Battleground Z
As I said in my review of Mii Force, I prefer the StreetPass games that are more passive, rather than those that are action-oriented and demand more focus. Because of that, Battleground Z was the game I dreaded trudging through the most. It was the final game in my lineup, so I had the incentive of getting a new set of Miis from the line and going back to Puzzle Swap as soon as I beat the next level, but I still had to work up the motivation to continue every time. It wasn't even a bad game, and I can see all the cool things they're doing, it just didn't fit with the way I like to consume my StreetPass-fueled media.
Battleground Z takes place in the middle of a zombie apocalypse, with you and the people you meet via StreetPass being some of the few survivors. Following the instructions of a genetic scientist who thinks she can cure the zombie virus, you have to battle through various locations to protect survivors and collect zombie DNA for testing. The stages have a lot of variety in themselves, asking you to reach a certain location, solve a puzzle, defeat a certain number of zombies, safely escort an important person, or defeat a boss, but they are each really just an excuse to have you beat up some zombies.
Like in Mii Force, your strength is determined by the Miis you bring along. When setting up StreetPass Mii Plaza for the first time, you're asked to select a hobby from a surprisingly long list of options. The weapon that a survivor brings into Battleground Z reflects the hobby they selected, and these weapons are a central feature of how the rest of the game functions. Most survivors you meet will be too scared to fight, but walking up to them in a level will prompt them to give you their weapon. However, anyone who also owns Battleground Z will give you the choice of taking their weapon or recruiting them to fight alongside you. I almost always chose to have them fight alongside me, but since your health is tied to your weapons, there were a few instances where it was critical for me to take the weapon so I could escape the risk of death.
Each weapon type has its own range and speed, and each individual weapon has an associated health bar and a limited number of charged attacks. I largely preferred to fight fast and close-range with options like the Wii remote, but some of the charged attacks on my lesser preferred weapons were incredible. I think it was the charged attack for the backpack that acted like a final smash from Smash Bros., transitioning to a cutscene where all of the nearby zombies filed into a tent before getting absolutely trounced. That kind of thing rarely happened, but it was always a treat when it did.
Even writing this review, everything I'm remembering seems entirely inoffensive. The gameplay may be a bit repetitive, and the story is rather cliché, but the weapons are cool and the levels are short enough to not be tiresome. The platform just wasn't right for me. I can see this being plenty of people's favorite StreetPass game, but I didn't enjoy how much I had to focus on it to play through the stages. Now that I've finished the game, I can comfortably respect what it did, but I am beyond relieved to get it out of my StreetPass plaza so I can spend more time caring for my flowers and getting colossally wealthy on the stock market.
Battleground Z takes place in the middle of a zombie apocalypse, with you and the people you meet via StreetPass being some of the few survivors. Following the instructions of a genetic scientist who thinks she can cure the zombie virus, you have to battle through various locations to protect survivors and collect zombie DNA for testing. The stages have a lot of variety in themselves, asking you to reach a certain location, solve a puzzle, defeat a certain number of zombies, safely escort an important person, or defeat a boss, but they are each really just an excuse to have you beat up some zombies.
Like in Mii Force, your strength is determined by the Miis you bring along. When setting up StreetPass Mii Plaza for the first time, you're asked to select a hobby from a surprisingly long list of options. The weapon that a survivor brings into Battleground Z reflects the hobby they selected, and these weapons are a central feature of how the rest of the game functions. Most survivors you meet will be too scared to fight, but walking up to them in a level will prompt them to give you their weapon. However, anyone who also owns Battleground Z will give you the choice of taking their weapon or recruiting them to fight alongside you. I almost always chose to have them fight alongside me, but since your health is tied to your weapons, there were a few instances where it was critical for me to take the weapon so I could escape the risk of death.
Each weapon type has its own range and speed, and each individual weapon has an associated health bar and a limited number of charged attacks. I largely preferred to fight fast and close-range with options like the Wii remote, but some of the charged attacks on my lesser preferred weapons were incredible. I think it was the charged attack for the backpack that acted like a final smash from Smash Bros., transitioning to a cutscene where all of the nearby zombies filed into a tent before getting absolutely trounced. That kind of thing rarely happened, but it was always a treat when it did.
Even writing this review, everything I'm remembering seems entirely inoffensive. The gameplay may be a bit repetitive, and the story is rather cliché, but the weapons are cool and the levels are short enough to not be tiresome. The platform just wasn't right for me. I can see this being plenty of people's favorite StreetPass game, but I didn't enjoy how much I had to focus on it to play through the stages. Now that I've finished the game, I can comfortably respect what it did, but I am beyond relieved to get it out of my StreetPass plaza so I can spend more time caring for my flowers and getting colossally wealthy on the stock market.
