Tank Top

Tank Top is a simple, two-player tank game played on a custom cylindrical LED display, inspired by the game Combat on the Atari. Two players sit across from each other with the game in between, each with a custom joystick controller to move their tank, and fire. The cylindrical field contains walls that require navigation, which is only performed diagonally. As players move around the cylinder into the natural fog-of-war, it becomes harder to see their player, and more dangerous. Bullets fired bounce around, but can be used strategically to trap and kill the opposing tank.

This custom hardware game was made for Train Jam 2015 (an amazing game jam organized by Adriel Wallick) which takes place days prior to the Game Developers Conference. Tank Top was built using many items found on the train, such as an ice bucket, Lysol wipes container, dixie cups, and finally two white wine bottles as the player controllers. Creating the custom LED display is a single string of 240 RGB LEDs, wrapped in such a way to create a diagonal coordinate system on which the game plays out. This game is a precursor to Cylindrus made less than two years later.

Credits

• Jerry Belich – Creator

Recognition

1. Train Jam GDC DisplayExhibitSan Francisco, CA — March 2 to 6, 2015

Gallery