A few paths are redirected in the mind
Armored Warfare is significantly more tactical than a shooter. You have to know best 30 seconds in advance what will happen next in order to react. Especially positioning is everything.
While some Red Bull friend at this point will groan, rub his constantly twitching left eye, and shout “Boring”, I have perceived this foresight as an advantage of Armored Warfare: The playstyle changes over time. You slowly grasp the subtleties. A few pathways in the mind are redirected. Eventually, you understand how to read from the radar whether the opponent is a lightly armored vehicle that you can take head-on, or if it’s a heavy tank that requires keeping distance.
You get an eye for the terrain, see a hill with bushes from a distance and think: “Delicious, I’ll spend the next 5 minutes here watching if something appears in the city below me when our scouts stir up something.”
Then, you can also choose the appropriate ammunition in advance of a shootout: Will you take a penetrating blue shot or opt for a hollow charge? All decisions that you only understand through trial and error over a number of matches. A good feeling to know more after a match than before!
A tank is not just a tank
This consideration especially applies to aiming and shooting. With reload times around 6 seconds, every missed shot hurts twice as much as in a shooter. The turning of turrets, the different target zones, flanking enemies, and the fidgeting until you hit a moving or stationary target at great distance: All of that feels surprisingly satisfying.
Especially the sound when you score a direct hit is really good!
Only during the course of the game did I realize how different tanks can be. There are some basic types: The battle tanks are the heavy colossi, support tanks and tank destroyers move faster but forgo armor; then there are extremely lightly armored combat vehicles that fire not with a cannon but with a heavy machine gun. A sustained fire is possible here. Sometimes you feel like a mosquito among elephants, but you certainly notice the speed and the better handling. The gaming experience is altogether different!
Additionally, there is artillery that stands at the back and fires from bird’s eye perspective.
But even two battle tanks of the same class play slightly differently. And they change even more when you complete several matches with them and can slowly upgrade the tank. You feel every engine improvement, every kilometer-per-hour more, and every change in turret configuration immediately affects the shot angle. That is an interesting concept.
If you compare this to an MMORPG: At the start, you have only two “basic classes” – a light tank with a machine gun and a heavier one with a cannon – but these basic types quickly split into more and more configurations that are essentially the same but differ in the details: Well done.
For military enthusiasts, interesting: In the “better tiers” that you unlock, the real development of tanks in our world is also reflected, from 50s behemoths over those of the Cold War to current vehicles.
On the last page of our test, we’ll discuss the good and not-so-good aspects of Armored Warfare and draw a conclusion.
