The extreme number of free games on Steam is exhausting to go through. Rooting through the good, the bad, and the downright horrible is a weekly occurrence that takes hours, but in minutes, disappointment is evident. Only a handful of free games are worth hours and hours of time and one of these games is a new indie title called “War Thunder”.

“War Thunder” is a massive multiplayer online game with beautiful sound and graphics, with historical accuracy to boot. Pick a World War 2 plane from the USSR, Imperial Japan, USA, The Third Reich, or the UK and take to the skies.

In the early stage of the game, only three game modes are available to the player: Arcade mode, Historical mode, and Full Real battles. Arcade battles feature two teams pitted against the ground troops of each others army, while going after other players in planes is a side objective.

In Historical mode, life instantly gets a heck of alot harder. No respawns, controls are even more realistic (with more clunkiness) and players start in an airfield. The game even recommends a custom tutorial before playing. Players are almost impossible to find and I don’t recommend it if you want to be playing a fast paced game mode.

But then you get to full real battles.  Ah, full real battles.  If the devil and Historical mode had a child, it would be Full Real Mode. I swear, it’s physically impossible to even get off the tutorial. Save yourself the time. Never even go near the full real battles.

The games maps are exquisite, varied, and beautifully textured. One moment players dodge bullets and steep ravines, the next its spraying your MG at a tank hiding behind the last trees in a bombed out field. Planes whizz through steep desolate gorges, and over lakes and rivers that reflect virtual beauty. The environments in this game are impeccable, rivaled only by the big-budget title “World of Warplanes”.

But even good games have their cons. Using a keyboard, the controls can be slow and sometimes unresponsive.  Invest in a joystick; it will be money well spent.  Beyond that, there’s some random drops in framerate that are more of a simple fix than an annoyance. The game includes only a handful of bugs, but is constantly being patched and updated. These small pin-prick like annoyances will be gone before we know it.

Finding good indie titles these days is like finding a needle in a haystack.  But every once in awhile, the needle is found.

Platform- PC (will be available for free on PS4 systems on launch day, November 15)

Likes/Dislikes

-Keyboard controls are clunky, but it doesn’t take away from the fun

-Only three game modes

-Many planes to choose from and many choices of customization