From: think!laird@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU (Laird Popkin)
Subject: Re: Questions about BattleTech
Date: Tue, 30 Apr 91 17:29:22 GMT
Organization: Thinking Machines Corporation, Cambridge MA, USA



In article <1991Apr25.210436.19988@menudo.uh.edu> jet@karazm.math.uh.edu 
("J. Eric Townsend") writes:
>
>In article <1991Apr25.080804.14090@milton.u.washington.edu> crispin@csd.uwo.ca
>(Crispin Cowan) writes:
>
>>The game I'm asking about is called BattleTech.  According to the moderator,
>>(contrary to my impression) it is an arcade game (I had thought it was
>>a building-sized getup, reminiscent of Photon).
>>
>>The radio article I heard specifically described fighting with other
>>players instead of the machine.  Would this imply some sort of LAN
>>connecting player boxes in an arcade?  Is "Joe's Pin-ball" really up
>>to LAN management 1/2 :-)?
>
>It's a bunch of hopped-up Amigas in closets, essentially.  Players fight
>each other in teams, have several viewscreens and roughly 200 gauges
>and controls to deal with.
>
>Check Amiga magazines over the past year for various articles on the
>BattleTech Game Center.

Actually, Amigas are nor of a peripheral to the system -- an A500 is used
in each pod to drive secondary radar displays.  The main displays,
simulation, and so on are all driven by custom graphics hardware in some
flavor of PC clone, with a big fast server CPU (also a PC) in the middle
running the simulation and keeping everything in synch.  I wish I lives in
Chicago so I could play... 

- Laird Popkin