Review Nine Years: A Look Back

[Hex 11,520]

It's almost unbelievable. A decade in the making since the game's first predecessor came to life in 2008. It has been a long journey, and yet, here we are enjoying the very Tanki Online we were promised for the future. As you all probably know, Tanki's birthday falls on June 4th every year, and with every passing year, the celebrations seem to get even more fun and interesting. Now, without any further ado, let's dig right into the current celebrations and see what the developers have to offer.

 

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History of Tanki Birthdays

2009
Instead of having a full-on celebration on it's first birthday, Tanki Online opened its doors to the masses by initiating a Open Beta. This happened on June 4th, 2009. @Anton Volkov, an administrator of Tanki Online, invited everyone to take part in the Open Beta, so they could all work together and fry as many bugs as possible ~

 

The closed testing of our project lasted almost a month. Around 600 people took part, who uncovered over 200 bugs and greatly helped with their advice and remarks. Still, there were lots of things to do: loads of bugs to fix as well as a ton of ideas and improvements. All of these things were handled and implemented within a few short months.

We invite you to take part in the open testing of Tanki Online!

And let’s hope the server holds!

 

2011
Celebrations for Tanki's second birthday kicked off with a great start. The weather in Tanki Online was sunny and warm, because the whole game was given a new look for two days. There were decorated billboards, new flags for CTF mode and most importantly, the Gold Box contained 200 crystals instead of the usual 100. There were also double supply rewards in daily bonuses. On top of all that, to create a festive vibe, a new paint appeared in everyone's garage:

 

2012
For Tanki's third birthday, the developer team kicked off the celebrations with a 25% discount on all items in the Garage, beautifully decorated billboards and sophisticated and newly designed flags. A new paint was also available in the Garage:

 

2013 
In 2013, Tanki Online become four years old. Following the footsteps of last year, a 25% discount on various items was announced, along with special billboards, new flags andyet another new paint:

 

2014
With the arrival of June 2014, Tanki turned five years old. The team definitely had planned something on this very special date, as the gameforum post turned 5, gaining over three-hundred likes! There were 50% discounts, 5000 crystal Gold Boxes dropping at a quintuple rate, double battle funds and THE GAME quest, with a fully-micro'd dream tank reward. To top all of this off, a special Holiday paint was also available in the Garage:

 

As Semyon himself wrote in the official post, it was definitely one of the most spectacular celebration in the history of Tanki Online.

2015
In 2015, Tanki celebrated its sixth birthday. There were 50% sales on everything, even crystals on mobile payments, credit cards, and PayPal. There were also double battle funds and Gold Boxes worth 6000 crystals. On top of that, the developer team had us partying with a full complement of holiday decorations including billboards, flags, parachutes, and a holiday paint:

 

And last but not least, the trend from the last year continued in the form of THE GAME. A contest where you have to fill in keywords for a chance to win a dream tank (and possibly some supplies and a physical gift, such as a mug or a t-shirt).

2016
For Tanki Online's seventh birthday, the team prepared a cool calendar of events packed with festive decorations, special in-game gifts, and of course, neat goodies and discounts. There were themed billboards and parachutes, a redesigned look for the Garage and a new paint:

 

There were double Gold Boxes and supplies, and what's more is that whenever someone caught the Gold Box, every around him/her would get a small gift of 100 crystals. Owing to the introduction of gifts, there were three special gifts:

 

 

Lastly, following the tradition, there was THE GAME.

2017
In 2017, the developers had planned everything from themed decorations, festive billboards and parachutes, special Gold Boxes which were dropping twice as often, birthday-themed flags for both the teams and some hefty discounts and offers! All in all, the 2017 celebrations were clearly one of the best ever, and to top all this off, there were two special holiday paints to fit in with the event:

 

 

The event also featured some gifts which we could send to each other and fully immerse ourselves in the event.

 

Current Celebrations

Themed Decorations
Like every year, Tanki spices up its holidays and events with themed decorations, which can mean anything from the meaningless sprites growing all over the maps, to the billboards which host the official logo of the game. Decorations not only create a festive vibe within battles, but also bring a fresh new change in the game, especially to those people who play the same old battles every day. 

Changes included new designs for drop zones, makeover for the parachutes, putting up of the new billboards and so on. This time, the Gold Box drop zone was something very original, it had no outer ring and was just a slice of cake with a spoon on the side.

The Gold Box itself got a new design, in conjunction with the birthday-style event. Colored cakes surrounded the box from all four sides, overlaying on a clear white background, with colorful sides and the very famous numbers, "1000" written in the middle - it was quite the design!

Like last year, there was no increase in the Gold Box value, however they were dropping more often due to the twofold increase in funds.

As for the themed holiday paint, it was the same one as the one featured in the 2016 Tanki Bday celebrations - which is honestly one of the best themed paints in my opinion. The small , intrinsic and colorful texture looked really good on almost all hulls, and even better with skins.

 

Finally, there were gifts, which were the same as last year. For 840 , your were able to send your friend a "Gift Box With Ribbon" gift. For 4200 , you were able to send your friend a "Birthday Cake Slice" gift; and lastly, for 8400 , you were able to send your friend a golden "Railgun Hornet Keychain" gift.

 

 

Discounts and Sales
Every holiday is packed with discounts, and so was this one! 

From 02:00 UTC June 8th till 02:00 UTC June 9th: –50% Shop.

From 02:00 UTC June 9th till 02:00 UTC June 10th: –50% Garage.

From 02:00 UTC June 10th till 02:00 UTC June 11th: Micro-upgrades


Special Offers
There were two special offers this time around...



For 15.99 USD, you got a hundred thousand crystals, five containers and three hundred of each supply (except Batteries and Gold Boxes). For a much more expensive 59.90 USD, you got twenty-five thousand crystals, fifteen containers and the graceful Pastila paint.

 

 

Other Exclusive Features
Last but not least, there were special daily missions that gave increased rewards throughout the celebrations.
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So there it is, a complete review (and a little bonus interview!) of the ninth birthday celebrations held in the game. Now, it's time for you to share your experiences. Tell us what you did during the celebrations, like which items did you buy from the sale, or how many Gold Boxes did you capture. Did you enjoy the celebrations or not? Do you think there could've been something that would've made the celebrations much more fun to play in? 

Comment away, read another interview down below and enjoy the celebrations!

[Hex 11,520]

Interview with Players

 

Now, it's time to interview some of the members of the community.

 

Question 1: How did you spend Tanki Online's 9th Birthday? Did you enjoy playing the game, and did you take part in the celebrations?

 

Question 2: Of course, this months marks a whole decade of Tanki Online. What does this make you think of the game's current state? Does it make you proud or do you wish something else could've been better?

 

Question 3: Now onto the final question, what was your best moment in these celebrations? Share your experience!

 

 

@Ninja

 

Question 1, 2: Sorry, I don't have any useful impressions since I accidentally spent 700k upgrading my Freeze M3 on the wrong day. All my plans disappeared and I didn't get my M4 Freeze nor my Magnum protection module.   :mellow: I was disappointed after that and didnt play anymore especially as there was nothing happening with golds. Laugh at me.

 

Question 3: Highlight for me was The GAME, myself, Coop, emra and Hexed worked together and we managed to secure my first ever top 100 place alongside emra. Pretty happy to have a decent result after playing 4-5 editions over a few years.

 

 

 

@lukey0

 

Question 1: I spent Tanki's birthday like I normally do, playing of course!  :P Although unfortunately this year I had exams approaching so I couldn't play as much as I wish I could have. But that didn't stop me spending some hard earned crystals, I purchased Twins M3, Twins' no splash damage alteration, Magnum M3 and of course plenty of MU's!

 

I caught a few Golds, but they didn't seem to be too common, maybe an increase of a drop rate would have been nice. The double funds was a nice touch to sweeten the deal.

 

Question 2: Tanki is in a major turning point right now, the current updates over the past 2 weeks and into the near future show this. Some of them are really nice like XT skins, Modules, Matchmaking, Juggernaut, HTML5 and finally a variety of overdrives soon. But I almost feel like the game is becoming too complicated, especially for newbies. Just making one mistake can detrimental now, because there are so many places to spend crystals. It never used to be like this, maybe simplicity is the key to success?

 

The celebration as a whole was nice, but once again Tanki reused a lot of celebration textures. Some new ones would be better in the future.

 

Question 3: My best moment would be just enjoying the celebrations in general. I made a nice sum of crystals and made good progress on my accounts.  :)

 

 

 

 

Question 1: Every time, when tanki birthday approaches. I have exams on that week  -_-

ofc being me, I always end up finding a way to play   :ph34r: Wouldn't want to miss the celebration  :P

What did I do during the celebrations?

 

Well, I been playing a lot of normal battles. Earning extra crystal for sales. Thanks, double battle funds. It would be gr8 if its triple. But i am not complaining. Double is fine.  :P

 

Since my alt acc is general. I couldn't buy any m3 equipments besides MU my current m3 equipment and protection modules.

I always enjoyed taking part in THE GAME. This time game was shorter but i liked solving that puzzle. I also like to thank and congrats Ninja and his team for their excellent work in leading The Game Search Group.

 

Question 2: Well, looking back to 2011, when I started playing. It's interesting to see what tanki has been through.

Hopefully, the Tin(10th) anniversary of tanki would be bigger and better. Improvements that I list probably won't happen  :P

Hmmmmm, well.

• 3x funds and 3x chances gold dropping.
• Drones on sales.
• The 50% is fine. I know everyone wants 75% discount. But 50% is good enough since its rarely seen in other celebration.
• It would be interesting if they had a celebration map like what they did with Halloween and Christmas. Just to make the 10th birthday more interesting.

 

Question 3: Well, not a lot of good moment for me. But I can pick out some of it. I liked the decoration design including the gold box and the drop zone. Rip, no double gold drop.

 

Hanging out with friends and discussing what equipments they are getting on sales. Ha, thank you Total_SkiIl and Zak for the parkour maps.   :lol:

 

 

 

@emrakul

 

Question 1: I don't have a lot to say either, I didn't play much during week, but I was pretty hyped for drones. Sales: I got assault (full MU), and as classic I did one MU on each module. Then I played a bunch (or a few more) games with assault drone, and kind of that's it

 

Question 2: From the celebrations themselves, I think this is the first time I enjoyed decorations more than all the other stuff. Gold box drop zone, cool and new +1
Nothing special about golds -1

 

Question 3: No best moment for me, just classic days and you don't need to ask us about THE GAME  :lol:

[Hex 11,520]

Contest

 

Enjoying the celebrations? Having a blast? Well, we've prepared a specially themed contest to go with this special Issue, so make sure you enter in that in order to have a chance of winning some extra crystals!

[stuartb 234]

Nice overview of the celebrations taken place to celebrate Tanki On line's birthday.

[GrandExecutioner 1,403]

Nice!

[Total_SkiIl 1,983]

 

Edited June 17, 2018 by Hexed
Removed big quote.

[Hex 11,520]

 

Thank you, corrected!

[Nine 693]

Awwww, you made a topic for me :)

[giant05 207]

lol :D 

[Heles 9,220]

Thnx for the Interview, Hexed :D 
haha, looking back at all the old holiday paint brings back a lot of memories :')   

[DRAKO523 795]

Everytime @Hexed writes these articles that leave me speechless, thank you for le memories ;_;