Yup, exact same as me. We’re about the same age, and I recall driving up to the city and pissing my money down the tubes on that thing. Luckily I didn’t usually get my ass kicked too bad. At least it was time based and you could respawn as many times as you wanted, os even if you got hammered you weren’t sitting on the sidelines.
Bosda, here you go: the Color Artists for the entire Field Manual series. Note that some books did not have a color section (Crusader Clans, and Updates). Also, the method of listing the credits varies from one book to another (some list specifically what each color artist made, while others just list them under Color Section).
Capellan Confederation: Cover Art; Doug Chaffee, Interior Color Art; Marc Sasso, Jim Nelson, and Franz Vohwinkel
Comstar: Cover Art; Doug Chaffee, Color Art; Doug Alexander, John Bridegroom, Zak Plucinski
Crusader Clans: Cover Art; Mike Sutfin
Draconis Combine: Cover Art; Doug Chaffee, Color Section; Rank Insignias; Jim Nelson, Medals; Tom Baxa, Jeff Laubenstein, Paint Schemes; Kevin Long, Power Armor; Jim Nelson, Mike Nielsen, Intro Page and Uniforms; Chris Moeller
Federated Suns: Cover Art; Doug Chaffee, Interior Color Section; Peter Bergting, Franz Vohwinkel
Free Worlds League: Cover Art; Doug Chaffee, Color Section; Rank Insignias; John Bridegroom, Medals; Joel Biske, Paint Schemes; Christina Wald, Intro Page and Uniforms; Chris Moeller, Power Armor; Matt Wilson
Lyran Alliance: Cover Art; Doug Chaffee, (this book does not separately list color artists, but has a color section, so) Illustration; Matthew Plog, Christina Wald, Loston Wallace, Steve Bryant, Brad McDevitt, Des Hanley
Mercenaries (Revised): Cover Art; Doug Chaffee, Color Section; Liz Danforth, Dave Martin, Mark Zug, Franz Vohwinkel
Periphery: Cover Art; Doug Chaffee, Interior Color Section; Marc Sasso, Franz Vohwinkel
Updates: Cover Art; Doug Chaffee
Warden Clans: Cover Art; Doug Chaffee, Color Section; Matt Wilson, Fred Hooper
PS. I just realised something, these are for the Field Manuals, created in the mid-to-late 90’s; NOT the original House Sourcebooks done much earlier. If the ones I’m listing are the wrong series of sourcebooks, then you will have to find the artist’s for the older ones on your own, sorry, I don’t have those.
Umm… Hey, Omniscient, not to be a nitpick, but:
1.) Robotech is a separate series altogether (made by Harmony Gold using scenes from several unrelated Japanese Anime shows; the robots used were from Macross). However, these series were the inspiration for Battletech-creator Jordan Weisman, and for a long time, slight variations of the recognizable robots were used in Battletech (until Harmony Gold found out and sued FASA; they settled out of court and FASA agreed never to use their images again, hence the nickname; the Unseen). Project Phoenix was a sourcebook that gives all those 'Mechs new, original, images (each using similar visual aesthetic as the Macross one) so that they can be used in products again. I explained all this in the OP.
2.) ALL of the Battletech, Mechwarrior, MechAssault (which will DEFINITELY have sequels on Xbox 360 considering the first two installments success), etc., ARE all one series, with one wholly integrated fiction. Even the ill-conceived Cartoon series followed the Cannon. There are three novel series, the series title simply denoting the time period it’s set in (Battletech is in the 31st century, and each book follows multiple characters in a story; Mechwarrior is in the 31st century, each book focuses on a single character’s career; and Mechwarrior Dark-Age books are just like Battletech, only in the 32nd century).
But yeah, there are novels (I highly reccomend them if you have any interest in dramatic sci-fi war-stories rife with political intrigue), there probably wont be a movie anytime soon (various studios have talked about it for over a decade, none ever came through on an offer), there was a show, there was a (short-lived) comic-book series, and all of the products follow one organized fiction. If you want a small dose of the fiction, head on over to Wizkids’ website (see earlier post for link), there’s several serials and short stories hosted there. If you like that, check out Battlecorps for more fiction.
DOH! hit enter by accident!
General comments for Omniscient; One; You lucky son-of-a-gun! :mad: I always wanted to play those arcade things, but never got the chance (I think the company was called Virtual World?)! 
Two; FYI, the Loki is also known as the Hellbringer (the Clans, a group of factions with radically different societies from the more traditional Inner Sphere, had all their mech’s given code-names by the Inner-Sphere, much as we did with German and Japanese units in WW2. The Clan names are usually the less culture-specific names)! I always preferred Hellbringer myself.
Three; Maybe I’m just being slow, but I don’t get what you mean by HD/DTS battle? what does that acronym stand for?
Four; I have this thread set up to e-mail me about replies, and when I got the latest one, it said: “…the last poster was Omniscient.” I found that amusing.
PS. a few of you guys have asked things, or made comments, that I addressed in the OP, I know it’s ridiculously long, but, could you try to scan it for these things so I’m not repeating myself? If you need clarification, that’s cool, I know I was really rambling there, I’m just asking if you could skim it a little closer?
odd question–
years ago, some fan came up with a system for creating 3legged Mechs, & Mech tentacles instead of arms.
With 2 versions of War Of The Worlds coming up, well…Martian Tripod Assault Mechs, anybody?
Has anybody got a copy of this article?
I have my own company for the moment. Regardless of what they do with SR4, we’ve got material that should expand the depth and breadth of Shadowrun for every character.
Don’t worry about the nitpick, but I do know the distinction between Robotech and BattleTech (due to an earlier SDMB thread, go figure), I just mentioned my acquaintence with Robotech in passing since it was relevant to the point.
I think I may have to pick up the Project Pheonix sourcebook just to browse all the schematics. That stuff is fun. Unfortunately I’m usually too busy and impatient to settle in with one of the books for the long haul, let alone a series. If I ever get unemployed again I might have to indulge though.
Virtual World does sound right. I think I might actually have a couple of those old battle summraies squirelled away somewhere at my parents house…hmm. Awesome stuff, even by todays standards I think that game would be pretty impressive. It was way ahead of its time I thought.
HD/DTS stands for High-Definition/Digital Theater System…basically, HD-TV and 5.1 surround sound. Just saying it’ll be seriously cool to play the new MechWarrior games on my HD plasma TV in immersive surround sound once the XBOX 360 is out.
Man, I just gave you a new quad BattleArmor. Sheesh, no pleasing some people… 