Here's a short review of Zero Divide by Zoom for the Sony Playstation...

Packaging: comes in one of those awful big PSX jewel cases (ala MotorToon
GP, Kileak, etc). Boy I hate these things, no place to put the insert and
bulky.

Options: there's an overwhelming array of choosable options, most are your
basic elements, they include computer AI, rounds per match, time limit,
variety of dramatic camera angles/actions, handicapping, various sound
off/on's, the ability to save matches for future viewing (or gloating), and
the ability to fully customize your controller's buttons individually (no
preset combos).

Selectable Characters: you have a choice of 9 different mechs you can
choose, each robot has it's pros/cons in speed, moves, damage/armor etc....
you get the idea. They are, for the most part, lightly texture mapped and
mostly gouraud shaded depending on the mech you choose. Each character has
a combination of 8 different costumes which not only vary in color and
textures, but some with different geometry as well. This is accessible by
pressing select + (any other action button) over your selected robot. Most
are humanoid based, some with guns, one shaped like a scorpion, another
like a dragon.

Stages: these are very elaborate, the actual ring is fairly big (roughly
2.5x the size of say a VF ring) and are like pedestals in a large room.
Most stages feature texture-mapped walls and windows which reveal a
scrolling environment outside, some are outside, while others in strange
locals....  All of them featuring little things in the background such as
waving flags, torches, dinosaurs/birds, to fog affects.

Sound: I find the music pretty cheesy representations of
disco/rock/pop/techno as they try to emulate at some point all of these
types in various stages. There are some good tracks and again music overall
is better than most games. Sound FX is mainly your punch/kick/explosion
sounds, nothing fancy and the robots don't have any taunting remarks at the
end of the rounds other than a boss or sub-boss giving a little speech
before a round.

Gameplay: From a brief period of play, this game rocks. Each character has
a vast array of moves, and a light combo system. There's also a short blue
bar located under your life bar which I've yet to discover it's use. It
might indicate how hard your mech has been hit or as a special attack bar
of some sort as it only decreases when you've been hit. As for the high
ring, this adds another element to gameplay where your character can
actually hang-on to the edge, recover, and re-enter the fight. However if
your character is hit so hard as to fly over the edge, you won't have this
option, the camera will pan on your mech's helpless squirming body as it
plummets to the bottom, ultimately desintigrating. There is no replay of
the fight at the end of the round other than when you save and replay it.
You must fight the other 8 robots on a multi-tier system before reaching
the big boss. I've only defeated the game on "Normal" in which I only met
the sub-boss and was advised by the ending to try "Hard". Again, LOTS of
basic and special attacks that are unique with very impressive AI with
Normal being a challenge.

Pros/New items: Multiple pounce attacks, if for some reason you hit someone
so hard, or their' playing possum (ala Tekken), you can take the
opportunity to hit them multiple times, shoot them, etc. Damage system, you
now have a damage system located the the edge of your lifebar. This
includes a basic silhouette of your mech and when damage occurs on any part
of your mech, the little image will reflect this in multiple color stages
according to the damage in that area (i.e. blue, green, yellow, orange,
red). I assume that once damaged in a certain area, another hit in the same
area will cause more damage than in a less damaged area. Another nice thing
to note is that your mech will  reflect the damage by missing body armor
and your skeleton become transparent and with electrical sparks in those
areas. As the match progress, and depending on the stage, your environment
(day/night) might change adds a nice graphical touch since some stages will
alter to a dramatic light sourcing (ala Sarah's stage in VF). As for the
size of the characters, of course it's all relative to the camera position,
but on a tight shot, both mechs will take up approximately 75% of the
screen without slowdown! Framerate is at a healthy 30fps in my eyes, not
quite as fluid as Tekken, but speedy just the same. Also of note are little
touches in the game like moving body parts on a mech (which in some cases,
are part of a special move), and little things like the bullet casings
falling and bouncing on the floor. When you pause, the camera automatically
rotates around your paused fight... no screen burn in here.

Cons: an annoying announcer's voice throughout the game, which although you
can turn off during the actual game, is still present in the beginning and
end of the rounds. Cheesy music... from your basic bad techno to almost
disco cliche and bad rock... not that good, better than most tho with some
good tracks on certain stages. Background elements like the sky, buildings,
trees are low-res 2d maps and look quite pixelated... but this is only
nitpicky. The main problem is the animation... all the character movements
were hand-animated and not motion captured ala VF... at some points the
animation is so rough looking (combination of 30fps, unfluid motion,
gameplay) it's hard to tell what's actually happening... although this is
one of the drawbacks, it's not a huge one. Annoying options include not
being able to change the characters and access the options from 1-player
mode.

That should do it... my verdict? If you find this one out there at a
reasonable price, pick it up, you won't be dissapointed if you like 3D
fighters. I got mine from CyberGames (vreppa@crl.com).

Cheers all,
     -loki@linex.com

......................................................................
marc n. chu (loki@linex.com)   ^_^    kerner optical, marin county, ca