''Battlezone'' is an arcade game released by Rebellion in 2016. It is an update of the original 1980 arcade game. The game was one of the launch titles for

PlayStation VR The PlayStation VR (PS VR, known by its code name Project Morpheus during development) is a virtual reality headset developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment, which was released in October 2016. It is fully functional with the PlayStation 4 an ...

in October 2016. As with the original, the game features first-person

tank A tank is an armoured fighting vehicle intended as a primary offensive weapon in front-line ground combat. Tank designs are a balance of heavy firepower, strong armour, and good battlefield mobility provided by tracks and a powerful engi ...

combat against an AI-controlled enemy force, but includes co-operative multiplayer and a

campaign Campaign or The Campaign may refer to: Types of campaigns * Campaign, in agriculture, the period during which sugar beets are harvested and processed *Advertising campaign, a series of advertisement messages that share a single idea and theme * Bl ...

structure, together with being designed for virtual reality.

Gameplay

The game is played entirely in first person, from within a tank cockpit. The game was originally designed for

virtual reality Virtual reality (VR) is a simulated experience that employs pose tracking and 3D near-eye displays to give the user an immersive feel of a virtual world. Applications of virtual reality include entertainment (particularly video games), e ...

with gamepad control - there are a few

HUD Hud or HUD may refer to: Entertainment * ''Hud'' (1963 film), a 1963 film starring Paul Newman * ''Hud'' (1986 film), a 1986 Norwegian film * ''HUD'' (TV program), or ''Heads Up Daily'', a Canadian e-sports television program Places * Hud, Fa ...

elements, such as targeting crosshairs, but most readouts are presented on display panels mounted around the cockpit, together with a holographic top-down radar display. One player starts a campaign by selecting a difficulty level and campaign length. Up to 3 other players can join the campaign, for a total of 4 players. Players can drop in or out at any time, including during gameplay. Each player chooses a tank that they use for the entire campaign, and each tank comes with an initial weapon loadout. The tank's loadout can be changed at supply points during the campaign. The objective of the campaign is to travel across the procedurally-generated hex map, ultimately to destroy the enemy's AI core in the volcano at the far end of the map. Each hex contains either a battlezone of one of multiple map types, a supply point, a shield generator, or a random event. Battlezones have different objectives — completing the objective and defeating enemies in the battlezone earns the players "data", and this data can be spent on upgrades or new weapons. Each shield generator destroyed on the map reduces the defences in the final AI core confrontation battlezone. Players have a shared pool of lives, starting with 3 lives. More can be purchased with data, but the cost increases rapidly. When all players are dead with no lives remaining, the campaign ends in defeat. To avoid spending lives, a downed player can be revived by another player. A post-launch patch added "classic mode", which recreates the original 1980 wireframe vector game in the virtual reality environment.

Release

The game was first released as an exclusive launch title for

on PlayStation 4 on 13 October 2016. A Microsoft Windows port supporting

HTC Vive VIVE, sometimes referred to as HTC Vive, is a virtual reality brand of HTC Corporation. It consists of hardware like its titular virtual reality headsets and accessories, virtual reality software and services, and initiatives that promote appl ...

and

Oculus Rift Oculus Rift is a discontinued line of virtual reality headsets developed and manufactured by Oculus VR, a division of Meta Platforms, released on March 28, 2016. In 2012 Oculus initiated a Kickstarter campaign to fund the Rift's development, af ...

followed in May 2017. On 1 May 2018 the game was updated and released as ''Battlezone: Gold Edition'', including a new

Xbox One The Xbox One is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. Announced in May 2013, it is the successor to Xbox 360 and the third base console in the Xbox series of video game consoles. It was first released in North America, parts of ...

port. The Gold Edition added support for non-VR, and included all add-ons previously released as

downloadable content Downloadable content (DLC) is additional content created for an already released video game, distributed through the Internet by the game's publisher. It can either be added for no extra cost or it can be a form of video game monetization, enabli ...

. It was a free update for existing Windows and PlayStation 4 owners. A Nintendo Switch port followed on 8 November 2018.

Reception

The game received mixed reviews upon release according to

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

References

External links

* {{Official website, http://www.battlezone.com/ 2016 video games Virtual reality games First-person shooters Tank simulation video games Single-player video games Multiplayer video games Video games developed in the United Kingdom Rebellion Developments games HTC Vive games Nintendo Switch games Oculus Rift games PlayStation 4 games PlayStation VR games Video game remakes Windows games