Unfortunately, as with so many games that get a little too popular, the games stagnated for awhile. Almost every game Activision released after Mechwarrior 2 followed its formula rather rigidly. Even Interstate 76 - despite it's groovy 70's revival - was really little more than Mechwarrior 2 on wheels. Also disturbing was the revelation that the graphics engine being used was falling far behind the times. It was time for something new.

Enter Battlezone. With the introduction of a single new game, Activision sends us a clear reminder that when it comes to fictional vehicle combat games, they're the ones to beat. Battlezone is one of those rare games that takes the best parts of their previous Mechwarrior-style games and puts it all together into a truly functional whole. Fortunately, it doesn't even stop there.

While Interstate '76 may have cashed in on the funkiness of the 70's in an alternate history, BattleZone uses the ambience of NASA's lunar missions as a backdrop for the alternate reality storyline they use. The premise is that in the early 50's, an alien metal of incredible technological potential is found, and the "space race" is merely a guise to cover the secret hot side to the Cold War. Your goal is to gain control of the deposits of this bio-metal across the solar system, but primarily to unlock the secrets of the technology behind it.

Toward that end, America fights an entire secret war against the Soviet Union over the metal and the clues to it's technology. While the "big picture" has little to do with the missions at first, it creates a foundation for understanding why we're fighting the Soviets (here known as the CCA) across space and become progressively more important as one gets further into the game.

So what exactly is Battlezone? The short version is that it's a blend of "Mechwarrior" and "Command and Conquer". Mechwarrior fans will recognize much of the interface, both in the key commands and in the linear mission-based gameplay.

On the other hand, the game offers a surprisingly streamlined interface that allows you to order other units for construction, resource gathering, defense, combat and so on. Essentially it's like playing a real-time strategy game from inside one of your units. Ever wonder what leading your own tank rush would feel like? Now you can find out just that and more.

Starting with a "Recycler" unit as your centerpiece, you can build a complete base with structures that serve all manner of functions from maintenance to construction, defense to production. Choosing where you want to build is very simple. A colored square representing the required area to build your structure will be projected onto the terrain wherever your crosshairs are, letting you know if that location has suitable terrain or whether or not it is sufficiently close to a power source to function.

Each combat vehicle in the game comes with a set of hardpoints dedicated to different kinds of equipment, and new weapons or supplies can be "catapulted" to your location even if it's in a forward assembly area far from your base. You can even catapult Nav Beacons to strategic locations to act as waypoint markers so you can send units to far off places without having to be there yourself. The design team has really done a remarkable job of finding ways to give you control over your forces even while you're piloting a vehicle or simply running around in your spacesuit.

What's more interesting is that unlike most other vehicle combat games, you can hop or eject out of your vehicle and run around in an armored space suit. Outside, you can scout from difficult terrain, change vehicles, attack light units, or even play sniper. If you should choose to act as sniper, your character will hold the rifle up to the screen, where you can peer through the thermal scope and spot the heat signatures of enemy pilots in their vehicles.

In this infantry mode you have three shots. If you can kill the enemy pilot in the first shot, his vehicle will automatically power down, and you can freely commandeer it for your own side. Should your first shot miss, you will immediately attract the hostile attention of that unit. You had better score with the next shots or pray you can get into another vehicle before one of his shots hits you, because almost anything fired at you can kill you in one hit. This part of the game is reminiscent of 7th Level's G-Nome, but it's much more balanced and refined. The missions are divided among two campaigns and a short series of training missions. The training missions do a pretty good job of getting players gradually up to speed. Likewise, the American campaign starts out fairly simple and gradually ramps up the level of challenge. The Soviet campaign is designed for advanced players who have probably already finished the American campaign.

The missions themselves are a little odd. Sometimes the missions appear to be the RTS-style "gather resources, build up your base, and raid the enemy base" but most of the time the missions are more Mechwarrior-style, where you have to accomplish certain goals that may have little to do with destroying the enemy base. In some missions, you're also under a time constraint, but it isn't always obvious whether you're being timed or not. At least it is very easy to call up a summary of your mission objectives without interrupting gameplay.

Unfortunately, the campaign of canned missions offers little replayability, especially for sim fans who are accustomed to dynamic campaigns or at least the availability of mission editors. This is really surprising when you consider that even Heavy Gear had at least a primitive attempt at creating a dynamic campaign - it would have been a real plus to see more effort in that direction. As it is, the player's only real outlet for playing different missions after finishing the existing campaigns would be to participate in the multiplayer games.

I've mentioned the feel of the game before, but it really deserves further mention here because it's done so well. The maneuvering model feels very realistic. Naturally, we can't compare how realistic the driving model of a hovertank is against its real world counterpart, but it still follows a set of properties which we understand instinctively because they act on us every day.

For example, inertia modeled in 6 degrees of motion helps create the feeling of a large flying mass. The antigravity effect feels a lot like the repulsion effect when you try to push two magnets of the same polarity together, making it difficult but possible to scrape the bottom of your hull. Likewise, it's very difficult to provide enough lift to jump much higher than the nominal hovering height unless you go ballistic.

The graphics engine is built for Direct3D support and software rendering, and is considerably more efficient than Activision's previous attempts at graphics engines for their games. Out of the box, the accelerated graphics are very good, with many options to adjust graphics for taste and frame rate, but it falls short of being spectacular, with limited visible distance, texture detail, and resolution.

However, there is an enhanced graphics patch that fixes some AI foibles and helps address all these issues (which should be available by the time you read this). By editing the render.cfg file, players can alter the viewable distance, go to higher resolutions, and activate access to large textures (meant for Voodoo2 or AGP 3d card owners) that improve the graphics with spectacular explosions, dust roostertails from the hover-vehicles, and a more sophisticated look overall.

Overall, Battlezone is a truly remarkable game that has a wide potential to appeal to nearly every type of gamer. Action gamers, real-time strategy buffs, Mechwarrior fans, and yes, even simulation fans should find Battlezone to be an entertaining alternative to their normal gaming diet. The lack of a dynamic campaign or even so much as a mission editor is certainly a letdown for simulation fans, but for those who are not swayed by that, Battlezone remains a tremendously entertaining game that truly validates the concept of mixing strategy and first-person action.

RATINGS

• Core Rating: 40
• Gameplay: 90
• Graphics: 80
• Sound: 70
• Intelligence/AI: 70
• Interface: 95
• Fun Factor: 90
• Learning Curve: 2 hours
• Overall: 85