ATARI ANNOUNCES BATTLEZONE FOR PSP

Quick action-based battles meets today’s consumer demands for engaging on-the-go gaming

Thursday 4th May 2006 – Atari, one of Australia’s leading sources of interactive entertainment, today announced the development of BattleZone for the PSP™ (PlayStation®Portable) system, a modern update to the 1980 classic arcade game. BattleZone immerses players in an interactive world with relentless onslaughts of quick, action-oriented battles. In development by Paradigm Entertainment, BattleZone for the PSP system will blast onto global terrain in November 2006.

Set in futuristic international military environments, BattleZone puts players in control of highly manoeuvrable hover tanks, challenging them in close combat scenarios against their rivals. BattleZone features fast and furious gameplay, photo-realistic environments, eight unique customisable team vehicles, an assortment of high-powered weapons and multiplayer battles. The four-player WiFi mode lets players go head to head, while unlockable weapons, vehicles and upgrades add even greater depth to the gameplay experience. In addition, extra game content will be available through the BattleZone web site, offering gamers news, leader boards and an exclusive online level builder tool that allows players to customise game maps. The extra content can then be downloaded to the players’ PSP system through a local PC-USB connection.

BattleZone provides players with six popular and well-known game modes, including Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, Team Deathmatch, Hotzone, Knockout, and Fox and Hound. For casual gamers, the single player mode offers an easy learning curve for pick-up and play gaming and a tournament progression to win upgrades and enhancements.

Designed to take advantage of the PSP system’s high quality display, BattleZone’s crisp environments depict military combat arenas from around the world. Specific sights include abandoned cities of Russia, jungles of China, desert canyons of the United States, Antarctica’s frozen tundra and the Canary Islands. Players can fight their way through the compelling open play of ten worlds in BattleZone, two of which can be customised online and transferred to their PSP system.

Capitalising on all the PSP system offers with quick action control, close combat gameplay, familiar game modes and WiFi capabilities, BattleZone will yet again redefine vehicle combat action for the next generation of today’s portable gamers.

Battlezone is scheduled for release on PSP in November 2006.