Tank Universal
Latest screenshots
View the gallery
Tank Universal
Contender for Indie title of the year!
If you have previously read some of my editorials or listened to one of the early pod casts on this site you will know I have this spot in my heart for independent (indie) and small development team created games. In my opinion, they will be the true savior of PC gaming, bringing it back to where it once was. When the true innovation in gaming is made by those who love the games they work on, toiling for long hours and not those who are building clones of popular games or shoveling out another MMORPG or RTS game. It is time for the developer to return to their garages and basements and building games they want to play, when gameplay was king and graphics were a luxury and not something you needed to spend millions on for something less memorable in the end to the gamer.
With that said, I always jump at a chance to review, preview or do an editorial on a independent game, to see and play what is usually the best gaming experience for week or even that month. Sometimes of course I am disappointed but sometimes I am not and this last week I can certainly say with great confidence that my time spent with Tank Universal has been a fun and worthwhile gaming experience.
Tank Universal is a game that appears to be the love child of the movie Tron and the game Battlezone, but has become it’s own entity running away from its parents like all children do, or should do. With slick gameplay, some very challenging and exciting levels, amazing art design and only a few minor flaws this tank battle game becomes more then just a minor fun diversion but a benchmark title in the indie development community.
Gameplay
WASD, F1 to F9 and your mouse are the only controls you must know to blast your way through the multitude of well designed levels in this tank battle game. Pure mayhem can describe some of the combat with multiple tanks, gigantic Mech’s, turrets and colossus spacecraft which are all over the place destroying everything in their path and most of the time it is up to you to reduce them to their virtual parts.
The actual combat with your tank is more then just point and shoot, you also must raise your tanks main gun up and fire for distance, at a moving target, while you are moving and being knocked around by explosions and incoming fire from all around you. Using a wide variety of weapons from smoke bombs (so helpful), deployable auto-turrets, mines, missiles (extremely cool) and various other fun toys you lay waste to fortresses, tank platoons and everything else the enemy sends your way.
While it is very fun, addictive and a game that will stay on my PC for a very long time, there are a few minor issues with it, such as no game-pad controller support, the game is crying out for one, you can not skip cut-scenes and you should be able to and no quick save option, but it auto-saves for you which is very nice and no multiplayer gaming another feature this game is screaming for and would be so much fun to play.
Graphics and Audio
Graphically the game stands out for one main reason, it looks similar to, but is wildly different from the movie and other games based on Tron. Of course some may not see it that way, there is a major difference. What is most impressive in the art department is how simple yet effective the graphics and art design are, unless you are a total graphics nut who must have complete realism in your games (and then you must only be playing Crysis for anything close to that), the graphics are something you will appreciate right off the bat or something that will grow on you. Effects are big and full, explosions, smoke, fire and more are all well done with this raw energy around them. When your tank is hit, depending on the amount of damage, determines the actual effect and duration of the effect on your screen with a snowy technical view. The effects are so well done other vehicle combat games can actually learn something from TU here.
Each tank and enemy unit, along with the entire level design uses primitive shapes (cubes, cones, spheres, etc with box shapes) and in their actual layout the shapes end up building a fantastic world. Tank Universal gives us something that looks and feels very old, but works in this world that feels more virtual then anything we are used to so it works.
Beyond one graphical issue I have with no wide screen support and that is really not good since all of my PC monitors are widescreen and the game does not support my resolutions of 1650x1080 I was limited to play in full screen or have part of the screen cropped. Not a big deal but hopefully this is something that can be fixed later on with a patch.
Audio wise the game does lack overall in the music department for sheer number of songs, but I will admit it was not until I was listening for the music did I actually notice when it was there and when it was not. Battles are so huge and frantic with explosions and effects they make their own symphony of destruction then any composer would need to. Each of the sound effects are basically generic, but not more generic then anything else we have seen in most PC games lately, even some of the games with multi-million dollar budgets.
Value
I love indie games, they are by far usually the most fun, innovative, gameplay centric titles out on the market. Most of the time a good indie developer knows their limits and strengths, builds their product around a core idea using their strengths and ends up with a fantastic title like Tank Universal.
Bottom Line
While not perfect, for its price, indie roots and throw back to the movie “Tron”, this is a must buy for action gamers.
Pros
- solid fun gameplay
- fantastic art design, simple yet very effective
- great special effects
- good music and sound effects for a indie title
- more proof indie titles ROCK
- extremely well done for basically a one man team using some 3rd party tools
- for $18 bucks well worth buying for the fun and indie gaming support
- Perfectly stable on my brand new computer that runs the latest high end PC games like butter
- taking down the giant mammoth Mechs is very cool
Cons
- no quick save
- can not skip cut scenes
- no real direction of what to do, where do go sometimes in game, but it is fairly obvious most of the time so not a big deal
- before you start your training, VERY BORING! Made me want to quit the game.
- No controller support
- No multiplayer and limited skirmish maps
- No widescreen support 16:9 and 16:10 would be very nice
- No high resolution support up to 1650x1080 would be very nice
the one ugly graphic part is the real world cut-scene, the rest of the game may not look “pretty” but the art style fits
Final Verdict
Here's a small guide to help you understand our evaluation of games.
PRESENTATION GRADE
Can be from the game's box to the contents of the booklet, and even the game introduction. (Intro, menus, options, etc)
GRAPHIC GRADE
Up to what point the graphics have been worked on my the developper. The design type, the effort used for textures and environments, as well as animations and framerate.
AUDIO GRADE
Is the soundtrack a good match to the game's style, he ambient sounds keeping with the gameplay and the sound effects clear and convincing?
GAMEPLAY GRADE
Placement of the controls and the inferface that the player with be using during the game.
REPLAY VALUE GRADE
The most important factor in the evaluation of a game. It identifies the lifespan of the game and the fun of coming back again and again.
During my time at E3, I was able to take both Sony’s Move and Microsoft’s Kinect for a spin. Though they’re competing largely for the same market, they’ve each tackled the task in very different ways. With this competitiveness comes both companies’ claims that they have the best solution. So who really wins? It may be too early to tell,... 
RSS Feed