The guy who gave a negative review to Battlezone 98 Redux after playing 8k hours

My god I love BZ98. For me, the remaster was frustrating. The most annoying thing was that certain things, like the combat AI, had been improved in ways that broke the balance of the single player campaign. I doubt players with the subject’s level of mastery would be bothered, but it significantly reduced my enjoyment.

It remains a rare gem, though. There are so few RTSs that place you in the world there isn’t even a name for the genre. The only others I can think of are Brutal Legend and Sacrifice. But BZ98 was the one that I discovered first.

I guess Giants: Citizen Kabuto is another.

are you me? I have the same complaints and memories...

Yes, loved that game! Would have loved it more if it was actually finished.

Ultrabots (1993) was another.

Command and Conquer:Renegade was a (somewhat)contemporary of bz98 and scratched that BZ itch.

I remember waiting the The Pitts renegade server to start at 5 PM. Great memories from that game, it's a shame Westwood was acquired right when it was released.

Some of the remakes are just career springboards for wannabe developers. Look how talented we are, we can do this, you must employ us! Others are just plain ignorant, thinking they can cut corners.

The thing that comes to mind is the awful System Shock remake that some middle finger showing snotty kid created. Ruining the atmosphere, by changing the music, the setting, the intro and outro and even the looks. I can understand when Ferrari sues bloody idiots because they mod their cars in an unacceptable way.

I played an astounding amount of Urban Assault. The only other games that ever scratched even a similar itch were Allegiance and EvE.

Wild too that Urban Assault and Allegiance were both pre-xbox Microsoft games.

Urban Assault is a wildly niche game. I tried it once and it was so impenetrable I couldn’t even figure out the first settings goal.

Rather obscure but there there's also Hostile Waters: Antaeus Rising which comes in second only to Battlezone 98 as my favorite in the first person RTS genre. Tom Baker voices the narration, which is a nice little bonus.

> The most annoying thing was that certain things, like the combat AI, had been improved in ways that broke the balance of the single player campaign.

That's interesting because I remember being able to do alright in the original BZ98 campaign, but I can't make it past the second mission in Redux. I figured I just am getting old and my skills aren't sharp any more, but maybe not.

> There are so few RTSs that place you in the world there isn’t even a name for the genre.

I've never played the game under discussion but could someone expand on this?

Why is the genre so rare/unnamed? What is meant by "place you in the world"?

Does Team Buddies count? :P

The genre is RTS+FPS and it's super hard to get the design right.

RTS players usually like being above the fray, FPS players like not having to think too much ahead.

Battlezon 98 did manage to deliver an amazing experience, but the AI was poor so competitive multiplayer is where it was at. Then obviously in the 1998 world of gaming there is only skill, and skilled players could wipe you off the map well before you have had the chance to learn anything and improve your skills...

I guess this experience can now only be found in some ARMA mods and other mil-sim type games, with well-organized private games, and this is not everyone's favorite universe, nothing sci-fi or fantasy themed that I know of.

>It remains a rare gem, though.

I still have dreams of battles I once, long ago, played in Tanarus.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tanarus_(video_game)

Instead of being a god in the sky, you sit in a hover craft on the ground.

Minecraft, Foundry etc would probably be the closest.

Arma. God I hate that game. You need tryhard larpers or that game is fundamentaly broken.

In the Battlezone analogy all but one player who is commander have the role of NPCs

> Ferrari sues bloody idiots because they mod their cars in an unacceptable way.

You mean when Deadmau5 put a wrap job on his?

Yes! I played that too! Love it, never managed to beat the huge frontal assault mission, though. IIRC Paul Darrow was a voice actor on it. Who I saw many years later playing Sam Vimes in Wimbledon Theatre.

I have had a similar idea for a game since I was a child ~20 years ago.

My vision was a mix between a FPS where where you have a squad with you that you can order around with say quick wheel actions. Then you could "zoom out" to the battlefield to give more RTS style commands.

One key thing was any of the members of your local squad could be multiplayer real people instead of NPCs and also others could fill out the squads you are commanding.

Then daydreams about a hierarchical command structure where the player in the game with the highest "rank" is the highest in command. His "tactical RTS" view is just controlling say a few platoons but nothing more specific than general orders. Then say each platoon would have a commander (highest rank again, etc) who would have to implement orders from above using both his FPS view or using his tactical RTS view which now let's him control squads. Then down the line a squad commander who can control members of his team and so on.

I think it would be a bit rigid and I know of games which check off a few boxes but I would love something like this.