"What's it like", I said in a strong tone, "What's what like?", the man replied from behind his bullet proofed game sales desk. "That game.. That game with all the bloody great tanks going around blowing up all the other bloody great tanks to bloody great pieces", I said, "What this game?", he said pointing to some new Dreamcast title on another monitor, "No that game", I said, "Oh you mean THIS game?", he replied with a questioned expression, "Yes that's the game!", I said with a final winning tone.

Something had taken my eye that day; it wasn't the sexy women behind the counter [Ed - yeah right!], no, but instead a game calling itself 'Treadmarks' that was being played out in a rather brutal fashion on one of the show monitors. To my sheer dismay I was promptly told that the title was unavailable for another few weeks. Then in some kind of twisted irony I was informed by E-Mail on that very same day that a review copy was going to be sent, "whooo", I screamed with excitement.

All things come to those who wait, liars!

As tank games go there hasn't been much in the way of originality for some time now, in fact most modern tanks games are simulations rather than arcade shooters or even racing games. TR aims to blow the mould by being a game based solely on action, big guns and big explosions rather than the tiresome, "Range…. Aim… Aim.. FIRE!".

LDA (Longbow Digital Arts) clearly wanted to create something original and most of all, fun. TR was the answer, you can race, race with guns, race with bigger guns or just jump into an arena on-line or off-line and slug it out to your hearts content. That'd be true if it wasn't for the first of many rather irritating problems, the controls. Perhaps not the actual controls so much as the limitation of movement and control you have directly over your Tank.

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