You Can’t Avoid The Inevitable.

Each drone has a virtual co-pilot that the user can be customized. In Armada, it is called TAC, Tactical Avionics Computer. It manages navigation, weapons, communications, etc.

Each Interceptor (the ship that Zach flies) has thrusters, weapons, and shields. To make it realistic, they include power cells, which are efficient batteries. They can recharge at a very slow rate by themselves. The battery decreases when shields are hit, everything you move, and each time you fire a weapon. This requires the user to use power sparingly.

All the drones are equipped with a self-destruct mechanism that kills everything around it. It takes seven seconds to activate though.

When a drone is down the player has to wait to control another drone from the hangar. It also includes a launch queue which can take a while depending on the damage.

Zach listens to his father’s old mix called Raid the Arcade. Since the bad guys are computer-generated they follow a pattern. The music in the mix is rock, so it also follows a pattern. Music is key for Zach to win.

As the battle progress, the Icebreaker laser barely ran for a minute, and over half of the drones are destroyed. Zach tried to distract them by doing crazy maneuvers. The mothership, Doolittle, was shortly destroyed. Zach and the Icebreaker exploded and the mission failed.

Zach tries on one of his dad’s old leather jackets. It was covered in patches from the Activision high-score-awards. Apparently, it didn’t fit before, and now it does. Shortly thereafter, he decided to go to bed. So far, the entire story has been just one day. Zach still vowed to stop playing Armada for at least two weeks.