Wargaming.net is putting the final touches in World of Tanks, their historically accurate free MMO where tanks are at their best. The Closed Beta is live and Free MMO Station had a place in it. After all the hype and some really funny teasers for the game, it’s time to play and see how it is shaping up.

But before anything else, the tanks deserve a mention. Wargaming.net really went to great lengths not only to offer an impressive quantity of tanks, but to recreate them with striking detail. The detail is not only in aesthetics, but also in statistics, with the Russian and German tanks spread over three classes (light, medium and heavy), each one with over a dozen attributes, from health to speed or rate of fire.

There are also several parts for upgrading the tanks including hull, engine, armor, gun, chassis, and more. Since our first tanks are really underwhelming, earning experience is vital to gain more parts and perform better in the battlefield. The upgrades will unlock new and more powerful tanks, but players need to watch out for the ones they buy, for two reasons: stats that fit with their playing style, and the slots available in the garage that you can purchase with gold, the cash shop currency, which can be converted to credits. The garage is also the place where you can repair your tanks and resupply ammunition.


World of Tanks is considered an action game, but don’t take it lightly. There’s some actual strategy and tactical awareness involved, like if everyone in the Battlefield series and CounterStrike got a tank and started playing. Rushing leads mostly to defeat, and since there’s no respawn, you can’t be reckless and must seriously consider teamwork. When your tank is destroyed, the only option is to exit the battle and repair it. Besides all the tank stats, the maps require some thinking, since some slopes can considerably slow down your vehicle and there are lots of hiding spots. Also, the power of the tanks can make trees and even some buildings collapse.

While we couldn’t yet try the ambitious Clan Wars mode, the battles we entered allowed 15 vs 15 players, more than we could wish for. The battles didn’t last longer than 15 minutes, and while you could destroy all enemy tanks, capturing the enemy base (or flag, as it is) immediately wins the match.

As far as visuals go, World of Tanks can be of striking beauty and supports higher resolutions. The urban maps are filled with detail, although the building textures could be a little sharper. But when you look at the beautiful natural scenery, its different colors, the impressive drawing distance and some details like the water or the tire tracks, it’s easy to see World of Tanks as a very appealing game. I didn’t even mention the tanks because they really need to be seen in detail, from the smaller ones to the more imposing metal beasts.

We already knew that World of Tanks was an original game. Now that we’ve played it, it seems so full of details, much more than you would expect from a “simple” action game. It is intricate and demands you to look at it as something really different, so much that you could easily mistake it for a commercial game. But it’s a free to play MMO (supported by a cash store, as usual) and has a lot of potential.

To know more about the game, read our exclusive interview to Alex Shilyaev, the project-manager on World of Tanks.