Activision gained a few fans with the release of Pandemic Studio's Battlezone on the PC a couple of years ago, and so, naturally, it's time to release a sequel. Enter Battlezone II.
Andy Smith

Battlezone. That was an old arcade game, wasn't it?
Certainly was. A twin-joystic, vector graphics, tank battle simulation.

Is that what Activision's game was like?
No. Despite the name, Battlezone wasn't an updated version of the arcade game. It was more a 3D C&C game really.

Oh I see. Resource management and combat.
That kind of thing, but slightly different. You had the resource management thing in that you had to mine what they called Biometal in order to build new tanks and stuff, and you had to collect the scrap from destroyed units and recycle it, but there was a lot more to it.

Like what?
There was this great story running through the game. You started off as an American space commander battling against the Soviets across various planets. Then you both discover that everything is not what it seems and some aliens come into the equation.

Doesn't sound very original.
It may not be original but the story was extremely well worked and added a great deal to what was a good game anyway.

Talk more about it then.
Let's move on to Battlezone II, shall we? It takes the game a step further in that the 3D landscape can now be used tactically. The basic game's pretty much the same: build factories, make tanks and go kick butt. The aliens are back too, but things have been tweaked, new weapons and units have been added and the game's AI has been beefed up.