The player's mercenary company initially takes on localized threats in certain planets far from the civil war. In the game, the player takes the role of Spectre, a mercenary BattleMech pilot travelling inside the fictional interstellar region of the BattleTech universe called the Inner Sphere during the FedCom Civil War (specifically during the time period from Januto late July 3067). MekTek expressed their intent to move away from the BattleTech franchise, and a new group interested in maintaining free versions appeared but encountered difficulties securing permission to continue offering the game as a free download. In the following years, MechWarrior 4: Mercenaries was no longer available free. MekTek recovered the MekMatch match making service on May 1 and the forum was restored the next day. However, due to the massive influx of 100,000 downloads and web site accesses, and related services crashed. By ApMicrosoft had cleared its free release and on April 30, MechWarrior 4: Mercenaries was released to the general public by MekTek as a free download. Mechwarrior 4: Mercenaries and Clan and Inner Sphere expansions were re-released for free.
It is a standalone expansion of MechWarrior 4: Vengeance, based on the BattleTech MechWarrior game universe. Mechwarrior 4: Mercenaries is a vehicle simulation video game for Microsoft Windows, released in 2002.
