Favourite mecha RPGs

[jian]

I kind of expect this one to be very far ranging, because people have very different views of what they want from a mecha game. Some want the careful tactical gameplay of Battletech or Lancer; some want the finely balanced mecha creation rules of Mekton or GURPS Mecha; some want minimalist invisible rules to allow for dramatic stories so characteristic of real mecha* anime; some want fantastic pyrotechnic combat rules allowing for mecha combining, transforming mecha, mecha who are actually supernatural beings, and all the rule of cool excesses of super mecha* anime. These various ideals aren’t remotely mutually exclusive.

*A quick note for those who don’t know: mecha anime/manga: real and super mecha are roughly opposite poles of the genre. The older genre is super mecha, giant robots as unique superheroes like Mazinger Z or Beast King GoLion (Voltron in the US), while real mecha, giant robots as military vehicles with some degree of realism, took off in the 1970s with AT Votoms and Gundam. In both cases, mecha allow for human struggles on a greater scale, but with different genre flavours and assumptions. The two poles are thoroughly mixed by now, but they’re useful markers nonetheless.

I haven’t played all mecha RPGs by any means - for instance, while I’ve read Lancer, Mekton, and GURPS Mecha, I’ve never played them. I will mention a few that are more prominent at the moment.

• Lancer: The new hotness in mecha RPGs for the last few years, Lancer benefits from amazing art (by the creator of the Kill Six Billion Demons webcomic) and a solid tactical rule set similar to D&D 4E. I don’t think my group will ever play it, but it is a work of art.
• The Mecha Hack: A simple streamlined game based on the Black Hack, TMH is easy to pick up and play and cleverly streamlined. I don’t think all the chargen options are well balanced, but it’s a nice try. There’s a more recent iteration based on its own science fantasy setting, Aether Nexus, which is very cool but insists on using its own terminology for almost everything.
• Apocalypse Frame: An interesting light real mecha game based on LUMEN, AF really ought to work well for this kind of fast mecha action.

Anyway, what’s everyone’s favourite? What makes you want to play a mecha game, and what game sparks your interest for doing so?

 

[jdrakeh]

Chris Perrin's Mecha, Remnants, and Salvage Union.

 

[aramis erak]

I've run 6, and only one-shots of each: Mechwarrior (1st ed), Robotech (Palladium), Mekton II/Mekton Zeta, beta of Robotech (Strange Machine), and Heavy Gear, Robot Warriors (Hero System adapted core).

I've used Mechwarrior 2nd ed & Merc's handbook as a solo activity.

I've read several more: Jovian Chronicles (same mechanics as Heavy Gear), Mechwarrior 3rd ed, Mechwarrior: Destiny, Savage Worlds Robotech: Macross, Rifts, Macross II (Palladium)... and most of the release of SMG Robotech.

I've skimmed GURPS Mecha...

The following have humanoid robots piloted from within, but are not actually mecha games: Traveller, Spacemaster, DragonSpace. All three of those also have powered armor.

So of these, the one I liked best as a mecha game is Mekton II, but Heavy Gear 2nd ed came in a real close second. I'll use Mekton Zeta instead of Mekton II - better construction rules - but the combat's the same, and the non-combat, as well.

As an RPG with Mecha, Palladium's Robotech is the only one to have gotten more than a one-shot or two. Mekton was the one I most want to run again, and Mechwarrior: Destiny is on the "is it worth the effort to teach the setting to my players", of whom 1 is familiar and 1 is a hardcore fan, and the other three have zero familiarity.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

While I like the genre, I’ve rarely been a GM in any game in which mecha were possible. That would have been a couple brief stints running RIFTS, plus some superheroic HERO campaigns.

As a player, with the exception of a single RIFT campaign (again), I haven’t played in a mecha game since the 1990s. Back then, there was one guy in that group who was REALLY into anime (especially mecha), so he tried running a mecha campaign. But he wasn’t satisfied with the system, so he killed that campaign…

And started a new one in a different system. Which he quickly killed, and started another one in a different system…

I don’t clearly remember how many times we went through that cycle, nor which ones we played. Mechwarrior was on the list. I think we tried Robotech, Mekton & BESM as well.

I have to say, despite the constant chaos, each one of the aborted campaigns was fun. I suspect that’s more to do with his GMing skills & the group in general, but...

With that kind of experience, I’d say this: find a system you & your players can grasp and that will allow you to tell the stories you want to play. Ignore the default setting if need be.

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

Worth noting that Aether Nexus is a cousin of Mecha Hack more than a sibling. There are major changes (almost universally improvements IMO) to the original hack of Black Hack in AN that alter gameplay quite a bit, and even with the Mission Manual for MH (which is nearly mandatory, it adds so much) there's just loads more customization options for AN. Not only are there more choices, there are more things to tweak and the straightjacket of level-based progression is gone, replaced by a fairly freeform point-buy system that means two pilot/frame combos that started out 100% identical are almost guaranteed to grow very differently over time.

They're both good but in different ways, and if AN ever gets its own Mission Manual equivalent it's probably going to be amazing, with build versatility akin to Lancer while running on a lighter, faster engine.

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

The old Hero System Robot Warriors stand-alone game deserves mention as well. The original 3rd edition is available from Hero Games, and there's a (professional grade) fan update for converting to 4th, 5th and 6th on DTRPG over here. As you'd expect, it's supremely versatile even compared to GURPS and Mekton, quite well balanced - but it's also Hero system, which is great if you like it but many folks don't.

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

There was a long period of time when I would have lauded Mekton based on nostalgia, but a recent attempt at playing a PbP (which has fallen through completely) got me to actually go through character creation for the first time in over two decades and my opinion has changed. The game (with the tech book expansion) does offer some of the most versatile and comprehensive mech (and vehicle, starship and even kaiju) building rules while avoiding hopeless overcomplication, and the mecha combat rules work all right even between different scales of combatants. The problem is the actual roleplaying engine its attached to, which has not aged well. It's still using a primitive form of the various Cyberpunk systems, which isn't a major problem in and if itself, you could hack in the better parts of CP Red with some work.

But the rulebook inevitably uses a ton of space for mecha rules, which leave the character generation rules feeling cramped. Some elements feel archaic and/or just plain creepy, in particular the life path system which focuses heavily on romantic entanglements for PCs who are still of high school age. There are both fixed archetypes (for less experienced PCs - archetypes newbies also get extra XP for advancement during play) and a Traveller-style option to play vets with varying numbers of service terms in a (rather strange) set of careers. Playing older characters forces you to roll extra lifepath results with non-optional outcomes, which might reward you but are also very likely to cause permanent loss of attributes and other complications.

Other issues by modern design standards include way too many skills tied to different attributes in a very uneven way, a pretty limited personal equipment list that also doesn't feel very scifi at all from here in 2025, and as with many R Tal games, Reflex is a God Stat and if you don't take a 10 in it you are probably going to die - especially if playing a vet who lost points from their lifepath. You can also expect to start with fairly ineffective skills outside of the cockpit unless the GM plays around with suggested task difficulties, which are high enough to make things very hard for starting PCs. It's not as bad in combat where you're rolling against enemies (who are often even worse than you are to start - assuming you have a good REF) but the static numbers for other things are on the excessive side.

So yeah, the mecha stuff is still pretty darn good, but it's got an albatross of a pilot generation system around its neck that badly needs an update at this point and will likely never get one unless some fan puts in the effort.

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

While I wouldn't call it a mecha game per se, Fabula Ultima does cover mechs (and starships, airships, etc.), primarily in the Techno-Fantasy book. If you're looking for a tabletop game that feels like playing a JRPG first and being a mecha game second it might be worth looking at. It's a fairly narrowly focused system, but it knows what it's trying to do - emulate classic JRPGs - and sticks to it pretty well.

 

[Wofano Wotanto]

All that blathering aside, I don't have a single favorite game in the genre, but Lancer, Aether Nexus and Mecha Hack all rank high for me. If I wanted to run something where the mechs are kind of secondary and the pilots spend a lot of time out of their cockpits I'd either go with Robot Warriors (for crunch) or kitbash something out of Cortex for something more abstract and narrative-focused.

 

[ShinHakkaider]

Many, MANY years ago I played in a many years long MEKTON ZETA campaign. I rarely get to to play as I've always been kinda a forever GM but it was by far one of my favorite TTRPG experiences of my life. My character name was a combination of two Tomino character names from Juusenki L-Gaim and Zeta Gundam, Haman Kamandara. He build his mech up from a basic stolen enemy mecha to by the final conflict, a long range killing, missile loaded beast of a mecha. As a character he was a typical child soldier swept up in trying to help his friends steer clear of the conflict and being swept up in it at the same time. Haman literally after 3-4 years of play FINALLY defeated his nemesis, Lark (aka The Long Range Killer) in a duel in and around asteroid debri on the other side of the moon.

Unfortunately Lark was an esper with short to mid range teleportation abilites. When Haman closed to deliver the final blow to Lark's mecha personally, he blind teleported into Haman's mechs cockpit and shot Haman. My character realizing that if Lark gained control of this mech he'd absolutely lay waste to my companions who were fighting a desperate battle elsewhere. (It was Haman's job to deal with Lark away from that battle otherwise we would have been slaughtered). So instead Haman chose to detonate the self destruct mechanism, killing us BOTH. It was the first time that I'd seen my buddies, who I'd been playing with since high school get visibly upset at a character death other than their own. They tried to get me to try other options but they also knew what the Gaprak Mark V was capable of.

It was also the most MECHA ANIME death ever and ultimately an AWESOME way to go out.