Tiny Tanks looks like big fun, out today

I love the smell of silly multiplayer games in the morning, and Tiny Tanks reeks (of a good time). It's an online or local multiplayer tank 'em up where you spend most of your time trying to blow each other up, and some of your time seeing who can jump the highest. Or dodge a big laser.

It's due out on early access at 5pm UK time today, so now's the time to start assembling a crew.

Tiny Tanks caught my eye with its crispy minimalism, then locked my eye up and started prodding it with multiple game modes and modifiers. Like so:

I'm mostly going off that trailer because I can't find a list of game modes, but it looks like tanks can assert their dominance by coating the map in paint, punting other tanks off cliffs, or jumping real high. There are modifiers in the mix, too, letting tanks duke it out in such common conditions as snow, darkness, or low gravity.

You can apply up to three modifiers to each map, which lets developers LeadFollow Games boast about "hundreds of game modes and modifier combinations". That's technically correct, but more usefully correct is that it will have seven of each at launch.

I'm reminded of playing on Fretta servers in Garry's Mod, where you jump into a different stupid mini-game every fifteen minutes. Part of the magic there lay in seeing the source engine get stretched in a hundred different directions, but this might capture some of the same spirit.

I'd be surprised if even the basic battling isn't funny. If the sight of anonymous tanks being punted off cliffs can make me grin, punting my pal Dan should make me cackle.

The full launch is planned for "between spring and summer 2020", by which time the devs will have added more maps, modes and modifiers, plus a level editor.

Tiny Tanks will be available at 5pm UK time/9am Pacific on Steam for £7/$9/€9.