MechWarrior 5 finally stomps onto Steam and GOG this month

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The smashing mech sim arrives with a free update and full crossplay between PC and Xbox players.

MechWarrior 5: Mercenaries' Steam debut may have been delayed—but when you're an 80ft steel war machine, I think we can forgive a little tardiness.

This month's launch comes with full cross-play between Epic, Steam, GOG and the game's new Xbox versions. This includes the game's Heroes of the Inner Sphere DLC campaign, which will only require one player to own it to play cooperatively. An update also includes a bunch of new features, including squishy infantry units, a revamped UI, extreme weather conditions and a new campaign intro.

I fell off MechWarrior 5 faster than I'd liked, thanks to a repetitive mission structure and paper-thin narrative that couldn't hold up to fellow mech-smasher BattleTech. But it's still a bloody good mech sim—and if all you want is a big toybox full of stompy robots, MW5 will do you more than fine.

"MW5 is unmistakably a game about being a sandbox mech jockey, and the stories are just a low-quality veneer over some superb robot combat," Jon wrote in his MW5 review. "If you're here for a mech smashing simulator, this is the best new mech smashing simulator around. Here's hoping for more and better from a MechWarrior 6."

Natalie Clayton
Natalie Clayton
Features Producer

20 years ago, Nat played Jet Set Radio Future for the first time, and she's not stopped thinking about games since. Joining PC Gamer in 2020, she comes from three years of freelance reporting at Rock Paper Shotgun, Waypoint, VG247 and more. Embedded in the European indie scene and a part-time game developer herself, Nat is always looking for a new curiosity to scream about—whether it's the next best indie darling, or simply someone modding a Scotmid into Black Mesa. She also unofficially appears in Apex Legends under the pseudonym Horizon.