Tank! Tank! Tank!

Genre: Arcade / Action

Players: 1-4 Competitive / Co-Op (Local Split-Screen, Online)

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Review:

Tank! Tank! Tank! Is an Action game first released in arcades in 2009 and ported to Wii U in 2012. This game was released with an a la carte approach – you can play a few of the basic multiplayer modes for free, but getting more maps, unlocking the additional multiplayer mode, and unlocking the single-player story content all require additional payments, with the price of the full package coming out to around $40. There was also a physical release containing the same content.

Graphically, this game isn’t much to look at, making use of passable but unimpressive 3D characters and environments. It’s not much to listen to either, with energetic but forgettable music that’s largely drowned out by the loud noise throughout the battle. This game has a lot going on at any given time, but none of it is particularly compelling.

Perhaps the loud noise and frenetic activity is here to distract you from the gameplay, because this gameplay is exceedingly simple. Use your D-Pad or analog stick to turn and move forward and backward, and use a single button to fire. That’s it. You don’t even aim vertically – the game does that for you automatically.

The result is a game that definitely feels very arcadey, but it also absolutely feels like it bears the stamp of shallowness that arcade games often have. Missions will generally last only a few minutes, and during that time you’ll just be scrambling to turn, move, and pick off targets without much thought beyond picking up an occasional temporary weapon upgrade.

This isn’t to say that this game lacks fun. To be sure, this game does manage to tap into that sort of basic primal fun that you get from blasting away at enemies (both robotic enemies in PvE and other tanks in PvP), but there’s so little thought or strategy that goes into it, you’ll tire quickly.

One other odd thing I should note – I cannot honestly tell you how well the game’s online works, because I don’t know if what I’m seeing is accurate or some sort of trick. Online lobbies seem to be full of players willing to play with you in both co-op and competitive modes, but given that this is 2022 and this game wasn’t exactly a megahit title, I can’t help but feel like these are likely NPCs in disguise. In any case, artificial or no, the “online” multiplayer in this game works fine, as much as anything works.

In the end, Tank! Tank! Tank! Is fun, but it’s far too shallow to hold your interest for very long. The arcade-style chaos has its appeal, but there’s just not much to the game beyond that. If you have a Wii U, you might as well download the free version of the game to try out the limited multiplayer options available to you without dropping any money, but I doubt you’ll want to actually spend money on this.

tl;dr – Tank! Tank! Tank! Is a simple Arcade-style Action game that has you driving a tank around and shooting other tanks or robotic enemies. There’s some simple arcade-style fun to be had here, but it’s so shallow you’ll tire of it extremely quickly. The a la carte payment system does mean that you can download a portion of the multiplayer for free, but after playing it I doubt you’ll want to spend money to get any of the rest.

Grade: C-

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