assumes command of Zulu company in a campaign to liberate the desolate planet Cermak in the Periphery, taken by a renegade Smoke Jaguar, Star Colonel Marcus Kotare (a character that was featured briefly in MechWarrior 2: Mercenaries), for an unknown reason that is revealed later in game. Once again, the player starts with inferior Inner Sphere mechs (pilots and mechs from original campaign cannot be exported into expansion), though both mechs and pilots are better than in the start of the original campaign. The expansion features a total of three campaigns. Aside from the missions, the expansion also includes a new soundtrack, new landscapes along with redesigned and new buildings, new weapons, three new mechs for each side—Stiletto, Bushwacker, and Mauler for IS and Shadow Cat, Nova Cat and Turkina for the Clan, and new vehicles including Alacorn, Pilum and Regulator tanks, as well as ammo trucks that also doubled as mobile bombs and Centipede scout vehicles. Desperate Measures also acted as testbed for the concept of custom NPC mechs that had their own names (like Kotare's Turkina), weapon configurations and overall superiority to the standard modifications. This idea was carried on to, and greatly improved in, MechCommander 2. A compilation called MechCommander Gold was released in 1999 that includes the base game and the expansion. Reception The game received favorable reviews according to the review aggregation website GameRankings. Next Generation called it "a good first effort, and FASA is to be commended for trying something different in the overcrowded field of RTS games. Unfortunately, it lacks polish, and the repetition of each mission drags down the fun factor." The Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences nominated the game for its 1998 "Strategy Game of the Year" award, although it lost to Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. The game was a runner-up for Computer Games Strategy Plus 1998 "Real-Time Strategy Game of the Year" award, which ultimately went to StarCraft. The staff called the former game "great", but argued that "only StarCraft was stellar". References External links 1998 video games BattleTech games Freeware games MechWarrior Microsoft franchises Multiplayer online games Real-time tactics video games Video games about mecha Video games developed in the United States Video games set on fictional planets Video games with expansion packs Windows games Windows-only games