Game 11: Battlezone

I don't really feel qualified to talk about Battlezone. When you get down to it, I'm not really an arcade game kind of guy. I like Star Raiders, Astrosmash and Night Stalker on the Intellivision, but that's about it. Modern arcade games are straight out. About the only thing I like that's arcadey are fighting games, but are those arcadey anymore? That's a question for someone who isn't me. Battlezone is thought of as the progenitor of the FPS. I still feel like for something to be a true FPS you need some kind of level design and different weapons. That's just me being pedantic.

Ode to Joy starts up the menu in PC Speaker goodness. I feel like that's all the joy I'm going to be feeling. After a while the menu shows a demo that doesn't really do much. I check my keys so I don't end up having to press the Scroll Lock key to fire and start wishing I didn't do this. In fact there's not really much for me to talk about outside of the dedicated categories. I'm not very good at this, and quite frankly I don't really need to be. I'm trying to force in a classic arcade game into the category of FPS, even if it does technically qualify.

Why purple for the moon?

I saw this screen a lot.

Christmas came here this year.

Weapons:
You have a single cannon. It fires straight ahead and never runs out of ammo. 1/10

Enemies:
There are enemy tanks, which suffer similar problems as you do. Flying saucers, which fly. What I think is supposed to be a plane that runs straight toward you. Decent variety for an arcade game. There are also supertanks, which I don't know if I met or not. They probably killed me if I did. 2/10

Non-Enemies:
Nada. 0/10

Levels:
You play in the same zone forever. Sometimes cover appears. 0/10

Player Agency:
Originally, Battlezone on the arcade controlled via two joysticks. One for each tread. This, of course since tanks don't move like other vehicles. On DOS, you control the tank via the keyboard. Turning goes in on direction and doesn't stop until you press the other direction. These are extremely difficult to use and not something I'd like to see done ever again. You should not attempt to emulate proper tank movement with a single set of keys. 1/10

Interactivity:
Nada. 0/10

Atmosphere:
I don't really get anything from this. 0/10

Graphics:
Once again, I feel like the DOS gamer got shafted. The original had monochrome, this has CGA. Why the porters felt the need to make the most out of the CGA is beyond my 21st century sensibilities. 1/10

Story:
Aliens have invaded and you're a tank defending Earth. 0/10

Sound/Music:
This offers the best possible use of sound and music with this kind of sound system. A simple musical opening that doesn't hit the high notes, and simple sound effects for destruction. 2/10

That brings the total to 7. That shouldn't be taken as a mark against it, just as a sign you shouldn't play it just for the FPS cred.