Ever since David B. Lutton II programmed Bang Bang for Windows, the concept of having two objects take turns at shooting one another has managed to appeal to gamers of the violent kind. Be it worms, cannons or tanks - the gameplay basically always consists of adjusting angle, firepower and finally pressing that beautiful fire button to (hopefully) kick enemy a$$. Atomic Cannon offers a huge variety of landscapes and enemies - can it stack up?
Atomic Cannon’s single player mode can support up to 8 bots and 4 human players on a single machine(!!!), each one of them can command up to 5 tanks in different combat scenarios. However, the main menu still remains simple and uncluttered:
Each battle takes place on a randomly generated landscape - the images below show a few of the possible configurations:
Tanks can be controlled in two ways - the screen can be tapped to control firepower and angle simultaneously, or each parameter can be modified in an ‘editor’:
Atomic Cannon has dozens of different weapons that can be purchased. The weapon overview form is a bit crowded - it’s not always easy to determine what a weapon does or where it is:
Isotope did a great job creating the arms - some of the weapons seen in this game have never been available before(e.g. a tracer that tells you more about correct firepower and angle):
‘Power-up’ weapons allow you to heal your own tank instead of attacking your opponent’s. Weapon impacts can ‘terraform’ the landscape; new ‘land’ can be created right over an enemy’s head with the right weapon:
The game logic behind Atomic Cannon is extremely flexible - each and every parameter can be customized:
Isotope did a great job by allowing players to pause and exit the game without losing the current state of ‘combat’
A variety of sound effects and excellent music add some audio appeal to the game. Last but not least, the game also contains a network module:
This review looked at version3.0 of the game on an hp ipaq rx4240. Atomic Cannon needs about 5000KB of RAM and can be installed onto a memory card.
Cutting a long story short, Atomic Cannon is excellent fun for all those who like the concept. Computer-generated landscapes and a huge amount of weapons make sure that this ultra-versatile game doesn’t get boring after a few times. On the flip side of the coin, however, the huge selection of weapons and options makes the game a little hard to grasp at first glance. Anyways, people who like the idea of such games definitely have to give the free trial a whirl - the price of 20$ is justified.