[Game] Who else here loves the Battlezone series?

[NoxNoctum]

BZ1, Red Odyssey (mission pack for BZ1), and BZII all kick ***. Totally unique games, nothing else even remotely similar. I'm playing through BZ1 right now, then I'm gonna go through RO and then through BZII again.

If anyone you haven't played it, buy it, they're all like $2 off ebay... actually I think there's a free installer here for BZ1 since it's such an old game:

http://www.battlezone1.net/home/page_7/index.html

Don't be fooled though, it's easily stood the test of time. Even the graphics still look somewhat decent. Gameplay's unparalleled. Not to mention the campaigns are incredibly difficult on the "Hard" setting, especially RO, which for me is a good thing. Insane missions. It's the only RTS/"shooter" that's ever pulled it off IMO. As for the combat... basically it's dogfighting in hover tanks . (that can float over hills and do all kinds of crazy maneuvers)

Basically the story is the Buzz Aldrin/Armstrong moon landing was a cover up... actually the US and the Soviet Union both had military bases on the moon and were fighting over "biometal" for some time... the war expands and you go to other planets and and and... don't wanna spoil it . BZII follows up on that. RO throws the Chinese into the mix when they decide they want a piece of the action too.

Here's the intro for BZI:

YouTube - Battle Zone Intro

BZ2 intro:
YouTube - Battlezone II: Combat Commander Intro

And yes, there actually IS a thumper weapon .

 

[SiC-Disaster]

BZ1 kicked so much ***, i played it to death and love it.
We should get a strat game on sometime, there is still a community devoted to this game. Well, 2 communities who hate eachother's guts actually, both developed their own mod for BZ1 but one changes too much.
I tried getting into one of those communities several times, but each time got turned off by the consistent flaming going on between members of the two communities.
Besides, they hardly played any strategy games online, and usually only played FFA, which i dont find that much fun. It feels like a shame when the RTS part is worked out so well.

BZ2 however... I dont like that one too much. The base construction is too simple, because all the buildings have to be adjacent to eachother which results in the same base each time, with perhaps a slightly different layout.
Worse than that, is that the AI sucks. They can build units fine, but the actual unit movement is off the charts. They rather bump into you and ram you to death than actually shoot you, at least that is the feeling i get sometimes.
BZ1 vehicles are much faster to pull the trigger, much more accurate and tend to fly better, too. Once a golem comes walking through the mist, you actually think 'oh ****, here goes my tank', and often enough, it results in a quick bail-out and a hike back to base to find another tank, hoping not to get killed along the way

The base building in BZ1 is much more free-flowing, because most production buildings require a geyser which are spread out all over the place, and the contructor can place buildings anywhere, and doesnt have to connect them to others.
Bases are much more diverse, and offer tactical difficulties when you need to spread them out.
The only thing about BZ2 i did like was scrap pools, allowing you pretty much infinite scrap to build with. BZ1 only had scrap scattered on the ground which you could pick up.
You usually have to decide to either go defensive or offensive, because you wont get enough scrap for a combination to be effective. If both players decide to go defensive, that kind of kills the game.

Anyways, the forum i tried getting into was this one:
[URL]http://www.battlezoneclub.org/forum/[/URL]

And a host of downloads can be found here:
[URL]http://www.battlezoneclub.org/youngguns/downloads.html[/URL]
Basically you need the BZ Installer 1.4k, which is the full game.

EDIT:
The thumper was cool, but hardly ever used it because i never found much use for it.

 

[LemoN]

Oh yes, the BZ games were pure awesome.

 

[fiftyone]

Me !

 

[The Masta]

Oh yes, the BZ games were pure awesome.

Exactly.

 

[SgtH3nry3]

And a host of downloads can be found here:
[URL]http://www.battlezoneclub.org/youngguns/downloads.html[/URL]
Basically you need the BZ Installer 1.4k, which is the full game.

That link is down.

Anyway, you could try to get enough attention to get the game republished at gog.com.
Vote here: http://www.gog.com/en/wanted/

 

[NoxNoctum]

Like I said it's available free at the website I posted.

I disagree with most people I thought BZII was a blast. The AI may have been a bit weaker, but other then that, the campaign was great, and I liked the dramatic "choice" you have to make midway through. (plus that Russian chick's voice is hot). A lot of people bashed how the vehicles looked too (the orange color) but personally I thought it was pretty cool, "industrial" feel. Plus just the model looked better than the original grizzly IMO. Regardless you can get mods that turn it to camo type green and such. If you haven't played RO SiC I highly recommend it. VERY challenging, particularly the Chinese campaign.

Ya if we get enough interested parties I'd love to get together a BZ1 strat game. Like you SiC to me FFA isn't anywhere NEAR as much fun.

And ya the thumper is limited in its uses, plus it uses a ton of ammo, but it sure as hell looks cool

EDIT: I edited my original link to take you directly to the download area, just DL the "1998 installer". It's a community made patched up version that includes RO and a lot of optional improvements.

 

[SgtH3nry3]

Like I said it's available free at the website I posted.

Whoops, missed it.

I disagree with most people I thought BZII was a blast. The AI may have been a bit weaker, but other then that, the campaign was great, and I liked the dramatic "choice" you have to make midway through. (plus that Russian chick's voice is hot). A lot of people bashed how the vehicles looked too (the orange color) but personally I thought it was pretty cool, "industrial" feel. Plus just the model looked better than the original grizzly IMO.

Same here. The original Battlezone was just a tad better, but I think BZ2 was a great game aswell.

 

[SiC-Disaster]

I agree that BZ2's campaign was good, i enjoyed it alot.
But in general there was too many other things that were pretty meh. Like i said, the AI which continually bumped into me, even friendlies, but the basebuilding played a big part too.
BZ1's bases are tactically a lot more diverse, and can offer a different challenge each time, which feeling is completely missing from BZ2.

I dont have much trouble with the new vehicles in BZ2 either, though i prefer the old BZ1 vehicles. I loved how the Grizzly looked tbh. Or the Russian scout vehicle, with it's wings.
I think what most people had trouble with in BZ2 is not so much how the vehicles looked, but some people i spoke to were pretty upset that there were tracked vehicles in BZ2 (like the assault tank), while they loved the hover-feel of BZ1's vehicles.
I still love flying around in BZ1, it feels just perfect

 

[NoxNoctum]

One thing I gotta say about BZ2 is that in strat mode I loved how you could have multiple people on the same team... afaik I know this isn't possible in BZ1 (i.e. one commander per team).

I distinctly remember playing a match years ago where it was like 10 humans (one of whom was commanding obviously) vs an entirely AI controlled base. Crazy intense.

Also... check this out... had no idea it was possible:

YouTube - Battlezone 2 hover tutorial

I'd love to fly in with a group of tanks above visiblity range and then ambush the enemy base from behind .

Also, the unit grouping was superior. That said in BZ1's campaign you never really needed more than 10 offensive units. (plus howitzers you could essentially use offensively)