Aquazone Aquarium Simulator (2/AX)

Aquazone Aquarium Simulator (2/AX)

This website was last updated on: March 02, 2008 by Daniel Wright

This site is all about the 3D Aquazone game, originally known in as Aquazone 2 Real Aquarium Simulator and later updated and released by Frontier Groove as Aquazone AX Life Simulator -- these are often shortened to Aquazone 2 (or AZ2) for the original Cinomix version and Aquazone AX (or AZAX) for the later Frontier Groove version...

Aquazone 2/AX is (in a way) an update to the original Aquazone games produced by 9003inc and OpenBook9003inc for the English and Japanese markets respectively... Many people incorrectly refer to Aquazone Deluxe 2 (with Guppies) as Aquazone 2, this is however wrong. Aquazone, Aquazone Deluxe & Aquazone Deluxe 2 are all the same program the different versions generally only refer to the items available with that version.

The program files did receive many incremental updates both via the website and on the different CD's made available, the original Aquazone started at version 1.0x, AZ Deluxe started at version 1.5x, and AZ Deluxe 2 starter at version 1.7x... the later Japanese only Aquazone XP started at version 1.8x and is still in production but only in Japanese...

After the sale of Aquazone by OpenBook9003inc to Cinomix, Cinomix released Aquazone 2, a 3D update (allegedly) to the original 2D game, however AZ2 was not anywhere near as popular as the original game, due in part to the slow speed of rendering the tanks, the reduced breeding options and (for non Japanese gamers) the Japanese only limitation. Cinomix didn't do too well with the Aquazone franchise and later passed it on to Frontier Groove, Frontier Groove re-packaged and re-released Aquazone XP as Aquazone Classic which is still selling well in Japan, and then set about creating a new easy to use 3D aquarium, this turned out to be Aquazone VE (an interactive screensaver) which was later released in English through Allume Systems and is quite lovely. However that was not a true aquarium simulator and the Japanese gaming public (and Aquazone fans) demanded more, Frontier Groove decided to update the less than popular AZ2, but rather than a simple update to the existing program they opted to reformat many of the files for speed and better fish animation, the result was Aquazone AX, a slightly more popular program than Aquazone 2, but still Japanese only.

Aquazone 2 and Aquazone AX share many items in the standard installations, AZ2 items that are not provided with AZAX can also be imported into AZAX, AZAX items however can't be used in AZ2, so it's best to use AZAX if you can get hold of it...

No demo version of Aquazone AX has ever been made, so we are limited to the very poor Aquazone 2 demo, which is nothing more than a bad screen saver, all interactive options have been excluded, and all you can do is look, frankly I'd rather look at Aquazone VE.

Many add-on items have been produced for Aquazone 2 and Aquazone AX, most are purchased though the AZ Shop, but some are given away for download from the website.

Updates to both versions of 3D Aquazone are available for the Frontier Groove website...

System Requirements

Aquazone 2
Windows 98SE/Me/2000/XP
Celeron 667Mhz or Better
300 MB HD, 128 MB RAM
DirectX 8.1 or Better
Accelerated 3D Graphics Card
(With at least 16MB of VRAM)

Aquazone AX
Windows 2000 / Windows XP
Pentium III 1GHz or Better
300 MB HD, 128 MB RAM
DirectX 8.1 or Better
Accelerated 3D Graphics Card
(With at least 32MB of VRAM)