Hey Everyone

Here is the review of GTB from the blog post: http://spacesimcentral.com/?p=753

Got to spend some time with Gratuitous Tank Battles (GTB) this past week and I would like to thank Cliffski from Positech Games for opportunity to checkout this upcoming game from the same developer that brought us Gratuitous Space Battles (GSB). GTB is a bit of a hybrid game because it has both RTS and Tower Defense elements to it. The developer did a good job in creating the feel of old style battles and battlegrounds with futuristic tanks, mechs and soldiers units you see in the game. In GTB there is three different play modes (Campaign, Custom Maps or Online) and each of those you can choose to be one offense or defense. To go along with the game modes is also three difficulty levels (Captain, Major and Colonel), so between the difficuly and the game modes you really do have a lot of playability available to you. Just like in GSB, there is some nice tools in the form of a unit designer and map editor to really bring out re-playability and strategy portion of the game.

So let's touch on this Unit Designer. How can you not like this tool? It is pretty straight forward to use and there is a lot of customization you can do to create unique and specialized units by adding or changing; hull, armor, ammo feeders, propulsion, weapons, targeting and augmentations. There is different equipment available depending on the unit/hull type you chose to edit. All of these components have different tiers and you slowly unlock these as you play through the campaign missions. The unit editor will also allow you to paint different sections of the weapon or soldier as well to truly make them your own. The map editor is a basic tile editor, that will let you create your own custom maps where you can choose the type of terrain, enemy routes, mount implacements, troop trenches, bunkers, obstructions and other terrain objects. Both tools are easy to understand and grasp and it shouldn't take you long to create your own maps and units.

Here is my thoughts on the PRO's and CON's of Gratuitous Tank Battles in it's present release state (Beta v1.005).

PRO's

- The user interface of GTB is very responsive and easy to navigate

- During the battles, you can zoom in on any area of the game map and you can really hear the sounds of battle up close and the increased visuals on the units and special effects are great.

- The unit designer and map editor is a huge plus to GTB, because it now has unlimited playability with the new units that can be created and unllimited map possibilities.

- Online play with the user maps is done well. The addition of player map rankings and comments is a nice touch, the filter tool for this list works well to help find maps to try.

- Saving a recording of your game and replaying the game as the attacker/defender (good stuff there).

- In my many hours with GTB I didn't experience any crashes or technical issues. I don't know about you, but having my game work on day one is important to me.

CON's – (Please take into account this is a beta I am testing.)

- Campaign mode could have some more missions, yes there is different difficulty levels to make them challenging but could use a few more.

- Would have liked some sort of review screen before the mission that would allow you to see all of the possible unit types with stats that you could be facing. This would help to better plan your attack/defense strategy.

- In the campaign mode, it would have been nice to see units level up if they survived the mission and then you can use them in upcoming campaign battle.

- Maybe I didn't unlock everything yet, but I would have liked to see troops with rocket launchers and or mortars.

Overall I am having a nice time with Gratuitous Tank Battles and it definitely gives you a challenge in the later levels or colonel difficulty levels. What I have been doing a lot is playing the campaign missions to unlock unit equipment/weapons/upgrades for the unit designer. You can spend a gaming session just thinking about your unit creations. Because you do have to really look at a lot of factors when it comes to unit building. There is always the speed of the unit, which the weight of your unit plays a big part in this. The armor and firepower you are going to assign. But in the end depending on what you choose there will be a unit price assessed. So all of this plays into each other. Yes. You could make a tank/mech that could make it to the end of the route. But was it worth the cost-per-point ratio? In the end you are in a race with the clock as well. I have had plenty of games where I ran out of resource points and came so close to winning. Making the right choices in units and when to deploy them is the key to victory and Positech Games has a small victory themselves with Gratuitous Tank Battles. If GTB follows GSB model there will be a demo that you should be able to try soon. If you liked GSB, I am sure you will like what you see. GTB will be finishing up closed beta very soon and you will be able to get your hands on this soon enough.