World of Tanks

World of Tanks
Developer(s)	Wargaming
Composer(s)	Sergey Khmelevsky
Engine	Bigworld[1]
Platform(s)	Windows
Release date(s)	RU 12 August 2010 CHN 15 March 2011 EU 12 April 2011 NA 12 April 2011 SGP 8 March 2012 VN 16 March 2012 KOR 27 December 2012[2]
Genre(s)	Action, MMO
Mode(s)	Multiplayer
Distribution	Download

World of Tanks is a massively multiplayer online game developed by Belarusian-Cypriot^[3] company Wargaming, featuring early to mid-20th century era fighting vehicles.^[4] It is built upon a freemium business model where the game is free-to-play, but participants also have the option of paying a fee for use of "premium" features. The focus is on player vs. player gameplay with each player controlling an armored vehicle, which may be a Light, Medium or Heavy tank, tank destroyer, or self-propelled gun. World of Tanks debuted as an eSports game at the World Cyber Games 2012.^[5]

On 10 June 2013 it was announced that World of Tanks was coming to Xbox Live Arcade on 12 February 2014 as World of Tanks: Xbox 360 Edition.^[6][7][8] Xbox 360 players will use separate servers to those playing the Windows version and players of each version will have separate accounts.^[9] The Xbox 360 version is being developed by Wargaming West studio (separate from the Windows version).^[10] An Xbox One version has also been announced for a 2015 release.^[11] World of Tanks has also recently expanded to mobile platforms under the name World of Tanks Blitz, in addition to a board game titled World of Tanks Rush and a collectable card game titled World of Tanks: Generals.

Gameplay

The player takes control of a single armored vehicle of his or her choosing, and is placed into a battle on a random map.. The player has control over the vehicle's movement, firing, and can communicate with other players through typed or voice chat, and several preset actions that give tactical instructions visible to only their team. The methods used to win a match are either destroying all vehicles on the opposing team or capturing a base present in some game modes. World of Tanks contains multiple game mechanics such as camouflage, shell ricochets, and module damage.

Game modes

The players in World of Tanks can choose six primary types of battles: random battles, team-training battles, tank-company battles, team battles, stronghold battles and special battles. The battle type "Historical Battle" once also existed but has since been taken down for improvement upon its poor reception following its release. Within Random Battles, players can also participate in platoons, groups of two or three players who are put into the same match. There are also missions to be completed in Random Battles, upon completion of which the player receives some type of reward: credits, higher crew experience coefficients, or even new vehicles.

Vehicle types

The game currently models the effects of both armor and cover and includes 382 armored vehicles from the Soviet Union, Germany, Britain, France, China, Japan, and the United States.

The vehicles have been modeled in 3D very carefully, with attention paid towards visual accuracy,^[12][13] but as this is not a simulator, certain parameters (e.g. reduced main gun characteristics-range and penetration physics) have been simplified, and in-game controls are very user friendly for gameplay.^[14]

World of Tanks has five different types of vehicles. These are: light tanks (LTs or lights), medium tanks (MTs or mediums), heavy tanks (HTs or heavies), tank destroyers (TDs or anti tank guns/cannons), and self-propelled guns (SPGs, artillery, artillery gun/cannon or "arty", short for artillery).

Most tanks have a 360-degree traversing turret, regardless of the facing direction of the hull. Most of TD's and SPGs and several unusual tank models (e.g. M3 Lee) have limited fields of fire. In order for these vehicles to aim a different direction, the vehicle's hull must traverse to face the direction of fire, ruining aim and concealment.

All vehicles are restricted to a single main gun, even if their models feature additional weapon mounts. This is done in different ways for different vehicles. For example, the hull-mounted howitzer of the Churchill Mk I is unused in favour of the turret-mounted cannon. For the M3 Lee, the reverse is true.

All vehicles are fully tracked, and cover the eras from late World War I (i.e. the Renault FT) through to the early 1960s. The majority are based on historical designs, though many, such as the German Maus and British TOG II, only existed as prototypes, and others, like the FV215b 183 only as design studies. The game also features conjectural vehicle designs such as the Waffenträger auf E-100 or Jagdpanther II which never existed.^[15]

Vehicles are currently divided into seven nations: Soviet, German, American, French, British, Chinese, and Japanese. All vehicles have pros and cons between their respective counterparts (same vehicle type of the same tier). Some tanks are more "well-rounded" while other vehicles may excel in certain areas and fall short in others.

Clan wars

World of Tanks has implemented a never-ending campaign with Clan Wars unfolding on the Global Map. The Global Map with a particular part of the Earth has been introduced and split into certain provinces. Clans, which consist of players with a maximum of up to 100 members, fight over these provinces on the overworld through specialized World of Tanks game battles. A clan must have a minimum of 15 members to participate in Clan Wars.

Currently, each region in which World of Tanks is based (i.e. North America, Russia etc.) has access only to a limited section of the globe which they can strive to conquer, with the Russian server having the largest amount of territory due to the bulk of the player base existing within that country. In the course of time however, other continents will be added so there will be the opportunity to dominate the entire world.

Clan Wars is generally considered "end-game" material within World of Tanks, meaning that players who wish to take part must usually be highly competitive and possess one or more tanks at the Tier 10 level. Different clans have different requirements for new recruits however, so the specifications for getting involved in Clan Wars vary greatly.

Customization

All vehicles can be customized to a certain degree, either visually or in terms of performance, with the majority of parts (such as tracks, guns, turrets, and engines) being modular parts purchased from the game's extensive Tech tree.

Various two-tone and three-tone camouflage schemes are available for all tanks as well, including both historically accurate patterns and game-specific, custom variants. Camouflage is available for temporary use (7 days or 30 days) by paying with freely earned in-game credits, or for permanent use by paying with gold purchased in the World of Tanks store or won in an in game event.^[16] Players can place national flags, pre-designed slogans, and camouflage (that will increase the chance of remaining undetected).

All vehicles can mount 3 pieces of additional equipment, which varies from vehicle to vehicle, and offers various advantages. Some equipment allow the gun to fire faster, some increase the durability of certain parts of the vehicle, and some help keep the vehicle hidden while stationary.

Finally, each vehicle can carry 3 consumables (single use items that must be re-purchased each time they are used). Examples of these include repair kits, medical kits, and even Extra Rations that boost the tank's crew for the duration of a single battle.

Development

The developers thought of the concept of World of Tanks in December 2008.^[17] The game was officially announced by Wargaming on 24 April 2009. Developers claim that the game budget was the largest ever in the game industry of CIS,^[18] but there has been no independent proof of this claim.

Alpha testing of the Russian version of the game began September 2009, with only six different vehicles (Su-85, BT-7, T-34, Pz IV, Hummel, Tiger) and a single map available. By the beginning of the closed beta test, which started on 30 January 2010, several dozen vehicles and three maps were completed.^[19] In three months, the number of beta tester requests approached 40,000, and over 400,000 tank battles took place.^[20] Open beta test of the Russian version started 24 June 2010; at that point, there were seven maps available, along with over 60 Russian and German vehicles.^[21] Closed beta test of English version of the game began on 8 July 2010.^[22] The Russian version of the game was officially released on 12 August 2010;^[23] however, due to technical difficulties, the game servers went offline on 13 August.

According to a Wargaming official press release, the number of World of Tanks users worldwide reached 700,000, including 500,000 users on Russian servers (350,000 active players), and 200,000 on Western servers (150,000 active players). The number of peak concurrent users exceeded 43,000 on Russian servers and 10,000 on Western servers. The average active gamer spent 3 hours 20 minutes playing the game every day; over 10,000,000 battles have been fought since September 2010.^[24] By 4 January 2011 World of Tanks had recorded more than one million registrations worldwide (Europe, Russia and the United States). This milestone was reached in less than a year since the launch of the closed beta in Russia.^[25][26]

On 5 January 2011 there were 74,536 players simultaneously online on the Russian World of Tanks server, which, according to Wargaming, had become a world record amongst MMO games.^[27][28] The "Most players online simultaneously on one MMO server" world record was officially registered by Guinness World Records on 23 January 2011 and constituted 91,311 players.^[29] According to the game's official site, the Russian server hit the one million registration mark on 18 January 2011.^[30]

The open beta of the English version of the game was launched on 27 January 2011;^[31] the official release was scheduled for 12 April 2011.^[32]

The World of Tanks pre-orders were scheduled to be available for the American and European clusters before the game release.^[33] World of Tanks was released on 12 April 2011 in Europe and North America.^[34]

On 24 May 2011 total number of registrations for all three game servers reached 3,000,000 players (2,000,000 on Russian server and 1,000,000 on Europe and North America).^[35] On 18 November 2011 the public test of awaited version 0.7.0 was started. Two new maps are released based on the fjords of Norway and the swamps of Eastern Europe. New texture for tanks also introduced.^[36]

In June 2013, Wargaming stated that they now have 60 million registered users for World of Tanks.^[37]

The game was localised into the Japanese language within the Asia server on 5 September 2013. The Japanese version has collaboration events related to the tank-battle anime series Girls und Panzer. Additionally, six voice packs featuring the characters from the anime as well as an expansion pack changing the tanks look were released.^[38] In addition, the Vietnamese server was shut down and merged into the Asia server during 2014.

World of Tanks Blitz

In May 2013, Wargaming announced World of Tanks Blitz, a mobile version of World of Tanks for tablets and smartphones using Android and iOS.^[39][40] The game allows 7v7 battles, as compared to the 15v15 battles on PC. The Closed Beta Test (CBT) started on 19 March, and ended 3 April. World of Tanks Blitz was released (in the iOS version only) on May 2014 in European countries like Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, and Iceland, with all other countries currently awaiting launch.^[41] It was released on 27 June 2014 in North America, (again, in the iOS version only).^[42] Beta testing and/or release of the Android version has been released on the Russian server. World of Tanks Blitz was released on Android on December 4, 2014.^[43] As of February 2015, the Android version had 1.1 million downloads.

Reception

Reception
Aggregate scores Aggregator Score GameRankings 82.32%[44] Metacritic 80/100[45] Review scores Publication Score Eurogamer 8/10[46] GameSpot 8.0/10[47] IGN 7.5/10[48] PC Gamer (UK) 85/100[49] Browsergamez 75/100[50]
Awards Publication Award Golden Joysticks Award 2013 "Best Online Game"[51] Golden Joysticks Award 2012 "Best MMO" MMOSITE's Reader's Choice Awards 2010 "Most Anticipated MMO in 2010" KRI 2010 "Best Online Client Game"[52][53] E3 2010 "Best New Concept"[54]

World of Tanks has received favorable reviews, and currently holds a Metacritic score of 80 out of 100.

World of Tanks holds a Guinness World Record in the category of Most Players Online Simultaneously on one MOG Server. The record was registered on 23 January 2011 when the number of players on the game's Russian server totaled 91,311.^[55] This record was beaten by the European server on 13 April 2012 during the anniversary special weekend where all players could enter a code to be Premium account holders for a day. Numbers of over 305,000 were recorded during this period.

As of December 2013, there are 75,000,000 registered players worldwide and a 1.1 million peak concurrent players.^[56] This is an increase of 15 million over the 60 million in June 2013^[57] and 30 million over the 45 million in December 2012.^[58] Within two weeks of the launch of the South Korean server, the number of concurrent users in Korea reached 10,000.^[59]

In 2012, Wargaming's revenue was declared to be 217.9 million Euro, with net profit of 6.1 million Euro, as declared in an annual report for the Cyprus Stock Exchange. The money gained by Wargaming almost exclusively came from World of Tanks.^[60]

In 2013, the microtransaction revenue of World of Tanks surpassed that of World of Warcraft, earning $372 million and ranking fourth highest amongst online game revenues.^[61][62]

See also

• World of Warplanes
• World of Warships
• World of Tanks: Xbox 360 Edition
• War Thunder

References

External links

• Official North American site
• Official European site