Mechs, explosions and a TV with legs, all for free as this episode takes on Hawken

My other serious concern with Hawken is its longevity. It's not as though multi-player online games that are centered around short term PvP match making are anything new. This sort of game has been around since FPS first moved from the golden age of split screen gaming to the online world. For games like this to have any kind of longevity they need to have something to keep their player base interested in what is at its core, a repetitive gaming experience.

There are many different ways that developers attempt to mask or overcome repetition; either through an immersive story driven (often single player) campaign, by utilizing some kind of persistent world or game play mechanic, releasing a wide assortment of game types or maps, player driven content or by adding an extensive roster of units or customization options.

Unfortunately Hawken has not employed these conventions to any significant degree. While the roster of mechs available and the associated customization of weapons, items and cosmetics are a step in the right direction they were not nearly robust enough to hold my attention beyond a week or two, a sentiment echoed by those whom I played with as well.

Hawken is a well put together, accessible and visually pleasing gaming experience, but ultimately feels repetitive. For me and those who played alongside me, it was an extremely enjoyable two weeks but by the end of it we felt we were probably ready to move on.

But wait, you can't move on, you haven't answered the question yet!

True enough. And perhaps Hawken is one of the best examples yet of how gaming can be free if you accept one small caveat. You must be prepared to play games in small doses. That could mean playing the snot out of a game for a short time period or taking a very casual approach over a longer period of time, but either way it seems to ring true for match based games such as Hawken.

This is clearly evident in the way in which Hawken is monetized. Just like most free-to-play games there is a dual currency at work. Meteor Points cost real money, and as such are wholly off limits, Hawken Credits on the other hand are earned just by playing the game. However there is a third mechanic at work in Hawken that's worth pointing out, Experience Points.

While the concept of Experience Points is of course not even remotely new, in Hawken, a great many of the things that can be purchased with either Meteor Credits or Hawken Credits are only unlocked based on the current level of your pilot (which is basically your account) or the level of a specific type of mech in your roster.

But the problem I discovered was that the longer I played the greater the disparity between XP and Hawken Credits earned became. After playing for only two weeks I was starting to unlock new mech ranks (which grant access to new items and upgrades) before I had even accumulated enough Hawken Credits to buy the upgrades from the previous rank.

To give you an example of the disparity between XP and Hawken Credits earned take a look at the screenshot above. On the left hand side you can see that for this match (a win no less) I earned 5188XP to only 278 Hawken Credits. I also earned another 200 bonus Hawken Credits from two achievements, but these are an exception, and you can't always count on them being there. Even if you include the bonus Hawken Credits I still earned almost 11 times more XP than Hawken Credits.

Now granted the required XP to unlock a new rank of mech is considerably higher than the average price of an upgraded weapon, ability or item, but either way I found that the longer I played the more difficult it was to keep up with the available upgrades for my mech. This was further exacerbated by the fact that was also trying to equip some of my other mechs with near gear as well.

In the end I always felt as though I wasn't earning Hawken Credits as fast as I would like. So to try and speed things up I'd play more games to earn more Credits, but that would also gain me more XP which would unlock more things to buy and leave me feeling all that much poorer. It felt sort of like a vicious circle, with the only equalizer being using real cash to buy Meteor Credits to use for purchases when you run out of Hawken Points.

A clever strategy to be sure, and one that I've no doubt will have that numbskull Mr. Spendypants throwing piles of cash your way, but you'll have to do better than that to fool the Free Agent. With Meteor Credits off limits for me I resigned myself to the fact that my equipment load outs would likely lag behind paying customers  unless I stuck around for the long haul, something I'm happy to say I won't have the opportunity to do.

Of course that's not the only thing you'll miss out on if you want to play Hawken for free. But rather than bore you with a wall of text describing what you can and cannot buy, I've prepared another video supplement to walk you through it:

And with that we're out of here

I really can't help but reiterate, despite anything negative I might have said, in the short time I was able to play Hawken I really did enjoy myself. It is my sincere hope that Adhesive adds some extra meat the bones because Hawken is off to a great start. And of course if an Oculus Rift ever happens to come my way, you can dang well bet I'll load up Hawken and enjoy it all over again.

Thanks for sticking around; your readership is greatly appreciated. As always, feel free to ask questions or throw in your own two cents about Hawken in the comments section below.

Also a special thanks to those who joined me in playing Hawken over the last two weeks. It was great to hear some different perspectives as well as to have some of my own perspectives validated.

If you feel like joining the Free Agent on the next mission then stay tuned to my Twitter feed as I'll be announcing the next game to be featured on the Free Agent sometime soon. Look me up in game (I usually go by Caergan) and let me know what you think.

See you next time on the Free Agent.

Robert "Caergan" Gray
 Follow me on Twitter @Caergan