Tanks Meet Zombies

Genre: 2-Stick Shooter

Players: 1-4 Co-Op / Competitive (Local)

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Review:

Tanks Meet Zombies, originally released on PC in 2018 and ported to Nintendo Switch in 2019, is an arena-based 2-Stick Shooter where players drive around a customizable “tank” (more like a buggy with a gun) and shoot down hordes of zombies.

The presentation here is a bit lacking. The game uses simple 3D graphics, but they are so zoomed out from the action that it’s difficult to make out any details. This can actually interfere with the gameplay, as different enemies require different types of attacks to defeat. As for the sound, the game uses a forgettable energetic soundtrack, cute high-pitch zombie screams, and an extremely annoying announcer that you’ll quickly find yourself muting in the game’s options.

The core gameplay here is good – moving around and shooting feels pretty fun. Unfortunately, the game piles so many problems on top of this that it’s hard to appreciate it.

Firstly, as mentioned, the hard-to-see enemies require different types of attacks to defeat, but frustratingly players are punished for making use of the wrong attacks on the wrong enemies – players can run over most enemies, but some enemies damage players trying to do so. What’s more, if you have replaced one of your vehicle’s limited weapon slots with an enhanced close-up weapon like a combine, you’ll be at an even greater disadvantage in these sorts of situations.

The game occasionally gives players gift boxes that have temporary “power-up” pickups to collect, but unfortunately these pickups seem to be a downgrade more often than not – one removes your human from their tank to fend for themselves on foot, another reverses your tank’s controls, and another speeds up the tank, making it unwieldy to control in the process. As a result, you’ll find yourself avoiding these “power-ups” when they show up.

There are more problems beyond these – in some of the game’s multiplayer modes, the game only cares about the first player, endlessly respawning other players but ending the game if player 1 is killed. And in every game mode, things start to feel repetitive very quickly.

I feel like there was some potential for a good arena-based 2-Stick Shooter in Tanks Meet Zombies, but the multitude of problems it has keep that potential from coming to fruition. And with the multitude of other great 2-Stick Shooters on the Nintendo Switch, it’s hard to recommend this one.

tl;dr – Tanks Meet Zombies is a 2-Stick Shooter whose core gameplay is decent, but its potential is ruined by boring repetitive combat, power-ups that are best avoided, flawed multiplayer, and frustrations caused by the game pushing you to use different kinds of attacks and then often punishing you for doing so. You have numerous better options in this genre on the Nintendo Switch.

Grade: C-

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