How this reference is paid for
Legionella Personal s.r.o. earns an advertising commission when a reader follows a link from this site to the War Thunder website and registers an account there. The advertiser pays that commission, not the reader: following our link changes nothing about what you pay, and gives us no role in your account.
The commission does not decide what appears here or in what order. The structure of the category decides that, and the entries run from the most general idea to the most specific. Our coverage is narrow on purpose; the affiliate disclosure and the editorial method set out how narrow.
The category in one paragraph
A desktop vehicle combat game is a multiplayer game in which each player controls a vehicle rather than a person on foot, and the vehicles are drawn from real military hardware of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. A match puts dozens of them on one map in two teams, and the vehicle you bring comes from a collection you have unlocked over time. The appeal is specific: a Spitfire and a T-34 handle nothing alike, and the difference is modelled rather than described. So is the difficulty — the vocabulary, the progression systems and the realism settings all arrive at once, and a storefront page explains none of them. That gap is what this site is for.
Five ideas the category runs on
Most questions a new player asks are one of these five ideas in disguise.
- The tech tree
- A branching diagram of the vehicles a nation has in the game, arranged by era and capability. Later vehicles unlock by playing earlier ones, so an account progresses sideways through hardware rather than upwards through levels.
- Battle rating
- A number attached to each vehicle that decides the company it keeps in matchmaking. The developer sets it from performance data and revises it in updates.
- Realism level
- A setting, usually two or three named modes, that changes how much the game does for you: how forgiving the handling model is, and whether the map shows enemy markers or nothing.
- Research and repair
- The two-sided economy inside a match. Playing earns research points and currency; losing a vehicle costs currency to repair, so a session can move an account backwards.
- Premium content
- Vehicles, accounts or bundles sold for real money that change how fast those economies move. This is where consumer rights start to matter, and we treat it as a spending question.
How the realism levels compare
The most useful thing a newcomer can learn is that these games are usually three games in one client. Publishers name the modes differently; the shape of the ladder rarely differs.
| Aspect | Most assisted level | Middle level | Least assisted level |
|---|---|---|---|
| Control input | Mouse aiming with heavy stabilisation | Mouse or stick, reduced assistance | Full axis control, joystick or wheel favoured |
| Enemy information | Markers over most visible enemies | Limited or range-restricted markers | Visual identification only |
| Damage model | Simplified outcomes, faster matches | Component damage matters | Components plus crew and systems |
| Match length | Short | Medium | Long, with travel time |
| Suits a reader who | Wants to learn the vehicles | Wants the vehicles to matter | Wants the aircraft, not the match |
The entry on modes and realism levels works through each row, including why the middle level is where these communities tend to settle.
The title this site has a commercial relationship with
One title is covered here with a paid link, and naming it plainly is more useful than burying it in a comparison. War Thunder is a multiplayer vehicle combat game created and published by Gaijin Entertainment, in which battles are fought with planes, helicopters, tanks and ships. It runs on desktop computers — Windows, macOS and Linux — and is not offered as a mobile app, so a reader on a phone needs a computer to play on.
Getting started means registering an account on the publisher's own page, confirming the email address you register with, installing the game client, then launching the in-game tutorial. That order is worth knowing, because the tutorial is where the control scheme and the realism setting are introduced, and both are easier to set once than to relearn later.
What the game costs, what is sold inside it and which regions it serves are stated by the publisher, not by us. Focus Network makes no claim about the price, content or availability of any title.
Paid link. Legionella Personal s.r.o. receives a commission from the advertiser if you register an account after following it. The price you pay is unaffected, and the commission had no part in what this entry says.
Money inside a game you did not buy in a shop
Access to a client and payment for content inside it are separate transactions, and the second is where Australian readers have rights that are easy to overlook. Purchases inside a game are supplies of goods or services like any other, and the consumer guarantees under the Australian Consumer Law are explained by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, which also covers refunds and misleading advertising.
Some titles sell randomised items, where money buys a chance at a reward rather than the reward itself, and a reader is entitled to understand that before paying. The entry on progression and spending sets out how these systems work.
What this site will not do
It will not tell you which title is best: that depends on your hardware, your patience and the vehicles you care about, and we cover one title commercially. It publishes no reader experiences, scores or star ratings, and reproduces no publisher artwork. It will not ask for an email address, because it has no list to add you to and collects nothing at all — the privacy policy and cookie policy describe a site that sets no cookies and runs no analytics, and they are short for that reason.
Australian services worth knowing about
These bodies recur through the entries; better to meet them here than mid-problem.
- eSafety Commissioner — the national online safety regulator, with reporting routes and guidance for carers.
- Scamwatch, run by the National Anti-Scam Centre — where to report a scam and read how current ones work.
- Australian Classification Board — classification decisions for games distributed in Australia.
- Australian Cyber Security Centre — the plain-language password and multi-factor advice our accounts entry draws on.
- Office of the Australian Information Commissioner — the privacy regulator, including for complaints about us.
Questions readers arrive with
Do I need a powerful computer to start?
You need a desktop or laptop computer, and that is the firm part. These titles are built for Windows, macOS and Linux with a mouse and keyboard, and are not distributed as phone apps. Beyond that, requirements change between updates, so the publisher's own system requirements page is the only reliable figure.
Is a vehicle combat game the same thing as a flight simulator?
They overlap without being the same. A study-level simulator reproduces one aircraft in depth. A vehicle combat game puts many vehicle types into a shared match and tunes them for competitive play, so the modelling is deep in some areas and simplified in others.
Why do these games sort players by battle rating instead of level?
Because a vehicle's effectiveness is not a number that rises smoothly. A rating system groups vehicles of comparable capability so matches stay readable, and the developer revises it as match data arrives — so a vehicle you own can move into a harder bracket after an update.
Where do I check whether a game suits a child in Australia?
The Australian Classification Board publishes classification decisions at classification.gov.au, and the eSafety Commissioner publishes guidance for parents and carers at esafety.gov.au. This site restates no classification, because only the Board's record is current.
Two sensible places to start
- If the category is new to youThe entry that defines the terms, the vehicle classes and the shape of a match. Everything else assumes it.
- If your question is about your computerWhat this style of game asks of a desktop machine.