Hawken

Hawken

Hawken is a free to play, multiplayer-only first-person shooter featuring enormous mechs and micro-transactions from independent studio Adhesive Games.

Overview

Hawken (stylized as HAЩʞEN) is a free to play multiplayer first-person mech combat game developed by Adhesive Games, an independent development studio that grew from a small original group of five people who left Project Offset. The game was developed using Unreal Engine 3 and went into open beta on December 12, 2012. It was released on Steam Early Access on February 14, 2014.

Gameplay

Hawken is set in a distant planet that has been industrialized to the point of collapse and men are fighting over the few scarce resources left. Battles take place in first person cockpit view and plays much like a first person shooter but with mech elements

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Before each match, players pick their mech. Mechs come in Light, Medium and Heavy classes with Light mechs being more maneuverable but less armored and Heavy mechs on the opposite end of the spectrum. Each mech has a primary weapon on the left arm and a secondary weapon on the right arm. Weapons do not consume ammo but will add heat to the mech. When a mech overheats, both weapons are temporarily disabled until the mech has cooled down sufficiently. Mechs have an armor gauge, which is the player's health. At any point, players can choose to deploy a repair drone, which will heal the mech but forces the mech to shut down and be vulnerable to fire. Mechs have thrusters that allow the mech to perform maneuvers such as boosting, dodging and brief flight. Performing maneuvers requires fuel which will recharge when not in use.

The Garage
The Garage

Players can customize their mechs in the Garage as they see fit. Three primary weapons are available to each mech. Mechs can also carry up to two deployable items, an offensive item and a support item. Items recharge over time and include an EMP burst or a deployable energy shield. Mechs can also be equipped with three internals, offensive, defensive and functional, which provide passive buffs and debuffs to the mech. One countermeasure can be equipped, which is a one time use consumable. Each mech has an optimization tree, which provides buffs to the mech's offense, defense or movement. Every mech chasis comes with a unique ability such as "Damage Absorb" which reduces incoming damage for a short amount of time. Finally, Hawken allows for several cosmetic customizations such body type and camos.

Mechs gain XP as they are used and level up. Leveling up provides buffs to the mech's performance and weapons as well as unlocking new weapons, items and optimization points. The level cap is 25, at which point the player can choose to prestige the mech. Prestige will reset the mech's level back to 1 but will unlock special prestige weapons, internals or camos on each prestige.

Current game modes include Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Missile Assault and Siege. Missile Assault plays like Conquest or Domination from other first person shooters in which players fight to control three missile silos on the map. Siege operates in two phases. The first phase, players collect energy from nodes on the map and return to them to base. Once enough energy has been collected, a battleship is deployed, which flies towards the enemy base while attacking enemy players. Once it has reach the base, the battleship bombards the base until it is destroyed. Players can shoot down the battleship with their weapons or capture the anti-aircraft gun on the center of the map to assist in shooting down the battleship. The game proceeds until a team's base is destroyed.

Monetization Model

Hawken has a similar monetization model to other free-to-play games such as League of Legends. Like League, a rotating set of Mechs are put on trial each week, allowing players to try out the mech without buying it. Players will keep any experience they accrue on those mechs though they will not be able to customize it until they buy it. The game has an in-game currency, Hawken Credits (HC), as well as a real world currency, Meteor Credits (MC). Mechs, weapons and other items can be bought with both HC and MC however cosmetic changes, credit and exp boosters can only be bought with MC. The default exchange rate is $1 for every 144 MC however buying more expensive MC packages provides more MC per dollar.

USDMCMC/Dollar
$5720144
$101483148.3
$253780151.2
$304752158.4
$508280165.6
$10017280172.8

System Requirements

Minimum

  • CPU: 2 GHz Dual Core
  • Memory: 3 GB RAM
  • Graphics: 512MB Card with DirectX 9.0c and Shader Model 3.0
  • Operating System: Windows XP or later
  • HDD: 5GB of free space