Wild Metal Country

The Good
Rockstar (the new name of DMA Design) offered this game for download in exchange for some personal information they can use in their marketing. A great way to benefit both the company that created it and the gamer, in addition it gives the older games a chance to reach a new audience. Great move!

The physics incorporated into this game give it a unique flavour; it makes the driving much more interesting, it adds to the combat tactics (using the shock-wave of explosions to flip over a hostile tank, the need to constantly correct your aim because the recoil slightly changes the heading of your tank, etc), and it is refreshing to see this in an action game.

Although the action can be played fast, there is also time to approach the challenges as puzzles. The levels hold varying challenges. It is addicting!

You can choose several vehicles. There are plenty of different hostile vehicles and stationary artillery.

It is a pity i didn't find a multiplayer game, because i think this is a great game for people to play together! But if i really wanted to, i could organize such a match.

The Bad
The landscapes do not vary in their emptiness. Even though the textures and height map change often, making you change your approach to completing the level, i would have loved some aesthetic additions, such as bushes, to break the monotony.

The land-textures could be improved.

Finding your way around the map requires a navigation skill, which is good, but it can get frustrating when a lot of the environment looks similar.

After a few levels, i was slightly bored, knowing that the objective was the same as in the last.

I would have enjoyed playing a tank with faster movement and less mass (the available vehicles do not differ a lot)

A split-screen option for multiplayer. This feature should be a standard one, even in modern games that primarily use network connections.

The background story. I prefer a game that doesn't pretend to have a story, if not present.

The Bottom Line
It is no grand experience, but fills a niche. The physics add to the fun and are a great challenge to discover how to use them to your advantage. A game that builds on arcade mechanisms.