Do people really want to see this mod swarmed with thousands of players who don't give a damn about the setting, lore, goals, and history of the game?
Well sorry to break it to you guys, but this type of game is NOT popular. Most people dont like stomping around in giant robots that move the speed of tanks and turn slower. Most people want to run around pretending to be a soldier, who doesnt suffer from fatigue, can drive any vehicle they want, can shoot artillery with no training using a very simple control scheme, can melee someone to death in one hit, and can just generally do as many things in a pseudo realistic way as possible.
This game needs to be successful with the battletech community, it needs to pull people over from the now dated and overplayed Mw4 into a fresh 2010 era game.
If you want it to attract the masses, then there's going to have to be some major fundamental changes to it to make it appeal.
My gauge of success is its recognition (which it already has to some degree) and its appeal to the community its aimed towards. I am disappointed it doesnt have as large a player base as I would expect from a recently released MW game, but then again I think alot of MW players have far too high expectations for anything set in the battletech universe. The way I look at it, we should be glad of what we get, because this franchise could easily have been dead and buried many times over.
