• Adjustments to Penetration
• Adjustments to blast power and recoil
• Adjustments to recoil at the time of shot
• Adjustments to reload time
• Adjustments to Speed
• Adjustments to Stability
• Adjustments to Defense
• Adjustments to Durability



Noticeable updates for Chromehounds:

- Naqa leg stability has dropped to 206 from 226 and rj401s have dropped to 216 from 236
- armor durability has dropped dramatically
- DDs have less stability and don’t quite fire at the same time anymore, plus the slash damage has been reduced. They’ll still be around, just less devastating.
- machine guns are now lighter and have higher heat at impact
- some mortars have increased/decreased power and faster reload times
- most sniper builds have reduced effectiveness at range
- Reload times in cannons have changes slightly, Anelace was 2800, now 3100.
- Heavy cannons have a slight delay between barrels when firing, causes inaccuracy.
- Radiators are useful, lowest one does 300, highest 600
- The light homing missle has 23 ammo instead of 25
- MT21 mortars went from 5000 reload time, to 4000
(for those that don't know, 5000=5sec, 4300=4.3 sec etc)
- Cannons seem to have slight extra kickback, not much.
- NA makers have more range. the largest is almost 1400 now.
- speed on everything has gone down apart from hovers-gone up 1 speed
- The howies dont fire as straight as before but they are still somewhat usable. (With three, with four possibly all over the place)

Gameplay
• Fixed an issue that the prevented team members (except Host) from seeing the opposing flags Squad's Headquarters at the time of Battles in Neroimus War.
• Fixed various collision issues that caused soldiers to fall through the world.
• Fixed an issue that prevented the user from viewing the 25th part in the acquired list of lottery items.
• Fixed an issue that prevented users from viewing their own gamertag in the Leaderboard. Searches will no longer be case-sensitive within this category.
• Fixed an issue that caused players to lose nation support after applying to lottery parts over 41.




BADONKADONK. Patch released on the 9th. General information on it is above.

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Although I haven't played in many months, (I found the patch rebalances iffy), some sad news for anyone here who cares (ahaha, no one. :( )

Servers are being shut down in January.

Anyone who still owns this up for some final hurrah? (And getting wrecked, since I'm not up to speed on builds these days)

Well, guess I better find a way to mop up those achievements then. My friend will be crushed; he's been bugging me to play Chromehounds with him for awhile.

Oh what the fuck, I'm still struggling to get most of the achievements with an inactive squad. At least there's a chance that they'll get around to making a sequel now. Maybe.