The interesting dilemma about designing a free-to-play game is that you want players to continue playing, else the creek runs dry. It has been nearly a year-and-a-half since the open beta of Mechwarrior Online in October, 2012. The latest patch, released last week, adds a DirectX 11 rendering engine to the game. While specific details are scarce, this will allow MSAA to be applied.

In terms of content, two new mechs have been added to the game: BNC-LM Banshee "La Malinche", and CTF-3D Cataphract. The former is an assault mech with a fairly balanced loadout, allowing for energy, ballistic, and missile weapons with double heatsinks, while the latter is a heavy mech with a focus on energy weapons with one ballistic slot for variety. Jump Jets are also tweaked for reduced mobility and incentive to add more than just one.

PC Gamer spoke with the developer and got a little extra information on future patches. First, a new matchmaking architecture is expected to launch in April. They claim it will be a complete overhaul of the whole system. They also expect 3D Vision, "proper" SLi, and TXAA will make appearances in the next couple of patches — but don't quote them on it (oh, whoops!)

Mechwarrior Online is available now (and has been, for well over a year).