In addition to the VR Battlezone reboot Rebellion announced last summer, Battlezone 98 Redux, a remake of the 1998 version of Battlezone that was developed by Activision (which as Wikipedia explains “bears little resemblance to the original"), is in the works.
Both Game Rankings and MobyGames indicate that it received a very positive critical response, including a 93 percent review score from yours truly (in the magazine, of course, as this was 18 years ago). While the original game's fiction, as far as I can remember, didn't get much beyond “tanks in space,” Battlezone 98 Redux is set in an alt-history 1960s, in which the space race has led to a shooting war between the US and the USSR over mysterious alien bio-metals.
Battlezone 98 Redux will blend first-person combat with real-time strategy, featuring “remastered visuals, online multiplayer, and near unlimited mod content from Steam Workshop.” There will be two separate single-player campaigns, one American and one Soviet, comprised of 29 missions spread across seven different planetary environments, as well as Deathmatch and Strategy online modes for two to eight players.
The system requirements:
The Little Willie:
- OS: Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8 or Windows 10
- Processor: Dual-core CPU with SSE3 (Intel® Pentium® D 3GHz / AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 4200) or better
- Memory: 2 GB RAM
- Graphics: Microsoft® DirectX® 10.0 compatible graphics card with 256 MB of memory (NVIDIA® GeForce® 8800 series / ATI Radeon™ HD 2600 Pro) or better
- Storage: 2 GB available space
- Sound Card: Microsoft® DirectX® 10.0 compatible sound card or better
The Challenger 2:
- OS: Windows 7, Windows 8 or Windows 10
- Processor: Intel® Core™ i5 / AMD FX series or better
- Memory: 6 GB RAM
- Graphics: Microsoft® DirectX® 11.0 compatible graphics card with 1GB of memory (NVIDIA® GeForce® 400 series / ATI Radeon™ HD 7750) or better
- Storage: 2 GB available space
- Sound Card: Microsoft® DirectX® 10.0 compatible sound card or better
Battlezone 98 Redux is slated for launch in the spring. You can find out more at battlezone98.com.
Edit: This article originally conflated Rebellion's VR Battlezone with Battlezone 98 Redux. They are, in fact, two different games.
