MechWarrior Online will be fully operational by the end of Summer

I still haven't seen a single groundhog, but people are already talking about Summer, let alone Spring, like we're absolutely certain it's going to happen. Yesterday, Piranha Games gave us another reason for this damnable Winter to shuffle off and give Spring/Summer their due: the launch (proper) of MechWarrior Online . As revealed at GDC, the stompy multiplayer shooter will exit beta in late Summer, more specifically "no later than" September 21st. Well that is the last official day of Summer.

Before its balmy launch, the team are hoping to add a number of new features. Firstly they aim to increase the number of mechs in-game from 8-on-8 to 12-on-12, something that will happen in "the next 60 days". The user interface is also getting a bit of spit-and-polish, which should go well with the revamped community warfare features. You'll soon be able to pledge your allegiance to various houses from the BattleTech universe, including Bungalow, Semi-Detached and... OK, so I'm not exactly au fait with BattleTech.

Thanks to Joystiq .

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Tom loves exploring in games, whether it’s going the wrong way in a platformer or burgling an apartment in Deus Ex. His favourite game worlds—Stalker, Dark Souls, Thief—have an atmosphere you could wallop with a blackjack. He enjoys horror, adventure, puzzle games and RPGs, and played the Japanese version of Final Fantasy VIII with a translated script he printed off from the internet. Tom has been writing about free games for PC Gamer since 2012. If he were packing for a desert island, he’d take his giant Columbo boxset and a laptop stuffed with PuzzleScript games.