Hawken is a first person online multiplayer arena-style mech shooter...

And it made a mighty effort to bring these robots to a large audience. Hawken takes place on the planet Illal, where once it was resource rich, it has now become overly industrialised and overrun by a nanomachine virus which covers a third of the planet's surface. Now heavily conflicted, the last corporations fight each other for what they can, dispatching bipedal war machines to gain territory and materials. Go free for all or team play in fast-paced matches. Evade enemy attacks with dashes or press them using items and guns. Earn xp and credits to buy mech or item upgrades, and purchase new mechs. Master the battlefield with quick manouvers and your weapon of choice.

Gameplay

The gameplay is satisfying and responsive, dashing to the side to avoid a rocket or going to town with both wielded weapons is very fun. Hits feel rewarding and enemies upon death drop health orbs which enables you to stay in the fight. Fuel for 'sprinting' and weapon heat encourages the gamer to strategise in close quarters rather than spray bullets everywhere for a random kill. It's cool that you can request for assistance in team death match which encourages teamwork and this makes matches more thrilling. Different classes of mechs allow for varying health pools over mech speed so choose for the right situation. Items like blockades, turrets, jammers, and repair charges can be used, even multiple times, to funnel or distract enemies, or buff yourself. The game can get a bit tedious as there are a small variety of maps and grinding for credits took a long time, but the mech combat and fun factor is exemplary. It's a massive shame that the game was taken away from PC servers and towards that end updates hadn't been fulfilling.

Audio Visual

Hawken's world and technology are really cool to me. Even though the quality is a bit outdated the user interface, HUD elements, sound design is quite beautiful and futuristic. The HUD is lively and accurate, with distinct indicators for weapon heat and cooldowns, hits, incoming damage, enemy health, xp, sprint status via crosshair, is all just great. Another plus point is that is makes you feel like mech pilot, with the delay in cockpit rotation and skill/ item availability on interior screens is a nice touch. The soundtrack is nice and should play more often, with longer songs I think. The game has fun emoticon holograms and victory poses if you like to celebrate. I think HUD colours could be customised too which is cool but the defaults are good. I guess the cockpit chassis can obstruct the view significantly but I never had issues with it and it gives the mech character.

Pros

• Solid combat and feel
• Interesting items
• Variety of mechs and weapons

Cons

• Small playerbase
• Full game no longer available on PC
• Gameplay could be repetitive

Conclusion

Hawken is an awesome mech shooter that I really dig. Definitely a title I would purchase for the pleasure of playing. I score it 8/10.

Information

• Release date: 2012
• Developer: Adhesive Games
• Platforms: PC, Xbox, PlayStation

(If you are interested, there is a way to play the offline version on PC at this link: Hawakening.com, and I recommend using this tutorial to do so: How to play Hawken in 2020 || A step-by-step guide to Hawakening).