Planet Battlezone .com is gone!

[TheJamsh]

Sucks big time, lots of handy links and sites hosted by it.

Anyone have a backup?

[VSMIT]

Nope.  Thankfully the forum is still there, so I can direct people here.

If they can even find the forum anymore...

[S.cavA.rmyG.en]

Sucks big time, lots of handy links and sites hosted by it.

what happend to it?
where did it go?
did it get moved to a new location?
can I get directions VSMIT?

[technoid]

Yeah, I noticed PBZ was gone last night too, but I wasn't really sure if it was gone last night or weeks before.  I'm sure it had something to do with Pandemic Studios closing.   

PBZ was the first BZII site I came upon 9 years ago, before I noticed more people were hanging out at Pandi forum.  At least we can thank Adrian Wong for keeping up PBZ during its heyday, as BZUniverse is a direct descendant (or "clone", more or less) of PlanetBattlezone, through the work of Menacer (and subsequently Wz). 

[Zero Angel]

Ah yes, I remember PBZ! It was original bz2 tutorial site, and it used to be the biggest bz2 forums around back in 2001, then menacer (the guy in charge of PBZ) got laid off from gamespy (the company which sponsored PBZ) or something like that, and BZU was created in its ashes. I liked menacer, he was a real bz2 fan and good guy.

[VSMIT]

what happend to it?
where did it go?
did it get moved to a new location?
can I get directions VSMIT?

It was removed.
It was removed, it didn't go anywhere.
It was removed, so the new location is a bin somewhere.
No.

[CivBase]

Well that sucks...

At least most of the info from there was in the electronic manual anyways.  On the bright side, maybe this means that EA will eventually let go of the Battlezone franchise.  After all, with Pandemic going bye bye, what could they earn from it?  They probably loose more money off the thing than they get from it at this point.

I know it's a long shot... but a guy can dream 

[AHadley]

Then the copyright falls back onto Activision (who don't want it) and Atari (who will have it if it comes their way)

[CivBase]

Think Atari could/would make a decent BZ game?

It wouldn't be as outsanding as most hot games today, but Atari seems to love running a ton of little projects all at the same time.

[technoid]

Think Atari could/would make a decent BZ game?

They already did and it became famous.  It's called 'Battlezone', made around 1979.     
There'd be no Pandi BZ1 or BZ2 without the Atari BZ inspiration, even if it was to be titled something else.  It was so good, it even inspired the U.S. Army to contract Atari to make a version for them for military tank training, as some people here already know.  Remember, it was state of the art back then also. 

[CivBase]

lol, BZ1 pwns the arcade BZ.

Still, Atari would own the franchise.  Why not run with it?  It's a well-written story and a great game concept (though the current game needs some major improvement).

[technoid]

lol, BZ1 pwns the arcade BZ.

Well of course it "pwns", if you mean technologically.  Software game programming has come a long way in ~20 years (1979-1998).  But it will be the same in ~20 years (from 1998), when someone decides to make a sequel (or reimagined) version of Acti BZI, in which case BZI will be "pwned" itself.  But yeah, there are so many sci-fi military genre computer games out there, it would be difficult to say if the new Atari would be able to recreate a Battlezone along the lines of Acti/Pandi.  What could be the next new thing for BZ1/BZ2 series?  Hmm, probably something in MMPORG with VR would be nice, i.e. full immersion.

[technoid]

Speaking of PBZ (back to topic, heh)...

http://planethalflife.gamespy.com/fullstory.php?id=88108

From the list of names mentioned in the article, you might spot "Ghostfire", which is Adrian Wong, who I mentioned earlier, PBZ's site director, right before Menacer took over.  You might have spotted both of them in the FE credits as well. 

[AHadley]

Chronological order of the BZ games we know and love:

Battlezone (Atari - 1979)
Battlezone (Activision - 1998)
The Red Odyssey (Team Evolve - 1998)
Battlezone 2 (Activision & Pandemic - 1999)
Battlezone (Atari - 2006?)

[Nielk1]

Chronological order of the BZ games we know and love:

Battlezone (Atari - 1979)
Battlezone (Activision - 1998)
The Red Odyssey (Team Evolve - 1998)
Battlezone 2 (Activision & Pandemic - 1999)
Battlezone (Atari - 2006?)

Forgot ROTBD.