Nerf Arena Blast

Last updated
Nerf Arena Blast
US NAB FRONT.jpg
Version of the front box cover, with a player firing a Nerf "Wildfire".
Developer(s) Visionary Media, Inc.
Mondo Media (cutscenes and artwork)
Publisher(s) Hasbro Interactive
Designer(s) David Walls [1]
Engine Unreal Engine
Platform(s) Microsoft Windows
Release
Genre(s) First-person shooter
Mode(s) Single-player, multiplayer

Nerf Arena Blast (known as Nerf Arena in Europe) is a first-person shooter developed by Visionary Media, Inc. and published by Hasbro Interactive, released under their Atari Interactive label. The game, based on Nerf, was touted as a "family-friendly version of multiplayer combat games like Quake III: Arena and Unreal Tournament ", [4] and was supported by Hasbro Interactive until that company gave its rights and properties over to Infogrames. The cutscenes were animated by Mondo Media alongside them doing the in-game art.

Contents

Gameplay

Single-player

The player starts on a team called the "Twisters", an amateur team competing for the "Nerf Champion of the World" title against 6 professional teams. The player must compete in each team's 3 arenas, totaling 21 playable maps (including the amateur and championship maps), plus a handful of "Bonus Round" maps. In order to compete against the next team the user has to place in the top three in each event (PointBlast, SpeedBlast, and BallBlast). [5]

Game types

  • PointBlast: PointBlast is based on the Unreal Deathmatch game type; instead of gaining kills, or Frags, the player gains points by either hitting an opponent, knocking or tagging an opponent out, hitting targets in the arenas, or by picking up "Bonus Points" tokens left by "tagged out" players.
  • SpeedBlast: SpeedBlast is a race between players where both have to pass through seven colored flags in sequence. Players are allowed to tag each other out of the race using their Nerf guns, with the tagged players returning to the last flag they touched.
  • BallBlast: BallBlast is a Scavenger-hunt game type, where players fight for colored balls, in order to shoot them into targets. Doing this gives the players a certain number of points, depending on which ball they shoot in. Once a player gets the first six balls into the target, a seventh ball (called the "gold ball") is added to the game. The game is ended by any player shooting all balls including the golden ball into the target. The winner of the match is whoever has the most points when the game ends, rather than who shoots the gold ball into the target.

Multiplayer

Due to the similarities between Unreal Tournament and Nerf Arena Blast, it is possible to play Pointblast in team mode, because Pointblast is essentially a Deathmatch game type in most aspects, except for the scoring system. Other than that, the game types in single player mode apply to multiplayer mode. The community has released a Capture the Flag mod, [6] which has given rise to a large number of new maps for NAB.

Expandability

Nerf Arena Blast used Unreal Engine and therefore supports user-made maps and add-ons to the game, but due to some parts of the engine being altered, the ability to create add-ons like in Unreal Tournament is somewhat limited. However, hundreds of maps and modifications of Unreal maps have been published, and multiple modified weapons and game modes (such as Capture the Flag) have been created.

Reception

See also

Related Research Articles

Deathmatch, also known as free-for-all, is a gameplay mode integrated into many shooter games, including first-person shooter (FPS), and real-time strategy (RTS) video games, where the goal is to kill the other players' characters as many times as possible. The deathmatch may end on a frag limit or a time limit, and the winner is the player that accumulated the greatest number of frags.

Urban Terror is a freeware multiplayer first-person shooter video game developed by FrozenSand. Originally a total conversion of id Software's Quake III Arena, FrozenSand released Urban Terror as a free standalone game in 2007 utilizing ioquake3 as the game engine. While the game engine is licensed under the open-source GPL, Urban Terror's game code is closed source and its assets are freeware but not open content.

<i>Unreal Tournament</i> 1999 first-person shooter video game

Unreal Tournament is a first-person arena shooter video game developed by Epic Games and Digital Extremes. The second installment in the Unreal series, it was first published by GT Interactive in 1999 for Windows, and later released on the PlayStation 2 and Dreamcast by Infogrames in 2000 and 2001, respectively. Players compete in a series of matches of various types, with the general aim of out-killing opponents. The PC and Dreamcast versions support multiplayer online or over a local area network. Free expansion packs were released, some of which were bundled with a 2000 re-release: Unreal Tournament: Game of the Year Edition.

<i>Unreal Tournament 2003</i> 2002 video game

Unreal Tournament 2003 is a first-person arena shooter video game developed by Epic Games and Digital Extremes, and published by Infogrames under the Atari brand name. The game is part of the Unreal franchise, and is a sequel to 1999's Unreal Tournament. Like its predecessor, the game is designed mainly for multiplayer gaming.

<i>Unreal Tournament 2004</i> 2004 first-person shooter video game

Unreal Tournament 2004 is a first-person arena shooter video game developed by Epic Games and Digital Extremes. Part of the Unreal franchise, it is the third game in the Unreal Tournament series and the updated version of Unreal Tournament 2003.

<i>Starsiege: Tribes</i> 1998 video game

Starsiege: Tribes is a first-person shooter video game. It is the first of the Tribes video game series and follows the story from Metaltech: Earthsiege and Starsiege. It was developed by Dynamix and published by Sierra On-Line in 1998. An expansion pack, Tribes Extreme, was cancelled; it was supposed to add single-player missions, multiplayer maps, and bot AI.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nerf</span> American toy brand

Nerf is a toy brand formed by Parker Brothers and currently owned by Hasbro. Most of the toys are a variety of foam-based weaponry, with other Nerf products including balls for sports such as American football, basketball, and baseball. Their best known toys are their dart guns that shoot ammunition made from "Nerf foam". Their primary slogan, introduced in the 1990s, is "It's Nerf or Nothin'!". Annual revenues under the Nerf brand are approximately US$400 million.

<i>Tactical Ops: Assault on Terror</i> 2002 video game

Tactical Ops: Assault on Terror is a first-person shooter video game developed in 2002 by Kamehan Studios and published by Infogrames as a MicroProse title. The game is a standalone retail version of a multiplayer modification of the same name published by Kamehan Studios in 1999 for the game Unreal Tournament. The game features match-based missions in which two teams, themed as Special Forces and terrorists, battle to complete mission objectives and kill their opponents. Upon release, Tactical Ops received mixed to average reviews, with critics faulting the game's similarities to the non-commercial version and lack of defining features compared to other multiplayer first-person shooters.

<i>Unreal Championship</i> 2002 video game

Unreal Championship is a first-person arena shooter video game developed by Digital Extremes and Epic Games, published by Infogrames, and released for the Xbox. Part of the Unreal franchise, Unreal Championship is the console version of Unreal Tournament 2003, and was developed to take advantage of Xbox Live. The game is notable for being the first ever console game to receive a downloadable patch. In 2003 Unreal Championship was added to the Xbox "Platinum Hits" line.

<i>Unreal Championship 2: The Liandri Conflict</i> 2005 video game

Unreal Championship 2: The Liandri Conflict is a first- and third-person arena shooter video game developed by Epic Games and published by Midway Games. It was released in April 2005 for Xbox. The game is part of the Unreal franchise, and is a direct sequel to 2002's Unreal Championship. Unreal Championship 2 was designed from the ground up to take full advantage of the Xbox Live gaming service.

<i>Unreal Tournament 3</i> 2007 first-person shooter video game

Unreal Tournament 3 (UT3) is a first-person arena shooter video game developed by Epic Games and published by Midway Games. Part of the Unreal franchise, it is the fourth game in the Unreal Tournament series, and the eighth and final game overall; its name is in reflection of the game being the first in the franchise to use Unreal Engine 3. It was released on November 19, 2007, for Microsoft Windows, December 10 for the PlayStation 3, and on July 3, 2008, for the Xbox 360. OS X and Linux ports were planned, but they were eventually cancelled. A free-to-play version, entitled Unreal Tournament 3 X, was leaked in late 2022 and cancelled in 2023.

<i>Mobile Forces</i> 2002 video game

Mobile Forces is a first-person shooter video game developed by Rage Software using the Unreal Engine and published by Majesco Entertainment. The core team of Rage Games who developed Mobile Forces went on to become Realtime Worlds.

<i>Nerf N-Strike Elite</i> 2009 video game

Nerf N-Strike Elite is a 2009 on-rails shoot 'em up for Nintendo Wii and sequel to the 2008 Nerf N-Strike. Like its predecessor, the game is bundled with one N-Strike Switch Shot EX-3. New to this game, however, is the "Red Reveal" decoder lens which is attached to the Switch Shot and, when the player looks through it, will display hidden game elements such as the weak points in enemy armor and reveals secret codes for accessing other content. This game is also compatible with the Wii Zapper.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nerf Blaster</span> Toy gun firing Nerf darts

A Nerf Blaster is a toy gun made by Hasbro that fires foam darts, arrows, discs, or foam balls. “Nerf blaster” or more commonly “Nerf gun” are often used to describe the toy. Nerf blasters are manufactured in multiple forms; the first Nerf blasters emerged in the late 1980s with the release of the Nerf Blast-a-Ball (1989) and the Sharpshooter (1992). Today, Hasbro has produced over twenty unique lines of Nerf-brand blasters, with each line centered on a particular theme or type of ammunition. Hasbro has also produced Nerf blasters based on specific franchises, including Marvel Comics, Star Wars, G.I. Joe, Fortnite, Transformers, Overwatch, Halo Infinite, and Roblox. Nerf blasters are available in several international marketplaces, although some blasters have their names changed or are not sold in certain countries due to laws surrounding toy safety franchises.

Unreal Tournament was a first-person arena shooter video game developed by Epic Games. It is the ninth game in the Unreal franchise, the fifth game in the Unreal Tournament series, and the first entry to be released since 2007's Unreal Tournament 3. The game utilizes Epic's Unreal Engine 4 and was released for free on Microsoft Windows, OS X, and Linux. The game was released as an alpha in 2014, but was never completed due to Epic Games' focus on Fortnite Battle Royale.

<i>TagPro</i>

TagPro is a free-to-play online multiplayer capture the flag video game originally designed and programmed by Nick Riggs. The first version was released in February 2013, after Riggs began experimenting with software platform Node.js. The game is named after one of its three obtainable power-ups. It follows the basic rules of capture the flag, along with some modifications, including power-ups, spikes, and other map elements.

<i>Hardware: Rivals</i> 2016 video game

Hardware: Rivals was an online multiplayer vehicular combat game developed by SCE Connected Content Group and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 4. It was the successor to the 2002 PlayStation 2 game, Hardware: Online Arena.

<i>RIGS: Mechanized Combat League</i> 2016 British video game

RIGS: Mechanized Combat League is a 2016 first-person shooter sports video game developed by Guerrilla Cambridge and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment for the PlayStation 4 console and its virtual reality add-on PlayStation VR.

<i>Rocket Arena</i> 2020 video game

Rocket Arena is a third-person shooter online video game developed by Final Strike Games and published by Electronic Arts. It was released for Windows, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on July 14, 2020. The game received mixed to positive reviews, with praise for the gameplay, characters and visuals, while the lack of content received criticism. It was delisted from digital storefronts without prior warning on November 18, 2023.

An arena shooter is a subgenre of shooter games and multiplayer games that cover both the first-person shooter and third-person shooter genres. These games emphasize fast-paced movement in enclosed map designs that foster engagement between players.

References

  1. ↑ Butts, Stephen (September 30, 1999). "Nerf Arena Blast Interview". IGN. Archived from the original on February 23, 2002.
  2. ↑ I. G. N. Staff (1999-10-01). "Nerf Arena Blast Interview". IGN. Retrieved 2023-05-16.
  3. ↑ "UK release dates list updated". Eurogamer.net. 2000-03-10. Retrieved 2023-04-20.
  4. ↑ "Gamespot Review of Nerf Arena Blast".
  5. ↑ Hasbro Interactive and Visionary Media (1999). Manual.
  6. ↑ ""Home"". Planet Nerf Arena. Retrieved 31 October 2016.
  7. ↑ Soropos, George (January 22, 2000). "Nerf said". Smh.com.au . Archived from the original on August 15, 2000. Retrieved March 27, 2022.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.