The BattleTech universe, of which the beloved MechWarrior and MechAssault® video games are but one part, had its genesis in the fevered brain of one Jordan Weisman. Weisman and his partner Ross Babcock founded FASA Corporation in 1980, and by 1984, they had produced the very first tabletop game of giant fightin' robot tactics: BattleDroids.
Droids?
That's right—the original name for BattleTech was BattleDroids, but to avoid any possible legal unpleasantness with the George Lucas empire, FASA changed the name with the second edition in 1985.
The BattleTech pen-and-paper games continued to do well over the years, and slowly FASA began to move closer to realizing Weisman's original dream—not the publication of strategy games, but the development of networked computer games.
It's been a long road from tabletop to video game.
Back when MIDI Maze was the hot thing in networked games, Weisman's vision of location-based video games with advanced graphics was, to say the least, ambitious. But, the vision became a reality in 1990, when the first Virtual World Entertainment complex opened in Chicago, featuring 16 networked BattleMechcockpits. Driven by state of the art, custom-built hardware and software, the Virtual World experience put players right in the middle of a thirty-first-century battlefield, complete with a simulated 'Mech cockpit—and they loved it.
The next five years saw the continued success of the tabletop game lines, the Virtual World centers, and the emergence of the firstBattleTech games for personal computers. The popular roleplaying game (RPG) Shadowrun also emerged in this period; the first edition was printed in 1989, and the line remains popular even today.
From Paper to PCs In 1995, Weisman’s FASA Corporation and Denny Thorley co- founded FASA Interactive, which focused on BattleTech games for personal computers and location-based entertainment for Disney and Virtual World Entertainment. From 1995 to 1999, FASA Interactive releasedMechCommander and started what would becomeMechWarrior 4 and Crimson Skies for the personal computer.
Come 1999, history was made when Microsoft Corporation purchased FASA Interactive, thereby securing the rights to all future video games based on FASA properties. Now known as FASA Studio, the tradition of excellence continues with a new generation of games like Crimson Skies®: High Road to Revenge™ and the MechAssault series, developed in partnership with Day 1 Studios.
Through some licensing legerdemain, rights to the "classic"BattleTech tabletop game and the Shadowrun RPG line are currently owned by FanPro (AKA Fantasy Productions LLC), which continues to support them. WizKids Inc. (another Weisman gig) maintains the rights to another BattleTech spinoff, the MechWarrior: Dark Age game line, one of their popular "Clix" games (a collectible miniatures game system).
Can you believe it's been 20 years?
Good old FASA, the pen-and-paper game company, no longer exists as it once did, but it has certainly made its mark on the entertainment industry. By any measure, BattleTech is one of the most popular sci-fi properties, with more than 20 years of history, millions of players in multiple mediums, and a myriad of spin-off products. Here's to another 20 years of heavy-metal mayhem!
