Arcade version
Battlezone is an arcade game from 1980. The game was first published as an arcade cabinet. The player looks through a periscope and controls the tank from a first-person perspective. The object of play is to destroy all opposing vehicles. Battlezone is one of the first commercial 3D shooters and was presented in vector graphics. The porting to the Atari 2600 had to be assimilated for technical reasons. The arcade version could later be found on the Arcades Greatest Hits - The Atari Collection 1 (for Super Nintendo and Playstation).

Arcade version	Atari 2600 version

The remake
The remake of Battlezone was developed by Activision and it's a real-time strategy game. You still control your tank from a first-person perspective, but additionally you have to build up, manage and defend your base. As in other real-time strategy games you have to collect natural resources, train your soldiers and send them into the fight. Moreover you must make sure that there are always enough supplies for ammunition and reinstatement work at the front. Every unit has limited ammunition and hit points like in every other first-person shooter.

Valuations
Although Battlezone received very good valuations it commercially flopped. Activision developed a sequel of Battlezone which flopped too. The opinions on the N64 version differed a lot, a part of the press rated it as bad, some others as average and others again as good. Some points of criticism of the N64 version were the awful sound, the disappointing multiplayer mode and the additional single player modes (see below) which were exclusively developed for the console.

Story
In the '50s, during the cold war, some meteors are going down over the Bering Strait. They contain a so far unknown metal which is called "Bio metal". The Soviets and the Americans could invent futuristic weapons due to the new material. For the Bio metal was soon used up on Earth the opponents searched on Earth's moon and there they encountered each other. While there's the cold war on Earth, there's a struggle of supremacy on the moon.

Comparison
Compared is the uncensored PC version (with Patch 1.4) with the N64 version ESRB Everyone 6+ .

Altered title

For the N64 version is more extensive than the original PC version, the title was adapted.

PC version	N64 version

Altered menus

As previously mentioned the N64 version contains more single player modes. The explanation for the particular mode can be found under the pictures.

PC version	N64 version
There's no mode selection
	(Symbols from left to right)
	Arcade: identical in content to the Atari original
	Pilot: the missions but without tactic and strategy
	Commander: the PC realization
	Training: as the name already says.

Blood/Splatter

If you kill a pilot in the PC version parts of his body fly through the air. In the N64 version they abandoned the violence, just a mini explosion is shown.

PC version	N64 version

The Black Dogs

In the PC version you fight as a Soviet against the Black Dogs. In the N64 version was included a complete Black Dog campaign. But the units look pretty equal to the Americans and they just got a dog symbol. The campaign contains 10 missions which differ in the difficulty level.

N64 version

Further information :

Actually there should have been a PAL version. But as far as we know it was just send to specialist press and was never available commercially. The PAL version was multilingual and it was tainted with slowdowns according to statements of a test report by Big.N.