Best Tank Games Mac
With Call of Duty, Battlefield, and more returning to the 1940s, we have to ask: what are the best WW2 games on PC? The most devastating conflict in our recent history of fighting over land and ideologies has been distilled into heroic charges, tense dogfights, epic digital wars, and savage battles many times over, and here you’ll find the top World War 2 games to play right now.
Whether you’re looking for the grittiness of a beach landing, the strategy of battle planning, the thrill of an aerial dogfight, or intense camaraderie experienced by a band of brothers, there’s a World War II game that has something to offer you. And thanks to the new wave of interest in the period, some of these games sport astonishing graphics and modern, punchy gunplay.
So from massive, free-to-play vehicular battlefields to complex war games, you’re bound to find something below to keep you duking it out for countless hours in our round-up of the finest WWII games.
Mar 25, 2020 15 Best Tank Games To Play In 2019 (Most Amazing Tank Games) Tanks, the true Beasts on the Battlefield One of the best and most famous tank battles is one you can watch here. Powerful and mobile vehicles that can take and dish out large amounts of damage, tanks are a must use for players in various games. Our collection of games like World of Tanks has other MMO games that will put you in the driving seat of a vehicle. World of Tanks is a free to play game that lets players take control of a variety of tanks and battle it out against other players. Originally launched in 2010 the game has become a. The best WW2 games on PC. Travel back in time and fight for freedom in the best WW2 games going, from free war games like War Thunder, to Call of Duty. Tank games: 11 of the best on PC. World of Tanks, Armored Warfare, War Thunder, and more - these are the very best tank games and tank simulators on PC.
The best WW2 games are:
War Thunder
World War 2 was a combined arms effort, with land, sea, and air forces offering equally invaluable efforts, and War Thunder truly captures that. It originally threw a spotlight on the war’s colossal aerial battles, but soon went on to include land battles through the medium of noisy tank warfare, and naval efforts via its sea-based expansion.
Boasting a dizzying number of historically accurate aircraft, tanks, and boats from pretty much every nation involved in the war, this exceptional free-to-play WW2 game offers a great multiplayer experience that neatly sits in the middle ground between complex simulation and arcade fighter. Like a sim, War Thunder has incredible attention to detail that makes it compelling to play. Each machine feels genuinely different and all offer their own challenges. And even when you’re not in the heat of battle there are tactics to consider as you stock your hangars with various new vehicles and upgrade them to suit your approach.
More like this: War Thunder is also one of the best plane games
- Sep 04, 2018 Overall, people love it for its art direction, gameplay, humor, and strong community. And Team Fortress 2 is still among the most played games on Steam and one of the best free fps games for mac. Metascore: Not demanding: Yes.
- Jan 23, 2014 The 10 Greatest Early Mac Games (And How to Play Them) The Mac, which turns 30 on Friday, wasn't known as a gaming platform in its early days, but there were some ground-breaking games.
Developer Gaijin Entertainment has expanded each of its combat types out, so you can read our War Thunder naval combat guide or our beginner’s guide to War Thunder tank battles if you need some help learning the basics.
World of Tanks
Wargaming’s flagship free-to-play WW2 game is obsessed with tanks, hence the name World of Tanks. It’s full of incredibly detailed artillery platforms and caterpillar tracks for you to drool over before rolling into battle. Hundreds of these glorious machines can be researched, unlocked, and purchased as you gain experience and resources from every tense match.
World of Tanks is a game you can dip your toes into, play for a bit, and have fun. On the surface, it’s simple and arcade-like, but underneath the chassis is the loud, angry engine of something more serious. How vulnerable is the machine gun port of the Tiger II? Where are the soft spots on the indomitable IS-3? What is the effective armour thickness of the T-32’s upper glacis? Armour penetration, angles, weak spots – this is the stuff you need to know.
To taste victory time after time, to work your way up the tank tiers and eventually get your name on leaderboards, you need to make a significant time investment. It would feel a bit like work if this wasn’t a game about blowing up tanks, which never stops being fun. And with constant updates, new maps, modes, features, and an audience of hundreds of millions of players, you’re always learning. It might not be the most realistic game at times, but it’s easily one of the best tank games on PC.
Want to try World of Tanks? PCGamesN has teamed up with Wargaming to give a free US tank – the M22 Locust and 600 gold to any new players who sign up using this link:
World of Warships
The third of Wargaming’s WW2 games, World of Warships sees the tried and tested formula of World of Tanks transposed to the sea. It’s not just World of Tanks with ships, though, as the switch to naval combat has informed a lot of big changes. These sea battles are slower, more thoughtful, and ultimately more tactical than their land-based counterparts.
Out in the open sea, there’s a sense of dread and vulnerability that you just don’t get in Wargaming’s other titles. Not this severe, anyway. There’s no hiding or running away in World of Warships – just plans, some of which will fall apart, and others that could, with some help from your team, lead to a glorious victory.
Air support adds an extra interesting wrinkle. You can hurl the fighters and bombers positioned on your decks at your foes, and suddenly the game starts to feel like an RTS. But one where you’re also frantically trying to line up your killer cannons and praying to Poseidon that this time, this time, it’ll be a direct hit. That is what makes it one of the best WW2 games on PC. On top of all this, Wargaming also do a terrific job of updating the game, with expansions adding new ships like a Pan-Asian line of destroyers to the game, not to mention the odd World of Warships seasonal event.
Steel Division 2
If you’re not into hardcore wargames and are looking for a more hands-on WW2 strategy game then Steel Division 2 ticks a lot boxes. Taking place on the eastern front of WW2, Steel Division 2 focuses heavily on the source material, translating every aspect of the horrid struggle between Axis and Russian forces into its gameplay. Soviet conscripts are in abundance, but are poorly equipped and will yield under too much pressure. The SS troops on the other hand offer a great deal more efficiency, but lack energy and enthusiasm after months spent fighting in the harsh Russian winter.
Much like the first game, Steel Division: Normandy ‘44, the sequel is peerless when it comes to representing the scale of warfare, offering up large maps with strict, unnatural borders so as to give you a cross-section of a large-scale combat operation. You have tanks, troops, and aircraft under your control, but your focus at all times is on the battlefield rather than where you’re drawing these forces from.
The new Army General mode is a neat touch, which does an excellent job mixing RTS story campaigns with the long-form strategic decisions you’d normally find in one of the best war or grand strategy titans. These four mini-campaigns take you through the Belorussian Strategic Offensive Operation that saw Soviet forces finally breakthrough the Axis stranglehold, with most of the action taking place on a strategic map.
Call of Duty: WWII
If you are looking for breadth and realistic details, then COD: WW2 might rub you up the wrong way with its Eurocentric campaign and PPSh-41-toting German soldiers. However, what it does better than all but the best WW2 games is connect the player to the squad they fight alongside, all the way from the beaches of Normandy to the capture of Ludendorff Bridge. It does this by tying health, ammo, and grenade refills to squad members, forcing you to seek out your medic if you are low on health, even if a tank separates you. It is an elegant and organic way of simulating the bonds that form between brothers in arms.
Take aim: Our list of the best sniper games on PC
COD: WW2 also stands out as one of the best WW2 games because of it relatively recent release date. After the glut of World War 2 games that hit PC in the mid-2000s we endured a decade-long drought where all the leaps and bounds made in videogame graphics helped bring other conflicts and settings to life while WW2 games were left behind. In our COD: WW2 review we were impressed by the audiovisual fidelity, which lends the campaign an almost filmic level of sheen, whether that is the sumptuous ring that fills your ears every time you reload an M1 Garand, or the unsparing particle effects that give every texture and environment their due depth. Sure, you will have seen and fought these WW2 battles in games before, but they have never looked this convincing.
Call of Duty 2
Call of Duty 2 was a jolt of electricity applied to the WW2 formula when it launched in 2005. Familiar scenes like the D-Day landings were recreated in greater detail, with more drama and a nail-biting sense of vulnerability. And, at the time, it was the best the war had ever looked.
Read more: Here are all the COD campaigns, ranked best to worst
With four campaigns across three theatres, the global scope of the war was on display. Like the original Call of Duty, it followed British, American and Russian troops, but also presented the north African campaign for the first time, as the Brits fought across the desert, melting and dying and hiding from tanks.
We Mac Tanks
Despite being over a decade old, COD2 has stood the test of time thanks to the fact that it was one of the first games to add features like regenerating health, so you could focus on the battle and not worry about scurrying around looking for health kits. And with improved ally AI, it really felt like you were leading proper soldiers – all of them named – rather than mindless models with guns attached to them. Not just one of the best WW2 games, Call of Duty 2 is one of the best FPS games on PC.
Company of Heroes 2: Ardennes Assault
As our Company of Heroes 2 review points out – despite capturing the horror of winter warfare the RTS sequel didn’t quite hit the same high notes as its venerable predecessor. But with the standalone expansion of Ardennes Assault, Relic reinvigorated the single-player portion of the series, giving it one of its most interesting campaigns and regaining the WW2 RTS games crown.
It is all about the dynamic map. The Ardennes region is one big, constantly shifting warzone, with the Germans attempting to lock down as much territory as possible. Controlling the US forces of Baker, Able and Dog Company – all with unique mechanics and strengths – players must force the Germans out, bit by bit, in a desperate, bleak campaign. It is not just about winning battles; a victory doesn’t matter if it has cost you all your veteran units and left the rest of your force tattered and weak. A Pyrrhic victory spells doom for your campaign.
Random objectives and events can crop up in battles and on the campaign map itself, so no campaign is alike. You might be tasked with assassinating an officer during a mission, or ambushing a convoy on the campaign map, and failure or victory will have a tangible impact on the rest of the war. It is a persistent, savage war, where failure is always nipping at the heels of the increasingly desperate US forces. With details like that, no wonder it is one of the best WW2 games on PC.
Commandos 2: Men of Courage
They don’t make them like this anymore, and that is a tragedy. Commandos 2 is 17 years old, but remains utterly unsurpassed. It is a puzzle game, essentially. You control a group of operatives behind enemy lines, across ten elaborate, complex, devilishly hard missions.
Each mission is a huge, sprawling thing with a beautifully detailed, liberating map and tricky objectives that require a lot of planning, scouting, smarts and a spot of trial and error. Objectives run the gamut from stealing documents and rescuing spies to blowing up ships and stealing vehicles. Getting in the way of that are countless patrols, guards, minefields and even harsh weather. Luckily, the Commandos have more than a few tricks up their sleeves.
You have a spy who can steal clothes and disguise himself as the enemy, a secret agent who can distract and drug Nazis, and a battle-hardened Green Beret who likes to get a bit of blood on his hands. You even have a dog, Whisky, and he is both delightful and good at drawing the attention of enemies. Each mission gives you a specific group to use, and then it is up to you how you want to go about completing the main, secondary, and bonus objectives. It is this kind of freedom that makes Commandos 2 not just one of the best WW2 games on PC, but one of the best PC games of all time, period.
Red Orchestra 2: Heroes of Stalingrad
As much as games like Brothers in Arms and World of Tanks aim for historical accuracy in their weapons, machinery, and locations, they still offer a Hollywood-tinted depiction of the action. Red Orchestra 2 removes the filters and offers an unflinchingly difficult simulator shooter. Heroes of Stalingrad recreates battles from the Eastern Front in a Battlefield-like combined arms settings with soldier classes and vehicles. Throwing pray-and-spray, gung-ho attitudes to the wind, Red Orchestra demands strict teamwork, caution, and a considered tactical approach to objectives.
It is the hardships of being an individual cog in the machine that makes Red Orchestra compelling. Machine-gunners are vital for covering fire, allowing other players to advance down the field. But holding down the trigger too long causes the barrel to melt and buckle, requiring it to be replaced in a lengthy maintenance animation. Tanks are murder machines when fully crewed, but attempt to commandeer one by yourself and you will find yourself a sitting target as you attempt to aim your cannon. As well as the stresses of being part of a team, as an individual you’ll have to constantly count your rounds as a complete lack of HUD removes any indication as to what is left in your magazine.
Each round of Red Orchestra 2 is hard work, but like ARMA and other bullet-physic heavy shooting simulations, there’s a distinct, unrivalled sense of victory with every point scored. Few WW2 games make you work this hard for a single kill. If you’re more interested in the Pacific conflict then there’s even a spiritual successor from Tripwire Interactive called Rising Storm that’s just as brutally realistic.
Silent Hunter III
The Second World War is frequently depicted as a violently bloodthirsty, explosive, and ear-drum bursting conflict. But not every element of all-out war is noisy or fast paced. For the quiet, considered, cold-blooded killers out there, there is nothing quite like Silent Hunter’s unique brand of stealth. Throw out your undercover OSS agents, and submerge yourself in underwater naval warfare.
Related: Check out our rundown of the best stealth games
Silent Hunter III, despite being over a decade old, remains one of the best WW2 games, and allows you to command a U-Boat full of German seamen under the surface of the Atlantic ocean. Freeform missions simply inform you of targets and naval traffic, allowing you to conduct the operation in whatever conniving manner you so wish. You will need to be map savvy; Silent Hunter is one of those gloriously uncompromising submarine games, and without solid navigation skills you’ll be firing torpedoes into the open ocean instead of the side of a Allied merchant ship. Patience is the key ingredient though, as you lurk in wait as your plan slowly comes together.
Brothers in Arms: Hell’s Highway
The Brothers in Arms games offer some of the best stories in the WW2 niche, filled with personal tales of struggle and camaraderie. Hell’s Highway, the third in the BiA series, brings the troubles of the 101st Airborne’s Matt Baker to a close with a harrowing story that emphasises the relentless loss of life every soldier was forced to endure, evoking the likes of Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers.
Backing up the story is a fantastic FPS game. It borrows the third-person cover system of the Rainbow Six: Vegas games, making the squad tactics a much smoother, effective element. War is hell in Brothers in Arms, and the methodical employment of flanking maneuvers and suppressing fire is the only way you’ll be able to survive it. Thanks to the tight-knit relationships Hell’s Highway weaves over its campaign, by the end you will really feel as if you helped pull your comrades through the dirt.
And damn is it grim. Grisly, too. Body parts are blown off, men are turned into bloody bags of meat – it is nasty stuff. It does not feel like Hell’s Highway revels in the gore, though. It feels more like an attempt to present war as a horrible, traumatising scenario that you should be glad you are experiencing on a PC rather than in reality.
Battlefield 1942
With Battlefield 1942, it felt like the FPS genre was evolving. Until DICE released the first in what would be an enduring series, multiplayer games were mostly concerned with the glory of the individual. They were about fast reflexes and kill counts. Battlefield 1942, however, is all about cooperation.
You can see where a lot of the series’ systems began, like the roles or classes, the addition of vehicles like tanks and planes and the importance of controlling the map. There was an even greater focus on combined arms warfare, though. You could be bombarding coastlines with your capital ship while your chum flies around in a bomber, trying to take out manned installations protecting the coast. The scale and diversity was crazy. And the maps let you duke it out in all of WW2’s theatres, so you could fight as the British in El Alamein or the Imperial Japanese Navy in Iwo Jima.
A few years ago, EA made it free, but it has since been removed from Origin due to Gamespy going out of business, leaving the game without servers. However! There are still places you can download it from, along with community servers, so there’s still life in the game yet – you can also get Battlefield 1942 in HD with the right mods. But should that life run out, DICE brought the 40s back with their latest game: Battlefield V.
Order of Battle: U.S. Pacific
Order of Battle: Pacific takes the now well-worn Panzer General-style of wargames and manages to do more with than any other of the classic game’s successors have in a long time. It is an intricate-yet-approachable wargame, with logical rules and a distinct eye for detail.
Military shooter games for mac. There is no story, health regeneration or ammo drops here, only tight gameplay meshed into an original take on the FPS genre.One more thing Praised for its innovative look and gameplay, Superhot’s minimalist graphics also mean it can play on a wide variety of Macs, with great performance even on our 2013 MBP.Superhot benchmark results (in FPS).
Each move becomes a series of puzzles. Objectives need to be reached quickly, with no dawdling. Yet extending your grasp for side-missions can also provide bonuses further down the line. Each decision expands into new opportunities and further questions.
It is also a game that finally succeeds at naval transportation and combat, which is pretty rare among the best strategy games, and a vital feature considering the Pacific setting means much of your time will be set at sea. Order of Battle’s approach to naval is exceptionally strong, and makes sailing from port to port as interesting as battles themselves.
Hidden & Dangerous 2
Hidden & Dangerous 2 may be an ageing veteran that needs a stick to stay mobile these days, but its tales of silent heroics, undercover operations, and daring strikes have been unmatched in the 15 years since its release.
Rainbow Six for 1944, Hidden & Dangerous 2 is a tactical squad shooter with all the trimmings we’re clamoring for in the modern era: permadeath, persistent characters, detailed operation loadout screens, and fully open maps with mission goals to be completed any which way you fancy. Leading a squad of four stiff-upper-lipped SAS officers, there is a fascinating variety of missions that take you to every theatre of the war, from a snowy top secret research base to the dense jungles of Burma.
Related: Here are the best old games for more classics like this
The level of freedom is comparable to Hitman: Blood Money (there is even the option to strip enemies and steal their clothing), and the lack of enforced silence means when things go belly-up you can crack open the heavy machineguns and simply murder your way out. The controls and systems are all fairly clunky and the AI of your squadmates is never up to scratch, but the thrill of Hidden & Dangerous’ campaign is absolutely worth pushing through the niggles for.
World of Warplanes
World of Warplanes lets you live out your fantasy of being a World War 2 fighter pilot, absolutely for free. Wargaming’s WW2 game thrusts you into the cockpit of over five aircraft types that can include thousands of customisable configurations. Your eternal fight for dominance of the skies sees you facing action-packed 12v12 dogfights that require careful communication and effective teamwork for you to claim victory.
This free PC game is set in the Golden Age of military aviation, and it has the environments to match. You can choose to fight for one of seven nations, but the canvas through which you’ll be targeting the baddies is inspired by land masses all over the world. It means that, if you’re anything like us and get shot out the sky on the regular, you’ll at least be able to enjoy the view on the way down.
IL-2 Sturmovik 1946
Though IL-2 Sturmovik is almost old enough to leave school and get a job, it remains one of the best simulation games of all time, particularly those with a military bent.
1946, then, is something very special, because it contains IL-2 Sturmovik, its sequel, and a whole bunch of expansions, which means you get an almost bewildering number of campaigns and richly detailed planes, and by the time you are done with it all, you will be effortlessly pulling off Yo-Yos like a master ace and speeding across the skies in Yaks and MiGs like a natural.
While 1946 collects all the pre-2007 IL-2 Sturmovik games and expansions, it also adds nine extra campaigns and lots of lovely jets in an alternate history version of the war that sees Germany and Russia duking it out in the skies in high speed jet battles. The missions are scripted, though you will find dynamic battles in the older games that come with 1946, and you’ll find yourself on tense bombing runs, foiling deadly raids and getting into plenty of thrilling dogfights.
And there we have it: the very best WW2 games you can find on PC. In need of even more? Head to our partner site Wargamer for a look at the best WWI games or even the best WW2 strategy games. But, until next time, tinkety tonk and down with the Nazis, old fruit.
What are the best PC tank games 2020? Rolling into battle in a vehicle that weighs the same as ten elephants and can raze entire buildings with a single shot simply never gets old, but it’s not always easy to find a game that delivers the perfect tanking experience. If you’re looking for the best free tank games or the biggest triple-A armoured division sims, you’ve come to the right place.
Tanks are brilliant because they’re immense hunks of killer steel, destroying all in their path with ease. But the tank is also synonymous with tense firefights and immense claustrophobia. The agony of reloading, the snail pace, and the fact that you’re the enemy’s priority target make tank games as nerve-wracking as they are empowering.
There have been countless greats to pick over the years; the genre has been knocking about since the Apple II days. From hyper-realistic, control-laden sims to arcadey, point-and-explode shoot-’em-ups, here are the best tank games on PC.
The best tank games are:
WORLD OF TANKS
If it is a hardcore, lifetime-to-master tank game you are looking for, steer well clear of World of Tanks. This free-to-play titan offers fast and frantic gameplay with only a handful of realistic elements thrown in for good measure. This is one of the best tank games for casual gamers looking for an in-road to more tanking action, and yet one with enough depth and progression to keep gamers invested well into the later tiers of unlockable tanks.
Perhaps World of Tanks’ greatest strength is its roster of over 250 armoured vehicles, ranging from scout vehicles to battlefield behemoths. Better still, with the game featuring vehicles from France, Great Britain, Japan, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Soviet Russia, the United States and China, there is heaps of variation in what you will be battling alongside and squaring up to in World of Tanks.
Want to try World of Tanks? PCGamesN has teamed up with Wargaming to give a free US tank – the M22 Locust and 600 gold to any new players who sign up using this link:
War Thunder
A leviathan of free-to-play tank games, War Thunder favours hardcore tacticians, genius statisticians, and obsessive attention to detail. Unlike rival World of Tanks, War Thunder cannot make any claims to being accessible. There are a ridiculous number of tanks and branches of research; you can easily pour hours of your time into the wrong tank. Additionally, War Thunder boasts a complex and sophisticated armour penetration mechanic, which forces careful consideration before firing a single shot.
While War Thunder’s arcade mode does a good job of introducing gamers to some of the game’s core mechanics, you cannot consider yourself a War Thunder veteran until you have emerged victorious from a simulator battle. This stripped-back game mode restricts your view, turns off aim assists, and dramatically increases the time it takes to perform any action. Every encounter is a nail-biting tactical nightmare.
If you’re just starting out then be sure to check out our War Thunder Ground Battles tips and our guide to the best War Thunder tier 1 tanks. War Thunder also offers planes and ships to pilot, making it one of our best plane games, too.
Valkyria Chronicles 4
Tanks denote a feeling of power. You burst through battlefields encased in metal, blowing various buildings to smithereens. Not every game lets you get away with that, though. Valkyria Chronicles 4, for one, leaves you feeling exposed if you charge in all willy-nilly – making for an alluring blend of power and strategy.
Sega’s tactical RPG puts you in the trench coat of an army officer tasked with guiding his unit through the grim reality of war. As you engage foes in turn-based battle, one of the units you call upon is a tank. Play it smart, and you’ll blast ‘em to bits in a cunning flanking manoeuvre; put a step wrong, however, and you’ll find your tank shut down by a Lancer.
Europe’s pre-WWI political climate inspires the setting of Valkyria Chronicles 4. Visually, however, it looks closer to an anime game, which gives it a visual charm in comparison to other tank-based games.
Tank Game Mac
Armored Warfare
While the tags of ‘MMO’, ‘free-to-play’ and ‘tank’ apply to Armored Warfare as well they do to World of Tanks, a number of key differences ensure both are worth the time of a tank games veteran. Transporting World of Tanks’ remarkably approachable gameplay to the more modern era, Armoured Warfare provides tankers with more equipment, newer tanks, and a selection of versatile tank tech that adds a great deal more variation to the core gameplay.
Additionally, Armored Warfare brings PVE to the fold, allowing you to team up with friends to take on AI enemies, progressing through the ranks of tanks without constantly losing out to highly skilled foes in PVP.
As a live game, Armored Warfare new tanks arrive frequently with updates that enhance and expand the game. You’ll never be short of a boomstick on wheels. On top of being one of the best tank games you can get, it’s also one of the best free PC games.
Steel Armor: Blaze Of War
What’s more fun than blowing stuff up and driving through buildings? Carefully micromanaging its crew and innards to the point where you forget you’re actually in a tank and instead begin to believe you’re a machinist in a factory… obviously.
Steel Armor: Blaze of War offers up new pastures where tank games are concerned, looking to the battlefields of the 1980s Iran-Iraq conflicts. Tank enthusiasts will adore the rampant attention to detail – there are only two tanks in the game, but both are rendered to staggering detail, inside and out. Despite being fiddly and at times inaccessible, Steel Armor’s dry ardour for military hardware makes it a must-play for tank game veterans and fans of war games who want a more modern setting.
Panzer Elite Action: Gold Edition
Bundling two classic Panzer titles into one Steam release, Panzer Elite Action: Gold Edition is hours upon hours upon hours of driving tanks around World War II battlefields and blowing stuff up – and that is exactly what we need sometimes. Incredibly user friendly, but full of engaging mechanics and unlockables, Panzer Elite Action is a tank game all about surviving famous historical campaigns to fight another day.
Speaking of: Here are the best survival games on PC
Playing on either the Allied or Axis side in a variety of famous conflicts, Panzer Elite Action gives you control of four-to-five tanks and sets you on your merry way blowing stuff up and cowering behind hedgerows for some semblance of cover. While it lacks the realism of its originator, Panzer Elite, the need to look after your crew and upgrade your equipment makes for a compelling experience from start to finish.
Arma 3
170 miles of pristine military sandbox await players heading into Arma 3 – it’s a massive open-world that lends your tanking an overwhelming sense of scale. Gone are the days of distressing close-quarters encounters in bombed-out cities, Arma 3 hands players a new source of anxiety in the form of having to constantly scan the horizons for new threats. Buildings and natural cover are scarce, meaning that survival, and indeed victory, rely upon being able to identify and destroy the enemy before they even know you are there.
While not strictly a tank game, Arma 3 possesses an incredible level of realism that brings the concept of modern tank warfare to life. Indeed, Arma 3’s realism means it has been mistaken for real war footage by news organisations. Playing as the armoured arm of a massive army is what Arma 3 does best: aiding ground assaults, hunting down enemy tanks and wreaking havoc on strongholds. Besides, when you hop out of the heavy armour you’ve still got one of the best sniper games around.
Battlefield 4
Careful positioning is key to surviving in most tank games. Battlefield 4’s tanks hate careful positioning. Battlefield 4’s tanks like going really fast, blowing helicopters out of the sky and making little ground people run away and cower behind buildings. Battlefield 4’s tanks are ridiculous.
Rampaging around the map causing untold damage and ruining the carefully laid plans of your fellow soldiers is the order of business in Battlefield 4. This is tank gameplay at its most empowering, allowing players to become Death on tracks and leave any veneer of tactics or strategy behind them as they romp around the map exchanging shells for XP.
Related: Check out our best simulation games list
If you prefer your tanks a little more old-school, you could hop over to Battlefield 1, or for the WW2-flavoured Battlefield 5 vehicles. Panzers, Churchills, and Sturntigers await!
Heroes & Generals
Forget the strategy-based metagame that accompanies Heroes & Generals’ engrossing ground battles and you have still got a hectic combined forces war game in which tanks play a vital role. Include the metagame and Heroes & Generals is the complete tanker’s package, offering everything from resource management to explosive first-person combat.
There are few tank management features to pay constant attention to in Heroes & Generals, which means the focus is strictly on wreaking havoc. The combined forces element of Heroes & Generals lends your role as a tank commander some genuine potency on the battlefield, where your actions can make the difference for your fellow teammates, whether on the ground or in the air. If WW2 military hardware is your bag then Heroes & Generals is easily one of the best free Steam games you can get.
Red Orchestra 2
Tanks are not the focus of this realism-heavy Eastern Front shooter, but the way they seamlessly fit into its mud-and-guts gameplay make for some of the finest tanking moments around.
Red Orchestra 2 utilises a similar ballistics and armour penetration mechanic as War Thunder, ensuring that every encounter between two tanks is an adrenaline-fuelled duel where knowledge and precision triumph over brute force. The constant threat of instant, fiery death at the hands of enemy anti-tank troops is just part of what makes it one of the best multiplayer games on PC.
Company of Heroes 2
Transporting the brilliantly refined RTS gameplay of the first game to the Eastern Front, Company of Heroes 2 is a SEGA game all about tactical ingenuity and making the best use of your tanks. Cover, line-of-sight and suppression are the keys to success in Company of Heroes 2, meaning you will have to direct your resources using genuine battlefield tactics if you want to repel the Axis threat.
Packing a devastating punch and able to turn the tide of any battle, the tanks of Company of Heroes 2 are a joy to send guns blazing towards enemy infantry units and watch as the casualties mount up. Like all good tank games, Company of Heroes 2 acknowledges the vulnerabilities of a tank, punishing players who send their armoured units into the fray without due caution.
Panzer Corps
Panzer Corps is old school turn-based strategy gaming at its absolute finest. Putting you in the boots of a Wehrmacht general, it is your job to oversee and manage operations across 26 gruelling Axis campaigns.
Ignoring the fact that you are fighting for the bad guys, the focus of Panzer Corps is firmly on leading your units to victory. There are over 800 unit types spread among 20 unit classes, which results in an endless array of attacking options for both sides. If that is not convoluted enough, every unit has roughly 20 parameters by which its strengths and weaknesses are judged – it is all a battlefield-mathematician could possibly ask for, making it one of the best strategy games around.
Panzer Corps 2
Best Tank Games Ever
Almost nine years after the release of Panzer Corps, the Panzer Corps 2 release date has finally arrived. Besides the huge visual upgrade, the WWII strategy game sequel also expands on the tank battle experience, with the inclusion of over 1000 unique units (up from Panzer Corps’ 800) and an expansive campaign including 60 scenarios.
The multiplayer offerings are also numerous, with several ways to take the battle online against – or in cooperation with – your friends, and with extensive modding support and a powerful Scenario Editor, you’ll be able to orchestrate the tank-on-tank showdowns of your dreams.
Stand down, commander: your training is now over. You now know all the very best tank games you can play on PC, and are ready to run your own campaign of destruction. If you’d like a little out-of-tank action, you may also be interested to know we have training in the best WW2 games, too. But until next time, keep your eyes on the road and a shell in the barrel, and have fun tanking it up.