Picked up a very cool Steel Battalion dev brochure.

So it's greyed out even if you have the system link cable hooked up to another Xbox? I would think you would need two copies of the Pilot Test like you do with Line of Contact to have system light up for a LAN game. Unfortunately I never tested my copy before I donated it to The Strong.

 

Just plugged into the gaming switch.

 

Where did you end up finding a copy? I got lucky with a buy it now Steel Battalion bundle package on Ebay.

 

Same deal, on eBay with a buy it now.

 

Do you have a copy of LoC? What is its behavior with the switch? Supposedly works very similar.

 

I can select System Link option on the retail game.

 

How strange and disappointing. I am not totally convinced it wont work. You might want to try a system link cable (crossover cable) with another Xbox if you have one and see it that helps. There are so few of those Pilot Test betas floating around its hard to find any info on it. If they are online only just for the beta that would really be unfortunate Capcom limited it in that fashion.

 

Now that I look back at my photos of the Pilot Test I see that "System Link" is not checked as an option on the back of the game case. What a shame. Still a good collector's piece or museum piece, but pretty much useless unfortunately. I do wonder, though, if someone with some Xbox skills could rip the files from this disc and somehow get them to work with LoC system link? Just a thought, but probably not doable.

https://assemblergames.com/attachments/backcover-jpg.24193/

Note: Speaking of the back of the case I noticed the "HDTV 720p" box has next to it "(US and JPN only)". I think this answers my earlier question that this Pilot Test beta disc was released worldwide and not just certain regions. I wasn't sure if Japan had their own version of the Pilot Test beta disc.

 

Do you still have the disc. Part of Steel Battalion group on facebook. Would like to try it out.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/406257546221492/

 

I've commented on that post, unless they fire up the old beta servers and the original Xbox Live service comes back online, it cannot be played.

 

I donate all of my collections and findings to The Strong in Rochester, NY for preservation purposes so, no, I do not have the beta disc in my possession anymore. As Syclopse said, without the servers or some serious hacking/modding it wont run anyway. Besides, the final game is still playable via LAN so not really an issue. To this day, Steel Battalion and LoC are still my all time favorite mech games. Although, Mechwarrior 5 is looking to be a challenger. I hope they don't screw it up like MW Online.

 

Thanks for scanning these. Its great especially the picture of the dev team with the xbox devkit.

 

Exactly. When GameDigga presented that brochure to me for purchase privately, I had never seen it before and I knew it was uber rare. That photo of the dev team made my jaw drop. I wish I could have scanned it, but because the way the document was stapled together it would not lay completely flat so a flatbed scanner would have damaged it. I did the next best thing and took high resolution photos of it before sending it off to the museum.

 

I really like glass box with mecha models. It really seems like the dev team loved their jobs.

 

I don't think we'll ever see a game as unique as Steel Battalion again because of the production costs involved and that's what makes it such a special title. I truly wish, though, Capcom would have released a PC version of this game so many more players could experience the epic atmosphere of this game.

Edit: Can you imagine this title with some of Logitech's more advanced controllers? I think it would have been easy for them to do without having to go to the expense of the elaborate controller that came with the Xbox.

https://www.logitechg.com/en-us/space-simulation

 

Ive never played it tell you the truth. I just can justify the cost of shipping the controllers plus the scalping going on now. Also the version of ind-bios I have has that ingame reset thing. So i need to reflash it with a newer version or it will act up with this game.

 

Yep. I heard about that. I know I read somewhere there are some workarounds until you get around to flashing your bios.

 

I heard the newest version removes the igr or does something that fixes it. I just dont have the time for that right now. Heres hoping for an origional xbox emulator in our lifetimes that can play steel battalion and jsrf flawlessly.

 

Oh my... that brings back memories.

As a matter of fact, I still have a controller (with the games), but moved away from video gaming (and yet here I am, checking the forums every now and then).
Anyone (preferably in Europe) want it for a fair price?