Mech 5 Clans is a hard game to review. There's a lot to like and to dislike in equal measures. The game isn't well optimized and will likely never be. It loads fast on a SSD, although the animated loading screens always stutter on my end. Bless your soul if you try to play this will less than 8Gb of VRAM and a less than fairly recent cpu. It runs well on my 4090 but you can tell that's it's the hardware carrying the performances. In exchange the game looks gorgeous, the levels are lovely to move in and the particles effects will burn your retina. I thought it looked fairly similar to Mercs but going back to that, it looked a lot more bland and grey by comparison.
The ai is dumb as bricks, if you played previous Mechwarrior games, you'll know what to expect. They can, however, be wrangled by the new tactical map that allows you to pause the game and issue command like in an RTS. It's still underwhelming when compared to Mech 4, which had you control up to 7 other teammates and had a good variety of orders. Mech 5 still has only move, guard, hold fire and attack orders, but they are now much more fluid thanks to the map.
The story aspect is harder to evaluate. On the one hand the huge leap in quality when it comes to cutscenes with advanced (albeit uncanny at times) facial animations that bring Mechwarriors to life like never before, but on the other the dialogue, writing and characters are average at best (although compared to the abysmal characters from Mech 5 Mercs, quite an improvement). That being said, the sub text is very good. They manage to incorporate a good amount of info and world building into the characters. They each represent a different facet of the Clans and while the characters themselves are bland, what they tell the player about their society is well put together. Jayden is your average Clanner, ambitious but flexible due to his young age. Mia and Ezra are complete opposite as they embody the Crusader and Warden ideals. Liam is someone that is very aware of how Clan traditions hold them back and Naomi is a typical example of a Clanner past her prime, disillusioned and on her way to "retirement". The story itself is okay, it helps that you see these characters go from cadets to veterans in one of the most brutal conflict of the setting.
Difficulty is also a mixed bag. The game gives you the tools to succeed, and you can outfit even the starter mechs with a lot of weapons (a 25 tons Kit Fox with 8 lasers? Why not) to make some crazy efficient builds. The problem is that starting out, you won't understand how all of this works, even if you're coming from Mercs, and you'll likely get torn to shreds very quickly. You will always be outnumbered and outweighed from the third mission, and you have limited time to repair your mechs between missions. There is always something that demands focus, which you split between buying new mechs, researching upgrades and leveling your pilots. You also need to recruit more scientists and engineers (think Xcom, the more the better). People that played through Mercs dlc campaigns will know what to expect, but the new players might feel pressured. The game is balanced for experimented players essentially, a newcomer will feel the sting of defeat at first. Important to note that since your pilots start off as rookies, their damage, range and accuracy will be noticeably worse in the early missions.
Mission design is a lot better, with more varied objectives and settings, that being said, the old design flaw of dropping tons of enemies on you is still there. While I don't think it's a very good design, it will be made worse if you rush in. If you play strategically, force the enemies in narrow passages and lead them back to your squad that you carefully positioned earlier, then you'll find it a lot more satisfying.
Mech variety was something I was worried about, as they were only 16 chassis in the base game (the dlc mechs are retroactively added to the main campaign, which is very welcome), but they drip feed them at the right pace throughout the campaign. The Mechlab may seem limited at first, but you can mix and match different body parts to create your own variant. Some people wish that the base game would be more like the YAML mod for Mercs, but I think that limitation breed creativity, and that working within constraints to achieve the best output is what makes it interesting. You can still make broken builds with a bit of experimentation. I see people taking way too long on the dreaded Sokols or falling to pieces mid mission. Again, you have to play strategically, running in a straight line is not a long term plan. Being able to output continuous damage is more valuable than a high damage value mech that can only fire every so often. you have to aim for the enemy weapons, not the center mass (which is the most armored part). Run sideways and only fight the enemy when it's not actively focusing you.
With these caveats in mind, I recommend the game, although people wanting a sandbox like Mercs probably won't like this, as this a story focused, handcrafted missions campaign.
