There’s no hiding the fact that blowing up robots is one of the most fun things you can do in games. It’s an inherent pleasure to humans seeing them go up in smithereens for some reason. At a time when A.I threatens to turn The Terminator fiction into a very possible reality, why not enjoy the time we still have left on this beautiful Earth tearing through wave after wave of machines? Even more so if it’s done as well as in TankHead?
Developed by Alpha Channel, a cleverly named Canadian studio, you could consider this to be a roguelike of sorts under the guise of a combat game in the vein of Armored Core, but boiling it down to merely another in a long line of indie games that have you rinse and repeat levels would be a huge disservice to the team behind it.
First and foremost, TankHead has huge maps to explore and varied objectives, and while yeah, you lose basically everything you’ve picked up at death, there’s much more to it. The game offers a sometimes convoluted but still very interesting backstory where in the far flung future humans have transferred their consciousness to robot bodies, and one in particular is Whitaker, who is on a mysterious mission of his own.
The catch is that the little guy can attach to a tank body and wage war against an oppressive enemy faction that threatens to take control of the world. Each run has you tackling an ever-growing list of missions that you beam yourself to from your home base, and in them you have to make do with the crap that you find along the way.
Whitaker can pop out of the tank at any time and pick parts to attach to their tank, improving their chances of somehow making it against a seemingly endless supply of much better equipped opponents. But worry not, even if you fail not all is lost as some upgrades do remain between attempts, the ones you spend valuable chips that you scrounge up on, increasing your stats much the same way you do in other roguelikes.
The basic combat gameplay in TankHead takes some getting used to and you’re likely to outright fail your first few attempts at playing. It’s tough to get a lock on enemies at the same time that you are moving and trying not to get shot at, because you’re driving a tank and can control its threads and cannon or other weapons independently. It takes some getting used to and can be slightly confusing, especially when the action starts heating up.
After a few tries and learning the motions of playing, though, it’s quite a rewarding experience, one that doesn’t shy away from providing a higher level of difficulty and kicking your teeth in if you are not careful. This is the sort of game where the experience comes from trial and error, and like your Dark Souls and co, it pays to be ready for anything. Bosses are big and tough, requiring you to think and be quick on your threads. Often, it pays to fully explore the entire level before engaging with them, but at the same time, there’s an ever-present danger of getting wiped out as resources can be scarce.
TankHead is technically strong, even if there are some rough edges to its presentation, mostly due to assets sometimes taking a bit too long to load in, having you drive over checkerboard surfaces with no textures to speak of anywhere. Visually, it’s very impressive. Things blow up really nicely and the density of detail for the world, while not photorealistic, works well in providing a good sense of immersion, as does some surprisingly decent voice acting and satisfying “thunks” and “bowoshes” when it comes to its sound effects.
For what it is, TankHead is really cool. It reminded me of my time skulking around in the older MechWarrior games as a kid, and thanks to its customization mechanics that gradually grow the further I got into it, no two runs felt the same, which along with the slowly developing story makes the progression feel meaningful and not just a rush to get numbers to go up. Even though it was one of the last releases of 2024, you should definitely not overlook TankHead.
