BattleTech

Chicago-based FASA Corporation's original 1984 game focused on enormous robotic, semi-humanoid battle machines battling in a science-fiction feudalistic Dark Age setting. The game was at first called BattleDroids.[5] The name of the game was changed to BattleTech in the second edition because George Lucas and Lucasfilm claimed the rights to the term "droid";[6][7] the machines themselves were renamed BattleMechs from the second edition onward.

The game components included:

• First edition: two full-color terrain maps, 48 stand-up BattleMech counters, four sheets of playing markers, plastic counter stands, dice, and a rule book.[8]
• Third edition: two color maps, a pack of record sheets, and fourteen 2" plastic miniatures of various BattleMech war machines.[9]
• Fourth edition: two rule-books, a booklet of record sheets, 48 stand-up playing pieces, and a sheet of 144 insignia stickers.[10]

Rather than create their own original robot art, FASA decided to use already-extant designs that had originally been created for a variety of different Japanese anime, including Dougram, Crusher Joe, and Macross. The rights to these images were licensed from Twentieth Century Imports (TCI). In later years, FASA abandoned these images as a result of a lawsuit brought against them by Playmates Toys and Harmony Gold over the use of said images.[11] In 2007, Classic BattleTech line developer Randall N. Bills explained that FASA had sued Playmates over the use of images owned by FASA. Although Playmates was ordered to stop using the images in question, FASA received no financial compensation. FASA realized that the use of licensed images made them vulnerable to lawsuits and worried that such a suit would bankrupt the company. Following the suit, FASA made the decision to use only images that they owned in future products.

The anime-sourced BattleMechs continued to be referenced in-universe, but their images were no longer seen in new sourcebooks. This led them to be termed by fans as "the Unseen". When Fantasy Productions licensed the property, these "Unseen" images were expanded to include all art produced "out-of-house" – that is, whose copyrights resided with the creators, not the company. Catalyst Game Labs has continued this practice.[12]

The game's popularity spawned several variants and expansions to the core system, including CityTech which fleshed out urban operations, infantry, and vehicle combat, AeroTech which focused on air and space-based operations, and BattleSpace which detailed large spacecraft combat. FASA also published numerous sourcebooks, known as Technical Readouts, which featured specifications for new combat units that players could select from. However, despite the large number of such pre-designed BattleMechs, vehicles, aerospace units and other military hardware, the creators also established a system of custom design rules, enabling players to generate their own units and field them in combat. In addition to game rule books, FASA published several background books detailing the history, political and social structures of various factions in the game, including all five Great Houses of the inner sphere, ComStar, the Periphery States and the fallen Star League.

FASA launched two additional systems to complement the core game: BattleTroops, an infantry combat system, and BattleForce, a large-scale combat simulator governing the actions of massed BattleTech units. The Succession Wars, a board game released in 1987, is one of only two purely strategic titles of the series (the other being "The Inner Sphere in Flames" from the Combat Operations book). The Succession Wars is played on a political star map, with players trying to capture regions of space.

Recent years have seen a trend of consolidating the expansions into "core products" for efficiency. Beginning under FanPro's aegis, then continued under Catalyst Game Labs, the various rulesets have been combined into a series of Core Rulebooks:[13]

• Total Warfare (TW) integrates the original boardgame with CityTech, BattleTroops, and parts of AeroTech 2 (itself a consolidation of AeroTech and BattleSpace) pertaining to atmospheric operations (such as simplified rules for Dropship operations, and the use of AeroTech Fighters in atmospheric combat).
• Tactical Operations (TO) supplements Total Warfare with rules for expanded game-play (advanced rules). These include an expanded weapons / equipment table listing (Lostech), advanced unit types (such as "mobile structures", planetary fortresses, and "large support vehicles") as well as numerous optional gameplay enhancements for planetary-level conquests (consolidating Maximum Tech and other expansion packs, like Explorer Corps).
• Strategic Operations (SO) consolidates the rules for multi-game campaigns within a single star system (such as unit morale and management, repair and maintenance, equipment salvage, in-game construction, and unit-level economics) with the remaining AeroTech 2 rules omitted from TW. These include the introduction of capital-level spacecraft (Jumpships / Warships / Space Stations / Fighter Squadrons) and equipment, space warfare rules, and the use of space travel as a gameplay element. A revised version of BattleForce is also consolidated into the book.
• TechManual (TM) consolidates the customization rules with technical fluff from various products for units compliant to Total Warfare rules. (Construction rules for the missing units are listed in TO or SO, as these units are not considered to be "tournament legal" for gameplay).
• Interstellar Operations (IO) was originally a project that had been available in beta form. The book was designed to introduce rules for faction-wide operations (such as entire Clans / Succession Houses / Empires) across multiple campaigns and star systems—up to and including the entire Inner Sphere. The book itself would have also included an expansion of additional technologies which stipulated per time period in the game universe's history, including revised rules for more advanced types of vehicles such as Land-Air 'Mechs, Superheavy BattleMechs, and unique period technologies. The size of the materials slated for the book forced its splitting into two volumes; the second, which was initially known as the Campaign Companion, was renamed.[14][15]
• Campaign Operations (CO) is the self-contained companion book to Interstellar Operations. The book provides core rules handling player campaigns, using different rules sets. Taking older legacy rules found in previous source books, CO presented them in a singular core rulebook for better accessibility for the player. Included in the publication are rules to build environments for players to create and maintain combat units to be played in the game universe and rules allowing them to design their own worlds and star systems if desired.[16]

After FASA Corporation closed its doors in 2000, Wizkids bought the rights to the game in January 2001.[17] They reworked the IP to launch their MechWarrior: Dark Age collectible miniatures game, but licensed the rights to continue to publish products for the old game to FanPro (itself a subsidiary of Fantasy Productions). Topps bought Wizkids in 2003, but this did not change any publishing agreements at that time. FanPro held the license to the original tabletop game (which they rebranded as "Classic BattleTech") until 2007. At that point Catalyst Game Labs (CGL) acquired the license from Topps. CGL continues to hold the license to this day; with the end of the MechWarrior: Dark Age miniatures game, the name of the traditional tabletop game has reverted to simply BattleTech.

On 24 June 2009, Catalyst Game Labs announced that they had secured the rights to the "Unseen" art. As a result, art depicting the original 'Mechs could be legally used again.[18] However, an update on 11 August 2009 stated that the part of the deal regarding designs that originated in images from Macross had fallen through, returning the original images to Unseen status once again. Since then, designs that originated in images from Dougram and Crusher Joe are no longer considered Unseen.[19]

The BattleTech creators' goal of creating an immersive BattleMech simulation came about 1990 with the opening of the first BattleTech Center at the North Pier Mall in Chicago. The BattleTech Center featured 16 networked, full-sized cockpits or "pods" that resembled a BattleMech cockpit with over 80 separate controls. Each player selected a 'Mech to pilot into combat against up to seven other human players in the other cockpits. Virtual World Entertainment, the company that managed the centers, later opened many other Virtual World centers around the world. It later merged with FASA Interactive Technologies (FIT) to form Virtual World Entertainment Group (VWEG) in order to better capitalize on FASA's properties. In 1999, Microsoft Corporation purchased VWEG to integrate FIT into Microsoft Game Studios and sold VWE. VWE continues to develop and support the current BattleTech VR platform called the Tesla II system, featuring BattleTech: Firestorm. Members of the "pod" ownership community continue to update the software and hardware for the Tesla II cockpits (e.g., by developing kits that allow to replace the original CRT monitors with modern LCD ones[35]) for both private, commercial, and convention use.

• More than 100 tie-in novels. The novels are set in both the Classic BattleTech era (mid-3000s) and the Dark Age era (3130s). The original (Classic) BattleTech novels were produced between 1986 and 2002, while the Dark Age era Novels were produced from 2002 to early 2008. Publication of titles under the Classic BattleTech and MechWarrior lines resumed at the end of 2008.[36]
• An online writing project named BattleCorps produces novelettes set in different eras. The subscription-based BattleCorps offers monthly stories set across the history of the fictional universe. As of mid-2017, no new stories have been released in the first two quarters of 2017.[37]
• The Spider and the Wolf, a comic book-style sourcebook published by FASA in 1986 as a supplement to the original board game. It depicts the inception of the "Black Widow Company" in 3015 and offers a brief introduction to the BattleTech universe as a prelude on the inside cover. Three potential game scenarios are presented in the back of the book.
• A series of licensed comics, published in the late 1980s by Blackthorne Publishing under the BattleTech and BattleForce monikers. The BattleTech comics included an "annual" and a "3-D" special issue, while the third of the three-issue BattleForce comic was left unpublished. The comics are not officially dated, but due to real-life publication date and plot context, speculation suggests that setting is circa 3025.
• A five-issue comic book limited series, BattleTech: Fallout was published by Malibu Comics from 1994 to 1995.[38] The series is set in early 3050 during the Clan Invasion and depicts a group of disparate fugitives pairing with the Belt Pirates. The two parties form an irregular BattleMech force to remove the Clans from the Star's End system. The first issue has two special editions, one with gold print ("gold edition") and one with a holographic cover. The fifth issue (titled "Issue #0"), offers three very short supplemental stories outside of the main plot of the comic.
• A 13-episode television show, BattleTech: The Animated Series, aired on Fox in late 1994. The show was produced by Saban Entertainment and followed Major Adam Steiner and his unit, the First Somerset Strikers in an ongoing conflict with Clan Jade Falcon.
• Electric Entertainment, a company under contract to Paramount Studios, has leased the rights to produce a motion picture based on the BattleTech universe. Development has been slow and little is known about the project's status.